Discussion Characters / FireEmblemThreeHousesBlackEagles

So, these two sections were removed last year by that guy who did all the sweep edits.

For Bernadetta:

• Foil: To Marianne in so, so many ways:
  • While both have issues with their respective fathers, Marianne is more ambivalent towards hers and some of her endings have Marianne improve her relationship with Margrave Edmund. Bernadetta on the other hand has an abusive asshole of a father who only seeks to make her a "proper wife" so she can marry a powerful noble, and her relationship with her father never improves. Moreover, while Marianne is adopted, Bernadetta is the birth daughter of Count Varley.
  • Bernadetta is a physical unit while Marianne is more focused on magic. Marianne also has a boon in horse riding, while in Bernadetta's case it's a hidden talent. The opposite happens with their lances abilities.
  • Both have extreme self-esteem issues and trouble talking to other people. Bernadetta has a ton of anxiety and perceives anything she does as a sleight while bordering on being a motor mouth, while Marianne simply doesn't engage in social activities and isn't much of a talker. Bernadetta also has a desire to make friends at the Monastery whereas Marianne prefers to be left alone.
  • Marianne has a particular fondness for animals, while Bernadetta has an affinity for plants (though she does like animals too).
  • Bernadetta has strong survival instincts, contrasting Marianne's desire to simply die.
  • Outside of Verdant Wind, Marianne will completely vanish if the player doesn't poach her; Bernadetta, in spite of (or perhaps because of) her fear of Edelgard and her father, can always be encountered fighting for the Empire at Gronder Field on Azure Moon and Verdant Wind. In a similar vein, while both of them show among the most lavish devotion to Byleth when Supported, Bernadetta shows no real loyalty to any of the other Lords and is mostly uncaring of their ideals; Meanwhile, Marianne will almost excessively idolize either Edelgard (if poached on Flower) or Claude (on Verdant Wind), although the bond she can develop with Dimitri is generally much healthier.
  • Part of Marianne's issues come from the nature of her Crest, meanwhile Bernadetta seemingly has no issue with her Crest whatsoever, one of the few things she doesn't dislike about herself.
  • Marianne is highly religious, while Bernadetta is indifferent to religion as a whole despite being the daughter of the Minister of Religious Affairs.
  • Physically they contrast each other, with Bernadetta being a short slender girl while Marianne is a tall curvy girl. Bernadetta wears a short skirt, Marianne wears a longer one. After the Time Skip, Bernadetta grows considerably while Marianne remains relatively the same.
  • They both experience Character Development in differing ways during the Time Skip if recruited: Marianne becomes more confident, cheerful and social, and expresses disgust with how she used to behave. Bernadetta does become a little braver and stronger too, but still maintains some of the insecurity and anxiety she had prior.

And for Dorothea:

• Foil: To Hilda, both of them are very feminine women who nonetheless find themselves on the battlefield and like to use their wiles to get people to do things for them. The difference between them being that while Hilda is lazy because of her exceptionally talented older brother setting impossibly high standards Hilda doesn't feel up to filling, thus she prefers to delegate her chores by flirting with others, Dorothea has had to work hard her whole life owing to being poor and her flirting is out to catch herself a rich spouse who will support her when she is old and grey.

The reason given for the removal of both is that Bernadetta and Marianne do not interact, and nor do Dorothea and Hilda. Well, as of Three Hopes, they do now. But I don't really have any fighting energy in me these days, so I thought I would bring it up here just in case there were any objections before I restored these tropes.

Edited by ThePantherMan Hide / Show Replies

Does anyone mind if I add a note about Scarlet Blaze and uncomment out the route information? I feel like it's a bit self-defeating that that is present for the Lions and Deer, but not the Eagles (implying there's something up with that house).

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• Recurring Element: Petra continues the trend of a female sword-fighting warrior from a foreign land who has trouble with the local language started by Ayra, with Petra being a close follow-up from Athena, albeit Petra has better understanding of the local language.

Is the first part of this even true in regards to Ayra? While I have never played Genealogy, everything I have heard about Ayra hasn't portrayed as being like this, at least as a comparison to Athena and Petra.

Edited by TPPR10 Continue the bloodline, Fujimaru! Hide / Show Replies

I done did do make a sweeping edit of this page.

I removed all quotation marks around "those who slither in the dark", because that's a description, not their name.

