[E17 Spoilers] A certain character.

[Shia]

Massive episode 17 spoilers about a certain erm, imposing character.
 

 

Ever since the last episode, the person named Lin finally steps out from the shadows to have a more direct role in the story. Ever since I saw this woman fly on her Hydreigon and basically eat a Giant Steelix alive, she became my favorite character. And the mysteries surrounding her just piled up since then. Laura and the other orphanage people somehow remember her, and the likes of even Sirius and Solaris, which to remind you are both A-class murderers, are actually terrified of her to a certain degree. Even though she's only appeared once back then, her reputation is already tremendously horrifying.

And boy, does she live up to it. I'd really just like to say that ever since Episode 16, every time Lin's involved, everything goes to literal hell. In just the short span of time she's stepped on to the spotlight, she basically kills 2 named characters. Though, one of those is only a potential, but still. She Mami'd Amethyst and got Taka the same old Titanium Meteor treatment. She could've also easily turned both Victoria and Adrienn into barbeques and Arclight as a pincushion, but somehow she doesn't. When even the Champion HERSELF has nothing against such a character, we're kind of erm, in trouble.

Though, admittedly I could just be hyperboling all of this up since I'm such a huge Taka fan and I'm still in shock about his death in one of the story branches in E17. And also the fact that I'm a Lin fan too.

All in all, I'd really just like to say that I'm impressed that Lin actually lives up to the terrifying image that the game has built up about her. Which isn't that easy to pull off, in my opinion. She's basically a walking black hole. A really good kind. In a story sense, again in my opinion at least. She's had such an impact on me that in fact, from now on, I'm honestly scared for each Episode release. As I said, since Episode 16, the suffering train has just been pushing through, and with Lin driving that thing, it'll basically never stop. Which makes sense because we're slowly reaching the final episodes now.

But even then, there's still not a lot known about her. Which only makes me more excited for the next episode releases. While at the same time being scared. So good job to Amethyst and the creators and what not for Lin. And boo, for having her kill Taka. Because now I'm conflicted.

TL;DR, i love lin but i hate her too 

also my husbando taka deserves to live
 

[pokemastercj1]

Spoiler

So spoilers for the path you didn't get (since you saw Taka die you must have had the Reshiram path) but in the Zekrom path Lin herself gets stabbed through the chest by Titania, and lives. So yeah, Lin's even scarier than you just described as it seems she can cheat death.

 

[iDunno]

[SPOILERS FOR EPISODE 17]

 

Personally, I'm kind of on the fence about her. On the plus side, she is definitely intimidating, and every time she appears (well, at least in this and the last episode) there's a definite shift in the atmosphere, and you know things are about to get ugly. Problem is, Lin is a pretty generic and unimposing name for a villain; there's already a green-haired Pokemon villain whose ace is Hydreigon; and the first time she appears is fairly late in the game, and at that point she comes out of nowhere ("oh, there's this random person here, she's the true leader of Team Meteor. We know we built up Solaris throughout the whole game, but he's actually second-in-command, xoxo").

Also, personality-wise, she is kinda like a generic Shounen anime/manga final villain (cold, powerful and goes on and on about how feelings and friends are useless and all that matters is true power), while Solaris feels more like an actual Pokemon villain (only more remorseless and pragmatic). Also, the mystery about Lin's true identity and motives is scary to me, but for the wrong reasons: I fear it's gonna be something silly and over-the-top (like the "Adult-Lin-is-a-robot-controlled-by-Child-Lin" theory). Overall, while I don't hate her, and I'm looking forward to beating that Hydreigon and whatever else she has, I feel the game would be much better and consistent if Solaris was kept as the main villain :/

[Nyarth]

Spoiler

Good taste in husbando my friend 

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

 

I agree with a lot of things everyone has been saying! I have a few mixed feelings on Lin, and it has more to do with her execution of a character, but I also really like her in the game. She’s a great addition, and I’m super excited to see what happens with her later to come.

 

My issue is that she’s being built up over the game as a very formidable threat, but whatever she does it’s kind of working counterproductive on her own part.

 

The easiest way to build up a character that’s going to be a final boss is to have them beat the stuffing out of characters that have already been established as strong with ease. 

 

Our introduction to her is when she takes Saphira and her giant Steelix down in oneshot. That scene is really nice and all, especially since we know how powerful Saphira and Steelix are already. 

But the issue lies in the fact when we see Saphira again. Completely unscathed and also with two of the keys. Lin hasn’t defeated Saphira at all, and it just makes Lin look less of a larger than life foe because the stakes have been now reset at that point.

 

In 16, Lin defeats Ame under a big type-disadvantage. Ame is introduced as the freaking Champion, so Lin beating the Champion means something, right?

