The RPG Duelling League
RPG Debate => RPGDL Discussion => Topic started by: Dhyerwolf on February 07, 2009, 05:53:43 AM
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It returns! Basically, after Taya (and SF's in general) serious struggling, I thought that it should probably at least be brought up again.
For an idea to make the second round of the boot topic, it must have seven people supporting it's removal from the DL. I went around talking to various people, fielding ideas for the topic. Also needs to have more 'boots' than keeps.
Feel free to suggest new ideas if you wish. Any new ideas need seven votes to make the next round of booting.
Check on Votedraw: http://www.rpgdl.com/votedraw.php
Suggested Games
ATL 4 (Bebedora got a specific mention)
Chrono Cross (Lesser used, less connected, later characters; Split-path characters; Pip and Sprigg)
Baldur's Gate
Brigandine
Fire Emblem 7 (Lesser used, less connected, later characters)
Phantasy Star 1
Phantasy Star 2
Shining Force 1
Shining Force 2
Barbarossa (Suikoden)
Suikoden 1 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters)
Suikoden 2 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters)
Suikoden 3 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters)
Tales of Eternia
Valkyrie Profile (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters)
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Gut reactions, without having researched the draw...
As usual, Barbarossa is not rankable to me. It's not at all clear to me he's the Hydra; that really feels more like a True Rune Incarnation like S2/3/5 finals.
I'm always up for less AtL4. BGs probably, too.
PSs... Keep Rolf. Inclined to say keep PS1 in general but I might be misremembering their vote draw. PS2 filler I am less attached to.
EDIT: Checking the vote draw... yeah BGs fails, AtL4 as well. Phantasy Stars are tolerable; I really can't see why you'd pick on them but not, say, ToE, which ranked below them in every votedraw cutoff I checked. I could also mention Brig here but at least that has fans.
So yeah. I'll support booting Barbarossa, Baldur's Gate, Arc the Lad 4, and Rassius (ToE). Could also be argued into some trimmings, but I'll let others make the arguments.
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Keep PS1 and Rolf. ABstain on the rest of PS2. Remove BGs. I loved the games as a DL concept but they did not work. Remove Barbarossa. Remove AtL4. Remove SF1 besides for Max and Jogurt. The remake did not help this game at all and it's not even gotten better as totals have dropped. Remove SF2 besides for Bowie and Odd Eye. I can be argued on keeping say Peter, but by and large it's been awful. Taya drew 35% against Persona 3 and lost badly. Urgh.
N ote to Dhyer: Count this as a boot all with the exception of the afore metnioned items. We can sort through the rest next stage.
Edit: Keep on Suikoden for now. Not seeing nearly enough support to justify a boot.
Edit: Keep VP besides Freya. The mages are boring, but who cares? The game draws and it -does- have character fans. I say this as someone who hates the game about as much as anyone, but I can't see culling this title besides Freya.
Freya, fuck off and die.
Edit: Tenative boot to ToE. Would like to see this make the next stage.
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Keep PSes, AtL4, Max and Jogurt
Kill the rest of ShF1, Barbarossa, and BGs
Abstain on ShF2
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Boot Bebedora. Not much of a dueller, random inclusion. Kharg at least proved he could keep up season 41.
Keep BG for now. Similarly to Kharg, they recently had a very successful dueller in Imoen.
Phantasy Star 1- I'd just throw in old. Very antiquated filler.
Phantasy Star 2- Keep Rolf, Anna, Rudo, and Amy (Aka the ones that I'd feel most people know what exactly they can do). DEFINETELY boot Josh Kain, who managed to lose to a Shining Force Dragon. Also, Nei, Hugh and Shir (Although I'm semi decent with the last two, I guess).
Shining Force 1- Keep Max. Abstain on Domingo. Boot everyone else.
Shining Force 2- Keep Bowie, Odd Eye, and Peter. Abstain on Sarah and Slade. Everyone else can get the boot.
Boot Barbarossa. Not actually him, etc.
Brig- Keep. Quite decently liked within the DL, self-pandering and such.
CC- Well, I'm 100% down with booting Pip and Sprigg, and NEB's list. Both are duelling headaches. Abstain on everyone else. I like elemental weaknesses, but there are so damn many of them! (Of course, if the weaknesses were 50%, I'd vote keep due solely to interesting ness).
Fire Emblem 7- Futile, but I'd boot based on Djinn's and that other list floating around.
ToE- Boot Rassius and Shizel and Chat! Rassius has already been gone over. Shizel has form split based on plot, and isn't liked. Abstain on Max, keep the main 4.
VP 1- Futile again, but I'll again agree with Djinn's list except keep Yumei, and also Freya.
Suikoden Games- Boot my lists on page 3
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Keep Phantasy Star 1, Phantasy Star 2, Barbarossa.
Abstain on ATL4, Baldur's Gate, Shining Force 1, Shining Force 2.
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Keep:
PS1 (small cast)
Rolf (main, has history), Nei (memorable female lead), Josh Kain (only one with an interesting spoiler skillset vs. Robots),
Kharg (main), Darc (main),
Max (main), Jogurt (godlike), Domingo (iunno), Bleu (Light needs more dragons),
Bowie (main), Peter (memorable),
and all bosses from PSes & ShFs (far more memorable than most of the PCs)
EDIT: super makes a good point
Darksol (main villain), Mishaela (memorable lackey)
OddEye (best part of ShF series?)
Abstain on:
Bebedora (eh, she's kind of funny),
Rudo (first non-Nei partner, somewhat memorable), Amy (apparently used by a lot of people),
Anri (sort of like a lead female?),
Ramladu (kind of important/memorable)
Sarah (sort of like a lead female?)
Barbarossa (maybe just rename him Sovereign Rune Incarnation?)
Boot:
BGs (apparently not drawing at all),
The rest of ShF1/2 PCs (definitely not drawing well),
The rest of ShF1/2 bosses (memorability not really there)
PSII PCs (forgettable, but I could be argued to keep 'em)
-Djinn
Is there any way we might cull some CC, VP1, or FE7? They aren't horrible at drawing, but there's just so much fluff from these games that we wouldn't rank these days. Just some ideas:
CC: A bunch of non-requisite PCs without much impact (if any) on the story.
Doc (splitpath), Funguy, Greco, Grobyc, Janice, Luccia, Macha (splitpath), Mel (splitpath), Mojo, Neo-Fio, Orcha, Orlha, Pierre (splitpath), Skelly, Sneff, Turnip, Van, Zappa
Glenn is also splitpath, but if I'm remembering correctly, he's popular and decent a dueller. Nikki and Korcha are also important to the story, though splitpath PCs.
Starky, Pip, Draggy, Miki, Guile are also nonimportant to the story, but I have this impression that they're popular. Note that while Starky is unimportant to the plot, he's apparently not optional (wow, I never knew). Sprigg is also an auto-recruit.
Garai... I just don't remember him well.
FE7
Dart, Hawkeye, Heath, Isadora, Legault, Renault, Vaida
- all later game pick-ups who don't really stand out in stats or have much effect on the story.
VP1
Gandar, Janus, Jayle, Jun, Lyseria, Nanami, Yumei
- later game einherjar who don't have direct connections to storylines outside of their own. Don't know which, if any, are fan favorites.
Llewelyn and Belenus don't have any connections to storylines outside of their own, but they are fairly standard earlygame pickups.
Shiho and Suo's storylines only connect to eachother's. But I get the impression that Shiho is popular for some reason.
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ATL 4 (Bebedora got a specific mention)
Abstain
Baldur's Gate
Give it shoes made for traversing work zones and snow fields.
Phantasy Star 1
The cast is small enough for me to want to say a blanket keep, but if they have to go, at least have Alis as a FW. The only match she's been allowed in was against someone who eventually upgraded to Godlike.
Phantasy Star 2
Everyone except Rudolf is actually interesting to a point. Boot Rudolf, keep the rest.
Shining Force 1
Keep Max, Domingo, Jogurt, and the bosses. Beat the rest with an iron pole.
Shining Force 2
Abstain.
Barbarossa (Suikoden)
The only logic I've seen to debunk Barbarossa could also be used to mass boot pretty much all the Legaia 2 characters, Yuna, and pretty much any other summoner ever. At least he has direct control over its power. I say keep.
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AtL4: Abstain on this one.
Barbarossa: Is a crappy rank, but I hate seeing people show up in booting topics repeatedly so I'm just going to abstain on the whole mess. Won't be sad to see him go, though.
BGs: Boot all, sadly, and everyone lame enough to not play BG2 gets a boot in the ass.
PS1: Keep. It's a small cast and Alis at the very least should be here to represent it.
PS2: Keep Rolf at the least. Abstain on the rest.
ShF1: Max and Jogurt are sufficient representation for the game. The rest can't win fights that should be theirs in landslide victories. Abstain on Domingo though, since he's sorta nonfail and certainly memorable.
ShF2: Keep Bowie and the bosses. The rest of the PCs aren't worth keeping around if even one of the better ones (Taya) handily loses easy matches, so boot 'em all.
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and all bosses from PSes & ShFs (far more memorable than most of the PCs)
Galam owns nothing in terms of memorability and Geshp.... well, see youthful spirit and his recent run. SF bosses besides Odd Eye and Darksol have been all kinds of awful in the DL since the beginning. I'm fine with retiring everyone on Djinn's list besides Renault (sucks but has memorability in spades) plus I'm in favor of retiring Pip. Screw Pip.
Abstain on any Suiko bootings if it comes up besides Barbarossa.
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Regarding CC, while I won't support wide cuts to a game that draws this well at this time, axing splitpath certainly seems reasonable. We didn't rank FE7 splitpath, and FE7's in the same general ballpark of drawing as CC. I'd keep Glenn, but that still leaves...
Guile
Pierre (strong support here, since he additionally has obscure equips which make him suck less than first appears!)
Nikki
Mel
Doc
Macha
Razzly
Korcha
I -think- that's the list, at least. It's been a while since I've played CC, so someone correct me if I've forgotten anyone
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I'm pretty strongly in favor of tossing Sprigg and Pip for being boring headaches as well. That does cover all the splitpaths of note.
Edit: It's like pulling teeth to get writeups for some of the more obscure/unliked cast members for really big games. Sprigg stands out for this the last time she got in, so I'm happy to see her ass hit the door.
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ATL 4 (Bebedora got a specific mention)- Boot Bebedora (as much as I pain to say that)
Keep Kharg and Darc
Baldur's Gate- Keep Imoen, boot the rest
Phantasy Star 1- Keep Alis, boot the rest
Phantasy Star 2- Keep Rolf, Nei, Rudo and Amy, boot the rest since they arent used as much, Keep Neifirst too, forgot about her.
Shining Force 1- Keep Max and Jogurt, boot the rest
Also add in a boot for Brigandine (except keep a Forgotton warrior (not sure who is the best bet here though). Using the vote draw Season 40- current it was drawing worse than BG and Arc 4, yet never gets mentioned in these topics)
Shining Force 2- Keep Odd Eye and Bowie and boot the rest. (abstain on Peter though, might be talked into keeping him. )
Barbarossa (Suikoden)- Keep, pointless to boot him.
Keep all others mentioned in the topic (CC, Suikoden scrubs, VP scrubs, FE7 scrubs)
Edit: Tales of Eternia: Boot Ras, Chat and Max (Ras is a temp, the other two are optional), Keep the others.
EDIT: Also I dont care about vote draw as long as characters are not getting robbed. Kharg/Imoen isnt getting Robbed, shining force is. Thus the reasoning for my votes. As always, I like having a forgotten warrior since it gives the DL more variety. and Plus, I like many of the low drawing games >_>
Edit yet again: Forgot about Neifirst and added in a keep for her. Also added an abstain on Peter.
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ShF - Boot the vast majority, excepting the mains (Peter & Bowie) + Jogurt + Odd Eye.
ATL4- I voted strongly to keep the mains before because they have character and are interesting heavies. Unfortunately it seems that they end up in an annoying interpretation swamp I didn't know about, as I find allowing the Big Owl / Pyron just bizarre as it seems clearly flavored as a team-ability. That makes me much more meh about keeping them around. Abstain I guess.
Baldur's Gate - Keep Imoen and Minsc. Boot the rest.
Phantasy Star 1 & 2 - I don't think "is a small cast" helps that much, though I suppose everyone who played the game knows the characters that way. But PS1 is not a game that has stood the test of time. Keep FW Alis, boot the rest of PS1. For PS2... uh, not sure. Keep Rolf, Abstain on the rest.
Barbarossa - Whatever? Light boot I guess.
CC - DHE's list seems decent, though I think Guile might have some memorability for the whole not-actually-Magus thing. Sprigg and Pip can also be booted, probably.
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AtL4
Boot Bebedora.
BGs
Keep Imoen/Minsc as FWs, boot the rest.
PS1
Keep Alis, boot the rest.
PS2
Hmmm, I'll say keep in general for now.
Shining Force 1
Keep Max and Jogurt. Abstain on Domingo. Rest can go.
Shining Force 2
Keep Bowie and Odd Eye. Abstain on Peter, Sarah and Slade. Rest can go.
CC
...yeah, I'll back dropping the Elf's list+Pip and Sprigg.
Barbarosa
Keep. Always felt like it was him to me.
Tales of Eternia
Boot to the head.
Brig
Sure, boot it. It's always a voting block for me when it comes up.
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No comments on other goings ons here (my ultimate vote in the matter is not relevant at this time) but thought I'd go through Djinny's stuff. First off, booting Fire Emblem characters is just a bad idea. Every character in the game has their fans and we've often gotten comments about not ranking ENOUGH people. While that matter ultimatedly died down, honestly the only guy Djinn listed that I can't think of either duelling (Dart notably) or fan (in particular Renault) reasons to keep is Hawkeye. Whoo booting one guy from a cast of 25.
VP... if you wanted you could probably cut everyone but Lenneth, Lezard, Arngrim (who hey, have VP2 anyway), Loki and Surt obviously for bosses and... Lucian and Mystina are probably it otherwise. You could probably argue a few other people for comedy value (Shiho, Llewelyn) and Lawfer for overall gameplay and duelling worth, but yeah. Basically any cut beyond those first 7 is somewhat arbitrary, which is the sort of thing that it's best to avoid.
