Will This Game's Playable Roster be Elite Heavy?

[Interdimensional Observer]

To explain the titular question, all FE's draw from all levels of society, but they don't always do it equally.

FE4 Gen 1 is a case of a roster that draws more heavily from the upper crust, 14 of its 24 PCs are royals or nobles. Gen 2 with Subs is very commoner, but with expectable "canon-ish" pairings, nobody is not a blue-blood. And going back to Gen 1, Finn might not be holy blooded, but he doesn't seem lower class exactly, the rougher hewn Arden and Alec do, but not Finn for some reason.

Fates is another case of an elite-heavy roster, with the majority of PCs are royals or the retainers of royals, which I consider part of elite society. Monarchs and nobles need vassals, so I'd count an official royal knights like Abels and Cains, even if they aren't explicit of elite stock, to be elite, unless part of their essential background is being not of white collar character, like Dieck. Although they're more in a grey zone here, serving elite as their lives, but lacking/defying their mannerisms.

On the other hand, Thracia 776 is a case of the rule of the lower classes. To contrast with FE4, you have next to no one with holy blood, and Marita and Galzus have no right to rule, and some elite you do get, like Linoan and Miranda, are of the lower end of the elite structure. Only Leif, Ced, and Diarmuid have the right to entire kingdoms/mini-kingdoms. Royal knights are relatively few as well, with your starting team mostly bandits/militiamen. 

Then you have most other FEs where the elite--common mixture is more balanced.

If FETH/FE3H is centered around three noble houses, like Fates was around two royal families, then there is the potential that it will also be elite-heavy.

This isn't exactly a bad thing, nor a good one. For Fates, well perhaps such an elite emphasis stole from world building via more commoners in the roster, but then again, Awakening was more commoner, but still was bad at world building.

[thecrimsonflash]

I think it depends on how desperate the circumstances are, if it is a more prosperous time the likelihood of knights and lords fighting on the front lines is higher, but if the circumstances are more desperate, perhaps the common farmer may need to take up arms to defend his home. looking at the trailer, it could go either way.

[Icelerate]

I think so. Lowly commoners aren't going to be commanding a squad of units in battle. 

[Modamy]

It seems pretty likely given that each unit is leading a squadron of soldiers. It doesn't really count out mercenaries who lead their own men or veteran soldiers (possibly of common birth) who are respected and given authority over others.

[Book Bro]

It'll probably be a mix. I could see most of the cast being royalty or knights but there also being a good amount of mercenaries. Hopefully we see some commoners join up as well, but given the story I would expect very few of them in the army.

[Ivy Wife Supremacy]

Yeah I see a mix but royal/knight/noble being the majority and yeah mercenaries as well.

[Calico]

I hope not. One of the worst things about Fates was that nearly everyone was either royalty or retainers to royalty, and I felt that that made recruitment and character relationships feel a lot less varied. Hopefully, it's (supposed) focus on three royals versus ten from Fates will mean more kinds of characters will be a part of our army.

We still know very little about the story, so it's honestly way too early to tell. 

[Dandy Druid]

I'm going to go with yes, given as how each unit seems to be controlling a squadron of soldiers.

Although it would be pretty funny if we picked up some Donnel/Mozu and handed them a group of soldiers to take care of.

It would also be interesting to see how leadership affects some characters.

[wissenschaft]

5 hours ago, Calico said:

I hope not. One of the worst things about Fates was that nearly everyone was either royalty or retainers to royalty, and I felt that that made recruitment and character relationships feel a lot less varied. Hopefully, it's (supposed) focus on three royals versus ten from Fates will mean more kinds of characters will be a part of our army.

We still know very little about the story, so it's honestly way too early to tell. 

I actually enjoyed that quite a bit. Its not like your leading actual armies in most FE games. Your units should be the elite of the elite.

Now certainly there can be a lot more variation in backgrounds besides "royal retainer". But that all comes down to writing quality.

[Slumber]

6 hours ago, Icelerate said:

I think so. Lowly commoners aren't going to be commanding a squad of units in battle. 

They absolutely can if they work their way up the ranks. 

... Which is actually going to be a weird thing to consider if they don't change up character archetypes a lot. 

"Hey likely sociopathic mercenary Myrmidon/random Bandit or Pirate with a heart of gold, join our army and we'll instantly give you a horde of mooks to control." 

The mooks, who have been loyal for who knows how long, will wonder "Hey what the hell?" 