Not quite. Ame’s introduction of Champion without context or previous knowledge works badly here. We don’t know how powerful Ame is to begin with, and our first hearings of Ame in action is that she and Adrienn were overpowered and defeated. Not good first impressions.

So Lin’s defeat of her is kind of meaningless. Her being the Champion is kind of meaningless here, because said Champion hasn’t really shown anything Champion-ish to begin with.

...but that scene where Hydreigon bites off Ame’s head was pretty freaking cool, I’ll admit.

 

E17 is a lot better in these regards! Sadly, it’s only in one path though. Lin spooking around and reviving herself makes her more mysterious, but not more formidable.

So I’ll have to focus on the Reshiram path. Lin tricking Titania, and then immediately defeating her was a great scene in these regards! Titania was previously established as insanely strong, and she didn’t exactly get away completely unaffected. Her actions and behavior actually changes in regards to what Lin had done to her. So Lin’s actions are finally shown with big impact here!

 

Some other stuff in regards to Lin’s own personality has already been covered. I’m super biased to icy-cold villains though, so I can’t exactly cover it without gushing.

 

I hope we have more interactions with her as we had in E17, but some early showcases of her worked negatively for her.

Regardless, all aboard the suffering train!

[Shia]

7 hours ago, pokemastercj1 said:

  Reveal hidden contents

So spoilers for the path you didn't get (since you saw Taka die you must have had the Reshiram path) but in the Zekrom path Lin herself gets stabbed through the chest by Titania, and lives. So yeah, Lin's even scarier than you just described as it seems she can cheat death.

 

Oh yeah, that too. That's probably related to the mysterious background around her. There's an implication that Lin we see now is that way because of her falling to the same place where Adrienn did, turning her old and possibly having mumbo jumbo hoopla effects on her.

 

3 hours ago, iDunno said:

[SPOILERS FOR EPISODE 17]

Personally, I'm kind of on the fence about her. On the plus side, she is definitely intimidating, and every time she appears (well, at least in this and the last episode) there's a definite shift in the atmosphere, and you know things are about to get ugly. Problem is, Lin is a pretty generic and unimposing name for a villain; there's already a green-haired Pokemon villain whose ace is Hydreigon; and the first time she appears is fairly late in the game, and at that point she comes out of nowhere ("oh, there's this random person here, she's the true leader of Team Meteor. We know we built up Solaris throughout the whole game, but he's actually second-in-command, xoxo").

Also, personality-wise, she is kinda like a generic Shounen anime/manga final villain (cold, powerful and goes on and on about how feelings and friends are useless and all that matters is true power), while Solaris feels more like an actual Pokemon villain (only more remorseless and pragmatic). Also, the mystery about Lin's true identity and motives is scary to me, but for the wrong reasons: I fear it's gonna be something silly and over-the-top (like the "Adult-Lin-is-a-robot-controlled-by-Child-Lin" theory). Overall, while I don't hate her, and I'm looking forward to beating that Hydreigon and whatever else she has, I feel the game would be much better and consistent if Solaris was kept as the main villain :/

I see your point! But I think that she was a better executed example of those kinds of characters. She's pretty one-dimensional from what we see now, but at least she actually live ups to that image. She's a full-blown sociopath that just makes dark speeches, but she's incredibly efficient about it. Unlike most characters that just give grandiose speeches without being able to live up to it. As they say, you can talk the talk, but can you walk the walk? I don't know, I just really like those villains that are evil simply because they are evil. No dark backstory. No Freudian Excuses. Just plain, simple, unadulterated evil. Stereotypical characters aren't always necessarily bad. That's why they're stereotyped in the first place. However, such characters can be divisive and it depends on your perspective on whether they're capable or not. Which is not a bad thing at all. Also, I think giving her an over-the-top name would probably just make her a lot less tolerable, imo. Giving her a generic name grounds her in some way, even though her character is NOTHING but grounded. I see where you're coming from though! 

 

58 minutes ago, Nyarth said:

  Hide contents

Good taste in husbando my friend 

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

 

I agree with a lot of things everyone has been saying! I have a few mixed feelings on Lin, and it has more to do with her execution of a character, but I also really like her in the game. She’s a great addition, and I’m super excited to see what happens with her later to come.

 

My issue is that she’s being built up over the game as a very formidable threat, but whatever she does it’s kind of working counterproductive on her own part.

 

The easiest way to build up a character that’s going to be a final boss is to have them beat the stuffing out of characters that have already been established as strong with ease. 

 

Our introduction to her is when she takes Saphira and her giant Steelix down in oneshot. That scene is really nice and all, especially since we know how powerful Saphira and Steelix are already. 

