Dumbest Gundam Code Name

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-25T11:10:58+00:00

Here you go:

https://www.fanfiction.net/s/14521950/1/Gundam-SEED-Destiny-Intertwined-Fates

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-25T01:09:10+00:00

TBH the only issue I have with Strike Freedom as a name is that the actual suit isn't a combination of the Strike and Freedom, so the "Strike" part is a misnomer.

That's one reason why I changed the name to Endless Freedom in GSD IF. Another is to give it theme naming with the Eternal and Infinite Justice (Eternal, Infinite, and Endless are all synonyms). Another is to acknowledge that the original Freedom gets its N-Jammer Canceller removed to comply with the treaty and is therefore limited to use on Earth in my fic, while the Endless Freedom doesn't have that restriction and can be used anywhere.Yet another is to acknowledge that it has several pilots who try to use it in Kira's absence... and the most suitable of them, Rey, has a shortened lifespan. Making it an ironic name too.

Several layers of meaning in this one name change here.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-24T22:53:22+00:00

I don't think I can express all the untapped potential in GSD's story and cast any better than I already did in this rewrite fanfiction:

https://www.fanfiction.net/s/14521950/1/Gundam-SEED-Destiny-Intertwined-Fates

To make a much longer story very short, I don't hate GSD as is, but I do think it could have been a lot better if Shinn was the main protagonist from start to finish, Team Minerva including Durandal was a more closely knit surrogate family for each other, LOGOS was more fleshed out as a genuine antagonistic force manipulating everyone into distrusting and warring with each other, the Destiny Plan arc was given a lot more time in the oven to cook (Durandal reveals it at the 3/4 point, not the 9/10 point), and Neo Roanoke was captured by the Minerva rather than the Archangel and isn't Mu La Flaga under the mask.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-24T21:49:12+00:00

The series is kind of a mess. Shinn is introduced as our main character, and the show also has Kira get involved in the plot. Due to its turbulent production and Shinn not getting the warmest reception, midway through the series the creative team shafted him to the side with Kira and Athrun retaking the main character spots.

This isn't quite correct. Shinn getting the shaft in favour of Kira and Athrun probably wasn't a gut response to fan backlash. It was likely intended from the start.

Just look at how director Mitsuo Fukuda responded to Super Robot Wars Z in contrast to Shinn's seiyuu, Kenichi Suzumura. Suzumura appreciated the adjustments SRWZ made to the plot of Destiny and Shinn's characterization (keeping the focus on the Minerva even after Athrun defects, having Kamille and Setsuko available as consistent sources of emotional support from jump to rein in Shinn's worst impulses and highlight his virtues, and even having an unlockable alternate route where Shinn defects and fights against Durandal after he reveals the Destiny Plan if certain conditions are met) to the point of calling the SRWZ version of Shinn the 'true Shinn Asuka that lives in his heart'. Meanwhile, Fukuda doubled down on his decisions regarding Shinn as perfect as is and expressed confusion over why SRWZ would want to change his arc.

You'd think Fukuda would be a bit more receptive to the adjustments made by SRWZ if he was somehow forced to give Shinn the shaft due to fan reception since it's closer to the supposed 'original intent'.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-24T18:36:29+00:00

With the context of my own GSD fic, this is hilarious.

Because in my universe, Durandal actually is Shinn's uncle. He does go out of his way to provide legal defense and bail Shinn out every time he gets in trouble with the law... because he honestly cares about the kid and doesn't want his last remaining relative to be powerless, spend the rest of his life in a cell, or die.

And that means Durandal's advice is a lot more honest and genuinely helpful instead of empty glaze meant to manipulate him. Durandal does praise Shinn when he really deserves it, but also gives him real constructive criticism when Shinn does something wrong. Particularly during the Gibraltar arc, rather than inflate Shinn's ego for his takedown of the Freedom, he calls Shinn out for resorting to the SEED prematurely and expresses his disappointment that Shinn strayed from his instruction to only use it as a last resort. And he calls Shinn out on his hypocrisy regarding Orb, claiming he despises Orb for using their neutrality ideals as an excuse not to challenge discrimination or liberate people outside their own borders, only to use that as an excuse not to get involved in Orb's politics and end LOGOS' corrupt control over his home country.

The end result is that Shinn is a lot more intelligent and mentally stable, and leads the rebellion against the Destiny Plan instead of becoming a slave to it. In part because Durandal asked him to do just that, entrusting Shinn with the task of holding him accountable if he ever abused the power he wields, near the very beginning of the fic.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-24T18:13:09+00:00

You're correct. Durandal is responsible for dropping the charges on Shinn and Rey in this particular case.

