#I don't want to get shit on by people who already consider student and byleth ships 'on thin ice'

[dazzlerazz]

Ciel and Rhea have a duo alt named Zanado's Flowers which itself is a reference to a wip I have of them by the same name where Ciel and Rhea retire to Zanado to spend the rest of their lives together

[randomnameless]

As claude is my fav character in FE16 one of the things that confused me about people praising Three Hopes GW as the "true claude" because GW Claude uses more violent methods to get what he wants and therefore somehow that means he's the manipulative schemer we the devs always intended , it just made me go ??? Like what??

Cause as your post pointed out, he already was a manipulative schemer in FE16. like we know he uses people to try to push things in his favor, but because it wasnt outright violent then somehow that made him a goody two shoes???

Like uh no. He's not a goody two shoes and he has always been morally ambiguous. he always had these flaws. it's one of the reasons I like his character.

the difference was he drew a line at how far he'd go.

Like why bother using force or violence when you have Hilda to charm people into doing what you want? Why fight the church when you can use them to bring in recruits to take down Edelgard and end her war? Why not use Byleths influence to bring people together in Fodlan and then use them to establish peaceful relations between Fodlan and Almyra? Why use violence at all when you can use guile.

Anyway hes always been a little shit lmfao. I can't blame people for not liking him for it either its totally understandable! The reasons you dislike him are why I like (and hate) him. He's secretive and he's manipulative, always has been.

But to his credit, he does have his limits and when he goes too far he steps back , apologizes or admits his faults, reevaluates and tries to do better- with ehh varying outcomes. And that's so realistically human. He's a work in progress.

He chooses to seek the truth, he always wants more information, and he's willing to hear people out. This plus his self awareness and willingness to change his view based on new information is IMO his greatest strengths. Everyone has biases, but how many of us are able to look at ourselves and consider what if I'm wrong.

By the end of the game his character is very different from where he began. His stance on Rhea and Fodlans faith by the end of VW is perhaps one of the most obvious changes.

whoops my venting warped into this LOL sorry 😭😭😭

Ooh don't worry!

I actually don't mind talking about characters with people who don't share the same opinions, if I had to talk to myself it'd be pretty boring lol

But yep, as you said, Claude is a work in progress, and I'll even say he still evolves between VW's end and his epilogue card*!

Yellow units have always been a wild card in FE, they're not your allies like green units, but they have their own allegeances and might become enemy units later on, or not.

And even if Claude has a manipulative streak and sometimes prioritizes his goals instead of the means used to reach that goal, Fe16's Claude is a Claude who is shown being able to take a step back, reconsider, realise he's wrong and ultimately move in another direction.

Claude can apologise and learn.

But there are lines Claude will not cross to reach his goals, at least in Fe16. And those lines are what Flamey jumps over during WC.

Come Nopes and... Clout crosses the same lines VW's Claude wouldn't have crossed, Claude can manipulate and be sneaky, Claude doesn't start wars. Fe16's Claude offers his sympathies to Billy after Jerry kicks the bucket, he doesn't give Billy his best Caellach impersonation.

And when his Nopes version refuses to consider other POVs or even reconsider, it's annoying because, hey, we know Nopes wasn't supposed to portray the lords in a good light else the player who inserted in Billy would feel bad, but we came from a Claude who learns and admits (even if it's subtle) he was wrong...

To a 1st year undergraduate student who thinks he is smarter than everyone in the room, and doesn't even bother to read his syllabus. Claude graduated, Clout didn't, and we have to follow the "non developed" Clout in Nopes making bad decisions on top of bad decisions... Yeah, I can see why it's really annoying for fans of guys character.

* I earlier checked the VW ending painting thingie, Claude apparently is holding a treaty to alliance lords and they are negotiating? But while both sides are backed up by soldiers, only the Almyran ones have weapons?

I know Almyra is a sour subject - I can think of both doylist and watsonian reasons why Claude never adresses the elephant in the room, even in the Fe16 room - but ultimately in his ending cards Almyra and Fodlan finally have their famous peaceful relationships and king Claude even furthers bonds with the two states, so it sort of worked in the end!

[fireemblems24]

I am so glad you pointed out the imperialist vibes Edelgard has sometimes. As someone who lives in a country who was basically occupied ahem conquered because they said "we have better ideas that will improve your lives" and had our culture absolutely shattered, one of the main reasons why I disagree with Edelgard so much is because of that. She thinks her point of view is superior and the most morally right and I really don't like it whenever she sounds so confused about people defending their homeland. Especially that one line she has with Dimitri in Chapter 17 ffffff—

Like, girl, they have the fucking right to disagree with you please stop sounding so confused as to why they can't see eye to eye with you gahhhhh

I would be more tolerant with the war if she had say, did diplomacy before it? But she tried to had Dimitri and Claude killed in Part I (the prologue). I would also understand her better if the war was a last resort and the other leaders were corrupt and all that. But they're not. Many of the students (who have power because many are noble heirs) outside her house are heavily affected by the nobility and Crests (Sylvain, Ingrid, Mercedes, Lysithea, etc.) or at least understanding of the problems caused by them (Dimitri). It's so frustrating how so much of this can be prevented if she just talked about it.

Also, to those who said she wants the change to be quick, even with war it won't be. The fucking war basically caused continent-wide damage. It's going to be so hard to actually fix this. Hell, there's definitely going to be an eventual rebellion by former Kingdom / Alliance people or sympathisers. It's not going to be as clean cut as the game or some pro-Edelgard people make it to be. Not everyone is going to agree with her, whether she takes over or not. She just destroyed the stability of the continent and while yes, she can rebuild it again, it will still take time and who's to say future leaders won't be corrupt? Also, a hierarchy will always exist, whether she likes it or not. Especially if she plans to set up a meritocracy. Meritocracy is going to usually end up giving power and privilege to those with already pre-existing privilege as they the opportunity to show off their merits or develop those skills. Poor and disabled people are going to have difficulty as they don't have equal opportunity to develop skills and accomplish stuff. I'm generalising, but it just ends up as a hierarchy, again. Not only that, it also has ways to enforce discrimination.

Basically, what I'm trying to say is, she needs to long term plan out her systems. I apologise since I have bad memory but as far as I remember, the game doesn't give us too many details on how she wants to establish her system. All I remember is she does the war > Church / Rhea out of power > Establish her government > ???. Someone please clear this up for me because I'm confused.

...and again really, diplomatic reforms are an option. Yes, they're much more tedious. Yes, they take so much more longer. Yes, sometimes it feels impossible to accomplish. But did she not even consider it as an option?

All in all, I do like Edelgard. But I really wish the game let us go against her while we're with her? I wish it wasn't just general "agree with Edelgard" for CF. I remember someone pointing it out to me before that it would've been really great if she had someone in her house who does the same role Felix does in AM... which is basically disagree and call out the lord's shit. And they pointed out Ferdinand could've probably been that character for CF. And I kinda agree? I really think CF would immensely improve if Edelgard had a challenger / foil to her beliefs similar to how Felix does that for Dimitri.

Anyway, sorry for the very long ask lol. I like Edelgard and I agree with some of her morals and ideals such as the crest system being bad but....she's done so dirty asdfghjkl. I do think she's written well enough to incite these emotions in me, and she makes for a good antagonist. As a protagonist lord however.... yeah.

First off, sorry it took so long to respond, but I wanted to give an equally throughout response. 

While I haven’t gotten to chapter 17 yet, I can attest to the notion that Edelgard’s rhetoric is eerily similar to Imperialist propaganda. I do understand this is fiction, and that it’s okay to hand-wave/enjoy things in fiction that you shouldn’t or wouldn’t in real life. Crimson Flower has its charms and parts I enjoy. Edelgard is an interesting character more hampered by things that plague Three Houses as a whole than anything else, but it’s still worth examining how dangerous her rhetoric is. Because, unlike you, my country sits at the opposite end - the Imperialist nation selling that rhetoric to its citizens, and, unfortunately, at the time I bought it - which makes me really sensitive to this. 

I’m from the US and I’m specifically speaking about the US’s invasion of the Middle East. I was in middle or high school, just barely a teenager, and naive and ignorant enough to believe what my leaders said. Because guess what? I bought into it out of misplaced and ignorant (and racist) compassion. I was horrified at the idea these people were suffering unfairly just because of where they were born whereas I got all these promised privileges just because of where I was born. I really thought the US would go in there and give them democracy and everything would be great. Looking back, I realize they were lying, that we’ve only made things worse, that it’s horribly racist to assume the US was just inherently better, and I’ve sense then gained access to fast-speed internet, traveled, matured, etc . . . and thankfully this all happened before I had any actual power to do anything like vote. But to this day I’m beyond pissed off they used my own compassion against me to line their own pockets. It was ignorant and racist, but it was all based in concern that others didn’t have the same quality of life I had and a growing realization of my own privilege. And that’s what I hate so much. It didn’t sound evil. It sounded good. It used people’s good will and compassion against them and twisted it into evil for their own causes. 

I don’t think Edelgard is after Faerghus and the Alliance because she wants oil. I think she honestly thinks she’s doing good. And, if this were real life, I think that makes her rhetoric even more dangerous than a corrupt politicians’.  Because everything else is still the same. She’s being ignorant, nationalist instead of racist in this case, and honestly thinks her moral superiority will improve everyone’s lives even if it means ravaging the entire content in war. She is dangerously naive and ignorant. 

Maybe I’d support her more morally if I believed for an instant the general populace welcomed the changes she wants to bring, if the leaders she fought against weren’t open and wanting change themselves, ect . . . But the dialogue indicated her presence inspires people running and screaming in terror, not welcoming her presence (see the chapter where you kill Claude). The Kingdom is still fighting tooth and nail against her. She’s not supported. Her changes aren’t wanted. And she hasn’t bothered to learn a single thing about the cultures she’s determined to squash under her heal nor the leaders heading them. 

I also think I’d support her better if we had a clearer idea of what her plans were. But CF has shifted from Edelgard speaking about interesting ideas and classism to evil dragon overlords and chastising Byleth for making her blush. The decision to side with her or Rhea is not choosing between two ideals, but an emotional, spur of the moment thing. Edelgard’s early supports with Byleth attempt to convince the player to side with her not based on political ideals, but on feeling sorry for her. 

CF gives you no choice but to agree with everything Edelgard says (as you said, there’s no “Felix” or a “Lorenz”). It wants you to support her war without question, and therefore you don’t get any answers to questions like - if this is really just about Rhea, why are we invading the Alliance? Because they won’t hand power over to you? Why didn’t you just stick to the Empire to enact your changes? In the end, you’re left with what sounds more and more like an entitled Imperialistic princess with absolutely no idea how ignorant she is hell bent on conquering what she thinks belongs to her based on a conspiracy theory. 

All that said, I do think Edelgard has interesting ideas and isn’t wholly wrong, just how she goes about it is horribly wrong. And I fully believe the core issue is how CF has dropped the ball big time writing wise, because diving deeper into her ideas and not her crush on you would go a long way. So would shifting the narrative away from evil boogey dragon lady must die and everyone else is wrong and I am superior and right and more towards a clashing of ideals, this route could’ve been a lot more and seemed a lot less ignorant, naive, entitled, and Imperialistic.