Woobie / Fire Emblem

Fire Emblem is home to many woobies due to being a game about war.

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Archanea Era

• Marth is driven from his homeland and separated from his sister at the tender age of 14, learns his father has been betrayed and killed by a longtime ally, is forced to leave one of his companions for dead, learns his mother was killed shortly after his homeland was conquered, is betrayed by a longtime ally of his, and nearly loses his sister again to Demonic Possession.
• Katarina was raised as a Tyke Bomb by an abusive matriarch, and is forced to betray the first people to show her kindness. She gets better after the Avatar convinces her to turn face.
• Prior to the events of Shadow Dragon, Nyna's kingdom is conquered by Dolhr and the entire royal family save her executed. Nyna only survives thanks to the intervention of Camus, a general of Grust, a nation allied to Dolhr. Nyna falls in love with Camus and attempts to sway him into defecting, but his knightly honor prevents him from betraying his country and he is presumed killed in battle shortly afterward. After the events of Shadow Dragon, Nyna is forced into a political marriage with the Aurelian prince Hardin in order to place a king on Archanea's throne. After Hardin is corrupted by the evil sorcerer Gharnef, he offers Nyna to Gharnef to be used as a ritual sacrifice to resurrect Medeus. Nyna is thus brainwashed and forced to fight Marth. Camus, having survived and taken the assumed name Sirius, brings her to her senses, but vanishes shortly afterward to return to Valentia and live with his new lover Tatiana. Nyna finally breaks down, abdicates her throne to Marth, and vanishes, never to be seen again.
• Throughout the events of Shadow Dragon, Hardin suffers from deeply-hidden jealousy of Marth, who was chosen as the champion who would save the world. He also falls in love with Princess Nyna of Archanea, but she does not reciprocate due to her unrequited love for Camus. After the events of Shadow Dragon, Nyna offers her hand to Hardin in marriage in order to place him on the throne of Archanea. Hardin gleefully accepts, but soon falls into despair when he realizes Nyna never loved him. The evil sorcerer Gharnef takes advantage of his despair to give him the Darksphere, which corrupts him into a tyrannical despotic emperor. Under the Darksphere's influence, Hardin offers Nyna as a sacrifice to resurrect the evil dragon Medeus and starts a world war that causes the deaths of countless innocent lives. When Marth defeats him in battle, Hardin comes back to his senses, but can only lament in horror at all of the sufferings he caused and reaffirm his love for Nyna before succumbing to his wounds and dying in Marth's arms.

