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Noire's Father
This post is not about designer intent. This post is not about designer intent. This post is not about designer intent. From a designer intent standpoint, the issue can probably be summarized as, "they thought it was lulz and no big deal."
This post is like my post about Ike and the epilogue, an attempt at sensibly reconciling these things in some way that enriches rather than cheapens the universe, for pretentious fic writing purposes or general peace of mind or whatever.
All right. So. Noire's daddy.
The issue at hand is this: Tharja, both in the other universe and this one, has used Noire for experimenting with new hexes for what appears to be a pretty long time. And Tharja's spouse has dealt with this by going up and confronting Tharja and getting the hex transferred to him instead for his efforts. Beyond this, in the present world, he also steals Tharja's hexing implements in an attempt to stop it for good -- but Noire explicitly says that he'd never tried anything like that in the alpha timeline.
So what's up with that, dad? Why didn't you deal with the matter in some way to stop it once and for all?
1. Physical limitations
Let's say he tries to physically leave Tharja. Grab Noire and run or whatever.
First of all, it's not really clear how far they'd have to run to be out of the danger zone, if ever. Henry/Olivia, Henry/Tharja, and Henry/Sully supports all indirectly suggest that hexes can affect a target fairly distant from the caster. Can you get far away enough from Tharja? She's probably got a lifetime supply of hair hidden away, and she might just make you projectile vomit slugs until you come crawling back. With the possible exception of Henry (who apparently finds the runny nose curse too "delicate" to counterhex, but should probably be able to keep them safe from any seriously coercive hexes meant to bring them back, which are probably more mainstream) I don't think the dads could assert themselves against that unless they either outright killed Tharja or attempted to enlist the support of other army members, both of which are questionable options thanks to the following reason.
The second reason is that there are more dangerous things in the world than Tharja in this doomed timeline. A lot of them. Noire seems to suggest in her father A support that it's ~free will~ that's allowed her father to steal mommy's curse kit whereas he'd never tried before, but personally I think it's the difference in circumstances. In the doomed timeline you need every fighter you can get, and alienating a powerful mage who would protect your own child and everyone else's over the matter of runny nose hexes probably doesn't work out to be a gamble in your favor. Because while Tharja is a threat to her child, she's a threat on the level of "persistently causing discomfort," not "eaten alive" -- and insofar as larger threats are concerned, Tharja's presence helps1 rather than hurts.
(I would actually be interested to know if there's scholarship on divorce in times of major, immediate, and external survival-related uncertainty, like if they go way down when a country's currently fighting a defensive war or recovering from a tsunami or something. I do know that there's research done [a lot of it] on the matter of economic dependence, but I think the "Child Getting Hurt vs Where Next Meal Come From?" question is a very different one from "Child Getting Hurt vs Will Zombie Eat Child?" question. In the latter, both sides of the scale are about the child's well-being.)
Considering that Tharja outlived Dad, his staying with her may have even saved Noire's life.
In the present timeline, dad's already pulling stunts within months that alpha-timeline-dad never tried to pull. Perhaps their relationship is charted for a significantly different course in this timeline, now that no one has to play nice because of the zombies.
1 Per Tharja/Noire A and the Future of Despair DLC, Tharja acted to protect Noire from serious threats, going so far as to sacrifice herself.
2. Social pressures
There are two people outside of daddy's own potential neuroses that might keep him attached to Tharja.
One of them is Tharja. By all accounts, he loves her and has probably seen her sweeter side, which might cause him to believe too much in her ability to ~change~ (or generally not do harmful things to their daughter). All right, that's daddy's weakness. But.
The other one is Noire -- because despite being afraid of her mother, Noire is also very clingy and feels warmly toward her. Judging by their interactions I'd certainly guess that Noire would object to the idea of being permanently (or near-permanently) separated from her mother.
And I suspect that when your daughter is squalling for you not to do something, it's harder to convince yourself that you're doing it for her sake, especially when your wife is using the same "it's good for her" excuse to do said questionable things.
3. Because he was dead
No, really.
Noire/Tharja C: "You were consumed with avenging Father, so you never had time to waste on me."
Dad died before Tharja. How much earlier? It sounds like it was a matter of years to me ("you never had the time to waste on me"?). I don't think the game clarifies. Perhaps it says in one of the Future of Despair Dad&Noire chats, but as far as I know there's no general statement about Noire's dads in general.
But it's certainly possible that the worst of it, the part that drove Noire to having a split personality and whatnot, came after dad was already gone. Yes, practicing hexes on your kid is certainly bad enough in principle, but when it's runny noses I think I can understand dad having a "Well, let me talk to her" mentality about it. I'm not sure I want to know what Tharja was practicing in her latter days.
