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#claude discourse
faroreswinds · 11 months
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is GW's direction really that crazy when you think about it? feels more like people are just salty that Claude didn't team up with their faves on his route because people look at Claude as a third party that validates their side. But what I saw in Hopes fit what I thought about Claude from Houses Claude does whatever he feels most benefits his goals at the moment regardless of morals. He teams up with Faerghus when he feels it benefits him most, he teams up with the Church when he feels it benefits him most, he teams up with the Empire when he feels it benefits him most and he throws his allies to the dogs when he feels it benefits him most. Like in Houses, Claude tells Dimi before leaving in Azure Moon that this is how he operates and that he only makes moves that he thinks benefit him. That's the story trying to communicate how Claude and Dimi are different. Do fans think he's just trying to be cute or that his words mean nothing? Claude's not a man of rigid principles, he's an opportunist. He, the other characters and supplementary material repeat that same message about him over and over again too. like Claude's not supposed to be a uniformly kind person, he's friendly and pleasant to talk to but someone that can be amoral or moral depending on the circumstances. And in GW, an alliance with Edelgard was more personally beneficial to him than trying to team up with Faerghus. They have the bigger force, they're paying Leicester significant reparations, they're getting stability at his southern border and they want to eliminate the same threat.
I mean.... It kinda is a crazy direction.
The issue isn't just the differences between Hopes!Claude and Houses!Claude. That could be a whole other explanation on its own, but since you have framed it as in-character, let's go over the other reason why it is a poor direction on its own.
The biggest issue, anon, is that Hopes!Claude... is an idiot.
Nothing he does or says makes much sense when you add up all the worldbuilding elements together into one big pile.
For example, he decides to side with Edelgard and wipe out the Church. He believes this will end the war quicker, and remove Edelgard's justification for war. And if that justification is gone, then Edelgard will have no choice but to cease her aggressions, or else the war is no longer justified.
However, this logic ignores sooooo many things. The first is that Edelgard publicly declares that the Kingdom and Alliance are false nations that only exist due to meddling forces. That should be a red flag right there and then. Not only that, but Edelgard invaded his nation and beelined for the capital. That should have been another red flag. If Edelgard didn't wish to take over the Alliance, she would have had no need to go for the throat.
Claude even admits that Edelgard might not stop her war. He should know that someone may not stop a war just because it is no longer "justified". And yet, he continues to side with her.
Here is another one. Claude puts a lot of blame on the Church for... basically everything wrong with Foldan. Forced marriages. Fierce border protections. The existence of nobility. The lack of freedom for nobles. I mean, just everything and anything you can think of, in his eyes it is the fault of Rhea and her Church.
But how can he come to that conclusion? Does he live under a rock? Is he not the leader of the Alliance? Does he not know that Edmund, within his own Alliance territory, makes trades with other nations outside of Foldan? When he went to school, did he not see how people of Duscur, Brigid, and Almyra got places in the classroom? How a woman from overseas got to be a Knight of Seiros? Even if he only spent two weeks there, surely he saw something, no?
He is also a prince of another nation. A nation with no Church, and no Crests. And they still have a King and nobility of their own. So why is he blaming the Church for such things? He literally is from another nation.
Hopes!Claude feels like he was written by a young author who is just starting out. There is no logic to his thinking. He just hates the Church because the writers needed him to.
And what makes it worse is that Claude is supposed to be the smart one. He is lauded as the brilliant tactician. The guy who thinks 5 steps ahead in every chess match. But he comes across as the most ignorant of the three lords, who cannot see past his own nose.
So yes, this is why is it a crazy direction. It's not just because of any misalignment of his character from Houses. It's because within Hopes itself, Claude is just a moron that it is hard to take him and his thought processes seriously.
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raxistaicho · 2 years
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Who GW Claude really is
Spoilers!
As we’ve seen by now, certain people - mostly Edelgard detractors - are raising a gigantic stink over the way Claude is portrayed in Golden Wildfire. I believe this is the result of three year’s worth of a misunderstanding of who Claude is being brought crashing down.
