timon

Any idea on what the "+" means there? I'm sure it's not multiple steps conversations (arrows over letter), so I wonder what it is. For some, like B+, I'd guess it means "you're close to A", but I have A+ with a few characters (and I'm pretty sure the S rank is completely up to player choice, you don't need additional support after A?).

The problem with Group Task is that they're awfully slow, they build more support than skill level, even with a perfect and a proficient character. That's something I realized too late in the game, I was hoping Marianne could access Holy Knight just by leaving her on Stable Duty the whole game, it just doesn't get there. Had to focus daily goal and instruct to even get a chance at the certification. On skills, I've been getting great use of Dex+4, it really has an impact on your hitrates, especially as you go into BowKnight and can hit realiably from absurd range. Movement+1 is obviously amazing (especially considering that you actually lose one mov going from Paladin into Holy/Dark Knight), but the others are a bit garbage imo. By the point you get to an S+ (not gonna happen outside of NG+) your unit can probably take effective damage in the face without worrying. Weight reduction is nice, but Heavy Armor is basically useless unless you're going for that specifically. And they don't stack, which sucks. Alert stack I'm not sure about, it probably has good use for some Warp tactic with Wyvern Lords, but I'm not much for that kind of strategy so for me it was unremarkable. They could've made them a lot better by just allowing us to set all 3 at the same time, it's not like it's a broken mechanic since it gives fuckall exp.

I mean you have your answer, you just don't want to accept it. I, for one, am happy as it is and feel like it makes sense to not force these things. Actually I think they should even restrict more the heterosexual options (romancing someone like Hanneman is NOT okay even for anime, the guy could be Byleth's grandfather). The one thing I agree with in this whole thing is that showing Alois and Gilbert on S instead of A+ is a bad idea, even just from a UI point of view really.

Does that mean that you get "closed out" of your savefile, or can you still access it at least to see stuff, if not to play maps?

So I just did Marianne's paralogue and

Did you ever need a rally in this game though? Maybe in Lunatic, but as long as it's just Hard it's just irrelevant, I rally only when I have a dead turn because it raises support. Same thing for Warp, how relevant is it? Obviously having it makes a unit much better, but even then, we have stride and by the end of the game most units have high range and/or high movements, I don't think it's as big as we're making it seem. About Annette, maybe I'm bias because mine is really, really garbage. For comparison, Hanneman became a better mage. But in general, she just doesn't hit hard at all, ever, sure her magic is decent, but she doesn't get spells. And she's made of paper, even opposing mages deal big damage (and when you have 32 HP at level 30 it's BAD), at least Linhardt (who hits for similar non-damage) has sky high Res and decent health. Also I repeat the importance of spell list, she's probably the worst among dedicated mages? Excalibur is obviously amazing, but by the point you get it your other mages have enough Magic to take down Wyvern even without effectivness, and you're not killing Falcons with magic anyways. Here's how I see magic users: Top: Lysithea (just the best, and best spell list by far), Dorothea (not great magic, but second best spell list) Good: Hubert (he's a nuke, good speed, third best spell list), Marianne (she works like a healer but still hits like a truck) Average: Linhardt (crest is good for healing, the rest is unremarkable), Lorenz (Sagittae, Ragnarok, Agnea's Arrow), Mercedes (probably best healer, but that's it) Bad: Annette (see above), Flayn (she joins too late, you have someone better for sure), Ignatz/Sylvain (I've seen them used as mages, not the best) Hanneman: Hanneman (you know he's bad, but you're still using him because he's cool) I'm not counting Manuela because 35 growth is not enough for a mage. I mean she joins with more Strength than Magic, she's made for Pegasus tbh. Shame because she gets bolting. tl;dr: I honestly can't think of a worse mage than Annette in this game (among students I mean).

I'm not sure how much you consider spoilers, so I'll tag it, it's spoilers for Empire route

No, always intermediate, I think you get lv.23 in chapter 11? Post timeskip recruitments come in intermediate as well (so they're kinda useless apart from support reasons). Saint Weapons require an A rank in their skill level (except Caduceus Staff), but Hero Relics take 10 HP a turn if the units doesn't have a crest (doesn't matter if it's the same or not). Hero Relics give special combat arts if you equip them on someone who has the corresponding crest, Saint Weapons give bonuses to everyone, but they're increased if you bear the crest (eg. Chicol's Lance recovers HP, but Ferdinand recovers more HP from it). I'm pretty sure the Mace does, never seen an Hand Axe though.