Jugdral Era

• Sigurd himself. Over the course of the game, his childhood friend is kidnapped, he and his father get framed for treason and regicide, he gets hounded halfway across the continent, he is manipulated into laying the groundwork for an evil empire, he is forced to kill one of his best friends in battle, his wife gets kidnapped and brainwashed, his sister and brother-in-law are slaughtered in a futile attempt to save his sorry hide, his father dies in his arms, his last remaining ally turns out to have been with the villains all along, said ally taunts him about how he has married the brainwashed wife, and he and almost all of his friends get roasted for their troubles.
• Tailtiu: Starts out as a super cheery, devil-may-care Genki Girl that has the markings of a Plucky Girl. The pluckiness starts to shatter the instant her father brands her a traitor along with Sigurd and she felt that her childhood friend Azelle is the only one she can turn to. It breaks again when confronting her father and eventually losing contact with her husband after the Battle of Belhalla. Then she gets kidnapped with her infant daughter Tine to Freege, losing contact with her son Arthur, and broken beyond belief due to the torture and abuse of Hilda just to protect little Teeny that she degenerated into a depressed woman that dies losing her will to live. And possibly, she gets turned into the Deadlord Anguilla afterwards, seeing that Anguilla has both minor Tordo blood and the spellbook Tailtiu had in the beginning: Thoron. Damn it.
• Tine: See above. The prospect of being kidnapped since infant age, seeing her mother die protecting her and spending the rest of her childhood taking further abuses by Hilda now that Tailtiu is gone (like being called 'traitor's daughter'), and Bloom still acting like a controlling uncle instead of protecting her... it's not doing any favors for Teeny's insecure self. It was a good thing that there were some kind souls like Ishtar and Ishtore to prevent her going off the rockers. The same also applies for Linda, who takes Teeny's role if Talitiu died or had no children.
• Arthur: Unlike any other children, Arthur pretty much had his life as a normal child robbed from him at the tender age of 7, including the kidnapping of his mother and sister. Other children may have their noble upbringing (Ced/Fee), being in an Orphanage of Love (Seliph & co, Faval/Patty, Leen), be in a good retainer/parent's hands (Leif, Nanna, Julia (yes, Arvis and Deirdre were very kind to her before things went to hell)), or be Happily Adopted (Corple). Arthur only had a stranger old lady that picked him up and the rest, he had to fend for himself since young age, shaping up his 'cold' self as mentioned.
• Altena: Kidnapped as an infant by Travant, the man who murdered her parents, and raised to believe that she's his daughter, with the Nea Fuyuki manga suggesting that she had a very unhappy (if not outright abusive) childhood with Areone as her only support. Either way, by the present she's a Broken Bird, and the bomb that Leif drops on her doesn't help, seeing as how it shakes up everything she's known and pits her against Areone, her Implied Love Interest.

Elibe Era

• Lucius's father was murdered by a mercenary when he was young, and his mother later died of illness shortly after. This resulted in him being put in an orphanage where he was bullied for his feminine appearance. He later served as a retainer of House Cornwell, although the Marquess and his wife were assassinated, driving their son and Lucius's closest friend, Raymond, to be driven by madness. While Lucius does earn a happy ending of either opening up his own orphanage or travelling the continent with Raven, The Binding Blade indicates that the owner of the Araphen orphanage has been killed by invaders...
• Nino. Her family was murdered by Sonia, and was taken in by her only because Nergal thought she could be some use to them. She would then grew up being neglected and verbally abused by Sonia, not even learning how to read. Even after recruiting her and training her up, she still inevitably witnesses the deaths of her step-family that she loved dearly. To make matters worse, the sequel reveals that Nino died when she was only 25, leaving her sons behind.
• Legault is a deserter of the Black Fang, he's also a liar and trolls the people he supports with to cover up his issues of losing the friends that he knew for years. The reason for him abandoning the Fang was because he was forced to kill a companion against his own will. And just like Nino above, he will watch his friends that he knew so fondly die, which can be at his own hands too if the player chooses to.
• Lyn was conceived by Madelyn and Hassan after the former refused to court Marquess Araphen. Her entire tribe would then be slaughtered by Taliver bandits months prior to the beginning of the story. She travels to Caelin after learning about her Lycian to save her grandfather, who was poisoned by his brother. She does get a chance to meet Marquess Araphen, but he is revealed to be racist towards Sacaeans. Regardless of whether you give Lyn a paired ending or not, her grandfather would later pass away anyway, presumably from natural causes this time.
• Ninian and Nils spend the majority of the story being pursued by the Black Fang and Nergal. As it turns out, they're Really 700 Years Old Half-Human Hybrids forcefully pulled out of the Dragon's Gate and stripped of their powers by Nergal. Their father abandoned them at a shrine to search for their mother, but never returned. Ninian in particular, falls in love with Eliwood (which can be reciprocated depending if you support them or not), but is pulled back by her heritage. She is later accidentally killed by him, and even if she is resurrected by Bramimond, she either leaves forever through the Dragon's Gate or live happily with Eliwood at the cost of having a shorter lifespan. If the latter is achieved, then Nils would leave through the Dragon's Gate alone, never to see his sister and all the friends he got to knew again. And forgot to mention, after completing certain side chapters in Hector Mode, it's later revealed that Nergal is their father. Nils will even shed tears upon his death, although he wouldn't know why.
• Eliwood goes out to search for his disappeared father, but never did he ever thought said mission would involve his father dying in his arms after all his efforts of finding him, and accidentally killing the girl he loves. (Even if Eliwood is paired up with someone else, Ninian always falls in love with him.)
• While he doesn't express sadness as openly as Lyn and Eliwood, Hector's parents passed away from illness, leaving his older brother, Uther to take care of him. His brother would then contract the same illness that took his parents and his death was kept as a secret to him. Once he figured it out of his brother's death, he was more than angry at Oswin for not telling him what was happening.
• Priscilla barely has any chances of having people in her life stay long. It ranges from her separation from her biological family, her brother pretty much abandoning her even after reuniting with him years later, and all of her romantic relations (save for one) ending badly due to her high social status.
• Kishuna is the only morph created by Nergal capable of having emotions, and is looked down on by him. Renault's conversation with Nergal heavily implies that he is a recreation of his dead friend.