Edited June 14, 2018 by Slumber

[YingofDarkness]

I'm going to be echoing everybody else by saying that the cast will probably contain more members of the upper crest then commoners. It would only make sense if the squads are being led by nobles, high ranking military commanders, fresh knights with a lot of potential that have some connection to the former 2, and mercenaries. Your random farmer is more likely to end up being part of the squadron then leading it.

[thecrimsonflash]

14 minutes ago, Slumber said:

They absolutely can if they work their way up the ranks. 

... Which is actually going to be a weird thing to consider if they don't change up character archetypes a lot. 

"Hey likely sociopathic mercenary Myrmidon/random Bandit or Pirate with a heart of gold, join our army and we'll instantly give you a horde of mooks to control." 

The mooks, who have been loyal for who knows how long, will wonder "Hey what the hell?" 

can't wait for a jaffar or volk type commanding a small force, "what are your orders officer?" "..." "your orders... officer?" "just do whatever" "right... we'll do just that officer. *mumbles* who put this guy in charge?"

or for that matter any younger character "hahaha very funny commander, now can you please show us our real commanding officer?" "*loli/shota cries*"

[IGdood]

It would be interesting to have secondary leaders or subcaptains who can be recruited and fight as a secondary character within the squad.  Graphically they'll be distinct from your generic redshirt/mook but numberswise they confer additional stats.  I can see commoner characters rising to this level, at least.

 

Bonus points if they can be transferred between certain squads and get an extra bonus towards leaders they have an affinity for.  If the squad they're in is destroyed, such characters die along as well.

Edited June 14, 2018 by IGdood

[Interdimensional Observer]

20 hours ago, Slumber said:

They absolutely can if they work their way up the ranks. 

... Which is actually going to be a weird thing to consider if they don't change up character archetypes a lot. 

"Hey likely sociopathic mercenary Myrmidon/random Bandit or Pirate with a heart of gold, join our army and we'll instantly give you a horde of mooks to control." 

The mooks, who have been loyal for who knows how long, will wonder "Hey what the hell?" 

Assuming we have to actually recruit anyone anymore. Awakening made recruitments nearly a nonissue, and Fates made it even less of one. Like what is the point to Nyx being an NPC?

I get that Xavier's recruitment should never be repeated, and Stefan- well in the modern world such obscure recruitments will be undone by the wide wisdom of the Web. And I know that most recruitments in most games are indeed very easy. But you did have to try a bit more than Afatening does, and while it isn't a big part of FE at all, I kinda liked it.

 

On 6/13/2018 at 3:08 PM, Calico said:

I hope not. One of the worst things about Fates was that nearly everyone was either royalty or retainers to royalty, and I felt that that made recruitment and character relationships feel a lot less varied. Hopefully, it's (supposed) focus on three royals versus ten from Fates will mean more kinds of characters will be a part of our army.

This too is what I rather fear. You can use a heavy amount of retainers to really flesh out life amongst the elite, but Fates didn't do this. The roster was societally top-heavy, without doing much at the top.

[Quiyonce]

Huh...now that I think about it, there were only 7-10 1st-gen non-royals/royal-related characters in Fates. I'm hoping for a little more diversity but if they use the fact that all these characters have common grounds to incite tension, character growth or even plot I wouldn't mind that much as long as we have at least a few outliers.

[Maimishou]

Hm. Assuming the three houses are noble houses I think we could get a fair number of Elite members of society on the roster. I'm not really sure it matters either way though. So long as the characters and their relationships are good I don't see why people would be against it.

[Landmaster]

Looks like it will be the case for the most part considering it's about Three Houses, likely Elite Houses. But I'm sure there will be commoners joining, as well. It doesn't truly matter to me either way but I doubt it will be totally just nobles~

[NekoKnight]

I expect it to be elite heavy (if the game starts at a military academy, it's likely many of your units will be fellow students) but I hope it's a bit more balanced. Characters coming from all walks of life makes a world feel more Brom and Nephenee contribute more to the world than Arthur and Effie who get "character gimmick + very loyal retainer" as their significance. Ideally each character would be able to contribute to the setting in some way.

[ChiefStrudel]

On 6/13/2018 at 8:06 PM, YingofDarkness said:

I'm going to be echoing everybody else by saying that the cast will probably contain more members of the upper crest then commoners. It would only make sense if the squads are being led by nobles, high ranking military commanders, fresh knights with a lot of potential that have some connection to the former 2, and mercenaries. Your random farmer is more likely to end up being part of the squadron then leading it.

