FoxyGrandpa

One part of me wants a fifth path to resolve some important plot threads and missing story beats, but I can't see how it'd play out without being a mess. For one thing, TWSITD would have to be this path's main antagonist, and they'd have to have you fight Patricia or at least confront her at some point, but given that they are already destroyed in the GD / Church Route, this wouldn't be as exciting as it could be. Another issue I see is, how are you going to get the three main characters working together Edelgard is the main source of the conflict throughout the story and Dimitri's lust for revenge makes him very difficult to convince as well, espicially if he has to join with edelgard. One possible scenario I could see for a fifth path is that during the battle of Gronder Field, a Javelin of light is launch to the center of the map, and the three main heroes need to work together to overcome this threat. Cornelia and Thales take control of both the Kingdom and the Empire, so you'd have to fight both during the story. Still, this setup is a mess, since Edelgard, despite not liking TWSITD, fundamentally disagrees with the church system and hierarchy it places based on crest. Having her say something like "oh, the fight against the church was a ruse so we could get info on TWSITD by working with them" would really diminish her character for me. I can't see Dimitri working wtih Edelgard either unless he arbitrarily gives up his lust for revenge for the greater good here, despite not doing so beforre when he was asked to aid the kingdom. That would also ruin his character for me.

Can't speak for everyone, but from my experience, getting into Desperation range usually gets in the way of charging Galeforce if Roy kills the opponent. The added Defense from Steady Impact has the potential to open up new strats for him using other skills like Lunge, so he does also benefit in that way.

Rinea's artwork is so pretty and graceful. I'm so glad she's finally in the game. Still, its a bit weird that we've been getting free female units for almost every TT+ in the last year. Not complaining personally, but I'm curious as to why IS is handing more and more free girls. I'm guessing its to attract people to play the game, but that's only conjecture. Don't particularly care about her stats, other than its shockingly similar to OG Azura. I'm disappointed in her base kit however, and will likely swap out everything.

In my two playthroughs of the game, I've noticed several interesting motifs shared among several characters. Here are some I found. Familial Complications and Fulfilling Expectations: Whether it be minor or major, many characters in the game have complications between them and their family. Several characters have either different perspectives from their relatives, have lost a relative or both. Because of tensions among their family, many characters express their need to fulfill obligations or to ignore them entirely. Characters who fill this role: Discovery and Creation: Several characters in the game are also related to discovery in some way, whether it is to learning more about the world, or suppress elements of its existence. A handful of characters also desire to foster the creation of something new. Characters who fill this role: Troubled Love Lives: Love outside of S-rank supports is surprisingly common in three houses, and more than a handful of characters have some trouble with love. Some characters have to deal with one relationship, others have to deal with many. Characters who fill this role: Are there any motifs you found interesting in three houses?

Well, I wouldn't say that. While the sword specialist classes in this game aren't that good, Swords are probably one of the better weapon types in this game in a vacuum due to their low weight and high hit rate. Lacking an easy 1-2 range option isn't as bad here since D Bows are much more useful than Javelins or Hand-Axes

Funnily enough, I kept Ashe a Sniper on my first run of the game since I didn't level up his skill in riding and he ended up carrying me in the last two chapters. That's more a testament of how good hunters volley is rather than Ashe himself, however. Dancer doesn't seem like a bad class for him since he he can also steal, but his lack of proficiency in healing does make it a bit of a turn-off for me.

