History YMMV / FireEmblemTellius

* EightPointEight: The [=GameSpot=] review pans ''Radiant Dawn'' for not including Mii support and being too much like the rest of the series. And being hard on Easy Mode. And not including motion controls, which resulted in a very bad review anyway. [[FailureIsTheOnlyOption And guess which console was being criticized by the same site for using motion control in too many games.]]
* AlternateCharacterInterpretation: Was Deghinsea [[spoiler: siding with Ashera against the party a case of SuicideByCop as a way to atone for his past actions? Some of his post-battle dialogue would imply him to be a DeathSeeker]] and it's one of the few ways his actions there would make any sense.
* {{Anvilicious}}: Racism is bad, we get it.
* AntiClimaxBoss:
** How to beat [[spoiler:The Black Knight]] in ''Radiant Dawn'': Give Ike a damn Hammer. Wait two turns. Even without a hammer, he's still a fairly easy boss, especially when compared to [[spoiler:Deghinsea, Sephiran, and Ashera]]. The hardest part of that fight is keeping him alive long enough for your other characters to get the Wishblade from Levail. No doubt as payback to the insanity of the first duel in Path of Radiance. It's entirely luck-based.
*** Fridge Brilliance; he always wanted to fight 'Greil at full strength'. He raises Ike, lets him live, for this reason. He got exactly what he wanted. Exactly as one-sided.
** Oliver in ''Path of Radiance''. He's actually far better as a player unit in ''Radiant Dawn''.
** If she can avoid being shot down by bows on the way across the map, Elincia can charge straight up to Ludveck and use her just-obtained InfinityPlusOneSword to carve him up in one round. (On easy and normal mode, at least.) Haar can also slaughter him with a Hammer.
** Shiharam, mainly because almost no one survives once Ike uses Aether.
** Dragons can't do ranged attacks in ''[=PoR=]'', which sucks for Ena as she can be easily pounded into the ground with Thunder magic.
** Petrine's not actually that weak overall, but her Magic stat is low and she comes equipped with a Magic Lance that isn't all that good to begin with. It makes for a somewhat dissapointing boss fight. It's really too bad, since as shown [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrD0ahGOEC4 here]] Petrine can actually be a fairly serious threat if properly equipped.
* SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic: Some of the best music in the ''Fire Emblem'' franchise comes from this game.
** Both games start with great Opening Themes. ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AmjFaThkqaA Path of Radiance]]'' starts with a rather short one, but it sets the mood for game ''perfectly''. ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lc9M3KLyZk Randiant Dawn]]'' on the other hand, is longer and more bombastic, which also fits the game's narrative to a T.
** "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r41Y9V4pscE Rally the Spirit]]" from ''Path of Radiance''.
** Also "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DzRDhWE-LLM Eternal Bond]]" from ''Radiant Dawn''. Not only is it awesome enough to be part of the opening and the closing music numbers, but ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros'' [[BootstrappedLeitmotif renamed it "Ike's Theme"]], despite there being "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GU1DyA4JKrk Ike's Resolution]]".
** "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTL-uSO4xyc The Devoted]]", the Greil Mercenaries' battle theme in ''Radiant Dawn''. Few times such a short song is this intense. The loop only lasts 40 seconds, but every single one of them is awesome! It returns in ''VideoGame/FireEmblemFates'', unedited, as Ike's battle theme.
** The rest of the Battle Themes are also awesome, we have:
*** "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OY7aRxosb8M On Wing's Glory]]", Crimea's and [[spoiler:Hawk Army's]] Battle theme.
*** "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aL79isTPIJU Unstoppable Destiny]]", [[spoiler:The Black Knight's]] Battle theme.
*** "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_qz1CA_Hdk Wisdom of Ages]]", [[spoiler:Deghinsea's]] battle theme.
*** "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7m7MaGH72NE Origin's End]]", [[spoiler:Sephiran's]] battle theme.
*** "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvRRwGgNC9s A Grasping Truth]]", [[spoiler:Ashera's]] Battle Theme.
*** Also, Naesala's "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEQ3glAuw24 Wheeling Corby]]", Tibarn's "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQy2qTc6z3Q King of the Sky]]", Caineghis' "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muwP_DMe5nk March of the Lion King]]".
** "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAZVQtBfWqk Mist's Theme]]" in ''Radiant Dawn''. Ike's little sister is just the more adorable with this melody.
** Of course, the recruitment theme, and Oliver's theme, from both games.
* BaseBreakingCharacter:
** Makalov. The fans either love him for his jerkassery, his pink hair, and orange armor. Or hate him for his jerkassery, his pink hair, and orange armor. In the same vein, ''Radiant Dawn'' Astrid. In [=PoR=] her base was very solid as she's a very lovable character. Come ''RD'' however, there's been some bases that thinks that this is a completely different Astrid based on not only her going down in tier list, but also how she seems to crank up her HorribleJudgeOfCharacter trait by fawning over the aforementioned Makalov, thereby an inversion of RescuedFromTheScrappyHeap. While some are still pretty okay with her, glaring flaws and all.
** Stat-wise: Edward. He's either one of the best characters in the game for having some of the best growths in one of the best classes, or one of the worst for coming in with very weak base stats (especially lack of defense) and requiring significant investment to really shine on the harder difficulties. His usefulness generally depends on what difficulty you're playing; Part 1 on Hard Mode ''really'' isn't kind to MagikarpPower characters, while Edward will get off the ground really fast on Easy. He also tends to generally appeal to more casual players who'll play on the lower difficulties and spend more time/resources raising such characters, rather than to the more hardcore players playing for efficiency and lower turn counts, that will brush them aside without them offering significantly greater reward at the end than the competition.
** ''Micaiah''. This girl has some of the most dedicated haters in fandom (it wasn't until more than eight years later that [[VideoGame/FireEmblemFates Nohr!Corrin]] came around to challenge her status as the most hated lord in the franchise), but the people who love her will rabidly defend her to the death. Then there's the less vocal third "we like her, but we can see why people have issues with her" group which is sadly drowned out by both the rabid haters and rabid defenders alike.
** ''Ike himself'' could be seen as one in ''Radiant Dawn'' since those who loved him would hate Micaiah and vice-versa. And often for the same reasons. The Ike supporters would hate on Micaiah for being bland while those who support Micaiah hate Ike for being a one man SpotlightStealingSquad. Additionally, Ike in general has become somewhat divisive for being emblematic of fans who vocally worship pre-''Awakening'' ''Fire Emblem'' games and hate the [[ItsPopularNowItSucks better-selling]] installments from ''Awakening'' onward, turning him into the rough ''Fire Emblem'' equivalent of [[Franchise/{{Pokemon}} Charizard]].
** Soren. Some fans love him for his cold and snarky personality, and tragic backstory. Others take issue with his {{Wimpification}} in ''Radiant Dawn'', and dislike the amount of HoYay he has with Ike, believing it to be [[PanderingToTheBase pandering to a]] [[YaoiFangirls specific crowd]] to the expense of others (as noted under VocalMinority below).
** Strictly from a gameplay standpoint (she's fairly well-liked as a character), Ilyana in ''Radiant Dawn''. Due to showing up fairly early in the Dawn Brigade's scenario and then joining Ike's group early in Part 3, she has ''the'' most availability of any unit in the game, and is also the only one who can reach SS-rank in Thunder Magic, allowing her to use Rexbolt. Given that one of the toughest bosses in the endgame is a dragon and is therefore weak to thunder magic, that makes her pretty awesome. That said, she'll probably still be ''slightly'' weaker than Soren when she first joins Ike's group even if you use her liberally in Part 1...and given that the Dawn Brigade's chapters in Part 3 allow you to field ''every unit available to them'', giving experience to a unit that ''won't'' be available to them in Part 3 will leave them at a severe disadvantage. Which means it might be wiser to just bench her whenever possible during part 1. Which...means she'll still be a first-tier unit at a point where your strongest units are nearing third tier, and is therefore ''horrible''.
* BestBossEver: Almost all of Radiant Dawn's endgame bosses qualify.
** The Black Knight is a one-on-one DuelBoss between him and Ike, and he finally unmasks himself beforehand. It's the perfect conclusion to the arc that began with Ike's father's death in the ''Path of Radiance''. ([[AnticlimaxBoss Being easily cheesable with a Hammer notwithstanding]].)
