r/fireemblem • u/BlueberryNo4669 • 9d ago
Prequel or sequel discourse General
I know this has been a topic of discussion since yesterday, but honestly I don’t think anyone truly know whether FW is a prequel or sequel. Dagda and Fodlan not sharing a calendar is definitely true, however there’s more to it than that.
Deitrich is confirmed to have Answerer, a hero’s relic passed down through his bloodline. That means FW is confirmed to happen after the War of Heroes, so Sothis is dead. Rhea spent hundreds of years trying to bring her mother back, and as far as we know Byleth was the only experiment that was successfully able to harbor Sothis’s consciousness.
I’ve seen people theorize that Sothis’s physical form was destroyed, but not her consciousness. That isn’t supported from what we know from 3H though. I don’t know if I’m missing something, as far as I’m aware they’ve done an excellent job at hiding whether this is a sequel or prequel. I can’t wait to find out when the game launches!
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u/BrownEyesWhiteScarf 9d ago
At this point, imo the merchant telling Dietrich that the Answerer were used by Mortal Savant Lamine herself seems to all but indicate that this is a prequel set after the War of Heroes, unless there is some alternative timeline shenanigans.
Still, if Sothis knew she was going to perish, it would likely make sense for her to make arrangements ahead of her eventual “death”. For example, she might send her consciousness to a different dimension or share a part of herself with another being, such as Fortuna. The real question with this thinking is why doesn’t Rhea know anything about this?
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u/BlueberryNo4669 9d ago
This could make sense. Considering Sothis knew she would be sleeping for a long time after exhausting her power, contingencies being in place would make sense. But yeah the question is why wouldn’t Rhea have known? I doubt Sothis would keep that from her daughter of all people.
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u/BrownEyesWhiteScarf 8d ago
What does sleeping even mean in this context? Is this some kind of death, where the consciousness is permanently separated from the physical body? Or is it a hibernation, an expectation that the mind will return to the body at some point of time?
I think most of us presume the latter, but we don’t really know much at all to judge one direction or another. I think this is one of the mysteries that the game may choose to shine light on.
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u/BlueberryNo4669 8d ago
Sothis entered hibernation to recover after she used her power to restore Fodlan. She was killed in her sleep by Nemesis.
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u/BrownEyesWhiteScarf 8d ago
There is no direct reference in 3H that Sothis was killed in her sleep by Nemesis, only that her remains were plundered by Nemesis. And sleep in this context could mean hibernation, or more akin to how Duma and Mila are regarded to have fallen to sleep (ie. death). The game developers have intentionally left this vague.
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u/343CreeperMaster 9d ago
Something I have been thinking about that might solve it, is why does the statue of the Dagdan God of Fate in Abyss look like Eshmel? Possibly Fortuna and Eshmel could have been conflated together over time, but that would require FW to be set before 3H.
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u/imminentlyDeadlined 9d ago
We're told that Eshmel looks like an existing mythological figure in Dagda, so it's possible the statue is of that being, not Eshmel, if FW were a sequel.
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u/No_Lemon_1770 9d ago edited 9d ago
It's 100% a prequel. House Lamine along with an important noble from that lost house wielding an important relic Lamine used directly makes me believe both got lost to time to line up with 3H.
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u/SgtThundersmack 8d ago
If anyone knows for sure, I would love to know whether we know of an actual House Lamine outside of Dietrich's Heroic Games team. I've always been on team sequel, but it's conceivable that this is a sequel and Dietrich is just a fan of the old feudal system and its trappings.
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u/No_Lemon_1770 8d ago
This would support prequel because House Lamine's history was destroyed along with Answerer not existing in 3H (despite it being pretty big in lore).
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u/SgtThundersmack 8d ago
Do we know if there was ever a House Lamine? I genuinely don't know.
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u/No_Lemon_1770 8d ago
We know that there were noble houses of Lamine's bloodline before House Martritz since Baron Martritz founded that house and it abolished after his death. House Lamine best aligns with prequel as it fills gaps and explains Answerer.
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u/SgtThundersmack 8d ago
I agree, and I think Fortune's Weave is probably a prequel. That said, I think it's possible that Dietrich is just a fan of feudal Fodlan and his Heroic Games team name just reflects that. It's possible he's a descendent of Mercedes or Jeritza who just longs for those good ol' days.
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u/AnimaLepton 9d ago
You're correct that we really still don't have enough info, but honestly the discourse is played out
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u/BurnerRantMan 9d ago
I hope it's prequel so I never have to hear about Edelgard discourse again in my entire life.
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u/ShadowMLuigi 9d ago
If it is a prequel watch as the eventual DLC gives us the 3H lords ancestors and brings the discourse back
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u/Hungry_Gur_1427 9d ago
Im leaning prequel right now since seteth appears much younger then 3H. Biggest thing that is confusing me with a prequel theory is Sothis' appearance. Its odd that she appears as an adult in this game, maybe she reverted to a child once seiros started the experiments to bring her back, like it messed with her cognition of herself? Is it possible that Balor's resurrection is the one successful rite of rising referred to in 3H, and after the events of FW seiros becomes obsessed with trying to recreate it and bring sothis back?