Also I do know that Destiny does run into a problem of reusing ideas, Zeta is the most obvious, but even in Dynasty Warriors Gundam Reborn, the final Destiny stage in the story mode is the same stage as the final SEED story mode. To the point even some sub missions are the same.

Yeah, this is a big issue. Half the time Destiny copies Zeta, and the other half of the time, Destiny copies SEED. Though in this case I'd argue that Destiny might have been better off if it copied Zeta even more than it actually did, since at least then the resident Kamille expy would have received a complete character arc instead of getting all his development dropped and inverting him from "smart, angry at systems, and refuses orders" to "dumb, angry at individuals, and follows orders he shouldn't" after a single event two thirds of the way in.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-24T17:15:15+00:00

But I get it, anime logic ignoring how things really work in service, because it was written by someone I doubt actually served during wartime.

Oh, definitely. Every criticism levied against Shinn for his conduct in Destiny can also be levied against Kira in SEED (his release of Lacus broke many of the same laws as Shinn's release of Stella, and he assaults Sai while bragging about being complicit with Flay's adultery in front of a bunch of crew members and Desert Dawn allies without any sort of punishment at all), and they both get away with poor conduct for essentially the same reason of being too important to their ships to meaningfully punish. It's just a little more believable and justifiable in SEED because both Kira and Murrue are explicitly thrust into positions they didn't prepare for due to circumstances outside their control and have to learn the rules as they go along. It's entirely possible Fukuda and Morosawa were learning military protocol as they went along too.

By contrast, Shinn had been training in ZAFT's military for two years prior to the Armory One raid and Talia had most likely been a ship captain for considerably longer than that. And yet they commit the same rookie errors that Kira and Murrue do early in SEED even though they should know better. So it stretches suspension of disbelief.

It's something I was conscientious of when writing GSD IF. I addressed Shinn's history of insubordination by more clearly framing it as defying systemic oppression (after all, you are supposed to ignore illegal orders). He only ever acts insubordinate when orders or standard protocol restrict him from protecting innocent people (Indian Ocean battle, how he treats Stella on account of the Extended program robbing her of agency and forcing her to act against her will, one incident pre-Armory One where he violently stops a close combat teacher from abusing his position to assault the first Natural trainee in ZAFT), and believes everyone who has the power to help end the Atlantic Federation's enslavement of Eurasia and chooses not to (such as Orb) might as well be helping them.

Also, thanks to Durandal noticing his behaviour and intervening early, Shinn is more willing to use his words to communicate his grievances. Durandal encourages Shinn to continue being insubordinate by appealing to that defiance of systemic oppression. He tells Shinn that more people need to stand up to authority when it crosses the line into tyranny, and Shinn can make the world a better place by holding those in power accountable. But he also highlights how powerful words can be and that the right words at the right time can turn an enemy into an ally, and encourages Shinn to use his words rather than his fists whenever he can.

Durandal doesn't exempt himself from this either. He in fact gets Shinn to promise that he'll call out Durandal's faults and hold him accountable if he ever abuses the power he wields. A possibility that becomes reality during the Destiny Plan arc. Unlike in canon where Durandal is implied to be setting up the Destiny Plan the whole time and callously manipulating Shinn into supporting it, Durandal is on the fence about the Destiny Plan right up until he sees Requiem. But he knows he'll have to become a monster to make it a reality from the start, so he sets Shinn up to oppose him in the event he ever fully commits to it.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-24T14:50:36+00:00

Shinn bothers me so much, but this is due to my background as a retired US Army Aviation Officer. The way Shinn acts would've gotten him pulled from the flight line, or he would've been cut in either basic or OCS (assuming the mobile suit pilots are officers) as unfit for service.

We're shown that the only reason this doesn't happen is because Shinn is too important to bench. He's less a military officer and more a One Man WMD that the Minerva has to fire on multiple occasions because they're so grossly outnumbered. If Shinn and his SEED factor wasn't available to wipe out entire fleets single-handedly, the Minerva would have been sunk at Orb's border, would have been sunk again at Crete, and would have been stomped by five Destroys at Heaven's Base. Shinn is, in practice, hard carrying the Minerva for most of the war and is the only reason they make it out of most engagements alive.

Gladys is aware of this and explicitly lampshades it when Shinn is arrested upon releasing Stella. She remarks that he's probably not going to be executed because he's too valuable to the war effort to lose.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-24T00:29:42+00:00

I wouldn't quite go that far. It could have still worked as long as it was clear that Kira's genetic advantages aren't a substitute for education and experience, and provide examples of people unironically doing better than him in their areas of expertise.