But the issue lies in the fact when we see Saphira again. Completely unscathed and also with two of the keys. Lin hasn’t defeated Saphira at all, and it just makes Lin look less of a larger than life foe because the stakes have been now reset at that point.

 

In 16, Lin defeats Ame under a big type-disadvantage. Ame is introduced as the freaking Champion, so Lin beating the Champion means something, right?

Not quite. Ame’s introduction of Champion without context or previous knowledge works badly here. We don’t know how powerful Ame is to begin with, and our first hearings of Ame in action is that she and Adrienn were overpowered and defeated. Not good first impressions.

So Lin’s defeat of her is kind of meaningless. Her being the Champion is kind of meaningless here, because said Champion hasn’t really shown anything Champion-ish to begin with.

...but that scene where Hydreigon bites off Ame’s head was pretty freaking cool, I’ll admit.

 

E17 is a lot better in these regards! Sadly, it’s only in one path though. Lin spooking around and reviving herself makes her more mysterious, but not more formidable.

So I’ll have to focus on the Reshiram path. Lin tricking Titania, and then immediately defeating her was a great scene in these regards! Titania was previously established as insanely strong, and she didn’t exactly get away completely unaffected. Her actions and behavior actually changes in regards to what Lin had done to her. So Lin’s actions are finally shown with big impact here!

 

Some other stuff in regards to Lin’s own personality has already been covered. I’m super biased to icy-cold villains though, so I can’t exactly cover it without gushing.

 

I hope we have more interactions with her as we had in E17, but some early showcases of her worked negatively for her.

Regardless, all aboard the suffering train!

Oohh, that makes sense. I think what solidified that Lin's a true powerhouse is that her Dark/Dragon Hydreigon was able to defeat an Ice/Fairy A-Ninetails. Something that's diametrically opposite to its typing. Still, there are some other factors to take in note here, like the Field Effect, the levels, speed, etc. I don't exactly remember how that battle went though. And as you said, she just didn't care and bit Ame's head off, so yeah. 

 

Another thing about the whole Lin scenario in E17, it also seems that Titania has a very personal vendetta against Lin, moreso than her regular relationship with Team Meteor as a whole, adding another mystery to her. Just as how the orphanage people remember her. I do hope that these questions would be answered soon though. And considering I was taken aback by E17, I hope it's just as shocking.

 

Taka is the best husbando. Good boy with an amazing scarf. And yes. Icy-cold villains are my favorite too. 

 

 

[Commander]

So let's talk about Lin for a little bit then:

Spoiler

While the data implies that she's very likely the final boss and the big bad, I'm not buying it. Let's just look at two scenario and the evidence to back up and support them.

 

1. Lin is not real

 

So if you're read up on the lore of the game, you'll realize something doesn't match up with Lin. She was a friend of Terra and a young girl in the orphanage (lot of people described her like that) which lead up to a lot of mixed stories. So in the orphanage Lin was a bully to the other kids such as Laura by stealing or breaking some of Laura's things leading to Laura's obsession with the number 8. She was also a bit of a prankster who took a prank too far on Sigmund and was never seen again. During this time she snuck out of the house to play with a quiet girl we came to know as Terra and the two were inseparable. In fact, Terra's parents were going to adopt her, but couldn't due to unforeseen circumstances.

 

If you remember the orphanage, you may remember seeing a bed covered in blood stains. Some people may say that it's for effect, but I think it's intentional. Sigmund is surprised to see the name which could imply he ended up killing Lin in one of his experiments. ECT normally wouldn't hit those levels so maybe it ended up being something a bit more brutal. Then that brings up the question: if Lin is dead, who is this?

 

When Sigmund asks if Lin and he have met before, Lin simply responds with "Impossible." Sigmund confirms that she looks very similar to the girl from the orphanage making him wonder a few things (which is the big reason he joined Meteor...but I'll save that story for when it comes). Lin doesn't act like the childhood character they know...or even human. We also know that Lin isn't human due to her "death" in Shade's Gym as well as her not dying in Titania's Gym despite being stabbed several times. Anna also says she couldn't see Lin fighting the Steelix implying Lin does not have a soul (since that's the thing she sees of people...not physically). There's only one character I know who has a connection to Lin: Terra.

 

It doesn't seem impossible that Terra would try to resurrect her one and only friend. Rather she found the body and used that as a base or conjured up an entire new entity is entirely debatable. It's also likely that Terra recieved a gift from Arceus to achieve this: defy logic. If this is true, then becomes the question of who is Lin again. Is it Terra controlling her? Is Lin defying Terra and has become her own entity? Or is there a hidden force behind her being the true villain and this merely a charade? It's a tad bit early to tell.