As I said in a few months-old post of mine, Claude is not an ally of Dimitri or the Church except when convenient;
So what of Azure Moon? That’s Claude at a desperate moment, and it’s not Dimitri Claude trusts, but Byleth. Similar to Edelgard, Claude seems to naturally want to trust Byleth regardless of route. This is most notable in Azure Moon and Crimson Flower, where Claude yields to the side Byleth has chosen.
But the route where the misconception that Claude and Dimitri would work together is most obviously expressed as false is Crimson Flower, where Dimitri is available for an entire five years for Claude to conclude an alliance with, and yet he doesn’t. Claude does not actively assist Dimitri or Rhea in toppling Edelgard; he instead feigns neutrality with the intention of playing kingmaker.
So what does this have to do with Golden Wildfire Claude? Well, he’s essentially Crimson Flower Claude but playable. Who was Crimson Flower Claude? He was a person stuck in the unenviable position of commanding the weakest country and caught in the middle of a war between two powers he simultaneously didn’t want to win.
In the other three routes, he’s only able to soften up to the Church of Serios,
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because he has faith that Byleth can curtail in the worst aspects of it. This is true no matter the route; Byleth simply has a magnetic effect on all three Lords, regardless of the route. See how Dimitri pleads to know why Byleth sided with Edelgard in Crimson Flower.
Conversely, he understands - and he expresses this in his support with Edelgard in Hopes - that if she crushes the Kingdom - which she intends to do because it’s too interwoven with the Central Church to leave as-is - then she’ll be in a position to do whatever she likes with the Alliance, and Claude needs the Alliance to be strong, as it’s his only source of influence in Fodlan. Without it, he can’t fulfill his ambitions.
Of course, he does end up losing in the end, so he’s forced to cut his losses and leave (and this is a post for the future, but he seems more at-ease giving Edelgard his goodbye than he does Dimitri).
But in Golden Wildfire, Byleth is on neither side. He wants neither Edelgard nor Rhea to win. Edelgard will conquer the Alliance, as I discussed earlier, and Rhea will come down hard on the Empire and expand the power of the Central Church. Neither of these results are something he wants.
Therefor, he, being the person in control of the weakest nation, has to essentially stalemate the war by taking out the Central Church with the Kingdom intact. That way, the Kingdom remains as a buffer against the Empire, but the Central Church can’t further its power. This is also congruent with his nature as someone who tries to find the least-bloody way that he can,
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But naturally, in two routes this doesn’t work and he’s forced to just cut his losses and hope for the best by siding with the stronger power. This is different from Three Houses, where he’ll take the weaker side of the war, because Claude’s willing to take a gamble when the chips are down and he’d rather whichever side Byleth chose wins than allow Edelgard without Byleth to win. If he has to choose between Edelgard without Byleth and Rhea without Byleth, he’s essentially being forced to choose between two equally bad outcomes, so he just chooses whoever seems most-likely to guarantee his survival so he can try to make something work in the aftermath.
So yeah, people who perceived Claude as someone who would side with Dimitri or the Church when it came down to it misread him. Just like Edelgard and Dimitri, he’s someone who wants to do things his own way, and he can only do that in a world where those two don’t win. Though, that said, he does seem more amenable to choosing Edelgard over Rhea, for understandable reasons; their ideals are fairly similar in ways.
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Me when people who disagree in the fandom actually exchange respectfully instead of being at each other's throats:
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microlm · 1 year
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“Fodlan’s insular culture” as proven by…Shamir being one of Rhea’s top officials, Petra and Dedue attending the academy, AG’s Sreng and Duscur paralogues, Adrestia and Leicester having warm water ports they use extensively for trade with outside nations? Almyra pillaging for funsies, Nader talking about looting Faerghus to bring home “souvenirs?” The Western Church (closest to Adrestia btw) hating the Central Church because they’re mad that Rhea isn’t racist? Hopes Claude is a selfish, opportunistic weathervane rewritten to make waifu emperor not look so bad in comparison, don’t insult our intelligence by trying to make excuses for the story butchering him and Almyra. Good luck trying to pin that as Byleth’s fault too when Byleth opposes waifu emperor on 3/4 routes in Houses and Claude not being swayed by them or Ms Emperor, and by the fact that not recruiting Byleth on SB has them persuading Claude of Edelgard’s bad intentions.