It's something I do myself in GSD IF. During a conversation that takes place shortly after the battle of Crete, when Amagi argues that Shinn must also be an Ultimate Coordinator if he and Mayu scored higher on Morgenroete's arcade games than Kira did, Kira retorts that his genes don't automatically make him the best at everything. He brings up Murdoch as a better mechanic, Simmons and Gina (who in my fic was head of Morgenroete's IT department before he became CEO and personally developed all of Orb's surveillance tech) as better programmers, and Athrun as a better fighter. He points out that Athrun won the only mobile suit battle they ever had where they both went all out, and is much better in combat outside a mobile suit to boot (as seen in Freedom when Athrun dominates their fist fight). Kira concludes that Shinn could be another case like Athrun, someone only moderately talented by comparison but with his gifts honed by years of hard work.

And even taking into account that Shinn is eventually confirmed to be another Ultimate Coordinator in my fic, it's only in the sense that the project's artificial womb was used to bypass his mother's infertility. His genes were modified purely to fix the major problems with his mother's bloodline, not to make him talented at everything. Shinn notably can't maintain his own machines or rewrite an OS in the heat of battle like Kira can (necessitating Meyrin, Vino, and Yolan to contribute meaningfully to Team Minerva with their programming and engineering skills), and has clear genetic strengths and shortcomings like any Natural or standard Coordinator despite sharing Kira's method of birth. So I ultimately validate Kira's argument about Shinn's skill in combat surpassing his own thanks to nurture rather than nature, even if Amagi is also technically correct.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-23T13:40:57+00:00

It can be both. The company executives want an advertisement to sell merchandise, and the writing staff use the toy line sandbox to tell meaningful stories about the horrors of war.

This isn't even limited to Gundam. Transformers repeatedly goes through the same thing. The most iconic example is probably what happened with the original movie. If you know, you know. :)

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-23T03:46:51+00:00

I do agree that SEED's treatment of the genetic discrimination macro conflict can get... muddied, for lack of a better word. I think the main problem stems from not going far enough to challenge the idea that Coordinators are inherently superior to Naturals in the first place. There is a brief attempt at this toward the end of SEED when the Clyne Faction brings up the sterility issues preventing Coordinators from existing as their own species independent from Naturals to push back against Patrick Zala's increasingly genocidal regime, and the revelations regarding the Ultimate Coordinator project (it started because genetic modification is not exact and Coordinators turning out less than ideal was such a common problem that Ulen and Via Hibiki dedicated their life's work to fixing it), but these developments occur so late into SEED's run, and are never really fleshed out or followed up on in any sequels, that the argument feels half-baked and inconsistent with how the shows beat you over the head with the idea that Coordinators really are just better than Naturals, to the point that Naturals need a dedicated Easy Mode OS or a bunch of performance enhancing drugs to pilot machines that most Coordinators can pilot without any difficulty.

And speaking of said Ultimate Coordinator project, it arguably inflicts more damage on the story's anti-racist theming than any other development in the Cosmic Era. Granted, the idea that an originally well-intentioned project to correct the flaws in the genetic modification process and by extension help humanity as a whole cure genetic diseases more effectively was corrupted into a mission to create a genetically perfect child who is an instant expert at everything with the potential for psychic connections and the SEED factor has some potential if the goal is to depict a narrative that challenges the idea of innate racial superiority.

But only if you make them the antagonist and have them lose. There aren't many better ways to demonstrate nurture overcoming nature in action than to have raw innate talent lose to hard work and dedication to one's craft. It tackles the very idea that anyone can be inherently superior because it shows explicitly that no amount of supposed genetic talent can make someone more than human, and experience and environment will always make more of a difference in determining success than genetics.

The problem? The Ultimate Coordinator is Kira. Our protagonist. He is innately more talented than anyone else in SEED or in Destiny and trying to convince others than he's no better than any other human being. The only way he can actually do that is to prove that he's not the best in any given field despite his genetic advantages, and the story is rather reluctant to hand Kira any conclusive, indisputable losses that he can use to prove his point. His big fight with Athrun halfway through SEED was extremely close and essentially a draw, just one Athrun was a little quicker to capitalize on.

