I'm with you on Fates' story, the only one I didn't like was Conquest and that was only concerning the line-to-line writing - the idea and atmosphere were really cool. I don't think it's a good story, but Birthright and Revelations were inoffensive at worst, and certainly entertaining enough for me to enjoy the whole way through. Conquest had me rolling my eyes a few times during the main plot but it was not entirely bereft of good moments either - the supports were the best of the three. Minority opinion though.
Oh, by the way... when you see a roaming enemy team up with a story battle enemy, be ready for a rough time. (Talking about Valentia again now)
I had that happen to me in Ch. 3 Alm's side, where you have to break through a tile-wide stairway and kill a bunch of archers, undead, and a summoner before an NPC gets killed. In the way was a bunch of armor knights as part of the standard encounter, then 10 additional cavaliers just to make that tile-wide stairway even more of a slog to get through.
Alm might've been taking nothing but 1's from all the enemies, but he couldn't cut them down quickly enough because not enough could even attack him. None of my own units could assist Alm either due to the 1-tile choke. Things slowed down to a crawl, but the NPC's blood loss wasn't. Needless to say, they died.
So I backed out of the fight, let the roamers come to me before engaging, then regretted it because letting them come to you means they get the first move on your low-def, low-spd cleric that you can't reposition. Needless to say, they died.
So then I fled all the way to the village, waited for the roamers to come near, then came out to attack them. Being able to keep my cleric from dying before I even get a chance to move them, I easily dispatched the roamers.--And then more roamers spawned from the same place I was trying to lure the previous roamers away from, forcing me to repeat everything all over again. Needless to say, I thought it was bullshit. >:|
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I feel Echoes works against itself at times as a game meant for the more narrative-oriented side of the fanbase. The game part can just
drag.