CC now I have a lot to say on, and am probably one of the few people around that bothered to really do everything in the game. I figure someone like that should probably comment here so >.>
First Group is, well, major bosses and Serge that should never ever be booted >.>
Miguel
Lynx
Serge
Garai
Second Group is major PCs that show up multiple times in the plot, even have boss forms, are automatic recruits at some point in the game, and also should probably stay.
Karsh
Marcy
Viper
Zoah
Fargo
Group 3 is special cases who seem like they should be in the above but aren't!
Kid- You wouldn't think you could skip on getting the heroine, but you can. The game beats you over the head about recruiting her of course, so you're bound to see her form some potion of the game even if you don't necessarily get her permanently.
Harle- Leaves around the midgame... but after the point you get L7 techs. Given CC's stat growth and this fact, don't think she should suffer from any temp problems.
Group 4 is required PCs with some plot but that you may or may not actually use in battle, depending. In other words, while everyone got them, they may not remember them well. If CC were in the bottom crust of draw power this would be the place to start making cutoffs, but since it's not they should all stay too.
Grobyc
Orcha
Norris
Radius
Riddel
Group 5 is required PCs with very little plot. They pop up, join, and you never think about them again. If we want to trim down on CC clutter, this is probably a good one.
Leah
Steena
Starky
Sprigg
Group 6 is unmissable optional characters with some token plot. Probably better compared to 4s than 5s.
Zappa- Zappa's a bit better than the others here, even. Being a major shopkeep does that.
Skelly
Luccia
Sneff- At least, I believe he's optional? I honestly forget, but he otherwise fits the 'token plot' bit.
Group 7 is unmissable optional characters with no plot. Scrubs easily forgotten.
Miki
Orlha
Pip
Greco
Janice
Draggy- I will say that Draggy is just... conceptually cool and I would totally object to booting him.
Funguy
Neo-Fio
Turnip
Van
Group 8 is 'obvious' pathsplit characters. That is, various "Save Kid" paths, and other characters that can be missed but that most likely won't be. Some are automatic, others aren't, some have more plot than others, but ultimately they're in the same boat.
Korcha
Irenes
Razzly
Mel
Group 9 is the viper manor pathsplit. You are guaranteed to see one of these three. And completely miss the others.
Guile
Nikki
Pierre
Group 10 is the 'obscure' pathsplit. ie not saving kid, ignoring her before going to viper manor, or otherwise missable permanently very easily.
Doc
Glenn
Poshul- Can be recruited two ways actually, but both are very missable very early.
Leena
Macha
Mojo- Probably the wonkiest requirements in the game. I can't even remember them sitting here.
Group 11... well. They don't fit anywhere else. I'd put them way at the top, but some people have this bias against Punies. Weirdos.
Peppor
Solt
It's worth noting here that Group 10 is really way more interesting than like everyone below Group 4. Well, not Poshul and Doc, but Macha's generally solid, Glenn is arguably the best non-Serge character in the game, and Leena, despite being unintuitive to recruit, is quite memorable anyway due to her position in the plot. As well, it's worth noting that Pierre is the simplest way into Viper Manor and, despite Elfboy's objections about obscure equips making him not suck, the fact is he's a cut above his castmates for being interesting as a dueller. Plus KETCHOP. I mean, KETCHOP.
Anyway, not really advocating anything one way or the other here, just figured that if you were going to put people up on the block you should be systematic about it.
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Boot Baldur's Gate. Keep everything else.
EDIT: Even after all the new additions, this vote stays the same.
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ATL 4 (Bebedora got a specific mention) - Kill
Baldur's Gate - Don't care~
Phantasy Star 1 - Keep, see Elfboy
Phantasy Star 2 - Keep, see Elfboy
Shining Force 1 - Keep Jogurt/Max, kill everything else
Shining Force 2 - Keep Bowie/Peter/Odd Eye/Sarah/Slade, kill everything else
Barbarossa (Suikoden) - Don't care~
I don't care about the scrubs either~
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As always not a fan of booting on principle, but...here are my thoughts, I guess.
ATL 4 (Bebedora got a specific mention) - KEEP KHARG AND DARC. I can see kicking Bebedora...but...eh. Otherwise, keep Kharg and Darc. Bebedora going is not something I'll fight against, but keeping the two main characters (who have done decentl enough) is a no brainer for me
Baldur's Gate - Keep all of them. Imoen and Minsc have done well enough. Not a huge fan of throwing them out
Phantasy Star 1 - Keep them all Well, Alis at worst should stay, but...awesome kitty, heroine, LEGENDARY WARRIOR at worst are well known enough, and Alis at least has some respect
Phantasy Star 2 - Keep them all At worst, keep Rolf, but keeping all of them is ideal - Shir and Kain losing is normal, and Kain losing to Dragons...I can definitely see people not allowing his stuff to hit them. The dragons aren't common encounters in Noah, and a lot of people aren't going to use Kain (most FAQs are dumb and recommend Anna/Amy/Rudo >_>). Also, Kain's skills only work on EVERYONE ONLY IN NOAH - it's...logical people would see Bleu winning there.
Shining Force 1 - Keep them all If you are insistent on booting people? Keep the plot people (Anri, Tao, Max, Darksol, etc.) and Jogurt. These characters aren't great fighters, so losing isn't a huge concern for me. Also, booting Jogurt? What?
Shining Force 2 - Keep them all See above, mostly - keep plot people if you are INSISTENT on booting them (Bowie, bosses, etc.)
Barbarossa (Suikoden) - KEEP Plot important, been in a lot...I understand there are arguments about legality, but...he keeps coming up, and people apparently don't unanimously have the same opinion of that, or he'd be gone by now. If he goes, there are other people I'd be up for kicking based on legality of forms issues >_>
As for Suikoden and CC...not in support. Perhaps if you just wanted to keep plot-important and required characters? Still not in support of culling, though.
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Imoen did not do well, she drew badly and beat one of the worst halves of light of all time to get that finals appearance and upgrade. Beating Chelsea, Suo, and Tai Ho with that mighty 40% drawing is not impressive. BG's have failed beyond belief as a FW idea (Both for drawing and interest). I'd love for it to have worked, but it's orginial purpose has failed and failed, etc. Even the group's biggest fans aren't exactly beating down the door to see it in. We ranked the BGers to give the game and series a chance, and it's not done nearly enough to keep it around.
ATL 4 (Bebedora got a specific mention) - KEEP KHARG AND DARC. I can see kicking Bebedora...but...eh. Otherwise, keep Kharg and Darc. Bebedora going is not something I'll fight against, but keeping the two main characters (who have done decentl enough) is a no brainer for me
Darc's put up a sub 40% drawing total this season.
At this point I don't think rotating out some of the characters who got in one or twice and are forgotten is a bad thing, even from well drawing large cast games. Less 'oh god, that scrub' and struggles to get writeups are always good. Suikoden games are bad about this just due to how many and how many plot PC's there are, but they can't match CC's habit of 'one match and forget' for most of the cast. We're seeing some ugly results when long forgotten fighters are popping back in and failing it up. That is more of SF2's problem though.
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As always I use the last year's worth of votedraw data here. (Amusingly enough, the only game to have no votedraw data AT ALL because nothing has gotten in in over a year is SMRPG...but it has no issues drawing, I would suspect)
Away with the following:
AtL4: Terrible draw, unliked by most.
ToE: Fails worse at draw than the above.
BGs: Utterly atrocious draw.
Brig: Yes, this is getting shot down, but I support booting the DL-worst draw on principle.
Keep anything else for now, mulling invidual characters later. Especially keep Barbarossa, his rune, his power, shows no signs of being possessed at any time surrounding the fight.
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I was bouncing around a post about some of those games myself. Did ToD/Lufia 1/LoL1 end up that much stronger in practice than the rest?
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Retire Shining Force 1&2, aside from Jogurt, Odd Eye, Max, Bowie, Peter (listed in descending order of importance). Watching them fail it up season after season is getting tiresome; consider this a mercy killing of sorts.
Retire Baldur's Gate. I wish this worked out, but fact is that it didn't, it seriously struggles to get both writers and votes and has no hope of improving in the forseeable future.
Keep the Phantasy Stars. They aren't that eggregious on either vote draw or being robbed.
Retire Barbarossa.
Abstain on everything else mentioned, include AtL4. Part of me wants to keep Bebedora just as a joke but eh... objectively not a great idea.
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Irenes, Leena, Poshul, and Mojo are not split path. Grobyc is optional and belongs in group 6 of Cmdr's list. Mel is not an obvious recruit and probably belongs in group 10. I would argue that Miki gets a bigger and more memorable plot scene (the concert with Nikki to wake the Black Dragon) than anyone in group 6.
And I would (sadly) add Lorenta to the list of plot-relevant VP1 duellers since her story is pretty much all about Lezard and Mystina. And how did you forget Jelanda for plot importance? Badrach is also around for unmissable plot.
The reason I wouldn't cull Kashell, Aelia, Grey, Lawfer is because they're all connected to Arngrim, and the largest connected character storyline in the game. Grey and Lawfer also have some fun gameplay reasons to be kept.
I will say that some of the CC scrubs do have something going for them, at least. When it comes to duellers with race-weakness-hitting abilities, CC is one of the most diverse cast in terms of 'speciation' to make those abilities worth existing.
Draggy, Harle have the dragon thing covered (though there's more of these in the DL than most races)
Janice is a demi-human/beastman (another common one, so bootable)
Grobyc is a robot (fairly common, bootable)
Poshul is doglike!
Razzly may be the only ranked fairy in the DL?
Irenes (and VP1 Yumei) are the only mermaids I believe...
Starky's an alien
Funguy, NeoFio, Turnip are the only plant-race duellers besides Peco, Spar, and arguably Venusaur? (oh, maybe Exdeath?)
Skelly's one of the few undead characters in Light, which makes lots of healers/priests happy
Mojo...
Pip... there's enough ranked pokemon (and if not, pokemon has better options than Pip)
Cutting all of Shining Force also severely cuts a large percentage of the DL Elf population. As well as driving the Centaur, Birdman, Dwarf, and Halfling population to extinction.
Think of the delicate DL ecosystem!
-Djinn
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Not a lot of games I feel strongly on this period; We've actually kept abysmal draws down to a halfway decent minimum, so at least they're not massively DL-wrecking.
Problem's more people nodding them for the sake of nodding them at this point, and several of them being big casts. I still can't bring myself to care too strongly. Still, not entirely against some bootin'.
Arc the Lad 4:
Boot Bebedora. Abstain on the rest. A token of the two mains seems reasonably harmless, but the draw is far too bad for me to say just keep them. Bebedora is a ridiculous person to keep in and not...er, any other given person, from all I can see.
Baldur's Gate(s):
...Yeah, boot. Initially I was going to abstain on this, but in addition to the low votes, it also has a terrible 30% win rate despite multiple duellers that are decent or good for their divisions, or at the very least spoilish. I certainly recall some robberies along these lines, too; For better or for worse, it's not a game people seem to remember the finer points of legality on. Oh well, I really do like the token PC RPG too... ._.
Phantasy Star 1:
Eh, it doesn't get in much and it's a small cast. Vote draw will only get worse but isn't absolutely hideous right now or anything. Abstain.
Phantasy Star 2:
Somewhat worst vote draw than PS1, better overall record, more interesting duellers. The only real thing that makes it cleanly worse than PS1 is that it gets in startlingly large amounts for it's vote draw...mostly due to those interesting duellers. Abstain again, don't really care. Keep Rolf regardless.
Barbarossa:
Boot, headache, has been since forever and has never brought anything to the DL. If people would, like, all agree to allow all three heads and not worry about the plot arguments involved, he'd probably be interesting enough to be worth keeping maybe, but that's like saying if people would agree to keep Ryu 5 with or without Wyrm, he'd be rankable; Neither's happening.
Chrono Cross:
Meh, don't care. It's not offensive to me. Abstain on the idea of trimming(obviously if someone moves to boot the whole thing, I'm hitting them with a stick. Bad dog.).
Shining Force 1/2:
Definitely would support a trim, particularly of Shining Force 2(Which hasn't got a GBA remake.); Both games are pretty hopeless on improvement for voting rights, are old, and lack some the S-E popularity of things like Secret of Mana or the whatever the heck the draw is of Phantasy Star 4.
Full boots aren't a good idea to me and I wouldn't support them. I have no particular opinion of who to keep and don't honestly feel like poring over the lists to generate one right now, though. But yeah, trimming is good, especially the "I get more appearances than multiple FFs" Shining Force 2 is that low and that hopeless on improvement...
Brig:
No. I'm on the fence on many of these, and they have much less interesting duellers, have maybe 5% difference in voting, much larger casts, much larger historical amounts of characters getting in, lose as much or more(Brig nearly has a 50% win ratio), and are often harder for me to get interesting writeups for(Admitably that's a subjective addition that doesn't effect my vote...much.), so.
ToE:
Abstain, don't care. Well, I might get behind booting Rassius; Did we need a headachey temp/boss-that-is-heavily-subtraction-defense-reliant-for-his-damage ranked from this kind of a draw? >_> But I dislike him anyways as a dueller, so.
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Not a huge fan of booting in general, but since we're on the subject...
I really think looking at individual matches is a bad idea, or the DL is going to start developing a rotating policy. Most newer games are gonna have worse draws against most older games, because there are more players being introduced to new games then old games. More players for new games and less players for old games means those sort of matches are going to get awkward vote skewing sometimes. To that end, I really wouldn't put too much stock in an individual week unless the overall vote draw shows a decisive trend for the game doing poorly.
Frankly, if we're going to get to culling things, we might as well just get to culling things. Pick a cut-off line for acceptable vote draw and boot everything below that point unless it is brand new/has realistic growth potential. If some of the games being cut have big fans, then cut them down to a FW or two and send the rest of the cast on its merry way. If you intend to cut games that are going to do poorly, you ought to cut games that do poorly period. While I understand the desire for favoritism and internal support... well. Its generally irksome at some level to see something you like cut while other things that are performing worse remain. But, of course, this is a general call.
