this. I feel the same, like, “why should I woo you? You literally kidnap/blackmail/enslaved me!” I ain’t got time for that. Let’s not forget the sweet talker/emphatic criminal, like, really?
It’s even worse that the PC can’t sabotage them, the police and detectives suddenly become incompetent and the criminals are untouchable. If they used to robbing valuable artifacts the crimes that they commit surely alerted the CIA ,FBI or the interpol. So? Where are they?
I can understand if the PC are the same criminal as them but as a innocent civilian or a PC who is working as a guard that was forced to break their work ethic? Hell nah.
All in all, heist genre is only enjoyable if the MC is a professional criminal themselves, not a innocent human that was forced to survive because they were roped in with threats and have zero experience.
Lady Luck takes it a step further: The story opens on you having to abandon ship for reasons (I forget what exactly those reasons are right off the top of my head), and before you can get out, you get almost-murdered and wake up on board the Lady Luck. The crew was responsible for saving your life… whereupon they slap a slave collar on you and tell you in no uncertain terms that you work for them now, and if you disagree, they’ll turn the slave collar on and make you agree.
Well. Good to know my working environment, I guess.
And then they start acting like you should be cozying up to them and wanting to be their bestest friend and acting all surprised and hurt that the guy they literally enslaved doesn’t like them. Hell, the whole story tries to heap it on as heavy as possible that they’re not bad guys, they’re just misunderstood, and you should want to help them and join their crew and-
I’m sorry, I don’t care about your drama, YOUENSLAVEDME FOR NO DAMNED REASON.
Of the… three or so times, I think, that I’ve played that game, not ONCE have I played the route where I sided with the Lady Luck team. I went Space Cops every time, and one of those times, I even grabbed the nearest gun and put a hole in the captain’s skull, just to make it clear beyond any shred of doubt that I have no intention of EVER working with the Lady Luck. Ever.
I bring it again because after SOH 5 I have an update:
In book 5 Tosh becomes a rare (maybe even the only) case of an abusive relationship where the abuser is the MC instead of the RO: without too much spoiler Tosh gets beaten at least thrice and once he/she brace him/herself for a beaten that luckly doesn’t come and a psicological abuse when the Ronin/MC ask Tosh which one loves more beetween him/her and the emperor (his/her childhood best friend) and despite all that Tosh does not snap even once he/she does a couple of times but to snap out the Ronin from his/her self deprecation
If nothing, at least Tosh worship complex is downplayed compared to book 3.
Sidenote (good or bad depends if you like him/her as RO): since book 5 Tosh is the RO with more in universe shipper (the Emperor, almost every Kondo who they come across and the Baron and the second closest to a canon relationship thanks to the time loops things; Tosh doesn’t call it “love” but if you pursue the romance, he/she’ll let slide that they had sex… a lot
I so desperately wanted “back out of this relationship immediately” button. And for the first time in my life I wanted it for the sake of the RO. The Ronin better clean up their act in the future, my poor baby Tosh.
By the way I’m still going for a Toshie romance… but, damn, she really deserves more than a hug after all that… and if I know SOH enough, the pain will get even worse before the serie ending
Ronin themselves would definitely qualify for “ROs you hate” if we were playing via anyone else’s perspective.
Nothing sexier than the overly depressed, bloodthirsty cannibal not-samurai who continuously causes harm upon your body, heart, probably mind, and soul.
Anyone who has seen Tosh and Ronin in the same room believes those two either are together or belong together. Almost everyone from the lowest of kondos to the literal Emperor himself
No, Tosh has sex only with the MC. It’s that the Baron enables it with his time loops, the Emperor knows ahead of the time that Tosh is going to fall for us and fully supports it, and Kondos are very pro-mixed race marriages, apparently
Me too, yeah. But I so much wanted to yeet the Ronin out of the relationship and straight back to Jigoku. At this point they and Jun/ko fully deserve each over.
The SOH series is a cluster of mindfuck and bad vibes overall, I have respect for the people that still reading it. I dropped it on book 3 and the rest is history.
That actually sound interesting. I still haven’t played it cause I need to replay book 4 since I don’t have that save for some reason and I’m lazy.
THAT I don’t like if it’s done in a ‘They are the official / canon RO’ way to be honest.
To be fair, it’s hardly psychological abuse to ask someone to choose a side, especially since the Emperor has been playing puppet master with the Ronin since book 1 and for all his talk about how important the Ronin is, he has been no help and IIRC didn’t even say he’d provide a reward.
That’s… definitely not what was alluded to on the authors tumblr. From what I’ve seen, most of the Blane romancers tend to prefer the “thawing the cold hearted” type of romance, which is sort of what it is? But it’s more… animosity being cleared up. (In any case, I totally get why you wouldn’t want to romance Blane ehsnrefushueirsfj. For me, the part I like about their character is their interactions with N and their dynamic with A, rather than them as an RO. Blane’s relationship with MC in regards to romance is… questionable, but the game itself makes up for it with an amazingly written found family trope)
Samurai of Hyuga is difficult for me in the sense that I kind of just… Want the Ronin to leave. Let them live alone and farm or something. For both their sake, and the sake of the people around them. I think some actual, genuine peace for once in their life might do them some good?
That’s kinda the goal of the whole series, find a way for the Ronin to get out of the carnage and how difficult that is for someone who A: Was literally raised for that and B: Lives in an extremely chaotic and bloody period of the empire where not being strong or brutal enough might lead to a fate worse than death.
So don’t worry, it’s not a bug, it’s a feature. That kind of story is obviously not for everyone either.
I have already left this ship although… this ending of the latest book. Damn, there is something in this series. even if I don’t want to read it anymore, it still intrigues me and I’m curious about the rest of the story.
Tosh lost the status of My Favourite RO Ever for this “betrayal”, no way to trust him anymore. Though I can’t say I count him among the ROs I hate.
I kinda want another thread that’s like: “Yes I do - Ro’s everyone hates but you love” I love Jun/Junko, they’re so unapologetically trash and toxic that it makes them different from most of other RO’s in this franchise. I also like Marcus (yes, even though he killed MCs dad, but in his defense, the legate ordered him to), I like A, and etc.
I second the idea. I like Maria in the sense that I find it very fun that i have a chance to try to kill her every time she tries to kill me, and I would love to gush about a few other asshole ROs in a new thread.
What you point out here seems to be something that most people in the thread miss: The Ronin is not only a fairly established character, but from the get go also a very unhealthy, wounded, and dangerous individual that even in its best moments is shattered by guilt, trauma and fury. Add on top of that the confession during this same book that, yes, the Emperor is using the MC to erase potential threats to his reign, and the question is far less psychological abuse and far more the raging cries of a person absolutely done with life and being used by other people as tool. It doesn’t mean it’s good, but I think people is reading too much malice in that specific line of dialogue.
SoH has tons of cringy, questionable anime moments (almost every interaction with Jun/ko for example, even if I believe that on principle the concept of that character it’s amazing and very well writen), but that specific interaction is not (imo) one of them.
this. I feel the same, like, “why should I woo you? You literally kidnap/blackmail/enslaved me!” I ain’t got time for that. Let’s not forget the sweet talker/emphatic criminal, like, really? 
I dropped it on book 3 and the rest is history. 
I think some actual, genuine peace for once in their life might do them some good?