History FireEmblemThreeHouses / TropesSToZ

** Ferdinand and Lorenz are both sons of dukes, who take extreme pride in their status as noble but also see a huge responsibility in living up to the ideals. In both cases, their view on nobility can rub other students the wrong way. Both of them see themselves are rivals to their house leader, and come to learn and respect the house leader in question in their respective supports. In both cases, the house leader is rather dismissive of the rivalry, treating it more as an annoyance. Both of them have fathers who are much less honorable than them, and who undermine their faction heads[[note]]Duke Aegir all but took the throne from under Edelgard's father. Duke Gloucester stages attacks on merchants trading with House Riegan and supports the empire against the pro-Alliance faction of Duke Riegan and Claude[[/note]]. Both sons, while proud of their lineage, view their fathers' actions poorly and seek to do better. Lastly, both are tea aficionados. Interestingly, the game does indirectly acknowledge their similarities; while most students' support conversations with each other have them slowly come to learn, respect and understand each other, Ferdinand and Lorenz' involves them immediately hitting it off and getting along perfectly due to their shared views and interests and thus just enjoying each other's company. They also serve as a "rival" to their respective house leaders, often openly challenging Edelgard and Claude.

* TimeSkip: After the first part of the story, Byleth [[spoiler:falls into a coma and wakes up five years later. Meanwhile, a war has been raging while they were asleep, thus setting up the stage for Part II]].

* WillTheyOrWontThey: If Byleth of either gender S-Supports Edelgard in her route, [[spoiler:it is mentioned that the two spend a lot of time together and share private moments with each other, but nothing is too publicly known. A similar description is given for Edelgard's other suitors if she gets S-Supports with them instead, except it's more blatant that they're romantically involved. The ending text, like in other ''Fire Emblem'' games, describes how historians view the unit, and omits anything that is not public knowledge. The actual S-support scene with Byleth will be blatantly romantic]].

* SpiritualSuccessor: With the game's Calendar system, mixing day-to-day activities with a dramatic fantasy plot, school setting, and emphasis on RelationshipValues, at least, in the first half, it has has drawn a lot of comparisons to modern ''Franchise/{{Persona}}'' games.

* SurprisinglyHappyEnding: The [[spoiler: Silver Snow]] ending involves [[spoiler: Rhea seemingly dying of her wounds in Byleth's arms, after both Edelgard and Dimitri died earlier, Claude disappeared, the Alliance, Kingdom and Empire all fell ''and'' the Church remnants were just gutted of dozens of their best fighters and high-ranking members in the final battle]], leaving Fodlan in a state of devastation unmatched in any other route and making it look like a straight-up DownerEnding. This then gets immediately subverted as [[spoiler: not only does the ending narration reveal that Byleth was able to rebuild Fodlan from its ashes as a prosperous, unified kingdom under their rule, it's possible for Rhea to survive ([[GuideDangIt if A-ranked before the end of Part 1]]) and even to marry Byleth (if S-ranked), finally moving on from her past and helping Byleth reform Fodlan, with their paired ending describing their work as "miraculous".]]

** Players who started with the Crimson Flower route are likely to see [[spoiler:Lady Rhea]] as a stereotypical [[spoiler: BitchInSheepsClothing BigBad who leads a CorruptChurch]], while other routes reveal that [[spoiler:the events of Crimson Flower are basically just her personal darkest moment, brought on by very specific circumstances, and she and the Church are otherwise much more affable and reasonable]].
** [[spoiler:Edelgard]]'s ''actions'' in all routes are about 75% identical, but because she is very aloof and undiplomatic and you can't look into her head, she comes across as [[spoiler: a power-hungry dictator]] on routes other than her own, rather than the [[spoiler:the guilt-ridden tragic revolutionary who just can't see any other option]] that she does on her own route.

* TimeToStepUpCommander: On the Silver Snow route, [[spoiler: Seteth appoints Byleth as the leader of the newly-formed Resistance Army, a duty they're initially relunctant to fulfill as they see themselves as unqualified and would rather search for Rhea. They grow into the role as the story progresses, and by the time the final chapter rolls around are fully prepared to rule Fodlan.]]

** Four characters ([[spoiler: Lysithea and Claude on CF, Ashe on VW and SS, Lorenz on AM and SS]]) will surrender to you depending on circumstances. When you get the option to spare them... you also have the option to kill them.

* VillainTeleportation: Taken to absurd levels: anyone can teleport in and out of maps as long as they aren't player-controlled. While it makes sense for the high-ranking enemy mages to possess this power, it's rather surprising to see [[ButtMonkey Acheron]], a mediocre fighter and mage all-around, suddenly warp in, and even more so when [[BoisterousBruiser Nader]] of all people does it. It's also rather infuriating, since both the Flame Emperor [[spoiler: aka Edelgard]] and [[spoiler: Hubert]] demonstrate the ability, and yet both seem to completely [[ForgotAboutHisPowers forget they can teleport]] while [[spoiler: they're under the player's control]].

