FoxyGrandpa

Fair points. Narratively, in Silver Snow, there was no House Leader, so it made sense that Byleth becomes the king of Fodlan. Verdant Wind is a bit more iffy, but Claude did want unity via friendship & understanding, not conquest, so that ending probably is better for his character than if he just ruled both nations. My issue stems from Byleth being characterized as a mentor rather than a leader. Though, thinking about it more, I believe the game tries to turn him into a symbol that the army rallies behind in Verdant Wind and Silver Snow. Despite this, I don't think was executed the best, especially in Verdant Wind where Claude steals the show in most of the campaign, making him appear to be the ideal ruler of both Fodlan & Almyra.

My first impressions aside, my thoughts on most characters has been mostly consistent. The only character who became slightly weaker to me was Byleth, though its not for the reasons you'd expect. For the most part, I thought their character as a player avatar was done well. Most of the praise the other students give them doesn't happen until the midway point in part one after you rescue Flayn & win the battle of the Eagle and Lion. And unlike New Mystery of the Emblem, the praise is contextualized well, as they are an authority figure, not some random bodyguard. I also really like how they complement the main character, letting them be more expressive. However, their endings Verdant Wind & Silver Snow suck imo. In Blue Lions, them ascending the throne as Archbishop made sense and seemed like a natural progression of their character while not taking away the spotlight from the main lord. The ending in Crimson Flower is also serviceable. However, the endings where they become the new leader of Fodlan feels like its done more for pandering. I also thought their story arch in the second half of Verdant Wind was mediocre & was where the self-insert praise got out of hand.

I was initially mixed on Battalions since they seemed like a superfluous addition compared to Pair Up or the Formation attacks we saw in the game's initial trailer. However, after replaying Shadows of Valentia (which is the most similar game to Three Houses), Battalions are a good addition. In Shadows of Valentia, there were many situations where you couldn't make use of the weaker units in your army on player phase since enemies would wail on them on enemy phase. This did have the side effect of making the player create formations to minimize enemy counterattacks, but this was hardly useful if the enemy used bows / magic or if the map was too cramped. Additionally, movement could be annoying in Shadows of Valentia, since Mounted units had drastically higher movement than infantry. This made in much easier for them to get ahead, but often meant that non-ranged infantry units could rarely see combat on some maps. Additionally, since most enemies don't die in one round of combat, sending your mounted unit to tackle a hoard of enemies was usually futile, since it often meant they'd hit one enemy, get damaged in return, and then get hit by a bunch of enemies on the next turn. It was easier to just slow your own army down to help facilitate kills on player phase and alleviate the pressure from your mounted units. Gambits (and some of three houses other gameplay systems) mostly address these problems. They make it super easy for weak units to contribute on player phase, since a strong unit can soften up a hoard of enemy's with a Gambit AOE attack, letting someone else easily get a kill without much risk. Positioning is still important, as Gambit boost increase the reliability of the attack. Stride, combined with hit and run shenanigans with Canto & easily accessible positional combat arts, makes it easier for Infantry / Armored units to see combat on most maps. Again, positioning is important, as you can give a higher number of units Stride boost depending on how they are placed. The stat boosts Gambits provide are also a nice bonus to help units that have been RNG screwed by giving them guaranteed stats.

In SoV, 2 of the 4 Story DLC maps for "Rise of the Deliverance" were just reused maps from the main game. They put the player in unique scenarios though, so it felt different enough to justify its price (that and the writing was pretty good). I believe Fates did something similar but I can't remember off the top of my head. I don't think Metodey's animations were too hard to develop. He reused animations like most of the character do in cutscenes, and I believe the developers use the same battle models for the cutscenes, so animating him shouldn't have been too hard, at least in theory. I also don't think he's a leader of Aelfric's men either. It seems like he's just your average sellsword assassin looking to make an easy buck & Aelfric just so happened to employ him. That's the impression I got from the main game as well. Though, if he is a sellsword, it would make it weird that he seemingly knows Edelgard and her future plans, while Edelgard doesn't know him. My guess is that he was hired by Edelgard & she just playing dumb so her plan isn't found out OR he was hired by TWSITD and they told him about Edelgard, so he knows her, but she doesn't know him. Or it could just be fanservice, who knows ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Hmm its really hard to decide, but I'll give a pity vote to Ignatz. The dude gets a ton of crap from the community, but I've got a soft-spot for him. On my first play-though of the game, I didn't even try recruiting him, but he joined my party on chapter 12, which was really awesome & made me think he was getting past his insecurities (based on what little I knew about the character).After fully getting to know him in the Golden Deer Route, I was somewhat disappointed that a few of his arcs, like the whole business with Lorenz's father and Raphael, were never resolved. Still, love his endings, especially the one with Rapheal. Also, why doesn't this dude have a support with Bernadetta? The two are really similar, with both being archers, liking painting, and being insecure. His design is pretty good. I really love his timeskip outfit, where he looks like Harry Potter. Like Ingrid, he's a fun unit to build thanks to his balanced growths, and varied proficiencies. His strength in Authority is really useful since it lets him fix stat deficits quicker & he can make a good Rally Bot. I've had success making him a Mortal Savant (Forged Levin Sword is a discount Thoron), Wyvern Lord, Sniper, and Assassin. He's one of these units that doesn't need much thought when building since one you choose a path, he can become specialized for that role pretty easily.

