Which path in Fates did you enjoy the most?

[Erik-a]

I recently beat Revelation and I finally got three games completed. I find it to be a really hard decision since I enjoyed all three of the games. I prefer the Nohrian characters over the Hoshidan characters, so Conquest wins there. Based on seeing all of the endings in the three games, I prefer Revelation's, although Birthright and Conquest's endings are very good as well (in my opinion). I don't consider myself a very experienced FE fan yet, so I haven't got to some of the other games yet since I've been focusing on the 3DS games before I get to the earlier games. For gameplay, I can't decide at all on which one I like best. 

What are your opinions?

Edited February 25, 2018 by Erik-a

[Ronnie]

Birthright. Conquest was alright but its late chapter gimmicks annoyed me more than impressed me.

[anniec8711]

Conquest easily wins on the gameplay front.  It's more faithful to traditional FE games with high difficulty, no off-story grinding options, and limited resources.  The game boxes even tell you on the back which game is more difficult!

I love Conquest's difficulty as the maps have a variety of traps and varied objectives.  The overall difficulty really forces you to think and plan out your attack before you make your move.  I guess that applies to the other 2 games, but they are much more forgiving should you make a mistake.

Unlike other 2 paths, enemies possess unique skills (Samurai w/ Lunge and Armored Blow, MOA w/ 4 rallies, etc.).  While this makes them formidable foes, this also makes them valuable allies as most of them can be captured and convinced/bribed to join your team.

[Ertrick36]

My best experience with Fates was with Birthright, though that may have just been because of the novelty of the game at the time more than anything else.  I liked Conquest up to about chapter 15.  And Revelation is a slog, but I'm a sucker for the "golden ending" and the fact that it brings the casts of each path together.

- Cast-wise, both Hoshido and Nohr have good characters and bad ones.  The good ones include Saizo, Charlotte, Benny, Mitama, Shiro, Forrest, Leo, Takumi, Arthur, and of course Oboro.  Most others are alright too, though the path exclusive characters I have yet to warm up to are Peri, Camilla, Setsuna, and two of the three Awakening Hoshidan copies (Asugi and Caeldori, whose base-characters I never really liked too much to begin with).  Hoshido has a very slight edge over Nohr, and it's mostly because of Oboro.

- In regards to the gameplay, they're all fairly solid.  The map design is allegedly the best in Conquest, but I haven't played that path enough to confirm that myself.  I mean, I have finished it, but I haven't beaten it on Hard or Lunatic, nor have I played through it a second time.  If I want a challenge, I'll just go play Thracia instead.  I hear the story is better in that game anyway.

- Storywise, they're all mediocre to me, but Conquest is the worst imo.  It feels like in order to tolerate the story, I have to pretend certain things happen or don't happen, which is the true mark of a story that I just can't enjoy.  Birthright is okay taken on its own - maybe dull for a stretch - but the point of the path split is ruined with Revelation.  Spoilers abound.

Spoiler

Okay, so I actually head canon that in either non-Revelation path, Anankos has used up too much power controlling Garon and the illusions to be a threat.  I picture it as a similar situation to Chrom landing the final blow on Grima; it's a threat that's temporarily put aside that will eventually rear its ugly head in a few generations or so.

However, even considering my head canon, there's no denying just how contrived the plot device that is the invisible kingdom is.  The fact that Azura knew about this, but didn't attempt to do anything about it or try to lead Corrin down the objectively correct path, is inexcusable.  And the idea that you go through either path, slaughter half of either family (along with possibly their retainers), and likely cause the deaths of many innocent lives, feels insulting when you come upon this final path and realize you can just go and kill a big, bad dragon.

It ruins the other two paths for this reason.  It is the worst path for the very reason it is the best path; it is the most ideal option for dealing with the ultimate enemy.

Nothing is really clear to me on my current feelings about Fates other than that I dislike Conquest's story enough that I can't bring myself to play through it a second time.

[Midnight Torch]

In terms of story, Birthright felt the most coherent. Corrin made the most sense in that path.

Gameplay-wise, I had the most fun in Conquest.

[Dandy Druid]

1 hour ago, Midnight Torch said:

In terms of story, Birthright felt the most coherent. Corrin made the most sense in that path.

Gameplay-wise, I had the most fun in Conquest.

