Fire Emblem Three Houses / Tropes A to D

Tropes A to D | Tropes E to M | Tropes N to R | Tropes S to Z | YMMV | Trivia

---

Fire Emblem: Three Houses provides examples of:

#-A

• 100% Completion: Unlocking every possible piece of content in the Extras menu is an absolutely arduous task that requires multiple playthroughs.
  • In the case of supports, while one can technically cut down the number needed for S-ranks via Save Scumming (by saving into another file after choosing Byleth's partner), you're also forced to go through the final chapter first (or last 2 chapters in some routes) before you finally get to see the support proper, and every route (including the secret one) has at least one exclusive support chain. A similar case exist for the Goddess Tower scenes.
  • Many animated movies and story events are locked behind specific routes. If the DLC Pass has been purchased, this also includes the Cindered Shadows sidestory.
  • The music gallery is a similar case as well, but with a unique caveat: each dub contains their unique version of "Song of the Nabateans", and "Edge of Dawn". This means the player needs to see the scenes using these songs in both English and Japanese at least once to unlock them, which, fortunately for the first case, can be done easily by changing the dub before watching the Part I event "Rhea and Sothis" via the Event Gallery. In the case of Edge of Dawn, however, a save file which saved after beating the Final Boss but before going into New Game Plus is needed if the player wants to avoid playing a complete route just to unlock the song.
• Abdicate the Throne:
  • Emperor Ionious IX of the Adrestian Empire ends up abdicating the throne in favour of his only surviving child Edelgard upon her request to which he agrees due to his frail state and advanced age making him unable to rule the Empire effectively.
  • This is also what Edelgard is planning to do once she manages to implement her desired reforms for Fódlan and finds a worthy successor. Her solo ending on the Crimson Flower route reveals that she does just that, entrusting the throne to a capable successor before vanishing from the public eye.
  • Several paired endings Byleth can have on the Verdant Wind and Silver Snow routes mention that Byleth ends up abdicating the throne once the situation in Fódlan returns to normal.
  • Claude's paired endings with Lysithea and Shamir have him abdicate his position as the king of Almyra.
• Aborted Arc:
  • Played with as a whole. Depending on the route, some plot points that pop up during Part I can potentially get dropped by the time Part II starts, the best example of this being Byleth’s origins which are eventually revealed only on the Silver Snow route (while you do get to learn some hints of it on the Verdant Wind route, the exposition given lacks some key details that are told in that path so you don't get the full picture). That being said...
  • The Azure Moon route plays this trope straight. late in the story, Dimitri starts once again seeking answers for the Tragedy of Duscur, which lead him to learn that his stepmother Patricia may have not only had a hand in what happened, but that she actually went missing instead of being killed like everyone in the Kingdom had previously assumed, and could potentially be still alive somewhere. While Dimitri had already chosen by that point to stop dwelling on the past, which would justify the trope in question, the plot eventually brings it up again after having taken over Fort Merceus, as one of the servants of House Kleiman mentions that all those involved with the incident were given the orders to not harm Patricia's carriage, reinforcing the idea she could've survived. In the end, this plotline is cut short and left unresolved as the storyline ends right after Edelgard's defeat. If you had the DLC and recruited Hapi, then Dimitri can manage to find some closure as their A rank support talks of how Dimitri's stepmother is involved.
• Absurdly Divided School: Students are divided into the titular three houses depending upon their region of origin: the Black Eagles for the Adrestrian Empire, the Blue Lions for the Holy Kingdom of Faerghus, and the Golden Deer for the Leicester Alliance, with each house specialising in certain weapons. You can recruit students to your house if you meet their requirements or your Support Points are high enough. Once the Time Skip occurs, everyone is united under your chosen house.
• Absurdly High Level Cap: A character's level caps at 99, when your party will be around level 40-45 at the end of a standard playthrough, and you will likely cap most stats long before this point. Also, due to the restraints on your time, it is nearly impossible to get anywhere near the cap unless you abuse the free maps on Normal difficulty, in which some auxiliary battles do not require you to spend activity points. Despite this, each character has a unique dialogue line upon reaching this level.
• Acceptable Breaks from Reality: Lockpicking and regular keys work just fine on the ultra-modern metal sliding doors of Shambhala.
• Action Prologue: The first two minutes of the game are spent showing the battle between the forces of Seiros and Nemesis at the Tailtean Plains.
• Actor Allusion: This is not the first time where Patrick Seitz voices a character with a Grim Reaper motif who is related to one of the characters.
• Advanced Ancient Acropolis: Shambhala, the headquarters of "those who slither in the dark" is eventually revealed to be this in some routes, featuring futuristic architecture and even modern technology (such as operating tables and monitors when inspecting Bias and Pittacus' rooms in Zoom View) which are seen nowhere else in the whole game.
• Advancing Boss of Doom: In chapter 4 of Cindered Shadows, your units will be chased by a Golem, and it has incredibly high Magic and Dexterity stats plus it will gain Lethality when its first health bar is depleted and Quick Riposte after the second so that it will be guaranteed to kill one of your units should you make them fight it. And since if just one of your units fall will result in a game over, you have no choice but to let your units flee for their lives.
• Aerith and Bob:
  • Among the four main characters, there's names like Byleth and Edelgard, but there's also more regular-sounding names like Claude and Dimitri. You've also got archaic names that have fallen out of popularity like Dedue and Sylvain next to contemporary names like Hilda and Ashe.
  • In general, most of the cast's names wouldn't have looked out of place in Europe a few centuries back (almost all of them are still in use today in one form or another), but then there's Rhea, Seteth, Flayn and Byleth...Which is a hint that none of them are entirely human.
  • Applies to the Hero's Relic weapons, as you have fancy names that reference mythology like Aymr, Areadbhar, and Failnaught alongside more regular-sounding names like Crusher, the Sword of the Creator, and the Lance of Ruin.
• After the End: Picking the Golden Deer reveals that the continent of Fódlan went through this. Thousands of years ago, it was home to an extremely advanced and prosperous civilization called Agartha that was built with the help of Sothis and the dragons. However, after a series of wars among the Agarthans, they eventually turned their weapons on Sothis herself, and this led to an even bigger war that left much of Fódlan looking like the modern Valley of Torment and killed most of the humans on the continent. The destructiveness of the weapons used is why none of the ancient technology remains above ground. Sothis eventually restored the continent to a livable state, but it took an immensely long time, and when she was done, the exhausted goddess fell into a sleep she would never have the chance to wake up from while she was still alive.
• Alas, Poor Villain:
  • On the Silver Snow and Verdant Wind, Edelgard's death is portrayed sympathetically: she talks about her regrets and how she had wished that Byleth had chosen the same path she did. She also asks her professor to kill her, since if she's left alive, the fighting and bloodshed will continue (and it's implied that thanks to her body bearing two Crests, she is not likely to live a long life regardless). Byleth wordlessly listens to her, spurred on from their hesitation by her words, and then swiftly kills her the moment she finishes.
  • On the Azure Moon route, if Mercedes and Casper's paralogue was completed before the final battle against the Death Knight, when he dies, Mercedes cradles him and calls him by his true identity, Emile, as she tearfully apologizes for being a lousy older sister for not rescuing him in time from House Bartels.
  • On the Crimson Flower route, Edelgard feels sorry for Dimitri after she kills him. She laments that her uncle's machinations twisted him into a person obsessed with revenge on her, as he believed that she was complicit in the Tragedy of Duscur, and that he could have become a good king during times of peace.
• Algorithmic Story Branching: Unlike in some previous games of the series, only the Player Character Byleth can reach an S-rank support, while recruitable characters are restricted to, at most, A-level supports with each other. However, even after two recruits have achieved an A-level support, the game secretly keeps counting how many times they've assisted each other in combat, and in the Modular Epilogue of the game, all surviving characters are paired off based on this hidden support score, with each receiving a special "paired ending" slide with the person they assisted or were assisted by the most.
• Allowed Internal War: The pre-timeskip paralogues "Land of the Golden Deer" and "Death Toll" involve regions of Leicester using military force against each other (in the former, Viscount Acheron attempts to seize Gloucester lands by force; in the latter, mercenaries hired by Count Gloucester are murdering merchants traveling to Derdriu), and the people responsible get a slap on the wrist at worst from the central government. It's an effective way of showing how grave a problem factionalism is in the Alliance, and a sign of things to come as to their response when the Empire declares war.
• All the Other Reindeer: The people of Duscur, Almyra, and the Abyssians.
  • The people of Duscur are treated with suspicion and animosity due to the people believing they are responsible for the death of King Lambert and countless others.
  • Almyra is constantly attacking Fódlan's borders, and Fódlan natives have reservations when it comes to foreigners.
  • The Abyssians, meanwhile, are treated with hostility and suspicion by some of the officers within the Church of Seiros for unexplained reasons as of yet. According to Balthus in the DLC Wave 4 Trailer, the people of the Abyss are comprised of merchants who were "chewed and spit out" by the nobility, along with orphans, lost souls, the elderly and the infirm; basically anyone who didn't belong. However, this could be potentially justified, since Constance admits that besides the most vulnerable, criminals also live in Abyss.
• All Your Base Are Belong to Us: Played with in the Crimson Flower storyline, as Garreg Mach was your base of operations during the school portion of the game, but upon siding with Edelgard in the Holy Tomb and making an enemy of Rhea and the Church of Seiros, the opening battle of the war is the Adrestian army seizing the monastery and forcing the Church to flee to Faerghus so it can be used as their base of operations. After the timeskip, the monastery is noticeably more run-down, and Edelgard can even admit that some areas are still unusable even five years after the battle. Also notable is that the statue of Seiros in the monastery chapel is pulled down (though chapel-related services like choir practice carry on as usual). The Knights of Seiros make an attempt to reclaim the monastery after the fall of Leicester, making this a straight example of the trope, but the Black Eagle Strike Force is able to hold them off.
• Ambiguous Situation:
  • The Flame Emperor's scheme to have Kostas kill Edelgard, Dimitri and Claude in the prologue ends up falling into this due to some late reveals, contrivances surrounding it, and the subplot itself never being uncovered nor explained, leaving its truth not-so clear cut in Three Houses proper:
    • Kostas' conversation with the Flame Emperor reveals the former was ordered to kill any young nobles that he could find, and was not told the Church and the Knight of Seiros would get involved afterwards. The Flame Emperor from their part brushes off Kostas' problem as something "trivial", and is more puzzled over Byleth being subsequently hired by Rhea as a professor, implying the latter development was not part of the plan. What makes the Flame Emperor's words suspect is that, when exploring Abyss in Chapter 3, a survivor of Kostas' gang chimes on the idea that his boss was tricked into getting himself killed.
    • After Byleth is hired by Rhea as a professor, Caspar early on mentions in the Monastery the Church had previously had their eyes on a teacher that was scared off by Kostas' attack, and that everyone expected Jeritza would've been made the Officers Academy's third professor instead before Byleth came into the picture. Considering Jeritza is later revealed to be both the Death Knight and working for the Flame Emperor, this also proposes an alternative (or second) motive for the attack; ensuring Jeritza is made into a professor to further his boss's goals within.
    • Finally, while exploring the monastery in Chapter 8, Ferdinand ponders if the House Leaders meeting Jeralt's Mercenaries back in the prologue was truly a stroke of luck, and if one of them happened to know there were mercenaries nearby when Kostas attacked. Given the story by that point is toying with the possibility Byleth's chosen House Leader might be the Flame Emperor, this proposes Kostas' assasination attack could've been set up to fail by having his boss' true identity lure him towards Jeralt's Mercenaries. Due to the Flame Emperor turning out to be a House Leader, this possibility, while never confirmed, cannot be debunked either.
  • Several of the claims made in Edelgard's war speech from default routes claims about the Church run off of ambiguity as the game doesn't confirm or deny her statements.
    • The biggest one is how much control the Church has over Fódlan, and whether or not Rhea can be called its true ruler. There is much evidence supporting and contradicting this claim, but Rhea herself never confirms nor denies it.
    • Another is that the church is hoarding wealth for itself. On one hand, the Church would naturally have some amount of treasure or wealth stored up from centuries of activity, and they obviously have the funds to pay for soldiers, teachers, and for basic needs, especially since — as shown with Leonie — many students had to pay to get in. Near the graveyard is a room that an NPC outside mentions is the treasury, containing several different weapons and armaments, so the Church logically would have some amount of hidden wealth stored away, which is supported by Pallardó in non-Crimson Flower routes, where he and his bandits have items and money taken from the ruined monastery. And in Three Hopes, it's mentioned the Central Church does tax the nations where it has strong influence. On the other hand, the NPC who mentions the treasury specifically clarifies it's only filled with weapons (the NPC could be lying, of course, but there's no evidence to say otherwise), the Church accepts donations (which was how some students like Dorothea got in), and rarely is money or wealth ever brought up by any of the staff. It's possible the Church does have a hidden stash of wealth that they hoarded for usage that was plundered by the empire and thieves (the NPC by the treasury notes they wouldn't store the truly valuable items in a building out in the open, even one under guard). Then there's the actual logistics of supplying, feeding, and sustaining both a clergy and a academy to train warriors, something that by its very nature would not be cheap, but the game doesn't go much into this claim beyond the statements made.
  • On the Azure Moon route, a retainer reveals later on that Dimitri's stepmother Patricia may have survived the Tragedy of Duscur, and speculates they may even have had a hand in instigating it. Whether this is true is uncertain, and if it were true, it's also left ambiguous whether Patricia was fully herself at the time and was motivated by a desire to leave to the Empire and see Edelgard again or if she had been killed and replaced by one of those who slither in the dark by that point, like her brother Arundel, though thanks to this reveal, a prior conversation between Rodrigue and Gilbert about the Tragedy retroactively suggests Patricia was most likely herself back then, as otherwise, an Agarthan impersonator would've likely tried to take advantage of her daughter's position as Emperor in the present. Regardless, the plot point is never brought up again on this or any other route.
• Anachronism Stew: In Silver Snow and Verdant Wind, after you finish off the Adrestian Empire, Byleth’s company receives a letter enclosed with the location of Those Who Slither in the Dark’s base posthumously from Hubert, and they march for it in the following chapter. Once Byleth and co. arrive at Shambala, they are greeted with a tron line-ridden ultra-futuristic stronghold with electric turrets and Humongous Mecha... defended by Agarthan soldiers with the same medieval armor and weaponry seen all game. Not to mention their pegasi, wyverns, and treasure chests.
• Ancestral Weapon:
  • The Heroes' Relics, weapons wielded by the Ten Elites during the conflict against Nemesis in the distant past. The weapons were passed down to their descendants, though only descendants bearing Crests can wield them safely; otherwise, the person wielding it is harmed or even turned into a monster. Each of the main lords gains one during the story, as do a few of the other characters.
  • The Sacred Weapons, weapons wielded by the Four Saints during the same conflict. Most of these weapons were kept fittingly in the possession of the Church, but several characters do get possession of them, including their original wielders. Interestingly, some of these weapons are linked to several members of the Ten Elites, though given the truth of the relationship between the Elites and the Saints, it's more likely these particular Sacred Weapons were actually owned by the Children of the Goddess who said Elites took the power of.
• Ancient Conspiracy: In the Verdant Wind route, it's revealed that those who slither in the dark have existed since ancient times (before the creation of the Adrestian Empire, the Holy Kingdom of Faerghus and the Leicester Alliance) and were responsible for the War of Heroes by leading Nemesis into the Holy Tomb to harvest Sothis' body, which gave him the power to slaughter the dragons residing in Zanado for the purpose of becoming even more powerful by bestowing his allies dragon blood and carved weapons, kickstarting Seiros' quest for revenge. One of the books in the Abyss Library also opens the possibility the group's current actions in Fódlan is merely one of their many attempts over the years at purging the surviving dragons and conquering the whole world for themselves.
• Ancient Evil:
  • Nemesis, the 'King of Liberation', is the legendary fallen figure Seiros fought and defeated with the help of the Adrestian Empire and Four Saints 1,000 years ago, and his death let Seiros create Fódlan as we know today. The truth behind the matter is however, unknown to almost everyone.
  • And above that is the true Big Bad of the setting, those who slither in the dark, aka the descendants of the ancient civilization Agartha. They're perhaps Fódlan's very first civilization, the reason why Fódlan has always been embroiled in struggle and war, and The Man Behind the Man the masterminds behind Nemesis' actions.