** [[spoiler:Deghinsea]] is a full-strength dragon Laguz, [[AttackOfTheFiftyFootWhatever absolutely huge and intimidating]] and with stats to match. He also has a map-based AOE attack, something rare in the series. As mentioned below, his status as this is the main reason why he's not considered TheScrappy.
** [[spoiler: Sephiran]] is not nearly as tough, but still has a few tricks, such as summoning Spirits to absorb attacks directed at him, as well as having an awesomely tragic boss theme, several great boss conversations and another AOE attack (magical this time).
** And finally, the FinalBoss [[spoiler:Ashera]], who is often considered one of the best final bosses in the series from a gameplay standpoint, if not ''the'' best. Unlike many earlier final bosses it's more than just having the main Lord wail away with their legendary weapon. Ike has to deal the final blow, but first you have to destroy the barriers surrounding the boss with the rest of your army, which requires making use of teamwork and skill combinations. The boss also has many different attacks, ranging from single-character snipes to AEO, both physical and magical. [[spoiler:Ashera]] is one of the few final bosses in the series whose fight feels like a natural extension of ''Fire Emblem'' gameplay.
* BreakoutCharacter: Even though these games didn't sell all that well, Ike qualifies handily for this trope on multiple levels. In the West, he is greatly loved for being RatedMForManly alongside other extremely popular Lords like Sigurd and Hector, and he is a very strong contender for "most popular Lord in the franchise" since [[AmericansHateTingle Marth's games aren't held in nearly as high a regard outside Japan]]. And even in the east where the older games are better received than the newer ones, Ike still managed to claim first place in a series-wide [[http://i.imgur.com/YqAdnKl.jpg Famitsu popularity poll]], beating out even Marth, the series' original hero and previous fan favorite. He also has the ''Super Smash Bros.'' franchise to thank for this, as Ike frequently ranks very high in popularity polls and is a much loved fighter, with only Captain Falcon beating him in sheer [[MemeticBadass craziness]].
* BreatherBoss: Hetzel, who only uses staves in the first part of 4F.
* BreatherLevel: ''Path of Radiance'' chapter 14, for being very straightforward compared to chapters 13 (defense mission that requires you to fight raven Laguz and think more strategically than usual, especially if you want all the treasure and you want to recruit an extremely frail NPC) and 15 (desert map in which you fight Laguz). Chapter 14 is as simple as sending your army along two paths and taking enemies as they come, with the only threats being the Feral Ones at the end and the boss. Hard Mode adds FogOfWar, but all that really does is increase your chances of accidentally killing Makalov.
* BrokenBase:
** Ike's sexuality is hotly debated among the fandom, given his lack of female support endings and revulsion towards Aimee in particular, the presence of male "companions for life" endings, and [[spoiler:the existence and nature of his descendant Priam]] in ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening''. Fans not only argue about what sexuality he seems to be, but what sexuality they ''personally'' view him as and why it's justified by canon -- including, not surprisingly, the option that [[MST3KMantra Ike's sexuality is undefined and that one shouldn't look too much into what seem to be "hints" either way]]. As the ''canon'' [[BiTheWay bisexuality]] of Corrin, Niles, Rhajat, and especially Soleil in ''VideoGame/FireEmblemFates'' has raised more of a ruckus, some fans believe that leaving the subject alone is for the better. On many video game forums, mentioning Ike's sexuality will often be met with replies of "best not to go there", and a furry-themed ''Fire Emblem'' subreddit requires non-canon labels for Ike x Ranulf and outright ''bans'' Ike x Soren submissions.
** Several of the big {{reveal}}s in ''Radiant Dawn'' are controversial, particularly Sephiran and Ashera [[spoiler: being EvilAllAlong]], the Dark Goddess [[spoiler: being GoodAllAlong]], and the Begnion Senate being [[TheManBehindTheMan responsible for everything bad in both games]]. Depending on who you ask, these are clever deconstructive twists on ''Path of Radiance'' and new shake-ups to the oft-stock ''Fire Emblem'' plots or {{Shocking Swerve}}s that retroactively diminish it and have long since become derivative cliches of their own.
* CargoShip: Gatria x Tree in a Skirt, from a base conversation with Shinon in ''Radiant Dawn'', immediately took off as a near-universally accepted joke OTP, see MemeticMutation below.
* ClicheStorm / {{Troperiffic}}: ''Path of Radiance'' is this for ''Fire Emblem'', backstory and setting aside. Elincia even ''looks'' like Guinivere and Nyna. Until she [[TookALevelInBadass suddenly dons armour and jumps on her grandmother's pegasus]]. There are those, however, who think [[TropesAreNotBad that this is exactly what makes it so much damn fun]].
* CompleteMonster:
** [[BigBad "Mad King" Ashnard]], the pinnacle of a SocialDarwinist, became the King of Daein by getting his father to sign a blood pact, and then invoking it, killing everyone who was in his way to the throne, as well as countless other innocent people. He then proceeded to [[{{Patricide}} kill his own father]], therefore becoming king. After finding out about the dark god (really the goddess of chaos, Yune) sealed in Lehran's Medallion, he decides to release it. This requires a war that spans the whole continent, so he decides to begin by invading the next country over. He also, after finding out that his own son Soren was unable to transform into a dragon like the child's mother Almedha used to be able to, decides to ''hold him captive'' to get ahold of the kid's uncle, the oldest son of the king of Goldoa. He then proceeds to warp Rajaion's body and turn him into something resembling a wyvern, and then uses him as a mount. He laughs at everything. His ideal world, the one that he wishes to create, is one where the only thing that matters is power.
** [[EvilSorcerer Izuka]], Ashnard's [[EvilGenius demented chief scholar]] and a a [[HumansByAnyOtherName Beorc]] MadScientist, is no less evil than his master. In his brief cameo in ''Path of Radiance'', he appears onscreen just long enough for it to be revealed that he is the developer of the [[AndIMustScream Feral Ones]], Laguz who are forcibly [[ShapeshifterModeLock mode-locked]] into their beast forms and driven insane to be used as CannonFodder. In his base at [[EvilTowerOfOminousness Gritnea Tower]] it is revealed he has a basement devoted to storing the corpses of his experiments' victims. Izuka takes on a much greater role in the second game, where he has been hired by Lekain to bend Daein to Begnion's whims. He takes on the role of strategist to Daein's weak-willed Prince Pelleas, where it is demonstrated that he would gladly sacrifice good strategy for [[RapePillageAndBurn pointless destruction]]. He injects the innocent [[WarriorPoet Muarim]] with the Feral One drug, which would have annihilated his mind if not for [[WhiteMage Rafiel]]'s intervention. When Begnion offers to make peace with Daein, Izuka springs his trap, telling Pelleas to sign a "peace treaty" that is actually a Blood Pact, mystically binding Pelleas and thus all of Daein into virtual slavery to Begnion. Finally, it is revealed that he's tested his drug on the Beorc, his own race, too, including turning Elincia's noble Uncle Renning into the TragicMonster known as General Bertram.
** [[BigBadWannabe Vice-Minister Lekain]], [[AristocratsAreEvil Duke of Gaddos]], is a high-ranking politician of the Theocracy of Begnion and senior-most member of the country's [[CorruptPolitician corrupt senate]] who is driven by his [[ItsAllAboutMe insatiable desire for more power]] and [[FantasticRacism hatred]] for [[OurWerebeastsAreDifferent the Laguz]]. When Begnion's Empress Misaha emancipated the country's Laguz slaves and planned to reveal that the royal lineage of Begnion was [[HalfHumanHybrid Branded]], Lekain had her poisoned, then, [[FalseFlagOperation pinning the crime on the peaceful Heron Laguz]], whipped his countrymen into a genocidal frenzy, [[FinalSolution reducing the Herons' population from thousands to four in a single night]]. He then conspired for Misaha's young granddaughter Sanaki and a young senator by the name of Sephiran to be elevated to the positions of Empress and Prime Minister respectively, the only positions higher than his own, while he held the real power from the shadows. After Daein lost the war to Crimea, Lekain had the defeated nation annexed by Begnion, and gave Duke Numida and General Jarod free rein to do what they pleased with it. When Daein declared independence, Lekain tricked its new king, Pelleas, into making a [[DealWithTheDevil Blood Pact]] with him, a mystical document that conscripts one nation in service to another under penalty of its citizens dropping dead one by one. Using this magic Lekain enslaves Pelleas and the Daein army to act as his accomplices in a war which Lekain plans to use to wipe the Laguz species off the face of the Earth.