^^^ Pretty much this

[Dean]

I think Conquest is excellent. Didn’t play Revelations.

[NSSKG151]

For me I would say I enjoyed Conquest the most. I personally like the Nohrian cast over the Hoshidans and the route was difficult yet fun. The only level I probably didn't like was the battle against the Kitsune. Some people will never stop criticizing Conquest for its rather...questionable storytelling but for the most part I didn't mind since I went into the game not expecting the greatest story ever told since most Nintendo games don't focus on story.

[Sasori]

Conquest for sure. Some maps went a little bit overboard with the difficulty such as the dreaded ninja cave, but on the whole I thought Conquest had some of the best maps in the entire series. A standout is the versus Takumi map in the market.

I thought Birthrights maps where pretty weak to be honest so I think I enjoyed that game least. The game just threw unpromoted or unthreatening enemies at you for way too long. Maybe it was because I started with Conquest, but I rarely felt challenged by anything birthright threw at me.

I still need to finish revelations so i'll need to wait on that one.

[Yexin]

i liked conquest more, simply because i felt SO SATISFIED after beating the final boss (my god i hate him so much)

now, seriously, i liked conquest because i liked the concept of revolutionize your own kingdom (even though it's been poorly realized, but still), and the difficulty made me actually feel engaged, i had fun trying to understand how to beat the hardest chapters

 

imho, birthright, despite what a lot of people say, is the most inconsistent storywise

i mean, come on, birthright's plot is basically "oh no they're destroying us, but wait corrin just joined us so we can destroy them instead"

nohr invaded hoshido, so presumably nohr's army is more powerful, yet even just with corrin's presence hoshido manages to down right obliterate nohr (i could write about this all day long, but that's not the case)

i don't remember revelation very well, so i can't say anything about it

[SavageVolug]

I would say Conquest especially when I like most if not all classes available to that route, by contrast I do not care for or enjoy the Hoshido exclusive classes. The only exceptions to this rule are 1) Spear Master- soldier when playable is always a good class 2) The Weapon Master promotion for myrmidons 3) Blacksmith- but this just ends up being a rehashed Hero than an original class so this one doesn't count as much.

In terms of gameplay and maps I like Conquest the best as for the most part I like this route's maps better however I will add that every path gets very gimicky and annoying towards the end. Revelations especially has a lot of gimicky maps that I do not enjoy, BUT I did find the map where you fight king Sumeragi intriguing at the very least, and for Birthright I liked the idea of the volcanic map I just think it could have been designed better. Now to it's credit I do appreciate that Revelations at least made the effort to try new things in it's map design and objective rather than every map be "Start here, go there and kill everybody." I still think many of Revelations' maps are too gimicky but I do appreciate what Revelations tried to do in that regard.

Going by story ending per path I dislike Revelations the most as I find it's ending the most cringe worthy due to how Player Worship heavy the ending is, and while the other two also have a bit of this at least it ends with one of your siblings taking the throne and attempting peace negotiations with the other country. Now I do enjoy the interactions between Nohr characters and Hoshido on Revelations and where the two armies join forces against a common enemy, but I do not enjoy the amount of player worship this path has or that certain characters that are playable on one path say Scarlet on Birthright for instance get killed off on Revelations.

[DragonFlames]

14 hours ago, Ronnie said:

Birthright. Conquest was alright but its late chapter gimmicks annoyed me more than impressed me.

This.
Additionally, Birthright's story, while basic, was the one I enjoyed most for being a basic Fire Emblem story that works and as long as the story in and of itself works, it's fine by my standards. Not everything needs to be "new" and "ambitious" to be good in my opinion and "new" and "ambitious" aren't necessarily good things, either; see Conquest and where it went with its "ambition", that is to say, it nosedove off a cliff into the depths of the ocean('s gray waves).

[Erik-a]

20 hours ago, anniec8711 said:

Conquest easily wins on the gameplay front.  It's more faithful to traditional FE games with high difficulty, no off-story grinding options, and limited resources.  The game boxes even tell you on the back which game is more difficult!

I love Conquest's difficulty as the maps have a variety of traps and varied objectives.  The overall difficulty really forces you to think and plan out your attack before you make your move.  I guess that applies to the other 2 games, but they are much more forgiving should you make a mistake.