 

2. Lin of Another World

 

Back in E16, we heard a prophecy about a timeline in which we were not in. This is possibly a previous timeline (and not in the future like a normal fortune) where certain key events happened. There's one character we haven't identified: a taciturn woman dressed in black and red. The other important thing is that they were an ally of the heroes. We can remove Titania from that list. Some people theorized it was Shade, but that is really hard to believe as Shade is referred to a man in the league officially and Anna even calls him Mr. Ghost. That slowly deduces it down to two characters: Lin and Terra. Both of these also contradict the prophecy as well as they do not meet the prophecy but...

 

We know time acts funny in the Cit-dae-Astrae...however you spell it so while it stopped time in this world, it could have sped it up in that world. Maybe instead of dying in that world, she nearly died and needs machinery (or a suit) to even survive. Maybe she conceals it but that suit is actually black and red as this Lin is very reserved and only says jarring phrases and words. She disappeared, but that world was more or less wiped (or reset). Maybe since she shouldn't exist is the reason why Anna can't see her.

 

That makes me wonder if she's possibly an ally instead of a villain. Something happened in that world that nearly destroyed it which is why as a final attempt the world was reset. My theory it was the release of Arceus or Meteor trying to create a new world which ended up leading to the destruction of the world killing nearly everybody. So now we have a Lin who knows what happened and that it was caused by Team Meteor through their ideals.

 

Lin certainly is no saint but she really only has killed one person: Ame outside of possibly Team Meteor members. Well Ame kind of was the champ and Lin being the champ would give her more power than she already has. She had plenty of time to kill and annihilate dangerous threats to her plans with Meteor: Saphira, Titania, Amaria, The Player, etc. She didn't though. It could be cockiness, or it could be something else. Lin needed the player to hold onto the keystone specifically which is why she was involved there. The prophecy hinted that Titania was the one to strike Cal down so maybe this was in order to prevent Titania's involvement and alter history (this could be for both and evil and good Lin as well). Arclight, another of the allies, lost an eye while the others were only harmed and lost nothing pretty much (minus Ame).

 

There's also the screens which showed the characters dying. We know that is going to happen to Lin, but it's kind of weird we'd know about the ending of the game so early that it'd make the ending rather...boring and anticlimatic in a sense. I can't say that all the characters were our allies, but they weren't are enemies either. Would also be interesting if it was Lin who ordered Terra to destroy all the pulses.

 

Don't take either of these ideas too seriously (mostly because data implies Lin is the big bad), but it's just food for thought over "ermagawd Lin is a bad villain and a mary sue cuz she too stronk and don't die"

 

[Shia]

Another tidbit to what you said..

 

In Episode 17, after the battle with Titania, Lin says that the player would keep the bracelets. The conversation moves forward which makes Titania think that Lin and the PC are working together. Asking that, Lin actually replies with "Aren't we?". There's also the fact that Lin specifically asked that the PC not be harmed at the whole Devon escapade. And true enough, the PC's the only one who got out without so much a broken nail. 

 

Lin's just mystery in the form of a character. We don't really know who she is, what she's up to, why she's doing what she's up to, or how she's even doing what she's currently doing. Even 17 episodes later, we still don't have a solid answer to any of these questions about her. Which is kind of worrying considering we're only 2+ episodes away from Reborn ending, iirc.

I do highly believe that the Lin we see isn't real though. "Real" is subjective, but she's definitely NOT as we think she is. I hope that it's more than just a puppet-master thing though. That just seems too obvious. Anywho, I'm excited to get to battle her because that means we'll get a VS sprite of her. 

[Nyarth]

10 hours ago, SHIA II said:

Another tidbit to what you said..

 

 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

 

In Episode 17, after the battle with Titania, Lin says that the player would keep the bracelets. The conversation moves forward which makes Titania think that Lin and the PC are working together. Asking that, Lin actually replies with "Aren't we?". There's also the fact that Lin specifically asked that the PC not be harmed at the whole Devon escapade. And true enough, the PC's the only one who got out without so much a broken nail. 

 

Lin's just mystery in the form of a character. We don't really know who she is, what she's up to, why she's doing what she's up to, or how she's even doing what she's currently doing. Even 17 episodes later, we still don't have a solid answer to any of these questions about her. Which is kind of worrying considering we're only 2+ episodes away from Reborn ending, iirc.

I do highly believe that the Lin we see isn't real though. "Real" is subjective, but she's definitely NOT as we think she is. I hope that it's more than just a puppet-master thing though. That just seems too obvious. Anywho, I'm excited to get to battle her because that means we'll get a VS sprite of her. 
 

 

 

Spoiler

She already has one! It was removed from the graphics folder I think, and this is the one that was used in the original league, so there's a possibility this isn't even the one she'll have. Spoilers!

 

Spoiler