Its more just a general time-saving measure. Reusing content from the main game saves the developers' time & resources, so they'll try getting away with it whenever they can. Fire Emblem itself has done this before in Shadows of Valentia, so its not necessarily a new concept to the series.

Reinhardt is already getting buffed thanks to Drive Attack 4 giving him Death Blow for free in his C slot. Just run Rally Up Attack on Gunther with Def / Res Ruse in the B Slot and watch his BF go to down with a net gain of +38 Attack when initiating on the enemy (+14 from double Death Blow, + 7 from Lull Atk Res & Drive Attack 4, + 6 from Rally atk spd+, +11 from Gunther's prf, Goad Calvary, and Drive Attack Seal.

Guther's refine is pretty good, basically Morgan's refine, but for attack and Defense. Spring Catria / Shareena debuff as the base effect makes him work well with ursula, Gunthra, and mathew too, which is neat. Ursula's refine seems ok. It lets her be a budget, blue Gunthra. With Lull's and Distance Def 4 being a thing, it might be more reliable that a blade tome, especially with a team comp that supports it. Erika's refine seems mediocre in the player's control, but decent if used by the AI. Gaius's new prf is weird. Its one of those percentage based weapons, which should make it amazing, but it requires investing in speed, which becomes a dead stat once you start doubling the opponent. And you need to invest a lot in speed to noticeably benefit from it (10 points in speed only translates to one extra damage). Swift Sparrow in A and Seal, and at plus 10 merge, would only grant him a net bonus of 5/6 points of damage in an ideal scenario, which is only on par with sothe. I can't see this one being too amazing personally.

https://imgur.com/a/jEdNQuD Iago's weapon, stats, and skills. Some might call his weapon inconsistent, which is true, but it'll be very fun to use. Definitely merging this guy up. His shit-eating grin is a nice bonus.

I actually never finished Conquest specifically (was my first run of the game & got too addicted to the side stuff). However, I beat Revelations & Birthright and thought it was cool he had a Staff rank, even if he didn't do anything special with it in those games. I love it when Fire Emblem differentiates specific characters by giving them special classes or characteristics (i.e. Walhart). I'm planning on replaying Conquest, so I'll experience his jank staff shenanigans soon enough. His character in Fates is a joke, but its a joke I can laugh at. A combination of being despicable, deplorable & pathetic makes him ironically entertaining. His death in Conquest was hilarious in a dark way, especially how he jarringly shifted from gloating to begging for mercy. I wish he was written better, ideally as a cunning strategist, but what's there is pure meme material.

Forrest is probably the only unit I'm interested in building on this banner. His stat line isn't the best, but if he has a super boon in speed, then it could be salvaged. I'm really interested in Midori's weapon. That weapon effect is actually pretty insane for an enemy phase archer like Norne, especially when combined with a self-sustain option like Noontime (which would trigger every round of Combat if she doubles the enemy). Running Lull Speed / Def in the B slot would make this threshold easier to obtain, although she'd be weak to enemy specials. Iago is cool ghb unit. Never hated the dude in Fates purely because he was the only Sorcerer in that game who could reach a B-Rank in Staves. Since he's a F2P Red Mage, I'm hoping he doesn't use the Canas / Julius statline, and has something a bit more unique. Hoping his prf isn't situational either. Something like Lull Atk / Res and Renewal 3 as his weapon effects would be a neat reference to his personal weapon & skill respectively.