Magvel Era

Tellius Era

The Woobie

• Jill Fizzart is a misguided youth of 17 (20 in Radiant Dawn) who starts off hating the Laguz because of the way she was raised in Daein. After having several long talks with both Mist and Lethe of the Crimean Liberation army, she finds out her racism was wrong. She only joined the army to please her father, Commander Shiharam, the only parental figure she knew. As a last-ditch effort to halt the advance of the Crimeans, Shiharam releases the floodgates destroying most of Jill's home of Talrega in a mudslide. After the fight, Jill comes to terms with losing her beloved father. Later on, she meets Commander Haar, one of her father's noble subordinates who proceeds to help her in her time of need. She's an exceedingly sweet girl when she's not being an Innocent Bigot and truly cares about her friends and family. In the second game, she's forced to side with Daein during a war with her former companions caused by the Begnion Senate's blood pact, and it hurts her deeply having to go against Lethe and other Laguz. Mist or Haar can recruit her back but not without tears.

• Our hero, Ike, who barely remembers his mother, and witnessed his father being stabbed to death in front of him. Especially after watching the memory scene in Radiant Dawn. To wit, he almost went nuts as a child due to seeing his mind-corrupted father brutally murdering his mother and subsequently going on a murderous rampage, to the point he had to have his memory wiped to spare his sanity.
• Elincia has witnessed her mother and father killed before her eyes by Mad King Ashnard, her uncle seemingly left for dead (it's later revealed he survived, but not before being brainwashed into the vicious psychopath Bertram), and many of her countrymen (including her retainers) imprisoned or massacred. She's constantly on the run from Daein who follow her as far as Crimea goes, her castle has been taken over by Ashnard, she witnesses countless atrocities causing her to take up arms against Ashnard's army in Chapter 26. When everything seems to be alright in the second game, the peace is later disturbed by Duke Ludveck and his supporters causing dissent among the Crimean people who wishes to kill her, usurp her, and nearly kills her beloved adopted sister and retainer Lucia (who is only barely saved by Ike and the Greil Mercenaries returning). She is almost killed by vile Senator Valtome and his men for daring to stop the fighting between Begnion and the Laguz Alliance. Then she witnesses the Goddess she thought was omnipotent and loving committing countless atrocities by turning her men aside from her closest retainers into stone and realizes that the "evil goddess" imprisoned in Lehran's medallion was actually Good All Along, and she leads her group with Tibarn to fight against the Disciples of Order.
• Soren, who was kidnapped by his father, left for dead, adopted by a woman and sage who didn't love him, and his only friend is Ike. Ouch.
• Sephiran/Lehran had his entire clan slaughtered, lost his laguz powers from his wife conceiving a Branded child, and had to watch war come to Tellius many a time. This cutie has been so broken, is it any wonder he thinks the beorc and laguz gotta go?

