#i just think they're shown to be in an interesting position vis a vis the moralintern

[bitchmael]

this might be me reading it wrong but while they obviously are Cops and pretty explicitly bastards because of it i'm not sure how 1:1 an analogy the rcm are supposed to be for real-world cops. like generally police forces are, in order to fulfil their role as the means of maintaining the state's monopoly on violence at home, empowered (both legally & logistically) to do whatever they need/want to do that and imo it's very telling that the game goes out of its way to say "the rcm are not allowed anywhere near breach-loading weapons". like the moralintern is apparently willing to allow the mercenaries to run around a civilian area carrying automatics but won't let (as i understood it) anyone in the rcm have them for any reason. couple this w the fact that the rcm was apparently started by the people of revachol themselves & allowed (there's that word again) to continue by the moralintern rather than being the MI's brainchild i think it speaks to some interesting tensions in the rcm's postion which are obscured by just calling them cops. which is not to say that they are not also cops.

[haunted-xander]

Finished the 6.55 MSQ so here's my (very positive) thoughts:

‌Love love LOVE Wuk Lamat she's so fun and her dynamic with Erenville is hilarious. Very excited to see more of her in Dawntrail.

‌Krile is already getting some nice scenes and I'm very happy she's finally gonna get the spotlight in dt. My girls been side-lined for 4 expacs it's about damn time she gets to shine.

‌The inventor of Pictomancy is literally Relm. Like they name drop her. Obv not the same Relm as in VI but still! Relm is real! And she was an Archon! tbh them naming an important character related to this type of magic after her isn't surprising- I just expected it to be something in the job quests rather than the MSQ.

‌Zero made super-spicy dishes popular in Thavnair lol. Wuk Lamat trying to toughen it out was hilarious. God I love her.

‌Wuk Lamat & Erenville being childhood friends was not something I expected! Very fun.

‌The catboy from the dawntrail promotional artwork is probably Wuk Lamat's brother, Koana(Was that his name? tbh I forgot. But she has a Miqo brother that's what's important). He looks smart, and it's possible he's gonna be another candidate claiming for the throne.

‌Based on the artwork, I had figured our main group was gonna be WoL, Krile, Thancred and Urianger, as they are the only Scions featured, but based on the quest it'll probably be Wol, Krile, Alphinaud and Alisaie. G'raha is allegedly staying behind, but since he's shown in Tural in the trailer I think he'll find an excuse to come along anyway lol.

‌Thancred and Urianger are going to be competing against us, which will be interesting. I think it'll be fun to see some of the Scions take on a more rival-y role, if only for a bit. It looks like they were petitioned by someone else participating in the Rite of Succession, so maybe they're working for Miqo boy? They're on his side of the artwork after all 🤔

‌(Also I think the writers know how popular those two have gotten together lol they're like making it a point to have them with each other at all times)

‌Estinien is going to Tural just for the hell of it which I think is hilariously in character. Literally going there at the same time as us purely by coincidence. He really can't escape us can he.

‌Y'shtola is neither seen nor heard of which tbh I think is fair given how much screentime and focus she got during the whole Zero arc. I do wonder why she's going to Tural tho, she's in the trailer too so I'm certain she will be there.

‌(Also, since G'raha, Estinien and Y'shtola aren't aligned with any particular side as of now, I think they'll be a neutral third party in the Succession rivalries going on. That, or they'll end up siding with the 3rd sibling that isn't the Obvious Villain (based on Wuk Lamat and Erenville's accounts) somehow. Will be fun to see in any case.)

‌The little memory dialogue from Emet was nice :) just a reminder of the adventures yet to be had. Also he's finally in the unending codex which I think is nice (ngl I kinda forgot about the codex until he got added to it)

ALSO I almost forgot to include it BUT we have a nice heart-to-heart scene with G'raha alone on a bridge and if the writers weren't COWARDS (and/or worried about romance ambiguity, at least for those relating to the WoL) he could've proposed to us then and there. You know he wants you. Do not hold him back writers let him do what he wants. (I'd have said yes ofc)

‌Backpack :)

[lunaetis]

following the post i made about eden's changes in demeanor and personality, i want to write out what are the factors that contributed to this change. so i'm going to dissect her personality and development from the beginning and how she is at each point in time ( at least the major ones ) to paint a clearer picture. it's going to be a very long read, so i'll put it under a read more.

awakening - eden was awakened by having the stellaron infused into her. her personality was blank. she was a blank canvas. her first exposure was kafka. we know kafka used her spirit whisper to influence eden's actions and decisions after this but we saw eden show attachment towards her. i'd like to think that it came from her body remembering things her mind no longer did. we learned from kafka later on that she wiped eden's memory, but that process was still fresh, so while her mind did not remember, her body did. she reached out to kafka. to the only one she still had attachment to. after that, her second awakening left her at a blank state.

astral express / herta space station - the next exposure are the astral express and people within herta space station. during this time, eden was shown to be majorly expressionless. she was stoic, barely showed any emotions on her face. she was still learning about the world, about the people, about emotions. we saw her slowly becoming more animated, but she was extremely quiet and instinctual. all in all, this period of time had eden exposed to positive influence. this was why eden started off trusting. she saw people of the astral express helping others, and later on they accepted her as one of their own despite knowing nothing about her. this was a major positive influence to her. her personality was a curious one. she wanted to see and know everything.