* ContestedSequel: Let's just say that there are many ''Path of Radiance'' fans who were '''not''' pleased by the changes ''Radiant Dawn'' made to TheVerse; like revealing that [[spoiler:Ashera]] was an OmnicidalManiac who was EvilAllAlong, [[spoiler: Yune, the Dark God inside the medallion]] was GoodAllAlong, [[ShipSinking cutting the Ike/Elincia subtext out entirely]] while cranking up his HoYay with Soren and Ranulf (rumor has it, in an attempt to [[PanderingToTheBase pander]] to the YaoiFangirl crowd), [[{{Flanderization}} flanderising]] a good number of characters (the {{Wimpification}} suffered by Soren is a particular peeve), and having a ''very'' [[FlatCharacter basic]] [[StaticCharacter Support system]] that robs potentially interesting characters (like Nolan or Giffca) of backstory and CharacterDevelopment.
* CounterpartComparison: Ike is occasionally compared to [[Franchise/{{Pokemon}} Charizard]], not so much for his character, but for his role within the franchise -- both characters are RatedMForManly {{Breakout Character}}s that became fan favorites and win popularity polls despite not being the SeriesMascot, and also became playable in ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros Brawl'' as fire-based heavyweight fighters. Less positively, both characters are also seen as symbols of "genwunner"-type fans who vocally worship older entries in their series and hate newer ones.[[note]]Although the Tellius games aren't the first installments in their series, in the West ''or'' in Japan, the analogy is still there.[[/note]]
* CrackIsCheaper: ''Path of Radiance'' and ''Radiant Dawn'' on Amazon are... pricey, to say the least. Even a used copy of either will set you back a hundred dollars.
* CrackPairing:
** Shipping Ike with [[VideoGame/FireEmblemShadowDragonAndTheBladeOfLight Marth]] is pretty popular due to both characters appearing in ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros'' and, in some cases, due to the whole debate on Ike's sexuality and due to Marth himself being viewed as [[TheTwink a "twink"]] despite having a canon wife. Ike/[[VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening Lucina]] also exists as a heterosexual equivalent.
** Going outside of the ''Fire Emblem'' universe, Ike is also shipped with his Smash-mate [[Franchise/MetalGear Solid Snake]] quite a bit. Just like Ike, Snake is a RatedMForManly character with a very similar ambiguous sexuality and HoYay situation.
* CriticalDissonance: While both games were well received (''Radiance'' a bit more so) and Ike is one of the most popular Lords in the series (if not ''the'' most popular), they sold very poorly in their native Japan.
* CrossesTheLineTwice: The boss of the ''Radiance'' chapter ''"Solo"'' is holding the unarmed population of a monastery hostage to gain leverage and some {{human shield}}s. He is the most hilariously, unapologetically [[CompleteMonster vile]] man your army has personally met thus far, and he seals it with his death quote:
-->'''Schaeffer:''' "...Gwaar... Haaaarr... Haaaaaa... Shoulda brought... more priests... [[BlackComedy Or some... babies...]] Dang..."
* DemonicSpider: Tiger Laguz in Radiant Dawn. They have very high HP with high defense, they hit very hard, and are very accurate with their blows, on top of having tremendous movement. You additionally tend to fight them with the Dawn Brigade, whose units are especially frail on defense, and while you don't have the crutch characters around in the chapters you fight them. It'll take some very cautious and strategic planning to ensure you don't lose any units to these beasts.
** Snipers and Warriors who wield a Crossbow-type weapon. Crossbows are an unusual type of weapon, that have an extremely high might value, but completely ignore the unit's strength in damage calculation. The result is that they tend to be much weaker weapons in practise, especially as these units have very high strength values to begin with and will thus be hitting a lot harder with standard weapons. However, these weapons become extremely dangerous against non-dragon flying units, even more so than standard Bows. To explain, some classes have a weakness to a specific type of weapon, which will have their might tripled in damage calculation when they come into play. Since these weapons have extremely high might values at base, they end up becoming insanely powerful against fliers (the weakest version, the Bowgun, has a might of 24, so against fliers its might becomes 72, which will deal massive damage regardless of strength values), and will deal massive damage if not [[OneHitKill outright killing]]. These additionally strike from a range of 1 and 2 (so you can't attack such units without a counterattack), they're extremely accurate (so even the fastest units have a high chance of getting plonked by one), and they're common throughout the game. They're a priority target that one must be aware of at all times when they have a flying unit in play, and they're a major reason on why Haar is so useful (as since he's a dragonrider, he's a flying unit who won't have to limit his movement in fear of them).
* EnjoyTheStorySkipTheGame: Some newer, casual players find that the gameplay and aesthetics of the Tellius games can be rather dull compared to ''Awakening'' and ''Fates'', but that they have great stories and characters, often outclassing the newer ''Fire Emblem'' games. For this reason (along with the rarity of the games), some players choose to follow Let's Plays for the Tellius games rather than outright playing them.
* EnsembleDarkhorse:
** Ike is literally one of the most popular lords in the series, if not the most popular. Besides his fame from ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros'', there aren't many lords who get such universal love. He's so popular, that in a poll for characters players wanted in ''VideoGame/FireEmblemHeroes'', Ike got in the top five, TWICE. His ''Path of Radiance'' version is number one while his ''Radiant Dawn'' version is number five.
** The [[http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/932999-/62232864 3-13 Archer]]. He's just a random Archer who (instead of just waiting to die like everyone else) jumps off his ballista to fight Laguz before he dies in a HeroicSacrifice. He has quite the fandom because of this.
** Nedata, the Pirate MiniBoss in chapter 9 in Path Of Radiance is very well loved due to being a hilariously stereotypical pirate who even has his own VillainSong. Many wish he was recruitable, and making him playable with the AR Code to recruit enemies is very popular.
** Mia, due to her [[GenkiGirl personality]] and being a Myrmidon/Swordmaster (the fandom's favorite characters all seem to come from this class). In ''Radiant Dawn'' she also gets additional points for being one of the game's best units, with ridiculously fast speed that allows her to double opponents and dodge with impunity even on the hard difficulty (''especially'' when paired with Ike, she becomes nigh-untouchable).
** Boyd from both games. On top of having a likable, interesting personality, he's also one of the most busted axe infantry this side of [[VideoGame/FireEmblemElibe Hector]], boasting insane stat parameters across the board.
** Heather in ''Radiant Dawn'', due to being one of the few new characters with personality and GirlOnGirlIsHot.
** Nephenee also has a significant following, due to her being a ShrinkingViolet farm girl. She's also popular for being the first playable Soldier in a localized game (the series previously had Lukas from ''[[VideoGame/FireEmblemGaiden Gaiden]]''), as well as having extremely good growth rates that she'll mostly always ending up as a battle juggernaut that mows everything in her path and either dodges like crazy or NoSell any incoming attacks.
** In a non-character example, the Tellius incarnation of the Soldier class as a competent playable class and its promoted forms, Halberdier and Sentinel, seem largely beloved. Improving Soldiers and creating and inserting Halberdiers (of [[AwesomeArt varying levels of]] [[SturgeonsLaw graphical quality]]) has become a very common practice in the GameMod community for the GBA trilogy, and the lack of this form of Soldier in ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'' was much bemoaned.
** Haar in Radiant Dawn, for being a badass riding a giant badass dragon, while being an even bigger GameBreaker than Ike, and while being available in more chapters than almost every other unit in the game.
** [[TokenMinority Devdan.]] [[CloudCuckooLander Danved as well]], [[BlatantLies who is certainly not Devdan]] [[MemeticMutation and who fights like ten men]].
** [[JokeCharacter Oliver]] too. [[{{Gonk}} He's the most beautiful character in the game]], owing to his [[{{Fanon}} having descended from]] [[VideoGame/FireEmblemTheSacredStones Gheb himself]]. He was even beautiful enough to transcend legends and return in ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'' immortalized as an Einherjar.