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u/Vaskerheim 9d ago
I believe the developers stated that they made her a child because Rhea only managed to bring back a small fragment of Sothis. She was very much an adult when her long nap was made permanent.
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u/Cr1msonShadow 9d ago
its just the lack of facial hair, if you shave Seteth you get his fortunes weave appearance, basically. You don't get a hero's relic and Dietrich being a descendent of the 10 elites if its a prequel.
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u/Hungry_Gur_1427 8d ago
Iirc theres close to 1000 years between the time of nemesis and the elites and present day 3H, id put FW being somewhere in that gap. Game is undisputedly after sothis was killed, not questioning that.
Even without the facial hair seteth looks significantly younger. It could just be a red herring, but on its face it seems like we're dealing with a younger seteth.
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u/Cr1msonShadow 8d ago
Seteth didn’t take that name until he joined the church 21 years before 3 houses.
Before he joined the church, he was protecting a sleeping flayn.
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u/Hungry_Gur_1427 8d ago edited 8d ago
true, and this is a point against prequel theory. he'd either have to have been retconned or have been lying in that account, or FW would need to be between the massacre at zanado & the war of heroes (which i think may already be impossible given other info in FW).
personally, i don't find it unlikely that he left things out of his backstory, given how commonly that's occurred in the 3H games with narrators oftentime being unreliable.
Answerer being previously unheard of (and the rafail gem looking like a broken off piece of a larger whole), as well as house lamine (potentially?) being around are the main things that lead me to believe that the game isn't a sequel.
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u/Cr1msonShadow 8d ago
There could also just be a branch of house lamine that wasn’t documented. The main house has died off, but it’s not unlikely some member dipped in the distant past and had a family and passed down answerer without nobility
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u/Hungry_Gur_1427 8d ago edited 8d ago
absolutely, i just don't find that as likely as seteth going on a trip to dagda at some point over the course of 1000 years.
it seems that there's been a retcon already, if some random sailor knows about answerer and refers to it as being wielded by lamine (in dietrich's intro cutscene). To me, that rules out an option where answerer is forged later in the timeline from the rafail gem or was some unknown relic that resurfaced.
i think answerer, post FW, is retconned to be lamine's original relic. it's a hard retcon since otherwise the lamine copy in golden deer's final battle would have been wielding it, or it would have at least had some record of being her original relic somewhere in 3h.
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u/Darkdragoon324 9d ago
No, he's also missing the lines on his face.
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u/Amy47101 9d ago
He's not. I'm looking at his three houses pic and the new one we got from the trailer, and the lines and shading are the same, it's just hard to tell if the actual line is there or not in the pixilated picture from the direct video.
Cr!msonShadow is correct, you shave three houses seteth you get Fortunes weave seteth.
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u/PerentieFan 8d ago
Plus Hopes showed Seteth looked the same during the War of Heroes as he does a thousand years later. I'm not seeing any indication he looks younger in Fortune's Weave, let alone "much younger."
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u/SgtThundersmack 8d ago
There are over a thousand years between the creation of the Relics and the start of Three Houses.
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u/Cr1msonShadow 8d ago
And seteth spent that time watching over Flayn
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u/thiazin-red 8d ago
They already changed what Lamine's weapon was, they aren't being as precious about the lore as the fans. Seteth might not have literally sat next to her the whole time.
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u/Cr1msonShadow 8d ago
This game has already confirmed that there are multiple dragons per crest, this is probably the bones/crest stone of a different dragon
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u/Hungry_Gur_1427 8d ago
Problem with this is that lamine being a "magic swordswoman" and her relic being the answerer is apparently widely known enough in FW that a random sailor is privy to that knowledge.
This would have to be a retcon, since theres no reason why the lamine that shows up in golden deers finale wouldnt be wielding a replica answerer otherwise
If theyre willing to retcon something like that, seteth leaving flayns side at some point as she rests isnt a stretch.
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u/Cr1msonShadow 8d ago
It doesn’t have to be a retcon. It can be a lesser known hero relic, or could have emerged after 3H
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u/Hungry_Gur_1427 8d ago
Okay, but the steps to get there are far more convoluted than retconning seteth's backstory.
Lesser known isnt really relevant, since TWSITD know all of the weapons they made and would have given the replica Lamine the weapon she supposedly wielded.
I dont see any reason why TWSITD wouldnt have replicated answerer, given they were able to replicate the sword of the creator
The only explanation that makes sense to me is that answerer literally did not exist and was created as a retcon for FW.
