Fire Emblem Three Houses: Reach for my hand, I'll soar away.

[Squark]

So, having gone through some exploring, it's now time to start actually instructing my students. And I'm afraid I'm kind of lost. I'm struggling to understand how to set my students (Golden Dear, for the record) up for success. What should I be looking for when trying to set goals for them? It seems like I should be basing that on what classes I want them to develop into, but to do that I'd need to know what class I want them to end up in eventually as well as what classes they should go through to get there.

It's a lot to take in, and most of the guides I've seen are either too general (Okay, sure, I know what does what, but how do I figure out what I should do?) or too specific (Okay, that's a list of classes you suggest for each student. Why, and how do I make them flow together?)

[tonberrian]

Each character has strengths, obviously - with the blue arrows pointing up. And weaknesses, with red arrows pointing down. There's also hidden talents - Either being a weakness or normal, but they have three stars next to them. Once you train them in a hidden talent enough times, it develops into a strength which grants them an ability.

Classes are really generic in this game, you can pretty much do whatever you want, but they have proficiencies - they'll gain in certain skills faster than the rest. The main benefits of classes are different stat growth rate changes, movement options, abilities, and whether or not they can use magic. Any character can learn magic by raising Faith and Reason skills, but they can only use it in certain casting classes - which means that you generally want, say, Lysithea, in a casting class, because that's her strength.

In addition, most classes have an ability and/or combat art you can learn permanently by mastering it, and additionally some classes have abilities that you can use while in that class. This lists all the abilities and how to get them. This lists all the classes and what abilities they get just for being that class and the proficiencies (which give more skill xp in battle). [url=https://serenesforest.net/three-houses/classes/class-abilities-arts/]This will tell what classes give what arts/abilities. There are other pages that describe what abilities increasing skills give, stat changes and stat growth modifiers per class, combat arts, etc.

I know that's a lot to take in, but on normal at least it's easy enough to just increase characters in what they're good at, and choose classes that they qualify for and raise them in a class until they master it. More in depth is finding an ability you want, then finding a path to get it as soon as possible, rinse, repeat.

[Zevox]

So, having gone through some exploring, it's now time to start actually instructing my students. And I'm afraid I'm kind of lost. I'm struggling to understand how to set my students (Golden Dear, for the record) up for success. What should I be looking for when trying to set goals for them? It seems like I should be basing that on what classes I want them to develop into, but to do that I'd need to know what class I want them to end up in eventually as well as what classes they should go through to get there.

It's a lot to take in, and most of the guides I've seen are either too general (Okay, sure, I know what does what, but how do I figure out what I should do?) or too specific (Okay, that's a list of classes you suggest for each student. Why, and how do I make them flow together?)

You can, broadly speaking, separate characters into a few categories, to make things a bit easier to figure out. The biggest divide being between magic-users and physical characters - it's pretty much a waste to try and force someone inclined towards one category into the other, as they're probably terrible at it, with very few exceptions. That particular divide is likely obvious from early on, as the magic-users start with spells and high magic stats (Lysithea and Marianne, in Golden Deer), while the more physical characters focus on weapons and have better physical stats. One of the rare exceptions is in Golden Deer though, in the form of Lorenz, who can do either physical or magical classes, and is as a result also good for the physical/magical hybrid classes you get access to at high levels, so you can take him in either direction.

An easy way to go is simply look at what skills a given character is good at (blue arrows indicating they learn those faster), and put them into classes that use those. You can't go wrong that way, as it's basically the default path for everyone.

I'm guessing you've not played Fire Emblem before, and as such don't recognize the existing classes and how they might relate to each other? I can give a breakdown of that, hopefully simply enough to be easily read.

Spoiler: Class Trees

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Basic Class: Commoner/Noble [there is no difference besides name]. Everyone starts here, until level 5, and should change out of it as soon as possible.
Beginner Classes: Myrmidon (swords), Soldier (spears), Fighter (axes/bows/gauntlets), Monk (magic). Pretty simple tier to pick a class for, just go by whichever weapon the character is using.

From there, things open up considerably, but you can still think of most classes as part of a sequence based on the weapon(s) they use.

Swords: The typical route here will be Mercenary -> Swordsmaster/Hero (male only for Hero), or Thief -> Assassin, though you can do either intermediate class into any of the advanced ones. Generally, the Thief/Assassin will be faster but weaker, while a Merc/Swordmaster/Hero will be stronger, though really all sword-using classes favor speed over other stats to some extent. Thief/Assassin also gets the ability to open locked doors or chests without a key, which is very handy, so it's often nice to make sure you have one of those in your army. There is no particular Master-rank class for this weapon route.

There's also the Lord class, available only to the house leaders. It's kind of unremarkable in all ways and I wouldn't recommend it.

Spears: Cavalier -> Paladin or Pegasus Knight (female only) -> Falcon Knight (also female only). Kind of an awkward weapon in that the only class options are mounted, and one of the two routes is gender-locked, so there's few options, but that makes it easy to decide on what to train. Also awkward that Pegasus Knights have no Advanced class, so they don't promote in between level 10 and 30, going straight from their intermediate class into the Master-class Falcon Knight. Anyway, Cavalier/Paladins are good all-arounder units with high mobility, and Pegasus/Falcon Knights are very fast but somewhat fragile units who make excellent mage-killers due to their high resistance stat. Flight also means that Pegasus/Falcon Knights are among the most mobile units in the game. Optionally, Cavalier/Paladins could train axes and heavy armor to take the Master class Great Knight, but it's not a strict upgrade as it trades speed for higher strength and defense, and it is hard to get all of the required stats up going that route, so it's purely optional.