Which, of course, given my feelings above, leaves me with two realistic options. Either we need to conduct some sort of general site word survey and get the exact numbers for how many voters individual games actually have, or we need to use the overall votedraw to determine whether the game just had a particular bad pairing for some reason or if there is actually a tend indicating that its draw has decreased substantially.
So, yeah. Basically, I support if we intend to boot anything at this juncture, that we take a major analytical look at the whole thing and do it in a systematic manner.
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Irenes, Leena, Poshul, and Mojo are not split path. Grobyc is optional and belongs in group 6 of Cmdr's list. Mel is not an obvious recruit and probably belongs in group 10. I would argue that Miki gets a bigger and more memorable plot scene (the concert with Nikki to wake the Black Dragon) than anyone in group 6.
Bad phrasing on my part. Irenes went in with the "save kid" pathsplit people because you can technically miss her (don't try to help the Demihumans during the whole Zelbess arc), but if you follow normal RPG logic you won't, so I tend to assume your average RPG player did in fact recruit her.
Similarly, Mojo and Poshul are not technically pathsplit but can be missed permanently and are fairly obscure. Leena is pathsplit (do or do not allow Kid to join after Serge's Grave), it's just that one side gives you two characters (Leena and, if you missed Home Poshul, Another Poshul.) while the other gives you Kid one dungeon early.
Grobyc does indeed join automatically. When you're caught in Viper Manor, after his boss fight, he stops you during your escape and tells you that, because you beat him, he'll follow you.
I recall the game beating you to recruit Mel, and at the least triggering her join event automatically (though I do remember it being annoying to finish and you can miss her that way, yes). I could be mistaken? *researches* Ah. After that event you have to go back and talk to her again. Yeah, not terribly obscure as long as you opt into the event.
I always just remember Miki as "Nikki's random minion". I suppose the fact that she's the co-star of the Radical Dreamers event could give her something? That maybe puts her on par with Van and Orlha (who I tend to find memorable as "oh yeah, she has that boss form with ACTUAL EVADE") but still seems a bit less than other since she's hardly the star of that arc.
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No to all. Mrf booting. Mrf it hardcore.
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You know, responses like that piss me off. Why no? Why do you want to keep something like SF2, that has horrible draws and gets robbed when any of them get in? What reason do you have to say no to booting something that we almost certainly wouldn't have ranked if it came in after we got anything resembling quality control?
I'm really tempted to just throw in a boot everything vote to offset this but I'll look at it in more detail later.
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Getting solid feedback from most voters is not going to happen. Most of the talkative voters are on the forums already.
Drawing isn't absolutely everything (See Dario), but it's a big part of it. AtL4/BG/Shining Force have been constantly not good for more a season or a match, it's going on 30-40 seasons for AtL/ShF of them being bad to terrible in every single regard.
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Keep everyone from Chrono Cross, first of all. Yeah, ok, FE7 doesn't have everyone ranked but...well, someone is already ranked and drawing well enough to justify staying, why boot them? CC doesn't have any real problems other than potential blandness for duelers, so yeah. Now, I WOULD be against ranking some of these duelers (true Path splits barring Glenn, whose both popular and genuinely interesting, for example) if CC were to be ranked NOW, but as it stands, I think CC is fine the way it is.
Boot AtL4. Bebedora should have died a while back but like 2 vague "keep her in" statements that were more asides than actual true requests let her barely break the threshold which *punts* Darc has done spectacularly horrible, thus should go. Kharg...I can see keeping him alone, but eh, letting AtL4 stay in at all at this point feels stretching it, and if nothing else, it rids the Big Owl arguments entirely. So yeah, definitely yes to Darc and Bebedora, and merely "Strong support" for retiring Kharg <_<
Shining Force feels like they just exist as filler at this point. They really add very little, and their vote draw doesn't justify keeping them in, especially for a cast that big. CC, Suikos and FEs all typically draw well so them being in with large casts is fine, Shining Force doesn't have this excuse. I could see keeping very few characters like Max, Bowie and a few other popular ones like Peter, Slade, Jogurt, etc.
(for the record, I think we should seriously keep Jogurt in regardless of how ShF is voted. We need to keep the definition of Puny in, no >.>?)
PS1...eh, don't care, guess they can go. They don't contribute much nor really harm anyone at the same time, so I really don't care.
PS2...punt all but Rolf. Its really a worthless cast with a bad draw, but Rolf is at least interesting, and pretty much more memorable than the entire PS2 cast combined, so that has to be worth SOMETHING.
BGs...get rid of them. BG was originally ranked to test something, and its long since past that stage, it really needs to go as a result.
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First, don't boot CC.
Boot BGs.
Boot PS2 except Rolf.
And don't care on everything else.
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I was bouncing around a post about some of those games myself. Did ToD/Lufia 1/LoL1 end up that much stronger in practice than the rest?
Not much, they're in the 47-48% range. I'd have to think about those if they got nominated for booting, but I'm not going to suggest kicking them out.
PS2 is at the 49 range...PS1's only match is against PS4, and only a 55 at that?! Good grief.
SFs draw above 50% on average, for the record.
Changing vote to include Boot PS1.
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I'd be a lot more worried about votedraw if we still had B8 in attendance. As is, I'm not really in the mood to object to seeing stuff booted/retired/whatever, but I would prefer to keep one or two FWs from most if feasible;
Abstain on AtL4. I'd pick out a FW except it sounds like all three have issues.
Keep Imoen/Minsc, abstain on the rest of BGs;
Keep Alis, abstain on the rest of PS1;
Keep Rolf, abstain on the rest of PS2;
Keep Max/Jogurt, abstain on the rest of SF1;
Keep Bowie/Slade/Peter/Odd Eye, abstain on the rest of SF2.
Imoen and the one person even I clearly remember from my short time playing the BGs series, Mains from PS1/2, Max and the Frue Power from SF1, Bowie, one of the more notable gameplay characters with some plot tie-in for those who like that, and one of the most often forced AI-PC members of the team, with Odd Eye as the boss rep.
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Random list of people I'd suggest to keep from ShF1 and ShF2:
All of them!
...ok, seriously...
ShF1:
Max
Ramladu
Kane
Mae
Anri
Mishaela
Tao
Lowe
Jogurt
There people are plot important, initial joins, or Jogurt. Forced joins otherwise:
Bleu
Zylo
Balbaroy
Alef
Other neat people to keep:
Domingo
And...I'd not be adverse to seeing the others leave (well, I wouldn't fight them), but these above I think are decent enough to keep. We lose the failure of GONG, GORT, and GUNTZ (oh noes the g's!), but...eh.
ShF2:
Odd Eye
Geshp
Zeon
Galam
Cameela
Lemon
Bowie
Peter
Zalbard
Slade
Plot people are above. Forced joins are below:
Gerhalt
Jaha
Sarah
Kazin
Chester
Luke
Elric
Rohde
And others:
Sheela
Zynk
Taya
Chaz
May
Kiwi
I would...definitely keep at least the plot people and forced joins. I could see kicking the others, though they are oddly the more interesting ones >_> (May is the best archer, Sheela may be the only MMNK in the game, Taya the 2nd best Sorc, etc.). Oh well.
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ShF1:
Max
Ramladu
Kane
Mae
Anri
Mishaela
Tao
Lowe
Jogurt
There people are plot important, initial joins, or Jogurt. Forced joins otherwise:
Bleu
Zylo
Balbaroy
Alef
Other neat people to keep:
Domingo
OK has convinced me that keeping a small representation of ShF is okay. This covers all the plot important people and the majority of the classes from both ShF1 and 2. The strikethrough ones I'm for booting, along with the rest of ShF1. I don't know why Darksol isn't on OK's list, but he's worth keeping to me.
ShF2 bosses still aren't memorable, so I can't bring myself to support them (I couldn't even support Kane of ShF1 and that has better draw). But go ahead and add Slade and Lemon to my Keep list. Plot importance and relatively unique is in their favor.
ShF2:
Keep Bowie, Peter, Slade, Lemon, Sarah, OddEye
Boot the rest.
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OK has convinced me that keeping a small representation of ShF is okay. This covers all the plot important people and the majority of the classes from both ShF1 and 2. The strikethrough ones I'm for booting, along with the rest of ShF1.
I'm forced to ask: why bother keeping these ShF1 folks if they can't buy a freaking win? "Interesting dueller" or no, "representative of the cast" or not, what's the point in having them around if we know they're just going to lose during eliminations and then vanish for another twenty seasons? I just took a look at the cast's record: the only dueller from the game that's achieved more than one victory is Ramladu. If someone like Tao (who I at least think is a decent Light) can't eke out a win against Rozalin despite heavy board support, then what do the PCs actually bring to the DL? They let crappy fighters get wins they probably shouldn't get, and add nothing to the site (why keep someone who's almost guaranteed to lose whether they deserve to or not?) This is apathy-inducing at best. (Jogurt is obviously an exception since he is the epitome of failure.)
No comment on your ShF2 picks as they seem fairly reasonable to me.
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ATL 4 - Keep
Baldur's Gate - Boot
Phantasy Star 1 - Keep
Phantasy Star 2 - Keep
Shining Force 1 - Boot
Shining Force 2 - Boot
Barbarossa (Suikoden) - Boot
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Regarding Shining Force, I'd certainly be opposed to booting them utterly. They don't draw that badly, and it's an important game, something I feel does have some relevance in a game being ranked. It's the first SRPG many older gamers will have played, the first one seen in North America, and one of the more notable Genesis games. It's still widely available through a gaggle of ports (Virtual Console, various Sega Classics packages), emulation, and in the case of SF1, a remake. The games aren't too highly thought of any more so I have no illusion that a playership spike is going to occur. Characters being robbed is bad, but hardly the end of the world (with a low-drawing game I'd be more concerned about it being the one doing the robbing, though fortunately this is less common), and I'd also use caution about "robs" anyway as some of them can be explained by differing interpretations, etc, or just not respecting a certain aspect of that character (Kazin's loss to Titania is reasonable if you had no luck with Desoul, Tao has SF1R form which loses to most things, poor thing, and if you don't see Taya OHKOing she had a lot of trouble with Yukari).
Now, that said, I am certainly for trimming these types of games - they should not be getting more characters in per season than something like Chrono Trigger, and the only way to ensure that is to tighten the roster - shedding "why the fuck is she ranked?" characters like May, Zynk, Gong, etc. is fine to me. I really don't mind where the line is drawn, but I'll be pretty strongly opposed to booting the very core of either game.
Similarly, the Phantasy Stars. Everything I just said applies, except they are ALREADY trimmed down, being small casts, so I don't see why we're going after them. I am struggling to think of a reason to boot them and spare Tales of Eternia, which draws worse, is notably LESS available, and less significant as representation (just another PSX RPG vs. one of the few available for the Master System/Genesis...). You can throw Brigandine in there too - yes it has some fans, but it's also notably worse even than ToE on draw.
Reading Sage's post reminds me that, at the very least, I'm totally for booting Rassius. Not the kind of thing our third worst draw needs.
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Tao has formsplit though. Remake form loses to Rozalyn. (at least I voted for Rozalyn. Tao's remake form is awful. I also have more Rozy respect than most do here.) I dont see a robbing going on there. I voted to boot her more because of massive formsplit from the remake, not because of vote draw.
SF2 is definitly being Robbed though.
Arc 4 and Baldurs gate as far as I know are not being robbed that much. (I think Chisato deserved to beat Imoen, and I saw debate in Darc vs Akihiko in the stat topic. Kharg was not robbed. Neither was Bebedora. )
For me its not vote draw nesscessarily. (low vote draw shows people are following the rules that they only vote if they know both) its more robbing than anything that I boot.
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Echoing Cid in general here.
I don't think anyone's argued for tossing everyone from the SF series. But can you see a reasonable case for keeping anyone besides Max/Jogurt from SF1? Maybe Ramladu (He of the massive formsplit) and Darksol (Darksol), but the rest I can't see keeping. Domingo maybe, but he's always failed to do much in the DL proper.
ShF2:
Keep Bowie, Peter, Slade, Lemon, Sarah, OddEye
Lemon I'd kick to the curb as well. The non godlikes aren't generating much interest or noms (In fairness to Peter he was in FIT forever, so he just had bad luck getting in) and he has formsplit issues.
Oh yeah, a boot on fire to Ras. Boot Shizel as well.
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OK has convinced me that keeping a small representation of ShF is okay. This covers all the plot important people and the majority of the classes from both ShF1 and 2. The strikethrough ones I'm for booting, along with the rest of ShF1.
I'm forced to ask: why bother keeping these ShF1 folks if they can't buy a freaking win?
Because my primary concern with large casts isn't that they exist, but that they're overrepresented. And more importantly, if games like this were ranked with quality control in place, these are the characters I think would have the best chance of getting in.
Individual reasons:
Max - Main, strong support.
Ramladu - Decently memorable boss, best performance history.
Kane - No. Boot.
Mae - Has some plot. Would be the sole representative of her class for 2 games, and the only centaur in the DL. Enough people remember how the centaur class works that having one in wouldn't be detrimental.
Anri - Closest thing to a female lead, decently powerful.
Mishaela - Most memorable boss to me.
Tao - I just like her, though not exactly strong support here.
Lowe - First PC you meet, sole representative of his class for both ShF games, and only halfling in the DL.
Jogurt -Godlike, strong support.
These people are plot important, initial joins, or Jogurt. Forced joins otherwise:
Bleu - Light needs more Dragons. Massively important to the plot somehow.
Zylo - Nah, I like him, but boot.
Balbaroy - I don't particularly like him, but he would be the sole representative of his class for both ShF games and the only Birdman in the DL. (Oh wait, he and Tibarn)
Alef - No, I didn't even remember she was forced.
Other neat people to keep:
Domingo - Just cool. Not exactly strong support, just some favoritism for duelling worth.
Darksol - Main villain? Middling support. I think he has a better chance in the DL than a lot of the other bosses and all of the PCs.
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The original post should now be updated with all the suggestions so far.
Thoughts on new stuff (That I'll put in my original post too!)
Brig- Keep. Quite decently liked within the DL, self-pandering and such.
CC- Well, I'm 100% down with booting Pip and Sprigg. Both are duelling headaches. Abstain on everyone else. I like elemental weaknesses, but there are so damn many of them! (Of course, if the weaknesses were 50%, I'd vote keep due solely to interesting ness).
