lachless

[lachless]

frankenstein is about self loathing and recognition through the Other. it’s about the original sin. it’s about what we owe to our creations and each other. it’s about internalized homophobia and the monstrosity of a man desiring another man. it’s about Romance. it’s about romance. it’s about playing god. it’s about being transgender. it’s about the absent fathergod. it’s about society. it’s about unethical medical experiments. it’s about gay college dropouts. it’s about a big nasty monster dude who is, and i cannot stress this enough, spooky

[lachless]

Sorting the Black Eagles from Fire Emblem: Three Houses

This sorting uses the Sorting Hat Chats system, which is a modified version of the Hogwarts house system from Harry Potter.

Here’s a link to a detailed explanation, and here’s another with some different terminology. But to summarise:

Your primary house is WHY you do things. Lion primaries have a gut sense of right and wrong; they derive their morals from their instincts. Bird primaries decide on their sense of right and wrong from the evidence in the world around them; they derive their morals from their reason. Badger primaries focus less on ideals and more on people and groups; if it helps someone, it is right. Snake primaries focus on people too, but they prioritise their chosen people above all else.

Your secondary house is HOW you do things. Lion secondaries head resolutely and stubbornly for their goals; when met with a locked door, they kick it down. Bird secondaries collect tools and knowledge to help them; when met with a locked door, they have the key, or they know how to pick locks. Badger secondaries put in the slow, hard work, and they network with people to come to their aid; when met with a locked door, they knock. Snake secondaries search for the clever way to work around their obstacles; when met with a locked door, they notice the open window.

You can model a primary or secondary house, which means you adapt its system of tools or morality in addition to that of your own house. Houses can burn, meaning that you loose faith in your ability to be moral with your primary or solve problems with your secondary. Finally, houses can explode, meaning you loose yourself in a house to the expense of all else.

This is the second part of a series sorting Three Houses. You can find the first, sorting the Lords, over here.

Now, without further ado - let’s begin.

-

HUBERT VON VESTRA is a pretty clear Snake primary, with Edelgard as his most important person. He agrees with her ideologically and believes in the world that she fights for, but more importantly he simply believes in her. If she needed him somewhere else, that’s where he would be.

His secondary is also pretty straightforward. He’s a Bird secondary, the planner behind Edelgard’s revolution who’ll examine every angle, every plan and every poison to ensure they’re prepared for whatever the war throws at them. Like Claude, another Bird, he’s the one who sets up contingencies in case they lose, in his case his letter outlining the existence and location of Those Who Slither in the Dark. (It’s a damn shame these two can’t support, by the way, I’d love to see how these two masterminds would interact). Appropriately enough, this gives him the Villain Sorting, which further reinforces Villain Vibes that he seems to enjoy exuding.

At first glance FERDINAND VON AEGIR struck me as one of the felt primaries - Lion or Badger - because of how damn heartfelt he always feels when he talks about his morals, but on further inspection I think that comes from his secondary. His primary is actually a rather loud Bird Primary, who adopts the nobility system as the framework for his moral code but who refines his system from what he learns and encounters. He has a notable separation between his instincts and his morals in a way that’s characteristic for Birds - he tells Caspar he should consider “following moral convictions rather than instincts”, and proceeds to basically explain one of the core principle of his Bird system, that he feels being a noble entails helping those less fortunate and setting a good moral example.

As for his secondary, he’s certainly a straightforward one - Lion or Badger - and he seems to value social harmony and building connections with people and as a part of the way he navigates the world to such an extent that I think Badger secondary suits him best. His secondary seems to interact with his primary in a very interesting way - he tells Hubert in their supports that debate and voicing his opinions is so important to him because the process of debate allows him and his debater to realise new truths they might have been blind to. In other words, he uses his Badger to fine-tune his Bird.

Speaking of Hubert, their supports together are an interesting look at a straightforward and a circumventing secondary who struggle to understand how each other’s methods could be useful, and form a fierce rivalry because of it. It’s the core of their dynamic. Ferdinand finds Hubert’s circumventing Bird to be underhanded, while Hubert finds Ferdinand’s straightforward Badger naive. Their support chain ends with them realising that each other’s methods both have strengths, and in their paired ending they balance each other as the left and right hands of the Emperor.

LINHARDT VON HEVRING’s secondary is so overpowering that we might as well get it out of the way. He’s a Bird secondary, committed to spending his days unlocking whatever knowledge he feels drawn to investigate. He’s patently uninterested in making his knowledge actually useful, in a way that’s characteristic of a lot of Birds - for the most part, he doesn’t collect knowledge for what it could do, he collects knowledge because it’s shiny.

The problem with sorting Linhardt, however, is that he’s one of those cases where his secondary is so strong that it obscures his primary, because his actions are almost more motivated by his secondary than by anything else. I’m going to tentatively claim he’s a Lion primary from how motivated he is by what he feels drawn to. Sort of like a glory hound Lion, except instead of glory he’s looking for shiny Bird sec knowledge.

In contrast to Ferdinand, CASPAR VON BERGLIEZ actually is one of the felt primaries. Ferdinand starts talking about separating moral convictions from instincts and Caspar has no idea what he’s talking about, what’s this guy on? You just see someone in trouble and you help them out, simple as that, the idea of building a system rather than feeling it is foreign to him. From his lack of focus on groups I’m going to narrow it down to say he’s a Lion primary.

He’s also a pretty easy Lion secondary. When you see someone in trouble you need to help, what you do is you charge in and fight the guy who’s posing a threat, go straight for the source, no hesitation! It’s the Double Lion as the Revolutionary on a smaller scale. He struggles a lot with being impulsive, and a lot of his supports focus on him learning to think before he acts so he doesn’t wind up with consequences he wasn’t prepared for.

BERNADETTA VON VARLEY is a difficult one to sort, because both of her houses are unquestionably burnt when we first meet her. She spends a lot of her time both during the war and before it simply trying to survive, to get by day by day, and she also doesn’t seem to hold a high opinion of her ability to do much of anything, healing included. That said, she does unburn to various extents depending on her route, support chains and ending, and based on what we see here I’m going to suggest she’s a burnt Lion primary. I don’t think we see her longing for people or community to centre her the way I’d expect for a Loyalist, beyond simply longing for friends in a way that’s natural for anyone, but we do see her longing to know what’s right. Her line at the beginning of Crimson Flower where the Black Eagles are pledging allegiance to Edelgard is interesting to note here. She wonders if she’s doing the right thing, but oh! The Professor is here, and they know what’s right, so she can trust them! Burnt Idealists, and Lions especially, have a habit of latching on to someone they trust as a guide for their compass, and I think that’s exactly what’s going on here with Bernadetta. I think she’s a Lion rather than a Bird because she seems to struggle with wanting to know how to feel, not how to think.