I'm in agreeance on that. It fits more with the direction Fire Emblem has gone with recruitment. In the GBA titles it was common to recruit units from the enemy forces who had little to no ties to your units. Recruiting troops that way, then giving them a cadre of troops would feel odd. But in the most recent Fire Emblems, new units are just given to you during chapters. If Three Houses follows this formula, then it wouldn't be out of the ordinary for new units to join you with their own group of troops already under their command.

As an aside, I do miss the recruitment from the old games. Recruiting enemy generals, mercenaries, soldiers, and thieves was a lot of fun. It added an extra layer of difficulty on the maps, and you were forced to actually earn your troops. I don't like that new units are just given to you like how Awakening and Fates has done it. But with the addition of soldiers serving under each unit, I fear we're going to continue in that direction. Unless by convincing an enemy unit, we also convince all of their troops to defect, I don't see this method of recruitment returning in this title.

[Modamy]

2 hours ago, ChiefStrudel said:

I'm in agreeance on that. It fits more with the direction Fire Emblem has gone with recruitment. In the GBA titles it was common to recruit units from the enemy forces who had little to no ties to your units. Recruiting troops that way, then giving them a cadre of troops would feel odd. But in the most recent Fire Emblems, new units are just given to you during chapters. If Three Houses follows this formula, then it wouldn't be out of the ordinary for new units to join you with their own group of troops already under their command.

As an aside, I do miss the recruitment from the old games. Recruiting enemy generals, mercenaries, soldiers, and thieves was a lot of fun. It added an extra layer of difficulty on the maps, and you were forced to actually earn your troops. I don't like that new units are just given to you like how Awakening and Fates has done it. But with the addition of soldiers serving under each unit, I fear we're going to continue in that direction. Unless by convincing an enemy unit, we also convince all of their troops to defect, I don't see this method of recruitment returning in this title.

The soldiers under their command as an enemy unit could just join you as well. If a mercenary company's leader joins you why wouldn't the rest of his men. A common villager who is recruited into your forces could lead a squad implied to be made up of other villagers who have just chosen him as their leader.

[HappyHawlucha.]

10 hours ago, Modamy said:

The soldiers under their command as an enemy unit could just join you as well. If a mercenary company's leader joins you why wouldn't the rest of his men. A common villager who is recruited into your forces could lead a squad implied to be made up of other villagers who have just chosen him as their leader.

And a villager who has proved his worth during the recruitment battle could just be given a battalion. ORRRR the cooler option of having Villager classes as trainee classes without access to the formation command until they promote, so they will be on their own on the battlefield before promotion to accentuate their non-noble status.

[PrincessAlyson]

On 6/13/2018 at 3:08 PM, Calico said:

I hope not. One of the worst things about Fates was that nearly everyone was either royalty or retainers to royalty, and I felt that that made recruitment and character relationships feel a lot less varied. Hopefully, it's (supposed) focus on three royals versus ten from Fates will mean more kinds of characters will be a part of our army.

We still know very little about the story, so it's honestly way too early to tell. 

 

On 6/14/2018 at 4:57 PM, Interdimensional Observer said:

This too is what I rather fear. You can use a heavy amount of retainers to really flesh out life amongst the elite, but Fates didn't do this. The roster was societally top-heavy, without doing much at the top.

I agree with these statements. I would like some variety, because Fates did have too many Royal/Noble characters and elite soldiers/knights/retainers. I'm hoping for some middle or lower class people in this game to balance it out. Supports between Royal/Noble/rich/middle class characters and poor characters would flesh things out a bit and provide some world building. 

[Azz]

I feel like it will probably be majority elite class with a few non-nobles joining. I mean, we have at least 3 houses worth of characters, a possible military school more than likely full noble kids and then the church which is gonna be a lot. Though, I do hope we get some non-royals like Brom and Neph in PoR/RD to get a villager viewpoint on the church.

[ElectiveToast]

My two cents: The game’s plot will fixate mostly on the elite, while a few odd commoners may come in to shake things up. 

[HappyHawlucha.]

56 minutes ago, ElectiveToast said:

My two cents: The game’s plot will fixate mostly on the elite, while a few odd commoners may come in to shake things up. 

Commoners such as the Villager class will come in without the ability to command a squadron and will be a trainee class. When promoted to a base class they will have earned their right to command a squadron and as a result have more place in this setting.