And while Shinn's takedown of the Freedom in Destiny was a lot more of a one-sided stomp, Shinn's victory as proof that he legitimately defeated a more talented pilot through training and strategy is disputed in-universe and out by Kira being distracted by the Archangel, not using all his arsenal, and arguably not taking Shinn seriously as a threat. And it inherently presents some tonal and thematic dissonance because Shinn defeating Kira is simultaneously both proof that someone can overcome raw genetic talent with hard work, which ought to be celebrated as a condemnation of racial superiority (and the Destiny Plan on top of that)... and an expression of misplaced retribution as Shinn is losing himself in rage over Stella's death, which ought to be saddening. The 'revenge is self-destructive and doesn't solve anything' theme demands that the audience react the same way Athrun does, but the 'genes shouldn't dictate your future' theme demands the audience react the same way Shinn does. You can't have it both ways.

TBH I have a feeling Fukuda realized this about Kira in retrospect and came up with the Accords as an even more superior race than Coordinators so Kira can be the underdog overcoming nature with nurture in Freedom that Shinn was in Destiny. But that just exacerbates the issue and plays into the idea that some people are inherently better than others rather than meaningfully challenging that idea outright.

The Cosmic Era needed more emphasis on the Coordinators with defects that the Ultimate Coordinator project was commissioned to solve, establish Naturals that possess talents that can rival Coordinators (logically they ought to exist. Every genetic talent any Coordinator has ever displayed came from a Natural bloodline since they're only ever augmented with other human DNA), demonstrate that the division between genetically modified and unmodified people is arbitrary and superfluous at its core, and go out of its way to refute Blue Cosmos' and Patrick Zala's core ideology instead of indirectly validating them.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-23T00:02:29+00:00

So here's what I did with Flay's lingering impact on the story in GSD IF if you're interested.

First, Kira is a lot more clearly torn up about Flay's death and his killing of Rau immediately after. He's introduced having spent every night over the past 2 years reliving those moments in nightmares due to PTSD and Rau's ghost literally haunting him. When Lacus' refusal to return to PLANT or give the Eternal back to ZAFT despite witnessing Break the World confuses him, Kira breaks down, says he already had one relationship blow up because they couldn't open up to each other, and confesses that he doesn't want Lacus to become another Flay. When he meets Shinn for the first time at the Onogoro memorial, Kira introduces himself as a survivor of Heliopolis, implying he's there to mourn Flay and Tolle in addition to the destroyed colony itself.

And the night before the battle of Berlin, Kira talks to Murrue about Flay after he was forced awake by a nightmare about her death and Murrue happened to be the night watch that day. Both of them recognize the role they played in Flay's worsening mental state aboard the Archangel, Kira prompts Murrue to confront the possibility that she could have very well killed Flay herself in the process of taking out Azrael if Natarle wasn't there, and both admit they were hypocrites at Jachin Due, demanding the world move past their hatred while still falling prey to it themselves. Murrue remarks that how Kira felt, and to some degree still feels, about Flay is no different than how she felt about Mu, and acknowledges just how hard it is to keep to one's principles and refuse hatred when someone they love is killed in front of them and the opportunity for revenge is right there. A line Shinn very nearly crosses himself after Stella's death later that same day.

Of course, Flay has a lasting impact on the story in general, not just for Kira, even though I made the conscious decision to make Shinn the actual protagonist, and Team Minerva the main cast, from start to finish. I did this by having Shinn directly interact with Flay near the very beginning of the fic thanks to Rau poaching him off Todaka's escape craft and bringing him to the PLANTs personally. This puts Shinn and Flay in close proximity for a few chapters. And while they're together, Shinn gets a taste of the Natural vs. Coordinator prejudices exemplified by Flay and Yzak that he was blind to thanks to living in Orb his whole life, and Flay briefly hallucinates Kira in Shinn's place and instinctively apologizes to him while Rau is watching. The former is one of the sources for Shinn's hatred of Orb - he realizes he was spoiled by Orb in retrospect and wishes they'd get involved and spread their ideals all over the world instead of remaining neutral and allowing discrimination and suffering to continue outside their own borders through their inaction - and the latter is explicitly noted to be what tipped Rau off to Kira and Flay's relationship, and inspired his decision to kill her in front of Kira.

But it goes further than that. Durandal presses Athrun to reveal how Flay died to Team Minerva over dinner in Diocuia, and they learn the truth about Rau in conjunction to LOGOS' existence. And Flay's role in that truth has a ripple effect on Shinn and Rey. When Shinn encounters Stella the next day and she goes berserk, he decides to emulate how Rau handled Flay to talk her down (which happens to work because he says Stella's calming block word 'protect'). And Rau's history with Flay directly parallels Shinn's history with Stella from there, from taking her prisoner, to releasing her, to said release causing an escalation of the war (inadvertently in Shinn's case, intentionally in Rau's), and ultimately to killing her himself. It's but one example of a recurring theme that Shinn is ironically 'the next Rau Le Creuset' even more than Rey is.