** Volke, Marcia, Jill, and Stefan are quite popular.
** Bastian is also moderately popular due to his [[LargeHam exuberant personality]] and heroic {{Magnificent Bastard}}ry.
** Among the Dawn Brigade there's Nolan; while still a bit of a FlatCharacter like the rest of the new DB characters, he does get a bit more characterization than the rest of the DB that isn't named Micaiah, and has the most intriguing back story of the lot. Most significantly though, he's the one character among the DB who isn't a CrutchCharacter that's actually unquestionably useful; coming in unpromoted but with high enough base stats to make him instantly useful, while having really strong growths (especially in speed) to keep him very useful throughout the game, and getting Tarvos, an exclusive axe that's one of the best weapons in the game. He's also the one DB unit considered superior to his Greil Mercenary counterpart, and is the only DB unit besides Jill that's fully viable for the end game on an optimal playthrough. The result is Nolan being quite well liked, while his compatriots are either {{Base Breaker}}s, forgotten, or outright [[TheScrappy scrappies]].
* EvilIsCool:
** Just as Ike is one of the most popular heroes, the BlackKnight is one of the most popular villains in the whole series for his [[TinTyrant badass design]], memorable boss fights, his tragic backstory, and the [[HeelFaceRevolvingDoor ambiguity over his true morality]]. He even got his own Mii costume in the fourth ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros'' game.
** [[spoiler: Sephiran]] also has his fans, for being a MagnificentBastard ''par excellence'' and for being able to redeem himself. It helps that he's [[{{Bishonen}} pretty]].
* FanPreferredCouple:
** Pelleas/Micaiah is just as popular as the canon Sothe/Micaiah, possibly even more.
** Some fans still wish Mist could have married Rolf instead of Boyd. Most are usually civil about it, but at times it can enter DieForOurShip territory.
** While Geoffrey/Elincia and Lucia/Bastian are reasonably popular, there's a good number of fans who prefer Elincia/Lucia.
** Aran/Laura. In this case, it's more that fans were ''begging'' for them to get a paired ending to make them marginally less [[FlatCharacter dull and flat.]]
* FanNickname:
** [[MemeticBadass 3-13]] [[ArtificialBrilliance Archer]] (a character with NoNameGiven in-game).
** [[JokeCharacter lol-iver]] for Oliver.
** Gay Tree for Gatrie.
* FoeYay:
** Most prominently between Greil and Petrine, and between Valtome and Zelgius.
** Taken UpToEleven with Tibarn and Nailah. Their battle conversation could ''[[GettingCrapPastTheRadar very]]'' easily be mistaken for [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything something else.]] [[GuideDangIt Good luck actually getting them to fight, though.]]
* FountainOfMemes:
** Devdan.
** Septimus.
* GameBreaker:
** [[spoiler:Laguz Royals]] in ''Radiant Dawn'', Ike in both games, and most tier 3 characters in the sequel. To specify, there are now 60 levels to grow up, and each 20 levels you go up a "[[FanNickname tier]]" (which the game calls a "class change"), and get preset stat bonuses (contrasting normal level ups, where it's random). In the other games, there were only two tiers. Now there are three, and even though most of your units come in tier 2 anyway, their stats become so ridiculous that many people consider the Endgame the easiest part of the game.
** By extension, the mastery skills that fully promoted ''Radiant Dawn'' characters receive definitely qualify. The vast majority of them are basically critical hits with additional effects ranging from status ailments to HP absorption. Considering how powerful your units should be by the point at which most of them are fully promoted, the activation of a mastery skill is more or less an instant kill. What's more is that the activation rates of these skills are based on stats, and if you have a third tier unit, the stat that the skill runs on should be well into the 30s. In other words, your units will be performing instant kills almost every other turn by the time Part IV rolls around (many times even before then).
*** Notably inverted with the Whisper's mastery skill, Bane. This skill always leaves the target with 1 HP. That sounds pretty good, but in practice, it often activates when the target would normally be killed.
** Haar in ''Radiant Dawn''. LightningBruiser, excellent mobility, plenty of availability, weak to only an uncommon type of Magic that's very weak and inaccurate to boot, masters the best weapon type in the game, is essentially a flying tank that takes ScratchDamage at most from nearly everything... it's safe to say that Haar is one of, if not THE, best units in the game. Such is his influence as a GameBreaker that among ''FE'' fansites, when drafting tier lists for any game in the franchise (and even other games), [[MemeticMutation it's not uncommon to refer to the absolute top tier as the "Haar Tier"]].
** Titania acts as a Game Breaker in both games. In ''Path of Radiance'', she's the game's [[CrutchCharacter Oifey]] but has the growths to keep up with the rest of your army when they began to gain levels. In ''Radiant Dawn'', she is the highest level of the Greil Mercenaries, and is only five levels from [[FanNickname promoting]] into third tier. Add in her excellent stats, access to [[AnAxeToGrind axes]], and can support with fellow LightningBruiser Ike, and you'll see why she's called [[FanNickname Critania]].
** The Marksman class can also shoot at ''three'' spaces away from an enemy without losing accuracy like a normal Longbow would. Add a Double Bow, which allows them to 1-2 range (something that has always been the bane of Archers in this series), makes them quite formidable.
** The premiere Marksman of the Tellius series, Shinon, counts as this in ''Radiant Dawn,'' with his high Strength, Speed, Skill and Avoid ensuring that he'll be doubling everything, never getting hit by anything, and critically-hitting a lot of the time, as well as activating his Mastery Skill Deadeye often, which if it doesn't kill the target immediately puts them to sleep, which tends to be overkill as it ''triples'' the damage dealt by the attack. A far cry from his status as a CrutchCharacter in ''Path of Radiance,'' as well as his being affected by CantCatchUp.
* GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff: ''Path of Radiance'' is one of the core Western fandom's most beloved ''Fire Emblem'' titles of all time. It is also the lowest-selling ''Fire Emblem'' title in the series' history in its native country.
* GoddamnedBoss: [[spoiler:Sephiran's]] oddly low HP (50) for a late-game boss is to lull you into a false sense of security. Thanks to Mantle, he's healing 40 of that every turn, so essentially the only way to subdue him is to gang up everyone and take him out in one turn. You also need Nihil on those who will attack him if you don't want him to [[HolyHandGrenade Corona-bomb someone to death]]. However, he's got another dirty trick that is almost literally [[TheComputerIsACheatingBastard cheating]]: [[spoiler:Those magic spirit mooks always standing adjacent to him? They have an unadvertised Guard skill that will start directing attacks away from Sephiran when his HP is low. You have to remove all four of them before you can finish the job. Do this too slowly, and he'll use Rewarp to move somewhere else.]] Rude and rather lame, but it makes sense in context; he's a DeathSeeker. Another thing is up to this point, almost every enemy has very low amounts of luck; they might feel overpowered, but their hit and dodge aren't as good as advertised, and they won't get the critical hits with regular weapons that your units will. [[spoiler:Sephiran]] has plenty of luck.
* HarsherInHindsight:
** Many lines in the first game are ''painfully'' ironic after playing the second. But since the game's data makes it obvious the developers already had the plot of the sequel in mind when they wrote the first game, this was probably intentional. Examples include:
*** Ike: "And this [[spoiler:General Zelgius]] [[HorribleJudgeOfCharacter seems sincere enough to me]]."
*** Rhys: [In the epilogue] "Finally...it's finally over. At long last, we can return to a life without war. Praise the goddess." (Not only is an even ''worse'' war coming, but [[spoiler:it's all ''caused'' by said Goddess! Or, at least, by a guy who'll stop at nothing to wake her up...]])
*** The last words of Sephiran's SequelHook in the first game: "It appears your trials are just beginning, my gallant, young hero... May the goddess ride with you." end up sounding ''really'' dark when you realize [[spoiler:said goddess is the final boss, and Sephiran knows this better than anyone. So in other words, it's not so much a 'good luck' as it is a ''death threat''.)]]
*** In [=PoR's=] Chapter 21, Soren gives Elincia a very blunt account of what happens when a country loses a war. He later distrusts Begnion, claiming they're only helping them win the war to serve their own interests. At the time, everyone dismisses him as just being his usual {{Jerkass}} self... but then the sequel shows [[JerkassHasAPoint what happened to Daein after you beat them, and how corrupt Begnion really is.]]
