3hmisconceptions

[3hmisconceptions]

Quick Update

The past few days have been very busy, so I haven’t made as much progress as I’d like, unfortunately.

That being said, as of right now the Dimitri and Faerghus section of the masterpost is mostly done--it’s still missing a couple of links, mainly library stuff, but most are there!

Fedatamine also launched recently, and I’ve been browsing through the site. It looks incredibly useful, and most if not all of the links in the Rhea and the Church section will probably be coming from there.

Hopefully progress will be made faster now that I have some more free time. Thanks for bearing with me!

[3hmisconceptions]

Rodrigue according to Yuri funded the abyss for five years in azure moon and Dimitri is viewed as a local hero in the kingdom. I seen it thrown around the Kingdoms culture is toxic. Because knights but at the same time it’s shockingly the most accepting place. Sylvain said the kingdom and Duscur were always friends before genocide. Even in cf the knights accept Dedue enough to betray there king and die with Dedue. Dimitri always has cultural impact along with Rodgriue on the Kingdom.

I didn’t know about Rodrigue funding Abyss; thank you for letting me know! 

Yeah, there’s been a lot of “Faerghus is toxic” takes going around. While I do agree that many aspects of the Kingdom’s culture and actions are toxic (and often deliberately deconstructed in AM), these sorts of arguments are often overblown and involve a lot of speculation without much basis in the text. They also tend not to be made in good faith, as quite a few frequent criticisms I see directed at the Kingdom (it being sexist, for example), apply to all three countries, but are only mentioned in regards to Faerghus (and/or the Church).

I may or may not make another bullet point about this; I say “maybe” because there’s honestly not too much concrete worldbuilding going on. But if the “Faerghus is toxic” take becomes more widespread, I’ll definitely add it!

Thanks again for the ask, anon!

[3hmisconceptions]

In the DLC Library in Abyss it’s implied those who slither were helping with the separation of Fódlan. Not the Church. I don’t think that’s in the document. Great work you’re doing!

Thank you so much! I’ll add it to the doc!

[3hmisconceptions]

I just want to point out the library does confirm Fodlan has open trade with the outside world. Edmund and Nuvelle were noted for this and Morfis trades with them as well. Yuris advice box straight up confirms doctors are not banned and a cardinal wanted that not Rhea herself.

Thank you very much! I’ve added these to the masterpost!

[3hmisconceptions]

One more :) I know you said you weren't going to do Edelgard ones, but a misconception I've seen about her is that she isn't a dictator in post-CF. People think dictator = bad leader, when it's actually someone with absolute control with no checks or balances. Edelgard handpicks her successor, she bans and unbans Dorothea's play on her own whims, she can make Ferdinand or Manuela Prime Minister as she sees fit. Her sort of rapid-change only works in a dictatorship anyways.

Hello again! Unfortunately I think I’m going to avoid adding anything about Edelgard to the masterpost period. But if I do make that “Compilation of Arguments About Edelgard on All Sides” doc one day, I’ll add it to that!

(Also, about your last ask, are you okay with me crediting you for the misconception on the masterpost doc, or would you prefer to be kept anonymous? I’d message you about it but unfortunately sideblogs can’t initiate messages :/)

[3hmisconceptions]

A blatant Dimitri misconception I've seen multiple say is that "Dimitri is a psychopath." His entire arc/problem is about him not establishing healthy distances from others' pain and learning to live for himself, making him far closer to an empath and the exact opposite of a psychopath. He never does anything for himself - even in late AM - as everything he ever does is always at least partially motivated by pain others are feeling.

Oof, I haven’t heard this one in a while myself, but I’ll definitely add it to the masterpost. Unfortunately terms like “psychopath” tend to be thrown around without much consideration for what they actually mean, even when, as you’ve pointed out, they don’t match at all.

(Also I hope you don’t mind me publishing this ask publicly. If you’d prefer it to be private, just let me know and I’ll delete this ask!)

[3hmisconceptions]

Quick Update

I just learned about a project called fedatamine (here’s a link to their twitter!) that’s working on compiling all the text in the game and organizing it. It has a bunch of really cool features, like the ability to generate links to any specific line of text, not to mention that it includes the text for all languages of Three Houses, which will hopefully put an end to all the translation discourse once and for all.