Honestly, yeah. The most interesting and unique maps are usually reserved for DLC. This is how its always been, even back in the Super Nintendo era. BS Fire Emblem (which was basically FE3 DLC) had more interesting scenarios than FE3 and Thracia 776 (which based on the development history, would have essentially been FE4 DLC) also put the player in more engaging scenarios and challenges than FE4. I think what's stopping them from putting more interesting maps in the newer games is that it alienates most of the casual playerbase. Two of my friends who got into Fire Emblem after Awakening & aren't involved with the community both thought the map design was terrible in Conquest.

Do Bernadetta & Hilda use the same voice clips during gameplay?

Damn, Feh is already a better programmer than me lol

When is server maintenance required then? My understanding is that the server is mainly used for backend stuff like storing & altering data for weapon effects & the client just shows this stuff to the user. Stuff like skill inheritance not requiring server maintenance makes sense since the interactions are completely handled via a menu, where the buttons can easily be made active or inactive. My idea was that they'd either combine the datasets for green, red, & blue tomes into one large dataset or create a new dataset consisting of new generalized universial tomes like "grárfox". In hindsight, both of these aren't gonna happen, but making a new dataset for initial batch of colorless tomes seems plausible enough. Wouldn't this require server maintenance?

My only issue with this dude is that he's soft-locked to his prf since Tomes aren't universally inheritable like Bows. Its a good tome, but having the option to run something else like Blade tome would be cool. If I had a hunch, I'm guessing the maintenance update tomorrow is to update the json / SQL / whatever files that contain the data for Tomes & make them universally inheritable.

I tried playing female in one route, but I reset my save file & just went back to using male Byleth. Even though female Byleth is significantly more popular in fanart, I like using Male Byleth more purely since his eyes give him a more serious & somber expression by default, which fits 3 Houses' narrative better imo. Female Byleth is still better for general gameplay due to being able to auto-recruit Sylvain, while Male Byleth gets nothing. I think her class-set is a bit better too. At the very least, it isn't as one sided as it was in Fates, where Jakob was noticeably better than Felica in the prologue chapters, and practically swept the early game if you reclassed him to Paladin & paired him with Corrin.

Cindered Shadows had pretty good map design. Using characters in preset classes made it pretty fun to get out of tricky situations (i.e, positioning Edelgard to bait and soften multiple enemies by having Yuri use foul play). I like how its mostly made up of new maps, since the maps in the main game could get a bit repetitive. Favorite map was the escape chapter, which stressed me out if a pretty good way. Story was alright. I actually wanted a filler arch in the main game where the main characters go on a mischievous adventure separated from the main plot and this is exactly what this sidestory gave us. The idea of a 4th secret house was ridiculous, but the DLC contextualized it well so it wasn't too big of an issue. I didn't like how the last few chapters played out, where Yuri was a double, double agent, and I felt they didn't really make Aelfric sympathetic (SIMPathetic?) enough. The ending was pretty good though. I wish the house leaders and their amigos also had a bigger role in the story. There were nice little touches, like Dimitri talking to Edelgard about her hair, but I would have liked them to have more lines & a bit more spotlight in the story. New characters are great. I like Yuri and Balthus the most. Yuri for his sly & sarcastic personality, and Balthus for his connections with the Golden Deer & being a pretty irresponsible, but well-meaning adult. Gameplay-wise, most of them made the game more fun imo. Balthus is the most generic of the bunch, but he's still pretty good. His bases and growths are basically a straight upgrade from Raphael and he's got more learning talents so its easier to make him different classes like Bishop or Swordmaster. Only niche Raphael has over him is that doesn't have a weakness in Flying, it easier to make him a Wyvern Rider. Yuri is a pretty flexible unit (similar to Ingrid) but is much easier to use due to his better bases. He has a ton of learning weaknesses, but he can slot into most infantry classes just fine. Hapi is decent. Her access to Banshee Θ can alleviate some of the pressure fast & strong enemies like Assassins exert on some maps. Constance starts off the weakest, but once she gets Bolting, she's fantastic. 1-10 range spell with 4 uses & her insane magic growth lets her evaporate 4-5 enemies on each map for free. New classes are hit or miss. Trickster imo sucks due to the lack of a -Faire skill, 5 movement, and halved spell usage. If it had Swordfaire, it would have been a decent alternative to Assassin since it would trade movement for situational healing (which is pretty useful in this game) and if it didn't have halved spell usage, it would have been a fun alternative to Bishop. Unfortunately, it has neither so it ends up being lackluster for both types of units that would have used it well. I haven't used War Monk / Cleric, but on paper it doesn't seem too bad. It doesn't have Fierce Iron Fist, nor Grappler's immunity to terrain penalties, but its modifiers aren't drastically worse than Grappler (it actually has a higher strength modifier), its mastered abilities seem niche, but not bad, it still has fistfaire, and has heal as a base ability which somewhat makes up for halving halved spell list. Its only the only class option that gives females Fistfaire as a base ability, so I'll try slotting Catherine into it the next time I play the game. Valkyrie is a pretty good class, basically acting as a magical equivalent to sniper. It lacks a -Faire skill and has less movement than every other mounted class in the game, but its a pretty solid class for Mages that want to become Dark Knight since it innately build their Horse Rank.. Dark Flier is great since fliers are OP in this game and most enemies have low Res.

