Mechanics

Fire Emblem Three Houses runs on a calendar. Weekdays belong to instruction, rest days belong to exploring Garreg Mach or sitting certification exams, and every month ends with a story mission. Nearly every system in the game slots into one of those windows, so this guide walks through a professor's month in order: what each activity does, when it unlocks, and which of our fourteen detailed pages holds the full lists when you need them.

Weekdays: lectures and tutoring

Instruction happens on weekdays, and our certifications page is blunt that tutoring is only available then, so the teaching calendar deserves a plan. Three systems live inside the classroom.

Lecture questions

After a lecture, a student sometimes approaches with a personal question. The lecture questions page collects them by house together with the response that satisfies each student. Answering well raises your professor level and deepens the bond, and the page marks the replies that carry a +25 bonus, such as telling Bernadetta to train with someone stronger than herself or suggesting Ignatz paint woodland creatures.

Budding talents

Open the tutoring menu and look for three stars beside a skill category. That marks a budding talent: a skill that is neutral now but becomes a strength once the stars fill through lessons, unlocking a bonus along the way. The budding talents page lists who has one and what it gives. Nine characters have none at all (Annette, Raphael, Lorenz, Petra, Caspar, Dedue, Linhardt, Leonie and Ingrid), so no amount of tutoring will produce one for them.

Certification exams

Class changes run through certification exams, which open once a character reaches level 5. You may sit one exam per week, on a rest day, and each attempt needs a seal of the matching tier: seals come from tournaments, certain missions and the marketplace, and the master tier needs a Master Seal. The exam screen shows the pass chance, the skills it checks and the class description before you commit. You can sit an exam without meeting the skill requirement, but the odds fall sharply. Skill ranks grow through weekday tutoring and the Set Goals command, and because students learn at different speeds, the certifications page suggests letting those speeds guide what each one should become.

The four beginner classes each want a D rank in one skill: Myrmidon in swords, Soldier in lances, Fighter in bows, brawling or axes, and Monk in faith or reason. For the magic line from Monk through Gremory and Mortal Savant, including the Dark Seal classes, see our magic classes guide; for a recommended end class for every character, see best classes.

Rest days: exploring the monastery

Free days are when Garreg Mach opens up. Talk to students, pour tea, tend the greenhouse and return what people have dropped. Every one of these activities feeds support or motivation, and the monastery is also where recruitment happens.

Tea parties

Tea time unlocks after you finish Ferdinand's quest at the stables, which asks you to find a tea set. From then on you can invite anyone you already share a bond with, provided you have tea leaves from exploring or from the merchants. Higher quality leaves improve the result, and the guest's favorite blend improves it further. You then pick three conversation topics from three options each; two wrong picks end the party early, while three right ones unlock a fourth topic and the chance to appeal to your guest. A Nice Tea Party or Perfect Tea Time rating boosts both bond and motivation, and our tea party page notes that turning the camera during the scene helps the rating. The page lists every character's favorite conversation topics; their teas are below.

The advice box

The Cathedral holds an anonymous suggestion box that becomes active in Garland Moon and refreshes every month. Open a note and you have 30 seconds to choose a reply; the right one earns support points from whoever wrote it. There are separate sets of notes before and after the timeskip, and the advice box page lists every letter with its correct answer, the Ashen Wolves and Anna included.

Gardening

The greenhouse unlocks in Chapter 1 through the Green Thumb Beginnings quest. Hand seeds to the keeper, choose a cultivation method and the crop is ready on your next visit. Better methods cost gold, unlock with professor level and let you plant more seeds at once. The default method gives around five or six items per seed, Infuse with Magic guarantees six, and each step up adds one more; the Blessing of the Land event adds five to a harvest, and a stat booster in the crop adds one. Flower seeds are sold by the Western Merchant after Clearing the Way in Chapter 5, and odd seeds also turn up by the Amiibo Gazebo and within the greenhouse. The gardening page also records which seeds can produce a permanent stat booster.

Advanced drills

Talk to a student on a free day and you can train your own skills with them, much like faculty training. It only works when the student outranks you in that skill, and only by a step: to drill archery with an A rank student you need at least a B yourself. The advanced drills page lists every character's proficiencies so you can find a tutor; Claude, Cyril and Yuri each cover five skills, while Ingrid, Marianne and Constance are among the few who can teach flying.

Birthdays and dialogue

Two smaller systems round out a free day. Every student and staff member has a birthday on the Fodlan calendar, and celebrating it with a gift is one more bond boost; the birthdays page lists all of them, with the house leaders falling on Garland Moon 22 for Edelgard, Blue Sea Moon 24 for Claude and Ethereal Moon 20 for Dimitri. Story scenes also pose dialogue choices, and the right line gives a support boost with the speaker. The dialogue choices page runs through every chapter and every route, flagging the answers that depend on Byleth's gender or on which house you lead.