Rhea literally did nothing wrong, Claude is just a character the devs didn’t really give a shit about and wrote poorly in one game to save time and wrote poorly in another to deflect from their waifu character’s bad actions.
Some of this I'm going to just copy & paste what I've written elsewhere because...I already wrote it so might as well reuse it!
“Fodlan’s insular culture” as proven by…Shamir being one of Rhea’s top officials, Petra and Dedue attending the academy,
"Tokens and exceptions are not proper rebuttals to things that are stated to be systemic issues. Rhea the individual may hire foreigners, but Rhea the archbishop isn’t exactly attempting to improve things overall for all foreigners, because again, Lorenz directly cites the church as a reason why they should reject contact with foreigners. Claude directly sites the church as being the reason why official diplomatic channels were never established with foreign nations, and Dimitri does not disagree. Edelgard directly states that the Central Church was used to uphold colonization of Duscur and Sreng. And outside of Cyril or Shamir who are under Rhea’s employ, the only foreigners we see outside of the literal underground slums are people hiding their backgrounds, political prisoners, or people who were colonized by Faerghus."
AG’s Sreng and Duscur paralogues. Adrestia and Leicester having warm water ports they use extensively for trade with outside nations?
Sometimes insular policies still have trade at the ports, while limiting what is allowed in. See japan under the sakoku policy. It doesn't change the fact that apparently no official diplomatic channels exist. Also the existence of conflict and the taking of land while expelling/slaughtering it's original inhabitants isn't exactly something you want to use as a positive example of good international relations.
Almyra pillaging for funsies, Nader talking about looting Faerghus to bring home “souvenirs?”
Indeed, I have always had a problem with IS' onesided portrayal of Fodlan's conflicts with the outside. There's hints that there's something deeper and more nuance--like Sreng having it's southern half taken, both of Cyril's parents dying, Brigid being invaded by Adrestia first historically--but there is never enough focus on those perspectives. And 3Hopes' made it worse with regards to Almyra, and I can't say I'm too fond of some other choices they made regarding Sreng. But that's probably not what you're here to discuss.
The Western Church (closest to Adrestia btw) hating the Central Church because they’re mad that Rhea isn’t racist?
Yeah, the western church does suck! I hope Dimitri goes through with making a northern church in GW.
Hopes Claude is a selfish, opportunistic weathervane rewritten to make waifu emperor not look so bad in comparison, don’t insult our intelligence by trying to make excuses for the story butchering him and Almyra. Good luck trying to pin that as Byleth’s fault too when Byleth opposes waifu emperor on 3/4 routes in Houses and Claude not being swayed by them or Ms Emperor, and by the fact that not recruiting Byleth on SB has them persuading Claude of Edelgard’s bad intentions.
I think the story does him and Almyra wrong in a lot of ways, I just don't agree with where it does him wrong and where the emphasis of those critiques lie. I've never blamed Byleth for anything?? "Claude doesn’t look to Byleth to see whether or not he should attack Rhea, but Claude having Byleth as an ally means that he has a direct line to the new archbishop of the Central Church to change its current doctrines. In VW, he doesn’t mind joining with the weakened Central Church because Rhea has already been deposed, and the one who now heads the church agrees with his ideals. In CF, Rhea is still in power, so he doesn’t join with Faerghus.
However, Byleth choosing to attack Rhea doesn’t move him to attack Rhea because in the war, Rhea is only one side of the equation--the other side is Edelgard wanting to conquer the continent. Byleth’s decisions alone don’t move Claude, and that’s a misrepresentation of what Byleth being his ally actually means for Claude."