Unlike other 2 paths, enemies possess unique skills (Samurai w/ Lunge and Armored Blow, MOA w/ 4 rallies, etc.).  While this makes them formidable foes, this also makes them valuable allies as most of them can be captured and convinced/bribed to join your team.

Then that's the closest, other than Sacred Stones, to a traditional FE game then. I played Conquest on an easier difficulty, though. 

[Erik-a]

On 2/24/2018 at 11:59 PM, Ertrick36 said:

My best experience with Fates was with Birthright, though that may have just been because of the novelty of the game at the time more than anything else.  I liked Conquest up to about chapter 15.  And Revelation is a slog, but I'm a sucker for the "golden ending" and the fact that it brings the casts of each path together.

- Cast-wise, both Hoshido and Nohr have good characters and bad ones.  The good ones include Saizo, Charlotte, Benny, Mitama, Shiro, Forrest, Leo, Takumi, Arthur, and of course Oboro.  Most others are alright too, though the path exclusive characters I have yet to warm up to are Peri, Camilla, Setsuna, and two of the three Awakening Hoshidan copies (Asugi and Caeldori, whose base-characters I never really liked too much to begin with).  Hoshido has a very slight edge over Nohr, and it's mostly because of Oboro.

- In regards to the gameplay, they're all fairly solid.  The map design is allegedly the best in Conquest, but I haven't played that path enough to confirm that myself.  I mean, I have finished it, but I haven't beaten it on Hard or Lunatic, nor have I played through it a second time.  If I want a challenge, I'll just go play Thracia instead.  I hear the story is better in that game anyway.

- Storywise, they're all mediocre to me, but Conquest is the worst imo.  It feels like in order to tolerate the story, I have to pretend certain things happen or don't happen, which is the true mark of a story that I just can't enjoy.  Birthright is okay taken on its own - maybe dull for a stretch - but the point of the path split is ruined with Revelation.  Spoilers abound.

  Reveal hidden contents

Okay, so I actually head canon that in either non-Revelation path, Anankos has used up too much power controlling Garon and the illusions to be a threat.  I picture it as a similar situation to Chrom landing the final blow on Grima; it's a threat that's temporarily put aside that will eventually rear its ugly head in a few generations or so.

However, even considering my head canon, there's no denying just how contrived the plot device that is the invisible kingdom is.  The fact that Azura knew about this, but didn't attempt to do anything about it or try to lead Corrin down the objectively correct path, is inexcusable.  And the idea that you go through either path, slaughter half of either family (along with possibly their retainers), and likely cause the deaths of many innocent lives, feels insulting when you come upon this final path and realize you can just go and kill a big, bad dragon.

It ruins the other two paths for this reason.  It is the worst path for the very reason it is the best path; it is the most ideal option for dealing with the ultimate enemy.

Nothing is really clear to me on my current feelings about Fates other than that I dislike Conquest's story enough that I can't bring myself to play through it a second time.

I had the easiest time with Birthright, so my best experience was in that one, too. Conquest was obviously more difficult and I was up for a challenge, and speaking of which, the Endgame for Revelation was a challenge as well (and including the couple of chapters before it). I really like Camilla, though, otherwise I'd agree with you. Oboro is awesome, I use her a lot in my Hard mode run of Birthright and also in Revelation a bit. I'm leaning towards Conquest as well, if the topic is about gameplay, but the Endgame was nearly impossible for me. 

[redtutel]

Birthright. The story is emotional, Corrin and Takumi get solid arcs, and fantasy Japan is a nice change of pace from the Fantasy Europe setting of most JRPGs.

[anniec8711]

On 2/25/2018 at 5:45 PM, Erik-a said:

Then that's the closest, other than Sacred Stones, to a traditional FE game then. I played Conquest on an easier difficulty, though. 

I recommend FE6 Binding Blade if you're looking for a challenge.  Unlike Sacred Stones, it doesn't have places where you can grind outside of the main story (Tower and the Ruins).

Conquest is not a cakewalk on Normal difficulty.  I've heard some suggest BR Hard (some say Lunatic as well) is easier than CQ Normal .

[Shadow Mir]

On 2/25/2018 at 6:45 PM, Erik-a said:

Then that's the closest, other than Sacred Stones, to a traditional FE game then. I played Conquest on an easier difficulty, though. 

