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I know I'm extremely late to comment on this game, and because of that I don't know if anyone will even notice this post, but after finally getting a chance to play it I can't help but feel underwhelmed with the treatment they gave Flayn, which feels like a drastic downgrade to her portrayal in Three Houses. From the start, they show Flayn during the War of Heroes battle, and even give her the very first line of spoken dialogue in the game. From this, you'd think that her backstory or origins would be expanded or given a larger emphasis in the plot, but it's disappointingly never brought up again, and we learn nothing new about her for the entire game (and I have played all three routes). We also see her in the beginning chapters of Scarlet Blaze discussing strategy alongside Rhea and Seteth, setting up an expectation that maybe she will be portrayed as a higher-ranking member of the Church of Seiros who is actually involved in its affairs. That also ends up being nothing, though, as she doesn't appear alongside them at all in story scenes for the remainder of the route, except the penultimate chapter cutscene if you want to count that. In Azure Gleam, the route where you actually do get access to her as a playable unit, you would think she would have more relevance there at least. However, she is again relegated to only appearing in a handful of non-critical story events to offer one or two lines reaffirming what other characters had already said. Her base dialogue also came off as more generic and lacking the same heart as in the original game, at least to me. Those are only the things that I'm sad they didn't do with Flayn, but when I think about what they did do, it actually starts to get insulting. In the original game, Flayn was very much her own person, with a distinct personality and place in the setting. Here, though, she very much is just a satellite character to Seteth. As mentioned before, she offers no input to the events of the story, and only ever appears to sound off Seteth or sometimes others. Worse still are her protagonist supports, which, for some reason, have been written to revolve around him. To people who might question if it had always been this way, go back to view her Byleth supports and you'll see she doesn't mention Seteth once. And more eye-rolling still is that she brings up Seteth at least three times during the responses to her expedition questions, which again, never happened in Houses with her tea parties. It's like the game writers saw all the low-effort, moronic Seteth memes the fanbase was and continues to make about Flayn, and made that her actual character here. And no, this is not a two-way situation: Seteth barely mentions Flayn in his expedition responses because he still gets to be an individual. Does any other character in this game rely so heavily on the existence of someone else to flesh out their dialogue? Does this show that Flayn really was intended to be nothing more than a joke to the writers all this time? Well, maybe it's a no for that last question; at least they didn't fully capitulate to fandom madness and have her talk incessantly about fish like many wrongly assume she does. It just makes me sad that, because the prospect of DLC for Hopes seems increasingly unlikely, this is almost certainly the last true characterization we'll get for Flayn (and I wouldn't even call it that). In my opinion, that's definitely more than a bit disappointing.

By that I mean that Flayn is the only character, for whom death is not mandatory in any route, who I've seen people proudly express glee over killing. This happens in FE spaces all over the internet, and yes, even here. Never have I seen people commenting on any other character's fanart or videos about them that they made a conscientious effort to not recruit them so they could kill them. I don't even see this level of scorn directed at Seteth, who is in the exact same situation. It's only ever Flayn. This could be due to her disadvantage of being one of the few characters locked out of recruitment on a route, which may cause people to act more callously toward her (but even then there's never been anyone celebrating Hilda's death). Don't tell me "oh but other characters are hated too", other characters don't have people going to their content just to announce that they've killed them. "But Edelgard, but Dimitri"; their deaths are written into the narrative and cannot be avoided, which is not the case for Flayn, and the people making these ugly remarks most of the time are well aware of this. She did absolutely nothing to deserve so many people gloating about her death, some even going so far as to make memes and videos about it. I'm here to say it's disgusting; Flayn deserves much better treatment than she is given, and I for one will always see the value in her even if no one else will.

Many people have asked me how I pulled off reaching level 99 on higher difficulties, so I made this guide. This works not only for Flayn, but certain other characters too. Give it a try if you're mindlessly devoted to one, like me. 😜

Yes, I did it again. With video this time!

Here's a video I wrote and put together giving Flayn more unique battle quotes and also a recruit conversation in Crimson Flower. Voice credits are in the description. Hope you enjoy! (Sorry if this isn't the right subforum, I don't know if this counts as "fanart" or not)

Everyone else has one. Flayn deserves it too! 💚 I'm hoping to put together a collaborative celebration of the Flayn x Byleth pairing that would include fanart and other works. As mentioned, this would be in the form of either a week-long hashtag or a fanzine. My biggest issue with this though is that I'm neither an artist nor am I very Twitter-savvy, and while I've seen many Byleth-ship hashtags and zines, I don't have much knowledge of what goes into forming, promoting and creating content for them. I'm here to ask for advice on the process and also possibly recruit any artists willing to promote and produce Flaynleth content. This is something I strongly want to make happen, and any form of help with this task would be appreciated! Also, sorry in advance if this isn't the right forum to post this to. Feel free to move it to wherever appropriate.