Fire Emblem 7- Futile, but I'd boot based on Djinn's list.
ToE- Boot Rassius and Shizel! Rassius has already been gone over. Shizel has form split based on plot, and isn't liked. Abstain on the optionals, keep the main 4.
VP 1- Futile again, but I'll again agree with Djinn's list except keep Yumei.
Of course, I general find S2 to be more overranked than CC, FE 7, and VP 1, and to have blander fodder to boot!
Djinn, I'd note that some of the character you note for SF as having a better chance have already kind of failed.
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Now that a game I know has come up, I'll comment.
I think the FE7 list sounds good enough, with the exception that I'd probably at least keep Dart. Only Berserker from the game, and the only good representative of the class. At least on the boards at GFAQs, he's well regarded as one of the most powerful units, if somewhat impractical to promote unless you toss him an Earth Seal. Plot isn't much, but he's also a forced recruitment, unlike lots of guys we're keeping, and he's plenty strong as a middle - doubles lots of people with high strength and a critical hit bonus and has lots of HP? Probably better than some FE characters in Heavy, IMO.
As far as standing out... aside from the aforementioned smashy smashy, he's also... a somewhat humorously cliche pirate with a few interesting lines.
I'd also like to keep Vaida and Legault for the involvement with Black Fang/Nergal. Legault's claim is vaguely not there, especially because he's one of three assassins. Vaida's boss form probably has better justification for ranking than Piastol and her ilk, IMO, and the PC form is pretty much an extra tank that's RNG-screwage-proof if you really need one.
Fanboyism says not to boot any FE7, but if anyone likes I could put together a list of what I'd trim if I had to drop some characters, based on the criteria we used for FE9. And if we do that, FE8 might deserve a look at (though not as much).
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Suggested Games
Chrono Cross (Lesser used, less connected, later characters; Split-path characters; Pip and Sprigg)
- Keep. Well, you can cull some of the less... interesting ones. Glenn should probably be kept (I think a lot like him), as should Guile, Kid and Serge. Lynx and Harle, too, I suppose. Some bosses would be interesting, too.
Fire Emblem 7 (Lesser used, less connected, later characters)
- Keep all!
Barbarossa (Suikoden)
- Keep! I love this man. :(
Valkyrie Profile (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters)
- Keep Lenneth, Arngrim, Hrist, Silmeria, Alicia, Rufus, Odin, Freya, Loki. Boot the rest.
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Fanboyism says not to boot any FE7, but if anyone likes I could put together a list of what I'd trim if I had to drop some characters, based on the criteria we used for FE9. And if we do that, FE8 might deserve a look at (though not as much).
I'd like to see the list. I just kind of went with Djinn's because it was there, and I may not have the completely ability to remember myself (For example, if I had a choice, someone like Wil stands out as pointless to me, so yeah).
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Fanboyism says not to boot any FE7, but if anyone likes I could put together a list of what I'd trim if I had to drop some characters, based on the criteria we used for FE9. And if we do that, FE8 might deserve a look at (though not as much).
I'd like to see the list. I just kind of went with Djinn's because it was there, and I may not have the completely ability to remember myself (For example, if I had a choice, someone like Wil stands out as pointless to me, so yeah).
I made my list partly based on who I thought had the least fans. To me, someone like Rebecca isn't a good rank as she has practically zero plot. But I know she has fans. And 'fan favorite' holds a lot of weight with FE. I'd be interested in seeing another list myself. One that doesn't take 'fan favorite' into account.
I didn't know Dart had fans, or I probably wouldn't have included him.
Agreed that FE8 could probably use a look, too, though it's not bad.
-Djinn
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Rolf (main, has history), Nei (memorable female lead), Josh Kain (only one with an interesting spoiler skillset vs. Robots),
His skillset works on very few things in the DL. One of the things it works on (Dragons)...he lost to. I'd certainly argue that Hugh, Rudo, and Amy are more interesting than him.
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His skillset works on very few things in the DL. One of the things it works on (Dragons)...he lost to. I'd certainly argue that Hugh, Rudo, and Amy are more interesting than him.
Fair enough, but I personally find very specific spoiling to be really interesting. Especially for a Light. He is definitely my favorite PS2 dueler. I think there's at least one other crazy Josh Kain fan running around the DL. Chime in, whoever you are.
Other stuff:
Brig: Keep. It rarely gets in, doesn't rob, small cast, and a few vocal hard core fans to keep it afloat. This is the perfect example of what an 'inoffensive' less popular ranking idea should be. I want ShF1/2 to resemble this. I'd argue that PS1/2 are already like this except that PS2 gets in fairly often. VH is sort of like this, only with less hard core fans.
ToE: Keep Ried, Keele, Meredy, Farah. Boot Rassius and Shizel. Abstain Chat and Fog.
Of course, I general find S2 to be more overranked than CC, FE 7, and VP 1, and to have blander fodder to boot!
If you made a list of trimmable characters for S1, S2, and -maybe- S3, I would be in support of some culling there.
-Djinn
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Super: Talkativeness issues aside, would a one week hiatus or additional voting category for "What can you vote on?" be that hard or time consuming to deal with? I ask in all seriousness.
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No. People just would not respond. We've tried that before and gotten nothing.
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Alright, if I really had to cull FE7 down a bit... taking characters with either fans or substantial plot... listing anyone I'd consider, not necessarily who I'd vote to boot Because that would likely be no one.
First... bosswise, Nergal is an easy keep; Lundgren is the first halfway decent boss, and main villain of a story arc; Ursula sends even lesser minions after the party for a while, though beating her isn't necessary (Bolting makes her a major target though); Limstella is the closest I'd come to a boss boot, she doesn't stand out much, but she's a presence of some sort for the whole game, and another decent boss.
Legault - His plot is entirely based around sort of connections to more important characters like Nino and Jaffar, and he's probably the third choice for assassin since Matthew is both more present and a bit better stat wise, and Jaffar doesn't need a unique promotion item.
Fiora - Doesn't have her sister's plot connection, and while probably a little better in game isn't as popular or present. Still well used, only boot if we're feeling strict.
Heath - Plot isn't there at all, and while he has some fans, he's generally passed over for being underleveled and having a slow start.
Lowen - Not much plot, far less popular than Sain and Kent, and Marcus is far more noticeable.
Hawkeye - Lol plot, only stand out trait is being a prepromo Berserker with a unique sprite.
Vaida - Boss form is vaguely more noticeable than Piastol and her ilk, except without the plot or being a really cool fight, and being Nergal-powered. PC form is considered useful if you need another tank badly, but unimpressive. Fanboyism makes me want to keep her, but eh.
Wil - Vague Lyn's story plot, but the worst of the three of a much maligned class, and pretty boring to boot.
Bartre - No plot, FE7 Warriors lol. Has fans due to having some of the funnier support convos, at least.
Louise - A tad less plot than her hubby, but still a Sniper. Being vaguely interesting and funny makes her a little less popular than Rebecca.
Dorcas - Bartre, except with a very minor chapter dedicated to himself, in exchange for not having a personality. Also less used than Bartre by the FE7 'elite', such as they are.
Isadora - No plot. Noticeably worse than Marcus. Kinda boring. There are plenty of Paladins already.
Renault - While he is incredibly weak, and his story is difficult to uncover... he's got some interesting plot connections, and while rarely used is pretty well liked by the FE7 community. I'd probably keep him for that, though it's a slim justification.
If we were even more strict, I'd also toss in Priscilla, Erk, Rebecca and Rath, but despite top level opinion on any of their individual power, most first time players get a good bit of use out of them, and Rath has some vague plot connections.
Isadora is probably my favorite boot, and I wouldn't be bothered by Dorcas, Heath, and Hawkeye being dropped.
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Boot Baulder's Gate. Horrible draw, and Imoen was a lucky finals.
Abstain on Shining Force 1 and 2.
Abstain on Phantasy Star 1 and 2.
Keep Brigandine, not GOD-AWFUL vote draw, and inside discussion keeps it afloat.
Keep Barbarossa. I don't buy the whole "it's not him" thing. The Sovereign Rune is a part of Barbarossa, even if it's only embedded in his sword, and it certainly looks as though he morphed willingly. Even if the True Rune went berserk, it must have transformed Barbarossa into the Hydra, seeing as Barbarossa is dying after the defeat of the Hydra.
Plot aside, I don't see him as that generally unrespectable as a boss.
Abstain on Tales of Eternia.
Keep Valkyrie Profile.
Abstain on CC and FE dudes.
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Keep Brigandine, not GOD-AWFUL vote draw
Make whatever other arguments you like, but man. No. Brig has an even worse overall draw than the BGs, even with substantial internal support.
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I really don't see an argument for booting FE7ers. Ok, yeah, there's a lot of them, but the game draws fine, and outside of "OH NO THERE ARE TOO MANY!"...oh come on, Suikos have more ranked than they do, and a lot of Suikoscrubs are even LESS interesting and have LESS of a reason to be ranked. I'm not saying "Boot them!" (though, there are some I wouldn't be opposed to), just saying that there's really no objective reason to snipe at FE7. The fact that people tried to get MORE ranked from this game (but failed) at one point should indicate that the game is fine how it is.
I wouldn't mind seeing ToE go, since the vote draw is just that bad; admittedly, booting ToE while keeping the others looks weird, but flipside, we still don't have ToL ranked (ToV is too new, etc. thus doesn't count), so that's not exactly a good point in its defense.
Brig...I dunno, it feels like it intuitively should stay, but I can't support it worth a damn, objectively. I blame the NDF.
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I'd be fine with just showing Ras and Shizel the door. The PC's are inoffensive.
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If you made a list of trimmable characters for S1, S2, and -maybe- S3, I would be in support of some culling there.
This is the list I came up with
SUIKODEN 1
Yam Koo (Yep, only this one! Everyone else who might be on the list is forced or is one of the major enemies. You could also include Krin, who is kind of spit on decided being forced, and not necessarily memorable in his being forced. Kuromimi might only be forced for one fight, and Milia is forced rather later, but both of them seem fine to me).
SUIKODEN 2
Amada, Chaco, Gabocha, Gengen, Karen, Kinnison, Millie, Rikimaru, Shiro, Simone
(Chaco might be forced, but early a collection of scrubs with almost no plot. Mukumuku could also be included, but my gut reaction is that he has more fans somehow?).
SUIKODEN 3
Alanis, Belle, Gagdet Z, Kenji, Nei, Rody, Sanae, Toppo, Wan Fu
Some Plot but not much/dull: Gau, Reed, Shiba, Wilder
Similar but with Freeze or other notable stats: Dupa, Nicolas
(Left out people who I know have fanbases (aka Mel and Dogs). Otherwise the first part of the list is relatively plotless people who aren't that interesting. You could say Nei is interesting, but not for reasons that translate at all to the DL. The second group has minor plot, but often that plot is "Lackey to someone else or minor member of some group" and they also are bland. Third group is same as the second, minus that Dupa has Freeze and Nicolas has tanking, making them have other dimensions at least.)
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(Chaco might be forced, but early a collection of scrubs with almost no plot. Mukumuku could also be included, but my gut reaction is that he has more fans somehow?)
If we booted Mukumuku, Ciato would morph into the dread Mecha-Ogress and proceed to lay waste to all DLdom as we know it. While entertaining, I suspect this would ultimately be a bad thing.
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She was probably who I was thinking of when I was thinking he had fan(s).
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Hum. I'm not big on killing off games for various reasons, but I've certainly done my share of lobbying for taking some of the crust off Suikoden II (Suikoden III... honestly something like 50 of that cast of 70 would be rankable anyway. For simplicity and symmetry I'd rather rank the entire cast. PS Rank Ruby!). That said... seconding the following from Suikoden II:
Amada, Chaco, Gabocha, Gengen, Karen, Kinnison, Millie, Rikimaru, Simone
Omited from dhyer's list there is Shiro, who despite being scubby by endgame is a good character for a long segment of the game. I think your average player will use him a while. 'sides, he's a wolf! How cool's that!!!
Also supporting Rassius. A competitive Middle boss losing in Light because half the voter base for ToE think's he's worse than Solt... yeah. Between that and the vote draw he'll never win again, ever. No need to keep him around to be subjected to that.
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While I'm not too likely to support any Suiko trimmings (though tolerating a small few is possible), I will say that I particularly oppose Shiro being booted, ever. I'm not the only person who has had him as the freaking kill leader in a playthrough. See CK, basically.
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You know, responses like that piss me off. Why no? Why do you want to keep something like SF2, that has horrible draws and gets robbed when any of them get in? What reason do you have to say no to booting something that we almost certainly wouldn't have ranked if it came in after we got anything resembling quality control?
I'm really tempted to just throw in a boot everything vote to offset this but I'll look at it in more detail later.
Well, in for a penny in for a pound. Anthill's already been kicked over I suppose. Not meant to be personal to you, Yakko or the rest of the DL, but I'm just gonna be honest here.
Because I don't think it's a necessary move. I'm tired of booting in general because I go out of my way to play games that have low vote/writer totals to boost things for the DL. To this effect, I've ended up devoting the first game I start every year to a randomly Hatbotted low vote drawer. Guess what it's been the last couple years? Persona 2. Arc the Lad 4. Each one booted in the middle of playing it. Thank god Vandal Hearts isn't on the cusp yet. I don't get to that many games a year, so it's a pretty big time investment I make on behalf of the DL. Why? A long time ago I was told that if I wanted to see games stay in I needed to play more, write more and get other people to play more. I'm tired of putting my money where my mouth is and still seeing games get booted.
I've always thought the allure of the DL was the "Hey, look how many games are represented! This is interesting!" and seeing how many different characters there were. Shrinking that pool never made sense to me, nor has the obsessive compulsion to having booting. In the name of what? Vote totals?