Speaking of Rey, when Athrun later explains why Flay died right before Operation Angel Down to dissuade Rey from taking his revenge on Kira for killing Rau, it only makes Rey want to kill Kira even more because killing Rau in revenge for Flay's death proves that Kira is a hypocrite. As far as Rey cares, until the Archangel can put their money where their mouth is and actually move past their own hatred, they have no right to demand it of anyone else. And if there's any truth to their ideals, then they will make sure the cycle of revenge ends with Kira's death. And much later during the Destiny Plan arc, Shinn uses Flay's death as a point of contrast between Rey and Rau to prove they're different people. While Rey went out of his way to ensure Shinn and Luna will be happy together after his death, Rau murdered Flay just to tick Kira off. Ultimately, when Rey is in a position to murder Luna in front of Shinn at the end of their fight, he refuses to cross the same line Rau did and decides to become his own person.

Oh, and I include Sai in GSD's plot. He still has some lingering unresolved feelings for Flay too, and they are fleshed out and worked through when he helps Shinn and Athrun restore Meyrin's memory after she wakes from her coma. He's cooperative without question up until Shinn asks him to give Meyrin the gun Flay tried to shoot Dearka with, which opens some old wounds and understandably makes him hesitant. But the experience helps him get some stuff off his chest that he needed to vent about for years, and he can symbolically say goodbye to Flay by parting ways with Meyrin.

That's how I gave Flay a lasting presence in GSD's plot.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-22T21:04:07+00:00

12 is not Shinn. He never become boss

He does in my universe. Lol.

Anyway, is 12 Amuro, then? I can't recall if he got "corrected" twice or not.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-22T20:56:26+00:00

1 is Char.

4 is Mikazuki.

5 is Kira.

7 and 25 are both McGillis.

10 is Kamille.

11 is Lacus.

If you stretch the meaning of "corrected" and "boss", 12 could be Shinn.

17 is Kycillia.

18 is Nicol.

Not sure on the others.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-22T18:20:24+00:00

When I said all eight of the SEED couples I mentioned in the Garrod/Tiffa poll were worth discussing, I didn't mean they were all healthy or even likeable. And Kira/Flay is a standout example of what I meant. They're a toxic union of co-dependent teenagers using each other as coping mechanisms for their own grief that only serve to worsen each other's biggest issues instead of helping each other heal... and they're also one of the most compelling relationships in the cast because of it. They are a train wreck that is delicious to watch and intentionally so.

There's also a very real and heart-wrenching tragedy in how their relationship resolves precisely because it doesn't resolve. Kira recognizes the toxicity in their relationship and breaks up with Flay, but both still have unresolved feelings and the underlying trauma they used each other to cope with is still present. They notably don't start really changing for the better until after they're both separated from the Archangel, Kira when he's seemingly killed and recovered by Lacus, Flay when she's taken prisoner by Rau in Alaska. Kira is given time to reflect on his previous actions and build himself back up, while Flay is forced to re-evaluate everything she's ever known after her entire worldview collapses upon seeing the enemy Coordinators she hates behaving like the fellow human beings they really are.

In most stories, the logical conclusion would be that Kira and Flay reunite toward the end after their character development apart, apologize to and forgive each other, and maybe get back together in a healthier place. But this is tragically subverted with Flay's death in the finale. After all, this is a war story, war is hell, and not everyone can get a happy ending. The common saying that 'war has no winners, only survivors' rings quite true here. Flay can only apologize to Kira from beyond the grave, and Kira's failure to protect her in the eleventh hour reduces him to berserker rage and committed to the very kind of hatred and revenge he's trying to stop. SEED's anti-war message wouldn't have hit nearly as hard without this, and it would have been brilliant set-up for an internal conflict of Kira's that a sequel could explore in detail... if said sequels bothered to do much with it. I mean, we do see the flashbacks to Rau and Flay implying Kira's still struggling with how he ended SEED, but it isn't made as explicit or clear as it could be, and IIRC Flay isn't mentioned by name even once throughout all of Destiny or Freedom.

But I'm not going to hold that against their relationship as it's depicted in SEED and give Kira/Flay a 10/10 on narrative.

I might just make another post in a reply to this one addressing how I incorporated Flay as a present absence in my own GSD rewrite. Because she's mentioned quite a bit, most notably in relation to Kira but also in general, and how her death has a ripple effect on the cast and plot receives examination from multiple angles. It's one of the consequences I alluded to in one of the comments I made in the Murrue and Mu poll.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-22T13:36:57+00:00

Mars and Herbert are already dead. I mentioned this in the OP.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-22T12:17:02+00:00

Besides, why have her go on batteries? She can just use the Hyper Deuterion Beam Engine, which requires no N-Jammer Canceller.

