Roles are special things that you can equip to your characters that will dictate how they act whenever they are controlled by the AI in battle, in addition to providing some stats. They are separated into five different categories and each character in the game can equip up to four at a time.
You only start the game with a handful of Roles, with all of the others becoming unlocked in a variety of ways. A majority of them will unlock by leveling the other Roles, either through the use of SP or just by having them equipped when you finish battles. Other methods of unlocking them include from viewing specific Private Actions, as well as completing certain Battle Trophies.