* ViolenceIsTheOnlyOption: The Flame Emperor is a firm believer of this. [[spoiler: She wants to eradicate the Crest system that enables [[AristocratsAreEvil corrupt Crest-bearing nobles]] to perform utterly vile actions in impunity, but that is not possible as long as the Church of Seiros fronts a religious hierarchy where Crests are considered gifts from the Goddess. And since she believes [[ControlFreak Rhea]] is never going to budge and also sees herself as the one who must make the changes ([[ItsAllAboutMe among]] [[NobleBigot other]] [[SunkCostFallacy contentious]] [[RightForTheWrongReasons motivations]]), she thinks she has no choice but to take the fight to the Church... which, in practice, means declaring war on the other nations of Fódlan.]]

* WhatCouldPossiblyGoWrong: On the Golden Deer route, Claude says something like this right before you go to the Holy Tomb where [[spoiler: the Flame Emperor is revealed to be Edelgard, who tries to steal the crest stones hidden in the Holy Tomb, and then declares war against the Church]].

** If one doesn't invite Catherine, Shamir or Cyril into the Blue Lions or Golden Deer, they will not appear in Azure Moon or Verdant Wind. Alois has it even worse as he will vanish from the story altogether after the timeskip unless he's been recruited or the player is on the Crimson Flower route, [[spoiler: where he appears as an enemy during the Church's attack on the monastery.]]

* StoryBranchFavoritism: Averted. Unlike some other games (such as ''Fates''), there's no true path here as all of the houses have their own justifications and grievances. That said, it appears Azure Moon and Verdant Wind got more attention from the developers (the former has all of the exclusive stuff such as more useful characters, [[spoiler:Verdant Wind allows you to stop Nemesis]].

* SheIsTheKing: Noble titles across Fódlan take this approach when it comes to females ruling over a House/territory. The most standout example is Edelgard, who is explicitly dubbed Adrestia's Emperor; her Support with Ferdinand has him mentioning that a previous female ruler of the Empire also had the Emperor title. Other examples include Judith (called "Count Daphnel" in one of Byleth's [[DialogueTree dialogue trees]] on the Azure Moon route), Bernadetta (styled "Count Varley" in several of her endings). ''VideoGame/Fire Emblem Three Hopes'' expands on this with more examples from Hilda[[labelnote:*]](mentions that she'd be called "Duke Goneril" if she were chosen as heir instead of Holst)[[/labelnote]] and Ingrid[[labelnote:*]](mentions her inheriting the Count title when exploring camp on Azure Gleam).[[/labelnote]]

* VillainBall: At the end of the Crimson Flower route, [[spoiler:Rhea's final stand against the Imperial Army is to set fire to Fhirdiad so they will all burn inside. But for some reason, she orders the city to be lit ''before'' the Imperial Army is inside. So by doing that, Rhea's enemies has an easier time traversing through the city now when they got the chance to prepare themselves for it, not to mention that by doing this, [[NotHelpingYourCase Rhea just makes herself look even more true to how Edelgard describes her]].]]

** One of the dislikes listed in Hubert's profile is heights. He also has low stat growths in Flying.

** Felix's paralogue. Because the player has a lot of NPC allies that're surprisingly competent (including Rodrigue, who is a Tier 4 Holy Knight at a time when players might only be ''just'' barely reaching the Tier 3 classes), they can just sit back and let him take care of everything. However, unlike the above, doing this will cause the player to miss out on some very good rewards, most notably Felix's InfinityPlusOneSword, the Aegis Shield.

* WeaponOfChoice: While you could theoretically get anyone to use anything, every character in the game has proficiencies that determine their ability to grow with that particular weapon type. For instance, Dimitri leans heavily towards swords and lances, but has poor proficiency with axes, discouraging him from classing into a Warrior.

* YouKeepUsingThatWord: During Ingrid and Dorothea’s paralogue, Ingrid mentions that her suitor has offered a generous dowry. Except only brides offer dowries; grooms offer bride-prices.

** If one doesn't invite Catherine, Shamir, Cyril or Alois into the Blue Lions or Golden Deer, they will not appear in Azure Moon or Verdant Wind. An unrecruited Alois also disappears on Silver Snow.

** If one doesn't invite Catherine, Shamir, Cyril or Alois into the Blue Lions or Golden Deer, they will not appear in Azure Moon or Verdant Wind.

** If one doesn't invite Cyril or Alois into the Blue Lions or Golden Deer, they will not appear in Azure Moon or Verdant Wind.

* ViewerPronunciationConfusion:
** Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd is Blay-thid, not bladed.
** The Leicester Alliance is pronounced Lester, undoubtedly tripping up those unfamiliar with the English city of that name.
** Mercedes is always pronounced the French way (mer-SAID-es), not like the luxury car (mer-SAY-deez).
** The spelling of Dedue's name suggests various possible pronunciations such as DEH-du-eh, DEH-dyuu, DEE-dyuu, DE-doo, DEE-doo, de-DU-eh, de-DOO, de-DYU-eh, dee-DYU-eh, or deed-YU? The correct one is the counterintuitive de-DOO.

** Most of the utility Faith spells fall into this category: Recover has little uses due to how rare enemies wielding poison weapons are, Ward and Silence are superfluous due to how easy it is to either stay out of enemy mages' range (who have 4 move) or to [[SquishyWizard one-shot them]] and Rescue is impractical due to mages suffering from low movement that prevents them from keeping up with the other units.

** On the Verdant Wind route [[spoiler:(and to some extent the Silver Snow route)]], [[spoiler:you discover that this is exactly correct when it comes to the real histories of the Crests, the Ten Elites, and Nemesis]].