Her secondary is harder, because burnt secondaries tend to be harder to distinguish until they unburn. We see her comforting herself by making crafts and art, distracting herself with work - this could indicate a Bookkeeper Badger, but it could just as easily be a model she’s built to pass the time in her room. That said, I think her dialogue in later supports could also suggest she’s learning the Courtier Badger skillset, there’s definitely an argument that she’s keying into people’s vibes like a Badger. The evidence is still a little thin on the ground here, but of the four I think Badger secondary fits her best.

DOROTHEA ARNAULT is a pretty clear Snake primary. She makes it clear that she fights for the Professor, and perhaps Edelgard if on Crimson Flower. She appreciates it when their ideals line up with her own, sure, and it’s a good way to her heart - but once you’re in her heart, that’s why she’ll fight with you. Interestingly, she seems to associate inner circle Snake loyalty pretty closely with romance. She’s kind of baffled by the idea that Hubert, another Snake, could feel so intensely about Edelgard without it being romantic, and her quest to marry a good, moneyed man to take care of her when she grows old seems to be very Snake-coded in the way she wants to be loved. That said, she also seems to let people into her outer circles pretty easily, and she loves doting on her friends.

I think she also has a Badger primary model that she uses for things outside her people. The personhood of the people around her, generally, matters a lot to her, and she’s quite wary of the way the nobility in general can dismiss that.

As for her secondary, we’ve got ourselves another Badger secondary. Like I said before, she loves doting on her friends and caretaking in that very Badgery way. She’s also very good at Courtier-ing, although I think she has a model that she uses on top when she has to sweet-talk nobles for her job. Could be Snake or Actor Bird - without much evidence to decide it either way, I’m going to guess Actor Bird simply because it seems easier to learn for a lot of people and is therefore generally more common. She doesn’t seem to enjoy using this model very much, and associates it with the general unpleasantness of a lot of the nobles she has to deal with.

Finally, with PETRA MACNEARY we find the Black Eagles’ resident Badger primary. She’s a pretty easy call - she’s always focused on Brigid and her friends as her groups that she wants to help and protect. She’s a universal Badger who refuses to dehumanise anyone because of what they or their people have done, which comes as a surprise for a few people who expect her to hold a grudge against the people of the Empire for the events of the war between the Empire, Brigid, and Dadga. Caspar especially expects her to hate him because his father killed hers, but to Petra, he’ll always be a person before he’s the son of her father’s killer.

She shows a few signs of a Bird secondary in the way that she dedicates a lot of her time to uncovering information about Fodlan, but I think this is a model that she developed in response to being essentially kidnapped to live in a foreign country from a young age. I think her inherent sorting is yet another Badger secondary, who focuses more on Bookkeeper Badgering and hard work. She talks a lot about making herself strong, making herself a weapon, so that she can serve her people in a way that can be typical to Badgers. (Birds, the other built/prepwork secondary, tend to think of external tools rather than making themselves one.) Per her supports with Byleth she seems to struggle with exploding and overworking herself a bit here and there.

TLDR;

Hubert: SNAKE BIRD

Ferdinand: BIRD BADGER

Linhardt: LION BIRD

Caspar: DOUBLE LION

Bernadetta: LION BADGER with a burnt primary and secondary that unburns to various extents over the course of the game

Dorothea: SNAKE BADGER with Badger primary and Bird secondary models

Petra: DOUBLE BADGER with a slightly exploded secondary and a Bird secondary model

[lachless]

What are your favorite fandoms?

I tend to jump around a bit depending on what I’m watching/reading/playing, but my biggest two at the moment are Fire Emblem: Three Houses and The 100. Honourable mentions for to Life is Strange (haven’t engaged with it much for a while but very much looking forward to Lis3), Harry Potter (will probably never be entirely over this one, as you might be able to guess by my interest in shc) and Warrior Cats (my first ever fandom I engaged with online; I’m not really up to date but I never entirely left).

[lachless]

Sorting Hat Chats - The Weasleys

(It’s here!! It’s finally here!!)

Oh boy oh boy. So many of you have been waiting for this for SO long. But I’m finally doing it. All of the Weasleys…All of them (except for Rose and Hugo and Molly Jr and Fred Jr and-). 

I will be talking about Weasleys who have already been sorted and will link to the some of the original sorting posts, but not all of them.

And finally here is a description of the system I’m using right here by @wisteria-lodge​.

We’ll start with the oldest Weasley ARTHUR WEASLEY. Arthur Weasley is a pretty easy sort in my opinion. He’s very much the guy who goes with his gut and does things because he’s interested in them. He’s not very structured in his way of thinking though, so I say he’s a Lion primary. Some may argue because he likes muggles he’s a Badger primary, but I have to disagree. Arthur likes muggle OBJECTS and he while he likes muggles, he’s more interested in them as experiments, or as one might be interested in monkeys. They’re like humans but he just wants to know about their behaviors and how they use things (and considering he cant figure out a rubber duck he’s not doing a good job at it).

Speaking of him liking to know about behaviors and tools muggles use, that leads me to the point that Arthur is a Bird secondary. Also notice that when the Order talks about strategy he’s usually in these conversations heavily.

MOLLY WEASLEY was the hardest Weasley to sort in my opinion. Do I sort her as a Snake primary because she’s a loving mother? Do I sort her as a Lion primary because she’s forceful about her opinions and judgemental? Is she judgemental because she doesn’t want people encroaching on her family and screwing it over or is she judgemental because she makes snap decisions by her gut? Do I sort her as a Lion secondary because she’s a skilled duelist and yells half of her lines. Do I sort her as a Badger secondary because she’s constantly cleaning and knitting and mothering every character who comes her way? Is the Badger a model/performance? That’s four sorting options already.

Now to figure her out I first looked at the archetypes and immediately ruled out Snake Badger. Snake Badgers are more subtle and mild then her, even the fiercer ones. And by doing this it actually helped me to rule out Badger as a secondary option for her. While yes Molly spends a lot of time cleaning and working, her methods do not make her a Badger. Molly never goes for the soft ball approach, she sends howlers so she can yell at her kids, and always speaks the truth plainly and loudly. The Badger secondary we see is likely a model she built after she became a mother.