Fire Emblem Awakening

• Pretty much the entire second generation of Awakening qualifies for this, with the likely exception of Morgan. It is revealed through support conversations that their various quirks and personalities are just what they used to survive their Crapsack World of a future. Some even openly admit that their surface actions are just a mask to hide the pain and grief from their comrades.
• Morgan probably has it better than the other children, due to their origins being such a mystery, but it's still saddening that they don't remember their non-Avatar parent. In their A support with said parent, Morgan breaks down crying when they can't remember their parent. According to their ending, they never even recover their memories, though it's said Morgan doesn't particularly mind.
• Libra's parents wrongly assumed he was possessed and abandoned him, and he was completely alone until he joined the priesthood. Then all his fellow men of the cloth died against Gangrel's might. His inner pain is so strong it even scares his potential wife Tharja.
• Virion. We are first introduced to him as a womazining braggart that most characters treat with contempt. Not only do his supports reveal he is one of the nicest guys there is, if only a braggart, but he also was forced to surrender his land of Rosanne to Walhart's conquest because his people were ready to fight Walhart for him but he knew that doing so would send them to certain death, leaving him with the choice of surrendering and running away to live for another day and rally up allies to stop Walhart, or stand his ground and watch his people die. After that reveal, it's hard to not feel for the guy, especially with the harsh comments people can make about him in early supports.

Fire Emblem Fates

• Flora, a Ninja Maid, hasn't led an easy life. Her father ignored her in favor of her sister Felicia, who could use weapons better, and harbors feelings for a man whom she can't even support with. But that's nothing compared to her fate in the Birthright route, where her loyalty to her tribe leads her to backstab her sister and the Avatar, only to regret her decision so much she commits suicide by lighting herself on fire. Thankfully, she suffers less in the Conquest route and the third path.
• All of the royal siblings can become this when you don't side with them. Each one ends up suffering somehow as a result and it all stems from the fact that the Avatar did not join them.
  • Xander in the Birthright route has to witness the sibling he's loved all his life betray them, and in the most brutal way possible, even calling his father a monster. (They kind of have a point, but it's still harsh.) Then, while forced to fight said sibling, their little sister throws herself in the way, taking a mortal blow, and dies begging the two of them to stop fighting. Is it any wonder his final battle amounts to a Suicide by Cop?
  • Hinoka on the Conquest route. She was easily the most affected by the Avatar's abduction, making it her goal to bring them back even becoming a Sky Knight for that purpose after spending months crying and feeling helpless for their loss. The worst part is that she's obviously suffering a lot of heartbreak of you not joining Hoshido and is easily the most reluctant to fight you similar to Elise. Plus she had to grow up earlier to take care of her younger siblings and toughen up despite being a very sensitive girl. And at the end of the route, she's forced to take a throne she didn't want after both her brothers die in the war.
  • Ryoma is an Iron Woobie on Conquest. He's so deeply hurt by the Avatar's choice that it makes him angry, and it's clear he never developed the coping skills Xander did due to living a more or less charmed life aside from the deaths of all three of his parental figures. And in the chapter where the Avatar crosses blades with him, they lie and claim they killed Hinoka, causing the normally collected Ryoma to completely break down and show hatred towards the Avatar for the first time.
  • Sakura in Conquest is the only sibling who doesn't hold a grudge against the Avatar for choosing Nohr and expresses deep sadness if they fight her in chapter 22. Then, to add salt to the wound, she watches her countrymen die at the hands of Iago and Hans and is taken a prisoner of war. She's so upset she refuses to eat or speak to anyone until the end of the game.
  • Even before they met the Avatar, the Nohr siblings didn't have it easy. Years before the events of the game, they witnessed the deaths of not only their own mothers, but several other women Garon tried to marry as well as their children, and it's heavily implied that they had to kill to survive themselves. This happened when the oldest, Xander, was probably just a preteen.
• Queen Mikoto has not had a very good life. First, she was the lover of Anankos' good side and had his child, but Anankos eventually left her and their child for their safety and she went on to marry King Sumeragi. Then her husband was killed and her child was taken from her. Shortly after being reunited with said child, she dies protecting them. The assailant? The reanimated corpse of her husband Sumeragi, being controlled by her former lover Anankos.
• Saizo. He found out who was responsible for the death of his and Kaze's father, and went to go take revenge... which simply resulted in him getting his eye slashed out. Oh, and he never told Kaze about this, so he had to suffer alone about it for years. Then there's the fact that, depending on the route taken, he and Kaze can end up fighting each other, which counts for both of them.
• The Avatar doesn't have an easy time of it, either. Before the game even starts, they've already witnessed one parent being murdered (as a child of, according to fan calculations, roughly five to six years old) and been kidnapped and raised by an abusive father. Before the route splits, they get to watch their other parent die protecting them, then they get forced into a truly Sadistic Choice of which family to support in a war. Depending on what route is taken, the Avatar can end up losing some of their siblings, some of their friends, and even their spouse to a Plotline Death.