Vote totals, frankly, mean dick at this point, for two reasons. The first is that with the withdraw of Board 8, we know we're pretty much back to doing this for ourselves. And thats fine with me, honestly. We've also got mostly conjecture that booting helps vote totals at all. We had the same trends pretty much the whole time, with a pretty much bell curve where the Board 8 votes came and went. The vote totals have dropped, but it's not because people are being driven away by OMGPS1! The percentages are kind of misleading, because outside of and even including the Board 8 boom where things were kind of unpredictable, the slow growth never jumped or fell after a booting, and booting sure as hell had no effect on the influx of votes for Board 8. I've made this argument time and again, but I always get talked down to about stuff like VOTE TOTALS AND PERCENTAGES ARE SO MEANINGFUL! The only argument on this front thats mattered to me is that games tend to get robbed, but I guess I'd rather them be in and be robbed than have them not be in at all.
The second is, well, Brig would've been out a long time ago if it were vote totals. I'm tired of the hypocracy that always goes behind this. It's never objective, it's just the same old pet projects and playing favorites. I honestly don't expect it to be anything but that, but people always hide behind shit like vote totals. We're trying to run it like we're some sort of efficient business and not a mostly social site. Booting doesn't do shit except get people riled up, and that goes against the whole point of a social site. This is why I've just in general flat voted no boot with no argument the last two times there was a boot topic. It's the same argument over and over.
I also realize that yes, I'm contradicting my argument slightly in both that if the DL is more for us by us now, then it's fine for us to decide how it's run more than ever, and that I have a slightly joblike approach to how I choose the games I play in regards to the DL. But at this point, I'm laying my cards out on the table.
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It's a pipe dream, but... I vote boot to everyone on Ultradude's FE7 list. Legault, Fiora, Heath, Lowen, Vaida, Hawkeye, Wil, Louise, Dorcas, Isadora, Renault, *Priscilla, *Ursula. Abstain on Bartre due to his write up potential. (* minor additions to Ultra's list)
Erk is going to be the most accessible of the FE7 mages, so keep him. Rebecca and Rath are both marriage options for the mains, so I suppose they have some plot importance and are decent duelists. Keep. Keep the rest of the currently ranked options, too.
Dhyer's lists
S1: Boot Yam Koo.
S2: Boot Amada, Gabocha, Gengen, Karen, Kinnison, Millie, Rikimaru, Simone. Abstain Shiro. Keep Chaco, Mukumuku.
S3: Boot Alanis, Kenji, Sanae, Toppo, Wan Fu, Gau, Reed, Shiba, Wilder, *Rhett, Dupa, Nicolas. Abstain Nei, Belle. Keep Gadget Z (just feels right), Rody (awesome joke Light, has fans)
-Djinn
"I'm glad we had this talk."
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*Essay*
You know what? Thank you Soppy. You've inspired my rebellion against most of this booting.
Also, in advance, flat out 'no' to booting FE7 stuff at the moment.
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(To Sopko, specifically, before I get into my general argument: if booting exists (and it does), then if you play a game that is on the cusp of being booted, you really have little to complain about if the game is booted as or shortly after you play it; in fact, you're kinda asking for it. If a game is probelmatic enough to be booted, chances are one person playing it isn't going to help much.)
Okay, look. It's all well and good to say "shrinking the roster makes no sense", but hold up for a moment. Let's take that idea and follow it to its logical conclusion. If the allure of the DL is indeed how many games are represented, then why wouldn't we just rank as much as possible? After all, by saying no to booting you are also saying there is no such thing as a bad rank. We could do this.
If we wanted to destroy the DL.
Exhibit A: Best of the Not Ranked. I will be quite frank about my opinion here: NR sucked and I don't miss it at all. Why? Because it's simply NOT FUN to barely be able to vote on things. Unless you've played 300 RPGs like Niu, then a pool that broad is, due to the fact that even a single dueller you can't vote on disqualifies your voting on a match, going to create severe voting issues. Note that the effect is quadratic; doubling the number of duellers you can't vote on (making some simplifying assumptions) creates four times as many matches you can't vote on, and that doubling happens pretty fast as you rank more and more obscure RPGs.
And all that non-voting is very unhealthy for a social site. Go back, and look at some Not Ranked season topics. Notice anything missing? Why yes, you may notice a distinct lack of discussion on the vast majority of matches, certainly far less than the active DL season topics. When far fewer people can vote on a match, there's much less potential for discussion of the match, and discussion of a match is the site's reason to exist. Without that, it descends into little more than a popularity contest.
Okay, so, ending the tangent of "ranking everything is extremely stupid", we get to booting. How do these connect? Pretty simple. Having accepted we are not ranking everything, it follows that we must have standards for what is rankable. While there are several standards for ranking (plot relevance, dueller memorability), it's hard to argue with "People can vote on this" as one of the single biggest criteria. I think we can all accept this, right? This ties into my earlier comments: creating more matches that few people can vote on is unhealthy for the site, and you do this by ranking poorly-played games.
Okay, so, how do we know if people can vote on something before ranking? The answer: we don't. We can guess through a variety of means, and those guesses are pretty accurate, usually, but it's impossible to know for sure until we start seeing some matches in practice and looking at, yes, PERCENTAGES.
Booting, then, is where we behave like adults and admit that, yes, we made a mistake. We shouldn't have ranked ____. Correcting that mistake is healthy for the DL. The sheer ABILITY to make mistakes is healthy for the DL. It means that we can experiment by ranking shaky ideas and see how they turn out. WA4, somewhat unbelievably in hindsight, got some opposition when it was up for ranking, as people pointed to its sales numbers and suggested it would fail. As we know, it was a great success; the knowledge that booting existed had it failed miserably was a safeguard that helped it get ranked. On the other hand, Baldur's Gate 2 was another very reasonable experiment - people honestly believed that there might be many casuals who had played the respectably-selling game, or that we'd attract more PCRPG fans to the DL. Neither happened, the game flopped, so we could boot it without permanently damaging the DL.
I look at the current ranking topic. I see Mana Khemia, I see Wild Arms 5, I see MMXCM. There's no Dragon Quest 8 in the bunch. Any of these games could end up failing miserably. I don't consider the chance negligible for any one of them (the odds of extreme failure are slim, granted). If we couldn't boot, I would start no-voting all of them, and many other new ranking ideas. I assure you I would not be alone. This would be bad for the DL.
Booting has a further purpose. That is to account for shifts in the DL votership and general opinion. When we first ranked things back in Contenders days, Nall and Ruby were good enough to be ranked; we booted them as opinion shifted to the non-consideration of clearly defined battle forms. General Leo was ranked and even enjoyed some success, but 30 seasons later his battle form was considered too borderline plot-ridden and unscalable to be suited to the DL. And finally, games like Arc the Lad 4 may have enjoyed adequate votership in the early days of the DL, but as more and more new voters came along who hadn't played it, it started to struggle more and more to meet the criteria of rankability. The world is not static, so a booting mechanic is needed to address changes.
Whether you want to boot many characters or few or even none at the moment, the mechanic of booting is one that is very necessary for the DL to continue functioning. This is true whether you see it as a business or as a social site (and I agree that you should see it as the latter). It allows criteria of rankability to be upheld even after a game is ranked, to correct mistakes, and to adapt to changing times.
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Rolf (main, has history), Nei (memorable female lead), Josh Kain (only one with an interesting spoiler skillset vs. Robots),
His skillset works on very few things in the DL. One of the things it works on (Dragons)...he lost to. I'd certainly argue that Hugh, Rudo, and Amy are more interesting than him.
As far as I remember, it only works on dragons found in the areas of the game where it works on everything full stop. That may be the only places where dragons are found, but that is besides the point - there are a number of ways of looking at it. A) It's a bug, B) The dragons are mechanical, C) Machinery techniques work on dragons for some reason. Presumably others. I know that I'm firmly in the B) camp since from memory I went looking around and found that all the monsters in those areas were set as both biological and mechanical, but most people haven't done that sort of thing (and I seem to remember some people completely discount that sort of thing full stop).
His attacks work on the wizard/mage/etc type enemies in those areas too, but I don't remember any hype for his attacks working against Palom.
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Generally seconding all of NEB's thoughts. Booting is good because we make ranking mistakes or games just degrade over time and their DL positions become untenable. In theory, it would be great if were able to avoid all bootings, but in order to keep things healthy somtimes things have to go. Now, everyone has different ranking and booting criteria. I never strongly looked at the numbers, but I more paid attention to whether or not things could win when they should (and secondarily if games had a large of similar, not very important characters).
Granted, while SF can get wins (Over Connie and VP Mages!) and can come really close to beating people who they often have somewhat clean victories over, I personally don't see the enjoyment of seeing this game basically lose endlessly (Even worse, it's not the fodder losing, it's the stronger, more memorable duellers!). Since if the site really is about pleasing ourselves, does anyone really get a lot of enjoyment in saying Taya getting embarrassed again? Not to mention that while booting may not help voting totals, it would help people be able to vote on more, which in turn probably means they'll have more fun.
Sopko, you say we aren't being objective, but drawing 35% and kind of getting robbed? After a history of getting robbed? What objectively makes this dueller a strong case for staying in? I've voted for things I like to go now, and I've done it before too. Considering that the only game that seems likely to be fully booted this time is Baldur's Gate (Which granted, I may be the only person there with a keep vote and not saying keep all to everything), basically everything is still going to have some representation.
Another advantage to shrinking the pool is just better turnover. At this point, I know it's not going to do much given that H/M/L all are over 300 duellers by now, but I would then think if there was extra fodder, culling it would be better! (And hence why I strongly like culling games like FE 7/Suikodens/even CC. Between multiple sequels, you just end up with so many very similar characters who end up feeling very redundant, and it can feel like an overload. When some of them are kind of pale imitations of others, and have little plot, seems like they are already represented by others better).
On Josh...well, I believe those are weird demonic undead mages. However, I've certainly considered letting his stuff hit everything since it does hit all the last randoms, I believe? Of course, it seemed like consensus was that Josh could hit dragons, and even with the consensus he still failed. If he can hit only robots...well, does Light even have a single one? Uh...I guess Wisemen...were not completely unrobotic. Either way, he's an odd person to single out under the assumption that he can spoil people, because he'll never face any of them.
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Drawing 35% against another not-as-commonly-played game by DL internal standards. Granted, the win's odd, but perhaps there was respect for Yukari's MDef there or something else.
I'm staying out of this argument, vote's remaining unchanged. My only major comment is that the theory is sound, NEB, but on the flipside doing this sort of thing always has negative/sour grapes repercussions amongst fans, whether robbed or not, whether merited or not, and at a point where the DL's mostly insular you get to choose which downside you want. I hold no grief with either side and I expect you to have made up your mind, proven by writing that post, but.
Whatever happens, happens.
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Sopko's stuff:
I have absolutely no problem with retiring Brig at this point, and I don't think many of the other fans do. It's never really gotten robbed *MuttermutterRennac hype* and did okay enough during the peak of vote drawing, but changing up the games we have on site and retiring some of the older ones isn't a bad thing. I'd support removing say a Lufia 1 style game, which has never struggled, just because at this point it's old and narrowing our focus a bit's a good thing. If you can think of another game that's been kept in spite of bad drawing, by all means say so.
(You would be right that Dragon Quest 4 got kept in spite of not winning/doing well, but it had an announced and hype S-E remake that unremarkably made the game a solid DL title again. That was just a matter of waiting for it come out.)
I like the idea of rotating games and things we have in the site. Next season will be season 50, this is not a new site any more. If we can look at a game and see it is: Constantly being bad at drawing/getting interest/getting robbed, removing it isn't a bad thing at all. BG was ranked specifically with the intention (I should know, I helped whip up interest/kick people into the game) of retiring it if it didn't work. It sadly hasn't no matter how many tries we've given it.
Keeping games/people in that people don't care about and don't draw doesn't make the site look better, it's just frustrating. Geshp's SF2's best dueller and he has been a running joke for 40 seasons now because he can't buy a win. Removing scrubs from even decent titles like CC (Something I wasn't in favor of doing before) just helps prevent writer burnout. Some of the hardest people to cover on updates are of course really obscure titles and cast members from large games no one cares about. Sprigg, come on down. We are keeping some of SF1/2 without a doubt, just what stays is up in the air. More to the point, there's no way we can have open rankings like we do and not retire things. Cranbud's roster was close to half the size of ours and he controlled what got in. He could have pet FW and oddball ideas that never get in because he could set up the fields. We can't, and have to have a little more roster control.
Exhibit A: Best of the Not Ranked.
NR was great in the first several board seasons largely because everyone could vote on it. The games that did well (FE and SO3) got ranked, along with several longstanding unranked games that did really well. FF1, PKMN, etc. I lost interest in it right as we really started ranking in en mass a lot of games, or when it went on site. Perfect timing there. Oh well.
I'm staying out of this argument, vote's remaining unchanged. My only major comment is that the theory is sound, NEB, but on the flipside doing this sort of thing always has negative/sour grapes repercussions amongst fans, whether robbed or not, whether merited or not, and at a point where the DL's mostly insular you get to choose which downside you want. I hold no grief with either side and I expect you to have made up your mind, proven by writing that post, but.
Sour grapes do happen pretty much no matter what with any ranking/booting period. I don't regret any of the things we've retired. Do you really think that Guido and some of the other awful ideas we've had ranked were a good thing for the site? The DL is better off for the vast majority of the things we've removed being gone.
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Actually, I feel Elfboy missed a vital point, and one that, indeed, is very important to counter a point.
The point is pretty simple.
"We're down to internals anyways. What does it matter?"
Elfboy sorta glanced on this point, but not really a solid blow; As NR showed, internals can get stuck on voting.
Easily. NR and main DL combined broke...what, over 150 games? Averaging 40 hours?
C'mon, not everyone can reasonably hit that.
But that's really secondary to my main point.
You see, if we're down to just internals, there's another thing to point out. If we're down to just pleasing ourselves-something I honestly kinda dislike, it rules out the potential for having new people interested potentially, but assuming this...
...Why not trim the roster down to something more interesting to a majority and make intelligent rankings of characters with good writeup potential and interesting duelling options, rather than just inanely ranking as much as possible 'cause we can? And then rank new people who are like the good stuff I just said.
And if this isn't a bad idea...then we'd have to cut stuff that was as early as the RPGP, kept by a group of people that could entirely control the content of who got in, when they got in, and who they face, if they wished-content that worked for the RPGP just may not work for us, not if you want to keep any standards of enjoyment.