Her primary was the harder one to figure out, and boiled down to who is she more like Ron, or Ginny? What big moments define her in the series? And the surprising conclusion I came to is…she’s a Snake primary. Check it out: We know from some outside the book sources and kind of the books that Molly was not involved in the original war, whether this was because of her newborn children or a disinterest in fighting doesn’t matter. While Arthur seems in his element when they’re a war family, Molly clearly doesn’t like it but puts on a front because she believes it’s her duty. Plus, her big cause fighting moments are defending children from being involved in the war-but they’re all children that she views as hers. And what is Molly’s boggart? Her entire family dead. Plus, during that time Percy was gone she wasn’t bitter about it like Arthur and the rest of her family, she just desperately wanted him back.

BILL WEASLEY is in my opinion a Snake primary. A lot of what we see of Bill is him being loyal to his family and wife and also being nice to people. I will say I think he adopted a Lion primary model for the war. Unfortunately characters like Bill don’t get much press.

Bill’s secondary is clearer, he’s a Bird secondary. He worked as a curse breaker, which likely requires a lot of precision work and planning and observation skills. Plus he got good grades in school, was eligible for an exchange program, and is very smart in the books usually. Plus he’s sexy like a Snake Bird.

CHARLIE WEASLEY gets even LESS press then Bill, but from sources outside of the books and context clues I’ve manged to conclude his house and it is…surprising. I initially sorted Charlie as a Badger primary, but-BUT I think he’s actually a Bird primary. Now stay with me here, but Charlie left his family for a dragon preserve, and when looking at his age he either left right out of school or he graduated early so he could leave as soon as he could. That’s not Badger behavior. We might be able to justify it if he visited his family regularly but he DOESN’T. He visits in the fourth book but that’s the last we see of him till Bill’s wedding. When the going got tough and things got bad in England Bill returned to the family, but Charlie stayed with his dragons and only returned for the wedding and then to wreck shit with dragon fire. And it’s important to remember he’s the only one in the Weasley family who never married in canon.

And this even through my initial sorting of his secondary into question. Is he a Bird secondary or actually a Badger secondary, and I think he’s a Badger secondary. The main thing for me is he started working with dragons, an animal based job that seems to be mostly taking care of them, not studying them or anything. And Charlie oddly reminds me of Luna, another Bird Badger who worked with magical creatures. Plus, quidditch isn’t a skill I would expect from a Bird secondary, but it might be one I expect from Badger secondary (especially since he’s a seeker like Draco). And he didn’t really come in with a plan, he just came in dragons blazing (which could be a sign of a Lion secondary but he does not have the vibes).

PERCY WEASLEY is a Lawman Lion Bird (The Mycroft variety in fact-Order over Chaos usually). Everyone says Percy belongs in Slytherin and ironically the primary sorting I think fits it the best is Lion. Percy is temperamental, arrogant, anal, ambitious, and one of my favorite Weasleys. The thing with Percy is that while he does love his family and shows concern and love for them often, a lot of that is outweighed by his ambition and pettiness. While you can just chock Percy’s hatred of Dumbledore to being weak to the propaganda of the ministry (and that IS in fact a Lion trait) I think it was him following his gut seeing as his siblings have almost been killed under Dumbledore’s watch several times. And Percy really does care about things along with being ambitious and wanting power (CAULDRON THICKNESS IS IMPORTANT FUCK YOU). People have waxed poetic about Percy before and I won’t be able to do it as well as them so we’ll stop that there.

And against the argument of Bird primary Percy, a Bird primary would take in multiple arguments and would’ve thought about what his family said. Percy didn’t.

His Bird secondary isn’t hard to see. He is the study machine and is the planner (plus he has a sense of humor that we see a few times and I do think that’s a Bird trait). Him and Hermione are very similar in that sense.

My sorting of GEORGE and FRED WEASLEY was helped greatly by this essay posted to Tumblr by @bittyblueeyes​. Before, most of the thoughts I had about these two were speculation, but with this I got some numbers and confirmation. Fred is a Lion Snake while George is a Snake Bird. A dangerous combination, and frankly we’re lucky they didn’t become ministry employees because with them there they might’ve come up with something even crueler than dementors.

Let’s also get something out of the way, they model each others sortings in full. They’ve spent their whole life being lumped together and mistaken, that they’ve been able to completely mask as one another.

Anyway, Fred is a Lion Snake because he’s the one who really pushes to get stuff done and make money, and is the larger practical joker. He’s got the blend of cruelty that comes from being a Lion primary with a Snake secondary (and as added bonus this is James Potter’s sorting, who he shares a lot in common with). When it comes to his Lion primary it’s him being the more ambitious twin. When it comes to his Snake secondary it’s the fact that he’s more likely to do wordplay or pranks then George. But he also has the Snake secondary skittishness. I would also like to point out that Fred is the one to forgive Percy first, and I think that’s because he has a similar sorting (and similar Lion primary).

George meanwhile is the more family orientated one, and only family I should mention. He can be cruel to people who he doesn’t consider family. That’s why I sorted him as the Snake primary. As for the Bird secondary, while it would’ve worked to sort him as a Badger secondary, Bird makes more sense. He’s the one who refines all the plans, and tends to be the more quippy of the twins. Ironically this makes the Bird secondary the most common of the Weasleys despite the heavy Gryffindor culture they have. 

RON WEASLEY has been sorted before by @wisteria-lodge​ over here. And yeah she’s right. Double Lion Ron Weasley, with a burnt Lion primary who usually follows Harry’s morality because Harry is the chosen one, the-boy-who-lived, and his best friend. I don’t think I can put his sorting more perfectly than Wisteria so just read hers.

I’ve already sorted GINNY WEASLEY (which you can read right here) with help from @awinterrain​. But I will reiterate what I said about Ginny Being a Snake Lion. Also, honestly, I’m back tracking on what I said about Ginny having a burnt primary. She’s too…confident and okay with herself to be burnt. Her big moments in the series are usually centered around Harry thanks to JKR’s writing. Her moments are things that are very Snakey, dating around, flirting with Harry, just being herself, it’s kinda hard to explain.

And she’s a Lion secondary, her natural state is loud and honest, and her signature is spell is turning her boogers into bats to attack people it’s disgusting and violent and honestly, let her have it.

And while I could stop it there, I did want to talk a little about the Weasley family and their sortings. While the whole family is mostly varied in it’s sorting there is a heavy Lion culture in the family, not just with the primary but also with the secondary. Arthur provides the Lion primary and Molly provides that Lion secondary that has influenced their entire family. Pretty much all of the children if they don’t already have a Lion primary already can model it well (Charlie once again is the exception). And even though they don’t all have Lion secondaries, they all have the vibes of one, which I think is something of a performance they’ve inherited from Molly. When the going gets tough they try to act like Molly. I think it’s interesting to see how that interacts.