*** Many of the party's interactions with Oliver and especially Naesala. Playing the first game alone gives you the impression Naesala is an utterly horrid man who eventually serves as an ally of convenience because [[BecauseYouWereNiceToMe you helped one of the few people he genuinely likes]] and justifies his serial [[KickTheDog puppy-punting]] with vague statements about how much his nation is relying on him. [[spoiler: Once Blood Pacts are introduced, though, you realize this is ''far'' more literal than it sounds]]. Oliver is a bit more subtle, but note how he always talks about "protecting" Reyson after buying him as a slave. Just what he tells himself so he can sleep at night, right? [[spoiler: Nope, he's totally sincere, and what's more it's implied he of all the Senators was left out of the loop on who ''really'' signed the Heron Clan's death warrant]].
** Crimea is a real place, but it's small, mostly obscure, and nobody's really going to notice that the NamesTheSame. Until 2014, that is, when it became a flashpoint of Ukrainian-Russian tensions in the aftermath of Euromaidan and by extension ended up all over the news. And then they got annexed by Russia.
** Mordecai declares he'd want nothing to do with a goddess that supposedly decreed Branded should not exist to Stefan in [=PoR=].
* HilariousInHindsight:
** Volug is a WalkingShirtlessScene [[OurWerewolvesAreDifferent Wolf Laguz]]. Radiant Dawn came out in 2007, before [[{{Twilight}} a certain film series made a certain werewolf infamous for his shirtlessness]].
* HoYay[=/=]LesYay:
** Among the males, most prominently Ike with his all-male support endings, especially Soren and Ranulf.
** Among the females, there is Heather who pretty much flirts with every woman she meets (Nephenee, Lucia, Ilyana... even giving hyperbolic compliments to Elincia ''without'' meeting her.)
** Other places people notice HoYay include but are not limited to Oscar/Kieran, Tibarn/Reyson, and Zelgius/Sephiran.
** Other places people notice LesYay include but are not limited to Jill/Mist, Jill/Lethe, Tanith/Sigrun, and Nephenee/Calill.
** Lampshaded in ''Radiant Dawn'' when Micaiah mocks Sothe's [[TheKnightsWhoSaySquee constant fanboying]] of Ike.
-->'''Micaiah:''' Right. Lord Ike, "hero" of the Crimean Liberation, leader of the Greil Mercenaries, and father of Sothe's children...
* HypeBacklash: A side effect of the heavy praise that the games started getting [[VindicatedByHistory years after their debut]]; some fans find the Tellius games to be underwhelming compared to their reputation and/or don't see what the big fuss is all about. It doesn't help that the games are [[SeinfeldIsUnfunny slightly outdated in some respects]] compared to the better-selling 3DS entries, although there are very few complaints about ''Path of Radiance''[='=]s story unlike with those games.
* IKnewIt: [[spoiler:The Black Knight's true identity of Zelgius]], as well as [[spoiler:Bertram being a BrainwashedAndCrazy Renning]]. Thanks to the magic of hacking ''Path of Radiance'' and examining unused files and dummy data, many saw these coming a mile away, although [[spoiler:Ranulf]] spoils the former in ''Radiant Dawn'' for those who didn't.
* ItWasHisSled:
** The [[spoiler:Greil Mercenaries saving Lucia]] at the end of part II. Yes, it was originally a spoiler, since it was never hinted at the beginning. Also, [[spoiler:Zelgius is the Black Knight]].
** [[spoiler:Greil's death]] from the first game.
* ItsEasySoItSucks: StopHavingFunGuys complained that you could save mid mission in ''Radiant Dawn'', providing an opportunity for SaveScumming (a first for a ''Franchise/FireEmblem'' game, at least in the West; some previous ''Fire Emblem'', like ''Genealogy of the Holy War'', allowed that option). Others countered that you can't do it in Hard Mode (the mid-battle saves are deleted when you load them).
* ItsHardSoItSucks: The [=GameSpot=] reviewer said that the game was insanely hard, even on Easy Mode, which contributed to the [[EightPointEight badly received low score]]. Up until then, every Fire Emblem was made easier for international release. This one wasn't, except for including some new weapons, and making promotion and forging weapons less of a hassle. It ''really'' didn't help that the Japanese Normal, Hard, and Maniac modes [[DifficultyByRegion were renamed Easy, Normal, and Hard in the localization]]. It's quite likely that many reviewers avoided playing Easy [[EasyModeMockery out of pride]], not realising they were jumping straight into the Japanese Hard. (The English Hard was actually a HarderThanHard mode in the Japanese version, which explains why it's so brutal compared to the HM of earlier games.)
* JustHereForGodzilla: Many people check out these games due to Ike's popularity in ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros''.
* MagnificentBastard:
** Ashnard, though [[spoiler:you don't find out about it until his backstory and motives are explained in the second game, well after his death. In the first game, he just comes off as being AxCrazy]].
** Non-villainous examples include Nasir, Bastian, Naesala, and Soren (although the last becomes more of a GuileHero by the end of Path of Radiance).
** [[spoiler:Sephiran]], who is TheManBehindTheMan to ''everyone''. Lekain thinks he's one, but is more of a high-functioning SmugSnake.
* MemeticBadass:
** "The 3-13 Archer," a particular friendly archer in Chapter 3-13 of ''Radiant Dawn'', is especially distinguished for MemeticBadass status in spite of want for a ''[[NominalImportance name]]''. By [[http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/932999-fire-emblem-radiant-dawn/41748409 an incredible quirk]] of ArtificialBrilliance, the 3-13 Archer has cemented himself in the hearts and minds of ''Fire Emblem'' players everywhere.
** Ike himself. He's generally held as one of the manliest and most powerful Nintendo characters of all, rivaling Captain Falcon in this respect but with slightly more canon justification. A series of polls on Website/GameFAQs' ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros'' board was dedicated to determining whether Ike truly could solo other ''Smash'' and Nintendo characters in canon -- surprisingly, he was voted to lose against Falcon himself, ''without'' the Chuck Norris-like memes usually associated with the Captain.
* MemeticMutation:
** Danved is certainly not Devdan. He also fights like ten men.
** "Give them a sound thrashing!"
** Ike's [[HeroicBuild buffed-up]] design in ''Radiant Dawn'' is frequently compared to a gorilla by Japanese fans.
** In any discussion involving pairings in this game, expect [[CargoShip Gatrie x Tree in a Skirt]] to show up. Also expect it to appear in a lot of "Fire Emblem OTP" lists.
** "[[StupidNeutral GOLDOA WILL NOT MOVE!]]"
* {{Moe}}: Mist, Ilyana, Astrid, Amy, Micaiah, and Sanaki. A lot of people think this of Rhys as well.
** An interesting quirk of this is that Sanaki's "moe appeal" is ''in-universe'', and gets invoked by Lekain [[spoiler:as he explains just how Sanaki was used as a tool by the Senate]]. It ultimately ends up bordering on deconstruction, since her moe appeal [[spoiler:has, without her even realizing it, made her life and the lives of many others hell]]:
--> '''Lekain''': [[spoiler:In an unprecedented move by the senators, we elevated Sephiran to prime minister, keeping him serving as close to you as possible. This plan, radical as it was, proved far more effective than we dared dream. A young, handsome prime minister and an adorable moppet of an apostle brought the people's support to incredible new heights. Apparently, the common citizenry is gullible enough to [[GullibleLemmings blindly follow any leader]] [[BeautyEqualsGoodness who is sufficiently attractive]]. Enamored as they were, no one ever seemed to care whether or not you could hear the voice of the goddess. With the new apostle and prime minister, the political landscape became unrecognizable. Even in the face of overtly unreasonable legislation, the two of you would stand on the balcony... a smile and a wave later, the people would cheer and go on with their happy lives.]]
* MoralEventHorizon:
** Jarod crossed it when he murdered three innocent civilians in pursuit of the Dawn Brigade, and possibly earlier when he [[YouHaveFailedMe killed one of his own men for failing to capture the Dawn Brigade.]]