This is an issue I need to address that no one else ever seems to mention, but I suspect you're all probably all aware of on a subconscious level. Flayn is not respected or taken seriously as a character by the vast majority of the FE fanbase, and whenever anyone brings her up it's almost always in the context of a joke: either how she's "obsessed with fish" or how expressing any sort of fondness for her will enrage Seteth. I get that these jokes were born out of actual (though heavily exaggerated) elements in the game, but it's come to a point where jokes have begun to replace actual facts. For example, I recently shared the following fanart I had commissioned: (source) And to my surprise and frustration, the most popular reaction was asking if Seteth would really be okay with Flayn and Byleth's marriage. Anyone who's played the game and actually knows these characters should not be asking this, but the fact is that the "Angry Seteth" meme has become so ubiquitous that a worryingly high amount of people have assumed it to be reality (this pic was commissioned specifically to challenge that assumption). I've been told that I "worry too much about memes" or "take them too seriously", but this sort of misinformation is what happens when people don't challenge this "it's all a joke, nothing matters" mindset.(And this doesn't just apply to Fire Emblem or even gaming, but that's too broad a topic for here). And of course this isn't the only example, but I point to it as a particularly egregious case. There have also been times where people have doubted the the validity of Flayn's official character information because it doesn't mention "fish obsession". As a whole, there are just many, many instances where these memes are brought up on Flayn posts meant to be meaningful or serious, and the result is that Flayn is far less respected than most characters, even those who are hated by a lot of the fanbase (because hating characters requires a degree of respect for them, as you still have to acknowledge that they are important and that their actions mattered enough to be hated). And yes, I'm sure people will bring up handfuls of other characters who have some recurring meme attached to them, but it still doesn't reach the amount of irreverence Flayn receives in comparison. Flayn is the only character whose autonomy people don't respect; I've even heard it said that Flayn isn't herself a character and is just a Seteth plot device. This couldn't be more wrong: Flayn is a beautiful, wonderful character in her own right and deserves to be viewed and treated as such. Not just an eternal punchline. If you've read this far, thanks. I've brought up this discussion here as this is one of the more reasonable pockets of the FE fandom from what I've observed, so I trust you'll be willing to lend my points some degree of validity instead of saying I'm trying to "kill fun" or "thinking too much".

I remembered I had these sketches lying around and decided I'd redraw them, who knows maybe someone would get a kick out of them so why not post them! Please forgive me for any formatting errors as it is my first time posting here. Now I'll go on and explain my thought process behind designing these two! I'll start with Cethleann, since we haven't really seen a "light dragon" throughout the series I based her main appearance off of some divine dragons we see in other games as well as The Wind Caller and The Immaculate one (due to them being related), as for the whole idea of her teeth being flat was mostly due to the whole "Flayn likes fish" thing, plus it makes her look less menacing compared to most dragons which personally fits for me. As for Cichol, he takes most of his inspiration from the earth dragons from the earlier games which explains his lack of wings and tough looking scales. I still wanted to keep the whole design motif of the Immaculate one in his design because it just felt right to me. The first two sketches were from March of this year but the revamped sketches can be seen in this image here which was drawn today!

