Design Considerations for the Laguz Royalty Banner:
The first question is which 4 heroes to choose for the banner. I knew that I wanted at least one of each of the three main types of Laguz - Beast, Bird and Dragon.
I already had some ideas for a Heron Laguz, Leanne specifically, following some conversations with friends. Whilst the Herons are Bird Laguz, they are so dramatically different from the other Birds, that I felt that having a second Bird Laguz to round out the banner would be appropriate.
As to which would be the second Bird, it would be between Tibarn and Naesala. Of the two, Naesala seemed more interesting to go into.
I briefly contemplated having Deghinsea as the Dragon, but Kurthnaga is the player unit and more important to the story, so there really was no contest. It would be rather difficult to justify one of the other Dragons over Kurthnaga, so he was in.
Finally, the Beast. This was really tough, and I came very close to doing Skrimir over Nailah. Not in the least because some of his skills write themselves (Fury and Brash Assault). Ultimately though, I wanted to balance the number of Males to Females on the banner, especially since most of the female Laguz in the games were relegated to minor roles.
I seriously considered using Special Gauges for Transformations for the Laguz, given how important is to using them in the game. However, it seemed like it would take away from giving the Laguz some cool things. Given that most of these Laguz get or already have Formshift, it would have been extra work for little benefit.
Out of all of the Laguz, I suspect that Leanne will likely be the most contentious, as her power level is possibly insane. I only developed the idea behind Galdrar of Sorrow after the Galdrar of Vigour, so it might be possible to make some changes to dial her back.
I have given her the worst stat total of any character for a good reason. If she gets attacked in combat, she should probably die. To compensate for Galdrar of Vigour, she needs to suffer in other ways to prevent her from just becoming too strong.
As it seems like every character in Heroes has a weapon, there came the challenge of how to approach Heron weaponry. On considering what the Herons in Radiant Dawn had, the Galdrar of Sorrow seemed like my best bet for a weapon.
The low might was a matter of course, then came to translating Worst Biorhythm into effects. Given how Special relates to things like Crits as well as Mastery skills, it seemed like having something that affected that would be interesting, especially as it hasn’t yet been explored. The Panic effect also made sense, as it converts an opponent from being at their best to being at their worst.
The Galdrar of Vigour was trying to work out how you could work Herons as dancers in Heroes, especially since all of them could AoE refresh in their native games. Allowing every square next to the Heron to be refreshed would have been crazy, which left Leanne’s refresh style.
From my experience of playing FE: Heroes, the number of times I’d actually want to refresh two units two spaces apart is really low. Admittedly, if I had Leanne, my playstyle would probably change. The fact that you really have to think about positioning to get full use out of it is really nifty though.
I added Windsweep so that Leanne could actually use Galdrar of Sorrow without dying.
Dancer Heroism was created because late game, Leanne would struggle badly dealing damage or getting kills. This is a way to train her up without actually engaging in combat or blowing through ridiculous numbers of crystals and shards. The reason it is post map is so you don’t just grind her up by continually waiting and dancing whilst the enemies don’t attack. These numbers are the most subject to change, as I just did some rough ballpark guesses on what would be best.
I went with Green for Naesala because of Vortex and its association with Wind Magic.
Naesala’s stat line was actually based around the sword users, and especially the Myrmidons already in existence. This is quite obvious given his great speed and mediocre attack. His defences in PoR and RD were nothing to write home about compared to the other Laguz Royals, so Myrmidons seemed a good fit.
The Great Beak was designed around similar principles to other legendary weapons, high might with a level 2 skill built in. I went with a ploy because it was Naesala, who is rather slippery.
In RD, Tear crippled the target’s speed if they somehow survived the attack. Given that Astra or equivalent would mean that the target was already dead, I wanted some way to still preserve the speed aspect of the attack to help differentiate it from other skills. Tear was the result. Rather unintentionally, it makes Naesala quite good against armoured opponents, but I’m cool with that since he’d just dodge them in RD anyways.
Distant Counter was chosen as a nod to Vortex and Shriek in RD, both of which give ravens a ranged attack/response.
Hit and Run was chosen because Ravens were very mobile in the games, and Naesala has something of a habit of withdrawing when it’s beneficial to him.
And now, I must quote Ranulf:
“Naesala and the ravens of Kilvas betrayed us? Again? “
Hence Traitor’s Ploy. A skill that is hard to use without backfiring and cleaves close to Naesala’s constant side switching in the Tellius games.
Given that Kurthnaga was always going to be Blue, I wanted to round the banner out, so gave Nailah Red. That said, her stats were based more on axe users given her enjoyment of fighting.
Not much to say about Great Fang, it was not something I put much effort into, but still wanted to make impressive for a Laguz Royal. Think of it as a Mt: 16 weapon with Atk +2 built in.
Savage was made to be a Beast Laguz alternative to Astra, so I just went with something in the same vein, originally it was going to be Charge 4, but I seem to recall seeing something about Astra’s cooldown maybe going down. If Astra remains at Charge 5, then this would have Charge 4.
Sturdy Blow was for the brawler in her, and I didn’t want to just do new skills.
Glare was a pain. I was tempted to put it in as her special, but I also wanted to make a nod to Savage. The question then becomes how to handle something like Glare, as petrification is rather good. The solution was to make the trigger condition tricky, and harder to fulfil as the map goes on. Even then, this skill is good, but so are other personal skills. (Power Creep FTW)
The reason why Kurthnaga was always going to be Blue is because Black Breath seems a very natural progression from Dark Breath. Black Breath is literally just a legendary version Dark Breath+. Honestly, I would have liked to do something else with it were it not for the existing version of Dark Breath.
Due to Kurthnaga losing movement whilst transformed, making him armoured seemed like a good way to give a nod to that. It also gave me an excuse to pump his stat line a bit more.
Kurthnaga’s stat line is one of the highest in the game, which is rather fitting for a Dragon Laguz, who always outclassed pretty much all their peers.
Smite was added almost as an after-thought. Once I’d mostly finished with Kurthnaga, something felt missing. I’m not entirely sure why, but Smite seemed to fit the bill nicely.
My reason for Dragon Fang? Dragon, dragon, dragon.
Enduring Stance was there because he was always somewhat tanky, but not much to write home about on the attack.
Finally we come to Black Tide. Yes, it is a copy of Light Breath’s effect, however, this effect was basically what Black Tide did in RD, and much as I might have wanted, Light Breath translates to Black Breath in no sensible way.
It’s kind of sad that Kurthnaga ends up as F!Corrin but better. Oh well, it’s my fantasy banner and I’ll do what I want :D