Anime Adaptation (Season 1) Prologue (2 episodes): Byleth meets the house leaders, all of them work together to kill Kostess (They'd kill him in Remire Village instead of the Red Canyon to save time). He adjusts to school life, meeting all the student, getting the hang of his / her new life at Garreg Moch. Before he sleeps, he talks to Sothis, who tells him that there is much he / she has to learn. He wouldn't participate in the moch battle, but rather watch from a distance, and critique the 3 house leaders on their individual leadership faults. Edelgard should win, but only narrowly, and her technique should be shown to be poor. Dimitri Arch (2 episodes) Byleth would work with the Blue Lions to quell Lonato's Rebellion and Miklan's band of thieves. These episodes would focus on Dimitri, with Ashe and Sylvain playing major roles in each episode. Claude Arch (2 episodes): Byleth would work with Claude to solve the mysteries associated with the Goddess's Rite of Rebirth and Flayn's disappearances. This arch would show Claude's detective skills quite well, as well as his interest in the Sword of the Creator. I swapped Miklan's chapter and The Goddess's Rite of Rebirth since I felt that Miklan and Lonato's chapters play'd more to Dimitri and the Blue Lion's qualities (namely showing the tragedy of war) while The Rite of Rebirth & Flayn's disappearance plays more to Claude's strengths (scheming & detective work). To accommadate for this change somewhat, Byleth would be initially hesitant to wield the Sword of the Creator after seeing what happened to Miklan. Edelgard Arch (2 episodes) In the first episode, Byleth would work with Edelgard to defeat TWSITD in Remire Village. Monica would accompany the group, being particularly chatty with Edelgard. Everything would mostly play out the same. However, to save on time, Monica will kill Jeralt in this chapter. Edelgard and Byleth work together & chase her down. Edelgard will be reserved at first, but after seeing Jerault die, she'll open up to Byleth, and comfort him. In the second episode, the events of Where the Goddess Dwells will mostly play out in the same way, except Byleth would be much more emotional. Additionally, at the end, Thales will be shown scolding the Flame Emperor. Byleth Arch (2 episodes) This arch will mainly center around how Byleth deals with the loss of both his father and Sothis, with all the students, house leaders, and faculty trying to cheer him up. The primary character he'd spend time with is Rhea, who's also feeling a rollercoster of emotions. He'll confide to her the existence of Sothis, but tell her that she's still alive, which would make her happy and look forward to the Goddess's revaluation (which will take place in 3 months because of plot convenience). Near the midway point of the second episode, he'd find Jerault's diary, which would make him be more skeptical of Rhea's intentions. Battle of Eagle and Lion Arch (2 episodes) Now that we know all 3 main characters, we'd have them face off. Byleth won't participate in this, but helps each house train. First episode will mainly be about him training, with each of the 3 house leaders thanking him for his help somewhere in the middle of the episode. Second episode would show the 3 houses fighting, with Edelgard emerging victorious. However, she would still win narrowly. This would give her the confidence she needs that now is the time to wage war with the Church. Ballroom Arch (2 episodes) This arch would mainly center around the ballroom, with all the student's asking Byleth for advice on what they should do for the ball, and Dimitri & Edelgard confiding to Byleth their pasts. Throne of Knowledge Arch (2 episodes) Basically plays out the same as the chapter of the same name, except all the houses help Byleth defend Rhea. Edelgard is gone for the month due needing to discuss things with her father. To War Arch (2 episodes) Again, mostly plays out the same as the chapter. Will mainly focus of Claude, Rhea, and Dimitri's perspectives on the situation in the first episode, second episode would show the battle near Garreg Moch. Dimitri would go Sicko Mode on some imperial general to show that he means business. Filler Episodes Pretty much any of the paralogues work as good filler episodes since they focus on a less important character and develop their personalities. Combining some paralogues to focus on a small group of characters (like Lorenz's paralogue merging with Rapheal and Ignatz's paralogue) would probably be good for pacing.