• And I'm the Queen of Sheba: In Claude and Ingrid's C support, when Claude claims to get up at sunrise every day to meditate, Ingrid responds, "Uh-huh, sure. And I've decided to quit my pursuit of knighthood."
• And I Must Scream: It’s implied that this happens to those who are transformed into Demonic Beasts by Crest Stones or misuse of Heroes' Relics. The process is incredibly painful and the transformation is said to be akin to being swallowed whole by the Crest Stone. With the exception of a select few, after being transformed, people lose their ability to speak, and all they can do is make inhuman screams. Furthermore, it’s implied that their human bodies are essentially trapped underneath the flesh of their beastly state, as whenever a Demonic Beast is killed, their monstrous form dissipates into ashes, leaving nothing but their human corpse. It's also shown in Marianne’s paralogue that those who are transformed into Demonic Beasts can end up wandering the world for over a thousand years trapped in their monstrous state.
• …And That Little Girl Was Me: In Claude and Marianne's support chain, Marianne explains her low self-esteem and neuroticism by alluding to burdens she's had to bear since she was born. Claude responds by telling a story about a boy who was also born with burdens: his mother and father were from different nations whose people hated each other, and thus, no matter where he was, he was looked down upon. Claude doesn't outright tell Marianne that the story is about himself, but he tries to drop hints during the rest of the A support that he's the boy in the story.
• And Your Reward Is Clothes: One of the things unlocked in New Game Plus is alternate costumes/appearances for the three house leaders. Part of the Downloadable Content is also clothing: a Non-Uniform Uniform for Byleth and loungewear for all the students.
• Animal Lover: Marianne talks to squirrels and birds, and is good at riding. She also fits the "better with animals than people" stereotype because hardly anyone in her class knows what she sounds like.
• Anti-Frustration Features:
  • Divine Pulse allows the player to rewind actions up to three times per battle (and it's possible to increase this up to 13), even in the middle of the enemy phase, letting the player fix mistakes without starting the whole map over. This doesn't change the RNG, so you need to perform different actions; it can't be used to rewind an unfortunate Critical Hit and hope for a different result. In addition, it automatically triggers if you enter a Game Over state while you have charges left (for example, if Byleth or the main lord bites it, or if you fail the mission objective).
  • Almost all of the social sim, time management, and character customization can be opted out of. Skipping ahead on the calendar will automate these aspects, and will spit out reasonably usable unit builds in the process provided you set your characters' goals at some point.
  • The marketplace is fully available from the battle preparation screen, so there's no need to withdraw through several loading screens because you forgot something. The marketplace is also available from the calendar menu, thus preventing the need to waste a free day Exploring just to access the basic shops. The market always restocks its weapons at the start of the month as well.
  • Quests, Lost Items, random items, and conversations found by exploring during free time update monthly, so the player isn't missing anything by using Sundays on other activities provided they Explore once a month.
  • Battalions cost a hefty price to hire, but they are generally very cheap to refill. This allows the player to refill their Battalions frequently if they desire.
  • After the timeskip, all of the gear your units were wearing pre-timeskip will be repaired to full durability, including all of your expensive-to-repair Relic weapons. On Normal mode, all of your units that are below level 20 will be boosted up to 20, though this does not occur on Hard mode.
  • On the Azure Moon route, because of Dimitri's shattered mental state, he cannot participate in any Monastery activities, cannot participate in lectures, be taken to Tea Time, take Certification Exams, and no new Support conversations can be had up until the player reaches Chapter 18. There are plenty of countermeasures to mitigate the fallout of all of this, thankfully: Dimitri can still gain support points in battle, he can be freely reclassed to any Classes he's mastered prior to the timeskip (complete with getting his Great Lord promotion in Chapter 15), he can be deployed for Paralogue missions and Auxiliary battles, and he naturally still gains weapon experience through combat. All of these can effectively prevent him from falling behind.
  • If you're playing on Normal Mode, one repeatable Auxiliary battle costs no activity points each week, allowing for as much grinding as you like. You can't take promotion exams between battles, though, so use those wisely.
  • After using Divine Pulse, level-up gains aren't re-rolled, meaning that the soft reset of winding back time after a mistake won't come at the cost of a good level-up. (Though conversely, it also means you can't just keep resetting until a bad level-up turns good either.)
  • Each class has minimum stats to start with. If you have a character whose stats are poorer than the minimum stats for a class, upon taking that class, their stats will permanently be upgraded to that minimum. For an example, if you had particularly bad luck with Lysithea's level-ups and her Defense is about 6 when you upgrade her into a Warlock, she will automatically gain 6 points to Defense upon classing into Warlock, as Warlock has 12 Defense minimum.
  • While characters do need to invest in the proficiency that the class uses, they don't need to have them at the exact grade; all that the grade requirement does is make the chance of passing the exam certain. As such, as long as a character is within striking distance, they can still take the exam and have a chance to pass, even if it's less than 50%.
  • New Game Plus carries plenty of these. Among them, you're able to adjust Byleth's supports (to recruit your favourite characters you've invested time into easily on other routes), retain your professor level, retain class mastery and skill points, and will show you the skill ranks you need from the start, so you can more easily plan your character progression.
  • During the Red Wolf Moon ball before the timeskip, you can have a scene at the Goddess Tower with one of your possible romantic supports, using the one with the highest support level reached. If you have multiple possibilities, however, it's randomized amongst them. However, you can speak to the Gatekeeper on any free day that month and be given the option to choose who you want to appear at the tower on the night of the ball.
  • After the timeskip, Faculty Training is replaced with Advanced Drills, allowing you to learn from any unit with a higher skill level than you. This means you can't increase your skill if you don't have anyone stronger than you; however, the professors and knights can always train you in their specialized skills no matter how high your skill is, ensuring that you'll always be able to improve.
  • Enemy attack ranges will automatically update after you move but before you hit the "wait" button, allowing you to check to make sure you aren't exposing someone squishy to unwanted danger before you commit.
  • Flayn deserts you and Seteth won't join if you decide to betray the Church to join Edelgard. To offset that, their Paralogue's rewards are not exclusively tied to their own Crests, ensuring that you will be able to use them, and without any drop in utility, as any unit in the game — including Linhardt and Ferdinand, the other two characters who have matching crests that enhance their effects — can use it.
  • When you view a support between two characters, the support log automatically records the support for all the routes you've played as well as options to view the support before or after the Time Skip if applicable. This means you don't have to farm every possible support for every character.
  • Right after Byleth first becomes a professor at Garreg Mach, you're immediately thrown into a mock battle against both of the houses you didn't choose. That may seem like too difficult a mission for the beginning of the story, but to make it easier, the other house leaders are scripted to make some unwise tactical decisions during this battle (like sending long-range fighters like Ashe or Dorothea to the front lines, or having a heavy hitter like Hilda start from behind a barricade).
  • Despite the fact that it makes no sense, you can still lockpick all the sliding doors in Shambhala using door keys and lockpicks. On the same stage, they will also drop a lot of door keys.
  • When you have to open a lot of doors or a lot of chests are on the stage, a lot of enemies will drop chest keys and door keys.
  • If a temporary ally (such as a guest for a Part I paralogue or someone you grabbed for mission assistance) kills an enemy with an item drop, the item is automatically sent to the convoy.
  • The first post-timeskip chapter of all routes other than Crimson Flower immediately drops the player into a battle featuring only Byleth and their house leader going up against the bandits that have taken over the ruins of Garreg Mach, without the ability to use the rest of the player's students until midway through the battle when they charge in together. Unless the player decided to invest in Faith skills for Byleth (as the other available character will come in a class that can't use magic), the player will be without a dedicated healer. Fortunately, almost all of the enemies that are close to the player's spawn location are not only weak but also drop Concoctions, healing items that heal 20 HP for three uses, after they are defeated.
  • Enemy commanders cannot be killed by NPC allies, meaning you don't have to worry about the level finishing on its own until you have accomplished everything you want.
  • Byleth, Cyril, Flayn, and the twenty-eight student characters (counting the Ashen Wolves) have their level-ups rigged to ensure they get at least two stats per level, meaning they are less likely to fall off. This is especially helpful for Byleth, Edelgard, Dimitri, and Claude, as Byleth is force-deployed on every story and paralogue mission, the chosen lord is required for most maps, and either one dying is a Game Over.
  • If you’re a Black Eagle, you can’t recruit Hilda before Chapter 12, past the point where nearly all Part I paralogues have their completion deadline. Fortunately, the paralogue that requires Hilda's presence is the only one that has its deadline extend past Chapter 11 and into Part II.
  • Most of the content from the Cindered Shadows DLC only requires beating the fairly straightforward first chapter of the sidestory to unlock it in the main game, so you're only required to clear the rest of the fairly difficult DLC story for the more specific and powerful rewards.
  • After reaching a certain point in their respective routes, Edelgard, Hubert, Dimitri and Claude are automatically equipped with their personal C-Rank battalions at the start of the chapter. Should the character have a lower authority rank needed to use it by that point, the game will automatically raise it up to C to ensure they will be always compatible with it.
  • In the Crimson Flower route, the Armory, Vendor, and Battalion Guild get their stock updated one last time in Chapter 12 rather than Chapter 14 like in Silver Snow, Azure Moon and Verdant Wind, likely to account for the fact the route's less lengthier than the others.
  • Crimson Flower is the shortest Part II route at only six chapters and those six are the only ones where Jeritza is playable. To compensate for their Late Character Syndrome, they come equipped with the Mastermind skill (Lysithea's exclusive personal skill), which doubles skill experience so they can catch up in weapons and classes.
• Anti-Magic: The uncommon Altered Demonic Beasts and Altered Golems are one of the few monsters that have access to barries which shield them from magic attacks, and the only way to get around this is by having non-magic units destroy their barries to give spellcasters a fighting chance against them.
• Anyone Can Die: Once Part II begins, any character not recruited before the timeskip that shows up as an enemy can potentially die, with the exceptions of Petra, Hubert, Hilda, and Dedue on non-Crimson Flower routes, who will retreat if defeated only to reappear later in the story as an enemy once again or as an ally NPC.
• Arbitrary Headcount Limit: You are limited to between 10 and 12 units on the field, depending on the mission, and some may have an even lower limit. However, up to 3 of those who aren't deployed can accompany deployed units as adjutants and earn experience and support points.
• Arc Words: In Verdant Wind, after the timeskip, Claude frequently refers to the future he wants to build as "Fódlan's New Dawn". This is also the title of the last chapter.
• Artifact Alias: It's common for many characters to refer to Solon, Kronya and/or both by the identity of the people they impersonated, even after both have been dealt with long ago.
• Artificial Atmospheric Actions: In order to make the monastery seem more alive (especially in Part I), random unnamed NPCs will walk around the monastery. However, the player is able to get into their path and block them, causing them to get stuck - making things seem very artificial. Byleth doesn't even need to do this - sometimes NPCs might even get stuck trying to walk through each other.
• Artificial Stupidity:
  • Annette and Gilbert's paralogue features several enemies that will only target Annette. If your units block access to Annette, the enemies will get as close as they can to her but won't try to kill anyone standing between them. Because of their short range, they can become target practice for anyone with ranged attacks.
  • Invoked in the mock battle in the second mandatory fight in the game — the opponents will make very bad decisions, from a single unit charging into your entire force alone, to fragile ranged-attacking characters running unguarded into melee. Averted during the second Mêlée à Trois battle, where they will make much smarter decisions - which actually makes a lot of sense thinking about it.
  • The base game battle AI seems to struggle with the DLC Chalice of Beginnings, which allows the holder to counter attack at any range and can be acquired once you've beaten the Cindered Shadows DLC. (Including as soon as you reach Garegg Mach on a New Game+.) Enemy mages and archers will set up out of counter range (two squares away or on a diagonal square) of a Chalice-holding melee fighter before attacking, not taking into account that they can be countered as they are killed again and again.
• Art Shift: In contrast to the rest of the game's artstyle, the murals seen at the beginning of each month and after clearing each route are drawn in a very old western-like style◊ which wouldn't look out of place in a Renaissance museum.
• Awesome, but Impractical:
  • Petra's personal skill significantly increases her critical hit rate against enemies with less than half health. This is a powerful benefit, but in many cases, you're likely to kill any enemy that's weakened this much with a normal attack (with the exception of monsters, and there are special ways to inflict bonus damage on them).
  • Astra, the combat art gained by mastering the Swordmaster class. While it hits five times, each hit is very weak, which generally doesn't justify spending the extra durability to use it. By comparison, the Fates version of Astra was, though a random trigger, only reduced all hits to half damage and still enabled crits for each of them, which made it especially devastating in Ryoma's hands.
  • The Crest of Blaiddyd (Dimitri's Crest) doubles the Might of Combat Arts when triggered. However, it also doubles the durability cost of said Combat Arts, making you burn through Dimitri's weapons that much faster. This is particularly a problem in the late-game, when Dimitri will usually be wielding pricier, lower-durability weapons.
  • The "Defiant" abilities significantly buff one stat when the unit is below 25% of their health. The stat boost is nice, but not only is it difficult to get down that low without your unit being killed, but staying that low can be dangerous.
  • Recruiting all the students on a file without New Game Plus benefits. While this gives you a wide variety of characters to use, it's also immensely difficult to actually accomplish without Save Scumming, it can lead to experience being spread too thin if you try to use all the students, and it can result in Byleth's own growth being stunted as they spend most of Part I as a Master of None.
  • The rare Crescent Sickle lance has immense durability (especially if forged) and decent accuracy, but is heavier than even the Steel Lance. The forging material is also rare, only being obtainable by breaking the armor of the Crawlers and Titanus. That being said, their durability makes them great for Combat Arts.
  • Most of the Relic-related combat arts, with the exceptions of the Crusher's Dust and Aymr's Raging Storm. The Lance of Ruin's Ruined Sky and Areadbhar's Atrocity especially stick out; Sylvain can use Swift Strikes with any lance for more damage overall (including with the Lance of Ruin!), and Dimitri's great Strength means that Areadbhar will do more than enough damage with normal attacks, not to mention his Crest means he can very well break the weapon.
  • The Sacred Weapons. Unlike the Heroes' Relics, which are essentially more powerful regular weapons with Unique Combat Arts, these Relics have abilities of more unique weapons, possessing a Renewal effect along with the abilities of weapons like the Horseslayer, Brave Bow or the Hammers respectively, and unlike the Hero's Relics they can be used by anyone, with corresponding Crests only increasing the healing effects they have. However, the material needed to repair them, Mythril, is quite possibly the rarest material in the game along with Agarthium and, when combined with forging the Rusted legendary weapons which cost 10 to Forge and Repair, have very limited uses, especially in comparison to Heroes' Relics that require the comparatively less rare Umbral Steel. This gets alleviated slightly with the third DLC where feeding the animals around the Monastery can get you forging materials, including Mythril, but it can still be an issue. Not helping is that the Sacred Weapons barely have more durability than the Heroes' Relics (most have 30 uses, whereas the Relics that aren't Thunderbrand and the Vajra-Mushti^NoteThey have 30 uses due to having Brave Weapon/Gauntlet properties have 20), and whereas the Relics are all E-ranked weapons and can have their negative effects counteracted against^NoteUnits with Crests can still use Relics whose Crests don't match theirs, and on an NG+, you can give a Dragon Sign item to Crestless units in order to cancel the damaging effect., all of the Sacred Weapons require A-rank at base.
  • The Rusted Legendary weapons. Like the Heroes' Relics, they are more powerful than the base weapons and have insane benefits, such as Parthia's low weight and Hauteclere's unusually high hit rate. That being said, forging them from their rusted forms costs 10 Mythril and another 10 to repair them, meaning that if you were to somehow get your hands on all of them, you would need over 40 mythril. Needless to say, this often subjects them to Too Awesome to Use.
  • The Bolting spell, an artillery spell that can hit from 10 spaces away and do severe damage from almost certain safety. However, all three units who can learn this spell have some major drawback making it difficult for them to take advantage of it; Manuela has a bane in Reason, Hilda is a Magically Inept Fighter who favors physical classes like Warrior and Wyvern Lord, and Constance is paid DLC.