And I enjoyed Claude's betrayal in SB! In SB he didn't hold any cards because he was defeated in his initial attempt to hold ground, unlike GW. As a result, he is unable to solidify the Alliance as a united entity to push back against the Empire, losing both Ordelia and Gloucestor as Imperial vassals in the process. Lorenz even chooses to neglect his own responsibilities as an Alliance noble in favor of currying favor wit the Empire. Claude can't use Edelgard and freely manuever as much in SB. But there was never a sense that it was an entirely willing process, Claude even says it was under duress. That's why Byleth being a military trump card also against Edelgard gave him the push he needed to openly push back against her. That's kind of what Byleth tends to be: a card that can be used for his goals (and a friend but like let's not pretend he's not also using them). But also keep in mind, that he is also against the Kingdom and the Church in this betrayal scenario, so even there he is displaying that he is his own faction. He's neither fully allied with Dimitri or Edelgard or Rhea. His flexibility is my favorite quality of his.
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speeedyquick1245 · 1 year
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Me and Dimitri when GW Claude says that the Church forbids all interactions with countries outside of Fodlan when his dad, the king of the most devout nation in Fodlan, died visiting Duscar which is outside of fodlan: 
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Like maybe it is true but tbh for such a major justification to Claude’s actions in GW there’s not really much world building to support. I just really wasn’t sure at all like Marianne in the end. I feel like it would have been more interesting if Dimitri actually said anything to debunk some of Claude’s arguments cause like just with what we know it doesn’t make sense.
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jeweled-blue-eyes · 2 years
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Hey do you think that Felix kinda gaslighted Athanasia into giving Claude a chance since she was five? Like why is he encouraging this relationship with he knows that Claude abandoned her on purpose and he witnessed him almost kill her? And he was relying on her to "fix" Claude as if he was misunderstood.
And lily too, both kept pushing this idea onto Athanasia when she knew otherwise. I think this might have influence her decision in going back to him when Jennette had suggested she'd go.
I wouldn't call this gaslighting but his support of their relationship definitely influenced her decision to give Claude another chance. It's almost as if Felix cared more about Claude than Athy. Claude has done lots of things that Felix has been ignoring: torturing people, killing the concubines, killing his marriage candidates, killing a marquis for an alleged intimacy with the neighbouring Castorea (Side Story: I Became a Father One Day) threatening to kill others for daring to be annoying or boring. Sometimes Felix objects weakly but then Claude tells him to shut up and he does. Amazing that he doesn’t dare to go against Claude but expects it from child! Athy. Don’t get me wrong I like Felix but the fact that he let LP Athy be executed without a proper investigation and Lily killed alongside her leaves a bitter taste in my mouth especially when the manhwa lowkey ships Felix/Lily.
You could interpret it that way that Felix' top priority wasn't Athy reuniting with her family and having a healthy relationship with them but her healing the bruise Diana left on Claude's heart and the family thing was just a method to achieve that. In the Lovely Princess he was content with Jennette "healing" Claude and didn't make any big attempts to mediate between Claude and LP Athy although he was sad about the treatment she received. In the end it didn't matter who was fixing him.
This makes Felix look morally grey but c'mon the only other explanation I have is that he's stupidly naive which also doesn't fit with his Knight of Crimson blood persona. As Claude's guard and advisor he should be capable of recognizing a person's true nature. Claude never bothered to hide his ugly side from him. In LP Athy's own words Claude has always been cruelly honest from the start. Felix is just that devoted to his master. He was willing to risk Athy’s life to improve Claude’s well-being.
As for Lily: inconsistent character. No one in their right mind would want the child they raised in the same room as the man who murdered a dozen women in cold blood. Felix was friends with Claude and saw him in a good light but Lily was never that close to Claude. She has the worst impression of him, he kills everyone in the Ruby Palace, dumps a child on her and tells her if ever word about it gets out he kills everyone there, and then he appears again wants to play daddy and suddenly attempts to kill his daughter again lol wtf.
If Athy had a support system from the start that wouldn't encourage her to go back to her abuser she wouldn't have gone. Lucas offering to kill Claude doesn't count, he's basically Claude 02 anyway. Everyone she cared about is connected to Claude. If she was losing Claude she was going to lose the others too.
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adamantineheart · 1 year
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please feel free to send me fe3h/dimilix asks. but really any fe3h/few3h asks. now that I am here and not on twitter I can actually articulate my thoughts in paragraphs. I can go full nerd.
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mayhem-ensues · 2 years
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At the risk of getting a little toxic, the way people on this site keep going on about 'edelstans' feels like a lazy way to group everyone you disagree with into a group so they can be dismissed as some sort of hivemind.