So if you want to work for a standard for the DL that doesn't care so much about voting, pkease, please, please at least care about something besides shiny numbers of people ranked. Large numbers aren't a good reason to do things, and we're not hurting any fictional characters feelings here.
Game representation is one thing, but numbers of people could easily be jacked up by ranking notable random encounters. This is a terrible idea. I can spell out why if it's not obvious. >_>
I'm not saying this is the only way to think about this or anything, but please, we need to stop thinking about why not to boot things, but why to. I can see a logic saying that we shouldn't boot full games ever(I can, in fact, see it just by looking up at Soppy's post. >_>), but that logic blurs to uselessness when it comes to partial boots.
In fact, that argument literally had...no real relevance to this overall, unless we're booting a full game that I missed(PS1 maybe? We probably should keep Alis at least, but I don't care too much personally.). Certainly not a majority of what's up. I'm not trying to belittle it, just sayin'.
(Ironic that I got into this, as I think we may well be considering booting too much this period, to judge the general comments in this topic. I, for one, would much rather see a limited selection of the more interesting Shining Force 2 characters get left rather than slashing them down to three or so. But I don't care strongly about it, and evidently others do. I'd rather let them make the decision.)
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On Josh...well, I believe those are weird demonic undead mages. However, I've certainly considered letting his stuff hit everything since it does hit all the last randoms, I believe? Of course, it seemed like consensus was that Josh could hit dragons, and even with the consensus he still failed. If he can hit only robots...well, does Light even have a single one? Uh...I guess Wisemen...were not completely unrobotic. Either way, he's an odd person to single out under the assumption that he can spoil people, because he'll never face any of them.
There's Gadget Z!~
Also, I would throw someone using a robot into his range of destruction, so XG characters like Dominia, Kelvena, or someone like WA4 Tony (who upgraded, damn!).
Of note: In Middle, there are a quite a few more robots (Thursday, Robo, Grobyc, Aigis) and mechanical-reliant-types (Lucca, Barret, Lexis Shaia, Seraphita, SHION!, G1 Mio if you stretch...) who might show up in downgrade pools that he could spoil.
His attacks work on the wizard/mage/etc type enemies in those areas too, but I don't remember any hype for his attacks working against Palom.
This makes me think of Wild ARMs' series Metal Demons. So any of those in Light are in trouble.
So yeah... not much he can hit specifically that I can think of... But this just means we need more ranked Robots, not fewer specific spoilers. Oddly enough, if someone has a specific plant-hitting weakness, they'd be able to make decent use of it in Light thanks to CC and BoF2/3... Only ones I can think who can even get something like this are VP2 characters (Weedwhacker I think it's called?).
-Djinn
EDIT!
Game representation is one thing, but numbers of people could easily be jacked up by ranking notable random encounters. This is a terrible idea. I can spell out why if it's not obvious. >_>
Hell yeah, I want more Slimes, Rabites, and Igglanova ranked.
(Ironic that I got into this, as I think we may well be considering booting too much this period, to judge the general comments in this topic. I, for one, would much rather see a limited selection of the more interesting Shining Force 2 characters get left rather than slashing them down to three or so. But I don't care strongly about it, and evidently others do. I'd rather let them make the decision.)
I don't think that necessarily everything I'm considering culling should be gone all at once. Right now, the large-cast games are still drawing well, at least... even if getting write-ups for them are difficult, or if a lot of them feel like pale imitators of good/plot-important duellers.
But I personally feel that having a reasonably large number of series ranked with minimal representation makes for more interesting duels as it cuts down on the amount of repetitive duellers. (So yes, I'm a fan of the FW type things). I don't think it would have been bad to keep, say, PS3 Mieu, or TA Meis. And I certainly don't mind keeping a BGs FW either. Variety of duellers is nice, even if I can't always vote on them. But if there's only say, 3 characters from a game ranked that I've never played, I don't worry about not being able to vote in that particular match. But I still enjoy reading other posters' comments on the match, the write-up for that match, and thanks to stat topics, I can still think about how I would vote on the match if I -did- have voting rights. This has also inspired me to play a minimally-ranked game on at least one occasion (Legend of Legaia, which I ended up massively enjoying picking apart the mechanics as I played).
EDIT: Thought of another example of this: Brigandine.
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Igglanova and Black Rabite are bosses(Iggy's just one twice.), and Slime has a PC form. In DQ5. Which could be up for ranking in the next half dozen months.
>_>
<_<
I wouldn't mind ranking them conceptually...
(Actually, I genuinely hope to push for Slime's ranking, as it's a very easily accessed PC that makes for an interesting dueller on top of, er, being Slime, but.)
This is off on a tangent though, but it does somewhat highlight my point. The more notable random encounters tend to be quasi-randoms or have some weird boss form or something.
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Addendum: Boot Tales of Eternia as well. Seems like there's only support for getting rid of the bosses, but I wouldn't mind seeing it all go. The only thing that might make it better is if it got a re-release and retranslation in the US, which is probably doubtful.
Re booting theory: Allow me to say that conceptually I actually agree with Hunter Sopko. Bootings are pretty harsh, so ideally it would never be necessary. The real culprit is the DL's nomination system for setting up seasons. This is opening up ANOTHER can of worms, I know, but Sage's point about the RPGP being able to carefully pick and arrange matches is a huge difference. In a system like that, it'd be easy to slowly amp down the level of declining games such that Shining Force got in once every six seasons or thereabouts as a cute throwback to its fans. However, there's nothing stopping randomness from picking a bunch of SF noms several seasons in a row, like has happened recently, and people nominate it. I'm not a huge fan of Lufia 1 in the DL as well, but nobody nominates it, so it's not a big deal. If Lufia 1 was flooding every season, under the current regime where there's no way to stop it from getting nominated, it'd unfortunately need to be booted. Ugh, basically; it's hard to enforce the reasonable level lesser known games should get in such that they won't cause problems.
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First, don't boot CC.
Boot BGs.
Boot PS2 except Rolf.
And don't care on everything else.
I think I agree with AI1, here. (No, not Atellier Iris)
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Okay, look. It's all well and good to say "shrinking the roster makes no sense", but hold up for a moment. Let's take that idea and follow it to its logical conclusion. If the allure of the DL is indeed how many games are represented, then why wouldn't we just rank as much as possible? After all, by saying no to booting you are also saying there is no such thing as a bad rank. We could do this.
If we wanted to destroy the DL.
No, it's not the logical extension, especially that last part. It's taking it to an extreme mixed with a general strawman argument. No, it's not going to destroy the DL. And I never mentioned at all that we should rank everything. We just happen to have a different definition of where the line is when it comes to staying in the DL.
I see your point that I kind of bring it on myself by playing games that are on the cusp, but... it's still frustrating, especially when people would rather boot shit than play those games. I couldn't really put it this way before because most of the people I would level it at HAVE played them. I just think it's kind of a fatalistic argument to say "You bring it on yourself, one man can't make a difference" when... for the writer's corps at least it DOES make a huge difference to have another one.
Exhibit A: Best of the Not Ranked. I will be quite frank about my opinion here: NR sucked and I don't miss it at all. Why? Because it's simply NOT FUN to barely be able to vote on things. Unless you've played 300 RPGs like Niu, then a pool that broad is, due to the fact that even a single dueller you can't vote on disqualifies your voting on a match, going to create severe voting issues. Note that the effect is quadratic; doubling the number of duellers you can't vote on (making some simplifying assumptions) creates four times as many matches you can't vote on, and that doubling happens pretty fast as you rank more and more obscure RPGs.
And all that non-voting is very unhealthy for a social site. Go back, and look at some Not Ranked season topics. Notice anything missing? Why yes, you may notice a distinct lack of discussion on the vast majority of matches, certainly far less than the active DL season topics. When far fewer people can vote on a match, there's much less potential for discussion of the match, and discussion of a match is the site's reason to exist. Without that, it descends into little more than a popularity contest.
An extension of the same strawman argument. We went to a fairly large extreme for NR when it went on site, as Super pointed out. We could have set it up better, though the argument could be made that it would have gotten old fast if we really limited the games in it. Putting every last obscure game in there was a bit of a mistake, though it still interested me and accomplished it's goal even if it didn't garner a lot of votes. I honestly think as much as the obscure factor that it was on it's own subsection of the site and was mostly an internal thing that it never took off. But it does lead me to another point I'd like to make.
I sometimes wonder if I'm the only one who doesn't mind even if I can't vote on anything. It doesn't bother me in the least. I don't consider the DL any less fun, but then again, it's more due to the community than the arena that I come here. Nonetheless, it more makes me go "Hey, I should play that game!" than "Man, fuck this. I'm not having fun." I'm talking about the DL proper more than NR for this, since I've never encountered a week where I couldn't vote on anything (though sometimes when newly ranked games flood in, I've come close). It's sometimes funny that usually when a game like ToE or AtL4 gets in, it ends up facing a new game like P3 or FE9 that I haven't played yet and I end up not being able to vote on it.
I think we do a fine job of keeping things relevent to new people with new ranks. I'm not completely blowing them off, but the kind of people who are going to be put off by the occasional old game aren't usually the type to mesh with the group anyway, so being smart with new ranks will do fine for drawing people in. I don't think booting really helps with this, though it may not really hurt it either to be perfectly honest. My argument is that it's pointless rather than it hurts the DL, after all.
I'd support removing say a Lufia 1 style game, which has never struggled, just because at this point it's old and narrowing our focus a bit's a good thing.
While I don't really consider this a major point in itself, I can expand this to the larger argument. I'm just gonna say that installing a revolving door for old stuff that is still viable to "make room" for a new rank is sort of pointless since there's no reason to boot stuff if it's viable just because it's old. It's just progress for progress' sake and accomplishes no real goal if the game in question can still draw. Again though, this is in particular fairly minor point since I don't really see anyone getting behind this, but it can be applied to the argument at large since if you have a different idea of what is still viable or not it becomes very relevent.
I don't really agree with Dhyer in terms of the large cast games. I can see his point, but I can't get behind it. I respect it a bit more coming from him, though, since he does a lot of writing.
In terms of characters like General Leo and Necron, thats a different kind of argument entirely. That's a legality issue, not a popularity issue, and I do and have supported boots like this. I disagreed on Leo, to be fair, but Necron, Dario and the like were perfectly legitimate.
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I'll just go straight to the jugular here:
Boot Barbarossa, Tales of Eternia (or, in case it doesn't pan out, Rassius and Shizel at the very least) and BGs. I'd also support culling Bebedora/Kharg/Darc, and am much more amenable to further trimmings/bootings that make sense, but we can't just tackle it all on a single season. As for Freya, toss in an Abstain.
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That's more just my own opinion. What I'd like to do is say completely redo the roster from scratch with a much smaller pool of games/fighters, and do a very large pool of FWs (With a cap on how many could get in any one season). That won't ever happen, but it's still a thought.
I sometimes wonder if I'm the only one who doesn't mind even if I can't vote on anything. It doesn't bother me in the least. I don't consider the DL any less fun, but then again, it's more due to the community than the arena that I come here. Nonetheless, it more makes me go "Hey, I should play that game!" than "Man, fuck this. I'm not having fun." I'm talking about the DL proper more than NR for this, since I've never encountered a week where I couldn't vote on anything (though sometimes when newly ranked games flood in, I've come close). It's sometimes funny that usually when a game like ToE or AtL4 gets in, it ends up facing a new game like P3 or FE9 that I haven't played yet and I end up not being able to vote on it.
Not voting means less fan interest and it's harder to get writeups/the work done. People won't stick around if they can't vote, which is why we of course have fairly strict ranking requrements. Even with those we still have some 70 odd games and 1000+ fighters in. If a game can't win no matter what, the game should not be in the DL.
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No, it's not the logical extension, especially that last part. It's taking it to an extreme mixed with a general strawman argument. No, it's not going to destroy the DL. And I never mentioned at all that we should rank everything. We just happen to have a different definition of where the line is when it comes to staying in the DL.
If you're going to attack my argument, you need to explain why it's bad. Otherwise all I can say in response to your strawman allegation is "no it's not" and we get nowhere.
We have a different line for what deserves to be in the DL. I'm fine with this. Note that nowhere in my argument did I state an objective location for that line. If your line falls in such a place that Persona 2 is worth being in the DL, then I don't have a problem with that. (I think you're wrong, of course, but it's not an inherently flawed viewpoint.)
My point in that paragraph was only that the line does exist. You just admitted as much. And as long as that line exists, a game that is ranked can cross over to the wrong side of it (or have been there all along, we just didn't know before ranking it). This is where booting is appropriate.
And yes, if we completely removed the line, it -would- destroy the arena component of the DL. (I should have added that qualifier; the social part would survive even if the tourny shut down.)
Well, the other option is, of course, as Snowfire alluded to, closed season construction. But I'm not willing to give up open noms, one of the DL's coolest features. In order for the system to work, though, we have to keep what is nommable, acceptable.
I sometimes wonder if I'm the only one who doesn't mind even if I can't vote on anything. It doesn't bother me in the least.
Cool. However, surely you can understand why many people dislike being unable to vote? Any why it's a bad thing if a lot of people can't? I'll restate it: quite apart from the desire to vote and participate, there's the fact that the DL arena interest is maintained by people discussing and debating matches, something which is extremely difficult when only a third of voters can vote on a match.
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Regardless of whether anything gets booted this season or not, would it be possible to build a 'Retired roster' section under the Records section of the main site so that previous fighters' history would be easily accessible? I know the records are still in the database, but they're hard to find without a lot of digging.
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Posting to say I am not swinging in on this, but I was asked to look over the way arguments are going, so looking at it. Meh both sides have fair arguments this time (what how? When did DL start having logical fucking arguments in ranking/booting and why did you have to wait for me to stop taking part to do it? Trying to pummel sense into people season after season to at least logically think about their choices burnt me out on caring).
To be frank, at the state of the DL last time we booted, I thought we had pretty much hit the point that was acceptable to me. Brig wasn't great, but AtL4 was pretty much the threshold for fail I was prepared to trim. I have no idea about the current internal state though. SF2 might be below that fail threshold now.
I do agree that the DL has kind of hit the state though that it should only be done for the internal group now. I would be gauging how good and bad it is based on that.