  • Desperation, the mastery skill of the Cavalier. While being able to strike twice before your opponent can retaliate does sound useful, it unfortunately forces the Unit to become a Glass Cannon; like Vantage and Wrath, the unit needs to be at half HP or under for it to activate, but unlike them, it only activates when the unit is attacking. This means that to use it consistently each turn, you would need to have your units rely on their dodging ability to survive, which can be difficult for Cavalier units due to the speed penalty and -10 to their Speed Growth. The only natural Cavalier who it can potentially work for is Ingrid, and that's provided that you also put her through a speed-based class-line like Pegasus Knight and give her skills and stats to help her Evasion.

B

• Back from the Brink: Played straight on non-Crimson Flower routes. Byleth awakens from their coma to discover that the Kingdom has been reduced to a puppet state, only a couple of stray Kingdom nobles are continuing to put up a fight, and Dimitri has gone completely Ax-Crazy and is in no fit condition to lead a resistance by himself. The Alliance is only slightly better off, as Claude is only barely able to maintain a façade of neutrality and keep the country together due to civil strife between the pro-Imperial and pro-Church factions. The Knights of Seiros have been scattered to the four winds in a forlorn effort to find Byleth and Rhea. It's up to Byleth to turn things around, defeat the Empire, and stop Edelgard.
• Background Music Override:
  • Chapter 12's story map greets you not with the normal battle preparation music, but the truly tense and bombastic map theme, "Roar of Dominion." The Cindered Shadows DLC map uses the same song in Chapter 6.
  • Azure Moon's final chapter uses the same theme used in the final battle, "Apex of the World", for the preparation music, rather than the tense-yet-encouraging song "A Vow Remembered", which is used in the other routes for this purpose.
• Backstab Backfire: On the Azure Moon route, after Edelgard's defeat, when Dimitri tries to reconcile with her, she throws the dagger he had given her at his shoulder and is met with the end of his spear; it is implied she did this not as an attempt to kill him but to force him to kill her, as she believed there was no turning back from the path she had chosen.
• Badass Boast: Nemesis' battle theme God-Shattering Star is written in a Conlang, but the Japanese and English translations of the lyrics provided by Intelligent Studios has him shout to his allies, motivate them for a battle to come, and then loudly proclaim that he is the titular God-Shattering Star.
• Badass Cape: The house leaders, Edelgard, Dimitri, Claude, and Yuri, all bear a cape bearing their house's respective color.
• Bad "Bad Acting": In their B-support interaction, Claude and Ingrid challenge each other to be more pleasant — less slovenly on Claude's end and more cheerful on Ingrid's end. What plays out in their next interaction is a forced, painfully polite conversation between the two. Claude is first to drop the act when Ingrid runs out of lines.
• Bad Luck Mitigation Mechanic: Each class has stat minimums which, upon promoting, a unit will automatically be brought up to. This way, any areas that are deficient due to poor growths upon leveling up will get an automatic boost.
• Badass in a Nice Suit: The Expansion Pass gives male characters servants attire with them wearing suits, both regular and custom-made.
• Bad with the Bone: The Hero's Relics, including the Sword of the Creator, have a bony appearance with noticeable cracks and yellowish tint. It's because they are bones made into weapons as Nemesis murdered the progenitor goddess, Sothis, and created the Sword of the Creator from her bones and heart (which are made into Crest Stones). Nemesis and the Ten Elites also did the same to many of the dragons.
• Balkanize Me: A few centuries before the events of the story the entire continent of Fodlan was ruled by the Adrestian Empire but it was unable to maintain its hold on the continent as Faerghus and Leicester ended up declaring their independence from it. However, this gets inverted by the end of the story as all routes end with Fodlan being unified once more.
• The Bard on Board: The story surrounding Dimitri heavily parallels Hamlet. Dimitri starts out as an idealistic, refined prince whose life gets upended by his king father's death. He becomes haunted by the image of his father demanding revenge, and his quest for vengeance eventually takes a toll on both his sanity and his relationships with his friends. Dimitri eventually gets exiled by an authority figure complicit in his father's death, from which he fights his way out to claim his revenge.
• Batman Gambit: Claude’s plan to defend Derdriu from the Imperial Army in Chapter 19 of Azure Moon relied entirely on not only the Kingdom Army being able to successfully retake Fhirdiad, but also that they’d receive the message he’d sent them in advance and immediately come to the Alliance’s aid. Claude outright says that he had bet on Byleth and Dimitri’s selfless natures compelling them to rush to the rescue.
• Battle Amongst the Flames: The final battle of the Crimson Flower storyline, the Battle of Fhirdiad, is fought after Rhea orders the Knights of Seiros to set fire to the city simply to slow the Adrestian advance. The Black Eagles Strike Force faces off against the remnant of Faerghus' army, the Knights of Seiros, and Rhea in her full dragon form in the burning capital.
• The Battle Didn't Count: All over the place, to the point that it'd be easier to list the cases where the trope is actually averted.
  • The Death Knight and Hubert are the biggest offenders, as they will retreat every single time the player downs their HP until their final storyline battle. It reaches some ridiculous extremes on some routes where the former can be fought a total of seven times and the latter five times (not counting the two mock battles).
  • Dimitri gets a particularly grim use of the trope when he appears as an enemy on the Verdant Wind route: after being defeated he will retreat, only to die immediately after the battle concludes anyway.
• Battle in the Rain: The Battle of the Tailtean Plains against King Dimitri and the Church forces near the end of the Crimson Flower storyline is fought in the middle of the pouring rain. It adds to the somber tone of the battle.
• The Beastmaster:
  • While their means of training them are never explained, various factions of bandits, as well as Almyrans, show they are capable of training the magically-enhanced animals collectively called "monsters", such as giant wolves and giant birds, to fight alongside them as allies. Once the war starts, Demonic Beasts fight for Adrestrian forces; however, they are not genuinely allied so much as implied to be controlled via masks they wear produced by "those who slither in the dark's" technology.
  • In some of her endings Hapi becomes this, with her commanding not just monsters but even demonic beasts in battle.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: One boss fight has the party go up against Miklan, Sylvain's brother, who has stolen the Lance of Ruin in hopes of being special and important like Sylvain is with his Crest of Gautier. Miklan does get to be important, but as a warning, as once he tries to use the Lance of Ruin without possessing the necessary Crest, he's turned into a Demonic Beast, the first such creature the player has to fight.
• Begin with a Finisher: Happens offscreen when Ferdinand and Edelgard reach a B-Support ranking and fight a duel. Ferdinand is stunned and dismayed that Edelgard defeats him almost immediately. She responds that she felt she had to use her best techniques right out the gate, because while Ferdinand was overconfident and too inexperienced to know what a real duel was like, he was also too good a fighter for her to take any chances.
• Beyond the Impossible: It's mentioned in the setting that having two Crests at the same time is considered a natural impossibility, as there are no means that can allow such a situation to happen normally due to the human body lacking the constitution required. That's why the only characters in the story who actually bear 2 crests were not born with them, but victims of "blood reconstruction surgeries" (as Edelgard calls them) performed by those who slither in the dark, which came at the cost of the lives of their families as well of their health and life expectancy.
• Big Bad Ensemble: Zig-Zagged. On one side, the story has two main antagonists who collaborate with one another despite their end goals not aligning entirely: Thales, who wants to destroy the dragons in revenge for banishing his ancestors underground over a millennium ago and conquer the world; and the Flame Emperor a.k.a. Edelgard von Hresvelg, who wants to subjugate all of Fódlan in order to bring about societal reform. On the other, there's also one more potential antagonist who opposes them both and can potentially become Byleth's foe: Rhea a.k.a. Seiros, whose leadership has stagnated Fódlan and who has done some extremely questionable things in the name of keeping the peace and resurrecting Sothis. Which one takes center stage depends on the route:
  • On the Silver Snow route, Edelgard spends most of the game as The Heavy, but Thales is ultimately the true threat who needs to be killed to restore peace to Fódlan. The final enemy is Rhea, who is driven insane by draconic degeneration; if she survives, she is redeemed and works to fix her mistakes after the war.
  • On the Azure Moon route, Dimitri rolls right over Thales in his Arundel disguise and never learns of his true role in the plot. Edelgard is the main antagonist and final boss, while Rhea is Demoted to Extra and voluntarily relinquishes power after the war.
  • On the Verdant Wind route, Edelgard spends most of the game as The Heavy, but Thales is ultimately the true threat who needs to be killed to restore peace to Fódlan; Rhea performs a Taking the Bullet to save the heroes, and her fate is left nebulous. The final enemy is Nemesis, who is resurrected by Thales' allies to destroy Fódlan as a last act of spite.
  • On the Crimson Flower route, things get switched up for once. Byleth's influence tempers Edelgard's worst traits, and Thales remains an unfortunate ally of necessity and becomes The Unfought. Rhea has a mental breakdown upon Byleth's defection and becomes the unquestioned main antagonist.
• Big Damn Heroes: If Byleth S-supports Claude, he gives her a ring at the Goddess Tower and then leaves to take care of business in his homeland. Some months later, the Imperial Army and those who slither in the dark ally and invade Derdriu, and the new kingdom of Fódlan is unable to take them on. When defeat seems imminent, Claude, now King of Almyra, enters with Almyran forces and defeats the enemies easily.
• Big First Choice: Early on, the protagonist has to decide which house they will personally teach. While the first half of the game is roughly the same for all three houses, this changes after the Time Skip where the protagonist fights for the nation their students of the chosen house are from against the other nations; choosing the Black Eagles house grants the later possibility of choosing to side with Edelgard, the Flame Emperor.
• Big, Screwed-Up Family: Many of the students, especially those from noble families, have more than a few family problems, from rivalries with their siblings over who gets to inherit the family to family members trying to marry them off for personal gain.
• Bilingual Bonus: There is writing on the walls and floor of Shambhala, which is actually Russian. Specifically, on the floor of the outskirts, next to the arrows, there is writing that says “ЗАКРЫТЫЙ ГОРОД”, which means “Secret City”. On the walls of the outskirts is yellow writing reading “СВЕТИТЬСЯ СВАЯ”, which translates to “Shining Piles”. Lastly, outside Bias’ room, there is a sign on the floor that reads “Катакомбы”, which means “Catacombs”, which seems to imply that the door in that room leads to the coffin that Nemesis was hidden in.
• Bittersweet Ending:
  • Unlike Fates, there is no Golden Ending. No matter what you do, at least one of the three lords will die and Edelgard and Dimitri die in every path except their own. Also, none of the story paths completely resolves all the lurking problems or issues. The Golden Deer and Silver Snow paths arguably come the closest to resolving most of the issues plaguing Fódlan (as they are the routes where Shambhala is located and destroyed during the game, whereas in Crimson Flower the main battles against the Agarthans happen after the game's events while in Azure Moon it's implied they get away clean), though it comes at the cost of both Edelgard and Dimitri losing their lives. Even then though, the Agarthan remnants continue to be a problem (as noted in certain character endings), and issues such as reforming Fódlan culture, the church, foreign relations, etc. all happen after the game itself ends and are noted to take years.
  • While many of the character epilogues are upbeat, others can have a more bittersweet tone:
    • Dimitri's endings are generally bittersweet. His S-support scene with a female Byleth has him express that he will likely hear the voices of the dead for the rest of his life... which may not be all that long, since some of his support partners end up outliving him (Felix, Marianne, Dedue and Flayn). On the bright side, he does manage to become a better person, and rules over Fódlan as the beloved Savior King.
    • Out of Byleth's potential S-supports, her paired ending with Claude is one of the more bittersweet ones. He decides to leave Fódlan to unite it with Almyra and Dagda into a new kingdom, though he fully intends to return and seals the promise with Byleth with a proposal ring. The epilogue reveals that the Almyran army, led by Claude, pulls a Big Damn Heroes when Fódlan is about to be defeated and the aftermath of the war brought a new age of unity, averting the trope gradually.
    • The only way to have Felix get a happy ending outside of the Blue Lions route are in his paired endings with female Byleth, Ingrid and Annette. Otherwise, guilt will weigh on him for the rest of his life, even if he can find some small happiness in a spouse, or in Mercedes or Flayn helping him realize what he's done. His ending with Sylvain outside of the Blue Lions route even goes straight into a Downer Ending.
    • Any of Lysithea's endings where she doesn't get her second crest removed have the implication that she dies young, although she does manage to accomplish quite a lot in her lifetime.
• Black Knight: The Death Knight is a strong and enigmatic knight clad in black armor with a skeleton mask that serves one of the game’s main antagonists.
• Blade Lock: Post-timeskip, when Byleth and Edelgard first meet again in Garreg Mach as enemies on the Silver Snow route, they briefly clash blades. Edelgard manages to lock her rapier (the Sword of Seiros she took from Rhea) with Byleth's Sword of the Creator, after which both aim a strike at each other's throats, stopping at the last moment.
• Blaming the Victim:
  • In Chapter 17 of Crimson Flower, if Edelgard fights Dimitri, he'll call her out for trying to invade Faerghus and killing his people and closest friends, and in response, Edelgard blames him for reconquering and killing in retaliation of her actions, as she'll sacrifice anything that gets on her way to her goal.
  • A twisted case can happen during Chapter 20/21 of Silver Snow/Verdant Wind should Seteth or Flayn fight Thales. In spite of TWSITD manipulating Nemesis into genociding the citizens of Nabatea, Thales instead blames them and their kin for banishing his people to the depths of the earth in the past.
• Blessed with Suck:
  • What having a Crest can amount to. Congratulations, you’re descended from one of the great heroes of Fódlan's past. That gives you a special ability and possibly even physical abilities beyond that of normal people! It's also all many will ever care about in regards to you; you as a person are less valuable than the Crest you carry. Expect your family to marry you off into what is likely to be a loveless marriage, especially if you happen to have a particularly valuable Crest, or for people to try to use you simply so any children you might have with them will inherit your Crest and improve their standing. The tactics noble parents will sometimes use to ensure that you will be attractive for marriage may be abusive and downright cruel, especially for women. The worst part is, even experiencing all this themselves, people with Crests will simply continue the cycle with their own children rather than work to change it because of how valued Crests are in Fódlan culture and national defense.
  • While it is possible to forcibly implant a second Crest onto someone — like Edelgard and Lysithea — the procedure has a high risk of failure, resulting in crippling madness and/or death, which is precisely what happened with all of Edelgard's siblings. Even success will leave you permanently marked with white or silver hair, and your lifespan will be dramatically reduced as a result, as long as you carry the implanted Crest. This entire state of affairs (along with some misunderstandings about how Crests came about and what role the Church plays), and the torture she and her siblings went through, is what drives Edelgard to declare war on the Church of Seiros so Fódlan can be remade into a meritocracy and the idea of Crests as a social construct can be done away with forever. This is only from an in-universe view, as units with Crests often tend to be very useful gameplay-wise.
  • The Crest of Maurice, also known as the Crest of the Beast. People who are born with such a Crest are believed to bring bad luck and turn into horrible monsters with the passing of time. It has such a bad reputation that Maurice himself was the only ally of Nemesis who did not receive an in-universe Historical Hero Upgrade.
• "Blind Idiot" Translation: Downplayed with the description of the gambit "Sacred Shield". The English script states that "Allies receive 0 damage from ranged physical attacks for the rest of the turn" after using it. This is technically erroneous as its Japanese description never mentions it affects only physical attacks, meaning it grants immunity against both ranged physical and magical attacks as well.
• Bloodier and Gorier: This is the first game in the franchise with fully animated cutscenes to have blood, such as the opening cutscene. The Final Boss of the Cindered Shadows DLC also counts, being a giant blood-leaking dragon-zombie-corpse thing.
• Blood Knight:
  • Almyra has a warrior culture that instigate small skirmishes to enjoy the thrill of fighting. Despite putting themselves in a life-or-death situation, they use the battle to honor the dead, then head back home to enjoy big feasts and party after the battle, regardless of whether they win or lose.
  • Dimitri and Felix are also fond of battle, but the two have drifted apart over this, as even Felix finds the nightmarish glee Dimitri takes in slaughtering his foes unnerving.
  • The Death Knight is entirely motivated by his desire for fighting and killing only, which occasionally harms the goals of his boss, the Flame Emperor.