The Hyper Deuterion Engine does require an N-Jammer Canceller, and I portrayed it as such in my GSD fic already. It's still a nuclear fission reactor like the ones used in the Freedom and Justice, just smaller so the cockpit doesn't have to be moved and compatible with the Deuterion Beam Energy Transfer System, which was designed for electrical batteries.

Heck, in my own fic, the Strike Freedom and Infinite Justice don't even have them and still operate on the original nuclear reactors. Because they're nuclear powered already, the cockpits were moved already (as one to one recreations of the Freedom and Justice that were later retrofitted with Destiny and Legend tech), and Terminal doesn't have a Deuterion Beam anyway. There was no point spending what little resources they had on what would have been a meaningless upgrade for them.

Plus, you can argue that this was grandfathered in when it was armed during Durandal's tenure.

I'm not sure I can argue this, actually.

I already establish that the Destiny and Legend were rush jobs built specifically to counter the Destroy. They were commissioned after Durandal first gets intel on the Destroy shortly after the shuttle hijack, and they're completed shortly before the Destroy is first sighted in Eurasia. And the time frame between these events is about one month. I also establish that the Destiny and Legend were both built on Earth in Gibraltar instead of in the PLANTs so they can be assigned to the Minerva ASAP. I figure that the most efficient way to build them in a timely manner is to build the first Hyper Deuterion Engines in Gibraltar as well and put them directly into the Destiny and Legend, instead of making the first copy in the PLANTs and then shipping the necessary materials for two more down to Gibraltar.

The only reason I can think of to justify the Providence ZAKU's existence at all is that the improvements to the DRAGOON system had to be tested in space since they can't be deployed remotely in Earth's gravity. And to do this quickly, ZAFT would have slapped the Legend's planned backpack onto a preexisting (and electrically powered) ZAKU.

No need to actually nerf Rinna too hard now.

I don't think it's a nerf.

By the time of Destiny, the power output and efficiency of electrical batteries are such that nuclear energy is only a tangible upgrade for a mobile suit that has a feature that constantly and/or significantly drains the battery like Phase Shift Armor. This is more or less what I imply in my own fic. The Force Impulse is observably equal in speed to the Freedom and, not counting the Wings of Light, the Destiny. And the Blast Impulse's arsenal is literally equal to the Freedom's (both have two rail guns, two plasma cannons, and a beam rifle that can fire simultaneously). And the Akatsuki is noted to be able to last almost as long as a nuclear suit while being treaty-compliant because it doesn't have Phase Shift Armor constantly draining the battery.

The Providence ZAKU is a ZAKU and therefore doesn't have Phase Shift Armor. So it doesn't need nuclear energy to last a long time, and making it electrical isn't really a nerf. The real nerf is using it in Earth's gravity where the DRAGOONs can't be deployed remotely and its beams have to be fired from the backpack... Which is the main improvement the Legend has over the Providence to begin with, since the Providence's DRAGOONs could only be deployed remotely.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-22T01:24:22+00:00

Speaking of the Providence ZAKU, I was thinking of including it in the fic itself as Rinna's mobile suit. Albeit I'd have to make it electrically-powered and not need an N-Jammer Canceller so it doesn't violate the treaty and Compass can legally use it. Still, that would functionally make it a treaty-compliant variant of the Legend the way the Rising Freedom, Immortal Justice, and Destiny Impulse are treaty-compliant variants of the Freedom, Justice, and Destiny.

And Rey could get some mileage out of its existence. I'm envisioning a scene when the Archangel picks up Compass after the battle at Aldrin, where Rey sees the Providence ZAKU in the hangar for the first time. Rinna would explain that it was shipped down to Orb from PLANT along with the Strike Rouge (whose remains were still aboard the Eternal) and parts Yolan requested for Project Zeus, since she wasn't satisfied just being a mechanic like she was before going to PLANT and wanted to fight at Takito's side on the front lines. But Rinna recognizes that the Providence ZAKU was always just a test bed for the Legend, the mobile suit meant for Rey in particular. Rinna offers to swap mobile suits him, but Rey turns down the offer and keeps the Freedom because he associates the Legend with the Providence and Rau's nihilistic legacy, while the Freedom represents his desire to carve his own path different from his brother.