If stuff is being robbed and we are almost entirely functioning off of internal staff votes then that is an ENTIRELY seperate problem to look at unless every single external voter we have votes on everything then we have some internal voters that just may have to think about their approach to how they are voting even. I don't even know how out and out robs we are talking though of course, becauuuse you guys stopped making me care.
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That's more just my own opinion. What I'd like to do is say completely redo the roster from scratch with a much smaller pool of games/fighters, and do a very large pool of FWs (With a cap on how many could get in any one season). That won't ever happen, but it's still a thought.
I'm curious what this pool would look like. Could make a good board tournament pool. Something that tournaments like Dhyer's Proving Grounds, Cmdr's Tourney of Interest, or your List tournament could pull from that would make voting there easier.
...I realize that it might be kind of long (and off-topic in this thread), but that would be an awesome thing to read/discuss/brainstorm over.
-Djinn
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Gref: We're averaging 80 votes a week. We'll always have some level of casual voters, and the fact that SF2 can't overcome them and is tanknig across the board is a bad sign. I was pretty much the only board vote for Rozalin.
Closed season construction would by and large be horrible for the DL. We did it all of once, and that was a season 7 emergency. Funnily enough, one of the people I used for that was Odd Eye.
Djinn: Nah, fits in here well enough. The very rough idea is to shrink the core DL by a large margin while keeping a large pool of games. Something like S2/CC would be trimmed to an extent, and several of the lower tier draws like Lufia 1 would go down to FW status. You c ould also add the odd character or boss who fits the format now or was missed. A WA4 boss would work well enough here as an example. It'd be a lot of roster fine tuning.
You then have a large (50+) pool of characters from various games with the FW label that BCB used.
Say:
FW_Kharg (Arc the Lad 4)
FW_Nate (Though funnily enough, P1's a bad idea to drop down to FW status for this with the remake coming in theory)
FW_Yuri (Tales of Vesperia)
FW_Jack (Radiata Stories)
FW_Chopin (Eternal Sonata)
FW_Alicia (Valkyria Chronicals)
It'd be a mix of new games and older titles. We could pretty harmlessly stick in a lot of games that way while keeping the core roster good. The format would limit any kind of floods for FWs. And if one bombs, it's less important since with a large draw of FWs of old favorites and new titles to draw from, it'll be easy to let some games sink into obscurity. Can remove really bad offenders as at worst.
In theory I would like to do a universe reboot and start from scratch with that in terms of rankings/seasons as well (While keeping the history). Set all the 4.3 godlikes to 4.5, the 3.1 lights to 2.99, etc.
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Super, I voted Rozalin too! Granted I have more respect for her than most and I vote on Taos remake form since that is all I played.
I do like the idea of redoing the roster and leaving a bunch of forgotton warriors. It still leaves fan favorites in.
One of the reasons I came here was BECAUSE Arc the lad 4 was ranked. I got the link from Elfboy on the Suikoden 3 board and stayed because I was like "Hey, someone else becides me knows about this game. cool!" I even attempted to get more people to play it., both online and in real life. Part of the reason I love this place is because of the large variety of games ranked. Of course I cannot vote on all of them, but I even loved not ranked and I am sad to see it die, since it was the only chance some of my obscure favorites like Phantasy Star 3 would ever have.
Again, part of the bad votes this season is old game vs new games. Take Shining Force 2. Look at Odd Eyes votes compared to Kazin and Taya. Odd Eye drew much better vote wise. He was facing Wren, from another Genesis game. Kazin and Taya were facing newer games, and in the case of Taya, a game only about a year old. Darc also was facing the same game as Taya.
Maybe we should have the DL go "on hiatus" again and redo the roster and have a bunch of forgotton warriors. I like that Idea alot, especially since I like many of the games that have or are going to be booted. And really, Lufia 1 is that bad? the last time it was in Lufia faced Hachel, one of the lesser used Legend of Dragoon characters.
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Roz lost the board vote very badly is the point. She may have had one or two other of the regulars going for her but the vast majority were going for Tao. SF1 managed to get remade and ended up worse overall thanks to formsplit and almost zero boost in drawing. Go it! Odd Eye's always done better than the rest of SF2. You're right that new game versus old game can be ugly, but there's still no reason for SF2 to perform as badly as it has for as long as it has. This is not new, the game's been laying eggs since season 4 or so. Lufia 1's not bad, I just used it as an example of the type of game I'd clear out.
The idea isn't practical for so, so many reasons, but it's cool to shoot the breeze about.
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Kill Brigandine, BGs, Tales of Eternia. Bottom feeders. (Looking at the drawing of the last 20 seasons.)
SF1 isn't even close to a bottom feeder and THEY LOSE SO WE SHOULD BOOT THEM is just... what? Yeah, so what? SF2 has drawing problems but still is close to 5% better than the things on my list, and again, I don't think a cast losing is a good reason to boot them. Especially Taya. Taya is an unmemorable optional PC that I've barely ever used despite playing SF2 5+ times since all she does is fucking die in-game!
A hearty fuck no to anything that draws better than SF1.
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Taya is an unmemorable optional PC that I've barely ever used despite playing SF2 5+ times since all she does is fucking die in-game!
Out of curiosity, why is this the type of character you want to keep? <_<
I'm probably going to vote to trim things down and get rid of the unmemorable or optional characters that aren't doing well because people don't remember them or care about them. Not remove the entire games. I'm not sure why, just because the vote draw isn't pathetic, we can't get rid of characters that, if we were to rank the games from scratch right now, we wouldn't even consider adding.
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Try and look surprised on this one:
Keep 'em all.
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ATL 4 (Bebedora got a specific mention): Boot Bebedora, keep the rest.
Chrono Cross (Lesser used, less connected, later characters; Split-path characters; Pip and Sprigg): Boot.
Baldur's Gate: Boot.
Brigandine: Keep.
Fire Emblem 7 (Lesser used, less connected, later characters): Boot.
Phantasy Star 1: Keep.
Phantasy Star 2: Keep.
Shining Force 1: Boot.
Shining Force 2: Boot.
Barbarossa (Suikoden): Keep.
Suikoden 1 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters): Keep.
Suikoden 2 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters): Keep.
Suikoden 3 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters): Keep.
Tales of Eternia: Boot Ras and Chat, keep others.
Valkyrie Profile (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters): Keep.
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Stealing Dune's format because I'm lazy. <_<
ATL 4 (Bebedora got a specific mention): Boot Bebedora, keep the rest.
Chrono Cross (Lesser used, less connected, later characters; Split-path characters; Pip and Sprigg): Boot the plotless and bigger pathsplit issues, I'll try and come up with an actual list later.
Edit: From a quick glance at the ranked characters list I would get rid of: Leah, Orlha, Pip, Sprigg, Greco, Janice, Skelly, Draggy, Poshul, Doc, Macha, Funguy, Mojo, Luccia, Neo-Fio, Turnip, Mel, Van, Pierre. Guile is split but he's the easiest to find in my opinion and has other strange plot stuff. Other people are at least important even if you don't get them. There may be others that I'm not sure are pathsplit.
Baldur's Gate: Boot.
Brigandine: Keep.
Fire Emblem 7 (Lesser used, less connected, later characters): I don't see a real reason to get rid of these. Everyone remembers them.
Phantasy Star 1: Keep.
Phantasy Star 2: Keep, I guess. I can't see any reason to boot some but not all(aside from like Rolf) and it doesn't seem that bad except for like Kain.
Shining Force 1: I haven't played these so I can't pick out specifics, but boot optional/plotless characters.
Shining Force 2: See SF1.
Barbarossa (Suikoden): Boot.
Suikoden 1 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters): There... really weren't many from this? Can't think of any really worth getting rid of offhand.
Suikoden 2 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters): Boot, like CC will look into an actual list later.
Edit: I looked at the rankings and frankly, it's been so long since I played I'm not sure who is and isn't forced anymore.
Suikoden 3 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters): I would like to trim a few of these, but not many. Stuff like Kenji that nobody cares about.
Tales of Eternia: Boot Ras and Shizel, keep others.
Valkyrie Profile (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters): Boot Freya? I can hope, dammit. <_< Keep otherwise.
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Just for clarification, since super refuted it vociferously: I never suggested a closed ranking system, though I did note that the current random selection method is problematic. And indeed, the democratic nature of RPGDL nominations is cool. That doesn't change the fact that there exists such a thing as an objectively bad season setup - I will glare at the season in which Middle that had 5/8 Suikoden fighters with another 3-4 Suikoden fighters scattered throughout the other divisions in Week 1 here - and that there should be some mechanism for dealing with this. Yes there are a zillion asterisks and it's possible that the cure could be worse than the disease (especially if some kind of nightmare bureaucracy of rules was established to deal with the situation), but I'm sure that there's SOME way to avoid this without instigating drama and hurt feelings. It could be as simple as "the benevolent dictators of the DL have booted this rolled-up nom to next season because there are 3 fighters from that game in this season and it's too obscure to support that."
That said I strongly agree with super's idea for more FWs, perhaps pre-emptively ranking new games with FWs to get their feet wet, and gently moving older games to FW status.
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Booting things to the next season just spread the pain out some. This goes double with large cast games, because they could get anohter flood in the next season and you're just stuck constantly pushing back.
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Some ideas I came up with have problems too.
Best suggestion is to cap the amount of people each game can get in. There are a few problems with this, even with a tough cap like 2-3. It stops say, CC from flooding, but not Suikos. It also skews a games heavier, since we roll top-down. It also doesn't help with low-drawing games like SF2 or so, because even 2 getting in the same division can cause problems. I WOULD like it for newly ranked games, because new games lead to just as many vote total problems as unpopular ones and tend to flood more as people want to see the new blood in.
Open noms but closed brackets would also help alleviate it some, but again sometimes open brackets can make things more interesting, and there would be problems with basically orchestrating the entire season for characters to win.
Anyone else on this?
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I'm opposed to closed brackets. Just don't want to open the can of worms of who constructs seasons, etc.
Capping people who get in is possible, and you could avoid the problem of skewing towards the big games in top divisions by rolling divisions in the random order. (i.e. "d4 for division to roll first: 3 = Middle" or whatever)
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We could forgo the 'ranking' stage for Forgotten Warriors altogether, and include them as part of the Season Nomination process.
For example, we could set aside one slot each season for a non-ranked character. Everyone who nominates a pool gets to nominate one character who isn't ranked. From anything with a stat topic, just to cut down on some of the options there. When it's time to roll up a season, we roll from the FW pool to see which of the 50 or so characters gets a shot at being a FW for a season. (At this point, we can either put them in the correct division if that's known/obvious, or we can move to a short voting session where we decide democratically what division this temp FW belongs in.) Then we roll up the rest of the season's ranked picks.
The temp FW works like basically any other duelist for the season.
This gives a chance to see how certain games can work in the DL proper without the hassle of deciding what's worthy of ranking. It also doesn't clutter up the DL with new stuff/obscure stuff because it's only one fighter per season. It sort of takes over all the good points of NR, but it also pits the new fighter against Ranked (therefore hopefully more well-known) competition. A sort of mini-version of Cmdr's Tourney of Interest except that the whole of the DL gets a shot at nomming their favorite character, or more likely, the most interesting duellers will be nommed by multiple people.
(It might be fair to ask the nommers to be willing to do this FW character's writeups... and provide art.)
It also means less hurt feelings over bootings, because there's still a venue where non-ranked characters can get on-site recognition.
The biggest problem I can foresee with this is that a FW character gets into a too-low division. Thus, it might be a good idea to roll up the FW character a week early and then put him/her through the 'which division?' voting rigor before rolling up the rest of the season's duelists.
Even if the duelist doesn't draw very well, that's okay, because they are a temporary addition. If they do well, they (or their game) can be ranked. If not, then at least we didn't have to go through the process of ranking a whole new game only to see it fail and have to booted.
What do you guys think?
-Djinn
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I think it is a really bad idea, since we have some very, very stupid stat topics. While there is some merit to it, you are basically asking for the worst case scenario, which is someone nomming something really stupid, it going into the wrong division, going on a tear and the nommer failing to write/provide art.
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Stealing Yakumo's stealing Dune's format because I'm that lazy.
ATL 4 (Bebedora got a specific mention): Boot all
Chrono Cross (Lesser used, less connected, later characters; Split-path characters; Pip and Sprigg): Keep, plotless CC scrubs are still fun from time to time. Light isn't the same without FUNGUY and TURNIP.
Baldur's Gate: Boot.
Brigandine: Boot
Fire Emblem 7 (Lesser used, less connected, later characters): Keep. Rank Geitz >.>
Phantasy Star 1: BOOT
Phantasy Star 2: BOOT
Shining Force 1: Don't care
Shining Force 2: See SF1.
Barbarossa (Suikoden): B.O.O.T
Suikoden 1 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters): Boot
Suikoden 2 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters):Boot
Suikoden 3 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters): Keep. S3 filler is awesome
Tales of Eternia: Boot
Valkyrie Profile (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters): YES BOOT FREYA
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ATL 4 (Bebedora got a specific mention) - Boot.
Chrono Cross (Lesser used, less connected, later characters; Split-path characters; Pip and Sprigg) - Keep.
Baldur's Gate - Abstain.
Brigandine - Abstain.
Fire Emblem 7 (Lesser used, less connected, later characters) - Keep.
Phantasy Star 1 - Abstain.
Phantasy Star 2 - Keep Rolf, Boot the rest.
Shining Force 1 - Boot.
Shining Force 2 - Boot.
Barbarossa (Suikoden) - Keep.
Suikoden 1 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters) - Keep.
Suikoden 2 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters) - Keep.
Suikoden 3 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters) - Keep.
Tales of Eternia - Abstain.
Valkyrie Profile (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters)- BOOT FREYA. Keep the rest.
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I think it is a really bad idea, since we have some very, very stupid stat topics. While there is some merit to it, you are basically asking for the worst case scenario, which is someone nomming something really stupid, it going into the wrong division, going on a tear and the nommer failing to write/provide art.