I am a massive Flayn fan and I love seeing romantic art or fanfics of her and Byleth together, but this is sadly a pairing that either goes ignored or is openly vilified by much of the FE fanbase*. Mind you, this same fanbase has no issues with romantic Flayn pairings in general (Flayn x Dimitri seems to be wildly popular for some reason) but only is it when Byleth is involved that people seem to get up in arms. Yes, there are people who hate characters like Edelgard and Rhea, but nonetheless there are tons of art and stories of Byleth with them. Flayn by herself doesn't attract nearly as much vitriol (that I'm aware of), yet she's one of the characters least represented in Byleth ships (and yes, I know there are others, no need to bring it up). Flayn fans are also routinely mocked and insulted, and whenever Flayn x Byleth content IS created, it's always met with the same derision and backlash, often couched as "memeing". This is grossly unfair to Flayn and her fans, and both deserve better treatment. I know what many peoples' first objection is going to be to these points: "Flayn is a young child! Loving her or wanting her to be with Byleth is wrong and you are sick for it!" While this amounts to nothing but an empty and unwarranted personal attack, there are three reasons why it's completely invalid: Flayn is not a child or "loli" as people often label her. She has a teenage physique and is literally coded as being of 17 years of age (I'm not going to bother going deeper on this point because detractors will accuse me of "fixating on her body") Even disregarding the first point, no one is ever given hate for pairing Flayn with other characters as I've mentioned multiple times now. If Flayn is "too young" to be romantically involved at all, why is it still acceptable to pair her with Dimitri, Ferdinand, Linhardt, etc? Why is it ONLY with Byleth that it's a problem? People say they don't like pairing her because she "looks too young", but that doesn't stop the plethora of Bernadetta or Lysithea x Byleth content being produced, as well as the majority positive reception it gets in contrast (and yes, I do mean pre-timeskip). In summation, I am one among many passionate Flayn fans and we will continue to be her fans no matter how many insults and memes people bombard us with. Flayn is a kind, sweet and wonderful girl, and she deserves way more love and respect than this fanbase gives her, and so do we. *To be clear, I'm not referring to NSFW content of any kind, so don't even try to throw that argument out. If you have to make this about sex, that's on you.

Is she half-human? We know she's a Nabatean, with Seteth aka Cichol as her father. But is she fully-Nabatean, or is she part-human? We know her mother died in battle over a thousand years ago. Two things stood out to me that were mentioned about her: according to Flayn, Seteth first met his wife at a church in Enbarr, and the way Flayn and Seteth talk about her in their paralogue suggests that she knew she would likely be the first of them to die: Flayn: We cannot turn back the clock, father. We must live our lives fully, in the present moment. Seteth: You're right. That is what she always said, isn't it? Maybe I've watched Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood too many times, but that kind of stuff reminds me of the conversations between Hohenheim and Trisha Elric. Anyway, the third thing I want to point out is that Seteth and Flayn's reasons for hiding their identity have to do with Flayn's unique blood. If it solely had to do with Nabatean blood, then surely TWSITD would be after Seteth too, correct? But Seteth outright says, "There are many who would seek to harm Flayn due to the unique blood she bears", and Solon, when he reveals himself, says he was only after Flayn's blood. EDIT: Okay, so, as everyone's pointed out, they probably just went after Flayn because she's easier to capture. What do you think?

Asking without judgement, I'm genuinely curious to what the majority of people did regarding the fight against Flayn. Since statistically most people chose Black Eagles as their first house, it's very likely they were unaware of the mechanics regarding her survival (though if Crimson Flower wasn't your first path I would still like to hear from you). I want to see what action most players ended up taking, and whether or not their knowledge of her survival and/or their opinion toward her personally played a role in their decision. For me, Crimson Flower was my first playthrough and I didn't want to kill Flayn from the start. I didn't know about killing vs sparing, and by pure luck ended up sparing her to give Byleth the boss EXP.

Not going to lie, I really love pairing Edelgard and Dimitri, probably my favourite ship with Edelgard after both versions of Byleth. I don't know if this is a controversial opinion or not, but given their role in the game, I would have expected Dimitri and Edelgard romantic art to be more prevalent. I think what makes this pairing appealing to me is because I know it could never be in any of the established timelines. But it is something the both of them might have wanted by one point or another. They are likely Romeo and Juliet type of tragedy if Romeo became convinced that Juliet killed his father and his love turn into absolute hatred, and if Juliet started a war because she got sick of the family feud. Dimitri and Edelgard, the pair that could never be. I have also seen it mentioned in another topic that Byleth and Flayn is controversial for whatever reason, don't really understand why, it isn't really that much different from Byleth and Lysithea except Flayn is likely much older than any non-green haired character in the game. I also wonder if there is anyone who is shipping Edelgard and Rhea, because that is the most insane pairing I could think of and would be neat just because it is so ironic. So does anyone else support any pairings of characters that are unconventional or unpopular?

Hey folks, I'm turning this thread into a video archive on my 3H videos. Chris Hackney Interview Cyril: The Character Everyone Hates, Apparently. Hanneman: A Main Character in Secret Ike, Lyn and Robin. What If They Were in Fire Emblem: Three Houses? Shamir: Deadliest Waifu Deva Marie (Voice of Flayn) Interview