I removed all references to a "Church route", because there is no Church route. I also reworded some examples to not imply that Crimson Flower is a default route.

I moved tropes and events that only happen in Heroes to their own section.

I de-spoiler-tagged references to Lysithea having two Crests, because that isn't a secret.

Tropes I removed:

General

• Kill Em All: If you don't recruit any of them, then it is entirely possible to wipe out the Black Eagle house in Azure Moon and Verdant Wind. However, besides Edelgard, Hubert and Ferdinand are the only ones the player is required to kill themselves, as coincidence handles the others: If you don't kill her, Bernadetta would logically perish in the Battle of Gronder Field, as Edelgard is scripted to set spaces around Bernadetta's location on fire (whether or not Bernadetta, or even Edelgard herself, is still there). In Verdant Wind, even if you don't defeat them yourselves, Caspar and Linhardt's chances of survival when a third party causes the cutscene destruction of Fort Merceus are... slim.

This is about all or most of the characters in a story dying, not that all the antagonists die.

Hubert

• Bad Guys Do the Dirty Work: Invoked. He's insistent on being the bad guy doing all of Edelgard's dirty work so that she'll never have to and declines to tell her all the things he's been doing to make her dream a reality. Edelgard is dismayed by this, as she's already resolved to stain herself red with blood to create a better world.

Edelgard does plenty of dirty work herself.

• Dark Is Not Evil: Played With. Hubert's generic class outfits are all black and red, he learns exclusively dark magic through reason, has an overall sinister look to him, and serves as an antagonist on three out of four routes. However, he also despises those who slither in the dark, believing that their motives are not justifiable, and when he and Edelgard are both killed on the Silver Snow and Verdant Wind routes, he leaves behind a letter informing the party of their hidden base, asking them to destroy "those who slither in the dark."

Dude. Hubert is evil. He may not be quite as evil as the Nazis, but he's not a good guy.

• Everyone Has Standards: He is willing to do whatever it takes to help Edelgard in her quest, whether that means killing or scheming behind her back or even having his own father executed for betraying his duty to the Emperor. However, he expresses contempt for those who slither in the dark due to how vile they are. Hubert might not be a nice person, and he's borderline evil depending on how you view his actions, but everything he does is for Edelgard and making sure her dream of a better future for the land comes true. By contrast those who slither in the dark lack any justifiable motives in his view, as they commit such horrible experiments on people, including Edelgard herself. If you chose the Crimson Flower route, he makes it clear they only work together because they need the extra strength for the war, and he eagerly awaits the day he can make them suffer for their crimes. His disdain for them is such that he would rather go behind Edelgard's back and assist the enemy with information on their location, so that if he dies, he can make sure those who slither in the dark can pay for their evil.

This trope is about having lines one will not cross, not about crossing lines but finding it distasteful.

• Must Have Caffeine: Coffee is listed as one of his likes.

This trope is about not being about to function without coffee, not just liking it.

Petra

• Ambiguously Brown: She has a light tan complexion, likely due to her hailing from a tropical region.

She's Brigidan. There's nothing ambiguous about it. Ambiguously Brown is for characters who are, you know, ambiguously brown, not just every character with darker-than-white skin.

• Everybody Hates Mathematics: "Mathematics" is one of her dislikes, and one of her disliked gifts is the Arithmetic Textbook. She also has a weakness in Reason magic, which is often associated with science.

This trope isn't about one character not liking maths. Annette and Lysithea do enjoy maths, and Sylvain appears to do so in secret, so this isn't an example.

Linhardt

• Berserk Button: The normally laid-back Lindhardt pretty much throws a tantrum in his B-support with Catherine when she refuses to let him study Thunderbrand.

Getting mad once does not a berserk button make.

• Mythology Gag: Linhardt and Caspar's relationship is a callback to Ike and Soren. The two are childhood friends, and Linhardt resembles Soren in being a green-haired, anti-social mage. Linhardt and Caspar's paired ending is also a very similar, but more light-hearted version of Ike and Soren's, having them disappear to travel the world together.

That's a stretch.

• My Own Grampa: Zigzagged. His ending with Flayn implies they've had a few children after the war. As Flayn really is Cethleann, it essentially means Linhardt had babies with his own ancestor, as he bears the crest of Cethleann himself. However, since the Four Saints' crests were initially bestowed to their first human bearers by blood transfusion, and not transmitted by birth, there is ultimately no regular ancestral kinship between Linhardt and Flayn.