Um, can Sacred Stones even be called a "traditional" FE game, let alone close to one??

[Mandokarla]

I am of the opinion that Revelations shouldn't exist. At all. The maps are almost wholly irredeemable, gameplay becomes royals-emblem, which I find is just boring and wasteful. The story hinges on some of the most bullshit, asinine, lame mechanics I've ever seen. It completely invalidates any tenuous story validity the other two games had -- which is the core of my hatred. If you make a game whose advertising was centered around the player choosing a side, don't make a game that invalidates that original choice. If the dev time to Revelations had been slashed entirely and given to the dev teams for CQ and BR, then those two games would be significantly better. Improve BR's gameplay and CQ's writing.

Don't give me a bunch of unneccesary cross-nation supports (as fun as some of them are -- TakumiXCamilla is entertaining), give me a set of coherent, respectable supports for each of the main two games. 

That said, I will say that Birthright has the better writing and story of the two  three. Corrin is actually not a more naive and weak lord than Eirika, which was shocking to me (I played Conquest first). Conquest has some of the best gameplay/map design in the franchise (aside from a few lategame maps I find gimmicky and tedious -- Fuga's Wild Ride namely). Ch.10 Conquest is my favorite map in FE. 

[Dark Holy Elf]

Conquest is my favourite in most ways.

Its map design and challenge balance are nothing short of brilliant. Gameplaywise there's little doubt in my mind it's the best Fire Emblem. It also has a lot of characters I like - all four siblings, Niles, Odin, Selena, Beruka, Arthur, Charlotte. And it has some great music too: A Dark Fall in particular is terrific.

I like Birthright because the emotional storytelling surrounding Chapter 26 and how the game builds to that is very effective. Otherwise it's mostly Conquest Lite to me - much worse map design. Some people say its story is better but I don't like Generic Fire Emblem Story at all so even Conquest's messy alternative is preferable to me (the aforementioned parts of BR aside).

Revelation has some fun maps (I don't mind gimmicks as much as many people) and some not-fun ones. It's pretty clearly the worst route overall though. Neither BR nor CQ have great plots but Rev's is outright bad. I definitely disagree with anyone who says it's one of the worst FEs (the core mechanics of Fates are so good and at the end of the day that's what really matters) but it'll be the route I play the least for sure.

[Azz]

Conquest definitely. It's the only one I go back to every now and then while after finishing the other two, I only played Birthright once and never touched Revelation.

The gameplay is a lot better, compared to BR which is extremely simple and provides little to no challenge and Rev is way too gimmicky IMO, especially in the later chapters, when the story has also taken a nose dive.

The story in Fates is jack shit, but at least the premise of CQ was interesting and different to me. BR was way too cliche FE for me, and I like cliche FE stories. Rev was all over the place. At the beginning it was okay, though it did feel like a fetch quest, going around the nameless world to recruit all your siblings, but then you went to Valla.

As for characters, I find the Nohrians overall more interesting and fun compared to the Hoshidans who are a bit boring and unmemorable.

[TheHeroQueen]

I really liked Revelations. (pls dont kill me) I liked having all the units.

[DragonFlames]

4 hours ago, TheHeroQueen said:

I really liked Revelations. (pls dont kill me) I liked having all the units.

Looks up your address to kill you.
JK
Having / getting all the units (except for three) really is the only reason to even bother with Revelations in the first place. Though I will admit, having everyone does make for some pretty neat pairing and class options.

[TheHeroQueen]

16 hours ago, DragonFlames said:

Looks up your address to kill you.
JK
Having / getting all the units (except for three) really is the only reason to even bother with Revelations in the first place. Though I will admit, having everyone does make for some pretty neat pairing and class options.

Yeah It was really fun doing the supports. I did the weirdest ones lmao

[De Geso]

Conquest.

Birthright wasn't all that engaging after the first time. I didn't like much of Revelation in general, but there were a few good maps here or there.

Conquest was excellent gameplay wise throughout.

[Erik-a]

23 hours ago, TheHeroQueen said:

I really liked Revelations. (pls dont kill me) I liked having all the units.

Me too. I liked the ending of the route better than Birthright or Conquest.