Plan Out Your Character Development Paths Early
Fire Emblem Three Houses Tips & Tricks
Once you pick your House in Fire Emblem Three Houses, it’s a good idea to flip through your roster and take a look at the stats of each student.
Next, you’ll want to look at the Advanced and Master Classes available in the game. These won’t be unlocked until you hit levels 20 and 30 respectively, but it’s still a good idea to check out each class and make a note of what their stat requirements are.
This way, you can start to get an idea of how you want each unit to develop by the time they hit level 20, and passing the Certification exams to unlock your desired Advanced and Master Classes will be a cinch.
And how exactly do you know which class will suit which character? It’s pretty easy. You’ll want to look at their individual stats, not their skill levels, and see which ones they excel in.
Units with high flying or riding stats will make good mounted units, and from there, it’s a matter of deciding which weapon type you want them to specialize in, and choose the appropriate mounted class from there.
You’ll also want to keep Budding Talents in mind. When looking at a unit’s skill proficiency, you might see stars next to a particular skill, which means they have a hidden talent waiting to be unearthed if you level it up enough.
For instance, a unit might seem very magic-focused at first; but if they have a Budding Talent for the sword skill, you can focus on leveling their sword proficiency to unlock a permanent buff for that unit.
Learn How the Teaching System Works
Fire Emblem Three Houses Tips & Tricks
Once you’ve decided on your classes for each unit and have made a note of which skills they need to level up, it’s time to master the teaching system in Fire Emblem Three Houses.
The teaching system is surprisingly deep in this game, with quite a few mechanics to keep track of.
All you need to know is that your students will gain a bit of skill progress each week for the skills that you’ve set as their goals. At the start of each week, you get to review each student’s goals, which determines which skills they’ll focus on.
So if you want a particular unit to focus on magic, you’ll set their goals to Reason and Faith. Then, they’ll automatically gain a bit of skill progress for Reason and Faith each week.
Sometimes, students may also come up to you with suggestions for new goals. You don’t always have to listen to them, and you can develop your units however you want. But if you find yourself at a loss with developing a particular character, this can come in pretty handy.
You’re also given a set number of activity point for each week’s lecture, which allows you to coach individual students to give them an extra boost in skill progress.
Individual coaching is incredibly useful as you have the chance of getting Great or Perfect procs, which increases their skill progress boost and also increases the support points you have with them.
To get Great and Perfect procs, a student needs to be highly motivated, and their motivation meter is indicated by the smiley faces next to their names on the teaching screen. A student with no motivation can’t be coached, while a fully motivated student can be coached multiple times, and gives you higher chances of getting better procs.
Lastly, you can also set Group Tasks for two students each week. Group Tasks are an additional way of letting you increase skill progress for heavy armor, riding, and flying, so assign them to the appropriate students who are currently focusing on those goals.
Explore the Monastery Thoroughly
Fire Emblem Three Houses Tips & Tricks
Now that you have a better idea of how the teaching system works in Fire Emblem Three Houses, you’ll want to make use of the facilities in the Monastery to help supplement your lesson plans.
First off, we have the Dining Hall, which lets you do two things: meal sharing, and meal preparation. Meal sharing can be done multiple times a day, provided you have enough activity points, but you only get one free meal each time. Subsequent meals need to be crafted with ingredients obtained from gardening or fishing.
Meal sharing lets you eat with two students, and this increases support points, as well as maxes out their motivation meter.
Meal preparation can be done with one other student to increase support points, and this gives your entire roster a buff for that month, depending on the type of food you’re preparing.
Next up, you have the Cathedral, which lets you answer notes from the advice box, and go for choir practice. Choir practice can be done with two other students, and rewards you with support points as well as a skill boost in Faith.
The advice box is full of questions from anonymous students, and you need to give them the right kind of advice to increase your support points with them.
Once you accrue enough renown (from completing battles and side missions), you can talk to the Saint-Statue Artisan in the Cathedral and spend renown points on experience and skill buffs to increase your roster’s growth rate.
Finally, we have the Greenhouse and Fishing Pond, which allow you to harvest plants and fish. These don’t take up activity points, but are a good source of renown, so it’s worth gardening and fishing whenever you can.
Outside of all these activities, exploring the Monastery in Fire Emblem Three Houses is also a good way to get to know the students better. And if you have the right stats, you can even recruit students from other Houses into your class.
There are several other things to do as well, such as participating in inter-house tournaments to get new weapons and money, or talking to your fellow staff and faculty for Faculty Training. This is a good opportunity to give your own character some skill progress in whichever areas you want to develop.
There are side missions to take on in the Monastery each month as well, which are mostly just simple fetch quests and serve as a nice source of renown.
And it’s also worth noting that most of Byleth’s support conversations can only be viewed when exploring the Monastery, so you’ll want to keep a look out for the blue speech bubble icons on your map, which indicate available support conversations.
Every little thing you do in the Monastery contributes to your professor level, which is directly proportionate to the amount of money you get from the church each month and how many activity points you have.
Use Battalions and Combat Arts
Fire Emblem Three Houses Tips & Tricks
The combat system in Fire Emblem Three Houses should feel familiar to most series fans, but there are two extra things to take note of: Battalions and Combat Arts.
Battalions can be equipped to individual units, which give them access to Gambits. These are special disruptive moves that can debilitate enemy units to give yourself an advantage. Some can immobilize enemies for one turn, or even push them back by a tile.
Combat Arts are extra powerful attacks related to your equipped weapon types, with the only drawback being that they consume weapon durability.
While you can get through most of the game just using basic attacks, you’ll definitely want to make use of Battalions and Combat Arts whenever you run into monster-type enemies. These enemies have a very high amount of HP and can react with devastating counterattacks.
However, Battalions and Combat Arts are great for breaking through their armor and stunning them, allowing you to go on the offensive without taking too much damage.
Use Divine Pulse Wisely
Fire Emblem Three Houses Tips & Tricks
Mila’s Turnwheel from Shadows of Valentia makes a return in Fire Emblem Three Houses, in the form of Divine Pulse.
This mechanic allows you to rewind time and undo any mistakes you might have made. While you only get a limited number of uses, you can increase that number by spending renown points at the Cathedral. Divine Pulse is great for undoing quick mistakes, preventing you from having to restart grueling battles all over again.
However, one thing that’s worth noting about Divine Pulse is that it can’t be used as a save scum feature. This means that if your unit misses an attack, rewinding time and trying that same attack will only result in the same outcome, so don’t waste your Divine Pulse charges that way.
Share the Experience
Fire Emblem Three Houses Tips & Tricks
Finally, this is an age-old tip for any Fire Emblem game but one that still bears repeating. Always spread the experience evenly across your units. Allowing a select few units to get overpowered will leave the rest of your roster in the dust, and that can quickly become disastrous when you reach the last few battles.
As always, the best way to level up units is by allowing them to take pot shots at enemies from a safe distance, or letting a strong unit lower an enemy’s HP enough so that a weaker unit can finish them off. After all, killing a unit will reward you with much more experience than just regular attacks.
Once your professor level hits C, you can start assigning adjutants in battle. These are kind of like linked pairs in previous Fire Emblem games, though the link attacks in Fire Emblem Three Houses honestly aren’t all that effective.
However, adjutants still get a percentage of experience points when their leading unit makes a move on the battlefield, and this also increases support points between the two. You’ll unlock more adjutant slots as your professor level goes up.
Be sure to search for Twinfinite or check our Fire Emblem Three Houses guide wiki for more tips and information on the game.
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