The manuscript titled "Dynamic ecosystem assembly and escaping the “fire-trap” in the tropics: Insights from FATES_15.0.0" explores the influence of climate, fire regime, and plant traits related to fire tolerance on the biogeography of tropical forests and grasslands. The authors employ simulations with the vegetation demographic model FATES-SPITFIRE, incorporating three vegetation types with varying levels of fire tolerance. The manuscript is well-written, with a clear presentation of methods, a thorough discussion of results, and a consideration of uncertainties. I have a few specific comments regarding the methodology and explanations.

L133: Please provide an explanation for moist_{ext, fc}, moisture of extinction

Line 325: Can you clarify the origin of the value 66,000 °C^-2? It appears to be derived from Eq. 6 in Thonicke et al. (2010) but in their paper, 1.0*10^(-3) is adopted.

Fig. 3a shows a region of decrease in maximum temperature, whereas the surrounding regions show an increase. Can you explain the reason for the decrease?

Figure 9/10 and Section 3.2: It seems the experimental design resembles sensitivity tests, as they all represent potential vegetation cases. A justification for choosing the medium drying case for validation against observations would be helpful.

Fig S13. Suggest exchanging the positions of a) GPP and b) LAI to align with the color bar.

Line 467-468: How does FATES determine the overcompetition of fire-vulnerable trees over fire-tolerant trees in regions where fire was absent?

Line 535-536: How does FATES describe the large savanna region in Western Africa and Southern Africa, where tropical rainforest and grassland co-exist?

Dear authors, 

Please see my comments in the attached file.

Regards,