At the very least, Byleth has some justification for receiving praise Being a teacher and a mentor figure for the students is a position that naturally lends itself to being praised and respected. I don't think the praise Kris got made as much sense since he was just Marth's bodyguard (and leader of the 7th platoon I guess), which is mildly impressive, but doesn't really impact anyone outside of Marth. As a sidenote, I do think Byleth's inclusion was a necessary evil in order to make it easier for the lords of the game to express themselves and their motivations, but I'm getting side-tracked. Anyways, I do agree that intelligent systems more thoroughly understands how important movement is and did a reasonable job at balancing Infantry and cavalier classes. Infantry classes typically have between one to three less movement than cavalier classes on average, but for most maps, I find that my cavalry classes are generally keeping pace with my infantry classes or have them take a more roundabout path to reach their destination. A good portion of the game's maps penalize cavaliers through stairs, forest, and other difficult to traverse terrain, which infantry classes generally have less issues dealing with. While Cavaliers do have difficulty traversing terrain, Canto makes them very proficient at hit-and-run tactics, which is a fair trade-off. I've also found most cavalier units in this game to be pretty slow, only doubling other cavalry and armor units. Where I think IS dropped the ball in-terms of balancing are Flying units since they don't suffer any of the issues that cavalry classes have, yet get all the perks. Wyvern Riders / Lords are pretty ridiculous in this game, as many people have already stated, but I find Falcon Knights and Pegasus Knights to be perhaps the most difficult enemies in the game to face. Their high move, high speed, lancefaire, and decent strength makes them very tricky enemies to survive, since its difficult to run away from them, and easy to get one rounded by them. For some shitty reason, enemy pegasus knights also have higher movement than your own, which makes them trickier encounters than they should be.

Oh, I'm not saying they should re-release the game now, but sometime later. I think between late 2020 or early 2021 would be the best time to re-release it. Also, while some of the features I mentioned can be added through patches, its unlikely that they'd change entire sections of the game, like the repeated maps, through patches alone. I could maybe see them adding an epilogue for each house that contains a few chapters through a patch, but even that seems like a stretch since NG+ means its pretty unlikely that most people have their old save files in-tact to play these maps.

Fire Emblem: Three Houses is quickly growing to be one of my favorite games in the series, featuring a arguably the best balance of gameplay, story, and immersive world-building in the entire series imo. Despite my love for the game, I can't help but feel there are several missed opportunities within the game that prevent it from being as good as it should be. Similar to the Persona and Pokemon series, I think this game's lasting impact would greatly improve if it was given an enhanced re-release, ironing out some of the issues in the game that couldn't be addressed due to the initially limited development time. Some ways an enhanced release could improve the game: greater number of mid-week activities more minigames greater amount of variety for the post-timeskip chapters (several chapters are reused between routes despite not always making sense) exploitable dungeons recruitable NPCs (Judith, Rodrigue, etc.) more post-timeskip chapters that wrap up lose ends (currently, there are 18-22 chapters per route, which makes the game rather short by FE standards) more interaction between classes within pre-timeskip chapters (i.e. Dimitri and Claude being green units in Chapter 12) more supports What are your thoughts? Do you think the game should have an enhanced re-release?

I'm surprised no one has mentioned not using statue bonuses as part of a challenge run. On my first run-through of the game, I found it be reasonably difficult to keep pace with the level curve because I didn't invest into statues to get a higher exp gain.until the last quarter of the game. Once I did however, the game became considerably easier. I'm now on my second playthrough with every character recruited and I'm still noticeably ahead of the level curve.

Its been a while since I played the game, but I remember brave weapons being pretty good with guard stance since it immediately charged up the meter. I think in dual strike, it also gave your ally a psuedo brave effect as well, which seems extremely good.

I might be in the minority, but I find TWSITD very interesting precisely because we know so little about them. Their role as mole people in the game (killing and replacing people) gives a sinister atmosphere to the game's background and has the player speculating in a good way,. For example, the player could infer that TWSITD killed Dimitri's mother and sent Cornelia to heal the plague to put her in power, or Cornelia actually was once a genuinely good person before being killed and replaced by a member of TWSITD - the answer is open given how we only know other character's interpretations of the situation and don't know what really happened. This speculative element about Fodland's past wouldn't be as prominent as it is now had TWSITD had not existed or had their backstory been expanded on. They are one note in terms of personality, but if I'm being honest, I don't think the game really would have benefited had the writers made their actions "morally gray" because that role belongs to the other house lords you fight like Dimitri and Edelgard.