• Blood Magic: The power of Crests in general is heavily tied to one's blood as it is obtained via blood transfusion from a Child of the Goddess in the first place. More specifically, the forbidden Rite of Rising introduced in Cindered Shadows is the straightest example in the game: a ritual using the Crested blood of the Four Apostles in order to bring the dead back to life, originally created in a desperate attempt to resurrect the Goddess.
• Blue Blood: The Adrestian Empire, the Holy Kingdom of Faerghus, and the Leicester Alliance host several noble families, of which several characters are heirs, and many of which are descended from the 10 Elites and Four Saints of the distant past. The Leicester Alliance goes further, being a coalition of noble families who refuse to swear fealty to any royal.
• Bodyguard Legacy: House Vestra of the Adrestrian Empire has no domain but instead serves the royal House Hresvelg as guardians and advisors, and Hubert von Vestra, retainer to Edelgard von Hresvelg, is no different. He mentions constantly having to thwart more subtle threats to his liege's life.
• Bond One-Liner: Every character has one of several lines to say after killing an enemy, usually complimenting themselves ("No one makes it past me!") or putting down their fallen enemy ("You are nothing").
• Book Ends:
  • The game's opening cutscene has Seiros defeat Nemesis, with the soldiers under her command cheering after the battle ends. The Verdant Wind route ends with Byleth and Claude killing the resurrected Nemesis and the Alliance soldiers cheering.
  • At the start of the story Byleth works as a mercenary before becoming a professor at the Officer's Academy. However, if a female Byleth marries Felix on a non-Azure Moon route her paired ending with him heavily implies that she eventually returns to her life as a mercenary together with him after abdicating her position as the queen of the United Kingdom of Fodlan.
• Boring, but Practical:
  • The fishing minigame can be quite tedious in the long run, but it is a quick and easy way to improve your professor level, since it does not reduce your activity points.
  • Training weapons lack the raw damage and crit chance of the other weapons, but they make up for it with low weapon weight, rank, cost, and having the highest durability (50, 65 if upgraded) of any weapon type, plus they can be upgraded easily to increase their damage and hit chance. Giving your army upgraded Training weapons can be a valid strategy when strapped for cash, and it's easy to find them. The only real downside they have is their low attack means you have to rely on your unit's raw stats to compensate, but as enemies become harder to hit, the training weapons remain viable for just about the entire game. In particular, giving Unskilled, but Strong characters like Dedue, Raphael, and Caspar upgraded Training weapons can allow them to hit better, making them more useful than something like a Steel ranked weapon.
  • Near end-game, Iron weapons become this, replacing Training weapons. Iron weapons are easy to get, easy to upgrade, and they have better stats than Training weapons, but have lower weight and solid durability. Due to their better damage than Training weapons, Iron weapons can easily become standard equipment at the end.
  • The Unarmed Combat skill. By mastering the Brawler class, male units can gain the ability to fight with their bare fists in any class that allows them to brawl. Although it only has a passable hit rate and a Might of zero, it’s the only means of attacking in the whole game that can never break or run out, and characters with high Strength to begin with can use it to batter down enemies while saving on weapon durability. Female characters can also use Unarmed Combat, but only if they are of the DLC-only War Cleric class.
  • The stat-boosting skills and movement-related combat arts learned by mastering beginner classes. The stat boosts are always on, and the arts allow a unit's movement to be artificially extended. While Death/Fiendish Blow provide large boosts on player phase, Strength/Magic +2 is active on both phases.
  • Ignatz's personal skill, Watchful Eye, provides a flat +20 to his hit rate at all times. While his attack power is low, he can consistently land attacks even from a long distance with bows, and land Break Shot (and possibly Seal Strength) from a safe distance. It can also save you the trouble of trying to master the Archer class for him since he technically already has the mastery skill, allowing you to focus mastering other classes like Dark Mage for Poison Strike to make up for his low damage and add to his utility role or Thief for Steal to take advantage of his high speed growth. And if you decide to have him master Archer anyway and get Hit+20, having it equipped means that he'll almost never miss a shot.
  • In the early game, especially on Maddening, Sylvain and Leonie's personal skills, Philanderer and Rivalry, respectively. For simply standing next to a character of the opposite sex, both characters will deal 2 more damage and take 2 less damage from enemy attacks. And yes, they can trigger their personal skills by standing next to each other.
  • Hubert and Ingrid's personal skills give flat bonuses to gambits.^note +5 damage for Hubert, +3 damage and +5 hit for Ingrid. This lessens the need for Authority skills on them, allowing them to equip another skill instead, such as Fiendish or Death Blow, respectively.
  • Linhardt lacks Mercedes' area-of-effect heal in Fortify and Marianne's offensive potential. However, he has slightly more bulk and is the only one to get Warp, thus ensuring he has something to do on every turn. He's also the only healer in the game who can actually make decent use of Miracle due to having an above-average Luck growth, whereas the other healer's Luck growths are generally pretty low, making this a rather pointless skill for them.
  • Ferdinand's personal skill, Confidence, bestows a flat +15 to his Hit and Avoid if he's at full HP. While it may not be flashy, it can make him an excellent distraction unit by luring in enemies via his somewhat lower Defense. The additional accuracy also helps with more evasive enemies.
  • In some cases, settling for Advanced Classes can be more pragmatic than trying to get a Unit to a Master Class. While often having useful skills and higher Growth increases than Advanced Classes, a lot of the Master Classes are either Awesome, but Impractical, take a lot of work to reach, especially when Units lack the Skill strengths to fit into them naturally, or achieving the mastery skill can sometimes be outright impossible, especially on the significantly shorter Black Eagles route. Whereas having a Unit aim for an Advanced Class is not only less of a hassle and provides less pressure on getting your Units to increase their ranks, but not having to worry about Master Classes for a Unit allows for greater ease in experimenting with them and getting them skills from other classes. A prime example of this would be Felix who, while certainly capable of becoming a Mortal Savant thanks for his natural strength in Swords and Budding Talent in Reason, may not pay off very well since he possesses a low magic Growth and Reason initially starts as a weakness of his, meaning that he only gets two spells from levelling it up^note  Thunder and Thoron, and the Mortal Savant's -10% to a Unit's Speed Growth doesn't mesh well with Felix's Glass Cannon playstyle. Having him aim for Swordmaster on the other hand means that you can focus entirely on his Strength and Speed without having to worry about increasing his Magic, and he can spend some time in other classes to give him useful skills to improve upon his physical playstyle, such as Archer for Hit+20 to ensure his attacks land, or Grappler for Tomebreaker to make him an effective Mage Killer.
  • The basic Heal spell is learned at Faith E+ for all characters. While dedicated healers will later get the ranged healing spell Physic, allowing them to heal allies while staying back from the action, it's worthwhile to get all of your magic users to E+ Faith to pick up Heal since any magic class can use any spells they know, even if they are classed into something favoring Reason for Black and/or Dark magic. It can be a literal lifesaver to have a few emergency healers nearby the "front lines", all for raising Faith by one skill level.
  • While it can be tempting to upgrade your units class to the Basic ones as soon as they hit level five, mastering the starting class of Noble/Commoner first gives a flat +5 HP ability which can literally be the difference between life and death for them. While its effectiveness fades as you get deeper into the game where other means of protecting them become more readily available, it still takes quite a while before most units learn five other, clearly better abilities to replace it with.
• Boss-Altering Consequence:
  • By default, any character recruited during Part I who happens to be a mandatory boss in Part II - namely: Ferdinand in Azure Moon/Verdant Wind; Caspar and Linhardt in Verdant Wind (if certain conditions are met); and Shamir, Alois, Felix, Ingrid, Sylvain, & Mercedes in Crimson Flower - is replaced with a generic enemy general which, while boasting a similar skillset and weapons, is overall weaker and more manageable than the original deal.
  • In non-Crimson Flower routes, completing the paralogue "The Face Beneath" while achieving its side objective (having Caspar defeat the Death Knight) will make the latter gift his weapon to the party, and will from then on use a Brave Lance for subsequent fight(s).
  • Two notable examples from Crimson Flower:
    • Completing the paralogue "An Ocean View" in Part I will make Seteth and Flayn unable to use the Spear of Assal and Caduceus Staff in their future fights, and will instead use a Silver Lance and a Magic Staff respectively.
    • During Crimson Flower Chapter 17's battle, Dedue will transform himself into a Giant Demonic Beast after a set number of turns pass, or if the player ends their turn within his attack range. With clever use of movement-boosting skills and Gambits, you can bring a unit close enough to kill him without triggering his transformation.
• Boss Bonanza:
  • Verdant Wind's final battle features Nemesis himself along with the 10 Elites. As the latter provide massive boosts to the former's stats as long they're on the map, this means they have need to be dealt with first if the player wants Nemesis to be defeated through conventional means.
  • Crimson Flower's lategame (save for the final chapter, ironically enough) is this in spades, as all the enemy generals featured in the maps have to be defeated to end the respective chapters. In Chapter 15, the player is forced to fight Seteth, Flayn, and Alois & Shamir if they weren't recruited. Chapter 16 has Rodrigue, Gwendal, Cornelia and Felix & Ingrid if not recruited. Lastly, Chapter 17 has Dimitri, Dedue, Rhea and non-recruited Sylvain & Mercedes.
• Boss in Mook Clothing:
  • Once the routes diverge, if you've managed to poach a character that should appear as an enemy, they'll be replaced by a generic enemy with an equivalent loadout. For instance, if you recruit Shamir and/or Alois before siding with Edelgard, they'll be replaced by a generic Sniper and Warrior during the defense of Garreg Mach. In particular, not-Shamir retains her blatantly illegal skill combination which gives her ridiculous range. There are two signs that a Mook is a replacement. Firstly, their name states that they’re a general instead of a soldier, and secondly, they often have the commander's medal next to their health bar.
  • The final map of Silver Snow route has multiple of them. Beyond their slightly higher stats, Brave weapons and strong spells, General and Miracle skills, plus being called Frenzied Church Leader/Rampaging Cardinal, there isn't much differentiating them from common mooks at first glance.
  • Myson is a named enemy using a generic male Warlock model and portrait, encountered at the end of the Azure Moon route. He packs Bohr Χ, the strongest Dark magic spell which instantly brings the HP of anyone it hits to one, from 3 to 10 range. Not only is he protected by a few Demonic Beasts (and is shielded by a Fortress Knight in Maddening difficulty), the final boss is also chucking fireballs from across the map to easily finish you off.
• Boss-Only Level: The final chapter of "Cindered Shadows" is this, since it consists of Byleth, the Ashen Wolves, and the other students fighting in a small arena (the monastery's cathedral) against the Umbral Beast and the Phantoms it summons.
• Boss Remix: The Final Bosses of the Azure Moon and Crimson Flower routes, Hegemon Edelgard and the Immaculate One, are fought to the tune of "Apex of the World", a dramatic instrumental remix of the game's main them "The Edge of Dawn".
• Bothering by the Book: If Bernadetta and Ferdinand get a paired ending, it becomes this trope: by marrying Ferdinand, Bernadetta is technically choosing the path her father wanted, as Ferdinand is the same powerful noble her father was going to arrange a marriage to. But first, Bernadetta renounces her claim to House Varley, so now her father doesn't get any additional status or wealth out of it.
• Bowdlerise:
  • In Ingrid's and Sylvain's C-Support, Ingrid mentions how Sylvain once flirted with her grandmother, and later on, with a scarecrow. In Japanese, Sylvain flirted not with a scarecrow, but with a boy who was disguised as a girl for a performance, which was changed likely to avoid coming across as insensitive.
  • Turned on its head in the Black Eagles Route, at least if you're playing Female Byleth. At some point, Dorothea wonders if someone will make the story into an opera, and if so, whether Edelgard or Byleth will be played by the current Diva. In the translation, however, Dorothea wonders whether Byleth and Edelgard will have a secret love affair…
• Bragging Rights Reward: Learning the "_faire" abilities outside of their respective Advanced and Master classes and Offensive Tactics for Authority. All of them require achieving an S+ Skill Level in their respective categories, a feat which is nearly impossible on files without either a New Game Plus head start or way more than enough grinding to snap the game's difficulty and all of its enemies cleanly in two. By the time you do learn those abilities for the latter, you're likely to be at or near the end of the game and odds are that the bonuses they provide will mostly be both unnecessary and redundant, as almost every single Advanced and Master class has a built-in "-faire" Ability from the get-go. Offensive Tactics is the only unique Abilities out of the bunch, but even then, the Might +5 and Hit + 20 makes it far from worth the trouble.
• Brainwashed and Crazy:
  • Late into Part 1, Solon from "those who slither in the dark" spreads a plague/dark spell in Remire Village that by the end of Chapter 8, drives many of its villagers into a killing frenzy. His comments about the whole ordeal make abundantly clear that this was the sorcery's intended outcome.
  • On the Silver Snow route, when Rhea suddenly turns into her Immaculate One form and begins a mindless rampage, the high ranking members of the church who happen to bear her blood end up becoming crazy as well, with the ones with the highest amount of blood even transforming into White Beasts.
• Breakable Weapons: Returns after being missing in Fates and Shadows of Valentia, with a similar system to the one in Genealogy of the Holy War. Instead of being gone for good, broken weapons are a detriment to the user due to their weakened state. However, weapons can be repaired at the forge. Weapon durability extends to those in enemy hands as well, which can help with grinding Support Bond points: tank an enemy with a strong character enough times to break their weapon, then have someone weaker tank the enemy while standing next to the people you want to bond with. Combat Arts give access to more damaging attacks with special perks, at the cost of damaging the weapon as much as several normal attacks.
• Breather Episode:
  • The ball during the Red Wolf Moon is smack-dab between "Tomas" revealing himself to be a villain by forcing villagers to slaughter each other and burning down the town in the process and "Monica" stabbing Jeralt.
  • Following Flayn's abduction, Chapter 7 focuses primarily on the Battle of the Eagle and the Lion, and even features a fishing tournament. In many ways, it serves as the last moment of respite, as each of the following chapters features some sort of Wham Episode ^note the aforementioned Tomas reveal, Jeralt's death, Sothis merging with Byleth, Edelgard being revealed as the Flame Emperor, and the Empire's assault on the monastery leading into the Time Skip.
• Brick Joke: On the first Harpstring Moon of the game, talking to Dorothea over by Bernadetta's dorm will reveal that she lost a pale blue cloth somewhere (and that it's part of her underwear). In the training grounds a little ways from there, chatting with Caspar will have him mention that he happened to find a cloth, which he used to... wipe off his sweat. If the two students are talked to in that order, Byleth's response is a single ellipsis.
• Broad Strokes: Per Word of God, the events that take place in the Cindered Shadows DLC story do happen in the main canon but with the difference they take place prior to Byleth's arrival in Garreg Mach. NPC dialogue from Abyss also suggests Aelfric's scheme didn't get far enough in the core narrative before Rhea caught wind of it, resulting in him getting kicked out of the Church before the start of the game's events.
• Broken Pedestal:
  • The Verdant Wind route reveals that the Ten Elites, supposedly the heroic yet fallen founders of the continent's most prominent bloodlines, were actually vicious, murderous bandits that were allies of Nemesis from the start.
  • Reading Jeralt’s diary reveals he once held Lady Rhea in high esteem, and it wasn’t until his wife’s mysterious death during childbirth and Rhea’s refusal to explain Byleth’s situation after being born (namely, that they wouldn’t cry nor have a heartbeat) that he became distrustful of her.
    Jeralt: I used to think the world of Lady Rhea. Now she terrifies me.
• Broken Smile: One of the NPC soldiers sports this in a cutscene upon witnessing what the "javelins of light" can do to a fortress.
• Bus Crash:
  • If a character is defeated in classic mode in part I, most of them will either vanish or unceremoniously die during the timeskip.
  • Heavily implied to be the case for almost every student not recruited during Part I on the Silver Snow route after the second Battle at Gronder ^note Sans Ashe and Lorenz, who are fought during the story; Annette, who's implied to be forced to live with her pro-imperial uncle, Baron Dominic, if not recruited outside of the Blue Lions route; and Marianne, who just flat out never appears after the timeskip unless recruited. Characters describe the event to have been such a bloodbath the only confirmed survivors are Edelgard and Hubert, while Dimitri is mentioned to have perished and Claude is considered M.I.A. after the battle. However, Dedue showing up alive later in Enbarr to carry out Dimitri's will, despite being also declared dead, leaves the final fate of the other characters involved in the battle up in the air.