But, like, it's whatever. There are definitely some Edelgard fans out there with some wacky takes. I've seen them, you've seen them, we've all seen them, so whatevs the Edelstan thing isn't worth caring about.
Except now I have to see posts talking about 'khalidstans' as well. Like, my goodness this is just silly.
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deathbirby · 3 months
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Edelgard’s lack of interest in looking into the history of Fodlan beyond what her (dubiously reliable) father and (fantasy Nazi torture squad) TWSITD tell her is such a clear and glaring character flaw that so many of her “did nothing wrong” fans defend as Good, Actually. Like I can’t wrap my head around it, we know that there’s so much about the history of the continent that El either doesn’t or refuses to learn and while it’s understandable in some ways why she can’t it’s still like. Bad. It’s so clear that if her actual goal was liberation then she would’ve done more research, gone to the church and told them that hey, the Slitherers™️ are at it again and we need to do something. But she doesn’t, because that’s not actually her goal… it’s conquest of the other two nations and an overturning of the current system to favor her (mostly already privileged) friends, plain and simple. But people who either didn’t play any routes but CF or just didn’t pay attention/have poor media analysis skills love to say otherwise. Bluh.
I still can't get over how she was tortured and lost all her siblings to TWSITD and decided that the CHURCH was the biggest threat.
Edelgard 100% believes she is in the right and is the ONLY person who is right and thus is the ONLY person who can bring about change. And with "change" I mean "unify Fodlan and bring it under the control of the Adrestian Empire like it was in the past".
At no point does she consider that Wilhelm's history could've been tampered with, or simply been misunderstood after a whole millenia has passed. And why not? Because it's the only thing that drives her hatred for the church, and if it was disproven then she has no leg to stand on? Probably!
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Three Hopes is a Good Game. It gave us maps with territory outlines and more character interactions and Dimitri with a ponytail and Edelgard without cinnamon roll hair and Claude with trauma and Shez's empty little head and it gave us Holst and empire dads!
I see so many people complain about it and say how it doesn't exist to them for being out of character, but I really do think it's a Good Game
.
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butwhatifidothis · 3 months
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Do people really not see the inherent disconnect of the claim that Houses Claude is genuinely an amoral opportunist when his dream is to break down barriers to foster unity and peace? Like, is there not a fundamental incompatibility in having a desire for everyone to get along yet being a backstabber that throws people under the bus for their own benefit? From a personality/character standpoint, all that does is make Claude look like a ginormous ignorant hypocrite, and an idiot even though he's supposed to be smart. Because if his end goal is to create a diverse and harmonious community, how is he going to bring people together if he constantly betrays every side? And from a writing perspective, it makes no sense to have a character's actions and goals be completely contradictory and never address it.
Also for someone who is amoral, it sure is interesting in Balthus' Classroom QA Part 2 that Claude likes "ensure the fewest casualties" and dislikes "do anything to eradicate the enemy" when the question was "the war has been dragging for long so let's end it quickly". It's kinda like he has some principles or something.
Like, the idea of Claude being an untrustworthy backstabber who opportunistically takes advantage of everyone without ever growing close to them is just Hubert minus Lady Edelgard could be an interpretation of his character that aligns with at least his initial showing, or a surface level understanding of him. He calls himself the embodiment of distrust, he never fully opens up to anyone, he can in fact be fairly manipulative and callous; the crumbs are there, for sure.
But it also has to ignore how far he's willing to go to protect his people (putting himself in high danger when he is not sacrificial like, say, Dimitri is), or how he supports others having dreams for themselves (Goddess Tower), or how open he is to criticisms against what he thought (Cyril's support), or how he tries to be there for his friends (Marianne's support), or how he's open-minded enough to listen to people he initially thought needed to be his enemy (Rhea), or how violence is not just not something he considers but is something he actively rejects as a means of getting what he wants (The Alliance Leader's Ambitions, near the end), or how putting the people's lives in danger is something he is adamantly against (as you point out, Balthus' classroom question). A staggering amount of Claude's character has to be deliberately ignored in order to come to the conclusion that he's just a backstabbing opportunist who does anything to get what he wants (who magically gets fixed by Byleth's mere presence), because a backstabbing opportunist who does anything to get what he wants who magically gets fixed by Byleth's mere presence does not describe Claude.