Are swordmasters underpowered in this game? Compared to Assassins, they get less weapon exp for Bows and worse move in exchange for Astra as a class mastery skill, which honestly doesn't seem that good in this game since it cost a lot of weapon durability for an attack that is usually weaker than doubling....

Gonna echo what others have said and agree that growth bonuses late in the game don't matter. Canto, innate 4 range, and high movement give the Bow Knights more utility than the Sniper for things like hit and run tactics and chip damage. Despite this, Hunter's Volley is a really good skill that makes the Sniper better at outright killing enemies. Class Mastery takes some time though. Overall Bow Knight > Sniper, but Sniper is not terrible.

I may be in the minority here, but my biggest gripe with this game is the limited number of deployment slots. 10-12 units per battle makes it pretty damn difficult to divide my squad up and multitask without getting overwhelmed, leading me to resort to strategies like Warp skipping, turtling, etc. I know that Shadows of Valentia had a fairly small roster too, but mutlitasking was so much easier in that game because most maps had less enemies and a majority of my units still had enough buik to take a hit or two from the enemy. In this game, most enemy infantry classes pack high speeds and a faire skill, meaning they'll double (or quad) your unit, likely killing them. I'm not against having powerful enemies like these, but I would also prefer having a larger roster of deployable units to compensate.

Hmm, I've been think about this for a while. Obviously IS isn't gonna do this since cause $$$ and dragonflowers are a band-aid fix to the bst gap, but it is interesting to speculate about. Roy Eirika Marth

I think that the support conversations being animated now is a pretty big net benefit overall despite its flaws. Seeing the same animations constantly get reused gets pretty annoying and comes off as lazy, but support conversations are now able to immediately establish setting though visuals and adds a good amount of context to each support.

I can't speak about Ignatz cause I've relegated him to secondary roles like sniping fliers and opening chest rather than general combat (I made him an Assassin), but I think you undersell Ingrid. For reference, I made her a Falcon Knight. She ended up being pretty weak physically (to the point where her magic was actually 5 points higher than her strength). This wasn't too bad in the early game, with skills like Tempest Lance, but was a pain to deal with in the early post-timeskip chapters, where she is pretty weak. However, once you get the Levin sword, she becomes a total powerhouse. Out of all my units,, she's the only one who's able to consistently double most classes barring swordmasters and assassins (and even then, she's the only one aside from Ignatz, funnily enough, able to avoid doubles from these classes). Her damage output is normally poor, but Levin Sword lets her usually deal 30 to 40 damage on most general enemies- not enough to kill, but MASSIVE chip damage. Combined with Levin Sword's 2-range and canto, she's fantastic at hit and run strategies, especially on maps with more terrrain or walls. She only gets stronger once Frozen Lance and Hexblade are unlocked. You can't double with these, but they are more reliable than Levin Sword and are useful for finishing off foes. I don't want to oversell Ingrid cause her early-game performance is honestly lackluster, Levin Sword has low durability and has shaky accuracy, and she needs to use combat arts to not hit like a wet noodle against late game foes (unless they are mages, in which case her mixed offensive capabilities are fairly respectable). Still, I'd rank about as useful as Annette, who's fantastic at dealing chip damage, but straight up gets one-rounded by most late-game foes due to middling speed.

