I'm curious as to what everyone's favorite Three Houses maps are because I thought they were consistently really middling. I need to replay it again soon (at least Azure Moon) to better refresh my memory but in my mind right now every other map basically boils down to a setting that looks invariably like these two defaults:
that is ultimately solved by using Stride/Warp on your army of Wyvern Lords and Falcon Knights, who proceed to fly over all terrain and kill the boss in like two turns. LTCing not being the only way to play these games was recently discussed in this thread, and I agree with that sentiment 100%, but in 3H that efficiency is a natural consequence of there not really being an incentive to make use of anything other than the flying classes for physical units because class stats are all so even. It would be one thing if there were more smaller indoor maps, or maps with walls that limited mobility, or if there were more diverse objectives other than 'kill boss', but when basically every map is filled with terrain that limits non-fliers, and there are no tangible downsides to using Wyvern over a class like Hero (given that you can dismount and weapon restrictions aren't a thing), it's natural that you'd use fliers to breeze through most of these maps.
I guess some of that is more an indictment on how 3H handled its class system than the maps themselves, but in every route it felt like every map was either trudged through with your students to kill the boss in the early game, or flown over with your elite units to kill the boss in the late game. I just compare that to FEs like Conquest or Radiant Dawn (not including Part 4) which constantly mix things up and keep things fun. Or FE6 and FE7, which had maps that, on top of being consistently really good, are extremely memorable as far as how they look - you experience Bern, the Western Aisles, Sacae, etc. all with their own unique feel and visuals. Three Houses' map design just feels like generic forests and cities with a port or lava map occasionally. Sometimes there's a side objective so that something more is going on but they're generally just boring, and that's drilled in as you play the different routes because they're reused throughout all four.
The only maps that stand out positively to me at all are the last map of Part 1 when Edelgard storms Garreg Mach (Kino), Hunting by Daybreak (Kino the first time you experience it but feels like worst map ever made if you're playing Maddening), and a couple of the post time-skip paralogues that I remember being pretty fun... The Agartha maps were cool too, because if nothing else they were a change of scenery and had a bit more going on.
Again, I intend on replaying 3H again soon (last time I played it was like two years ago) and I could definitely end up with a better appreciation for them but even the better maps in 3H are disappointing compared to the upper-tier maps in something like Engage (think Ch. 11, 14, 17, 25, even 4 really stands out to me for some reason) or Thracia (think 4, 6, 14, 19, & the chapter you recruit Misha), just to throw a couple comparisons out there.
I hope I don't come off like I'm a-logging 3H or anything, because I don't hate it, but I just would not describe its maps as memorable... so I'm interested in the ways they appeal to others who got more enjoyment out of them than I did.