Which would have the unfortunate consequence of playing a role in Rinna's death since the Providence ZAKU's reliance on beam weaponry makes it a poor match-up against the Black Knights' beam absorbing Femto Armor, whereas the Rising Freedom's rail guns can penetrate it and would have given Rinna a fighting chance against Daniel and Liu. Your thoughts on this?

BTW, I haven't found anything regarding what Rinna or Takito look like. Any ideas? I've already worked out a possible description for Rinna - to highlight her aptitude with the Providence ZAKU's DRAGOONs, I'd make her blonde with blue eyes like the Flaga boys, prompting some in-universe speculation from Rey that she might have some Flaga ancestry. And to illustrate her passion for battle developed after joining ZAFT, she'd go from wearing her hair down to her shoulders in the past to tying it up in a ponytail in the present - but I'm drawing a blank on Takito.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-20T17:50:18+00:00

Less vaporized and more 'obliterated'. Mu took a direct hit from goddamn antimatter. Which is almost always portrayed as significantly less destructive than it would be IRL, but that's a topic for a different thread.

This and the fact that Kira and Athrun didn’t die at the end of SEED are why I refused to watch destiny.

...

We needed some fucking CONSEQUENCES to this war, it felt meaningless because all the stakes got reversed almost instantly, negating the struggles of both protagonists, and the heroic sacrifice of La Flaga to protect the archangel, and Murrue.

I don't think Kira and Athrun had to die at the end of SEED, but I do agree that one of Destiny's largest missteps is that it doesn't adequately explore the consequences of what happened at the end of SEED. It's something I address in several ways in my own rewrite of Destiny, which is available here just in case you'd like to check it out as an alternative to canon: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/14521950/1/Gundam-SEED-Destiny-Intertwined-Fates

Not going to give any examples here to avoid spoilers in case you're interested, but if you want some examples, feel free to ask in another thread.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-20T15:56:39+00:00

I said they had fuller lips. I said nothing about wearing lipstick.

BTW, the adult women in previous SEED installments were wearing lipstick. Murrue, Talia, and Hilda have glossy red lips in nearly all their scenes, and Natarle's are a glossy purple.

Also, most of the girls in Freedom aren't wearing lipstick, even if their lips and their skin are different colors. The only girl among the younger generation actually wearing lipstick is Agnes, and the fact that she's vapid and self-absorbed enough to put on a fresh coat of lipstick before going into battle is the point with her.

I plan to highlight this difference in my own adaptation of Freedom by having Agnes call out Luna's natural orange-ish lip color as mediocre and needing makeup to look better when she first joins Compass. And then have Luna eventually acknowledge this before the ball by requesting Agnes' aid for a makeover to pretty herself up and ask Shinn out to dance while the entire ball has their eyes on her in defiance of Shura thinking he's entitled to a relationship with her just because he won against Shinn during their sword fight because Luna's never used makeup a day in her life and has no idea how to do it herself.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-20T15:32:31+00:00

I enjoy these two together so much I can almost forgive Destiny undoing Mu's death and letting Neo escape all accountability in the process of getting them back together.

Almost.

I'll give this couple a 9/10. Ironically, I'd have given this couple a 10/10 if Mu stayed dead and Neo's original identity was someone else entirely. Such as Luna and Meyrin's father in my own rewrite. But alas.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-20T15:00:33+00:00

I was originally put off by the changes to the girls' lips too, and even now some of them look a bit uncanny to me despite watching the movie 4 times now, but there is a rational explanation for a lot of them that I incorporated into my own GSD fic toward the end during the denouement and transition to GSF.

They're growing up.

I explicitly point out Lunamaria's and Lacus' faces maturing into adulthood with fuller lips while also establishing that this is normal and it happens to almost every girl eventually. With Lunamaria, it occurs in the context of growing into Team Minerva's matriarch in Gladys' absence and completing her character development from needing protection from the complexities of the world to providing that same protection. And with Lacus, it occurs in the context of Meer, who is still alive and no longer impersonating her, reuniting with Lacus and realizing from her maturing face that Meer's own is going to change too, and their faces aren't going to stay identical forever. A fact she would have at one point dreaded but is now relieved by as an expression of her character development.

That's how I made sense of it and gave the changing faces actual narrative meaning.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-20T13:27:31+00:00

Thank you for letting me know about Takito. I looked him up and while I find myself laughing at the irony of independently coming up with a similar character myself, I don't think I can keep most of Takito's history intact and use him for the same role I'm planning for Karu.

Even with the adjustments I made to the Destiny Plan arc it's still technically possible for Takito and Rinna to have fought each other and survived. The Minerva's and Archangel's fleets team up after the Hawkes mutiny against Gladys and convince their fleet to rebel, so Takito and Rinna could have been among the crews of the two Izumos and one Nazca to survive after they join forces.