So…

Arthur Weasley - Lion primary/Bird secondary

Molly Weasley - Snake primary/Lion secondary, Badger performance or model

Bill Weasley - Snake primary, possible Lion model or performance/Bird secondary

Charlie Weasley - Bird primary/Badger secondary

Percy Weasley - Lion primary/Bird secondary

George Weasley - Snake primary, Lion model/Bird secondary, Snake model

Fred Weasley - Lion primary, Snake model/Snake secondary, Bird model

Ron Weasley - Burnt Lion primary/Lion secondary

Ginny Weasley - Snake primary/Lion secondary

[lachless]

What’s your sorting ?

Hey there! I’m a Double Snake. At the moment I’ve also got (I think?) a strong Badger primary model and a weaker Bird secondary one.

I’ve dealt with some level of burning on both my houses, so figuring out my sorting has been a journey and a half. Years ago when I first discovered shc I figured I was a Badger Lion. My primary was so completely burnt away it was basically invisible at the time, which left me with just my Badger model; and I was confident I was some kind of improvisational secondary but Snakes seemed… too illusive, too impressive, I didn’t think I could do that. It didn’t help that most descriptions I found at the time focused on Snake’s multiplayer skillset, which has always been something I’ve struggled with.

Shc stayed at the back of my mind for the next few years, so when I started unburning I realised pretty quickly there was a Snake primary under there. I discovered my secondary a lot more recently; when I started getting really invested in shc a few months ago I kept feeling this itch at the back of my mind that Lion wasn’t quite right, so explained the fundamentals to a friend and asked them what they thought. They instantly responded I was a Snake. All those times I was proud of snatching together a solution for something from just my surroundings? My need to leave space to pivot in the moment when I plan things? The fact that I was clearly was an improvisational secondary but felt uncomfortable baring my soul like a Lion? Snake, so very Snake, all of it. Cue me rapidly reassessing my life and skills with this new context and realising, wait, I am a Snake, that completely fits.

[lachless]

Ooh, this is interesting. I was actually writing up some notes for sorting this show myself before I realised it had already been done - I hope you don’t mind if I talk a bit about a few characters we sorted differently?

Put under headings and a cut, because wow, this one got away from me a little.

CLARKE

Clarke I picked out as an unhealthy Bird primary, not a Badger, who was convinced that she Knows Better because she has Figured It Out rather than because of her Badger. She reminds me of descriptions of immature Birds who first find their system and become convinced it is singularly Correct To Apply To Everyone until they have the opportunity to mature more. I’m actually not convinced dehumanisation is what’s going on with her, especially not in the earlier seasons - my interpretation was that the personhood of the people she acted against ultimately didn’t matter. She had figured out what would save the human race and so she would do that, consequences be damned, because “do what you must for the survival of the human race” is a deeply ingrained ideal on the Ark that she probably internalised from a young age.

She has a habit of adopting important rules and morals into her system from the people around her that she keeps or trades out depending on how they serve her - “The people have a right to know” from Jake, “love is weakness” from Lexa, “I bear it so they don’t have to” from Dante. This could be a loyalist primary thing, but the fact that Dante isn’t in any sense one of her people or part of one of her groups makes me think it’s a sign of her Bird finding ideals wherever she can.

If she is a Bird, though, she’s definitely burnt by Season 5. My interpretation of that set of events was that she didn’t think a lot of her choices were ‘right’ or ‘good’ and that it was a source of self-loathing for her - we see this in her Red Sun hallucination in Season 6, for example - but she also didn’t see what other choices she could have made to do any better. The result was that she didn’t trust her Bird anymore, any instead of trying to recalibrate it she ended up opting out of her own system entirely. She stops consulting it, or at least any of it but a few core tenants. More and more she takes that Ark mentality of “do what you must” and applies it to protecting Madi without caring about the morality of her choices anymore.

This also connects to her secondary. I absolutely agree that she’s at least partially burnt for a lot of the series, but I’m not convinced she was in Season 1, probably not Season 2 - and the thing is, her behaviour in these seasons is very Badger secondary, and I think this is where her Badger Vibes come from. She comes into the series with a very bookkeeper Badger reputation - all hard work and no play - and she has a stubbornness once she commits to a course of action that’s common to the inspirational/straightforward secondaries. Badger secondaries can work for communities in a way that can look like a Badger primary sometimes, but when unhealthy they can also tip into a habit of self-negation. “I bear it so they don’t have to” again. For Clarke this doesn’t just hurt her, it also distances herself from the communities that she’s trying to help to the point where it makes it so much easier to make decisions for them instead of with them.

BELLAMY

I’m fairly convinced Bellamy is a Snake primary, because basically every decision we see him make in the entire show is for one of his people. Octavia at the start of the show, obviously, but then infiltrating Mount Weather for the delinquents, siding with Pike to protect Skaikru, using the bomb that could keep the human race safe to instead save his people from slavery, risking everything to save Clarke from Josephine. It’s interesting you should bring up Cadogan’s cult, because he doesn’t join just because he thinks Cadogan is right; he joins because he thinks ascension will help his people, specifically.

I’m not sure I understand your point about loyalists finding it hard to understand outside perspectives? That’s not something I’ve ever heard before, and I know lots of healthy loyalists as well as idealists who consider it important to understand opinions outside their own. I think that’s a healthy human thing rather than being tied to any of the primaries.

I absolutely agree that he doesn‘t seem healthy in the way he relates to Octavia in Season 1, but I think this is a result of his Snake exploding rather than an unhealthy model. He thinks everything that could possibly hurt her is his responsibility to stop, which is not a healthy Snake way of being.

He does seem to develop beyond Octavia in a way that’s more than just expanding his Snake circles, though - I hadn’t considered it before I read your post, but I actually think he might develop a Bird model that he uses to approach situations outside his people.

And an aside on his secondary - I’d typed him as a Lion because has a very straightforward way of being that feels very Lion. You never get the sense that he’s putting on masks. But… now I’m confused. Is that just a result of his courtesan Badger shifting into parts of himself and having to ‘feel it’ the way they do? Am I picking up on things that I associate with Lion but are actually done by both of the straightforward/inspirational secondaries? I think you might be right and he’s a Badger?? I’ll have to think about this one some more, but thanks for broadening my horizons on this!

OCTAVIA

So she’s got a strong Lion secondary, she’s absolutely textbook, you can use her as an excellent example of basically every Lion tendency in the manual. The problem is, I’m concerned her Lion secondary might be so strong it’s creating a false positive for her primary?