• Busman's Holiday: The optional side missions often go this way. The characters will be investigating something irrelevant to the main story, only for the situation to escalate into a full-scale battle for survival.
• But Thou Must!:
  • In your first conversation with Sothis, the game will not allow you to proceed until you tell her you're a mortal.
  • In the aftermath of the Remire Village incident, the Flame Emperor confronts Byleth and Geralt. He denies being involved with Solon's experiments, and offers Byleth a chance to join forces with the reasoning that it will keep TWSITD in check. Even though there is an option for you to agree to this, if you pick it the Flame Emperor will straight-up accuse you of lying and leave anyway.
  • At the beginning of the Golden Deer house's version of Chapter 10, the game will not allow you to proceed until you permit Claude to borrow Jeralt's diary.
  • Zigzagged example in Chapter 11 of the Black Eagles route. If Byleth didn't attend Edelgard's coronation prior to the Holy Tomb ceremony, the trope will be played straight once Rhea demands Edelgard's execution, as neither choice given allows Byleth to dissent. However, if Byleth did accompany their chosen lord beforehand, the second option will change to "I must protect Edelgard", which will change subsequent events.
  • At the end of Azure Moon's Chapter 14, Byleth is given the option to choose whether the party should invade the Empire or reclaim Faerghus. Regardless, Dimitri will always pick the first option and will convince Byleth to do so had they chosen otherwise.
  • At the end of Chapter 15 of the Silver Snow route, the game won't let you continue the story unless you take Claude's offer for crossing the Great Bridge of Myrddin.
  • Many dialogue options, especially in Byleth's supports, are almost identical to another, making them examples of the variant in which "there is no 'wrong' answer to choose." For example, after Raphael and Ignatz's Paralogue, you can say that Raphael's "a nice guy" or "a good man." Otherwise, most of these choices are for the most part downplayed examples given they can raise or lower support points with other characters depending on the option picked.
  • There are two points in the game when the Flame Emperor offers Byleth a chance to ally themselves with; first immediately after the Remire Village mission from Chapter 8, and a second time at the very start of Silver Snow. In both times, there is an option that seems as though it may be a "yes", but the Flame Emperor always interprets it as a refusal. Downplayed, as the option in question is available, but not at those times.

C

• Call a Rabbit a "Smeerp": Characters refer to ballistic missiles as "javelins of light", since they have no idea what those things are. Though as they are surrounded by glowing rings of light when deployed, they fit the description, as even the Children of the Goddess don't fully understand the technology ancient Agarthans had.
• Can't Drop the Hero: Zigzagged. While Byleth can’t be dropped in any story related missions and paralogues, there are some chapters where the house leader doesn’t need to be deployed.
• Can't Kill You, Still Need You: This is why, on the Crimson Flower route, those who slither in the dark are fought after the war is ended, and why on the Silver Snow and Verdant Wind and routes, Hubert makes sure to leave a letter to Byleth and their faction telling them to go after those who slither in the dark. Despite that they are Obviously Evil and have caused many of the game's conflicts in recent history, the Empire still uses them simply because they can't afford to waste resources on dealing with them until after their goal is accomplished.
• Cast from Hit Points: In gameplay, whoever uses a Hero's Relic without the proper Crest or the Devil's Axe will suffer 10 damage after combat.
• Cast Full of Rich People: The game is set in a Military School for royals and nobles, so the majority of the cast are the offspring of rich landed nobility, with two royal heirs in the mix. There are fair number of commoners (though still a minority) accepted into the academy on their combat/academic merits, recommendations by nobles, pooled funds from their allies or families, etc. as well as a handful of Impoverished Patricians, but they could be seen as the exceptions confirming the rule.
• Celibate Hero: Unlike previous games, with only a few exceptions^note Sylvain, Lorenz, Manuela, and Dorothea, though they can reassess their priorities in supports, playable characters are not actively looking for romance. Either they haven't had enough time to truly get to know someone for a romantic relationship (Part I) or they're in the middle of an active war and have no time to think about romance (Part II). It becomes subverted in various paired endings, though platonic paired endings also exist.
• Central Theme: The four routes have a core theme they follow:
  • Silver Snow: Fighting for what you believe in even it means making enemies of your closest friends, and assuming leadership when no one else can.
  • Azure Moon: Finding light even in the darkness and learning and growing from tragedy.
  • Verdant Wind: Uncovering hidden mysteries kept secret from all and overcoming cultural barriers.
  • Crimson Flower: Challenging corrupt institutions and the cost of seeing one's ambitions and ideals realized.
  • And between all routes is the theme that support and understanding can bring out the best in anyone but at the same time it's impossible to do it for everyone.
• Chain of Deals: One sidequest has both Shamir and Catherine asking for a two-toned whetstone. In order to obtain said whetstone, you'll need to pick up the tome of Crestological Mysteries nearby and give it to Hanneman, who will give you the Tome of Comely Saints, which Manuela needs. Several exchanges later, you get the whetstone. You can only give it to one of the girls, and the one you choose gives you their favored Silver-level weapon and some support points.
• Changing Gameplay Priorities: Early on, your limited roster, limited class options, weak weapons, and overall lack of Combat Arts means that battles will be drawn out and progress slowly. You'll lean on the few reliable damage dealers you start with to do the bulk of the fighting while your other units focus on healing and getting in chip shots just so they gain some experience. Once you start to reach the Intermediate classes, the damage-dealing potential of your units unlocks, along with greater mobility and access to utility abilities. By the late game, most of your units will likely be Glass Cannons and Fragile Speedsters outfitted with elite weapons who focus on sweeping the battlefield as quickly as possible. Downplayed on Maddening where the same shift in priority takes place, but is less extreme due to the higher enemy health making it more difficult to sweep. In either case, this shift is further supported by the big, tanky classes like the Fortress Knight and Great Knight falling well below the late game power curve.
• Character Select Forcing: On Maddening, expect certain characters to become essential.
  • If playing as the Black Eagles, Edelgard becomes necessary during the beginning, as she's one of the few characters other than Byleth that can sponge hits reliably due to the other students being quite squishy due to having low defense bases and growths.
  • If playing as the Blue Lions, Dedue is basically required for the early-game, as his high Defense allows him to tank hits that his squishier teammates will fold to, despite his Crutch Character status. Felix is similar, as he has effectively the highest attack power on the team, although unlike Dedue, he remains strong throughout the game (barring bad luck with level-ups).
  • If playing as the Golden Deer, Ignatz and Raphael's early Rally skills (Speed and Strength, respectively) can enable kills that were otherwise out of reach, or at least allow an ally to avoid being killed. Leonie's high base stats and immediate access to Tempest Lance also make her a required pick.
  • Regardless of house chosen, that house's archer (Bernadetta, Ashe, or Ignatz) is required for chip damage due to their immediate access to Curved Shot, which notably allows them to attack enemy mages without fear of retaliation.
  • Late-game, at least one of Ferdinand, Seteth or Sylvain is required to deal with enemy Swordmasters and Assassins, as their access to Swift Strikes allows them to bypass their Speed and one-round them. Leonie and Cyril are in a similar case as well, as they can both access to Point-Blank Volley which serves a similar purpose.
• Chekhov's Gift: When they were both little kids, Dimitri gave Edelgard a dagger as a parting gift — symbolic of cutting one's own path in life. While uncomfortable about the gesture at the time, she's kept the weapon and even used it occasionally, such as against the brigands on the night she met Byleth. When the Flame Emperor leaves the same dagger behind, this clues Dimitri in to who they are. On the Azure Moon route, Dimitri gifts her back the dagger after failing to reconcile with Edelgard before the assault on the imperial capital, only for her to try to kill him with the weapon after being defeated in her Hegemon form.
• Chekhov's Gun: A relatively minor one. One innocuous quest in Chapter 4 has you looking for information on a band of thieves on Seteth's behalf, eventually learning that they are holed up on Conand Tower. Chapter 5's mission is to wipe out these bandits.
• Childhood Friend Romance:
  • Dimitri reveals that while Edelgard and her uncle sought asylum in Faerghus, they became friends and she even taught him how to dance. However, Edelgard apparently doesn't remember this, though she does say that her first love was a noble from the kingdom, and Byleth can tease Dimitri over supposed romantic feelings for her, though he tends to laugh it off. Nothing of the romantic nature results (for both story reasons^note they end up locked in a bitter war against one another in their respective routes post-timeskip and gameplay reasons^note neither can be recruited into the other’s class and support with one another during any route playthrough), much less of the platonic nature.
  • Ingrid, Dimitri, Sylvain, and Felix grew up together, and they can all be paired with each other except for Sylvain and Dimitri, though Felix and Dimitri’s ending is notably platonic.
• The Church: The Church of Seiros is one of the most powerful institutions on the continent of Fódlan, responsible for running the Officers Academy and keeping the peace between the three nations of the continent. It also happens to have an army of its own, usually deployed to suppress bandit attacks and provide military support to nearby territories.
• Class Reunion: The Battle at Gronder in Part II acts as a reunion for the Officer's Academy Class of 1180, although Claude snidely notes that it's the worst reunion in history given that they're all trying to kill each other at this point.
• Coattail-Riding Relative: A problem connected to the Crest system, that plays into several characters' backstories: some people are being forcibly bred or wed in order to produce Crest bearing children or create noble connections; others are effectively marginalized or discarded for not being born with a Crest. Permanently eliminating this trope is a major goal of both Edelgard and Hanneman: Edelgard by abolishing Crests entirely, and Hanneman making them ubiquitous so that while they're useful, they're also worthless for social climbing. Their support goes into detail on this trope.
• Color Animal Codename: The eponymous three houses of are all named in accordance to this trope: Black Eagles, Golden Deer, and Blue Lions. This also applies to the DLC house, the Ashen Wolves.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience:
  • The three nations of Fódlan (and thus, the three houses) are associated with a color: red for the Adrestian Empire, blue for the Holy Kingdom of Faerghus, and yellow for the Leicester Alliance. The main color is present in the nations' banners and their soldiers' uniforms, and their future leaders are clad in that color. After the timeskip, the majority of former students of the Black Eagles and Blue Lions also have red and blue in their clothing, respectively, while the Golden Deer form a rainbow (with two yellow lads).
  • Generic NPCs with little importance to the plot have light brown hair and eyes to distinguish them from the more plot-important characters with Manuela being the only exception to this rule.
• Combat Stilettos: Every female character except Lysithea and Catherine in their default costumes wear high heels while in battle, be they students, teachers, or knights; Felix also has high heels after the timeskip despite defaulting to infantry. This also extends to many female class costumes.
• Comically Missing the Point:
  • In Byleth and Flayn's S support, Flayn, intrigued that Sothis dwells within Byleth, asks if he considers himself male or female and if it's possible for a male goddess to exist. When he presents a ring to her, the proposal goes over her head. She finds it beautiful and remarks that Byleth walks around with a women's ring, which surely must mean he thinks himself female.
  • In Byleth and Cyril's S support, Byleth gives Cyril her mother's ring and asks him to try it on. He doesn't know its purpose, and when Byleth tells him, "There's no running away now", he assumes that means the ring is cursed and he cannot leave Garreg Mach.
• Common Tactical Gameplay Elements:
  • Fog of War (only on maps with a literal fog cover)
  • Movement Modifiers (different terrain types, like forest and sand, cost more movement points to some unit types, while flying units can cross some terrain impassable for everyone else)
  • Viewing Range (only of maps with fog: a unit carrying a lit torch dispels the fog much further than normal)
  • Movement Speed (armored units and mages have fewer movement points than light skirmishers, and mounted and flying units are much faster than either)
  • Unit Specialization (each class and even character has special abilities and stat bonuses that make them more suited for different combat roles)
  • Leader Unit (Byleth has an ability that boosts XP gain of adjacent allies, while the Lord class boosts adjacent allies' attack; and of course, Byleth or a house leader permanently dying is an immediate Game Over for story reasons)
  • Attack Range (different weapons have different attack ranges, which can be further extended with special abilities and combat arts)
  • Splash Damage (all Gambits affect multiple squares, with enemies further away from the attacker taking less damage)
  • Taking Cover (non-flier units standing in forests or bushes get evasion bonuses against physical attacks ^note on the other hand, standing on the other side of an entire house has no effect on the attacker's precision for some reason)
  • Called Shots (several combat arts disadvantage their targets in various ways), Knock Back (several Gambits push the target back a square or two)
  • Pincer Attack (Gambit attacks are boosted by nearby allies with high support levels; the special Combat Art Triangle Attack^note gained from mastering the female-exclusive Pegasus Knight class lets three flying units attack an adjacent enemy all at once)
  • Crowd Control (several basic Gambits "rattle" the enemy, preventing them from moving on their next turn)
  • Guard (kinda: assigning a defensive-type adjutant to a unit causes them to sometimes block an incoming attack)
  • Concealment (enemies in the fog get to sneak up on Byleth's troops, though not the other way around)
  • Context Action (instead of attacking or using magic, a unit can occasionally spend their turn opening a chest or a door, talking with an ally, or using a stationary weapon like a ballista)
  • Rule Breaker (usually tied to class or character special abilities, such as the mounted units' Canto ability that lets them use their unspent movement points after attacking, which unmounted troops cannot do).
• The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard:
  • Sometimes, enemy named characters will have skillsets that player-controlled units can't access. For example, an enemy Shamir on the Crimson Flower route will have Bowrange+1 from being a Sniper as well as Bowrange+2, a skill usually only usable by Bow Knights and one that normally doesn't stack with Bowrange+1.
  • Pegasus Knight in enemy hands is essentially an Advanced class, having better stats, better Movement, and Lancefaire. Naturally, when Ingrid shows up as an enemy Pegasus Knight during Battle of the Eagle and Lion, she uses the enemy version of the class, not the playable version.
  • If Hilda is recruited on the Azure Moon route, she is replaced in Chapter 19 by a generic female War Master, a normally male-only class.
  • A recurring problem with the tournaments. The character you enter is forced to use the Training version of the weapon (i.e. the weakest version), while your foes can have the stronger versions. In addition, any damage you take in one match carries over to the next unless you use one of a limited number of heals, while your foes are always at full health.
    • Related is the tournament battle for "Proper Conduct", where you automatically lose if you don't win in four moves, regardless of how close you are or how little damage you take. Naturally, the game doesn't tell you whatsoever about this turn limit, which isn't present for any of the normal tournaments.
• The Computer Is a Lying Bastard: In Petra and Bernadetta's Paralogue, the win condition is allegedly to get Petra to the goal in the southeast corner of the map or rout all enemy units. The game is lying. Approaching the highlighted goal point or routing all enemies currently on the map triggers a wave of enemy reinforcements, accompanied either by Hubert (non-Crimson Flower routes) or Catherine (in Crimson Flower), in the middle of your turn no less, and the win condition changes so that you're required to wipe out all of the enemy units before they reach the goal square.
• Continuity Nod: The Archanea regalia once again make an appearance, albeit as a chance to be obtained from rare monsters as rusted weapons.
• Contractual Boss Immunity: Major enemy bosses have either the General skill (immune to instant death effects and half damage from enemy gambits) or the Commander skill (immune to instant death, movement effects, and status ailments, and severely reduced damage from enemy gambits). Major magic-wielding bosses also tend to have Unsealable Magic, which renders them immune to Silence. Finally, enemies who normally have weaknesses to effective damage often have the appropriate skills or shields to nullify said weaknesses, with the notable exception of the Death Knight.
• Contrived Coincidence:
  • In Byleth and Caspar's C-support scene, Caspar goes after a suspicious man with a scorpion tattoo, who kills himself when he sees Caspar approaching. A knight scolds Caspar for his rash behavior, since he may have been part of an underground group. After the timeskip, Caspar approaches Byleth, saying he was thinking about what happened five years ago, when he's interrupted by a knight (who also knows of Caspar's actions) informing them that knights on patrol were attacked by brigands, all wearing scorpion tattoos, and while the knights prevailed, there were casualties. Caspar remarks what a coincidence it is that he should mention the suspicious man and then receive news of his comrades' attack.