Yes, the game's way too easy on hard, and yet I hope there will be middle ground between this and the tipical Lunatic bullshit. Wasn't there talk of 4 difficulties (without counting Lunatic)? I'm pretty sure I remember something along the lines of maddening/infernal from the data mine?

Honestly some of this is kind of a dumb choice of implementation. I get recruiting, I see why you'd need Byleth to talk people into it, but the spare option? Really? It's not like the other students want to drink the blood of their ex-schoolmates (unless you're killing everyone with Hubert lol). I had Leonie kill Claude, why the hell wouldn't she choose to spare him as well (also kind of sad she and Marianne didn't get special dialogue fighting him).

I looked it up just now, according to this https://gamewith.net/fire-emblem-three-houses/article/show/10501 you have to kill with Byleth to have the option to spare him and then you talk with him post battle. I'm sad, my only dialogue "option" was asking Edelgard how she felt about killing him.

Can you though? I thought there was one for every route, are you telling me you can actually recruit whoever you want post timeskip? Specifically it's known that

Empire route (Crimson Flower). Goddam don't tell me this, I don't have a savefile from before that fight... I did fight him with Byleth, but he didn't make the kill, is that the difference maker?

Holy Knight makes sense because you get mobile healing, it's also much easier for her than for most healer/mages (since she has talent/strength in the right places). That said I suggest to still train her sword enough to get Soulblade (it scales off her insane resistance, it's basically a nuke), and always get Reason up on your healers, at least to get a couple spells. Marianne has very good magic as well, I've been using her as an offensive unit from time to time and she deals big damage. So I'd say Holy Knight, you get more utility out of her and she's the best fit for it in the game, but get some offensive spells with Reason. Luckily she gets Blizzard and Thoron early on, you don't need anything else really. Obviously by spreading over to sword/reason you'll never get a 100% certification, but just try your luck every week until it works, with C in Lance (easy), A in Faith (will come naturally) and just a C-B in Riding you'll probably get accettable odds. Also I've got a question, is it ever explained where the hell Edelgard's axe comes from? I've read the weapon description, but it's not like it says much. Would be interesting to know what crest it has on as well (I image crest of Seiros, since Edel can use the combat art with it?)

Killing Ignatz felt bad, never really cared much about the guy, but the death quote is literally him saying that he never wanted that life anyways... and it felt even worse because I could've let him flee. But man, you don't hold a stealable Brave Bow if you want to flee, basic Fire Emblem rules. On the other hand killing Claude seems very unnecessary? I'm pretty sure he's smart enough to understand his situation and talk it out, his death really feels like it was added in just for tragedy purpose. As for recruitments, I can't see how anyone wouldn't recruit Leonie, she's made to join Byleth regardless of the chosen path. In my Edelgard route I also got Sylvain and Marianne which I think fit in well, seen as they hate the crest system. Though recruiting any of the "Dimitri childhood" trio will always feel bad (unless you get all three, wonder why he got mad lol).

The thing is, you shouldn't care at all about being doubled (and thus equipping a heavy axe is not an issue), because he takes half the damage of everyone else even if he gets doubled. That's the whole purpose of Raphael as a unit, just tank stuff. If yours doesn't tank well, then it probably got screwed on stats, and if your question is "how do I use him" the answer is the same as for every other RNG screwed character in this game series. And I'm saying this because there's quite a bit of people who said that Raphael has been a good unit, I had a early Golden Deer run and I can confirm the same, he's not top tier, but he does his job well. Obviously Hilda is a generally better Axe user (not as tanky), but then again Claude is just a better archer than Ignatz, Lysithea is a better mage than Marianne, Leonie is a better Cavalier than Lorenz, so what do you do, bench half your party? I fail to see the issue, really. Either bench him or babysit him to try and get him up to speed, not many alternatives.

There's to consider that a fair share of A supports seem to have some romantic implication, so maybe we're "supposed" to have just one, but the game gives you the chance to see them all in one playthrough? Seems dumb, but it might be the reason for this weird implementation.