What does this mean for this blog and the misconceptions masterpost? Not much, to be honest. Fedatamine’s website will launch on July 3rd, and once it does so I’ll likely be using their website for all the evidence I link. It’ll definitely make my job much easier, that’s for certain!

But until July 3rd, I’ll continue linking evidence like I’ve been doing, with a mix of screenshots and video timestamps. If in the future people find themselves preferring fedatamine, I’ll go back and update the old evidence links. 

Really I just wanted to give a quick shout out to fedatamine and all the work they’ve been doing (seriously they’re amazing), and to give a quick update on how things are going with the masterpost. That’s all for now; until next time, folks!

[3hmisconceptions]

Edelgard ? anon - Thanks! Figured it was something like that. I also find Rhea to be a character written inconsistently, but that may be only my take on it. The fandom definitely needs something like what you're doing, though, so keep it up!

No problem--thank you for being understanding, anon!

[3hmisconceptions]

Hmm... so apparently there’s now a “Dimitri isn’t actually mentally ill!” take which, uh, hopefully doesn’t become common? If it does somehow become widespread (please no), it’s definitely going on the masterpost.

[3hmisconceptions]

I doubt you like Edelgard, but would you be willing to do misconceptions for Edelgard? She isn't, for example, a Nazi or facist

So I figured I was going to have to address this sooner or later, and I thank you for bringing it up! In short--for now, I think I’m going to hold off on doing any Edelgard misconceptions. Not because I dislike her--if anything I’m more ambivalent about her as a character (I like her conceptually but was disappointed with her character’s execution, to be specific)--but because there’s a lot of messy writing surrounding her that makes it very difficult to parse out what is and isn’t “true.”

For example, someone could say a common misconception is that Edelgard is trying to take over the continent, and they could point to text in CF about how she’s specifically targeting the church and Rhea. But at the same time, someone could point to the other routes, where she continues the war even after capturing Rhea and her war is specifically described as a “unification” to say that she was intending to take over all of Fodlan. Both claims have textual evidence to support them, so which one is true? Well, that’s up to the player’s interpretation to decide.

There’s a lot of cases like this where there’s directly contradictory things being said and shown. You can point to how she isn’t or doesn’t do something in one route, but then is or does do something in another route (sometimes these contradictions happen on the same route, even), and that makes it very difficult to do this sort of “misconception debunking” like with Dimitri and Rhea, who while different between routes, are still largely consistent enough that there’s not much directly contradictory information. The closest would be Rhea’s extreme actions towards the end of CF, but in that case you can still reconcile who she is on that route with who she is everywhere else because her mental breakdown on CF is consistent with her backstory and PTSD.

Some might argue, “Well you should use CF as the ‘true’ Edelgard because that’s her own route,” but I disagree with this.

I think the appeal of multiple routes in a story is the ability to see different sides to a character, how they develop and change under differing circumstances, what choices they make when presented with different obstacles. A character should still be recognizable as that character in all routes because at their core, they are the same person. I think it’s a disservice to ignore three fourths of a character’s portrayal in a game, which is akin to ignoring three fourths of their depth and development. It’s one of the reasons why, in Dimitri’s case, I make a point to cite evidence on non-AM routes whenever I can, for example. 

With Edelgard, so much is left vague and up for interpretation that I wouldn’t even know how to start with this sort of misconception debunking. Is she okay with faith and only hates the institution of the church, or does she believe faith in general is bad and humanity should live without gods? Well, there’s solid textual evidence pointing to both. 

If I were to include Edelgard misconceptions, it’d probably be less of a “Misconceptions” doc and more of a “Hey here’s both sides to the argument and the proof both sides point to,” which would take significantly more time and research than I currently have the energy to do.

That could change. Once I’m done with the current masterpost, I could begin an “Edelgard arguments organization post,” but as of right now I don’t have any plans to do so.

This has been very long-winded and rambly, but thank you for asking anon! If you have anymore questions, my ask box is always open!

[3hmisconceptions]

(Links anon) yea I meant the black ones. all the blue ones work fine! thx for explaining.

No problem! I also added a note about the underlined text at the top of the doc, so hopefully no one gets confused!