  • On a larger scale, the game contains the end of two 1,000 year long plotlines; Rhea's plan to revive Sothis by implanting her crest stone into an Ambiguously Human homunculus comes to fruition and unknowingly returns to her side, and Edelgard finally breaks the 1,000 years of large-scale stagnation that Fódlan has lived in. To a lesser extent, this same generation also finally eradicates the Agarthans in three of the four routes, who have been opposing the church for that same thousand year timespan and have possibly opposed the dragons for even longer.
• Convenient Character Replacement: A weapon example as opposed to a character. The Axe of Ukonvasara, a very powerful sacred axe that is both effective on armored units and restores HP at the beginning of each turn, is available on all routes during the first chapter of the timeskip (chapter 13) except on Crimson Flower. To circumvent this, the Axe of Zoltan, another very powerful Anti-Armor axe is available on Crimson Flower during the story mission for Chapter 15. In other routes, the Axe of Zoltan is obtained so late that obtaining it, much less upgrading it by forging, falls into Awesome, but Impractical territory.
• Conveniently Interrupted Document: Many of the books found in Abyss' Shadow Library have had either ripped-off pages or have had key words and dates blurried due to the passage of time, leaving the player to fill the blanks with the various reveals that take place within the various routes.
• Cool, but Inefficient: You can zoom the camera all the way in on your units so that you control them like you would in a regular third-person adventure game. This allows full 360-degree freedom within the character's movement range and lets you see their battalions moving along with them. While a neat and visually appealing feature, it offers almost no tactical benefit whatsoever since it significantly reduces your field of vision with the zoomed-in camera. A mini map is displayed to help alleviate this, but it is still much less useful than sticking to the traditional, zoomed-out camera angle of the grid.
• Cosmetic Award: The reward for beating the game for the first time is New Game Plus and a title screen showing Sothis sleeping on the throne. The reward for beating the game on Maddening difficulty without starting a New Game+ is a title screen showing Sothis sleeping on the throne, under yellow light.
• Costume Evolution: During the first half of the game, your students will wear Officers' Academy uniforms. After the Time Skip going into Part 2, your students (save for Flayn) will wear new clothes.
• Coup de Grâce Cutscene: Every enemy must have their health lowered to 0 to defeat them. However, for major bosses such as the ones at the end of the Azure Moon, Verdant Wind, and Crimson Flower routes, the defeat is followed by a movie where Byleth and/or the chosen faction leader deal the finishing blows.
• Crapsack World: Fódlan may not be in an active state of war at the beginning of the game, but scratching under the surface quickly reveals the continent is a powder keg waiting to explode:
  • In the Empire, a corrupt cabal of power-hungry nobles has reduced the emperor to a figurehead, are ruthlessly exploiting their own citizens (as detailed in Ferdinand and Lysithea's paralogue), and have outright murdered nearly the entire royal family in order to create a perfect emperor with two Crests. There's also the fact that those who slither in the dark, a cult with designs on world conquest and no ethical scruples whatsoever, have their main power base in the Empire and are using the heir apparent as a puppet to spark a continent-wide war.
  • The Kingdom suffered a horrific regicide several years before the story began in direct response to the king attempting to make political reforms and committed pogroms on an innocent nation in reprisal, the current regent is an incompetent womanizer, food shortages, brutal winters, and a barren land make life hard for the people of the Kingdom, and Felix's paralogue makes it clear that they can barely handle common brigand attacks without outside intervention.
  • The Alliance's leading nobles are constantly squabbling, and the common people can and do suffer the consequences of their infighting; Raphael's parents were collateral damage in what is heavily implied to have been a political assassination, Count Gloucester is able to outright murder Alliance citizens as part of a power play and suffer no consequences, and Acheron raises his troops against Count Gloucester in order to seize his territory by force and only receives a slap on the wrist.
  • The Church preaches that the Crests were originally gifts from the goddess, a tenet that the nobility and other social climbers use to justify treating people as no better than breeding studs. Church doctrine is also used to justify widespread xenophobia against people not from Fódlan, and the Church either won't or can't rein everyone in.
• Crippling Overspecialization: The biggest drawback of using many of the teachers and knights. While very useful in their own class, they usually have a disadvantage getting a master class due to lacking any talent in a field not their own. Even after training them, characters usually have, at best, neutral proficiency or possibly even a negative to skills in the desired master class. Their growths are also purposely made a bit lower in all but one-three stats, making them all essentially forced to rely on their starting classes' natural growth bonuses to stay on par with your students. The most notable exceptions are Catherine and Shamir, who are both Disc-One Nuke in their own rights and are merely Brought Down to Badass once the student units have caught up with them.
• Cross-Popping Veins: When characters speak to each other, when someone is angered, a red cross-popping veins symbol will appear beside their head for a moment. Catherine's angry portrait also has one built in to her art.
• Crown of Horns: Edelgard begins wearing one post-time skip.
• Crutch Character: Well, crutch trait. Felix's passive makes his attacks do 5 extra damage as long as he doesn't have a squadron active (meaning none equipped or if he has one equipped, it has to be "dead"). This is extremely powerful early in the game, allowing Felix to do a guaranteed 5th of an enemy's health on top of whatever damage he normally does every attack. However, as the game goes on and enemies get larger health pools, 5 extra damage becomes increasingly irrelevant compared to the bonuses a good squadron will give. So Felix needs to work on his leadership stat flaw by midgame in order to avoid falling behind other characters who aren't penalized in leadership.
• Cryptic Background Reference: Three Houses adores this trope. A lot of information about Fódlan, its history, characters and even its neighbor nations is scattered across the game, most of which is never explored nor elaborated upon. Some routes will even dwell more on a few aspects of the setting than others depending on how important those are to its story, being a good example of this how Almyra's relationship with Fódlan is only explored thoroughly in the Verdant Wind route.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: What the Crimson Flower route basically amounts to. In the other routes, the other factions of Fódlan can only barely keep Adrestia at bay for five years until Byleth comes back and turns the tide against it. In the route where Byleth joins the Empire instead of opposing it, however, when they return, Edelgard is able to muster the full might of her forces and steamrolls the rest of Fódlan so badly that her route is the shortest by a good four maps, due in large part to not needing to retake the monastery or secure reinoforcements. Even the occasional unforeseen hiccups like Claude summoning Almyran reinforcements to defend Deirdru or the Knights of Seiros launching a surprise assault on Garreg Mach are handled without much fuss and don't ultimately make a difference anyway.
• Curtains Match the Windows: Around half of more of the cast have hair and eyes that are the exact same or very similar color.
• Custom Uniform: Varies from character to character during the school half. You’ll have characters like Hubert or Dedue wearing the uniform as they should. But then you have characters like Raphael or Mercedes, who add personal touches to it.
• Cutting Off the Branches: Averted, as the game avoids painting any route as the canon one. The Nintendo Dream interview also stated that there won’t be a DLC Golden route, due to the idea of people thinking it would invalidate the routes already in the game.
• Cycle of Revenge: This is a major theme in the game, particularly on the Azure Moon route. In the backstory, Sothis massacred the Agarthans for attacking her in their hubris. This caused "those who slither in the dark," the last vestiges of Agartha, to take their own revenge through Nemesis by having him kill Sothis in her sleep and using the remains of Sothis to forge the Sword of the Creator. They then massacred Seiros' brethren, which resulted in her going to war with them and killing Nemesis. those who slither in the dark retreated but continued to plot their revenge against Seiros and her church. To this end, they forge weapons and Crests, and much later, they experiment on Edelgard with Crests and convince her to seek revenge on the Church for promoting the Crest system (though she also intends to take revenge on them afterwards for their experiments once she no longer needs them). Dimitri becomes obsessed with revenge against her for her involvement with the people who murdered his family as a part of that goal. Dimitri only breaks the cycle on the Azure Moon route when the sister of an imperial general who died fighting Dimitri's army ends up killing Rodrigue while trying to avenge her brother, prompting Dimitri's Heel Realization.

D

• Dangerous Forbidden Technique:
  • Regardless of how many Crest bloodlines are in their ancestry, humans can only naturally be born with one Crest power active in their bodies. This seems to be for safety, as while it is possible to artificially implant a second Crest, the surgical process is traumatic and usually fails, killing the subject in horrifying ways. Even when it succeeds, the subject will be left with a vastly shortened life expectancy in exchange for their heightened powers, the strain of two Crests being simply too much for the body to bear.
  • Those without Crests can use Crest stones to gain power, but always at the cost of their minds and bodies, transforming into raging deformed hybrids of man and reptile called Demonic Beasts. Simply holding a Crest stone for long enough will cause the transformation in anyone who doesn't have their own Crest.
• Dare to Be Badass: Rare villainous example. In the lyrics of God-Shattering Star, Nemesis is crying out to his allies to rise up and challenge the gods themselves.
  Arise, you who do not fear death!
  Raise your heads bravely and take up your weapons!
  Pay no heed to the corpses of your comrades!
  Warriors, gather to this banner,
  Send out the flare of revolt and liberation
  To take back our pride
  from the beast called God!
• Darker and Edgier: Various elements including Grey-and-Gray Morality, Gambit Pile Up among various factions, dark backstories such as with Edelgard, Dimitri, Lysithea, Bernadetta, Hapi, and Jeritza's, and bloodier cutscenes make for a very dark game, especially when comparing this to Awakening, Fates, Echoes: Shadows of Valentia, and even the Tellius games. Put simply, this is very much the darkest Fire Emblem game since Genealogy of the Holy War, which is fitting since that game was the inspiration for Three Houses.
• Dark Reprise: "Blue Skies and a Battle", the theme that plays out during the mock three-way battle of Chapter 7, has a sweeping orchestra that permeates the scale of the fight, but is held in check with dubstep beats that mellow out the tone. Chapter 17 on some routes features a three-way battle similar to Chapter 7, but because it comes after a five-year timeskip in which the three playable factions have been locked into a war, there is no mock battle; every conflict is now real, and casualties are no longer excused by a retreat. "Between Heaven and Earth", which has a similar melody to "Blue Skies and a Battle", replaces the dubstep beats with a solemn chorus, making the overall song darker. Claude even makes a point of referencing the drastic drop in the mood, calling the "class reunion" the worst in history.
• Darkest Hour: Chapter 13 of the Azure Moon route puts Byleth in perhaps the direst situation in the entire game. The Kingdom fell during the timeskip, Dedue is presumed dead (and will be unless the player completed his paralogue in Part 1), and Dimitri is in no position to do anything because he's been on the run for five years after falling victim to The Coup. Oh, and the ordeal has turned him into a torture-happy Ax-Crazy Blood Knight with a severe case of Revenge Before Reason who no longer cares about his Kingdom or subjects and is on a suicidal, all-consuming quest to kill Edelgard, leaving Byleth and Gilbert to take charge. To cap it all off Dimitri's mental illness and agression fractures the cohesion of the Blue Lions, with many choosing to put their trust in Byleth instead and Felix becoming much more antagonistic towards Dimitri. Things do get better, but for a long while many characters at the monastery will express fear and/or doubts about Dimitri, his ability to lead them or their chances of winning the war.
• A Day in the Limelight: This game's paralogue missions put your regular units in the spotlight for one map and often have them handle personal issues.
• Deadly Deferred Conversation: During the Guardian Moon, Jeralt tells Byleth that he has something important to share with them, but he's interrupted both times during their conversations. He's killed by Kronya before he has a chance to tell them, and they figure it out by reading his diary.
• Dead Person Conversation: On Silver Snow, a few days after your army takes the Great Bridge of Myrddin and allows the Faerghus army to pass freely on their way into the Empire, Dimitri is reported to have died in battle at Gronder Field. That evening, he shows up at the monastery to speak with Byleth, who is incredulous that he's alive and senses something is amiss. Just as Dimitri appears to open up and say what's on his mind, Seteth wakes Byleth from sleep, and when they ask where the person they were talking to went, Seteth reports that he only saw Byleth asleep. Byleth tells him they were talking to someone, and Seteth remarks that it was probably someone who desired their guidance.
• Death Cry Echo: Any playable unit will give one of these when they die regardless of if they're your ally or enemy. Some of them are chilling.
• Deconstructed Character Archetype: Three Houses' Darker and Edgier setting gives the opportunity to deconstruct a lot of the long-running archetypes present in the Fire Emblem series. See the character archetype pages for details.
• Decoy Protagonist: Unlike the Blue Lions and the Golden Deer routes, if you’re a Black Eagle, your house leader Edelgard (and Hubert, her retainer) will abandon you character roster permanently after Chapter 11 if the route follows the default story branch (Silver Snow). Because of this, Byleth becomes the main character and the main lord for the rest of the story.
• Defeat Means Friendship:
  • In several quests, Byleth's class is tasked with beating down a group of rebels, defectors, or bandits causing trouble. After the chapter's cleared, they'll be added to the player's available battalions with the explanation that the fight was enough to impress them into coming to work at the monastery. In other cases, it will be a training exercise against various military units to prove the worth of the player's house.
  • On certain routes, Ashe and Lorenz will defect from their class even if they had been previously recruited. Lorenz does this on Azure Moon, Ashe on Verdant Wind, and both on Silver Snow. If they're defeated when they're encountered, they'll be able to rejoin Byleth and their allies.
  • On the Crimson Flower route, this is played straight with Lysithea. If the student wasn't recruited during Part I, the player is given another chance to do it in Part II should the character be defeated in battle.
• Delayed Reaction:
  • Bernadetta, due to her low self-esteem and anxiety, is prone to making assumptions about someone without really registering what the other person has said to her until a few seconds later, leading her to stop herself and verbally backpedal.
  • In Ferdinand and Hubert's A+ support, both assume that the coffee beans/tea leaves each bought for the other is for someone else.
    Hubert: Is it a gift? Perhaps for someone you fancy?
    Ferdinand: A gift, yes. For you.
    Hubert: Hm. Who is the unlucky— Did you say for me?! This coffee is a gift for me? Have I heard you correctly?
    [...]
    Ferdinand: For me? Are you certain? I would hate to deprive the intended recipient of such a fine tea.
    Hubert: That would be difficult to do, since I bought it with you in mind.
    Ferdinand: Oh, in that case, thank— What? You were planning to give this to me all along?
• Demoted to Extra:
  • In Cindered Shadows, Edelgard, Dimitri, and Claude become part of the supporting cast of the story, a far cry from the roles they get in their respective routes.
  • During Part I, the Western Church is an antagonistic branch of the Church of Seiros involved in 2 main story chapters and 2 paralogues. After the timeskip? They're reduced to nothing but common bandits that can be fought occasionally in auxiliary battles.
  • After gaining some more presence in spinoff games such as Heroes and Warriors, Anna is once again demoted in this game. While she can be taken as a student early in the game and has a Paralogue and a Secret Shop that can be visited during Part II, she has no support conversations whatsoever. Additionally, her dialogue at the monastery rarely changes, while most named characters and even unnamed ones have dialogue that changes at least once a month.
• Developer's Foresight:
  • Group Tasks and meals together will often have unique interactions between characters, namely those with supports with each other. These can range from friends motivating each other, to some characters flat-out questioning why you would pair them up together (such as Edelgard and Ferdinand). As they go through support interactions, some of their lines change during mealtimes and group tasks to account for the support conversation. For example, after Annette and Mercedes's B-rank support, which ends with them arguing, if you eat a meal with them together, they are both uncomfortable in their dialogue. After their A support, though, they're back on good terms with each other.
  • Students poached from the other two houses in the first half will have unique dialogue after the timeskip to justify why they've remained with you, fighting against their country of birth, including their families and former friends, or in the case of the Crimson Flower path, why the more devout students like Mercedes or Marianne would turn against the Church of Seiros. They'll also comment on events in the storyline when talked to in the months between battles. Sometimes there will also be battle dialogue when they're forced to fight against a former friend or family member, like a Crimson Flower path Felix having to fight his father Rodrigue during the siege of Arianrhod, which wouldn't happen on a playthrough of their native house. The game will even acknowledge several things you did, such as Dimitri calling out Felix for killing Rodrigue. This also extends to the knights and professors on Crimson Flower who may sometimes have choice words against each other, most notably Catherine and Shamir.