Even if one were to take the game's writing failure of properly presenting Claude tackling racial issues (like never addressing Petra's situation despite having supports with her) you can't really deny that Claude is, in fact, a caring person after taking everything in his character into account. For all his flaws, he never abuses the trust people have in him to the extent that they are actively put in danger, nor is it ever the case that the "doesn't truly tackle racial issues" ever translate to anything so drastic as "which means he'll actively worsen relations between two countries." And, well, yes; you still do have to take into account that his dreams are of bringing people together and disregarding past bad blood. He never stops trying to achieve this dream, and he wants it to come true so badly that he is willing to let other people that he trusts rule Fodlan to work together with him to achieve it, shown in VW and even AM. That means a lot for someone like Claude, who is otherwise pretty slow to trust other people so deeply.
That's not someone who would use Leicester's bad history with Faerghus as fuel to violently invade it. That's not someone who would use Almyra's navy to make it look to Sreng like Faerghus tried to invade it. That's not someone who wants to conquer other nations and make his own come out on top. Those things describe Hopes!Claude, which 3H!Claude is not.
It's like. You know how some 3H's fans see 3H as "Edelgard, Dimitri, and the third guy that justifies my fave"? How a lot of people in 3H's fandom don't really see Claude as his own character with his own perspective and ideals and beliefs and morals that are unique to him, and only see him as a battering ram to try and knock down one of the other two lords? And so don't really care how he's characterized in other things (like fanfiction, fanart, meta, or in this case spinoff media) because they never really cared about him as his own character? But then get really, really, really defensive when you point out the flaws in their perception of him, saying that you're the one who never understood or liked Claude, because if you did you'd "realize" that he was always [insert vague, bland description that happens to prop up the lord they actually like]?
Yeah that's basically what's going on here. Most people who prefer Claude as their fave lord do not like Hopes!Claude, some of the loudest voices in the JPN Amazon reviews were of people who hated Hopes!Claude and were literally trying to warn Claude/GD fans away from Hopes as a game because of how awful their writing is, while nearly every Hopes!Claude fan that I've seen vastly prefers Edelgard as their fave lord and are - you guessed it! - very defensive when it comes to Claude fans venting their frustrations over Claude's shit-end-of-the-stick treatment he got in Hopes.
So like, yeah. It's less that people aren't directly computing that Claude's ambitions and character don't match how he's depicted in Hopes, but that they just don't care that it doesn't since 1) it justifies their fave and 2) they never really gave a shit about Claude anyway
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faroreswinds · 5 months
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Claude did the right thing. If a caste system based on bloodlines and legitimized by an immortal who holds technology back for society requires war to take it down then so be it. And Claude used kid gloves on Faerghus too.
Does killing Rhea end the caste system? Why?
And what right does Edelgard and Claude have to decide to remove that caste system, as you say, from another country?
And I would say Claude went in guns blazing, considering he didn't even try to talk to Dimitri first.
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bowbowis · 8 months
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Wait! Not Like That!
It's rather telling that people who complained about Edelgard not trying to talk to Dimitri and Claude in Houses get upset about her winning Claude over by talking in Hopes.
It seems many of them weren't actually interested in seeing Edelgard try to advance her aims diplomatically and just wanted (and expected) Dimitri and Claude to convince her that an oppressive feudal theocracy isn't worth rebelling against. They certainly weren't expecting Edelgard to get one of the boys on her side instead.
Turns out even the magic of mansplaining isn't enough to overcome a well made case.
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emblemxeno · 11 months
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People honestly want to believe that Claude isn’t either OOC or badly written in Hopes, but you really expect me to believe that the guy who was three steps ahead of Edelgard and Dimitri on their respective routes in Houses in order to secure the survival of himself and his friends is also the same fucker who banks on the war ending in Hopes by killing Rhea when the credits roll and it shows it didn’t fucking work?