My Own Grandpa is about being one's own ancestor, not about shagging one's own ancestor. Also Cethleann never had any children before going into a magic coma.

Dorothea

• Buxom Is Better: Given her outfits, she clearly has no issue flaunting her ample breasts.

This trope isn't about hot girls having big breasts, it's about hotness being directly proportional to breast size in-universe.

• Foil: To Hilda, both of them are very feminine women who nonetheless find themselves on the battlefield and like to use their wiles to get people to do things for them. The difference between them being that while Hilda is lazy because of her exceptionally talented older brother setting impossibly high standards Hilda doesn't feel up to filling, thus she prefers to delegate her chores by flirting with others, Dorothea has had to work hard her whole life owing to being poor and her flirting is out to catch herself a rich spouse who will support her when she is old and grey.

Eh, Hilda and Dorothea never interact, so I don't think this counts.

Caspar

• Character Select Forcing: Caspar must deal the finishing blow to the boss of his paralogue in order to obtain a unique weapon as a reward. This can be circumvented on Azure Moon and Verdant Wind by waiting until the last possible moment to poach him so he starts off as a decently powerful Brigand who can be promoted straight to Warrior, and on Crimson Flower it's a moot point outright since you can't play his paralogue on that route; however, on Silver Snow, you are forced to raise him from scratch if you want that reward.

This trope is for cases where you have a choice of characters, but the level is built around one in particular. You have no choice but to deploy Caspar in his paralogue, so this isn't an example.

• Everyone Has Standards: While he's eager to jump into a fight most of the time, he's also terrified at the idea of fighting his father, and not just for the obvious blood relation.

This trope is about morals. The example is just Caspar having a realistic assesment of his own strengths and weaknesses.

• (Foil)
  • Serves as one to Miklan. Miklan holds nothing but contempt for his younger brother Sylvain for being born with a Crest, whereas Caspar holds no ill will towards his older brother for having one as opposed to him. While Miklan is driven by a wish to have a crest after being denied one for all his life, Caspar couldn't care less about being crestless and wants to make a future of his own. It helps that Caspar was never disowned and wasn't brought up in a family of "Crest fanatics", so he's still very well-adjusted despite his lack of a Crest.

Foils need to intract or be contrasted in some way by the narrative; merely having traits in common does not a foil make.

• Mythology Gag: Linhardt and Caspar's relationship is a callback to Ike and Soren. The two are childhood friends, and Caspar resembles Ike in being a blue-haired physical fighter with a strong sense of justice. Linhardt and Caspar's paired ending is also a very similar, but more light-hearted version of Ike and Soren's, having them disappear to travel the world together. Ike also had a similar paired epilogue with another male character, Ranulf, and Caspar has the same in Ashe.

Still a stretch.

Ferdinand

• Ambiguous Disorder:
  • His tendency to go over the top to get people to like him, energetic and occasionally-overly apologetic nature, and short attention span are signs of ADHD, especially Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria.
  • His difficulty in reading social cues and actually connecting with other people may imply some form of autism spectrum disorder.
  • His borderline obsession with outdoing Edelgard suggests he might harbor an inferiority complex in regards to her.

That's a stretch.

• Animal Motifs:
  • Horses. His default class line is the horse-based Cavalier line, he has a bonus towards stable duty, has a boon in riding, and can be found hanging near the stables often. His post-timeskip hairstyle also somewhat resembles a horse's mane.
  • He also has a mild dog motif. One of the dog breeds around the monastery is called the "Aegir Hound," and his post-timeskip hair resembles the shaggy coat of some dog breeds. Personality-wise, he's eager to please, social, and outgoing.

These are pretty weak.

• Dishing Out Dirt: His Crest is associated with the land, like his fellow Cichol-bearer Seteth aka the Cichol, the Earth Dragon.

Dishing Out Dirt is specifically about having power ovee Earth, which Ferdie does not.

• Exceptionally Tolerant: While majority of the nobles in the game prove to be Modest Royalty, Ferdinand tends to be shockingly forward-thinking given his upbringing. Despite much of his posturing about being a noble, he's rather open-minded to walks of life that differ from his own, and is quick to correct his behavior when he puts his foot in his mouth. In his A-support with Edelgard, he even proposes the integration of universal free education, to balance the disparity there between nobles and commoners, into the Empire once her work is done, an idea that even Edelgard hadn't thought of.