  • In the second battle at Gronder, several characters have different lines of dialogue depending on what you do. Whether you immediately gun for the Empire, advance toward the central hill, or (against all in-story logic) go for the Kingdom/Alliance will be commented on by Hubert and/or the Lord of the "allied" faction, who will direct their troops accordingly. Even if you leave the Kingdom/Alliance alone and spend the chapter tangling exclusively with the Empire, either Claude and his forces will charge in anyway because they can't tell friend from foe, or Dimitri will order his troops to attack indiscriminately because his rational mind has been long gone.
  • In the second-to-last fight of the Crimson Flower route, if you kill Dimitri before the other enemy commanders, not only Sylvain, Dedue and Rhea/Seiros (who most players would defeat before reaching Dimitri in the northeast corner of the map) will have unique quotes reacting to it, it will also slightly modify story dialogue later on to account their premature fall in the battle.
  • Characters that reach level 99 will say a unique line upon leveling up. Typically, by the end of a playthrough, units will be around their mid-40s; 99 is impossible to reach unless one grinds on the auxiliary maps on Normal.
  • Completing paralogues often changes dialogue when necessary in the main story and monastery. For example, if you complete the "Silver Maiden" paralogue, then at one point in Azure Moon's main plot, Dimitri will reference how you liberated Arianrhod, while in Crimson Flower, completing "Foreign Land and Sky" before a certain point in the story can make Bernadetta mention both in monastery and support dialogue her brief visit to Brigid.
  • Doing Catherine and Ashe's Paralogue has you executing the bishop of the Western Church. After, if you do Seteth's and Flayn's Paralogue, where the Western Church occupies a shrine to St. Cichol, Seteth comments that this group was separate from that Bishop. If you do them in the opposite order, Catherine will bring up the incident from Seteth and Flayn's paralogue.
  • When checking a character's profile, it will display the house or faction they belong to. Byleth's will default to the Church of Seiros, as they are an instructor, and will only change when you reach the timeskip. During the first level of the game, however, since Byleth and Jeralt are not part of any faction, their faction will instead say Mercenaries.
  • Some of the support conversations will have altered dialogue depending on if you got them pre- or post-timeskip, as well as the route. For instance, Linhardt pre-timeskip in his C Support with Caspar will have him wonder why their fathers hate each other so much, but if achieved post-timeskip, Linhardt will instead muse they are likely bickering in the Empire. Some even go a step further and actually make sure to account for time differences ^note such as Seteth and Hanneman's C Support where Seteth adjusts the amount of time they've known each other from 16 years to 21, or whether or not you've unlocked certain other Supports yet or not ^note In Byleth's A Support with Catherine, she'll talk about how Lady Rhea saved her when she was a student. Normally she doesn't remember exactly what happened, save for a few details, but if her C Support with Seteth is achieved beforehand (where he jogs her memory of that event), she'll recall exactly what happened.
  • Several paired endings will be different depending on the route and who are being paired together. For example, a paired ending for Ingrid and Felix always states that they got married regardless of the route, but on the Azure Moon route, Felix gets injured protecting her and gives up fighting after, something that doesn't happen in the other routes. Byleth's S supports also are all different depending on the route; male Byleth romancing Lysithea, for example, will all be different due to each route having Byleth in different positions after the war.
  • On the night of the ball, the player can meet a prospective Love Interest at the Goddess Tower. On the Azure Moon route, there's a scene right before that where you and Dimitri talk privately; if you pick him, at the end of the scene, you'll walk to the tower together instead.
  • If a character is on low health and scores a Critical Hit, they will wince and look pained instead of looking triumphant like they do when critting on full health.
  • Some of the students have hidden quotes that activate when they achieve a Critical Hit against an enemy playable unit or if their health is low. For example:
    Lysithea: I don't want to do this!
    Mercedes: You may want to move!
  • Several support conversations change context in accordance to which support was done before it. For example, in Ferdinand and Edelgard's A-Rank support, the support conversation opens with Ferdinand drinking and complimenting on the taste of the tea he drank, but if you open up Ferdinand and Hubert's A+ support beforehand, this opening changes to Ferdinand drinking coffee. Another example is Marianne and Ashe's B Support, if the player has completed her support with Sylvain, she mentions the outcome of it, and Ashe will comment on it as well.
  • Weapon animations will change to match the specific subtype of weapon you're wielding — for example, if you give a Crescent Sickle (considered a lance type of weapon) to someone, rather than stab with it, they will swing or chop with it.
  • Duscur (a once-autonomous region in Kingdom territory that was annexed by them after a terrible tragedy) and Almyra (a massive kingdom east of the Leicester Alliance) are home to people with darker skin. The models for Duscur and Almyran-affiliated enemies (or allies, regarding Chapter 18 of the Verdant Wind route) all have dark skin to reflect this. You encounter these models in Dedue's paralogue on the Azure Moon route, Chapter 14 of Crimson Flower, Chapter 18 of Verdant Wind, and two Paralogues (Edelgard's on Crimson Flower; Cyril and Hilda's on all other routes) set at Fódlan's Locket (a massive fortress hidden deep within the mountain range that separates Leicester and Almyra). In a similar vein, enemies affiliated with those who slither in the dark will have models with stark white skin, as this is a signature trait of both them and their ancestors, the Agarthans.
    • To take this even further, in Shamir and Alois' paralogue, you are deployed to defend Derdriu from what is assumed to be solders of the Almyran navy...except the models aren't dark-skinned. That's because they aren't Almyran at all, they're petty Fódlan-born pirates posing as Almyrans.
    • Another for Shamir and Alois' paralogue: If you chose to lead the Golden Deer House and bring Claude with you, he has special dialogue that the other house leaders don't get. He reacts very negatively with what the pirates are doing, and even has Boss Banter with the leader noting how they're adding more fuel to Fódlan's wariness and prejudice towards the outside world. This is also one of the earliest hints you can get outside of Supports that Claude himself is not only half-Almyran, but was also born there.
  • The final map of Crimson Flower has Gilbert as an enemy. If his daughter Annette is not recruited, then she will also be on the map. Should you decide to kill one of the two before the other, the game will acknowledge that you have pushed them past the Despair Event Horizon and they will break AI patterns and charge straight for your army.
  • Several support conversations can change context or be unlocked differently in different routes. For example, Lysithea's A-Rank support with Byleth won't be opened until the second battle of Gronder field is cleared in the Golden Deer route. And if you unlocked Seteth's A-Rank support late into the game in the Golden Deer route, specifically, after the opening of chapter 22, where Rhea told Claude and Byleth about Byleth's own origins, you have the option to mention that you have already heard it from Rhea.
  • If you chose the Golden Deer house, Claude has a special comment when facing the bosses in certain paralogues if he is brought. Namely, the "Tales of The Red Canyon" and "The Forgotten Hero" paralogues. This fits the fact that the Verdant Wind route is one of the routes where the characters are not Locked Out of the Loop. ^noteDimitri does not have any special dialogue in those paralogues when he faces the bosses, while Edelgard is flat out not available for the "Legend of the Lake" paralogue.
  • If you poached Lorenz into one of the other houses, he will remark on this for his paralogue, citing that even though he's no longer a part of the Golden Deer house, he will still eventually have a leadership role in the Alliance.
  • Should a character die in battle pre-timeskip, the epilogue accounts for this by stating they either perished during the battle at Garreg Mach, or gives them an excuse to justify why they are not playable, such as Marianne flat-out leaving. If they die post-timeskip, they instead are listed as killed in battle.
  • Seminars will adjust their flavor text to account for the character teaching it and what they are teaching. Characters like Petra will usually say she teaches a lesson about Brigid tactics, while others will use the characters' personality as the basis for their lesson, such as Caspar.
  • If Felix and Dorothea's B-support is obtained after the timeskip on any route besides Azure Moon, he dismisses her by saying that as he abandoned his family, she won't gain anything by marrying him.
  • If Felix's C-Support with Mercedes is done during Part II right after the latter's paralogue on non-Crimson Flower routes, Felix will acknowledge that Mercedes' lost brother Emile is the Death Knight.
  • If the player chooses the Black Eagles, sides with the church, and their birthday falls between 3/14 and 3/31, Rhea (or Flayn, after the timeskip) will write the birthday letter instead of Edelgard, and instead of receiving the Black Eagle Pendant, they will receive the White Dragon Scarf, a one-of-a-kind item, which can also be received if the player's birthday is between 4/1 and when the player chooses a house, and the player rescues Flayn in the first week of Chapter 6. Similarly, if the player chooses the Blue Lions and their birthday falls between 1/1 and 4/30, post-timeskip, Gilbert will write the birthday letter instead of Dimitri.
  • One that was added retroactively via the Wave 4 DLC for free: If you play the Verdant Wind route on Classic Mode and marry Claude and Flayn, their ending card will now differ depending on whether or not Seteth lived or died.
  • Constance of the Ashen Wolves switches personalities depending on if she's in the light or in darkness. Her portraits and dialogue during battles, tea-time, and other events will change depending on the situation. In addition, if she's deployed in an outdoor map but with clouds blocking out the sun (for instance, Lake Teutates), her "indoors" personality is applied.
  • If Anna happens to be killed while playing in Classic Mode, her exclusive shop in Part II will be run instead by a small girl who wishes to follow her footsteps. This also means the quest which unlocks it will be given by that same girl in such case. A similar case happens with Hapi and the quest she gives to unlock the Wayseer DLC facility, as a mercenary will deliver her quest instead if she had previously fallen in battle.
  • If you have any of the Knights of Seiros recruited when you get to the Battle of the Eagle and Lion, the game prevents them from being used for said level since the battle is supposed to be between the students.
  • While playing in Classic Mode, most of the story scenes take into account the possibility the non-plot important characters might have fallen in battle previously, either by having someone else say their line or just by simply omitting their contribution altogether, interactions and all. Special mention goes to the Azure Moon and Verdant Wind routes, as each contain a story event which will simply never come to pass if the character that the scene focus on had already fallen before then.
  • Scenes where characters (usually students) have discussions with each other are either changed drastically or simply don't happen if some or all of them were defeated in Classic Mode. Some noteworthy examples can be found Crimson Flower's Chapter 12 & 16, and Azure Moon's Chapter 19.
  • Petra's death quote mentions how she's dying on foreign soil, but this will change if she dies during her paralogue since it takes place in her homeland of Brigid.
  • Dialogue in several supports can vary depending on the recruitment status of characters. In Felix and Sylvain's B support they reminisce about their childhood; if the two have been recruited to another House while Ingrid has not, they note her absence as something which differs between the past and the present. In Claude and Ingrid's supports, Ingrid mentions that Claude shares similarities to a certain skirt chasing classmate of hers; if Sylvain has been recruited to the Golden Deer then Claude will immediately know exactly who she's talking about.
  • If Felix, Sylvain or Ingrid are recruited on the Crimson Flower route, Hubert will note that they are close to their enemies in the Kingdom and wonder if they'd consent to be used as hostages.
  • In Classic Mode, if a unit is defeated in the skirmish battles that you can sometimes play as part of the quests where you have to train with the Knights of Seiros/Faerghus/Adrestia they won't die and remain playable, just like when a unit is defeated at the main chapters that are mock battles. Not that the game tells you this, though.
• Diabolus ex Machina:
  • When Jeralt is killed by Kronya, Byleth turns back time using Divine Pulse so they could stop her. As they prepare to strike Kronya with the Sword of the Creator, Thales teleports right at that moment and blocks the attack, leading to Jeralt getting stabbed and killed again. Sothis remarks that if even Divine Pulse couldn't save Jeralt, his death must've been willed by fate.
  • At the end of the Silver Snow and Verdant Wind routes, it seems like you've saved the day; Edelgard is dead, the Empire is finished, Thales is dead, Shambhala is nothing but rubble, and peace has returned to Fódlan. Then either Rhea suddenly goes insane and has to be put down on Silver Snow, or Nemesis comes back from the dead and goes on a rampage on Verdant Wind. The former has no foreshadowing whatsoever, only making sense if you've read up on past games' lore and know about dragons degenerating into madness because of things outside of their control, and the latter relies on the fully unexplained mechanics of the Crest of Flames.
• Diegetic Soundtrack Usage:
  • At the Battle of the Eagle and Lion, the knights behind Rhea mark the beginning of the battle by playing a couple of bars from "Life at Garreg Mach Monastery," the exploration music for the first part of the game.
  • The bells at the Monastery play the first few notes of the franchise's theme.
  • At the beginning of her support chain with Yuri, Bernadetta hums a few bars from "The Edge of Dawn".
• Difficult, but Awesome:
  • Getting both Vantage and Wrath, the respective mastery skills of the Mercenary and Warrior respectively, for a unit can be extremely difficult, especially seeing as only seven units in the game have strengths in both Swords and Axes^note Edelgard, Claude with his Axe Budding Talent unlocked, Petra, Ferdinand, Seteth, Balthus, and Anna; two of which are route-exclusive (Edelgard and Seteth), one of said two you get late-game (Seteth), and another two are locked behind paid Downloadable Content (Balthus and Anna). Additionally, Ferdinand's personal skill, which activates when he's at full HP, discourages low-HP builds, while Claude and Petra are Fragile Speedsters who should be avoiding getting hit anyway, making this more of a novelty on them. If you're able to pull it off, however, you've effectively turned that unit into a One-Man Army who you can simply slap into the middle of the map with a Killer weapon, or any with a high critical rate, and watch as they slaughter all but the tankiest enemy units who come after them. Can be taken up to eleven if you put them in a class that provides bonus crit, such as War Master with it's Critical +20, get them Defiant Crit, or both.
  • For Magic-oriented Units with low strength, getting Mastery skills from Physical Classes can be a slog, even if you're able to give them a Magic Weapon like a Levin Sword or Bolt Axe since most of them are traditionally Squishy Wizards who can't take many hits and, with the possible exception of Lysithea due to her higher speed growth, can often be too slow to dodge attacks. But with some investment, there are some interesting and effective combinations you can make.
    • Vantage^note  Mercenary Mastery Skill can be a useful defensive skill for Lysithea when combined with her naturally high Magic Attack, maybe combined with Defiant Magic for good measure, since it can allow her to take out any low-resistance enemies who come after her before they can try and harm her, at the expense of making her more of a Glass Cannon than she already is.
    • Hit +20^note  Archer Mastery Skill can be a good insurance skill for Mercedes and Hubert in case their Dexterity falls behind their other stats, offsetting the risk her becoming Powerful, but Inaccurate. This is especially the case for Hubert due to Dark Spells generally having low accuracy.
    • Aegis^note  Paladin Mastery Skill can be a useful defensive tool for characters like Marianne or Hubert, both of whom have lances as a Budding Talent and the former has a strength in Horses, since it'll not only make them much tankier against fellow mages, but it can help their survivability against Archers.
  • The above point can also apply to Archer units. While they'll have less difficulty since they can still use their bows and you won't need to worry about getting magic weapons for them, they still tend to not deal as much damage as their peers and they tend to have low HP that makes them vulnerable up close. That being said, the different classes you can put them in will benefit them in the long run.
    • Ashe's strength in axes can allow him to become a Brigand to learn Death Blow, which adds a flat 6 to his damage when he instigates a battle, which will make up for his low base damage and make him a more damaging archer even without Crits. One can also make his strength in Budding Talent in Lances to make him a Paladin to earn Aegis which, while somewhat difficult due to him lacking a strength in Riding, can help his survivability against mages and fellow archers thanks to his high Dexterity.
    • While Desperation is generally seen as Awesome, but Impractical, especially for the frontline units who would normally get it, it can stack well with Bernadetta's "Persecution Complex" to make her a powerful offensive Archer who Players can use to take out enemy ranged units at the expense of making her, like the Lysithea example above, more of a Glass Cannon. Like Ashe above, one can use her strength in Lances and Budding Talent in Riding get her Aegis to increase her survivability against mages and archers to minimize the risks of this.
    • While Ignatz is arguably the weakest of the Houses' respective archers, his low damage output can be compensated in one of two ways. With the Dark Mage's Poison Strike, which he can access thanks to his Budding Talent in Reason, he can deal at least 20% damage to enemy units if he instigates a fight after the combat phase ends, which can still making killing enemies difficult but can add to his support potential by making him useful for weakening enemy HP for other units to finish off. If you want make him more offensively oriented, the Assassin's Lethality, which his strength in Swords and Bows can help him in accessing, can give him a chance of One Hit Killing enemies based on his naturally high Dexterity.
