I hope we're not derailing the topic too much, TC!
I don't really want to start a flamewar over tastes, here, but... it's friggin' FIRE EMBLEM. What are you playing it for if not gameplay? All FEs are pretty bad for story/graphics/etc. anyway (besides character art which RD does just as well as any other game).
The big thing you left out here is character development, which the series does extremely well (especially 7) but is completely absent from Radiant Dawn. The tradeoff, of course, is much more accessible, less cumbersome support system.
RD is definitely a mixed bag: series-best gameplay and great aesthetics are counterbalanced by a stupidly uneven difficulty curve ('sup Suck Brigade) and a questionably designed plot. Still, I love it for all of its shortcomings.
--
The Many Forms of Kobe:
http://i39.tinypic.com/oqx98z.jpg -- credit to KIRBEH