Exceptionally Tolerant is about society as a whole, not one individual.

• Man in a Kilt: Possibly during the school phase, as his uniform includes either a skirt-like piece or an extension past the waist, something not found on any other male student.

That's not a kilt, he just has a long blazer.

• Moveset Clone: Downplayed, but Ferdinand shares several statistical traits with Hilda.
  • Both have Crests that potentially shut down a foe's counterattack when using combat arts.
  • Both have proficiencies in lances and axes, with both being part of their default study plans.
  • Both have a budding talent in heavy armor, and upon unlocking, learn Seal Speed.
  • Ferdinand and Hilda share HP, Strength, Speed, Defense, and Resistance growths.

This is a fighting game trope.

• Not So Different:
  • Despite being nearly polar opposites with Hubert, Ferdinand shares several traits with him. Hubert kills his own father, while Ferdinand wants his to answer for his crimes. Additionally, both Hubert and a non-recruited Ferdinand will express jealousy at the attention Edelgard gives Byleth.
  • Despite how much he butts heads with her, Ferdinand actually shares Edelgard's hatred for nobles who abuse their authority. Where they differ is that Edelgard would rather rid the nobility class as whole while Ferdinand would prefer to dispose of those who do abuse their power and for the remaining nobles to strive to achieve his idealized view of what they should be.

This trope is about characters realising that they're more similar than they thought.

• Not So Similar: While he shares his lance/axe/riding strengths, Strength and Speed growths, and access to Swift Strikes with Sylvain, the two are more distinct. Sylvain has a passable Magic growth, a budding talent in Reason, a decent spell list, and access to the Lightning Axe combat art, allowing him to become a Magic Knight class, while Ferdinand is a Magically Inept Fighter. Sylvain also has less overall flexibility on the physical end, having a weakness in bows and a neutrality in swords, while Ferdinand is neutral and proficient, respectively. Finally, Sylvain's personal skillset has him set up to be more of a wall, while Ferdinand's makes him more of an evasion tank.

Sylvain and Ferdinand aren't really presented as similar.

• Not the Intended Use: He's clearly set up to be a combat unit between his good offensive stats, wide range of proficiencies, and access to the rare Swift Strikes combat art. However, his sword and riding proficiencies, good Speed and Charm, and evasion-granting personal skill make him a solid pick for the Dancer class, of all things. ^note Ferdinand's Charm stat gives him a high chance to win the contest, his sword proficiency, Speed, and personal skill let him easily stack evasion to become almost impossible to hit; and his riding proficiency means he can easily get Movement+1, lessening the need for the March Ring.

Ferdinand himself tells you he'd make a great Dancer. That's totally the intended use.

• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Downplayed. While his post-timeskip design bears more than a few similarities to Eldigan or Ares, they have little else in common beyond appearance and being cavalry classes.

SSS is for characters within a single continuity. The trope you're looking for is Expy, which the example says he isn't.