** Izuka definitely crossed it when he was testing his [[DeadlyUpgrade Feral One]] drugs on [[WarriorPoet Muarim]], although the Feral One drug’s existence to begin with could mean he crossed it sooner.
** Lekain crosses it every other line of dialogue.
*** Being responsible for the Serenes Massacre definitely stands out, though, particularly since [[spoiler:it's one of his few acts [[UnwittingPawn that weren't the idea]] [[ManBehindTheMan of Sephiran]]]].
*** [[spoiler:In fact, because the Serenes Massacre is what caused Sephiran to cross the DespairEventHorizon, Lekain is pretty much indirectly responsible for everything.]]
** Ashnard crossed it when he abandoned his lover, took his son hostage in order to lure in the boy's uncle, whom he turned into a mount, and then abandoned his son after that.
** Valtome does it twice, starting by ordering his men into the Kauku Caves (almost certain death) purely to "retrieve corpses" in 3-8. In 3-10, in case there was any doubt, ordering his soldiers (a hell of a lot of men) to attack the unarmed Queen Elincia, who has just managed to avert a major battle between Begnion and the Laguz Alliance.
** Naesala ''seems'' to cross, and is indeed considered to have crossed {{in-universe}}, when he has all fighting-age males in Phoenicis executed. [[spoiler:But it's a subversion; Naesala was under a Blood Pact, and we all know what that [[SadisticChoice entails]].]]
* {{Narm}}:
** Some of the voiceovers in the scenes in ''Radiant Dawn''[='=]s English version. Especially Deghinsea's. There was what was intended to be a very serious scene showcasing [[spoiler:Lehran's]] plight, but Deghinsea's voice actor decided to play LargeHam and whatever was intended to be serious in the scene vanished in thin air.
-->'''Deghinsea''': "Hold, hold I say!"
** The voice acting on the whole is rather bad: With the emotion levels going up and down at random points (pretty much every cutscene Tibarn is in sounds forehead-slappingly stupid due to the unnecessarily large levels of ham ''and'' DullSurprise the actor injects into the performance). Only a few scenes, like the ending of ''Path of Radiance'', manage to nail it and carry any sort of emotional weight.
** Ilyana's death. "I'm dying...on an empty stomach."
** Ike's memory scene has the child Ike shout in his deep adult voice. It doesn't help that his expression is completely blank.
* NarmCharm: Sigrun is retelling the day of Sanaki's coronation when she was just a small child. Tanith adds that she tripped 5 times over her cape, and Sigrun says that isn't appropriate right now as Sanaki is asking them [[spoiler: if her not being the true apostle changes their opinion of her.]] While this may get a laugh, it's still touching because it's [[DrillSergeantNasty Tanith]] and [[RoyalsWhoActuallyDoSomething Sanaki.]]
* NightmareFuel: The basement of Gritnea Tower. Or rather, [[spoiler:a dungeon filled with Laguz corpses]]. The description alone is bad enough, but the CG image shown to accompany it....
* OlderThanTheyThink: Nephenee is often mistaken for the first playable character in the Soldier class, which was exclusive to enemies and other non-playable units in the GBA games. The series previously had playable soldiers in ''VideoGame/FireEmblemGaiden'', such as Lukas, who joins in the beginning of that game.
* PeripheryDemographic: Due to Ike's extremely close friendships with males and lack of defined female marriage partners like other ''Fire Emblem'' protagonists, these games are among the most popular in the series with YaoiFangirls, which is a cause of BrokenBase among the non-yaoi/shipping sector of the ''Fire Emblem'' fandom. Like with [[Franchise/StarFox Fox and Falco]], some fans of Ike in ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros'' don't come in expecting their favorite character to have such a sizable slash fanbase.
* RelationshipWritingFumble: A possible explanation, a la ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsII'', for why Ike seems to be [[ShipTease so much closer]] to Soren and Ranulf than to any of the female characters. [[spoiler:Ike's descendant Priam in ''Awakening'' suggests, if only mildly so, that this may be the case.]]
* SacredCow: Much like ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTheWindWaker'' and ''VideoGame/PokemonBlack2AndWhite2'', fans of the Tellius games will valiantly defend them from any sort of criticism, right down to accusations of [[SeinfeldIsUnfunny being outdated]] and ''Radiant Dawn''[='=]s controversial plot points, and will often attempt to justify the games selling poorly, citing arbitrary reasons for why the allegedly "inferior" ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'' sold much better and saved the series. Likewise, some fans act like it's a cardinal sin to dislike Ike himself, although his ''Radiant Dawn'' depiction has some detractors.
* TheScrappy: Sothe in ''Radiant Dawn'' is disliked by many players, for being the closest thing the game has to a classic Jagen despite his decent growths, having by far the worst third tier class (terrible stat caps including a measly 28 strength cap, being restricted to knives (which are the weakest weapons in the game), and having a mastery skill that just leaves opponents at 1 HP with no additional effects while all other mastery skills outright kill), his overbearing devotion to Micaiah, and his outfit in both his classes [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking cropping halfway]] [[BareYourMidriff up his torso]]. The biggest sticking point with such players though is the fact Sothe is a forced unit throughout much of the game, and is mandatory to bring along into the endgame where his class limitations make him nigh-useless; the last one is especially bothersome to fans of Volke, who is an objectively superior knife-wielder to Sothe (his ''base'' strength is greater than Sothe's maximum strength with comparable speed, while his mastery skill is a guaranteed death blow with the same activation rate), which means to bring Volke along into the endgame would mean having two knife-wielders among your limited units (while there's also only one SS knife in the game). Sothe isn't without his defenders however, who will point out how indispensable Sothe is in Part 1 and the DB's Part 3 missions (i.e. the hardest parts of the game), and that by the time he loses his usefulness it doesn't really matter when you have so many other overpowered units to pick up the slack.
** Leonardo, Meg, and Fiona; Leonardo is an early-game archer with awful base states and poor growths in strength and speed, Meg is an armor unit who comes in very underlevelled with poor growths in strength and defense, and despite attempting to fill the niche of a "speedy armor" her speed cap is ''lower'' than Gatrie's (a character with '''far''' better Strength and Defence) and Fiona comes in late in Part 1 with hilariously bad base stats that would be fitting for a level 1 unit. Fiona is especially bad, as by the point you get her the enemies can double and kill her in one round, while the remaining maps of Chapter 1 either restrict her movement (eliminating her main advantage of being a mounted unit) or don't allow you to use her at all (and when you go back to the Dawn Brigade in Part 3, the first mission there also heavily restricts her movement), so it's impossible without an extreme amount of coddling and resources to make Fiona remotely usable (and it's not like she has amazing growths and stat caps to make it remotely worthwhile). All three are also [[FlatCharacter flat characters]] who get barely if any characterisation, so they have no chance to win people over in spite of their terrible performance. The few people who do like them tends to be for how hilariously bad they are.
** Lyre and Kyza, two Laguz units who join the Greil Mercenaries in Part 3. Like the above three DB characters, they come in with horrendously terrible base stats (Lyre especially, who can't even deal any damage to many enemies in her starting map) without having the growths to make up for it, and are completely flat characters who serve no relevance to the plot. Lyre is additionally a Cat Laguz, which are the Laguz with the worst stats and have the worst transformation meters (as they deplete the fastest during transformation). Lyre in particular is often considered an even worse and more useless unit than Fiona. And again like the aforementioned three, their fans tend to be people who like them because of how hilariously useless and flat they are.
*** It also doesn't help that you get them at the same time that you get Lethe and Mordecai back, units with identical classes and either outright better stats (Lethe vs. Lyre) or roughly even stats at lower levels (Mordecai vs. Kyza; Mordecai has the advantage in HP, Strength, Luck, and Defense while Kyza has the advantage in Magic, Speed, Skill, and Resistance, but Mordecai is only level 16 if he didn't gain any levels in part 2 while Kyza is level 18 and [[DumpStat Magic is more or less useless to any laguz that isn't a heron or a white dragon]].)
