Fire Emblem: Three Houses has been out for about a month now, and wow is it selling! Sliding in right behind FE: Awakening in lifetime sales, this new iteration is obviously a winner for the franchise as a whole. Its success is in no small part due to the number of risks the dev team took with all the new systems, changes to the established mechanics, and a slightly heavier story than the more recent titles.
With every new layer of complexity, however, come a smattering of finer details that players might miss, especially those who are now to the franchise. So, let's break it down a bit and give you some tips about certain things that aren't quite explained in-game.
10 Adjutants Gain Support
At first glance, the Adjutant system seems a bit... unnecessary? You can attach one unit to another and the support unit will help out in fights with no risk to itself, but the exp gained is pretty minimal.
So, what's it really for? Well, mostly for support ranks and class mastery. The best way we've found to use it is to grab a student from another class that Byleth desperately wants to scout, and have them join the team temporarily with the "Mission Assistance" option. Then, staple them onto Byleth and have them go nuts killing enemies left and right.
9 Master Classes Aren't That Great
So FE: TH had all of its stats, data, classes, and more completely open in an Excel sheet on day 1. That's just how the internet rolls. People go in, tear open the game, and compile all the useful info lightning fast.
What this recent dissection discovered is that the master classes really aren't all that worth it. Sure, 3-4 of them are direct upgrades, but most of the master classes are only as good as (if not "worse" than) their advanced class counterparts. They seem to mostly be there as a way to "multi-class" characters, or for people to have a metaphorical finish line for character builds.
8 Can't Nab The House Leaders Or Their Attendants
Now, this goes without saying, but class leaders Dimitri, Claude, and Edelgard can't be convinced to switch to Byleth's class. As it turns out, though, each of them has a right-hand man/woman who ALSO can't be recruited. For Dimitri, it's obviously Dedue. Edelgard has Hubert, while Claude has...Hilda?
That last one doesn't seem to make much sense considering Claude and Hilda don't seem that close, but still, these 6 kids are, sadly, absolutely off-limits (though Hilda might be recruitable in weirdly random circumstances).
7 Recruiting Classmates Doesn't Necessarily Require Skills
Back to scalping kids from the other classes: it's easier than we thought. The game likes to make the player think that the only way to recruit other students is by leveling up the stat/skill that the student is interested in, such as Reason/Magic for Lindhardt or Charisma/Lances for Ashe.
Instead, though, we just rained tea parties, food, and flowers and whatever students we wanted. That's right, if you get a student to Rank B support, they have a chance to randomly ask to join Byleth's class during any week. It's all RNG, though, so be aware that this might involve some save-scumming.
6 Budding Talents Are Easy To Obtain
Another little mechanic the game doesn't necessarily shout about is the Budding Talents system. This is another way for the game to push players towards certain skills for characters and to avoid people making Raphael a mage or something.
People seem to be confused about how to go about filling those stars. The answer? Independent instructing. Essentially, just get a student's motivation to 100, then use all their solo instructing points on that skill until it blossoms into a rad passive skill. It only takes about a rank or so to do, so players don't have to level an unwanted stat to A.
5 There's An Easy Way To Get Mastery Ranks
So, the game might not tell people this because it's a bit of a cheap strategy, but for the players that want to combine different mastery skills, it's crucial. To get a masterysSkill, a unit needs to fill their Class bar by performing in battles, and this can take a while.
During missions that don't have a set turn limit (most auxiliary battles), players can just un-equip all their weapons and let a weak enemy swing at them over and over. The best way is to make sure all Byleth's other units are outside of the enemy's range except the one with the class that needs mastering. Happy grinding!
4 Fishing Is Important, And Slightly Complex
Just like as any good game should, FE: TH features a fishing minigame! It's actually one of the better ways to raise your Professor Rank, because, obviously, a good clean line cast is the sign of an experienced instructor.
The fishing is pretty simple. Snag a fish and hit A when the moving ring enters the hollow ring. Surprisingly, many players don't seem to know that there are multiple opportunities for a fish per bait cast. When the fish icon hovers over the line and shakes, just hold on for a second. There are actually 3-4 opportunities to hit A and this allows players to wait for more rare variations. So, instead of catching all blues, players can drown in red, yellow, or even rainbow rarity fish.
3 Gardening Is Somehow Even More Important, And Easy
The greenhouse in Gareg Mach Monastery might just be the most important building in that school. Why is that? Well, some of the potential rewards to be gained from gardening are incredible: permanent stat-boosting consumables, gifts, food for stat-boosting meals, and more!
There has to be a drawback, right? Not really. It doesn't require any activity points to use and the only cost is whatever the player puts towards cultivating. Basically, our tip is to always remember to use this building, whether you're planting or harvesting. Flowers seem to be the best option as well, since food is available from shops as well as from random drops around the school.
2 Don't Throw Away Broken Or Rusted Weapons
The blacksmith is an option from the Marketplace menu early on, but it doesn't actually unlock until after the player completes a sidequest a few chapters later.
Our advice? Throw the broken, rusted, or otherwise unusable weapons into the convoy, because the blacksmith can fix them right up. Seriously, you can repair weapons and even forge them into new ones! Just remember, these forge-costs are dependant on materials gained through shops, sidequests, and battles, so they're not infinite. Some of the upgrades are locked behind the Professor Rank, too, so keep that in mind as well.
1 Watch Out, Gender-Locked Classes And Romances Are Back
Finally, this is more of a heads up and an overall complaint for this otherwise masterfully-made game. Yes, there are still gender-locked classes in Fire Emblem, and yes, they're still heavily in favor of male characters. So, before anyone makes their female Byleth, make sure there are no plans to make them into a Brawler, Grappler, Dark Mage, Hero, Dark Bishop, Or War Master. Wow, that's a lot.
At least the females will have a bunch of options as well... right? Oh, just Pegasus Knight, Falcon Knight, and Gremory? Not even Dancer? Huh. Seems fair. But at least there are same-sex romances now, right? Those options are just as oddly balanced, sadly, considering there are only 2-3 male-male romances and 5 female-female.