• Dirty Coward: Before Byleth became a professor at Garreg Mach, there was another professor who was just starting, but fled during the bandit attack, leaving Edelgard, Dimitri, and Claude behind. Lampshaded when Alois remarks that they "Can't entrust students to someone who's abandoned them once before, huh?"
• Disc-One Nuke:
  • Playing online can allow you to get incredibly potent equipment using the Spirits of the Fallen mechanic. While a good number of it is Rusty weapons, you can, as early as the third month, start finding weapons that will be better than what you have such as upgraded Training weapons, or Iron and Steel weapons. While it will take a little bit of time to get the Blacksmith, these can potentially trivialize early game fights as a result.
  • You can get the Lance of Ruin at the end of Chapter 5 if you have Sylvain in the party, and he's effortless to recruit if Byleth is female or the player chose the Blue Lions house. This thing has 22 might, 9 weight, and a unique combat art, and is pretty much the strongest weapon you're going to get until Thunderbrand (and you can't even get Thunderbrand on the Crimson Flower route until the very last mission).
  • Catherine, a Knight of Seiros recruitable on most routes from Ch 4 onwards, joins as a Swordmaster with Thunderbrand, which functions as a stronger Brave Sword before getting a normal Brave Sword, enough strength to single-handedly defeat the Death Knight (boosted further by her class' innate Swordfaire ability, which adds a flat +5 to her sword damage), and only grows stronger from here.
  • Shamir, Catherine's best friend and Foil, can be recruited at Ch 6 at the earliest as a Sniper with strength that surpasses that of all the in-house archers, an innate Bowfaire ability that adds a flat +5 to her bow damage, Bowrange +1 and will likely be the first unit in the player's roster to unlock the powerful Hunter's Volley combat art, which lets her launch two consecutive ranged attacks on enemies.
  • Felix's personal skill gives him five extra damage when he's not equipped with a Battalion, while Annette's personal skill is basically Rally Strength, giving the affected person +4 strength. These skills make the two great in the early game, and can make the Early Game Hell of the Maddening difficulty easier to go through, especially if you're on the Blue Lions route, where you get both from the start.
  • Completing the DLC storyline allows the player to recruit the Ashen Wolves (Yuri, Balthus, Hapi, Constance) on any new playthrough, whether it's a fresh file or New Game Plus, and each of the four come with a D rank in at least one skill. This also grants the player the Chalice of Beginnings (a Game-Breaker; see the page), along with 10k renown, which for a fresh file will virtually triple the amount of renown available to spend on the Saint Statues by the tiem they're unlocked.
• Disease Bleach: The painful and inhumane experimentation that endows someone with another Crest has a high failure rate. In the rare instances where the procedure is successful, the strain of bearing two Crests, along with shortening one's life span, turns the person's hair white.
• Distant Finale: Downplayed example with Jeritza's S-Support. While almost all S-Rank scenes take place right after a route's final battle, Jeritza's the only one that happens much, much later. Specifically, in the Empire's attack on Shambhala in Crimson Flower, which is alluded in many character epilogues that transpires later on after the main story.
• Divergent Character Evolution: The Cindered Shadows DLC only allows the player to use six units from the normal houses available, so the developers made sure that all of the characters who shared similar combat uses were made different to justify why you would use them. Specific examples include:
  • Claude and Ashe: Both Claude and Ashe are bow-focused units with a focus on Dexterity and Speed. However, Claude starts off as a Wyvern Rider, which makes him a Glass Cannon who focuses on dealing powerful bow damage, and can use axes if need be, but his attacking range is very limited. Ashe by contrast starts as a Sniper, giving him superior range on top of having several different ranged Combat Arts to compensate for his weaker offensive power. Additionally, Claude can reclass into a Sniper, allowing him to gain more range at the cost of his overall mobility, whereas Ashe has Assassin, which gives him more security (as one of the class's skills prevents them from being targeted so long as an ally is also in range) and speed at the cost of offensive power.
  • Edelgard and Hilda: Both Edelgard and Hilda are axe-focused units with high offensive power. However, Edelgard starts off as a Fortress Knight, making her more tanky at the cost of her offensive growths being weakened thanks to the penalty to Speed. Hilda by contrast starts as a Warrior, giving her more raw offensive power, but making her a Glass Cannon who is very fragile. Additionally, Edelgard can be reclassed into a Warrior, giving her the extra buff to her offensive power but losing her durability, while Hilda can become a Pegasus Knight, giving her a tremendous boost in Speed and the ability to fly, but making her even more fragile (and losing her battalion unless the player reclasses Claude and takes his battalion).
• Double-Meaning Title:
  • “Three Houses” could refer to the three classes at the Officers Academy, or to the three nations that rule Fódlan that each of the classes come from.
  • Meanwhile, the game's Japanese subtitle "Wind, Flower, Snow, Moon" can refer to either the four main seasons the game goes through during the story, or the story branches the game has.
• Double Unlock: Unlocking new classes is essentially a triple unlock. First, you need the skill requirements to take that class' certification exam (or close enough to them to attempt it with a reduced success rate). Then, you need the corresponding exam seal (Beginner, Intermedite, Advanced, Master, Dark, and the DLC Abyssian) for the level of that class. Finally, you need to actually pass the exam. Only then can you use the new class.
• Downer Beginning: On all routes other than Crimson Flower, the situation Byleth discovers at the start of Part II is extremely bleak. The western half of Faerghus is completely under Imperial control, Dimitri is on the run and has become a bloodthirsty butcher, the Alliance is fractured between pro-Church and pro-Empire factions with Claude barely keeping things together, the Knights of Seiros have been scattered to the four winds, Rhea is missing, and the Empire is on the verge of conquering Fódlan. Byleth's appearance is the turning point for them, as their appearance allows them to unite whichever faction they support.
• Downloadable Content:
  • The first "wave" of DLC launched alongside the game and added male and female Officers Academy outfits for protagonist Byleth. Wave 2 introduced new Auxiliary battle maps, "helpful in-game support items", Maddening difficulty, and some additional content. Wave 3 added new quests whilst making certain characters such as Jeritza playable for free; meanwhile, Wave 4 added a side story called Cindered Shadows (separate from the main game), new playable characters, locations, and online features, while also adding the option to have Tea Party with Rhea for free.
  • The "Amiibo Gazebo" gives minor item drops each in-game month once any amiibo is scanned. Previous Fire Emblem amiibo will include music tracks from their respective games, accessible in non-story battles.
  • In New Game Plus, having scanned a Fire Emblem amiibo lets one access the Holy Tomb. This gives better randomized items and a special ability called Sothis Shield that increases Resistance for three turns once per fight.
• Dragon Rider: Units can promote to Wyvern Rider and Wyvern Lord, and Wyvern Master and Barbarossa are exclusive to Claude. Like in most Fire Emblem games, a wyvern is a dragon with a pair of hind legs and wings where their arms would be, and as flying units, they have high movement and are immune to ground effects.
• Dramatic Irony: During the Azure Moon route, at one point a young girl begs to join the army in some capacity, despite clearly not being a soldier. She says that she must join the army, as she wants revenge on the man who killed her brother. Dimitri, currently seeking his own revenge, seems to sympathize and says that she can do whatever she wants. The player already knows that this girl is the sister of a general the Kingdom army killed a few chapters ago. The man she wants revenge on is Dimitri.
• Dramatic Unmask: The Flame Emperor's identity is revealed in the Holy Tomb in Chapter 11. If you're a Black Eagle, Edelgard is part of the party, so she simply tells everyone that she was the Flame Emperor. If you're a Blue Lion or Golden Deer, her mask comes off during battle. Everyone is horrified to find out she was the one responsible for the attacks on the Church, not least of which is Dimitri, who goes Laughing Mad. This reveal is so dramatic that it represents the point where the routes all diverge.
• Draw Aggro: Enemy attacks are now forecast during the player's turn, so they can know exactly who's at risk and shuffle units to protect anyone vulnerable. Hitting monsters with a Gambit forces them to target the perpetrator, which is particularly vital before their map attacks, as these aren't forecast otherwise.
• Dub Name Change: Ashe and Lysithea's last names change from Duran to Ubert and Cordelia to Ordelia (to avoid a shared-name scenario with Cordelia from Awakening) respectively. Meanwhile, Yuri Leclerc and Balthus von Albrecht's names were more changed wholesale; in the Japanese version, they're Yurius Leclair and Balthasar von Adalbrecht, respectively. Lastly, Aelfric's first name is slightly different in Japanese, as he's called Alphard instead.
• Dueling Player Characters: If you're a Black Eagle, the Chapter 11 boss is your own lord Edelgard, who has just been revealed to be the Flame Emperor. It's played particularly straight if you side with her and head to the Crimson Flower route, in which case she rejoins your party after the fight, while it's subverted if you turn on her and head to the Silver Snow route, since this marks her permanent Face–Heel Turn.
• Dungeon Bypass:
  • There are several levels within each route whose victory conditions are simply to defeat the enemy commander, and the right combination of Stride, dancing and Warp can enable players to skip the entire map and go straight to the commander, clearing the level in one turn.
  • A particularly notable example is the dungeon at the end of Chapter 6, where the victory conditions are either to defeat the Death Knight, or to defeat all the other enemy units. The player team starts right next to chamber where the Death Knight resides, but the route there is a complex maze involving locked doors and teleports. The obvious way to clear the level is to go all the way through the maze, which will take quite some time. But if the player has grinded Lysithea's Faith skill to B level in order for her to learn Warp, she can warp a strong character to the chamber in order to defeat the Death Knight right away. (Lindhardt and Hapi can also learn Warp, but only if their Faith level is A, which they are very unlikely to have reached at this point in the game.) Or if the team has a Killer Bow and a strong archer with the Combat Art to shoot arrows four spaces away, it is possible to shoot the Death Knight over his chamber walls and defeat him with a single critical hit. With these methods, the level can be cleared in one or two turns.
• Dynamic Difficulty:
  • In Maddening difficulty, the level of enemies found in most paralogues scale-up as the story progresses. That way, it manages to remain challenging regardless if it's done at the start or near its deadline.
  • While all of the routes level scale at roughly the same rate, with the endgame foes reaching around Level 40-45, there are certain aspects to each route that may make it easier or more difficult than others.
  • Zig-Zagged Trope route-wise, as every path features a variety of resources and tweaks that make the experience vary in spite of shared content:
    • Silver Snow and Verdant Wind are very similar, but also have many differences that make Silver Snow a bit harder:
    • Silver Snow starts with a similar amount of flexibility seen in the other paths but with some caveats: First, the route lasts one chapter less compared to Azure Moon and Verdant Wind; second, Anna's DLC paralogue is unavailable on this path; third, you need to wait up until Chapter 12 to get Cyril and Catherine to ally with you; fourth, you lose out on Edelgard and Hubert in Chapter 11 (thus missing their perks exclusive from Crimson Flower); and fifth, you lose access to a deployment slot from Chapter 12 onwards for every main story mission shared between both routes. As far challenge goes, there's a slight jump in enemy levels between Silver Snow's Chapter 16 and 17, there are no ally reinforcements for this path's version of the Fort Merceus infiltration map, the Embarr invasion maps need to be played back to back & the first also splits your party in 2 groups spread across the city unlike Azure Moon, and its final map is notoriously more difficult compared to Verdant Wind's, making you fight both a Final Boss and a slew of flunkies with multiple health bars and the Miracle skill. Finally, its base roster lacks a dedicated tank that lasts the whole route (unless Byleth is made into one), their mage, front-liners and archer lack bulk, and while a similar amount of non-crested units is shared with Verdant Wind, unlike it, none of the permanent students with crests have matching Hero Relics.
    • The Verdant Wind route meanwhile offers a good amount of resources and recruitable characters to use, lacking the late recruitment window Catherine and Cyril face in Silver Snow, with Claude - and by proxy, the Failnaught bow, the Immortal Corps battalion, his Paralogue, and the Sword of Begalta - being unique to it while also staying in your party during the whole path alongside his number-two Hilda, unlike Silver Snow's Edelgard and Hubert. Its starting cast meanwhile heavily favors bow users (with three members having boons and talents on it), has two dedicated magic users, one physical tank, two front-liners, and one member that can wield both use physical and magical attacks, all while three of the students lack crests with matching Hero Relics. Due to the route throwing a little bit of everything at the player, it ends up lacking mayor roadblocks besides the first Enbarr invasion chapter splitting your party in two groups spread across the city, and both Enbarr maps needing to be done back to back, and its final map, compared to Silver Snow, features mainly regular enemies, albeit with beefed up health and stats.
    • The Azure Moon route's main roadblocks are Dimitri's unavailability for Monastery training and Supports until Chapter 18, the possibility of permanently losing Dedue if you didn't do his Paralogue in Part I, and the abundance of mages and enemies using Bolting/Meteor or Ballistas/Onagers/Fire Orbs in the lategame; otherwise, this route offers the most resources for the player to tap into, the most recruitable units in the game (in addition to being the only route with Dimitri and Dedue playable and being able to recruit most of the members of the Church fairly early on during Part I, Gilbert also joins on it as well, and if you did do Dedue's Paralogue, he'll also stay with you permanently), and a balanced starting cast that features four front-liners, with two spell casters, one dedicated tank, and one archer, and with only two characters not having crests and matching Hero Relics. The maps that come after Chapter 17 also have far fewer reinforcements compared to the other routes, you fight the Death Knight one time less, and this is the only route where you can get both the Sword of Moralta, Sword of Zoltan, Tathlum Bow, and Annette's Relic Weapon.
    • The Crimson Flower route stands out in that, while it's the shortest path with only 18 Chapters, it's also by no means easier. It's main roadblocks are a slight jump in difficulty between Chapter 11 and 12, enemies dropping Intermediate Classes as early as Chapter 14 in the main story (other routes by comparison do so around Chapter 17~19), a heavy presence of enemy pegasi/wyvern riders, later missions having as a clear condition taking down multiple commanders - with very strong and exclusive equipment to boot -, its last missions featuring a high amount of monsters with Anti-Magic barriers, and its compactedness limiting how much your units can grow and access classes. It has the fewest amount of resources available too, netting you the lowest number of Paralogues, Relics, Sacred Weapons, and Battalions (most notably losing access to the rewards exclusive to Caspar & Ferdinand's paralogues), the church-aligned Battalions in the Battalion guild becoming unbuyable past-Chapter 11, and Umbral Steel available to repair Relics gained through Part I, while for characters, you lose access to Flayn after Chapter 11, and miss out the ability to recruit Seteth, Cyril, Catherine, and Hilda; conversely, it's also the only one where Edelgard, Hubert and Jeritza are playable and can fully access their unique benefits. Finally, the starting cast focuses mainly on magic, with three natural spell casters, three front-liners, one physical tank, and one archer, and unlike the other routes, while five students have Crests, only one has a matching Hero-like Relic compatible with it, which incidentally requires Agarthium to repair, a rare metal found only through breaking barriers of Giant Crawlers and Titanus.
• Dysfunction Junction: The three main lords have varying issues:
  • Edelgard became her father's heir, not because of her capabilities, but because all her siblings, both older and younger, died either from disease or insanity caused by Crest experimentation. The results of this has plagued her with nightmares for as long as she can remember, along with a healthy dose of Survivor's Guilt, and it leads her to attempt to kill Rhea and destroy the Church of Seiros, and lie to her allies and start a continental-scale war to attain her goal of bringing true peace to Fódlan in order to destroy the nobility and the Crest system that ruined her life.
  • Dimitri is the Sole Survivor of the tragedy of Duscur after a series of assassinations killed his father and other nobles. He suffers from Survivor's Guilt and can hear voices and hallucinations of those who died, asking why he hadn't avenged them yet. Post-timeskip, he is a Shell-Shocked Veteran with Sanity Slippage and is nothing but an Ax-Crazy Blood Knight wreck.
  • Claude is practically the most well-adjusted out of the three lords, but even he had to survive through the Chronic Backstabbing Disorder that is very common in his homeland. Only his pragmatic approach has kept him and his friends alive all this time. Before that he was ostracized in his homeland of Almyra, being relentlessly mocked for being a Child of Two Worlds, and ran away to Fodlan only to discover that its people were just as prejudiced. This has caused him to develop severe trust issues that cost him dearly outside of his own route.