Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes - Every Character's Secret Innate Ability (& How to Unlock Them)

Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes features a detailed and highly customizable class system, allowing players to specialize each unit in a variety of different ways. A lesser-known aspect of this is the existence of a hidden "innate skill" for each character, which can only be unlocked by mastering a specific class that is not one of their recommended classes. This guide will break down all of the unique skills and explain how to unlock them.

Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes is a hack and slash action game developed by Omega Force and published by Nintendo. Set in the world of Fodlan, but in a different timeline to Fire Emblem: Three Houses, the game follows the journey of a mercenary named Shez whose presence in the story alters it drastically from the previous game. Joining one of the Three Houses of the Officer's Academy, and later the army of one of Fodlan's three main factions, Shez joins up with familiar faces in a new story that follows one of three possible routes.

Proficient Witstrike - Mortal Savant

a white haired girl creates a large, purple blast directly in front of her. soldiers are flying in all directions. a mini map sits in the top right corner, an ability wheel in the bottom right, health meters for four different characters in the bottom left, and a hit count that reads "1014 hits" in the top left. Along the bottom are the words "Lysithea defeated the Thief!"

The Proficient Witstrike skill allows the unit to calculate all their damage using their magic stat, making it possible for magic-focused units to excel in physical classes like Mortal Savant, War Master, or Pegasus Knight. Unlocking this skill requires an eligible unit to master the Mortal Savant class. Only the following characters will receive this skill:

Lysithia, who can wield Thunderbrand this way to great effect thanks to her crest of Charon.
Lorenz, whose use of this skill is dependent on how his level-ups have left his strength and magic stats since he tends to be fairly well-balanced.
Sothis, who can use this skill to wield the Sublime Creator Sword to great effect.

Gather - Trickster

Fire Emblem Warriors - Three Hopes_Expedition_Monica

The Gather skill causes a unit to pull nearby enemies in front of them right at the start of their regular combo. This allows them to cluster enemies close together to maximize damage. Gather is unlocked by eligible units when they master the Trickster class. The following characters can receive this skill:

Linhardt, allowing him to cluster enemies together for his powerful spells and put them in range of his wind orbs.
Monica, allowing her to group enemies together to take full advantage of her powerful spells and AOE personal skill.
Manuela, allowing her to cluster enemies together for powerful magic attacks and draw enemies into position for her personal skill.
Shamir, allowing her to pull enemies into the path of her arrows and set up for arrow rain or the Bow Knight's charged shots.

Range Master - Dark Knight/Holy Knight

The Range Master skill greatly increases the range of the unit's attacks, allowing them to lash out over great distances and pull even more foes into their combos. For the majority of eligible characters, this is unlocked by Mastering Dark Knight, though Marianne and Seteth must instead master Holy Knight. The following characters can receive this skill:

Shez, providing them with even greater range for their absurdly fast Fleugal/Asura combos.
Hubert, allowing him to deal tons of damage over a wide area with his magic as a Dark Bishop.
Caspar, making his axe or fist combo attacks much further reaching, helping to mitigate the slower speed of such attacks.
Ashe, improving his already excellent range and allowing him to tear through hordes of enemies easily with his bow attacks.
Marianne, giving her excellent reach with her light element attacks, dealing decent damage while healing herself.
Seteth, mitigating the shorter range and slower speed of his axe attacks or further enhancing his range with spears.

Exalted Breath - Holy Knight

fire-emblem-three-hopes-dorothea-dancer-warriors-1

The Exalted Breath skill is excellent for users of recovery magic, allowing them to restore their awakening gauge relative to the amount of healing they do with their magic. Unfortunately, none of the characters with a natural affinity for the priest or bishop classes can learn this skill, but it is still very useful on certain units. Unlocked by eligible units when mastering the Holy Knight class, this skill can be obtained by the following units:

Dorothea, who has excellent magic stats allowing her to capitalize on this skill very well.
Raphael, who isn't really built for spellcasting at all, unfortunately for this skill.
Catherine, who can cast spells as a Mortal Savant and could get some situational usage out of this skill.
Byleth, who can cast a lot of spells in their unique class and can make good use of this skill in conjunction with their awakening boosting skills.

Flyswatter - Falcon Knight

The Flyswatter skill is a very valuable skill for pressing the advantage, improving the rate at which the warrior and awakening gauges fill when attacking foes that have been launched into the air. Available to eligible units by mastering the Falcon Knight class, here are the candidates:

Petra, who can make good use of this to tear through enemies with her incredible speed.
Leonie, who can use this while sending foes flying with her lance attacks.
Constance, who can use this in conjunction with a number of her magical combos to juggle enemies and empower herself.