Axes: Brigand -> Warrior -> War Master (male only), or Brigand -> Wyvern Rider -> Wyvern Lord, or Armored Knight -> Fortress Knight -> Great Knight (optional). Here you have real options: the high strength/speed/health but low defense footsoldier type, the more balanced-stats flying classes, or the high-defense/low speed tank classes. All have their uses, and most physical characters will do fine in any of them, it's mostly a matter of picking your preference - though there's two particular characters, Rafael and Dedue, who you would be strongly advised to go Armored/Fortress Knight with, as their speed stat will always be atrocious, and those classes help make up for that with sky-high stats elsewhere. Great Knight is again optional - it's easier to get into starting off the Armored/Fortress Knight route, but trades some strength and defense for its increased mobility, so it's not a strict upgrade.

Gauntlets: Brawler -> Grappler -> War Master (male only, optional). Just one route if you're focusing on this weapon, so not much to say. It emphasizes speed and strength over defense, sort of ending up in between the Swordmaster route and the Warrior route in overall stats.

Bows: Archer -> Sniper -> Bow Knight (optional). Just one real option for this weapon, so the only real choice is whether to train the extra skills to get into Bow Knight. I find it to be worth it myself, given the extra mobility and attack range it gives, but Snipers are plenty good enough for the endgame too.

Magic: Mage -> Warlock -> Gremory (female only), or Dark Mage -> Dark Bishop -> Gremory (female only), or Priest -> Bishop -> Gremory (female only). Sadly the only Master-rank pure mage class is gender-locked, so males will be stuck with Warlock/Dark Bishop or a hybrid class. Honestly, there's not much point to Dark Mage and Dark Bishop for anyone except Hubert, who is exclusive to the Black Eagles route, so this is really just a choice between focusing on your blasting magic (Mage/Warlock) or your healing magic (Priest/Bishop). And it's really advisable that all mages learn both types anyway, just for utility's sake, it's just that each class line will make them better at one than the other.

Hybrid Classes: At the Master rank you'll unlock classes that combined physical and magical prowess, which are optional classes that you could consider taking characters into, but nobody needs by default. These are Mortal Savant (Sword + Reason), Dark Knight (Lance, Reason, Riding), and Holy Knight (Lance, Faith, Riding). The most common use for this is to have mages go Dark/Holy Knight for the increased mobility that being mounted brings. Relatively few characters are suited to actually use both physical weapons and magic - your main character (Byleth); Edelgard in Black Eagles; Lorenz in Golden Deer; Sylvain, Felix, and Ingrid in Blue Lions; and Manuela and Hanneman from the Church are the only ones who really have the growths to potentially make it work. It's also worth noting that Mortal Savant penalizes your speed growth for some reason, so it can wind up being a bit of a trap, as that's arguably the most important stat in the game for anyone who isn't an Armored/Fortress Knight.

There's also several such Hybrid classes available as part of the DLC pass, but I can't comment on them yet, as I've yet to play the DLC.

Special Classes: Your main character (Byleth) and House Leader will gain access to unique classes as the game goes on that only they can use. Byleth gets one that uses swords, faith magic, and gauntlets, which is good but can be ignored if you prefer. Edelgard basically gets a variant of the Armored/Fortress Knight route, though honestly I think that those classes are better, personally. Dimitri gets the only non-mounted spear-focused classes in the game, but other than that they're kind of unremarkable. Claude gets the best, a pair of Wyvern-mounted archer classes, which is fantastic. There's also the Dancer class, which you'll have the chance to teach one (and only one) student of your choice around chapter 9 or so, which is a poor combat class (though it does allow you to use spells, which is handy) but gains the ability to dance for other characters, allowing them to move a second time in a turn.

A quick breakdown of each of the skills:

Spoiler: Skills

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Weapons: These are pretty self-explanatory: train them to get better at using the weapon in question. At each "+" rank (i.e. D+, C+, etc) you'll level up the ability that gives you a stat boost for using the weapon. At other ranks, you'll learn combat artes, or certain skills that are associated with the weapon type, such as "breaker" skills that make them better at fighting a specific other weapon type (swords, for instance, get Axebreaker, making sword users better suited to fighting axe wielders). Everybody wants one of these (or magic), sometimes two if a class you want into calls for it (Assassin, for instance, wants both swords and bows).

Magic: Reason and Faith for blasting magic and healing/support magic respectively. Any magic-user really wants to learn both of these, simply because there's no reason not to and it makes them more versatile. Non-mages would only dip into this if you intend them to take one of the late-game hyrbid classes, as any class that isn't specifically dedicated to magic use can't use magic at all.

Authority: Lets you equip stronger battalions, and makes their attacks (called Gambits) stronger. A useful skill for everyone, though it's not strictly necessary to make it high on anyone.

Heavy Armor: Only needed to qualify for certain classes (Armored/Fortress/Great Knight). It does give an arguably useful skill, Weight -3, at a fairly low rank (C), so anyone can benefit from taking it that far, but honestly you'll likely have enough skills to equip before you'd consider branching someone out to grab it anyway.

Riding: Only needed to qualify for the mounted classes (Cavalier, Paladin, Great Knight, Dark Knight, Holy Knight). Pretty useless otherwise, as its most universally helpful skill isn't unlocked until a very high rank (A+ for Movement +1).

Flying: only needed to qualify for the flying classes (Pegasus/Falcon Knight, Wyvern Rider/Lord). Does give Alert Stance at B rank, which gives a dodge boost when using the "wait" command, which could be useful to characters that emphasize dodging (such as Swordmasters, Assassins, or Grapplers), but again, you'll likely have your skill slots filled up by the time you'd consider training it just for that, and B rank does take a fair bit of investment to reach.