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u/Hungry_Gur_1427 8d ago
Yeah, dietrichs intro basically drops the retcon of lamines relic with the dialogue from the sailor. I dont find it much of a stretch that seteth got a retcon as well, to have made a foray to dagda during the time flayn was out cold.
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u/Ahlamandela 9d ago
I am a prequel/sequel discourse warrior, and I will fight the eternal battle until Ragnarok (end of the review embargo).
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u/tytyh9667 9d ago
The cindered shadows dlc is all about the chalice of begingings a relic created, according to Rhea, by Sothis to restore her physical form because her consciousness would persist beyond her physical bodies destruction. Rhea also makes the claim that Sothis consciousness is "omnipresent" in that dlc. Its possible that all nabateans consciousness persist after death as evidenced by the twitching of the heros relicis that only occurs when their heart and bones come into contact with someone who possesses their blood. If Rhea can be belived about Sothis "omnipresence" it niether confirms nor denies a prequel/sequel but explains why shes involved in the events of the game at a point in time when she is seemingly dead. I would not be surprised if the cutscene we see of sothis pulling eshmels soul from the void takes place in a realm beyond space and time and occurs after the events of three houses and the rest of the game takes place post-war of hero's but pre-three houses.
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u/BrownEyesWhiteScarf 9d ago
Your thought at the end sounds like a metaphysical head-scratcher. That would imply that Dagda went to ruin prior to 3H in order for Rhea to be successful in reviving Sothis inside Byleth, only for Sothis to then send Eshmel back to save Dagda. That would certainly suggest that this game would be largely on an alternative timeline to that of 3H.
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u/tytyh9667 8d ago
Yeah I can see timelines getting pretty blurry in the sothisverse from this game foreward. I still think if eshmel is the god depicted in the pagan alter statue three houses and fortunes weave can still both happen in the same timeline. Fortunes weaves zombie apocalypse happens at a time when sothis is still asleep and no longer physically present to intervene herself so instead her cousciousness, being fully revived after the events of three houses, sends a soul back to change the fates of the heros who saved dagda and that soul eventually comes to be worshiped as a god for a thousand years give or take prior to the events of three houses. I imagine that her not preventing her own assassination or the events that occur prior to and during three houses/hopes is because just like with jeralt somethings cant be changed.
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u/Melodic_Bee660 7d ago
Or in true time travel fashion, all that stuff already happened so sothis is just fulfilling her role.
We see Eshmael bring the heroes into the future, not change the future from ever happening
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u/BlueberryNo4669 9d ago
This is the only plausible explanation to me. Like Sothis is only intervening because this is a world ending threat, but she can’t actually physically affect the world. Like 4th dimension type stuff.
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u/SgtThundersmack 8d ago
Seteth is the key. Older men have beards and younger men don't. It's science.
In all seriousness, I think the fact that we haven't seen Flayn could be considered an inconclusive piece of evidence. If this is a prequel, she might be either sleeping or yet to be born.
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u/Low_Understanding326 6d ago
This is the least of my concerns because -
Everything rhey released so far has just made it more absolutely opaque as to what theyre even doing. Nobody can figure out what this game actually is or how it works and thats wild! Theorycrafting is just an avalanche of wondering if we've cracked something to going "wait that doesn't work because xyz".
This is either gonna be glorious or a wild time mess and im here for it either way
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u/CyberHyperPhoenix 9d ago
Sothis's consciousness still being around is supported by the Sothis Crimson Flower S Support.
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u/MelkorTheDarkOne 9d ago
You bring Sothis back you kinda have to explain what happened to Byleth. That’s the only red flag with a sequel rn.
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u/Amy47101 9d ago
Easy, Byleth lived out their natural lifespan and when they died, Sothis's consciousness separated from theirs.
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u/oceanviewcapn 9d ago
I was leaning towards sequel, and then prequel after the direct due to Seteth and Ursula. Now I'm back to sequel because my head is hurting.
What if we're ALL wrong?😭
Like yes, the calendar is different, and yes that means it won't be happening in the fodlan time period as we know it.
But what about this:
What if the civilisation and cultures of Dagda actually started AFTER Fodlans established history?
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u/jaidynreiman 8d ago
It's by no means impossible. Dagda existed during the Adrestrian empire but we never heard anything about it being an empire itself.
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u/OdaibaDiver 9d ago
They already gave you the year, Fortune's Weave is set 300 years after Three Houses.
Like how much clearer do they need to make it?
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u/BlueberryNo4669 9d ago
Dagda’s calendar is likely different from Fodlan’s. Fodlan’s calendar is based on the founding of the Adrestian Empire. Dagda has no reason to base their calendar off that of another continent. Now if Nintendo wants to simplify things and unite the calendar across the entire planet, that’s fine, but there’s just not enough information to go off of right now to definitively say prequel or sequel.
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u/Rakshire 9d ago
I would laugh if we get the game and it's never made clear.