She certainly does make decisions with her gut, but that isn’t just a Lion thing - it could also be a Badger thing, who feel their loyalty the way Lions feel their compass. I spent a lot of time myself tossing up whether to consider her a Lion or a Badger, and she definitely feels very Lion as a character. But what in the end convinced me that Badger might fit more is the emphasis on groups and belonging in her character arc.

Interpreting her relationship with the grounders as a Lion’s sympathy for the underdog is an interesting take I hadn’t thought of, but the problem is that the grounders really aren’t the underdog for most of this show, and especially not in Seasons 1 and 2, when Octavia first takes steps to join them. Sure, Skaikru have more advanced weaponry and other technology, but the grounders by far outnumber them and have a much better understanding of Earth and of battle tactics besides. Skaikru is fighting an uphill battle just to survive from the moment the delinquents land on the ground. I suppose it’s possible Octavia still considers the grounders as underdogs regardless? But I think what might have been going on instead is a Badger’s need for belonging.

Octavia was taught from the moment she was born that she Did Not Belong on the Ark. Of course, the delinquents certainly weren’t about to kill her for being a second child, but the sense of Not Accepted By These People that she’d been taught all her life must have been hard to shake. But then she finds Lincoln, who accepts her, and then Indra, and then through them she finds a sense of belonging to the grounders as a whole in a way I don’t think she’d ever felt about Skaikru. Except she’s still Skaikru as well, regardless, and that effected the way both of her groups treated her. So she spends a lot of the show balancing her allegiences to both communities, which culminates in her uniting them as Wonkru. Her dual loyalties to them both is part of what makes her uniquely suited to the role.

Of course, the need for belonging is a human thing, so it doesn’t contradict sorting her as a Lion, exactly - but the focus on belonging and allegiances throughout her arc more than on a gut sense of right and wrong makes me think Badger primary suits her better.

EVERYONE ELSE

I think we’re pretty much in agreement about the rest of the cast? Murphy I had as a Snake secondary but you’re right, Badger suits him better. He’s fluid in the way that both Snakes and Badgers are but in a very different way than say, Emori. I hadn’t even thought about Levitt to be honest, but him being a Badger secondary is a great explanation for why the people of Bardo keep trusting him, especially since their ideals as a society seem to be very Double Badger. I’d say he seems to have a very good Badger primary performance as well, although he drops it the second he gets the chance. And as for Cadogan - I think his Badgering goes beyond just a performance, he has a Bird model with a very Badgery system. He has Decided that Badger morals are the way to go. But he’ll also drop them for his Snake circle and then feel bad about it afterward.

Sorting Hat Chats: The 100

I’ve been thinking of sorting the characters on this show for a while, but that’s easier said than done because it has a pretty extensive cast LOL. At the end, I decided to limit myself to those characters that made it alive to the final season, and a few cases that only really appeared in it and were key to the plot (although if anyone wants, I’m happy to debate others). I apologize beforehand if I forgot anybody xD. Obviously, spoilers from the show are to be expected.

For those who don’t know: the sortinghatchats method was inspired by Hogwarts houses, but it uses a dual way of sorting characters: primaries, relating to motive (WHY do they do things), and secondaries, referring to methods (HOW do they do things). Instead of the traditional names for the houses, it uses Badger, Bird, Lion, and Snake.

There’s also what’s called models:  primary or secondary sortings other than one’s own, that you’ve taught  yourself or being taught to use to get by when yours fails you. They can  also adopt performances, the ability to appear as another  sorting, but those are self-aware and more about mimicking behavior for  specific circumstances.

Primaries or secondaries can also be Burnt (something has gotten in the way, making you feel you can’t trust them or use them) or Exploded (in the opposite direction, one goes too far with their sorting. I.e.,  an Exploded Lion secondary would throw themselves at anything without  thinking of the consequences, becoming quite self-destructive).

Now, a brief summary of each sorting, for reference:

LION Primary’s sense of morality and ethics comes from inside. Things just feel right or they feel wrong. BIRD Primary gets their morality and ethics from the world outside them. They decide what they think is right. BADGER Primary is focused on the good of the group. Who cares if something is technically “moral” if people are getting hurt? SNAKE Primary is a lot like Badger, but instead of protecting the group, their highest law is the well-being of the individual people they love.

LION Secondary gets their power from being direct, honest, completely themselves. Their “plan” is just keep going until someone stops them. If they see a locked door, they kick it in. BIRD Secondary collects tools and skills. They build things, find things, learn things. If they see a locked door, they go through their box of keys until they find the right one. BADGER Secondary is fair, hardworking, and shows up. They’re good at getting people to trust them, and good at getting people to help them. If they see a locked door, they knock. SNAKE Secondary knows the right mask to wear for each situation. They’re adaptive. They go in the back way. They find the third option. They’re the ones who know how to pick the locks.

Keep reading

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I used to be a loyalist who struggled to understand idealists. It seemed almost dangerous, to me, choosing a value over a person: doesn’t that mean the person never mattered? How could you risk hurting them?

But from what I’ve seen, that’s not what idealists are about at all. Loyalists are about protecting people, yes, but idealists are the ones who spend their time on the how. As a loyalist, I would say people are my cause; idealists seem to be drawn to causes a little more abstract, about how you help people, what’s important, not who. Both have blind spots, yes. You can find idealists who lose track of the who altogether, just like you can find loyalists who lose track of the how, and wind up hurting others or themselves. But that’s why we need both, so we can balance each other out. Both are so important, and both can be so good.

Nowadays I'm thinking of Idealists as the ruthless, bad guys who don't care enough about people. And that Loyalists at least care for people as they are, and how caring for people could ever be wrong? Would you please help me, and talk of how each primary can be really bad and really good? Or if you have already, if you could please redirect me to that post.

I talk about this a lot. I think it’s the unifying theme of my blog.

And I do watch the discussion go through trends. At the beginning there was a lot of anti-Snake stuff which I thankfully haven’t seen for a while. Then it was all anti-Badger, and I got private messages from Badger primaries all concerned that Badger was being turned into the “bad guy” sorting. And so I made a point to write a lot about Universal Badgers, and how Badger primaries can be healthy and heroic.

And so maybe I’ve over corrected. But I’m an Idealist, I adore Idealists, both characters and real people. I think that’s more than reflected in what I write, and the heroic characters I and other people have sorted. In my summary of the system, I write a lot about how each primary can be unhealthy or immature. And that’s mostly because, at my core, do not like the words good and bad. I think they are flattening and overly simplistic and thought-killing. And I truly believe I could not write this blog if at any point I EVER considered ANY of the people I write about to be ‘good’ or ‘bad.’