** Kurthnaga, who suffers a really bad case of OverratedAndUnderleveled; after you see him blow up a castle and a huge deal is made about him transforming, he comes in right before the endgame way underlevelled with terrible base stats (including a 20 speed stat when transformed, while everything at that point is around 30). He's additionally a mandatory unit to bring along into the endgame where he'll be useless unless you pour an extreme amount of bonus experience into him (while not having the potential to make it remotely worth it), and his Black Tide skill (which raises the defenses of adjacent units by 5) isn't very useful, unlike the similarly mandatory, yet combat-ineffective, Ena (whose Blood Tide skill gives adjacent units an extremely useful strength boost of 5 and a skill boost of 5 that helps a lot against the final boss). The only niche use of Kurthnaga is exploiting [[ThatOneBoss Dheginsea]]'s inability to attack him, which even then you'll need to get his strength up by at least 5 levels before he can even scratch Dheg for pitiful damage.
* ScrappyMechanic: The Skill Capacity system in ''Radiant Dawn'' is very poorly implemented, mostly because Shove and Canto were changed from innate abilities to unremovable Skills that took up capacity, and because the Mastery Skills earned by third-tier units on promotion, which understandably have a high capacity, are ''also'' unremovable - and in most cases, have a capacity equal to the amount that the unit was supposed to gain in the first place! As a result, almost every unit has far less potential for Skill customization than their ostensible Capacity suggests; the only real exceptions are Laguz and units who join with a really good Skill already equipped (e.g. Nolan and Nihil, Nephenee and Wrath), because automatically held Skills don't take up capacity.
** This was worse in the previous game where Skills were lost for no good reason if it was taken off a character.
** Biorhythm could be a pain in ''Path of Radiance'', but ''Radiant Dawn'' took it one step further and had it change ''every turn''! This meant if your Leonardo or Mia were performing wonderfully at the beginning of a chapter they could suddenly start failing badly near the end. This made a lot of players mad.
** The Laguz's transformation meters. It makes non-royal Laguz units so much less flexible, and requires players to be so much more cautious with their placement at the end of turns to ensure they don't untransform while being assaulted on the enemy phase. The result is that even with items to mitigate the transformation meter, Laguz perform a lot worse than equivalent Beorc units, and require really overpowering stats or abilities to be useful. Even with OP stats, Laguz will often get overlooked by players for inferior Beorc units so they don't have to deal with the meters.
* SeinfeldIsUnfunny: Players introduced to the series via ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'' may find that the Tellius games (particularly ''Path of Radiance'') can feel rather primitive in terms of music quality, animation, lack of voice acting for individual characters, and lack of side missions.
* SlowPacedBeginning: For some (especially those who dislike Micaiah), ''Radiant Dawn'' doesn't really pick up until [[spoiler: the Black Knight himself joins your party at the end of Part I]], and the game doesn't let up from there.
* StoicWoobie:
** Soren is the most obvious example, although admittedly he loses some of his stoicism in the scenes that make him the most {{Woobie}}-like. Except for his Path of Radiance [[TearJerker B Support]] with Ike.
** [[spoiler:After making his promise that there shall be no great war, Dheginsea is not only forced to hide Lehran from the world and persecute the branded, but also sit idle as the Laguz are forced into slavery, since the Dragons interfering would cause said war. Then Ashnard has an affair with his daughter, uses their child to draw out and kill his eldest, and then warps a brigade of red dragons into Feral Ones. Dheg still remains neutral. Then a great war happens anyway, and his only remaining child Kurthnaga joins the war. He still remains neutral. By the end of Radiant Dawn, Dheg has lost a child, had the other two turn against him, the majority of his people killed, discoved that everything he did to prevent war was completely unnecessary in the first place, and his hundreds of years of neutrality torn down before his eyes, and all he could do to validate his actions was to continue to uphold his promise, even in the face of Armageddon and the objections of everyone around him.]]
* ThatOneBoss:
** If nothing else, Dheginsea is statistically fearsome: 100 HP, outrageous stats (''six'' of them maxed out), a skill (Mantle) that stops your skills, renders him immune to non-blessed weapons, and heals him for 30 HP every turn; and to top it off, a mastery skill (Ire) that just plain kills you, period. The good news is, by this point you've had a chance to get three copies of Nihil, which you can simply slap on your three strongest units to even the odds. The bad news is, you're still having to fend off his countrymen in the meantime, and they are no slouches. Another strike against Dheginsea is that (like all the rest of the enemies) he will never retaliate against Kurthnaga or Ena. Not that this helps you anyway, since those two are lucky to damage him at all.
** Ike in Radiant Dawn Chapter 3-13. He'll be as strong as you levelled him up to at that point, which is going to be at max level with many high capped stats unless you went out of your way to not use Ike in the prior chapters, while he wields the Ragnell. You additionally have to play the very underpowered Dawn Brigade in this chapter, none of which will likely be able to survive a single round against Ike, let alone deal substantial damage to him, as they'll probably be a bit past level 10 in tier 2 at best without careful investment. Fortunately for the player, Ike doesn't move until the final two rounds, and the player doesn't ever have to combat him to win the map (the objective is to survive for 12 turns). However, defeating Ike is an InstantWinCondition, so those speedrunning or otherwise concerned about their final turn count will have to beat him. Beating Ike will usually come down to using your Master Crown to promote one of your DB units to tier three beforehand and getting lucky with a mastery skill, and/or exploiting Ike's low resistance to put him to sleep with a Sleep Staff from Laura so you can take safe accurate shots at him (which you'll only get if you recruited Aran back in 1-3 and kept both him and Laura alive up to this chapter).
** [[OutsideTheBoxTactic Since Ike keeps the exact same loadout... you can unequip Ragnell in the last chapter you used him, making him a lot more manageable.]]
** In ''Path of Radiance'', defeating the Black Knight is more or less a matter of luck, unless you've gotten Mist leveled up reaaaaaal well. And even then you have to do it in [[UpToEleven just four turns]], which is harder than it sounds.
** [[TurnsRed Berserk Ashnard]] in Hard Mode is no slouch either, not because of his stats, but because he ''actually moves''. And like the BK, unless you [[GuideDangIt prepare specific combinations of skills on specific characters beforehand]], it mostly comes down to getting lucky with Ike's Aether. And Ashera help you if you run out of Physic staves...
* ThatOneLevel:
** ''Radiant Dawn''[='=]s Chapter 3-6; you play the Dawn Brigade for the first time after Part 1, in a mission where you'll have to kill a ton of Laguz (up to 50 on hard mode), in Fog of War. You also won't have {{Crutch Character}}s anymore to carry you through like the end of Part 1 (the Black Knight does come, but not until late into the chapter and the swamp you fight in makes him nigh-immobile), while your DB units are underlevelled and can be easily killed in two hits from the accurate [[DemonicSpider Tiger Laguz]]. Your saving graces are being able to finally take the [[PowerLimiter Wildheart]] skill off of Volug at this point (who'll be the only unit who will reliably be able to take more than two hits from the Tigers), Sothe with a Beastkiller (which will allow him to one-round kill the Laguz, though he won't be able to take a hit), and Nolan, Edward, Leonardo, and Jill getting some very powerful weapons (especially Nolan with Tarvos, which grants a defense boost that can make him the only other unit besides Volug who can take more than two Tiger hits).
** ''Radiant Dawn''[='=]s Chapter 4-3 if you don't specifically prepare for it; it's a standard rout mission, but you fight in a large map that's entirely desert, which severely limits the mobility of all units besides mages, thieves, fliers, and transformed Laguz, while also making armor and horse units nigh-immobile. In part 4 you additionally have all your units split between three armies, which outside of a handful of mandatory units on each army, you choose which unit goes to which army (and you can't modify your decisions once you make them). So if you don't have prior knowledge of this chapter, you could very well choose to not have fliers and Laguz on the Silver Army while putting your best armor and horse units in it, leaving you crippled for this map. You do get Naesala, a Laguz royal, here regardless, alongside another very powerful Laguz in Skrimir, who can both potentially solo the map. But with just those two, while very doable, it'll take a very long time to clear this chapter.