Well, yes, that IS the worst-case scenario. But honestly, that's not going to destroy the DL. And if a character getting a run because he ends up in the wrong division is the worst thing that could happen, doesn't that make the whole thing a decent idea. I mean, it's not like other characters haven't done this before. And games that aren't well-known tend not to be able to 'rob' matches anyway. Historically, they seem to be the victims are robbery more often than not.
Honestly, I think the stipulation of "only nom something if you're willing to write and provide art for it" should be good enough to keep what is nommed reasonable. But, worst-case scenario, if art is impossible to find, we toss that character and use some other randomly-selected alternate.
I don't think the concept itself is inherently flawed.
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Edited in boots for ToE and Brig. If that really is our lowest drawing stuff, then hey.
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ToE isn't. It's at about 48%, which is 3% higher than the next on the list.
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Regarding Djinn's idea: No.
I could nom something off the top of my head that only two or three people here have played, and probably about 10% of our voters have played. Then we have a match every week that only <=10% people can vote on, and if they make it to the finals, that's EVERY WEEK INCLUDING THE FINALS for that division. That kind of ruins the fun for 90% of the people because they can't even vote on the finals. Yeah, it's only one person per season, but on finals week, that's 1/4 matches right there.
Not to mention the points that Andrew put up.
Just keep that kind of stuff to board tourneys where it belongs.
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I agree. A neat idea (and one I threw around a long, long time ago), but ultimately...probably hurts more than helps. A board tourney might be a good idea, or a resurrection of NR...but that's way, waaaaaaaay off, I think.
This has to be the most respectful, friendly, logically-debated retirement topic I've seen in years, though.
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Seconding Tal on the FW idea. Short circuting whatever ranking process we use won't work out well.
Honestly, I think the stipulation of "only nom something if you're willing to write and provide art for it" should be good enough to keep what is nommed reasonable. But, worst-case scenario, if art is impossible to find, we toss that character and use some other randomly-selected alternate.
No. In fact, hell no. Even ignoring the problem that people do come and go and don't always vote, there's the fact that you can't be 100% sure of being able to vote on a FW unless you've played literally everything in the DL. Low drawing games always have funky results. I'm not talking low like say ToE, I'm talking the P2 Guido level. You n eed to have some decently strong bottom line for FWs. Otherwise you're going to have an NR situation where someone (me or say Tai) are stuck writing for a game they don't know against a game they don't know. That's not fair to anyone involved. NR gives some very painful examples in general why this doesn't work. On a related note, I probably know Remedi better than I do several entire games I've played in the DL, just because I wrote for her so many tiems.
Anyone can say they'll write for a game. Shit does come up in life, they have to go out of town, sick, etc. You have to have backups in case it hits a low draw or something off the wall that only a few people know. The 10 minimum writers I use is both an internal measurement of playership and about as far as we reasonably stretch a game's viability to be written effectively without problems or relying on one person. There are a few exceptions to this (P3. XF would most likely be fine in the DL for writers as of now because several of it's hardcore fans write a ton), but by and large it's a good cutoff.
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Plenty of games on the chopping block this time...
Let's see...:
ATL 4 - Keep. Kharg did pretty well during S41. Maybe the next time.
Chrono Cross - Boot the plotless, etc. Too many to list, refer to Djinn's post. They get in too frequently, must be annoying for those who can't vote for the game.
Baldur's Gate - Boot Viconia and Edwin, Keep the rest. (Starters and Imoen.)
Brigandine - Abstain.
Fire Emblem 7 - Boot Dart, Heath, Isadora and Vaida. Keep the rest.
Phantasy Star 1 - Boot. Hasn't aged well.
Phantasy Star 2 - Keep Rolf. The rest? Abstain.
Shining Force 1 - Boot Kane, Tao, Lowe, Balbaroy and Alef. Keep the rest.
Shining Force 2 - Keep Odd Eye, Bowie, Sarah, Slade and Peter. Boot the rest.
Barbarossa - Keep.
Suikoden 1-3 - Keep.
Tales of Eternia - Abstain.
Valkyrie Profile - Abstain. Could use some minor trimming, but maybe the next time...
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Chrono Cross - Boot some guys.
Baldur's Gate - Keep Minsc and Imoen, boot the rest.
Fire Emblem 7 - Keep all.
Barbarossa - Keep.
Tales of Eternia - Boot Rassius, keep rest. I'd like to see Reid and one or two others get in by the next time we do this, and decide then.
Abstain on all others.
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This will be closed when the site closes thursday night, so get your votes in now!
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ToE isn't. It's at about 48%, which is 3% higher than the next on the list.
People need to keep this in mind: The full votedraw data is from season 9 and on. That's almost 5 years ago. Needless to say it is outdated.
41+, last year's worth, is 46.65% for ToE. Only things worse are BGs and Brig.
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When choosing a cutoff point, it's worth playing around with different ones, so you get a balance of "large enough sample space" and the issue of being recent enough to be relevant (see Tonfa).
ToE sucks by almost any measure though, not sure where Sopko is coming from there. The only games it beats under any cutoff I checked were retired games (e.g. P2), Brig, and BGs, as Tonfa said. It is trending downwards, and its recent draw of opponents is pretty average (three below, three above) so that may even be statistically significant. Would make sense, since the game is borderline unavailable right now.
Have I mentioned people who want to boot the Sega RPGs (in full, or reduce to lone FW) and spare ToE baffle me a bit?
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Didn't ToE get a PAL release on PSP or something?
That may have something to do with it?
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It did, but as near as I can tell, it made no real impact as it had less advertisement than, say, any Atlus game in the last couple of years.
I found out about it because GFAQs had it on it's upcoming games list. Nothing else.
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It did, but as near as I can tell, it made no real impact as it had less advertisement than, say, any Atlus game in the last couple of years.
Yeah, but Atlus has a remarkably devoted fanbase. The Faithful knows what Atlus releases, and they tend to buy... well, anything that Atlus releases. (Not counting Raidou 1 and Rule of Rose. >_>')
ATL 4 - Boot entirely. It's sole fans here are me and Alanna, correct? And Bebedora's probably out... and I actively despise both of the remaining characters. Selfish, yeah. >_>'
Chrono Cross - T'would simplify things if we got rid of every CC character in Light, so... boot all scrubs.
Baldur's Gate - Boot Imoen. Keep rest.
Brigandine - Keep Dryst for BtS purposes, boot the rest.
Fire Emblem 7 - Don't care.
Phantasy Star 1 - Boot.
Phantasy Star 2 - Keep Rolf. The rest? Abstain.
Shining Force 1 - Boot all.
Shining Force 2 - Keep Odd Eye, Bowie. Boot the rest.
Barbarossa - Keep.
Suikoden 1-3 - Keep. ...Why aren't we including S4 in this this discussion, incidentally?
Tales of Eternia - Abstain.
Valkyrie Profile - Keep Lenneth, and Lezard. Abstain on rest.
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Because S4 was ranked after the point in time where we got more conservative about ranking large casts. There are probably one or two characters you could strip out from the game (Konrad and Axel come to mind), but overall it isn't especially cluttered. Same thing with S5 (with Shoon, say).
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Oh. Fair enough.
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I like AtL4, as does Dhyer.
;_; at losing Tatjana.
And we don't think about booting S4 because it's the best game in the series - why it has less representation than S3 and S5 is beyond me.
Or, see what NEB said >_>
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I liked them as duellers anyways!
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Yeah, losing Tatjana sucked. Maru too. I like Bebedora, but the circumstances behind that are eh.
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ATL 4 (Bebedora got a specific mention) Abstain
Chrono Cross (Lesser used, less connected, later characters; Split-path characters; Pip and Sprigg) hm. Keep for now. Can I confess I don't want my (kinda but not really) namesake booted? Even though she probably should be?
Baldur's Gate Abstain
Brigandine Abstain
Fire Emblem 7 (Lesser used, less connected, later characters) Abstain
Phantasy Star 1 Abstain
Phantasy Star 2 Trim significantly (just Rolf is fine by me, but more is ok, too.)
Shining Force 1 Trim, but keep bosses/major characters (do I need to be more specific than this?)
Shining Force 2 Trim, same as SF1
Barbarossa (Suikoden) Keep. Call Golden Hydra or whatever if it makes it you feel better.
Suikoden 1 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters) Keep non-vanilla characters that may fit that description, boot the rest
Suikoden 2 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters) Same as S1
Suikoden 3 (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters) Keep everyone.
Tales of Eternia Abstain
Valkyrie Profile (Lesser Used, Less Connected, Later Characters) Keep. With a remake out there and sequels to keep interst active, I don't think booting is in order. Besides, unlike Suikoden, VP scrubs are actually usable without too much trouble.
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Boot non-major characters from Shining Force 1 (keep Max, bosses and maybe Domingo), boot everyone from Chrono Cross, Fire Emblem and all Suikodens except Barbarossa. ShF1 is obviously falling into PS3/AtL3 mercy-kill territory, and if anybody on the giant doom casts gets up to majority support for booting then hell if I'm going to stand in the way. The arguments for booting Barbarossa are missing the forest for the trees. Okay,s o it's possible the Hydra is a True Rune incarnation instead of Barbarossa....okay, but why boot it? How does that make the combat form unrankable? Rename him Golden Hydra or Final Boss Of Suikoden 1 if it makes you happy, but it's not like there's any confusion over who we were trying to rank there.
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AtL4: If enough people want it gone then fine, boot it. I do feel bad for Bebedora just because it's Bebedora.
Chrono Cross: Abstain. If specific folks come up next round I'll think then.
Baldur's Gate: Boot. Apparently is a failed experiment. I do feel kind of bad for it but I've never ever managed to find the games myself despite trying, so...
Brigandine: Boot. We have at least one huge massive outspoken drooling fan of the game, so I'm loathe to really go after it. Edit: but even he is voting it out so away it goes. Though I'll miss Cai.
Fire Emblem 7: Keep Everything. Is seriously popular, unless I'm going insane. Sure, I don't give a crap about Wil, but it isn't so bad.
Phantasy Star 1: Abstain.
Phantasy Start 2: Abstain, if it comes up next round I'll consider booting everyone but Rolf.
ShF1: Abstain, if specifics come up I'll consider it.
ShF2: Abstain, see ShF1, add in random like of Sarah/Bowie/Odd Eye.
Barbarossa (Suikoden) : Boot. Multiform boss who isn't actually a fighter in any sense. Lots of people just antivote him by default, and he is generally reviled by most and liked by none. Can't see him adding anything positive to the DL at all. I mean, if people were fans or something I could understand the drive to keep him, but what is the point? All he does is tick a bunch of people off while being enjoyable for none. I honestly see no practical reason to spare him, and plenty to sacrifice him.
Suikodens: Keep. Well, it is really popular.
Tales of Eternia: Boot Rassius and Shizel, Abstain On the rest. Barring good numbers I'm not sure on them.
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Boot Barbossa, Freya, BG, Freya, Freya, Shizel, Freya, and Freya.
Keep CC and suikoscrubs.
Abstain on the rest.
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Oh, almost forgot. Blanket boot extends to VP.
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Just tossing opinions on new stuff:
Suikoden: Wouldn't mind axing a few of them. So much boring filler that adds nothing to do the DL, and doesn't have the plot to back it up. For things to keep...plot relevant and those who have actual unique runes by the DL standards, like Rage or some such.
Freya: Keep. History in the DL, and if nothing else, scrubby as it may be, I still see no problems with the VP2 form (I just treat Ether Strike as an all or nothing move; kill on it or lose the fight.) If VP2 didn't exist? I'd probably lean towards getting rid of her, since Chap 0 form really is no different than other temps with massive scaling issues.
Naturally, the rest of VP can stay. Genevieve's the only one I'd consider booting but eh, she's harmless one way or another, and she's not completely worthless as a dueler, so don't mind her.
EDIT: As for ToE, abstain on all but Ras, who should get his ass punted.
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AtL4: Boot.
Chrono Cross: Keep.
Baldur's Gate: Boot.
Brigandine: Boot.
Fire Emblem 7: Keep
Phantasy Star 1: Boot.
Phantasy Start 2: Keep.
ShF1: Abstain.
ShF2: Boot optional PCs, which are Taya, Chaz(maybe?), and Sheela.
Barbarossa (Suikoden) Keepx10^23
Suikoden 1/2/3: Keep.
Tales of Eternia: Boot.
Freya: Bootx10^23
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Oh yeah, voted to keep VPs (See my post for why), with the exception of Freya.
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Just noting that from the looks of the Japanese strategy guide I picked up for Valkyrie Profile DS
SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS VALKYRIE PROFILE DS (yeah right)
Freya seems to get a rankable form.
END SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS VALKYRIE PROFILE DS.
I'm sure the people who have played it will know more, but it seems worth considering at this juncture.
Noting that the reason I have no problem with keeping Brig is that while its draw is League-lowest, it never has any problems getting writeups and it's already down to the point where only the mains are ranked. Similarly, I like the idea of only having the AtL4, ToE, and BG mains to represent our lowest-drawing games. The games that can draw slighter higher (PS1, PS2, ShF1, ShF2) could use only slightly higher representation (main, final boss, female lead, one or two noteworthies). The large-cast games just need to drop the characters that we wouldn't consider ranking if we were ranking them by today's standards (FE7, S1/2/3, CC, VP1).
I don't support a complete booting of any of these games.
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Then we'll rerank Freya as VP3. Considering the giant headache her earlier forms are, this would make the most sense to do. We did this (Way too late) with Hrist. Removing the splitvote there is a good thing.
Edit: It kind of goes without saying but serious spoilers or any unmarked spoilers will result in instant death here.
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Dhyer, check your PMs.
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Chrono Cross (Lesser used, less connected, later characters; Split-path characters; Pip and Sprigg) hm. Keep for now. Can I confess I don't want my (kinda but not really) namesake booted? Even though she probably should be?
I agree with you!
Then we'll rerank Freya as VP3. Considering the giant headache her earlier forms are, this would make the most sense to do. We did this (Way too late) with Hrist. Removing the splitvote there is a good thing.
Why don't we just rank her as VP2 now then? It's a legal form.
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You mean the battle that ends at Freya at half HP and using ether strike, not with you beating her or getting any kind of rewards? Screw that.
Edit: This topic is now closed. Thanks toe veryone who voted, round two will go up shortly.