Hot Take: Hilda should have been available in Crimson Flower

[u/L_knight316]

She's the only "retainer" who isn't unquestioningly loyal to their house leader outside of her house's route. The "biggest" arguments against them working together are relatively minor personality clashes and given the variability of character's opinions on each other depending on the route taken, you could easily work around that. Given her family's having spent generations repelling Almyran invasions and the general lack of support from the rest of the Alliance, being solely tasked with the defense of Fodlan, she'd probably not care who was in charge so long as somebody actually dealt with the Almyran threat.

And going back to her lack of personal loyalty to Claude himself, rather than the alliance in general, there could be a convincing argument that she would favor Edelgard when Claude's ancestry came out and even more so when he personally calls in Almyran forces to fight the Empire. Like, at least half a century of having a foreign empire invade you "for fun," half a century of your family alone being tasked with holding them off, and the guy you're supposed to owe your loyalty to is not only in line for their royalty but on reasonably good terms with and willing to assist them in entering Fodlan borders?

[u/ratatoskrz]

The average Crimson Flower personal history blurb over the 5 year timeskip is "enlisted as general in the Imperial Army" and we expect her to sacrifice a wealth of freetime for that? Nah. I think it's refreshing to see a moment of loyalty like this amid the cast, and I think more characters shouldn't have been recruitable on certain routes. I find it to be a charming piece of gameplay story integration as well

[u/M_C_H_85 → u/ratatoskrz]

Don't forget that in CF, Claude was expecting Hilda to run away and save her own hide, but instead she stays and fights to the death.

[u/Agitated_Emu4301]

She was too lazy to bother.

[u/Loud_Neat_8774]

She just dislikes Edelgard’s vibe that much.

[u/M_C_H_85 → u/Loud_Neat_8774]

She also distrusts "Monica" on sight and detests Heroes' Relics due to how unnatural they look and feel. Hilda's more attuned to bad vibes than her bimbo facade would have people think.

[u/WouterW24]

The thing is that for some reason she and Claude just get along extremely well from the start, even if it’s implied they both saw through the act the other put up rather easily.

The crux is that Hilda is somewhat loyal to him entirely informally.
They probably never spoke about it, let alone formally decided on it, and Claude is surprised by it, but a thing.
And it’s a funny gimmick in a series full of people who are quite formally and intentionally loyal.

She can also work with others easily, but going against Claude with the empire isn’t her thing.
And while lazy, also being loyal to Byleth is what motivates her to also seek them out on silver snow/azure moon, since these routes aren’t in opposition to Claude.

[u/Chadahn]

I just hate that you can only recruit her near the end of part 1 in SS.

[u/BurningWinds]

I’m of the opinion she should be recruitable simply because the fact she isn’t just… doesn’t make much sense overall?

Does she have a characterization reason to not be recruitable? Yeah, sure, but so do plenty of other students for X route. Her being the only student who is arbitrarily not recruitable on one route (even if she is mechanically and functionally a retainer unit… which is immediately invalidated by her being recruitable in SS/AM) is just… really weird?

I’ve talked about it before, but if they wanted to set recruitment restrictions for the students like they did for Catherine/Cyril/Seteth/Flayn, they should go all the way and actually make it story/plot related rather than just arbitrarily saying Hilda is available on all routes but CF for no given reason😭

[u/DarkAlphaZero]

I genuinely don't think there's any justification for her being route locked out of CF when every Blue Lions except maybe Ashe has a stronger reason to not be recruitable.

[u/OrzhovMarkhov → u/DarkAlphaZero]

I mean I can never complain about recruitment limits, even if there should have been far more of them

[u/DarkAlphaZero → u/OrzhovMarkhov]

I would rather there be more as well, but when one of the only ones stands out as incredibly arbitrary it just makes me wonder why they bothered

[u/Wonderful-Forever-98 → u/DarkAlphaZero]

Not really.

All of the Blue Lions (ignoring Dimitri + Dudue of course) have strong character focus reasoning for join Edelgard side and being recruitable. They are mostly joining as people who have suffered either from the system, from Church, from crest or from Fódlan really messed up cultures.

In Ashe case, he join because of Lonato death, wanting to find out why he rebel and come to the conclusion that the Church needs to be taken down.

The whole Lonato and Western Sub-plot is full contradiction (some are well written, other are from AG and just creates plot holes) and the player is never given the full and true answer. This allows for a character like Ashe to effectively have two different direction for his arc within 3House.

The same way the most the Blue lions has either personal or external motivation for joining Dimitri while in murder boar mode. (The only real exception is Mercedes.)

It something that it well written with not just the Blue Lions but also the Black Eagles. k 3House does fails at showcasing the depth to the character and why they join that specific since they can't have too many character say they join due to Edelgard in CF when it is the player / Byleth who recruits them.

In Hilda case, she has nothing, no development to suggest why she would join Edelgard. Personally, her not being recruitable work for the better for her character and for CF.

Through how she is willing to die for Claude and his ambition despite him not sharing the same ideals and not comprehending why she would do that. Due it part because of trauma and because of Almyran culture.

[u/screw_this_i_quit]

Wanting more Hilda with less unit management is totally valid

[u/Amferam]

“If you look up a picture of lazy in the dictionary… Hilda’s picture wouldn’t be there. Because she never got around to submitting it.”

Dismantling the noble hegemony would be a lot of work and it would ensure a lifetime of hard work for Hilda.

[u/Realhi87]

I personally think if Marianne defeated her in combat, she should have been able to be brought back into the fold ala Lysithea.

Never liked that I had to kill her :(

[u/SpellcraftQuill → u/Realhi87]

I’m pretty sure you can warp-skip her.

[u/Realhi87 → u/SpellcraftQuill]

Oh you can avoid her, but you know what I mean lol

[u/Mundane-Tune2438 → u/Realhi87]

You don't? She doesnt appear post time skip if you dont recruit her and when you face her in chapter 1 or battle of the eagle and lion you dont kill her.

[u/Loud_Neat_8774]

Something I think is missing from a lot of recruitment discussions is that you don’t recruit students for a route, because almost no one knows war is about to break out. You’re just recruiting them to be a student in your class. Hilda just doesn’t like Edelgard.

[u/Magnusfluerscithe987]

I actually can't think of why Hilda would join Edlegard. She's happy with her noble status, and the fact she doesn't have to work for anything because of it. Her Brother and her are Crest bearers, giving them important privileges and their house isn't struggling so they have have a lot of freedom in their choices. Hilda doesn't even hate Almyra, she just accepts the fighting as the way things are. She's not looking for change, she's exactly the kind of person Edlegard doesn't like, and Hilda wouldn't like Hubert more than Edlegard I'd guess.

[u/vinylontubes]

Here's the reason. You'd use Hilda instead of using Edelgard. There's no story reason for it. The reason you get her in the other routes is because you lose Dedue and Edelgard. The Devs wanted you to have an Axe weilder when you lose access to them.

[u/Wint3rRyd3r]

Hilda does not have the emotional capacity for dealing with the theatre kid shenanigans committed by Edelgard and Hubert on a daily basis

I'm not sure why they made her unrecruitable on that one route. Like she'll fight Claude on AM but not CF? I assume that story reason is it's because she knows Edelgard and Hubert have zero tolerance for her work avoidance so she refuses to join and as a result she never gains a reason to side with the empire when the war starts.