[3hmisconceptions]

Hey, glad you're doing this! I have one thing to add to your master post. You say, "It’s likely that Rufus or the lords in charge at the time instigated the genocide while Dimitri was recovering from his wounds" in the post. According to one of the library books, it was specifically Count Kleiman that carried out the subjugation of Duscur. This is reiterated in Chapter 21 of Azure Moon, when Dimitri interrogates one of his former soldiers. It's implied that he was approached by TWSITD (1/2)

(2/2) and Kleiman took the offer because it enabled him to simultaneously acquire more land and get rid of Lambert, who was in the midst of enacting reforms he did not agree with.

I legit completely forgot it was mentioned in the library books; thank you for letting me know! I’ll be sure to add it to the masterpost!

[3hmisconceptions]

a bunch of links on the doc aren't working! they're just underlined and don't go anywhere. you'e doing a good job tho!! keep it up!

Thanks for letting me know! 

Just to make sure, but do you mean some of the blue links aren’t working, or the black underlined phrases? If it’s the latter, I actually haven’t added those links yet; I’m currently using underlines as placeholders for when I do add links to screenshots!

[3hmisconceptions]

I’ve decided to make a masterpost countering the most common blatantly wrong Edelstan arguments against Dimitri, Rhea, and the church. Do you have any specific repetitive arguments you see all the time? I’m compiling a list of them. If you want to share any screenshots countering these that’d be really great too, but it’s not necessary!

A lot of them but I’ll try to think of a couple off the top of my head.

For the Church/Rhea:

The church persecutes nonbelievers

Rhea had the members of the Western Church killed because they disagreed with her doctrine

The church is inherently xenophobic

Rhea wanted Sothis could erase Byleth’s personality

Sothis hates Rhea/is creeped out by her

Jeralt hates Rhea

Rhea has ruled all of Fodlan with an iron fist for a thousand years

For Dimitri/Faerghus:

Dimitri is stupid for assuming Edelgard could have had anything to do with Duscur “because she was like eight at the time”

Dimitri’s weakness in Reason means he’s dumb

Dimitri is “status quo” because he took Rhea in during Crimson Flower’s time jump

Dimitri is being manipulated by Thales just like Edelgard is

Dimitri is creepy and obsessed with Edelgard for no reason and he probably wants to fuck Edelgard

Dimitri is abusive/manipulative

Dimitri doesn’t have any goals or plans for Fodlan and he doesn’t change anything once he becomes king

Dimitri is straight

[3hmisconceptions]

A bad take regarding Rhea I've heard a few times was that Byleth wasn't actually stillborn and Rhea totally killed Sitri by stealing her Crest Stone for her new "experiment." Even when I point out all of Cindered Shadows, I get "Well, Rhea is known to lie so why should we believe that?"

Adding this to the misconceptions pile.

[3hmisconceptions]

Bad take: Rhea/Church is homophobic

God did I forget that one? I can’t believe I forgot that one.

[3hmisconceptions]

About this Blog

For the past year, the Fire Emblem: Three Houses fandom has been home to waves and waves of discourse, bad takes, and straight up false information. I, and many, have gotten sick of seeing the exact same argument over and over again and having to refute it every other day.

With that in mind, the “3h Misconceptions Masterpost” is meant to compile these common “hot takes” and refute them, with screenshot evidence, so that if you ever see these misconceptions somewhere (which you probably will let’s be honest here), you can easily link someone the screenshots. Basically this “masterpost” is a glorified organization tool. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

And yes, this masterpost is currently specifically focused on Dimitri and Rhea. Why? Because those are the bad takes I have the most experience with, and misinformation is common in regards to those two, especially Rhea.

Anyway all rambling aside, here’s a link to the current masterpost. As you can probably tell, it’s still missing a lot of links as I’m still in the process of adding screenshots and more misconceptions. 

If you want to help--first of all thank you so much this game is giant and finding screenshots is a nightmare--feel free to submit a screenshot or video clip in the submission box! If you have a misconception you’d like to see added to the list, you spot an error (which there will inevitably be), or you just have a question or want to chat, the ask box is always open!

That’s it for now--I’ll post updates on how the masterpost is going as progress is made. Until then!