So right now, I’m hoping that this just isn’t something baked in. That there’s always got to be a baddie, and so I run round and round trying my best to take the heat off each one in a sequence. I know it’s hard trying to understand morality systems and ways of being that are not your own, but that is the entire point of this entire system.

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Archetypes: Sorting Hat Chats

I’ve been asked about my rationale for naming different primary/ secondary combinations. I did this originally as a tool to help me sort characters - I wanted to see how these types tend to be used, so I could more easily see what subversions looked like. I'll run through my thoughts, but know there’s a lot of variation within each category. But even WITH that variation, I do think that each one has its own specific energy that makes it interesting to talk about. An explanation of the terms I'm using.

DOUBLE LION “THE REVOLUTIONARY”

Pretty straightforward. The Lion primary knows something is wrong, they know it in their bones even if they can’t articulate it, and they’ve got to go out and do something about it. Probably charging at whatever power structure is directly in front of them. It’s unlikely you find a character leading a revolution who isn’t a Double Lion. These guys are intense, inspirational, single minded.

The villain version of the Lion primary tends to be the person who “went too far" or "became the monster they were trying to fight.'' But I think that the much more interesting Lion primary villain trope is the Traitor. Since Lions work from their feelings, and their philosophies can’t necessarily be articulated or linked to individuals outside of them - they can definitely have their head turned while still feeling moral about it.

One of my favorite examples of this Revolutionary archtype is actually Christian Bale‘s character from Newsies. He’s the spark that starts the unionizing revolution, but 100% needs his Badger and Bird lieutenants to keep him focused and keep him from defecting

LION SNAKE “THE ROBIN HOOD”

These guys are similar to the Double Lion - they will recognize a cause or injustice revolutionary style - but Robin Hood doesn’t go up and bang on wicked Prince John’s door. His move is the snake secondary one: confront the problem indirectly. Undermine the regime by stealing tax money and re-distributing it to the poor. Be simultaneously Robin Hood the outlaw and Robin of Locksley the noble, infiltrating and getting information. The Lion Snake is more likely to work within society (or deliberately separate from society) versus just breaking everything down.

LION BIRD “THE LAWMAN / THE VIGILANTE”

The fact that the Lion Bird can either be the Lawman or the Vigilante shows off the very clear hero/villain split you get with Bird secondaries. We also see this with the Snake Bird (simultaneously the Mastermind and the traditional Villain) and the Double Bird (either the Scientist or the Mad Scientist.) This is why I think I had such trouble naming the Badger Bird. I wasn’t leaning into the duality of the Bird secondary enough. The Badger Bird can be the King Arthur, or he can be the Mob Boss, and he’ll look kind of similar either way.

The Lion Bird also has that Lion primary conviction and drive, but they want to follow up on it with investigation, evidence, and plans. I actually think there need to be more stories about Lawmen turning into Vigilantes and vice versa. Because Lion Birds are their Cause no matter what external alignment gets attached to it.

LION BADGER “THE LINCHPIN”

This is my own sorting - although when I came up with this name I still thought I was a Double Bird. The linchpin is the pin-axle thing at the center of a wheel that prevents the whole thing from falling apart, and I think it's a good way of talking about the energy of this combination. The Badger secondary means they’re a lot less single minded than the other Lion primaries: their power comes from being part of a group. They become the emotional “heart” a lot, and have a way of quietly keeping things together just by existing. They can be leaders, but a Double Lion will lead from up front while a Lion Badger will lead from in the middle (if that makes sense.)

I do think it’s really funny that this is a common sleeper villain trope. Peter Pettigrew, Prince Hans, and Randall Boggs of Monsters Inc. all became integral to a group, and then exploit their position within it. They’re kind of the evil bureaucrat. Maybe that's a good trope for children’s media

DOUBLE SNAKE “THE TRICKSTER”

This is another straightforward one. Double Snakes are in it for themselves (and maybe like three other people.) They're going to be clever and tricksy about how they get what they want, and will not mind doing things backward and unofficially. And they won't mind if you know that's what they're doing. There’s something very unapologetic about the Double Snake which makes for very attractive characters. They are consistently voted the sexiest... and when they’re villains they’re fun villains. You know what they want, and what they want is not that complicated. I think that’s a big reason for the appeal of Snake primaries in general. They’re the easiest primary to understand and explain.

SNAKE LION “THE LANCELOT”

I used to call these guys “The Rebel,” which... is too generic, doesn’t really mean anything. So I started thinking about the Lion secondary as the Knight secondary, and I liked that. Double Lions are the Crusader Knight, riding for their Cause. Bird Lions are Grail Knights, riding for their own personal truth. Badger Lions are Champion Knights, here to help the helpless and defend the innocent.

And if that's that case… Snake Lions have to be the Knight Errant, the knight who rides for his lady. It is that simple. Lancelot might be a Knight of the Round Table, but he’s riding for Arthur the person, not Arthur the King. And for his lady, Queen Guinevere. I feel like his dilemma is one that’s common to a lot of Snake Lions: what happens when they’re forced to split their loyalty? It’s tragic, but Lancelot can’t have Arthur and Guinevere simultaneously.

(At least not until my awesome Arthur/Guinevere/Lancelot OT3 which I will totally write at some point :)

SNAKE BIRD “THE MASTERMIND / THE VILLAIN”

The classic. We see a little more of the Bird Secondary split, and well… this is your stereotypical villain. They want power. They’re going to use an elaborate plan to get it. There’s a lot you can do with this sorting, but I actually do think it’s fun that whatever you do, this slight undercurrent of villain and/or mastermind… never quite goes away.

SNAKE BADGER “THE LOVER”

The Love Interest sorting. Chances are very good that if there is a love interest (who does serve some other role in the story...) they're going to be a Snake Badger. Devoted to one person, solving problems by caretaking. This is the Badger secondary who is likely to have the smallest group, which is just going to make them look excessively devoted to their friends. This type is pretty gender neutral, which is fun. A lot of female love interests, but also your Mr. Darcys and Peeta Mellarks.

One of my favorite things about this trope (mostly just because I think it’s funny...) is that if you write a character who is not supposed to be a love interest, but who is a Snake Badger... subconsciously I think people are going to read them as a love interest anyway. Looking at you Jaskier, Horatio, and even Captain Barbossa.

DOUBLE BIRD “THE [MAD] SCIENTIST”

I think that (especially if you aren’t a Bird Primary yourself) your response to hearing a fictional Bird Primary’s motivation is kind of …huh. That seems random. Or oddly specific. You get your Hannibal Lecters, whose entire motivation is... wanting to eat people while drinking nice wine.