* ThatOneSidequest:
** Stefan and Shinon in ''Path of Radiance'' are infamous for being two of the hardest characters to recruit in the series. The first is pure GuideDangIt: you need to move one of two specific characters to one specific, out-of-the-way tile in a ''desert chapter'', with only one ''extremely'' vague hint to the whole ordeal. (The mention of "strange figures wandering the desert" in a base conversation. Yeah, that's helpful.) Even more annoyingly, if you miss him you miss both the S rank sword and one of the Occult Scrolls. For Shinon, you need to talk to him with Rolf, an Archer who'll be very weak if untrained, a fact only hinted at if you check the "conversations" section of the Unit menu. After this, you have to have Ike ''defeat'' him, which is normally [[FinalDeath the EXACT OPPOSITE of what you want to do to a recruitable enemy]]. And he doesn't join until the very end of the chapter, meaning a player could restart after Ike beats him, thinking he's gone for good.
** You get a massive amount of Bonus Exp for completing ''Path of Radiance'' Chapter 10 without being seen by the guards, i.e. playing it as a pure stealth mission. This is nearly impossible without a turn-by-turn walkthrough, as the guards' movements are erratic and unpredictable, and you need to unlock all the cells before leaving or you'll miss several recruits. (On the Japan-only Maniac mode, it's even worse, as the prisoners all need to ''escape'' the map in order to be recruited.)
** Another annoying BEXP condition is completing Chapter 15 [[PacifistRun without killing a single enemy except the boss.]] The LeeroyJenkins enemy AI makes it hard to avoid accidently killing some during the enemy phase, and if you want to do this ''while also recruiting Stefan'', then you're ''really'' in for pain.
** One of the conditions to recruiting the final secret character in ''Radiant Dawn'', [[spoiler: Lehran]]. Ike has to fight the Black Knight in 3-7, and ''both'' must survive the encounter. Essentially Ike needs to be very strong to even stand any chance of surviving, but not ''too'' strong. You also need to give Ike a ranged sword, because the Black Knight's Eclipse skill can activate in melee, and if it does Ike is 100% doomed.
** Getting the secret epilogue conversation involving Soren in ''Radiant Dawn'' requires a lot of set-up even if you know the GuideDangIt steps. You need to have him fight Micaiah in 3-7 and Pelleas in 3-E, both of whom are right at the end of a large map and surrounded by tons of very strong units, including multiple boss-tier characters. The best way to do it requires having the foresight to give Callil's Meteor tome in Part 2 to Haar, who joins Ike's group in Part 3, so that Soren can use it to hit both from a distance. Even then, Soren needs to get pretty deep into enemy lines in 3-E, which, seeing as he's a SquishyWizard, is a daunting prospect in itself. (Also, Nolan and Edward are on the best path for him to take, and both are ThatOneBoss if you trained them.)
* TheyChangedItNowItSucks:
** The generic support conversations in ''Radiant Dawn'' were not very well liked after four straight games of interesting, detailed ones. A fan project was started to create support conversations in the vein of those seen in previous games. [[http://forums.feplanet.net/index.php?showtopic=26098 Link here.]]
** The losses of the mercenary and hero classes were also met with complaining, although Ike basically counts as one in all but name, especially in the sequel.
* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodCharacter: Every single new character in Radiant Dawn lacks any kind of character development due to the removal of support conversations, and a lot of them had the potential to be interesting.
** Special mention goes to Stefan. He [[TheMentor offers]] Ike some sword lessons (that actually grant one of the only 4 Occult skills in [=PoR=]), is [[spoiler: descended from one of Ashera's 3 heroes]], and is clearly [[StepfordSmiler less jovial than he lets on.]] However, he adds nothing except for some special conversations and a Vague Katti. While this fits [[SecretCharacter his obscurity and secrecy]], he yields nothing despite [[spoiler:becoming the king of a Branded nation]].
** A not insignificant number of fans wish Micaiah had been the protagonist for the entirety of ''Radiant Dawn'', and that Ike's [[SpotlightStealingSquad overshadowing her]] in both screen time and usefulness was a mistake.
* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot: The [[HalfHumanHybrid Branded]], their place in the world, and their relationship to the Goddess[[spoiler:es]] are not examined nearly as much as they could have been. They also don't really do anything with the fact that [[spoiler:[[{{Irony}} each of the Ashera's champions has at least one Branded descendent]]. Soan gets hit the worst by this one.]]
** In the first game, there's an offhand mention that the reason that the Beorc oppress the Laguz, is that, once upon a time, [[CycleOfRevenge the Laguz oppressed the Beorc]]. Both when this happened and the nature of this oppression are never revealed.
* ToyShip: Mist and Rolf. Also counts as a FanPreferredCouple. [[spoiler:As with many ships, it was screwed out of a paired ending ''Radiant Dawn''.]]
* UncannyValley: The eyes in some of the female characters' portraits are drawn in a very dull complexion with almost no pupils, to the point that they look like marbles or amber. If the eye color happens to be something bright on top of that like red or yellow, this can make said characters seem eerily similar to {{Killer Robot}}s with MindControlEyes. Elincia, Marcia, Jill, Astrid, Micaiah, and Cahill's daughter Amy are particularly noticeable examples.
* VillainBall: Lots of them in ''Radiant Dawn'':
** Jarod suffers lots of them, mostly to stop the audience from developing too much sympathy or respect for him, to the point that this occasionally leads to rather bipolar behaviour ([[AFatherToHisMen he expresses his pride in his subordinates]] and in the next moment he [[BadBoss stabs them]]). The most obvious example is him demolishing the capital of Daein (and killing lots of ([[AMillionIsAStatistic unnamed and story-wise irrelevant]]) innocent civilians in the process) for no explained reason, after Micaiah and the Black Knight let him escape, probably because said mission made him rather sympathetic, and he was required to be killed as the DiscOneFinalBoss in the next one.
** Although Ludveck is more cunning than most ''Fire Emblem'' antagonists, he too lapses into StupidEvil by the end of his arc. His last trump card, have his men threaten Lucia, should Elincia not consent to his demands, is very cleverly played. Not so smart is his order to have her really killed, after Elincia after some thought decides that as a Queen she cannot meet said demands for personal reasons; Not only does he lose his only bargaining chip in the process, he gives Elincia and her followers additional reasons to hate him and have him killed.
** The most blatant and hotly debated case however is the one of [[spoiler:King Dheginsea]], whose reasons for opposing the protagonists make little to no sense in the eyes of most players. Suffice to say, he'd be TheScrappy if he weren't a pretty impressive Boss fight.
* VindicatedByHistory: Although both games were for the most part always well regarded among most hardcore fans of the franchise, their low sales made it feel like their memory wasn't going to last very long. Fast-forward a decade, two stellar appearances in ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBros'' and a spectacular franchise comeback thanks to ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'' later, and now it's more broadly praised than it ever was. There is no shortage of people who think these two games are the highlight of the entire franchise, especially among the games released in Western territories. The narrative is particularly well regarded thanks to the elaborated JigSawPuzzlePlot spanning two games.
* VocalMinority:
** ''Radiant Dawn'' is derisively known as a [[http://fe-according-to-japan.tumblr.com/post/56435492659/tellian-trivia "fujioshi game" in some Japanese circles]] and is accused of pandering to YaoiFangirls at the expense of other fans' enjoyment, due to its ShipSinking with female characters such as Elincia and HoYay subtext with male characters such as Ranulf or Soren. However, most fans don't hold such an extreme view of the game.
* WhatAnIdiot: The evening before the decisive battle with Begnion's occupation forces, Micaiah decides to slip out of the Revolutionaries' camp into the dark. Alone. When she was the de facto leader and main pillar of moral support for the entire army ([[StrawmanHasAPoint a fact that Izuka of all people pointed out]]). Had not literally [[DeusExMachina the Black Knight shown up out of nowhere]], the Revolution could've ended then and there.
* WhatDoYouMeanItsNotForKids: ''Radiant Dawn'' was rated E10+ by the ESRB despite its dark themes and slightly stronger language than the T-rated ''Path of Radiance'' (the word "damn" is used several times, while its predecessor only used "damned" once).
* TheWoobie: Among others, Tormod, Muarim, and Ena definitely count. Pelleas and [[spoiler:Naesala]] too. In fact, ''anyone'' who's had to deal with the horrific threat of [[spoiler:a Blood Pact]] counts.
* {{Woolseyism}}:
** [[spoiler:The Black Knight's survival]] is changed from very silly PhlebotinumBreakdown to ILetYouWin using existing reasons that feel in-character.
** "Mist" was changed into "Alja" in the German version since "Mist" literally means "manure".