#imo the lack of nabatean content or even explanation is directly tied to the player pandering 4th wall thing

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Seeing how badly sothis/byleth get treated by intsys makes me feel really badly for them and their fans. I thought self inserts were meant to fawn over the player but instead I see the company retcon them, replace, and low but high key shitting on them. I don’t think I would ever see this with characters like Link or Persona or the little pokemon kids so I’m not sure what intsys is trying to tell us about sothis/byleth if this what we see done to them, “they’re just a mindless beast”

As I realised thanks to talking and exchanging with people around and after years of discourse...

Fodlan suffers from "self-insert worship" but in a batman 5D chess gambit, from doylist wise, "player worship". Earl Grey must sell, thus the character who always loves the player and was made, designed, as the player's love-interest (Billy's), Supreme Leader's worship takes the cake.

As already pointed out, Fodlan games try their damnest to erase or not give any figs about Flamey, the "War" is just a background buzz and units are on snow class, and if something is to blamed for the destruction and deaths caused by the war it's deflected on the mole people, "Church/Kingdom BaD because they don't offer their heads on a platter" or the world and its systum - and the worst offender, on "crusts", aka, blood from a genocided race that mingled with "humanity" and is used as the scapegoat for everything wrong in the world. The "alien blood" is to blame and the real responsible for why Miklan tried to seduce people who didn't want to be seduced, or why classicism exist.

I exaggerate a bit, Heroes tried to poke holes at this smokescreen and it ended up with Supreme Leader running away from Lissa (the most persuasive character in the franchise?) because, hey, in her verse, no one told her 1+1 = 2, or no one she couldn't introduce to Aymr I guess.

(of course we have the lol!supports from the besf, but any opposition is resolved with a teaspoon in the following supports, there's no disagreement nothing, it's always "and John realised off-screen Supreme Leader was right and he was wrong", ultimate kuddos to the Ferdie support though, the biggest joke - but again, FE16's supports kind of suck).

With that in mind, Billy was always intended to be the SS Lord, and to opposed Supreme Leader (that's the gravitas and main steak served when you order Fodlan : "u will feel bad bcs u turn against ur precious student sad uwus").

And yet, not to prevent the irl players from, idk, buying Supreme Leader merch or routes or being engaged, even if it's through foolish fan-faction wars, Billy takes a backseat as Nopes fully embrace the core of the Fodlan games : Hresvelg Tea.

Player must feel bad for siding against Supreme Leader - so Supreme Leader must somehow be right, and make people at least some of them surface-level wonder if the ends justify the means, right?

Billy, when they are their character and not a self insert UI, thus must bow down to this rule - everything must be thrown in a blender so Supreme Leader's steak will look appetising, even if you have to destroy the tastiest risotto ever done in the process.

Rhea cannot have spotlight else we will be in a Lissa situation again - so if she has any, it'll play in the red herring already debunked 10 chapters ago "Church BaD Rhea BaD maybe she should have ruled over the world instead of letting HuMaNiTy rule itself". In Nopes? Conveniently, Uncle pops up so Rhea's goal changes, and she will prefer to save the world instead of putting the person who wants her out of Fodlan by tomorrow morning because her ears are pointy to the sword.

Dimitri? "BaD" as long as he wants to kill Supreme Leader, but when he'll become the Saviour King, he'll try to spare her and regret having to kill her - fuck to Baldo, Waldi, and the "creatures masquerading as humans" I guess - in FE16 ; in Nopes, he'll also join the "Church BaD" gang, thus isn't "really" opposing Supreme Leader, right?

Clout became a thing.

And Billy? Well, Barney's existence is their nemesis, so to prop Barney they should shit on Billy, right?

But to shit on them to this point - throwing them with the other Nabateans in Nopes in the "dgaf" trashcan but also, confirming the worst theories from FE16 (Jerry's not the best dad ever) hurts. Billy was, this time, sacrificed to make place for the new self-insert, but also, imho, to showcase how the damn space lizards are evil (and not only because we're playing an agarthan game/route, but also because it checks a certain someone's agenda).

So while I think it's less something of "the devs hate Billy" it's more like "the devs want you to buy Hresvelg Tea".

#anon #replies #3 nopes #to be honest I wasn't fond of Billy in the early years of the discourse #that alone b4u nonsensical support really irked me #just like the recruitment mechanic #but when Billy's allowed to be a character and not a self insert who has to be able to #join tru piss because the player wants it they're kind of nice #imo the lack of nabatean content or even explanation is directly tied to the player pandering 4th wall thing #bar maybe some people with very opinated views about religion #if more light was shed on Nabateans how could anyone buy merch of the character saying they are the source of evil in the world? #WoH DLC was never going to happen :(