Bit late, but one interesting way to handle a golden Route is to have only two of the house leaders pair up to accomplish something. This would create three new routes that could have different stories and themes. Claude and Dimitri - Work together to take down Edelgard. Claude could act as a voice of reason to Dimitri, giving him a better idea of Edelgard's perspective and her involvement with the tragedy. Not sure what themes this path could be, but it could explore how one should accept a truth that lines up with their logic, not their emotions. Dimitri and Edelgard - Work together to defeat TWSITD. Both work together to defeat their uncle and mother. The theme of this path could be confronting and accepting the past, and not letting it get in the way of the present. Edelgard and Claude - Work together to confront Rhea, destroying the prejudice and inhibition of technology that she promotes. This path would have a theme of understanding the purpose of the old systems, but rejecting it in favor of pursuing new ideals & uncharted territories. I could actually see the devs combining all these ideas into one new path. Something where Claude and Dimtri fight Edelgard at first, but Dimitri's more tempered attitude allows him to persuade Edelgard into joining his army. Then, all three fight TWSITD, with Dimitri and Edelgard learning the truth about their pasts'. Finally, all three confront Rhea and the church. I feel that each route would have a stronger impact if they were individual narratives rather than being combined, but it would help save on dev time, so I wouldn't mind it. It would still be somewhat unique since you'd fight the Church of Seiros at the end, who are contextualized much better than FE's standard evil religious zealots.

What's the best class path for Wyvern Lord Annette?

It would be really cool if Klein got a resplendent alt. I've already got a fair amount of merges on him and he'd love extra attack and speed for bigger & better damage. Since he's blond like Fjorm, Nifl attire would suit him well. Roy would look sick in either Emblia or Muspell attire. Male Corrin could wear askr attire to match the Hoshidan Noble class, while Female Corrin could wear Emblia attire to match the Nohr noble. Y!Tiki would look cute in Nifl attire with similar clothes to Ylgr. There are a few other characters I'd like to have alts like Marth, and Delthea but I honestly don't the current attire really suits them well.

Which character makes the best Trickster? Really like the class's design, but I'm struggling to find any character that could make good use of it. Most Sword users would rather go Assassin / Swordmaster just because its easier to build the weapon ranks for those classes. It wouldn't be a bad class for faith users normally, but for some reason the class halves the amount of healing spells they can use down to five, so it ends up completely gimping their potential.

This is some pretty interesting stuff. Its a bit sad to see that a fair amount of what was mentioned in the interview didn't get expanded upon in the main game, like Claude's real name, the region in Faerghus that apparently imported a lot of material from Adrestria, etc. Since the devs didn't want to "spoil" stuff when answering questions, I'm guessing their planning on releasing a prequel / midquel or definitive edition version of the game to develop these ideas (sequel wouldn't work imo due to multiple routes). Edelgard being a rival for the player character is interesting, but I think I like her more in the final game, where she's a foil to Dimitri, Claude, and Rhea. Byleth is a viewpoint character, so I don't think its necessary for him to have any rivals unless they are just irredeemably evil like TWSITD. I'm guessing the original intent was for the Knights of Seiros to replace the BE students to make the original route more emotional. It would make sense since there are 8 knights of seiros characters and Seteth is the main narrator of the route.

I got hella lucky. Within my first 5 pulls, I pulled a +Atk - Res Est, 2 5-star Narcians (both -HP +Defense), and a 4-star +Speed Narcian. I think I'll stop summoning while I'm ahead, but I'm definitely happy. +Atk Est hits 59 freaking Attack BEFORE any buffs from her weapon or Fury 4. She'll complement my +Attack Spring Catria and +Attack Spring Palla very nicely. Narcian is pretty awesome to have as well. Not sure if I should go with +Speed or +Defense for his IVs though.