As it pertains to post-view discussion, all spoilers are unmarked.
Being the mobile spin-off with a story considered to be subpar at best, many fans of Fire Emblem Heroes have expressed their disappointment whenever Intelligent Systems seemingly builds up to something within the story, only for there to be absolutely no payoff whatsoever. These are some examples of what fans consider to be wasted potential within the story, whether it involves the Main Story or other side stories like Forging Bonds.
- Book I's last sections of story focused on the curse that the Emblian family suffered from that drove them to become Ax-Crazy, and ended with Bruno leaving to find a cure for him and Veronica. While Bruno has indeed been gone trying to find it, the curse itself has never been spoken of or mentioned by Veronica again, leaving it unclear if it just hasn't occurred, or if its been forgotten/ignored by the writers. Jarringly, Veronica has, in person, worked with Askr twice now (Book III and Book IV) and has never once implied she felt an unnatural urge to kill them, nor shows any signs of being unable to control herself. It comes across as them silently removing it once Veronica became popular to justify her importance and working with the heroes. It would take until Book VI for them to address this plot point again.
- Book III had a lot of it, more so than any other book:
- In the lead up to Book III, a paralogue has Surtr revived by Hel in order to act as a tool for her to use. With the early part of Book III showing that Hel could revive the dead to add to her army, this made it seem like previously slain villains could be revived as soldiers for Hel's armies. Despite this, and an example of this being done by having Gustav appear as an enemy, Hel never does this and Gustav is the only named character to have this happen to them. And even then, it only happened exactly once before he disappeared, meaning neither Gustav nor this plot point were ever brought up again. This idea would instead be used in Book IV, as some previously fought characters are brought back as nightmares to stop the heroes, but as they are simply fake copies, it lacks the same weight that a revived one of them would have.
- Book III had the Heroes fought being a part of Hel's undead army. Not only is it never made clear if the Heroes fought were indeed brought back from the dead, given the theme of fighting an undead army, the game never uses this to its advantage to have any kind of banners based around the concept of undead heroes or heroes who fell but came back in some way. For example, Orson, a Fallen Hero of Renais who betrayed the heroes to revive his wife, the Duma Faithful, and the Dreadlords would naturally have fit into any banner given each one has some connection to the undead or being zombies. Instead, nothing is done with the concept.
- In Book III, much emphasis in the opening cinematic was put on Sharena being murdered by Hel. We later find out that this is an alternate universe version of her, whose brother became Líf, but while Líf himself credits his turn to darkness with her death, he never mentions her again after the book ends, and his playable forms have more to say on Alfonse and the Summoner than Sharena. While it's justifiable that Líf goes out of his way not to interact with Sharena directly, since he hesitates to attack her and simply speaking to the main universe Sharena in Chapter 12 is enough to make him question his goals, Sharena herself also doesn't have much of a reaction to dying, nor is any focus given to how she feels after Líf is defeated, despite Alfonse himself having moments to reflect upon what he could have become. Unfortunately, this lack of focus for Sharena just turns her into Collateral Angst that adds nothing to neither her character nor her familial relationship to Alfonse.
- The penultimate chapter of Book IV reveals that the Alfonse traveling with the heroes is actually the Summoner who dreamed themselves as Alfonse because Alfonse was killed by Alfaðör as punishment for defeating Hel. This opened the possibility of the Summoner and Sharena having to deal with or reverse Alfonse's death, giving Anna and Sharena the spotlight after both have been Out of Focus for most of the story, and presents an interesting plot angle for the next book. However the very next chapter reveals Alfonse is alive and well, turning Freyja's claim about his death into a Motivational Lie. Fans were upset with how quickly this plot thread was dropped after how amazing of a twist it was, and how it would finally give lasting consequences on the actions of the previous stories, rather than each Book having the same beginning and end as each other, with no major change between any of them whatsoever.
- Book VII reveals a key factor that Freyr and Freyja are Vanir gods, and that their father is Njörðr and aunt is Nerþuz. Many people suspected that their involvement and deaths in Book IV would become relevant to the plot of Book VII, particularly when it was revealed that Njörðr was the one responsible for the creation of Gullveig, the Golden Seer who destroyed the world in the future and in previous cycles. Additionally, others thought that Freyr and Freyja's relationship with their father would be brought up during the "Nihility & Dream" Tempest Trials when people correctly suspected Eitr was a younger version of Freyja. Unfortunately, this plot point of their relationship between the two gods is never explored outside of a few brief mentions from Seiðr and Freyr (and Feh in the April 2023 Feh Channel) that they hail from Vanaheimr and that Nerþuz is their aunt, which makes the sudden mention of the two feel like less like an important part of the story and more like an obligation due to their heritage in Norse Mythology.