I'm in the middle of my first play-through with the blue lions, so I'm not familiar with all the story beats, but based on what I've played and few spoilers I've read of other routes, I find most of the villans in this game to be very captivating compared to most other fire emblem games. One thing about three houses is that the player's actions directly influence whether or not certain student's become antagonist. For example, in the Blue Lions' route, the player is ultimately responsible for helping Dimitri see the right path following Rodriguez's death. However, in other path's Dimitri stays a bloodthirsty monster (according to a few things I've read online anyways) and dies an unceremonious death. The game shows us that our role as professor is important rather than telling us. While the execution isn't perfect, it still helps makes the student antagonist more tragic since we, as the player, know that the outcome would have been different had we managed our time differently or chose a different house. Ultimately, just like life, we can't fix all these problems at once. I find a lot of the one-off villains to be pretty solid and sympathetic as well. Lonota and Makalov have deep and developed backstories thanks to their connections with characters like Ashe and Sylvainn, respectively, and while neither has much impact or does much during the story, they still come across as tragic characters. Fleche and Randolph are also pretty good villans despite not doing much either. Both are portrayed as kind, but are unfortunately on the opposite side of the war as the main characters. When Dimitri taunts Randolph before his death, he become's the very thing he swore to destroy, making Fleche's desire for revenge understandable. What I like about Fleche is, despite being a relatively insignificant character in the grand scheme of things, she's ultimately the main catalyst that brings Dimitri back to his senses, as they're goals were quite similar. TWSITD is a mixed bag. On one hand, I dislike that they are the obvious bad guys in this story and are filled with mostly one note characters with no personal motivation. On the other hand, compared to all the generic bad-guy religious groups in past fire emblem games like the Grimleal and Duma Faithful, this one probably the best execution of the concept. Their presence within the story truly has a fair amount of mystery since they don't show themselves very often and their role as mole people makes the player ask questions in a good way. Was Cornelia always evil, or did she get secretly killed and replaced by a member of TWSITD? Was house Arundel created intentionally to cause political chaos, or did the real members of the housejust get replaced? It adds an interesting layer to the story that makes the player more invested, I feel.

Beruka and Selena have pretty sweet new weapons and refines. Guard + Special Accel reduction is a strong, tried and true combo and fees up Beruka's B-slot and sacred seal for other options like Aerobatics and QR. Selena's Armor effictive Wo Dao is pretty nice too and her attack is low enough that she can trigger its stat boost even with a plus attack nature vs most armored foes. However, with so many strong sword prfs among sword infantry like creator sword, refined Falchions, etc. I don't think this weapon will be enough to stop her from being completely outclassed. Mae's weapon and refine isn't that exciting in my opinion. Boey's refine is cool, but I really wish he kept his owl tome instead getting a prf raven tome. While his def is good, he really needed the stat boost from owl tome to patch up his other stats. At the very least, his A slot being free lets him run skills like Traingle adept for AA / CC or Bond skills for more general in-game content.

I'm inclined to agree with Nickdos that Three Houses isn't the most radically different game and that Fates introduces more new things, at least based on first impression. Most elements of the game, such as the permanent route split, time skip, voice acting, etc. are featured in other Fire Emblem games like FE4, Fates, and Echoes. I will admit, that the combination of all these elements borrowed from other games will give Three Houses a unique flair to it since most of these things appeared exclusively in a few game, but I don't think its fair to call it the most radically different entry because its borrowing these elements from other games in the series. While 3H doesn't appear to be too different from other games in the series, I do think it'll but some interesting twist on mechanics featured in other games. Weapon arts being tied to durability is something that skews the risk / reward in using them, since the durability loss impacts your units in later battles and possibly your funds rather than just in the current battle. Similarly, the my castle system from Fates is being used as a basis for the school in 3H, but backstory behind it makes it less immersion breaking than in Fates and from what I can see, it seems more fully featured with more minigames and a wider array of interactions with your units.

The interaction between Creator's sword and Windsweep is interesting, but frankly not the most broken thing the game as seen imo. Its sort of akin to Bold Fighter Firesweep sets that we've seen on units like Effie, though I imagine that the Special acceleration on Byleth's weapon and her infantry status will make her more difficult to deal with. Hypothetically speaking, would F!Byleth be able to defeat the bulkiest Blue units like Hector and Lukas with the following build (assuming she initiates and also has to take them on in enemy phase)?

A few questions

Spent 60 orbs on this banner for F!Byleth only to pull a shitty IV Owain. Honestly not that bad given that the it would take around 126 orbs to pull her on average, but still a bit disappointed. At the very least, my Summer Ylgr is making pretty good use of Wrath and Blue Flame.