In spirit of FE16's hopeful announcement tomorrow, I spent an ungodly amount of time calculating and analyzing the quality and quantity of facial hair in the entire series. How are the two related? I've never seen a fanbase more particular about needing more beards in the future installments, that's how. For each game, I have done:

1) Fraction and percentage of total PLAYABLE characters w/ facial hair

2) Fraction that accounts for total males (since FE doesn't have any bearded females or Magypsies, and some games have a lot more women than other installments)

3) List of playable characters with facial hair (see criteria for clarification)

4) Beard Analysis, as quality matters just as much, if not more.

For those who don't care about this text wall, I've compiled all the important info and between game comparisons in a posted comment.

Criteria

Playable: If this character can be used in the main campaign by some non-hacking means, I will count them as playable, with the exception of Fates capture units and amiibo. Trial map characters or DLC only characters are excluded as well. Custom characters are considered in their default appearance. I am distinguishing this as IS feels the need to make antagonists a lot more bearded, and I feel that will skew the results. I might do one for antagonists specifically in the future.

Facial hair: Visible facial hair is all they need. Doesn't matter if it's as strong as Tauroneo's, or as weak as FE7 Merlinus's. Stubble, mutton chops, goatees, etc. are all fair game.

FE1, FE2, and FE3 are instead substituted for their remakes. Their percentages might vary a little but they should be close to their remakes in values.

Genealogy of the Holy War

Total Characters: 2/49, or 4.08% (excluding subs as none of the subs are variantly bearded)

Total Males: 2/31, or 6.45%

Character list: Oifey and Hannibal

Beard Analysis: Though facial hair might be scarce, Oifey's mustache is great and Hannibal's beard is downright fearsome.

Thracia 776

Total Characters: 3/52, or 5.76%

Total Males: 3/36, or 8.3%

Character List: Dagdar, Xavier, and Conomore

Beard Analysis: Daddy Dagdar coming in strong for early game beards, and Xavier brings it home in the lategame. Conomore's mustache looks like he ripped it off of John Oates or a 1980's pornstar. In other words, it's pretty solid. Quantity might be a little low, but the quality is pretty great, especially thanks to Dagdar.

The Binding Blade

Total Characters: 7/54, or 12.96%

Total Males: 7/35, or 20%

Character List: Marcus, Merlinus, Astolfo, Bartre, Douglas, Dayan, Yodel

Beard Analysis: Marcus proves to still have it even in his old age, and quite frankly Merlinus' stache got a lot better with age. Speaking of mustaches, Bartre and Dayan are A1 in that regard. Astolfo's might be smaller than the others but I found myself really liking it for some reason. Yodel has the token old magic guy beard, its aight I guess. Douglas's is easily my favorite of the bunch though, and probably would make my top 5 series beards.

Honorable mention to Hector, his beard is phenomenal but sadly he doesn't fit the criteria and it kinda hurts me to not give credit for it. Actually you know what fuck it, we're counting that legendary beard anyways. Accounting for bonus points, stats would be 14.5% and 22.2% respectively.

The Blazing Blade

Total Characters: 4/43, or 9.3%

Total Males: 4/32, or 12.5%

Character List: Dorcas, Marcus, Merlinus, Athos

Beard Analysis: Dorcas manages to have a chin strap and not look like a tool, so there's some points. Marcus looks good as always, no qualms there. Athos's is the real highlight for me, he's easily got my favorite sage beard of them all. On the negative end, Merlinus needs to get out of here with that weak shit, he looks like he's about to rob a museum.

Honorable mention to Fargus, that beard is even more reason why he should've been a playable Gotoh, but unfortunately he's just an NPC. Damn, Elibe just loves giving awesome beards to NPC's. Would've really helped if he was playable, as I feel Athos' is the only beard of note here.

The Sacred Stones

Total characters: 7/34, or 20.5%

Total Males: 7/22, or 31.8%

Characters: Gilliam, Boulder, Garcia, Orson, Gerik, Dozla, Duessel

Beard Analysis: Moulder's Ron Swanson mustache is the closest anything's ever come to making me question my sexuality, next to Chrom's right shoulder and Ron's Swanson's actual mustache.