Ironclad - Great Knight

The Ironclad skill makes for an exceptionally powerful addition to defense-focused characters, allowing them to nullify attacks that would break, penetrate, or otherwise bypass their guard. This allows units to safely block combat arts that would normally break through their guard without any fear. This skill is unlocked by having eligible units master the Great Knight class, here are the units that can acquire it:

Hilda, supplementing her excellent attack stats and solid defense with extra protection.
Ferdinand, allowing him to tank heavy hits and keep on going.

Inspiring Agility - Great Knight

A more offensive skill than Ironclad, Inspiring Agility allows the unit to use dash attacks regardless of their current class. This gives them the ability to more easily string together combos while evading enemies. Unlocked by mastering Great Knight with an eligible unit, here are the characters who can learn this skill:

Bernadetta, who can make good use of it to transition from dodging back into attacking with her bow.
Dimitri, who can use it to quickly alternate between pressing the offensive with his spear and evading incoming attacks.
Rodrigue, who can use the skill to keep up the pressure while dodging similarly to Dimitri.

Heaviest Hitter - Wyvern Lord

Fire Emblem Warriors - Three Hopes_Claude Attacking

Another excellent offensive skill, Heaviest Hitter causes the unit's strong attacks to produce the stun gauge at a high rate, making it far easier to stun foes and unleash a critical rush. The skill is unlocked by mastering the Wyvern Lord class with one of the following units:

Annette, who can make excellent use of this skill in a physical class wielding her relic weapon "Crusher", or as a spellcaster with her array of dangerous magic.
Claude, who can use this in conjunction with his great attack speed in his unique classes to tear through enemy generals.
Hapi, who can benefit from this skill in much the same way as Annette using her powerful magical heavy attacks.

Domineer - Wyvern Lord

Keeping in theme with Heaviest Hitter, Domineer is a powerful offensive skill that boosts damage dealt to any unit that is on foot. Fittingly, this is learned by mastering the Wyvern Lord class with one of the following units:

Jeritza, whose excellent movement speed allows him to tear across the map and take down hordes of foes with this skill.
Arval, who lacks movement speed but makes up for it with exceptional wide-range attacks as a Gremory or Dark Bishop.

Sharpshooter - Bow Knight

Fire-Emblem-Warriors---Three-Hopes_Ashen-Wolves_Yuri-1

An excellent skill for taking down weaker foes, Sharpshooter causes critical hits to have a chance of defeating any non-commander unit instantly. This is great for clearing space and getting rid of annoying soldiers, and can be unlocked by Mastering Bow Knight as one of the following characters:

Mercedes, whose role as a support spellcaster makes her slightly less suited to this skill when compared to the other units that can learn it.
Ingrid, who can make great use of this on the front lines as a Pegasus Knight or Falcon Knight.
Yuri, whose natural affinity for the Trickster class makes him a perfect fit for this skill.

Prepared to Die - War Master

This skill causes the warrior gauge to quickly restore when HP is below a certain threshold and the warrior gauge has less than one bar filled. This allows characters to pull out warrior specials quickly during dangerous situations. The following characters can learn this skill by mastering the War Master class:

Dedue, who can use this in conjunction with his solid defenses to great effect.
Jeralt, who is also very good at taking a hit and can use this to dish out his special attacks regularly.

Nullify Magic - Gremory/Dark Bishop/Dark Knight

fe3h edelgard scarlet blaze black eagles

This exceptionally powerful skill allows the unit to completely nullify damage from offensive magic, allowing them effective immunity to magical damage and giving them an edge over some of Fire Emblem's strong magic users. This makes it one of the most powerful skills in the game, and it can be acquired by mastering Gremory, Dark Bishop, or Dark Knight, depending on the specific unit.

Edelgard learns this skill via Gremory and makes excellent use of it as an Armored Lord/Emperor.
Felix can learn this skill via Dark Bishop and makes excellent use of it to mitigate his somewhat lacking defenses.
Sylvain can learn this through Dark Bishop and uses it to great effect when facing dark mages.
Ignatz learns this via Dark Bishop, allowing him to mitigate Dark Mages' advantage against mounted units like the Bow Knight.
Holst can learn this skill from Dark Bishop, using it to compliment his speedy and aggressive playstyle.
Flayn can learn this skill through Dark Knight, allowing her to dance through enemy spellcasters without issue.
Balthus learns this skill through Dark Bishop and makes good use of it in conjunction with a brawler/war master's natural knack for fighting mages to become an unstoppable mage slayer.
Rhea can make excellent use of this skill, learned from Gremory, to bulk up her excellent natural defenses as a Saint.

Gatekeeper

The Gatekeeper in Fire Emblem is something of a special case, able to learn every innate ability except for Flyswatter by mastering the following classes: