Yesterday this topic popped up in my head, and now I’m curious to hear what possible takes you guys have on this.
What constitutes, for you, a good time to promote the main character(s) during the story?
I, for example, really like how they handled both of Ike’s promotions in Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn. Micaiah’s first one is good too (sure, Part 1 would ideally need a couple more chapters, but that’s a whole other can of worms).
The only examples of bad promotions times that I’m familiar with are Roy in Fire Emblem 6 (staying at Level 20 for what feels like an eternity), and Micaiah’s second promotion in Part 4.
The latter for me is especially bad, because by that point Part 4’s traveling segment has sucked 80% of the joy of playing the game for me, seeing as it all feels like fillery “Rout the enemy” maps.
Also, by that point I’ve been spending so little time with Micaiah as a playable unit that I really end up not caring anymore (seriously, for me getting 6-7 free level ups per map isn’t all that fun, especially since the units in Part 4 are way too many/strong. I feel like her 3 chapters in Part 3 balanced it way better, or maybe it was because of the stakes in the story, who knows…)
I’m generally in favor of story based promotions because it can tie a shift in the story to a shift in gameplay (as lords tend to be pretty integral gameplay elements since they’re deployed on every map). But the story should be written in such a way so that those promotions happen with a decent amount of the game left. Roy, unfortunately, doesn’t really have a character arc to speak of. He just gets told what to do by several other characters throughout the story, but a better time for him to promote would probably be either before or after the Etruria arc as that’s around when his responsibilities are growing. FE7 also has really late lord promotions, and it probably would be better to fit their promotions sometime around the return from Valor. Eliwood could promote in the first meeting with Athos, and Hector could get something from Uther when the group meets with him that promotes him. Not sure about Lyn though.
I also agree that Micaiah’s second promotion comes too late. It would probably be better if she had a few more playable appearances and Part 3 and promoted at the start of Part 4. Though Micaiah kind of gets squeezed out of the story by Ike and Yune at the end to the point that she doesn’t even have an endgame personal tome (Thani is her Rapier). So it’s understandable to kind of forget about her.
You’re right. Now that I think about it, Blazing Sword is also pretty bad in that regard. To be honest, a huge pet peeve of mine with that was that upon promotion they each gained a new weapon in which they could grow, and I hated not being able to raise both their main and extra weapon rank to max -_-
At least in Radiant Dawn junkies like me reach a compromise in regards to weapon ranks by just taking my sweet time beating the enemies becuase I really like seeing their weapon ranks maxed out.
Also, yeah. I really dislike that about Radiant Dawn. I enjoy the human and mundane conflicts in the first three parts, however as soon as Yune stops introducing herself during Part 4 the game really drops the ball in terms of pacing and character development for me.
The thing I’m most annoyed by is that I love using Micaiah and her group during Part 1. I really like the general vibe and their first-tier outfits. Also, the sensation and awareness of going up against such a massive army in Part 3 but still managing to hold your own (as I said, the enemies are much more balanced there) for the cause you believe in… I really love it too. Not many games do that kind of thing.
But then Part 4 comes around, and since Micaiah’s companions already got squat for development during the main game, the writers saw fit to not feature them in ANY SINGLE INFO CONVERSATION afterwards, aside from some quotes with Numida (which I admit, was a nice surprise).
Like, how do you mess that up being the sequel to Path of Radiance of all games?!
I understand that at the time they were kind of in a funk, but still… it will always be a scar for me -_-
P.S. →
Also, who doesn’t love getting critted to end and back by the enemies in Part 4 just because your characters didn’t grow in luck and speed?
I think that FE9 was onto something in terms of promoting the lord. For context, Ike promotes at the end of Chapter 17, after which promoted generics start appearing. So if I have to ask the question, I’d be asking when do generic enemies start promoting into higher classes, and slap the forced promotion around there, assuming the hacker in question is going for a forced promotion.
If we’re still assuming we’re talking about time of promotion, I suppose a good example of promotable lords would be like FE7’s lords. Disregarding their unit quality, I actually think that they have a good time to start handing out heaven seals. More enemies are appearing in promoted classes, and most of your new recruits join in a promoted class now.