It’s no surprise that these same people like to claim dislikers of Hopes Claude only like him for being a “heehee funny no problem brown man” and trying to infer we’re racist when in actuality taking the hypercompetent and intelligent brown guy and making him impulsive, violent, easy to mistrust by his own allies, willing to drag innocents into a conflict to save his own skin, and being extremely serville to a white woman’s violent and vengeful ignorance is actually a more extremely fucking racist way to write him than anything that was done in Houses proper.
Like actually go fuck yourselves for saying this shit lol
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microlm · 1 year
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“if Faerghus manages to subsume Adrestia, then there’s no guarantee that it wouldn’t take the opportunity to do the same to Leicester. And indeed, Faerghus proves that it would jump at the chance in trying to take those border regions, as well how it historically has done so to Leicester in the past.” Huh? WHERE??? Faerghus and Leiecester have NEVER shown mutual animosity towards each other after the Crescent Moon War unlike Adrestia still being upset that Faerghus got pissed at the empire for feeding its citizens to wild animals to entertain ppl in Enbarr. Edelgard and Ferdinand both keep this nasty idea that Adrestia is the best and has the right to rule over the entire continent just because. Hell, Claude and Leicester COOPERATE with the Church and Faerghus in Azure Moon, Verdant Wind, Silver Snow, Azure Gleam, in the latter Claude is FRIENDLY towards Rhea and they even plan battle strategies TOGETHER to fight against the Empire, but outside of AG Claude is said to continue to march towards Faerghus to crush it and he even crowned himself king which is a slap in the face to a confederation that was proud for not bowing to any king or emperor. And where is there any clue, indication in either game that Dimitri and co want to conquer Leicester? Where do they say that?
I really enjoyed your fic but i’m baffled that you’re supporting Khalidstan talking points, as a fellow Claude fan we just have to take the L and accept that the writers massively fucked over Claude and chose to write him much worse in Hopes and that Faerghus and co can’t catch a break from everyone trying to fuck them over too! At least Engage is coming out soon to wash our hands of Hopes so we can try to forget that game exists?
You have a lot of question I'm happy to answer!
“if Faerghus manages to subsume Adrestia, then there’s no guarantee that it wouldn’t take the opportunity to do the same to Leicester. And indeed, Faerghus proves that it would jump at the chance in trying to take those border regions, as well how it historically has done so to Leicester in the past.” Huh? WHERE??? Faerghus and Leiecester have NEVER shown mutual animosity towards each other after the Crescent Moon War unlike Adrestia still being upset that Faerghus got pissed at the empire for feeding its citizens to wild animals to entertain ppl in Enbarr.
The Crescent Moon War is a whole lot more recent than Adrestia feeding vaguely defined northerners to wild animals, like I'm not even sure that's supposed to refer to people from Faerghus as opposed to Sreng or something. Hell even the original Faerghus breakoff war was more recent than that if you want to talk about recent conflicts between the Empire and the Kingdom, so I'm not sure why you brought up what is essentially historical fiction about Seiros and Wilhelm set in the early 100s or 200s at the latest.
There technically weren't any outright wars between either the Empire or Leicester or Faerghus after their initial splits from each other--the most recent of which was the Crescent Moon war, but there's still been some quieter conflicts. Faerghus very much did get themselves involved in House Daphnel, and again with the western nobles that wanted to defect form the Alliance right before Claude chose to ally with Edelgard. "Those nobles wanted to leave the Alliance" but would they have gone through with it if Faerghus hadn't gotten themselves involved? Faerghus did because it benefitted them. That's just how countries are sometimes, but it doesn't exactly paint a portrait of confidence for the fledgling Federation that was founded in an attempt to make Alliance more formally unified as a nation and less a loose collection of nobles. How would they know that Faerghus won't continue to try to pick at it given the opportunity? Especially when the game shows time and again that Rhea can get herself involved in the Kingdom's affairs, and she does express that she doesn't see the Federation as legitimate. Maybe she wouldn't see it that way if the Federation didn't oppose her, but again, the first gesture of the church was to help parts of the Federation break off.
Edelgard and Ferdinand both keep this nasty idea that Adrestia is the best and has the right to rule over the entire continent just because.