I feel like SS's beards in general really suit the character well. Garcia's and Gilliam's may not look the nicest but they add to their aesthetic in a way that fits their personalities I feel. Gerik's makes him look like a seasoned and tough, Duessel's makes him look like a grizzled war veteran, and Dozla's is exactly the beard I'd picture someone who says "BWA HA HA" to have. Orson's beard just looks really nice, Monica was a lucky girl too soon?

Path of Radiance

Total Characters: 8/46, or 17.4%

Total Males: 8/32, or 25%

Character List: Mordecai, Volke (barely), Brom, Devdan, Tauroneo, Bastian, Largo, Giffca

Beard Analysis: One quarter of dudes have some sort of facial hair, and that is really solid. I'll include Volke in this as he has some stubble, and quite frankly I wish we got more of that in FE, it adds character. Brom's mutton chops and Tauroneo's majestic mutton chop/stache combo are pretty unique in that regard, don't see much of that either. Bastian's got some pretty tight facial hair game as well, kinda like Merlinus' stache done right. Mordecai and Giffca rock some awesome manes on the laguz side of things. Chose not to include Muarim as his looks more like facial markings rather than facial hair, similar to Janaff. Not only do we get a lot of quantity, but we get a nice bit of diversity as well, and I really like that.

Radiant Dawn

Total Characters: 12/72, or 16.66%

Total Males: 12/48, or 25%

Character List: Nolan, Nealuchi, Caineghis, Skirmir, Oliver, Renning, and Danved. PoR squad is also added to this, but without Largo, Volke, and Devdan.

Beard Analysis: Danved manages to fill the Devdan shaped hole in our heart with a beard of equal greatness. Newcomers Oliver and Renning bring some serious heat in the moustache category, Caineghis shows us what a real man's mane is like, Skirmir has a mane in training, Nealuchi's rivals those of the foxiest grandpas, and Nolan's fits him so well. Respect for keeping the beard percentage for dudes constant, unlike some sequels in this series cough New Mystery cough.

Note: Volke covers up his stubble with a scarf in RD. Since his facial hair isn't visible, I won't count it.

Shadow Dragon

Total Characters: 6/59, or 10%

Total Males: 6/45, or 13.3%

Character List: Hardin, Boah, Lorenz, Gotoh, Ymir, Frey

Beard Analysis: Hardin's studly mustache, Boah's adorable grandpa stache, Lorenz's slammin' goatee, Gotoh's sagelike beard, Ymir's Howie Mandel-esque soul patch, and Frey's bitchin' beard of blue make for an awesome collection of facial hair. Ngl, it's all kinda downhill from here in regards to facial hair.

New Mystery

Total Characters: 3/77, or 3.89%

Total Males: 3/55, or 5.45%

Character List: Frey and Ymir return and we get Dice, but Hardin, Boah, Lorenz, and Gotoh aren't playable any more.

Beard Analysis: This right here is why Shadow Dragon is better than New Mystery. Not because of the lack of Kris, but because of the lack of stache. Don't know why they decided to axe all the dudes with facial hair. Though if the newbie Dice has anything notable about him, his Viking style facial hair is it.

Awakening

Total Characters: 2/51, or 3.9%

Total Males: 2/26, or 7.7%

Character List: Basilio and Gangrel

Beard Analysis: While I quite like Basilio, him being the only good guy with a beard is a little sad. Gangrel is the other, and he doesn't even count if you exclude spotpass characters. Percentage wise, Awakening is actually better than New Mystery here, which I did not expect at first. Still loses to Shadow Dragon though as Archanea's most facially haired installment.

Fates

Total Characters: 2/66, or 3.03%

Total Males: 2/36, or 5.55%

Character List: Yukimura and Benny

Beard Analysis: Yukimura has 10 hairs on his chin. Yes I actually counted, and that is the most attention anyone has ever given him. By default, that makes Benny's the best beard in Fates. I love Benny, but his beard is below average at best for me, and that's being generous. I'm telling you people, the amount of facial hair is proportional to narrative quality.

Echoes

Total Characters: 4/38, or 10.5% (includes Cipher characters)

Total Males: 4/22, or 18.1%

Character List: Mycen for Alm's route, and Saber and Nomah for Celica's, and Randal with Cipher

Notable Examples: Mycen's redefines the term "foxy grandpa" with that throbbin' mustache right there. Saber's gives him a lot of rugged character, big fan of it as well. Nomah's beard manages to be the only thing remotely interesting about him. Randal brings back the awesome stubble which we haven't seen since Volke in FE9, though it might be a little faint.