Gifts and lost items are the other free-day staples. They have their own items guide, with every character's favorites in one table.

Battle days: battalions and gear

Battalions

Battalions arrive around Chapter 4, when Jeralt asks you to find the Captain's Quarters on the monastery's second floor. Head to the north end of the Reception Hall, turn left before the bridge and take the staircase up; the Tactics Primer inside unlocks the system, and the battalion guild in the marketplace then lets you equip or dismiss units. Your Authority rank governs how strong a battalion you can lead. Each one has endurance that falls when its unit takes hits, absorbing half the damage the unit does, or a quarter with Defensive Tactics; at zero the battalion vanishes until you replenish it at the guild. In return you get stat boosts and gambits, the attacks our battalions page credits with turning fights around.

The page's five picks for the strongest battalions, and the boosts they give a unit in formation:

Rusted weapons and the blacksmith

During rare monster sightings, the demonic beasts drop Rusted Weapons to whichever army lands the final blow. They look like junk, but the blacksmith, available from early in Chapter 5, can forge them into something far stronger through the Forge option. Iron, steel and silver weapons need smithing stones in varying amounts; turning a rusted weapon into a legendary needs Mythril, which the weapon repair page suggests farming by breaking the armor of large monsters. If you are deciding what your front line should carry in the other hand, our best shields guide weighs protection against weight.

The long game: recruitment, romance and routes

Recruitment

Students from the other two houses can be persuaded to switch, and our recruitment page rates the process as one of the game's hardest. Talk to a student on a Sunday and the offer appears once you meet their demands: one stat and one skill, with a C rank being a comfortable target. Decline, or fail to meet the terms while the offer stands, and that student is gone for good. There is a second door: push support to B through meals, gifts, drills, choir practice, cooking and fighting side by side, and they will join regardless of your stats. The three house leaders cannot be recruited, nor can retainers such as Hubert and Dedue. After the timeskip, recruiting means defeating a former student in battle and choosing to spare them, and the page names Lysithea, Lorenz and Ashe as the confirmed cases.

The page's five recruits worth the effort: Mercedes for healing that restores herself too through Live to Serve, Lysithea for the highest raw magic damage and double skill experience from Mastermind, Bernadetta for Persecution Complex damage and her Riding budding talent, Petra for Hunter's Boon criticals against weakened enemies, and Felix for the Lone Wolf attack bonus he gets when fighting without a battalion.

Romance

Romance is a Part 2 affair. Byleth is a teacher during the academy year, so S-Support conversations only open after the five-year timeskip, and you can marry one character per playthrough. Who is available depends on Byleth's gender: our romance page lists 22 options for a male Byleth and 24 for a female one, with Edelgard, Rhea, Jeritza, Alois, Linhardt, Dorothea, Yuri and Mercedes open to both. Support grows the same way it does for recruitment, through tea, returned lost items, instruction and standing next to the character in battle. The page ranks every candidate and opens its list with Bernadetta, Raphael, Dorothea, Marianne and Lorenz.

Routes

Your house decides your war. Blue Lions leads to Azure Moon and Golden Deer to Verdant Wind with no further branching. Black Eagles is the exception: reach C+ support with Edelgard before her coronation, attend it, and when Rhea orders you to kill her after the Flame Emperor battle choose to protect her instead, and you enter Crimson Flower alongside every student you recruited by Chapter 12. Kill her and you get Silver Snow, the church's route. The routes page suggests playing Crimson Flower first, then Azure Moon, Verdant Wind and finally Silver Snow, and notes that the routes share most of their maps, with three to five exclusive chapters each.

A month at a glance

Frequently asked questions

When do battalions unlock?

Around Chapter 4, after Jeralt's side quest sends you to the Captain's Quarters on the second floor. The Tactics Primer found there switches the system on.

What raises my professor level?

Lecture questions answered well raise it directly, and our renown farming page notes that nearly everything which advances your professor grade also awards Renown. A higher professor level unlocks better greenhouse cultivation methods.

Can I still recruit after the timeskip?

Only by defeating a former student in battle and sparing them. Our recruitment page names Lysithea, Lorenz and Ashe as the confirmed cases.

How many routes are there, and which should I play first?

Four. Blue Lions and Golden Deer each have one, and Black Eagles branches into two. Our routes page suggests Crimson Flower, then Azure Moon, then Verdant Wind, with Silver Snow last.