And I never said the Empire was right to absorb the other two countries? I've always hated that the routes ended in the unification, part of the appeal of GW's ending to me is that there's the possibility that it DOESN'T.
Hell, Claude and Leicester COOPERATE with the Church and Faerghus in Azure Moon, Verdant Wind, Silver Snow, Azure Gleam, in the latter Claude is FRIENDLY towards Rhea and they even plan battle strategies TOGETHER to fight against the Empire, but outside of AG Claude is said to continue to march towards Faerghus to crush it and he even crowned himself king which is a slap in the face to a confederation that was proud for not bowing to any king or emperor. And where is there any clue, indication in either game that Dimitri and co want to conquer Leicester? Where do they say that?
Yes, because there wasn't a viable alternative for him Azure Moon (as contrived as I thought it was, and largely serving the writer's desires for a unified Fodlan), Azure Gleam (where the ending implies he's still not happy about Rhea), and SS (where it was really just a brief military strategy, not really the full bodied alliance of the previous two examples). Verdant Wind he held the cards in his hands regarding the church, and he is friendly with Rhea with the important caveat that she's already deposed and he has no intentions of returning power to her.
Outside of AG, SB's "good" end has him still under the pact because he hasn't found a way to break free, SB's bad end has him warring with Edelgard but not explicitly marching to Faerghus, and you might want to reread the GW ending again. The ending is going through events in chronological order, the bit about "Claude has invaded Faerghus with Edelgard" is talking about the context of the final battle. He is currently in an alliance with Edelgard, and he is currently invading Faerghus that's why the final battle is in Faerghus. Dimitri purposely left Rhea there for Claude to defeat, and trusted him to leave Fhirdiad alone. He proposes peace after, and does not try to crush Faerghus.
The Roundtable crowned Claude king, he didn't crown himself. And Lorenz makes it clear that that agreement can be retracted. It's no more a slap than Claude convincing them to join a kingdom under a foreign king in AM. Claude at least proposes that the next king be selected by a voting process that includes commoners, so really, if that comes to fruition, that's more say that most of the population gets than purely being ruled by a hereditary oligarchy.
Regarding Dimitri, he's already made himself look bad by trying to absorb parts of Leicester (even if you say those nobles wanted it, it doesn't mean he had to be opportunistic and agree to it!), and again, Rhea does not view the Federation as legitimate because the central church was not involved in the crowning of it's king. Edelgard, while she once invaded, was actively changing her tune and acknowledging the Federation's legitimacy and paying reparations for the damages she caused. None of this would be much of a debate if the writing just went into this conflict more, and it would've been a fascinating way to drive some more church vs federation drama, but IS just decided to leave that to a side battle and flavor text.
I really enjoyed your fic but i’m baffled that you’re supporting Khalidstan talking points, as a fellow Claude fan we just have to take the L and accept that the writers massively fucked over Claude and chose to write him much worse in Hopes and that Faerghus and co can’t catch a break from everyone trying to fuck them over too! At least Engage is coming out soon to wash our hands of Hopes so we can try to forget that game exists?
I'm glad you enjoyed my fic! But these talking points aren't that different from the views I expressed in the fic. I think Fodlan has issues in the way it treats outside nations, I think Rhea has been maintaining a structure harmful to Fodlan despite her intentions, and I think Edelgard was wrong to try to absorb other nations and in the way she conducted her war in 3H (which 3Hopes did their best to soften to make Claude open to negotiating with her) but there was very much a path that Claude wanted to be able to walk with her and Dimitri and he doesn't care for the church's existing institutions.
There are parts of Hopes that frustrates me, but I think more than anything, I'm frustrated by the unsatisfying endings. I actually want more Hopes, I want a proper ending for the routes that explores the implications of their endings! AND I WANT PLAYABLE CYRIL!!!!!
Also, please try to stick to discussing the game instead of childish name calling of random strangers who tend to be PoC who love Claude but view Fodlan's portrayal of race with a critical eye, thanks!
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speeedyquick1245 · 1 year
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I think that regardless of what you think about Claude's actions in golden wildfire and his stance on Rhea and the Church being right or wrong, he’s just an huge asshole as a person in GW. 
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