Double birds seem especially unusual, just in terms of society. They are Bird secondaries and they interact with the world through gathering data, but their Bird primaries mean that data can literally lead them to any conclusion, no matter how potentially wacky. These guys consciously build themselves from the ground up, and can make them kind of detached - either in a logical way, or an unmoored way. They're written as either really stable, the rational mentor figure. Or really... not. And that’s how you spot a Bird villain. They’re not after money/power/safety, they’re after something weird.

BIRD LION “THE GRAIL KNIGHT”

This is the trope of Perceval or Galahad, questing after the Holy Grail chalice... which is really just meaning, and truth. It’s a personal quest. Grail Knights tend to ride alone, and a lot of the things that concern them are metaphysical, to do with identity, purpose, things like that. You can have extremely different Bird Lions, but I do think there is a sort of spiritual core there. Doctor Harleen Quinzeel sees freedom and truth in whatever the Joker is doing, and then once she recognizes his hypocrisy, has to go build her own meaning.

I actually think these guys are pretty easy to spot because of that Lion secondary. When they change direction, they change direction, and there’s probably a period of despair between the direction changes. I’ve talked about how Bird Lions having a habit of falling apart pretty dramatically, and that’s where that idea comes from.

BIRD BADGER “THE LAST MAN STANDING”

A rare sorting, but an interesting one. I call this one “the Survivor” or “the Last Man Standing” because, well, they seem to be. They seem remarkably stable. This is the Bird primary least likely to be a villain, and maybe the sorting least likely to be a villain. I think what’s going on is that they are grounded and integrated in whatever community they happen to be in (because of that Badger secondary), but they can define themselves and rebuild themselves in the Bird primary way. This makes them uniquely suited to building a new version of themselves for whatever situation they happen to find themselves in.

Maybe a better name for these guys would be “The Adapter.”

BIRD SNAKE “THE ARTIST”

Like all Bird primaries, these guys are inspired by their own projects and their own worldview, but because of that Snake secondary, Bird Snakes have a more easy-going ‘take the world as it comes' kind of energy. They are “the Artist” because everything they do is art: they want to use themselves and the world around them, put all of that towards whatever their Bird primary happens to be interested in.

You can have villains like the Nolan Joker, or the Talented Mr. Ripley, who kind of turn the world into their own personal philosophical social experiment. Or Scotty from Star Trek whose meaning is solely the well-being of the Enterprise. Maybe they just like traveling, and that's all they need. (It's a way for the Bird primary and the Snake secondary exist very happily together, so I wouldn't be surprised if that was pretty common.)

DOUBLE BADGER “THE PEACEMAKER”

Badgers are interesting, because while I think they’re generally regarded as “correct,” they’re also seen as kind of boring. That’s the case with both Badger primaries and Badger secondaries, which means it is doubly reflected in the Double Badger. They often get written as simplistic, the sweet Jane Bennett type who loves everybody and caretakes everybody and just wants everybody to get along.

They are often the targets of what TV Tropes used to call “Break the Cutie.” What could be more interesting than making this character, who wants to be happily part of a community, be forced to build protective models, be all tortured and angsty? I actually think we’re seeing a return of the Double Badger as an interesting character in their own right, with people like Aziaphale, and I'm here for it.

BADGER LION “THE PROTAGONIST”

What can I say? There are a lot of protagonists that are Badger Lions. They want to help the group - so we know they're the good guys - and then they charge and make stuff happen. Lion secondaries are very useful in fiction - you drop them into a situation and stuff just happens. I also think of this as the Starfleet officer sorting - because if you’re a Starfleet officer, either you are the sorting, or can model it really well.

I will say that this is kind of the stock Protagonist sorting, the way that the Snake Badger is the stock love interest and the Snake Bird is the stock villain. There’s just something sort of generic good guy about this one, which is why I want to see it used as a villain sorting more. Badger villains - mostly people who define ‘human’ very narrowly - are insanely terrifying.

BADGER SNAKE “THE POWER BEHIND THE THRONE”

Possibly “the Advisor.” This is another one I had difficulty pinning down. I called it “the Politician” for a while, which unfortunately came off as a little bit more negative than I meant it to, since I think this sorting has a lot in common with Lion Badger, the linchpin of a heroic team. The difference is that Lion Badger takes on that role kind of unconsciously, while the Badger Snake does it very consciously.

Their loyalty is to the group, but their skill set is all about subversion and different ways of going around the group, which is why there’s an interesting contradiction at the heart of Badger Snake. A lot of real life Badger Snakes struggle with feeling like “bad people" and it's too bad. These guys are ridiculously powerful and competent when they are sure of themselves, and I love seeing them in action

BADGER BIRD “THE KING / THE MOB BOSS”

Another difficult one, despite (or because) I really like them. I was calling them “the Architect,” because “The City Planner” sounded too boring… but that’s what they do. They’re all about the community but they problem-solve the way all Bird secondaries do, by prepping, and gathering knowledge. I talked more about this in the Lion Bird entry, but Bird secondary seems to have this villain split going on, and that’s what I see here too. This is a controversial love-them-or-hate-them sorting, and I think that’s why. There’s a lot of room in whether or not you see this sorting as villainous.

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Do people's primaries and secondaries change through their lives?

Ah. The age old question: can people change? My answer is a resounding yes, people are always growing and changing, becoming more healthy or unhealthy versions of themselves all the time! But does a person's innate sorting change? Well, by default, the answer is no. Whatever sorting you first picked up as a very young child, that's your innate sorting and always will be.

And those two ideas aren't at all contradictory because we have models. Don't underestimate how deeply a model can go. They are something you pick up and learn so well it becomes a part of who you are. They can become as strong or even stronger than your innate sorting. That's what happened to me with my Badger and Snake secondaries. While I may have eventually figured out which was innate, for a good while there, I wasn't sure which was the model because they are both so significant in my life. I found myself going in circles trying to figure it out before I decided that it didn't matter to me. The only thing I would gain from figuring it out was a way to describe who I was, when what mattered to me was who I am. And who I am is a beautiful blend of the two secondaries. Just because one is a model, doesn't make it any less a piece of me or any more fake than the other.

Anyway, I suppose all that might feel a bit cheap coming from someone who did figure it out in the end... Not to mention, many people do gain something significant from looking at who they were, so I won't dismiss the value of figuring it out... But I digress!

Ultimately, the answer to your question is yes, people's sortings do change. They change by adding and stripping away models. Our innate sorting is simply what we used first and what (most) people use most often because it's (presumably) what we know best. If we know a model better than our innate, like how I use Courtier Badger instead of a Snake mask, that is just as important to who we are as our innate sorting.