Fire Emblem Three Houses

• Bernadetta was pressured by her father to be a timid wife, having her tied to a chair for hours to make her quiet. She was belittled and called things such as unmarriageable. On top of that, she was not allowed to have commoner friends, with the one friend she had nearly beaten to death. As a result, she's a recluse with no confidence in herself and in fear that anyone who befriends her will have harm befall them. Many of a fan often express desires to get the chance to punish Count Varley themselves.
• Marianne was born with a cursed Crest that led to her being ostracized. There is at least one Crest scholar who constantly accused her of being a beast who eats people, and she often pushes people away in the fear that she will bring them misfortune. Worse, if you're not in the Golden Deer and don't recruit her, she doesn't appear at all after the time-skip, which heavily implies that she had killed herself.
• Flayn has been through the near-genocide of her species, participated in the War of Heroes that founded Fodlan as a medic when she (at least appeared to be) barely a teenager, and after being gravely wounded in said war, fell asleep for almost a thousand years, then woke up recently to discover that her mother (and presumably any human friends she had) were dead, her two uncles had left while she slept, and her father had become extremely overprotective of her. Then, she gets kidnapped by the Death Knight, and then discovers that one of her schoolmates (possibly her House Leader if you picked the Black Eagles) was responsible for her kidnapping, and is planning to start a continent-spanning war. Then, Byleth and Rhea both either vanish for five years, or in Crimson Flower, betray the Church and go crazy, respectively. You wouldn't be able to figure this out by looking at her, though.
• Dimitri was the Sole Survivor of a violent massacre that led to the deaths of his father and a beloved older brother figure. He was helpless to stop the near destruction of the country he was visiting (they were on a diplomatic trip) as they were wrongly blamed and scapegoated despite the fact he knew they weren't responsible, but no one believed him. Afterwards, he is constantly haunted by the dead calling for vengeance. This leads him to pursue revenge, which comes with dire consequences in the academy phase. He witnesses a battle that triggers his trauma, his beloved stepsister who doesn't remember him is revealed to be in cahoots with the very people who killed his family and war breaks out, leading him to snap and become hellbent on claiming Edelgard's head. Come the five-year timeskip, he's a broken shell of himself, and it takes the death of his father figure to snap him out of his bloodthirsty attitude. However, it's ultimately a Bittersweet Ending for him as he admits in his S support that he will likely hear the voices of the dead until he dies. It's even worse in routes outside of his own where he never gets your help and support for his trauma (and if you chose to recruit all the Blue Lions to save yourself from killing them, it means almost all his housemates, including his childhood friends have left him alone save for his Number Two) and his desire for revenge costs him his life.
• Mercedes has a difficult past and present. House Martritz fell when Mercedes was small, and her mother married Baron Bartels, but he neglected Mercedes and her mother after the latter bore him a Crest-bearing son, Emile. Mercedes and Emile ended up being bullied by their half-siblings for having a Crest, not unlike what Miklan did to Sylvain. Eventually, Mercedes and her mother were forced to flee and leave Emile behind. The two took refuge in a church in Faerghus, but a greedy and ambitious merchant bribed the church to force them to let him adopt Mercedes, intending to marry her off to improve his own status. If Mercedes opposes the Empire, she will have to fight against and kill Emile, while if she joins the Empire, she will have to fight against the church she believes in and her best friend Annette. Three Houses allows you to recruit Annette to make joining the Empire easier for Mercedes, but no such option exists in Three Hopes (although all three routes in this game allow her to settle things with Emile without bloodshed).
• Edelgard. First, you learn that in her backstory she was abducted by a cabal of corrupt nobles and an ancient cult and subjected to horrific experimentation that killed all of her beloved siblings while her father was helplessly Forced to Watch. It's also implied that these experiments both destroyed her happy childhood memories (as evidenced by her interactions with her stepbrother and childhood friend Dimitri) and shortened her lifespan (as evidenced by Lysithea, who is her Flawed Prototype). In the present day, despite wanting nothing more than to be an ordinary student living a happy and carefree life with her friends and teacher, she feels her only hope of changing the world for the better is to get in bed with the monsters who ruined her life. Things get better for her on the Crimson Flower route, but otherwise she is doomed to drive away the people she loves most, lose any remaining sense of idealism, bring about the complete destruction of the Empire, and ultimately die at the hands of Byleth or Dimitri so that they can shape the continent in her stead.