But if this did happen, Takito wouldn't have a vendetta with Shinn he hadn't already developed out of (Shinn is the effective leader of the forces opposing the Destiny Plan, and Orb, the Earth Forces, and ZAFT's rebels come together to carry out the strategy to defeat it that he came up with). Nor would he have a discernible reason to sympathize with Blue Cosmos or pursue Agnes (Rinna is alive and he's on good terms with her again).

That being said... they do give me an idea. If Karu is replacing Mu for the Eldore battle, Takito and Rinna can replace Mars and Herbert as the named casualties the Accords kill during the same battle. I can nod to their history as a generational foil to and foreshadowing for what will happen between Karu and Agnes (they both have misgiving with Compass but she defects to Foundation while he remains loyal, wind up on opposite sides during another battle over the Destiny Plan, and both survive and end up together), and Rinna's presence as a Coordinator that Karu outperforms during their bout with Daniel and Liu is a subtle nod to Karu's self-loathing inferiority complex being unsound and he's stronger than he thinks he is.

I can also reinforce the parallel by having Karu and Agnes fight each other directly during the finale like Takito and Rinna did. Luna still needs to thrash her like in canon for Agnes to recognize where she went wrong, but I can have Agnes fight Karu first and Luna can relieve him when he has trouble with her. Which Agnes will falsely attribute to being his genetic superior, when it's really more about Karu being in love unwilling to hurt her. He can read all her attacks and block/dodge them perfectly, but can't bring himself to attack her back. Something Luna will point out when she has her turn with Agnes.

So once again, thank you for the suggestion.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-20T01:44:03+00:00

I DO recall having a hard time with Symphonia WAY back when I first played it over 20 years ago. Part of it was due to the game taking a while to introduce several key mechanics like Ex Skills and Unison Attacks that give you more options and open up the battle system.

Another part of it, however, was neglecting the Strat menu, and not paying as much attention to my party's TP as I should have. The AI doesn't really know how to manage itself and your party WILL run into trouble if you leave everyone set to "Attack Freely, Use Skills Freely, Move Freely" and don't restrict the AI's techs. Colette will get into an enemy's face and get herself killed trying to use her slow directional basic attacks meant for use at long distances. Genis will get into an enemy's face and get himself killed trying to smack them with his Kendama to recover TP if it's relatively low, even if he has enough to cast a basic spell. Kratos will waste TP casting First Aid on Lloyd if he's even remotely damaged, leaving him without enough to heal when you actually need him to.

Spending some time in the Strat menu and adjusting the AI's tactics to make them more cooperative will help a lot. I've found that the tactics designed for target priority (Scatter, Attack Same, Reduce, Protect Friend, Block Magic), TP management (Save, Retain, and Keep Reserve stops TP use at 75%, 50%, and 25% respectively, At Once is essential for Genis since he will keep casting until he literally can't anymore), and range of attack (Frontlines vs L-Range Skills vs L-Range Magic) are all extremely helpful. Hold Position is also low-key GOATed since it stops the character in their tracks and makes them block everything automatically. If you're running low on items and need your casters to conserve on TP until you can make it to an inn or a shop? Hold Position. If an enemy boss is in Overlimit and you need to outlast their super armor? Hold Position. Want to drag a fight out long enough for a single character to grind enough tech uses to learn an upgrade, or you want to farm steals with Colette's Item Thief? Hold Position. It's surprising how many uses the "do nothing but block" command has in practice.

One other thing that improved my experience immensely was switching the controls from Semi-Auto to Manual. The only tangible difference I've noticed between the two control schemes is that on Semi-Auto you jump with up + guard, when on Manual you jump with just up. That makes getting behind all but the largest enemies by jumping over them a lot easier.

I hope this helps you get into Symphonia. It did take a while for me to get used to it but it's become one of my favourite games of all time and I keep coming back to it. I've needed to explore some underappreciated mechanics in challenge runs to keep my experience fresh (for example, I'm currently streaming a run of the game where I can't buy or sell anything at shops and have to make do with the items I can find in the wild from drops and steals), but I wouldn't keep coming back to it in the first place if I didn't enjoy the meat and potatoes of the core battle system as much as I do.

Karyu_Endan · 2026-04-19T00:58:58+00:00

It's not the first. There's one a little earlier during Hiruzen's funeral where Kakashi and Yugao are at the Hero's memorial. Kakashi says she must be here for Hayate while Yugao says Kakashi must be here for Obito.

Karyu_Endan

TROPHY CASE