Maybe Fire Emblem isn't for me.

The first battle was fine enough. It was a long walk through a hallway, splitting the party into two. Before it, we met a kid named Chad and reconnected him with his mage friend. Chad is a thief who can open locked doors and treasures. Sounds like a cool skill. The boss was the typical nonsense. Inside was Hector, who got beat up by the boss. Bern directly attacked this place with dragons, but they flew off as the battle started because the evil knights in this game are afraid to do anything... Anyway, Hector died, and his last words were to go to Ostia to find a weapon capable of defeating a dragon.

Along the way, we came across a traitor to our country. This fight introduces pirates, third party enemies. During the battle, we (the player) will see a conversation with a strange woman, who's being sold to one of our enemies. A red soldier helps her escape, and she joins us. Another healer is always welcome. But then that soldier and his group ambushed us. They wiped out two of my men instantly, triggering the permadeath. I got a little mad, but I tried to settle down. Rather than hold a grudge, I'm just gonna stop playing this game.

I don't think I'm going to have much fun through the remaining chapters. There are just too many mechanics I hate.
Besides the permadeath garbage, there's weapon degradation. I've never been a fan of my weapons breaking as it just ads more tedium and things to look at that aren't important.
The item inventory is yet more tedium. Characters can only hold four things, and anything else they get is sent to our wagon. So if anyone wants to pick up that item, they have to travel back to it and select it. And if you lose sight of what random, meaningless characters got it too, to begin with, you have to dig through menus to find it and then go through all that anyway. And then you have to figure out if the new owner can even use it. One of the treasures tonight was a halberd. Despite its name, it's actually an axe. I gave it to most of my spear users, but that was a big waste of time since none of them could wield it. And the guy who did use it got killed by the ambush.
Maybe if there was a hub menu between fights, I wouldn't mind it so much.
You can't switch weapons for a counterattack, leaving you in a weakened defensive potion. It's one of the reasons my guys died in that ambush.
I'm four chapters through, but none of the characters matter except Roy and named NPCs. One of the things I hated about Bahamut's Lagoon was how little anyone but five people mattered to anything. EM has more characters, and I don't think any of them will matter either.

If you like Fire Emblem, go have fun. I don't think it's for me, though. Before I get mad at it and hold a grudge, like I will do with Shining Force, I'm just gonna put it down. Maybe I'll give Awakenings a go one day, but I'm moving on to things I know I'll like. Well, "know" is the wrong word, but it's traditional and new. Maybe this subgenre just isn't for me? 

Lunar: Silver Star Harmony tomorrow.