Fire Emblem Engage

• Veyle has quite possibly the most tragic backstory in the game. She was born as the daughter of Sombron, a Fell Dragon who was willing to kill any of his children who displeased him. Her mother was persecuted by humans and ended up dying, leaving Veyle alone. Sombron gave Veyle an evil Split Personality that was loyal to him, while Zephia, leader of the Four Hounds, alternated between manipulating and abusing the real Veyle. As a result of Veyle's evil personality's misdeeds, her long-lost sibling Alear and their friends despised Veyle for some time before learning the truth.
• Alfred may seem like a generic Nice Guy who always wants to get buff, but, in reality, he is a Stepford Smiler who is hiding a very dark secret. He was born with a terminal illness, so he spent most of his childhood bedridden. Alfred was eventually able to keep his illness under control by constantly working out, but even then, it never truly went away, and his health is deteriorating even in the present day. Alfred forces himself to act tough, since being the future king of Firene comes with a lot of pressure, and he doesn't want to burden his people with his health issues. It's even the reason why Céline is so obsessed with tea, since she knows that her brother is not long for the world, and she uses tea as a coping mechanism. The worst part of it all? If Alfred is not S-Supported, then the "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue reveals that his illness did indeed catch up to him, and he died shortly after becoming king.
• Alear's past was - to say the least - rather horrible. Born to Sombron, the Fell Dragon Monarch, Alear had it made very clear to them at a young age that their father saw them as nothing but a disposable pawn, with emphasis on the "disposable". Past Alear recounts in a tone best described as "numb" how they saw most of their siblings die at the hands of their father, rather than the hands of their enemies, and were terrified of suffering the same fate. Forced to serve Sombron under the threat of immediate death if they ever failed, disobeyed, or showed weakness around him even though they clearly never enjoyed any of it, they pulled a Heel–Face Turn after meeting Queen Lumera, who eventually adopted them and gave them the love they never received from Sombron (no mention is ever made of their birth mother). At the end of the first war against Sombron, they helped fight and defeat him, finally freeing themselves from him - only for their abusive father to hurt them badly enough they fell asleep for a thousand years, and for them to develop amnesia after waking up. Oh, and then Lumera dies shortly after they wake up, in the proud tradition of Fire Emblem parents of the hero. Wow.