So about that bow accuracy/range discussion that pops up from time to time, I can now safely say it's not relevant AT ALL. I have 2 Bow Knights (Leonie and Shamir), they both went by Sniper to get there, though Leonie had some time as a Pegasus. Shamir has very high Dexterity, Leonie has average. Neither of them has mastered Archer, so no Hit+20. I've been hitting for easily more than 80% hitrate on every enemy even with steel and silver bows, the few times where it drops to 60-70 I just switch to Iron and hit almost 100%, if even that isn't enough (like against some bosses, eg. the one in Edelgard's route chapter 14) Curved Shot is more than enough to grant a good hit, which lays down the way for some other unit to move in. Against regular units they don't just pack high power (mostly killing in one or two round even Warriors and Paladins), but they have incredible utility, able to reach for flyers that stay in non accessible tiles or just assassinate enemy Snipers that can't respond. And, very relevant later on, they're the only thing that can safely face opposing Bow Knights, which otherwise screw you over, especially in groups. tl;dr: don't worry, make everyone a bow knight, if they have even average Dex they'll kill everything before the enemy even knows what hit them (since it's too far, lol). I'd say if your Raphael can't take hits he probably got RNG screwed, because he should definitely be able to take double attacks without a problem. As for hitting back, can't talk about gauntlets as I haven't used them, but with an Axe you're surely getting a solid response, if not for being quite inaccurate. But even then, who cares, Raphael exists to lure in enemies in range of your other units or to block up chokepoints, doesn't really matter if he misses.

This talk of flying mages reminds me, they should really separate the usage of Faith and Reason. As of now if a class can wield magic it can wield anything (that's why it's just convenient to always level Reason on your healers), that could make Falcon Knight a bit broken. But if you make a class able to use just white magic and one able to just use Black/Dark the problem's solved (and we can avoid having 2 literally identical classes in Dark Knight and Holy Knight). Well character's strengths are not always tailored towards a class (Ashe's not the only one), I actually kind of like this, gives you freedom. I think the Lance requirement on cavalry actually makes sense, and getting to C is not hard at all, but they really need to lower the Riding requirements or make it easier to get high up. Actually all the movement skills in general are awfully slow to get good at. Then again getting certifications is not that hard, I can't remember the last time I took a test with 100%, usually a 60 is enough to pass (and if it doesn't just wait for the week after and try again).

I think he was talking about having Sylvain use a bow, not a bow on Sylvain? But I don't think it's an issue, I'm a firm "bow are quite broken" supporter, but even I don't want to give a bow to every single unit, it feels cheap and takes away variety. Sylvain has other qualities (for example the fact that my Paladin Sylvain has 30 Str and 30 Def at level 29, what the actual fuck, it's more defense than a fortress knight, he doesn't need bows).

Do unlocked Merchants carry over to NG+?

I've also heard that you can get her post timeskip, but I'm sure (or well... I damn hope) it's not the bridge map, because I beat that map and she wasn't there. There was Ignatz, that's it. Though there were some cavalier reinforcements that came in and got out in like 1 turn, maybe I should've waited to "rout" them and she would've appeared? I hope I didn't miss out on Lysi, I really want to see that Edelgard support that everyone keeps going on about.

So almost every month you get at least one Sunday where there's a "monster event" or whatever it's called, basically your typical skirmish (though higher level) with an added beast. The thing is, those beasts drop rusted weapons, and those rusted weapons can be forged in OP past games' relics (I've got rusted Gradivus and Parthia). But here's the problem, they require insanely rare materials. And I know you can get them by fully breaking beasts' armour, but even then I'm at chapter 14 and I have SEVEN of those materials. I'd need 20 to get both the aforementioned weapons. So I guess my question is: is there even a point? Unless there's some way of trading materials into NG+/getting them reliably I don't see how those will ever be relevant. Is there even a point in doing the "red exclamation mark" battles? Have some of you managed to forge some of that equipment? Up until now I just always did them because they seemed special/important, but at this point I might as well ignore them.

I'm interested to know as well, I had some pretty random stuff myself (I'm quite sure some characters got 3 levels and some only 1, with no apparent logic). On another note, I've read that 2 routes are almost the same story and map wise, can someone confirm? Specifically

Yeah I'm pretty sure it works that way. Also I think it might consider "inbetween" support points, even if you don't unlock the rank. I remember getting Leonie after some flowers gift, but B support didn't unlock (and I mean it didn't unlock, I know it's not available to see up until a certain point). After all we've seen "inbetween" points matter in other circumstances, for example for Paired Endings, or even something completely different, eg. class certification odds increase even if you just gain exp in a skill level without gaining an actual rank.