Recruitment

Caeda recruits Lorenz into Marth's army in Shadow Dragon.

“	Another thing...During your travels, you are certain to meet many who despise Dolhr. Some may be hiding in villages; other may have been captured or forced to fight against their will or better judgment. It falls upon you to find these individuals and win them over your cause.	”	— Mostyn to Marth

Recruitment (Japanese: 仲間入り joining) is the term used to describe the act of gaining a new controllable unit in the player's army in the Fire Emblem series. As games progress, the player can gain more units to expand on their army, introducing more diversity into their forces. Recruitment is accomplished by a wide variety of means, usually based on directly talking to other units out in the field.

Methods of recruitment

Event/automatic

In many cases, a unit will automatically join the player's army at the beginning, end or during a chapter, or even while preparing. There are some such units who may require additional criteria to be met for them to appear. In Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn, this also extends to conversations which occur at the player's base, which are possible to miss through not viewing the conversation in question. Similarly, this is the only recruitment method in Fire Emblem Gaiden, with recruitment conversations optionally occurring by visiting villages, forts or castles after clearing them of enemies. In Awakening, Donnel is recruited at the start of his paralogue, but will leave the army if he is defeated or does not level up at least once.

Talking to enemies

The most frequent form of recruitment is to use the talk command on specific enemy units with certain characters and persuade them to defect to the player's army. Recruitable enemies are usually readily distinguishable in that they are not generic, actually possess an identifiable name and face, and in most cases are not the chapter's boss.

Examples of this include:

• Castor (Shadow Dragon & the Blade of Light/Shadow Dragon)
• Warren (Mystery of the Emblem/New Mystery of the Emblem)
• Ayra (Genealogy of the Holy War First Generation)
• Dalsin (Thracia 776)
• Sin (The Binding Blade)
• Dorcas (The Blazing Blade)
• Joshua (The Sacred Stones)
• Ilyana (Path of Radiance)
• Aran (Radiant Dawn)
• Gaius (Awakening)
• Rhajat (Fates: Birthright/Revelation)
• Lindon (Engage)

Talking to neutral or partner units

A variation on the above, on occasion neutral or partner units will appear on the map and can again be talked to by specific units, typically the army's leader, in order to recruit them.

Examples of this include:

• Lachesis (Genealogy of the Holy War First Generation)
• Asbel (Thracia 776)
• Clarine (The Binding Blade)
• Erk (The Blazing Blade)
• Ross (The Sacred Stones)
• Mia (Path of Radiance)
• Tormod (Radiant Dawn)
• Libra (Awakening)
• Nyx (Fates: Conquest/Revelation)
• Jade (Engage)

Visiting a village

Some units can be recruited by visiting a village in which they reside.

Examples of this include:

• Merric (Shadow Dragon & the Blade of Light/Shadow Dragon)
• Marisha (Mystery of the Emblem/New Mystery of the Emblem)
• Ronan (Thracia 776)
• Lugh (The Binding Blade)
• Canas (The Blazing Blade)
• Lute (The Sacred Stones)
• Laurent (Awakening)
• Mitama (Fates: Birthright/Revelation)

Hiring for a fee

Some enemy or neutral units require to be paid a sum of gold in order to be recruited. The payment required varies for each character, but is typically within the range of 10,000G.

Examples of this include:

• Beowolf (Genealogy of the Holy War First Generation)
• Hugh (The Binding Blade; Hugh makes multiple offers of decreasing price, and his stats accordingly become lower for every cheaper offer he makes)
• Farina (The Blazing Blade)
• Rennac (The Sacred Stones, if not recruited by L'Arachel)
• Volke (Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn)

Examples of other requirements

On rare occasions, the recruitment of certain units has more complicated and obscure requirements which typically require a certain amount of prior knowledge to actually succeed.

• In Fire Emblem: Thracia 776, to recruit Lifis, Salem and Misha, they must be captured and not released before their respective chapter's end.
• In Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade, to recruit Karla, you have to get Bartre as a level 5 warrior before in the beginning of chapter chapter 31xH, then make fight the two and make both of them survive.
• In Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn, two units can only be recruited from the player's second playthrough onward: Pelleas and Lehran. To recruit Pelleas, he must be spared in the opening cutscene of Part III, Chapter 13. To recruit Lehran, the Black Knight must be deployed in the Part I, Endgame, and Ike must fight the Black Knight as an enemy in Part III, Chapter 7 and both must survive.

Inverse recruitment

In Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn, in rare instances it is possible for units in the player's army to actually be recruited by the enemy by talking to certain enemy units. The sole unit capable of doing this in Path of Radiance is Jill, who is recruited back into the enemy by talking to Shiharam in Chapter 20; in this case, she cannot be re-recruited by the player. In Part 3 Radiant Dawn, Jill and Zihark can be recruited by members of either army as the player's perspective shifts between them, and will join the opposite side in certain chapters if they speak to certain enemy units (Haar or Mist for Jill, Lethe and Mordecai for Zihark).

Reasons for recruitment

Common reasons for joining the player and examples of characters who did so include:

• Leads the player's group, embarking on a journey for varying reasons (all Lords)
• Acquainted with (Quan and Ethlyn) or serves (Cain and Abel) someone else in the army
• Deserts from the enemy side, due to his/her own will (Heath) being convinced to do so (Roger) or a mixture of both (Devdan)
• Shares an enemy or goal with the army (resistance forces members such as Echidna and Larum)
• Forced into joining (Makalov in Path of Radiance) or has no option other than doing so (Lifis)
• Volunteer soldier (Ronan) or joins out of pure benevolence (Wrys)
• Hired to fight on the player's side (mercenaries such as Gerik and Tethys)
• Personal interests such as finding someone (Priscilla), staying with or protecting someone (Jaffar), improving their skills (Guy) and obtaining money (Dew)

Etymology and other languages

Names, etymology and in other regions
Language	Name	Definition, etymology, and notes
English	Recruitment
Japanese	仲間入り	Joining (a group); literally "comrade entering".
French	Recrutement	Recruitment

See also

• Replacement unit