#opal spring

Vassal's inheritor

"Fionn is a... confrontational young fellow. He has surprising mastery of the Fodlan language, despite growing up in Brigid, and is interested in the old ways - Knights of Faerghus and the Round Table of Leicester. He never shows the same thirst for knowledge when learning about our empire though." - Wilhelm von Hresvelg

Likes: Brigid, Hunting, Knighthood, Coats of Arms

Dislikes: Enbarr, The Empire, Boar Meat, Cowardice.

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Talents: Bow, Sword, Brawl

Hidden Talent: Authority

Bad At: Flying, Reason

Gameplay notes: Fionn would have higher doge stats in undergrowth and rough terrain than the other Black Eagles units, given his affinity for plant life and climbing trees! He would also be a fast dodge tank like Petra - if you get lucky with stat growth (reflecting my playthrouhgs with Petra, where sometimes she dominates a battle field and other times she is far worse as a unit). He's pretty solid overall. A brawler build, sword master build, or archer could all work. One of those very reclassable units, where no play-through is the same.

Design Notes:

I have SO many head-canons about Brigid it's not even funny. I'll try to spare you an essay, but this design was quite tricky (an essay might be needed!)

So Petra's design is made by a mash-up of "'foreign indigenous"'

Ancient british clothing (torcs, la-tene designs)

Generic Native American stereotypical clothing (not referencing any tribe or specific stuff just mashup bits and bobs)

body painting/ tattooing (could be any number of native traditions. since it's purple, it might be pulling from the pict tradition of blue body painting/ tattooing)

beaded headpiece (Egyptian, Mongolian, Alutiiq, Flapper era)

'Traditional brigid braids' which look like some European styles of braiding?? but it's really unclear in both the concept art and 3d model.

There are lots more but those were the ones I was looking at when thinking about the design.

Then I had a look at Brigid in general, from what we've seen

Tropical island oceans

generic European forest (reused map)

Irish naming schemes

British looking archipelago (Ireland size island, british size island right beside it, with presumably tiny tiny islands around them given that its an archipelago but doesn't have islands other than those two)

Spirit worship (could be so so so many traditions, across the globe. So I'm not sure.)

Client King's children being taken for imperial education.

So the client kings thing is really key here. That was a traditional roman practice, and the most famous examples (at least where I'm from) are from The British Isles. Petra is the standard imperial's hostage princess for Client kings.

Combine that with Irish naming schemes and a British archipelago, we had the place I chose to use as inspiration. Also spirit/ nature worship did happen with the ancient native British peoples.

Obviously as with "'foreign"' "'native"' thing there are lots of other ideas in Petra's design, but I wanted to be less... racist(?) or at least 'othering' in the way I designed her son.

So.

The sleeves are vaguely based on the Irish Leine and Ionar (when it's being taken off it has that shape, but the reference is Vague). The torcs Petra wears look quite cobbled together (as though she was trying to make one out of the adrestian things she was given) and are stacked in an unusual manner.  Torcs would (probably) not be stacked, and the thicker the torc, the more money and therefore status you had. Petra wearing thin torcs is quite a step down from what a royal one ought to look like. So Fionn has a large royal looking torc, as well as a tattoo on his neck - probably from his mother, so that no-one could take his royalty away, even if they stripped him of his culture and homeland.

The bottom of the cloth piece is HopesPetra inspired and Fionn has unclothed legs and a croptop moment under the cloth because sexualising Petra so much was silly, and I wanted the Brigid men to have the same sort of skin-showing-for-no-reason thing she had going on.

I could have picked other native cultures to have a look at, but this one fit so well with the torcs, and it's also the culture I had the most knowledge on. Again I didn't really want to be generalising massive swathes of current cultures, so using an ancient multitude of cultures (that can't help but be generalised given how little we know about them other than the stuff that seems to be used in Petra's design and inspiration) seemed like a better way to go.

I don't know. This design was quite tricky to do.

His hair was fairly easy, once we'd decided on a braid. The little braids are the Brigid braiding style, which Petra mentions in teatime dialogue; and the tattoo is the one Petra has on her back in hopes. Whydoihavetopickaname came up with meanings for all of the tattoos he has, and I'll ask her to send me them so I can pop them in a post.

Lowena is a contentions figure among the nobility of Adrestia. Her wicked wit and mastery of poetics made her a difficult opponent in a debate, and she had very dangerous opinions on the war and the expansion of the empire. She used to be a lot more opinionated before the Vestras cracked down on the rising noble opposition. Now she is the model servant of the imperial regime.

The poet 'Jule', however, is another story. Their poetry is as brutal as it is brilliant. Its supporters are the outcast and downtrodden of imperial society, and the criticisms their poetry levied at the dictatorial regime have given words to the lower classes and disgruntled nobles. The whole regime, but in particular the Vestras have been hunting for them for some time. Of course, if anyone were to suggest that 'Jule' was Lowena, Ferdinand would laugh, and change the topic expertly.

Lowena von Aegir

Noble Poet

Though she has dabbled in writing for the opera - Lowena's main artistic drive is poetry. Under the pen-name 'Jule' - inspired by the twin jewels of the empire her father claimed to have once been part of - she has published lots of thought provoking poetry on crests and the class systems. She longs to be part of the change she advocates for, and as a result has requested to be voted in to the position of advisor to the archbishop.

Likes: Poetry, opera, philosophy, history, politics, tea.

Dislikes: Those who harm others, coffee.

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Talent: Lance, Reason, Riding.

Hidden Talent: Faith.

Bad at: Flying.

Gameplay: Lowena would be a classic lance unit. Simple, easy. She could, via her hidden talent, be changed into a hard hitting healer class. Perhaps a war cleric or something like that. Honestly I haven't thought that much about it.

Design notes:

Lowena's design shows her nobility through ruffles and layered fabrics, but deliberately has no filigree, because on Ferdinand that is golden. Brass-y gold seems to be the main metal colour of the empire, and so I chose to avoid it when designing Lowena. Because either she is a supporter of Byleth in Silver Snow, or a dissenter in the regime of Crimson Flower, she refuses to wear gold.

She also has mostly hidden armour, the Ferdinand greaves are under her long pleated skirt - the pleats allow her to move if required, whilst maintaining a pencil shape. This is to give off the image of benign compliance, whilst being ready to fight or run when she needs to. Or to give off the image of peace-time whilst being ready to defend the people of Fodlan. Honestly it's quite hard to design characters with two separate environments and plot lines, but I'm having fun.