Discussion FireEmblemThreeHouses / TropesNToR

Third in my series of big giant Three Houses edits.

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

I rewrote all Flame Emperor examples to not use pronouns, because "they" is a spoiler.

I removed spoiler tags hiding the existence of Silver Snow, since it's one of the three default routes.

I reordered examples into SS -> AM -> VW -> CF, and generally rewrote things to describe SS as a default route and CF as the secret hidden villain route which it is.

I replaced all instances of "Nabatean", a word that is never spoken in the game, with "Child(ren) of the Goddess", a phrase used frequently, and by the dragons themselves to refer to themselves.

Removed the following tropes:

• Nintendo Hard: Downplayed example. The Silver Snow route is notoriously more difficult compared to the other routes. For starters, you lose access to your lord and respective retainer midway through the story, the main story maps from the halfway point onward have one deployment slot less compared to the other routes up until the endgame, Hilda, Cyril and Catherine all become recruitable midway through the story instead of early on like the other routes, and there is even a noticeable Difficulty Spike that takes place in Chapter 17 to boot. According to the developers, this was deliberate, as the Church route was conceived from the start as the path with the hardest difficulty, and that any measures taken which could be deemed cruel were fully intentional.

I don't think Nintendo Hard can be downplayed.

• Not Allowed to Grow Old: All of the students (and Cyril) all look and sound older after the Time Skip, and they all get a redesign to boot. Everyone else on the other hand, which includes the faculty, the Church members, and Knights, all look the same before and after the Time Skip. They don't even change their hair or default outfit, which is even lampshaded by Manuela. Via Flayn, this is also a cue of the strange nature of green haired church members.

It's only been five years; the adults won't look that different.

• Playable Epilogue: Subverted on the Church route. During that path's final month, your recruited characters acknowledge that all known threats to Fódlan have been thwarted, and during this period, they'll share to Byleth their plans for the future. While you're still given the option to train your units and do any available paralogues, you can also end the month early if you wish so. At this point, it would seem that the only thing left is to watch the credits, right? Wrong. Once the final mission starts, the chapter's title changes to "The Final Battle" and Rhea suddenly succumbs to dragon degeneration and starts a mindless rampage across the monastery in her Immaculate One form, kickstarting the Final Boss fight.

That's not what Playable Epilogue means.

Regarding the recent edit, I fail to see how what was removed was simply my own "interpretation." Rhea states the humans of Fodlan warred with each other in defiance of Sothis' teachings, and the Abyss text agrees that Sothis was angered by their wars as it states "for the children of men who spilled too much of the blood of life, it promises only cruel retribution." The whole point was that both accounts agree with each other in that respect.

Whether the text is stating that Sothis was trying to kill off humanity completely is an entirely separate matter. Though (and this is speculation) one must consider that the Agarthans regard only themselves as human, so they would be the "children of men" who fled into the depths of the earth" while the "beasts" left on the surface would have included the humans who filled Fodlan afterward. This is supported by how Hubert states their vendetta is not only against the children of the goddess but also against all other humans, just as the Abyss text states they swore an "oath of revenge against the surface world".

https://imgur.com/a/IbluWTg

Why was the Church route renamed "Empire route" when Byleth is explicitly refusing to fight for the Empire in it ?

Why were the route names changed to "Kingdom/Alliance/etc..." with the "the" constantly omitted ?