This post is like my post about Ike and the epilogue, an attempt at sensibly reconciling these things in some way that enriches rather than cheapens the universe, for pretentious fic writing purposes or general peace of mind or whatever.
All right. So. Noire's daddy.
The issue at hand is this: Tharja, both in the other universe and this one, has used Noire for experimenting with new hexes for what appears to be a pretty long time. And Tharja's spouse has dealt with this by going up and confronting Tharja and getting the hex transferred to him instead for his efforts. Beyond this, in the present world, he also steals Tharja's hexing implements in an attempt to stop it for good -- but Noire explicitly says that he'd never tried anything like that in the alpha timeline.
So what's up with that, dad? Why didn't you deal with the matter in some way to stop it once and for all?
1. Physical limitations
Let's say he tries to physically leave Tharja. Grab Noire and run or whatever.
First of all, it's not really clear how far they'd have to run to be out of the danger zone, if ever. Henry/Olivia, Henry/Tharja, and Henry/Sully supports all indirectly suggest that hexes can affect a target fairly distant from the caster. Can you get far away enough from Tharja? She's probably got a lifetime supply of hair hidden away, and she might just make you projectile vomit slugs until you come crawling back. With the possible exception of Henry (who apparently finds the runny nose curse too "delicate" to counterhex, but should probably be able to keep them safe from any seriously coercive hexes meant to bring them back, which are probably more mainstream) I don't think the dads could assert themselves against that unless they either outright killed Tharja or attempted to enlist the support of other army members, both of which are questionable options thanks to the following reason.
The second reason is that there are more dangerous things in the world than Tharja in this doomed timeline. A lot of them. Noire seems to suggest in her father A support that it's ~free will~ that's allowed her father to steal mommy's curse kit whereas he'd never tried before, but personally I think it's the difference in circumstances. In the doomed timeline you need every fighter you can get, and alienating a powerful mage who would protect your own child and everyone else's over the matter of runny nose hexes probably doesn't work out to be a gamble in your favor. Because while Tharja is a threat to her child, she's a threat on the level of "persistently causing discomfort," not "eaten alive" -- and insofar as larger threats are concerned, Tharja's presence helps1 rather than hurts.
(I would actually be interested to know if there's scholarship on divorce in times of major, immediate, and external survival-related uncertainty, like if they go way down when a country's currently fighting a defensive war or recovering from a tsunami or something. I do know that there's research done [a lot of it] on the matter of economic dependence, but I think the "Child Getting Hurt vs Where Next Meal Come From?" question is a very different one from "Child Getting Hurt vs Will Zombie Eat Child?" question. In the latter, both sides of the scale are about the child's well-being.)
Considering that Tharja outlived Dad, his staying with her may have even saved Noire's life.
In the present timeline, dad's already pulling stunts within months that alpha-timeline-dad never tried to pull. Perhaps their relationship is charted for a significantly different course in this timeline, now that no one has to play nice because of the zombies.
1 Per Tharja/Noire A and the Future of Despair DLC, Tharja acted to protect Noire from serious threats, going so far as to sacrifice herself.
2. Social pressures
There are two people outside of daddy's own potential neuroses that might keep him attached to Tharja.
One of them is Tharja. By all accounts, he loves her and has probably seen her sweeter side, which might cause him to believe too much in her ability to ~change~ (or generally not do harmful things to their daughter). All right, that's daddy's weakness. But.
The other one is Noire -- because despite being afraid of her mother, Noire is also very clingy and feels warmly toward her. Judging by their interactions I'd certainly guess that Noire would object to the idea of being permanently (or near-permanently) separated from her mother.
And I suspect that when your daughter is squalling for you not to do something, it's harder to convince yourself that you're doing it for her sake, especially when your wife is using the same "it's good for her" excuse to do said questionable things.
3. Because he was dead
No, really.
Noire/Tharja C: "You were consumed with avenging Father, so you never had time to waste on me."
Dad died before Tharja. How much earlier? It sounds like it was a matter of years to me ("you never had the time to waste on me"?). I don't think the game clarifies. Perhaps it says in one of the Future of Despair Dad&Noire chats, but as far as I know there's no general statement about Noire's dads in general.
But it's certainly possible that the worst of it, the part that drove Noire to having a split personality and whatnot, came after dad was already gone. Yes, practicing hexes on your kid is certainly bad enough in principle, but when it's runny noses I think I can understand dad having a "Well, let me talk to her" mentality about it. I'm not sure I want to know what Tharja was practicing in her latter days.