Bernadetta

• Foil: To Marianne in so, so many ways:
  • While both have issues with their respective fathers, Marianne is more ambivalent towards hers and some of her endings have Marianne improve her relationship with Margrave Edmund. Bernadetta on the other hand has an abusive asshole of a father who only seeks to make her a "proper wife" so she can marry a powerful noble, and her relationship with her father never improves. Moreover, while Marianne is adopted, Bernadetta is the birth daughter of Count Varley.
  • Bernadetta is a physical unit while Marianne is more focused on magic. Marianne also has a boon in horse riding, while in Bernadetta's case it's a hidden talent. The opposite happens with their lances abilities.
  • Both have extreme self-esteem issues and trouble talking to other people. Bernadetta has a ton of anxiety and perceives anything she does as a sleight while bordering on being a motor mouth, while Marianne simply doesn't engage in social activities and isn't much of a talker. Bernadetta also has a desire to make friends at the Monastery whereas Marianne prefers to be left alone.
  • Marianne has a particular fondness for animals, while Bernadetta has an affinity for plants (though she does like animals too).
  • Bernadetta has strong survival instincts, contrasting Marianne's desire to simply die.
  • Outside of Verdant Wind, Marianne will completely vanish if the player doesn't poach her; Bernadetta, in spite of (or perhaps because of) her fear of Edelgard and her father, can always be encountered fighting for the Empire at Gronder Field on Azure Moon and Verdant Wind. In a similar vein, while both of them show among the most lavish devotion to Byleth when Supported, Bernadetta shows no real loyalty to any of the other Lords and is mostly uncaring of their ideals; Meanwhile, Marianne will almost excessively idolize either Edelgard (if poached on Flower) or Claude (on Verdant Wind), although the bond she can develop with Dimitri is generally much healthier.
  • Part of Marianne's issues come from the nature of her Crest, meanwhile Bernadetta seemingly has no issue with her Crest whatsoever, one of the few things she doesn't dislike about herself.
  • Marianne is highly religious, while Bernadetta is indifferent to religion as a whole despite being the daughter of the Minister of Religious Affairs.
  • Physically they contrast each other, with Bernadetta being a short slender girl while Marianne is a tall curvy girl. Bernadetta wears a short skirt, Marianne wears a longer one. After the Time Skip, Bernadetta grows considerably while Marianne remains relatively the same.
  • They both experience Character Development in differing ways during the Time Skip if recruited: Marianne becomes more confident, cheerful and social, and expresses disgust with how she used to behave. Bernadetta does become a little braver and stronger too, but still maintains some of the insecurity and anxiety she had prior.

Bernie and Mary never interact or really get compared or contrasted. Not foils.

• Moveset Clone: Subverted. Bernadetta shares her bow proficiency and Strength and Speed growths (35% and 50%, respectively) with Ashe and Ignatz, but she tends to be the trickiest to use due to her axe bane and the balancing act required on her HP.

This is a fighting game trope.

• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Of Noire, being an archer who has developed a timid, negative personality as a result of parental abuse. By proxy, she can be considered one of Neimi.

SSS only applies within a continuity.

Ukrainian Red Cross Hide / Show Replies

Caspar is a clueless chick magnet. Agree or disagree?

Moon Star of Limbo, Give me the might, the muscle, the menace, of MON*STAR!

• Despite being the house most associated with magic, they don't have the two strongest magic units. Mercedes, the strongest Faith user, is a member of the Blue Lions and Lysithia, the strongest Reason user, is a member of the Golden Deer.

This section should be removed, it focuses too strongly on arguable unit quality.

Mercedes being the strongest faith user is very much debatable (She's hyper-focused into healing and lacks utility spells such as Warp or Silence), and shifts in the meta game have made Lysithea desirable more for her long-distance warp range than her ability to nuke down enemies (which is a little unreliable on Maddening). Furthermore, DLC character Constance is just as good at blasting enemies to smithereens as Lysithea, and she IS from the Empire.

Does anybody agree?

Edited by Raxis Hide / Show Replies

Can we conclude on Ferdinand and Hubert being Ambiguously Bi? I don't think theres enough to it, and the whole "Oh the Japanese text" excuse is not helping when there is no supporting link with a credible translation. Their ending has no romantic tone at all.

Muramasa got. Hide / Show Replies

Is Hubert and Ferdinand really Bi the way? It really seems too ambiguous to count, and it's repeatedly noted that they both only have female options.

I'll teach you a lesson about just how cruel the world can be. That's my job, as an adult. Hide / Show Replies

Does Bernadetta count as an example for "Morality Chain"? Her paired ending with Edelgard explicitly states that Edelgard has her as a Consul to keep from being detached from people. And that Bernie is happy to offer Edelgard an emotional perspective.

Would Hubert count as an Evil Brit? Probably not, right?

I just feel like the way his VA pronounces some lines tries to almost make him sound British, even though I can't explain how or why that makes sense to me. I doubt the trope applies to him but I at least wonder if someone else hears what I hear.

Considering Hubert has multiple paired endings that involve him falling in love with someone other than Edelgard, does 'Single Target Sexuality' really apply to him? Especially since 'Undying Loyalty' is also already listed as describing his feelings for her.

I've noticed that Ferdinand almost never uses any contractions. So it's always "I have" instead of "I've", "I am" instead of "I'm", and so on. I can't help but feel like this is somehow because of his noble upbringing, even if that makes no sense.

Is there a trope for this?

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