Fire Emblem: Fortune's Weave presents a vast and sometimes overwhelming experience, even with its integrated tutorials. Concepts such as the build stat, the significance of paralogues, and world map fast travel are often left for players to discover through trial and error. This guide compiles 23 key tips to help new players navigate the game effectively.
Prioritize Weekly Activities
Engaging in weekly activities forms the foundation of progression in Fortune's Weave. Meals at the inn and gift-giving are crucial for raising support levels and recruiting new units. Training at the arena boosts skill levels, enabling units to pass exams for new classes, while performing temple service unlocks valuable blessings. It is essential to return to Dagsion weekly to complete these activities.
Strategic World Map Use
Returning to Dagsion can also trigger enemy respawns on the world map, providing additional combat opportunities. Dietrich's Answerer ability can also force enemies to appear nearby on any map location, with levels scaling to the surrounding area.
Utilize the In-Game Calendar
The in-game calendar, accessible via the Plus button, offers a forward look at upcoming events. It details arena matches for skill point gains, the inn's menu, currently running plays, and character birthdays. This allows for strategic planning of weekly activities.
Don't Overlook Paralogues
Paralogues, appearing from September onwards, offer a unique way to recruit certain characters, often Flame Lords, as guest units in Act 3. These missions have strict and short deadlines, making it challenging to complete them all in a single playthrough. Players may need to replay sections or pursue them across different routes.
Leverage Auto-Activities
When unsure how to best utilize free time, the inn's auto-activities feature is a viable option. Players can send units out for a set number of turns to search for items, engage in combat, or train, returning with experience, items, or gold.
Attend Public Audiences at Temples
Visiting temples when their icons are highlighted yellow on the city map offers a quick renown boost of approximately 50 points without consuming turns. These temple audiences are held by enshrined deities.
Understand Temple Service and Blessings
Serving the gods at temples increases your reputation with their associated deity, unlocking new blessings. While optional, these blessings can be highly beneficial, especially on higher difficulties. Aurora's blessing, for example, can halve incoming physical damage for a turn. Activating these blessings requires Divine Sand, the same currency used for rewinding time on hard mode.
Analyze Unit Stat Growth Potential
A unit's information panel displays both combat stats and base stats. The base stats reveal a character's growth inclinations and any modifiers affecting them. Understanding these inclinations helps in assigning roles, such as a mage or healer, based on their likelihood to excel in magic or other stats.
Factor in the Build Stat
The build stat, returning from Fire Emblem Engage, influences how heavily a character is penalized by heavier weapons. Characters with higher build stats experience fewer speed reductions. This stat is particularly important for medium-build and smaller characters. Equipping accessories or utilizing paired abilities can increase build, allowing units to wield stronger magic more safely.
Study Personal Skills
Each character possesses a personal skill that impacts their combat effectiveness. Awareness of these skills is crucial for tactical deployment. For instance, Ultand's skill encourages keeping her near allies for HP restoration, while Fabio's skill benefits from an aggressive frontline role. Io's personal skill grants evasion and defense buffs when attacking as a cavalry unit.
Recruit Additional Units
Act 1's lower unit caps can be deceptive. Act 2 significantly increases the per-mission unit cap to 15, making a larger roster beneficial for handling the increased enemy numbers.
Complete Full Arcs Before Switching
While it is possible to pause one Flame Lord's act and begin another, finishing an entire Act 1 before starting a new one offers greater convenience. Completing an arc ensures all subquests are marked as finished for subsequent arcs, granting gold, rewards, and renown at the start of each new chapter. The explored world map areas also carry over.
Utilize Karma Shards Wisely
Karma Shards are earned by completing in-game challenges. These shards can be spent at the Shrine of Causality in the Obelisk Chamber for benefits such as discounts on weapons and gift items, or reductions in the Divine Sand cost of certain blessings.
Replay Chapters for Advancement
Completed arcs can be replayed via the obelisk. Stat and roster changes made during replays carry over to Act 2, so players should consider this before making extensive modifications.
Prioritize Weapon Upgrades
Given the scarcity of gold, upgrading existing bronze weapons at the blacksmith is often more cost-effective than purchasing new, un-upgraded weapons. An upgraded lower-tier weapon can perform comparably to an unimproved higher-tier weapon, conserving funds for character recruitment through gifts.
Repeat Dungeon Crawls for Materials
Dungeons are valuable sources of smithing stones and rare minerals essential for weapon enhancement and repair. Repeatedly running these dungeons can also provide experience for units, especially when utilizing auto-battle or skipping skirmishes.
Trade Rare Items at Vandahl Trading Company
Before selling excess rare vegetables, check the Vandahl Trading Company for potential item exchanges. This can yield valuable rare items instead of just gold.
Complete Sidequests for Rewards
Sidequests offered by NPCs at the start of each chapter are essential for gaining renown and accumulating gold, despite their potential tediousness.
Unlock Carriages for Fast Travel
Upon visiting a new region on the world map, prioritize activating carriage houses. These serve as fast travel points, enabling swift traversal across large distances for a small fee and a single turn.
Use World Map Preview Feature
To check the inventory of shops without traveling to them, hover the cursor over the shop on the world map and press ZL to access a preview. This helps determine if the trip is worthwhile.
Infer Gift Preferences from Meals
When character descriptions lack clarity regarding gift preferences, meals at the inn can provide clues. Observing which foods a character enjoys during a meal can suggest suitable gift items. For example, Jester enjoys pastries, and Simon favors vegetable dishes.
Save Before Gifting
If uncertain about a character's reaction to a gift, saving the game before delivery allows for a reload if the gift is not well-received. Fortune's Weave uses a single save file, and the game does not autosave immediately after gift delivery, enabling this strategy.