jarilo-vi / belobog - this was where we saw the astral express' influence on eden quite clearly. while eden was still rather quiet and not expressive, we saw her slowly opening up. she was adapting what the astral express had taught her. to trust others, and to help others. people she met on jarilo-vi also influenced the same thinking and strengthen it. she felt accepted when she helped others. she felt that trusting others is the right thing to do. this was her decision to do it, to help people, to make sure they're free. and it paid off to have faith and trust in people even though she just met them. she started to gain more personality to be more blunt, forward, and honest. to speak her mind, and see the good in people. she was akin to a cheerful, hopeful puppy, if you will.

xianzhou luofu - this was where things started to get real. the events in xianzhou luofu exposed eden to many kinds of people. you still saw her employing the same mentality of wanting to help others as much as possible. accompanied by welt and march really encouraged her to do that. what shook her belief was when kafka revealed the truth that everything that was happening was planned from the beginning. this was the first seed of doubt in eden's mind. this was when she started to question EVERYTHING up to this point. what she believed to have been her decision was all lies. everything was orchestrated to achieve the best possible future. elio had foreseen everything, she was simply walking a path prepped for her. from this point on, eden developed an insecurity about herself, her identity, and her purposes. it was her first exposure to deception and lies.

simulated universe / ruan mei's story quest - i'm going to group her exposure to herta space station into one section because they're all related. so, eden was recruited by herta to help test simulated universe in order to learn more about aeons. she agreed to do so because it was interesting and eden herself also wanted to learn more about aeons as well. herta and screwllum were also quite pleasant to be around. however, when she met ruan mei for the first time, the fact that she wasn't given a full information on what she would be facing, how she had to go down there alone, and to face a kind of danger that if it weren't for the creation disappearing on its own, she might not have made it out safely. for my eden, at least, that was another turning point where she felt used and manipulated. she was lied to in order to get results. the trust and faith she had been placing in people were starting to backfire.

penacony - and here we are, the triggering event to the change. eden was already treading the thin line of the concept of trust. up to this point, she had always been honest with her words, with her demeanor, giving people the benefit of the doubt, and being optimistic, being helpful, being hopeful. once again, that trust backfired greatly in more ways than one. the attachment she developed for firefly was, as i mentioned before, born from the fact that it was the first time that she felt normal. it was the first time she felt like she was bonding with someone without being influenced by the knowledge of her as the stellaron vessel. so it was a strong attachment because she felt like she had connected to someone as eden. losing firefly triggered her disassociation to reality for a moment, and the events that followed as she was told that everything was, once again, a game set by multiple parties and she ( along with the astral express members ) were pieces of the puzzle. now, they must learn the truth. the details were hazy for eden after witnessing firefly's death because ... lies. once again, lies and deception and manipulation. it never ends. and she felt like she couldn't trust anyone on penacony. at all. at this point, eden was proven by the loss of someone she grew attached to at her core, that trusting others blindly was a grave mistake. she cannot, and should not place her trust in people like that any longer, or else she would be used. like she had been multiple times before.

she had been so naïve to think that she could protect those she cared for if she tried hard enough. that as the vessel for the stellaron, she had the power to keep those she cared for safe. that illusion was shattered by witnessing death not once, but twice right before her eyes ( firefly and robin. ) it wasn't enough. she wasn't enough. the stellaron wasn't enough. faith, and trust, and hope, were nowhere near enough.

and it triggered the change as defense mechanism. i mentioned this before in the previous post, that her mind had decided to adopt the change in order to keep going. the journey was barely beginning. she knew she still had a long way to go, and being carefree and trusting aren't going to cut it anymore. she has to be more careful. she has to change. she has to grow up. to think more. to observe more. to watch her words. to know when to lie and when to not. to know how to protect herself in order to protect others. and to protect herself, she had to keep distance. she had to be more analytical. she cannot be driven by pure emotions anymore.

this change, of course, is still something that is subjected to change as story progresses. but with the exposures and experience she had up to this point, this was something eden felt she had to do to keep herself sane enough to go on without breaking. and, i also want to point out that the rare times the astral express weren't with her ( simulated universe / ruan mei's quest / penacony ) were the time that eden got hit by negative influence and viewpoint. i say penacony because they were separated and eden basically went through the events mostly by herself. basically, i want to say that the astral express is the one major positive influence and a sort of anchor for eden. without them, she's prone to spiral down a more negative path and development.

there are, of course, many other side quests, companion quests, and stories that could be included but i'm picking the trailblaze / main story quests as the main influences and exposures that eden had gone through. this is my own interpretation and how i choose to write eden, my trailblazer. it doesn't reflect what we see of the trailblazer in canon and only my own version of her.

if you make it this far and read everything, I LOVE YOU AND I APPLAUD YOUR PATIENCE for going through that ramble. thank you for tolerating my wall of china text on the ( traumatized™ ) space raccoon !