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Sorting the Lords from Fire Emblem: Three Houses

This sorting uses the Sorting Hat Chats system, which is a modified version of the Hogwarts house system from Harry Potter.

Here’s a link to a detailed explanation, and here’s another with some different terminology. But to summarise:

Your primary house is WHY you do things. Lion primaries have a gut sense of right and wrong; they derive their morals from their instincts. Bird primaries decide on their sense of right and wrong from the evidence in the world around them; they derive their morals from their reason. Badger primaries focus less on ideals and more on people and groups; if it helps someone, it is right. Snake primaries focus on people too, but they prioritise their chosen people above all else.

Your secondary house is HOW you do things. Lion secondaries head resolutely and stubbornly for their goals; when met with a locked door, they kick it down. Bird secondaries collect tools and knowledge to help them; when met with a locked door, they have the key, or they know how to pick locks. Badger secondaries put in the slow, hard work, and they network with people to come to their aid; when met with a locked door, they knock. Snake secondaries search for the clever way to work around their obstacles; when met with a locked door, they notice the open window.

You can model a primary or secondary house, which means you adapt its system of tools or morality in addition to that of your own house. Houses can burn, meaning that you loose faith in your ability to be moral with your primary or solve problems with your secondary. Finally, houses can explode, meaning you loose yourself in a house to the expense of all else.

Now, without further ado - let’s begin.

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Considering how much of her storyline is devoted to her chasing her vision for Fodlan, EDELGARD VON HRESVELG’s primary was harder for me to figure out than I’d thought it would be - harder than the other two lords. We can rule out Snake, because none of her main motivations are particularly connected to one person over another. I wondered if she might be a burnt Badger who’s decided that it’s impossible to save everyone, but the way she keeps on coming back to talking about her ideals and “a righteous future” makes me think she’s an Idealist primary - that is, Lion or Bird.

From there I was leaning toward considering her a Lion, because she has a sort of rightous fury and determination about her that’s common with Lions, especially Lion heroes and antagonists in fiction. But her conversation with Dimitri where she outlines why she started the war changed my mind. She keeps on coming back to how she’s reasoned that what she does is right even though it’s not obvious intuitively. There’s one quote in particular that caught my eye: “I weighed the victims of war against the victims of the world as it is now, and I chose the former”. She seems so sure of herself because she trusts the conclusions she’s weighed in her mind, not because she trusts in a gut sense of right and wrong. So Bird primary I think fits her best.

Her secondary is far more obvious - she’s a Lion secondary, through and through. While she can be sneaky when the situation requires her to be - when she pretends to be the Flame Emperor, for example - she by far seems to prefer being able to charge right for what she wants, no pretences, no holding back. “If you stand in my way, I will cut you down until you have no blood left to bleed”; while I doubt most Lions are quite that stabby about it, this is an extremely Lion thing to say, and it exemplifies the way she fights.

DIMITRI ALEXANDRE BLAIDDYD’s primary is much easier to spot than Edelgard’s. He’s a Badger primary, committed to helping every soul he can (except the few he has decided are not, in fact, people). He’s almost completely burnt by the time we meet him again after the timeskip - his morality has switched from ‘if you are a person, I will help you’ to ‘if you hurt people, you are not a person and mark my words, I will cut you down’. That’s all he has left to drive him. Recognising his desires and his ability to help people - unburning his primary, in other words - is a crucial part of his healing process. Viewed through this lens, his meeting with Edelgard is essentially a conflict between an Idealist and a Loyalist who cannot understand how the other could think that their view of the world could lead to a brighter future.

His intense dehumanisation when his primary is burnt is also interesting to note. The thieves from Reunion at Dawn, for example, are not people but are vile “rats” with a “nest” that must be destroyed because of what they’ve done. He’s also a good example of a Badger who dehumanises even himself; he says in his darkest years that he will make himself a rat, or a boar, if that’s what it takes to rid the world of other vermin.

Like Edelgard, he’s a Lion secondary who will charge straight for what he believes. While they can’t understand each other’s primaries, they understand each other’s secondaries completely and implicitly. When Dimitri gives Edelgard a dagger and tells her to use it to cut a path to the future she believes in, the symbol means something to both of them. And when he says he will rise to meet her there, he says he will engage with her on her terms, because her terms are his too.

Like Dimitri, CLAUDE VON REIGAN is a Badger primary, one whose focus throughout his story is tighter on groups. His core motivation is to break down the border and the prejudices between his mother’s and father’s countries, to create a world where they can learn from each other, help each other - and where he can’t be rejected by either of them on account of being too much like the other, and neither can anyone else like him. He needs both acceptance from his two groups of people and for them to prosper together. Both of these are very human, of course, but his focus on them as his ultimate dream is very Badger.

His secondary is a little trickier. I thought Snake, at first, for his reputation as a bit of a trickster and for his emphasis on wearing masks before he gets to know someone. But his schemes and his reputation as the “Master Tactician” come from a place of creating tools and plans beforehand. All his successful battles are based on careful planning, and he very much sees knowledge as power. In his own words; “When devising schemes, it’s best to have as many options at your disposal as possible. Expanding those options is kind of a hobby for me.” All of this is very, very Bird secondary of him. That said, he has a very powerful Snake model that he uses an an additional tool in his arsenal, mostly in social situations. I think it’s interesting to note that it’s his route that reveals the most of the game’s lore; because with his secondary, he’s the one who’s looking for it.

This also makes him another data point in the search for the elusive Badger Bird in fiction, which is great! @the-phoenix-heart has a suggestion here that Badger Birds tend to be rare because writers often associate Badger primaries with a sort of naivety and Bird secondaries with intelligence, which they don’t think should go together. Claude is an in interesting case with this in mind, because he seems, on some level, to believe this too - or rather, he thinks that showing his Badger could result in people thinking of him as naive, which conflicts with the flighty, clever, Snake secondary presentation of himself that he likes to show people. He keeps his big dream very close to his chest, only telling people about it once he knows he can trust them. Mind you, I’m sure this is partially because explaining his dream requires telling people he’s an outsider to Fodlan, which puts him in a vulnerable position. But he also seems concerned that people will think that he’s dreaming too big, that he’s unrealistic - he asks Byleth whether they think his goal is “just a crazy pipe dream” or a “brilliant ambition”. Claude seems to have decided on the latter, but he’s very aware that people could consider it the former.

TLDR;

Edelgard: BIRD LION

Dimitri: BADGER LION with a primary that burns and then unburns over the course of the game

Claude: BADGER BIRD with a Snake secondary model