Oh right I said something about giving my opinions on the expansion so uh, I guess I should start writing them out now.
Obiviously spoilers for the entirety of Dawntrail MSQ!!!
Tbh I don't know where to start iuefhiuefh.
Uhhh graphical update turned out nice! Out of the 3 of us, me and Shu kinda questioned if the update even happened since Hawu'li and Dre were virtually same as before, and Nana (player) kept mentioning how cute Nana (character) looks now. My only complaint is that Hawu'li's eyes are like one or two shades darker than they used to be, and I'm currently kinda debating if I want to bother using fantasia to fix it.
Enviroments look nice, and while I'm yet to go to many of the old areas (I sent Shu to go look at Il Mheg while me and Nana sat in que and it looked very nice), new areas are gorgeous! All of us literally screamed out loud when we noticed that the grass bends when you touch it haha. I'm also personally fan of the little tilt thing mounts do now if you strafe - it's very satisfying and I keep strafing around just to see my bike or flying mount tilt (❁´◡`❁)
As for story: I'm genuely surprised to see posts that some people didn't like it? I wouldn't call it my favorite expansion, but to me the story was good and the characters enjoyable. Only thing I'd complain about is that the pacing is very funky at times: first few areas are fine, then it slows down to a crawl, then speeds up very quickly to again slow down to almost complete halt before things pick up again. I still fail to care too much about the "cowboy area" - it felt very disconnected from everything else. Kinda same with the moblin area, but at least that place had some connectivity to the competition (+ the kidnap plot).
Meanwhile the "blue area" (sorry about the terms iauefhhu I don't have game open rn and I am chronically incapable of remembering any names) felt rushed: we wander in, no one wants to talk to us, then suddenly the big antagonist up till that point just goes "hey uh our culture's fucked, if you wanna change it I'll help". Imo that could've used some more time. Maybe have the Wuk Lamat instance happen earlier, and have the big lizard man think about things a bit longer, just to make it feel like he didn't change his entire worldview in like, half a quest.
As mentioned, cowboy area felt incredibly boring to me and I honestly don't know why. Catboy tribe was fine - I'd rather go spend more time with them. Their whole thing was pretty rushed, and while I have a small feeling that they'll be part of the patch storylines, I'd liked if we had been given a bit more time with them before things went to hell again.
Heritage found, Solution 9 and all that was better paced and the storytelling there was great! Like seeing one of the npcs forget about the old dead lady within seconds felt very horrifying. Shu and Nana haven't gotten that far yet (I finished the story on my own after returning home), but I remember spamming groupchat with "what the fuuuuuck that's so fucked" and stuff like that lol. Attack on Tuliyollal too, I think I have a few screenshots saved of npcs I noticed crying after dead loved ones on the streets right after it. Devs did great job portraying how scary the entire thing was.
What else uhhhh.... oh right the last area. Absolutely gorgeous again, and I do get the lore reasons, but damn does it suck having the areas go all lifeless if you want to finish story. I was looking forward to taking pictures there in the future :/ I did try and take some quick shots everywhere before going forward, but I'm sure I missed something. Probably have to get new game+ to that point when DT gets added there just for more screenshot locations.
This is already getting long but idc I'm rambling about characters too. Erenville sweet baby boy I am so sorry the entire last half became a personal nightmare for you (┬┬﹏┬┬) But we got to see him smile! Like actually smile not just tiny smirks! (I should have screenshot of that too lol) They better not write him completely out after this, I wanna go on adventures with him - something that doesn't leave him traumatized maybe.
Also pushing every Wuk Lamat disliker out of the way to hang out with her more. She was a very fun character, and I loved the fact that she actually went and did things on her own, not waiting around for WoL to save her every time like many of the npcs tend to do. She and Hawu'li are besties now.
Green G'raha Koana was a positive surprise too! Smart and a bit snobbish catboy who's bad with his feelings, but makes effort to learn and grow for his people and sister. Absolutely loved him getting very angry when Wuk Lamat was in danger - nerdy cat can go little feral, as a treat. Definitely added into Hawu'li's ever growing polycule - not into his bracelet yet, but they defenitely kissed during msq and probably started (casually) going out after.
Sphene... I really like her dress lol. Uhh I personally felt she was very sus from the start, but I feel like Hawu'li would've not picked up on those. Her plan would've come as complete surprise to him, and made him very very sad. Hawu'li's very "there's always a way if we just try hard enough" type of person, and being told that it's either having everyone else in the universe die or having the Endless die would've seriously got him feeling down for some time. Being a WoL means killing people to protect others sometimes, he knows that, but still. Luckily he had people there with him, who will keep supporting him, but he'll most likely need a little vacation after all this. (Luckily the Tuliyollali inn room is perfect for that haha)
Aaaand lastly, some random thoughts all tossed in no particular order since I can't ramble in the tags:
"This old man (Ketenramm) has more HD face than all of us combined D:" - me
*him saying something about being more than a guest to Gulool Ja Ja* -> me, quietly whispering in vc: "old man yaoi..."
Whomst the fuck did Zoraal Ja get his kid with??? There wasn't a single other lizard in Solution Nine, and I don't remember seeing any in Heritage Found either. Hell, none of the Alexandria flashbacks show any lizard people either. Did he just get some random hyur lady off the street? If yes then what happened to her? Did she die in childbirth? Got killed by Zoraal Ja for whatever reason?
Tiny jumpscare when milalla lore started saying stuff about "calamity that froze everything" and "came from somewhere else" and I, for a tiny second, feared they'd give some canon lore regarding Sixth and I'd have to go rewrite bunch of things in my own lore for the place. (luckily saved by msq mentioning the most likely came from source)
Happy that they gave us the alpaca mount for free! It's so adorable.
Sad that I had to use 7,5mil gil to get the purple bike mount 😑 I mean Hawu'li is swimming in money since I rarely buy anything (last "big buy" was that golden sheep), but muh money. At least it's a neat mount
They really went "you feel like you aren't needed healers? say no more, heal checks for everyone!". Last time I had to sweat that much on trial fight was Zeromus - DT made every trial pretty intense to heal.
That last trial holy fuck my brain is NOT big enough for it. I somehow survived with only one death (we wiped within like first 30 seconds lol), but god it was so stressful
Dungeons were generally neat, but I noticed a distinct "fuck mages and anyone with long cast times". So so much movement in almost every fight.
"En Avant saves lives" is true for the whm dash skill too. That skill is the best thing we've gotten in ages, it's saved me so many times when I notice I'm in wrong spot at the very last second.
SCREE BOSS! I was so happy when I save it omg. The boss before that sucked but seeing scree made it all better. (Our party immediately went "scree!" in chat lol)
Haven't seen all dungeon drops yet, but craftable/vendor gear is a bit meh. Happy for people who like those Mad Max bondage sets, but I'm not a fan. 98 gear being recolored Ironworks gear was not on my bingo list, but at least the healer top was nice for the few levels I wore it during leveling.
Login ques haven't been too bad! Idk how it goes on NA servers, but on Lich longest que I've seen after the launch (right after launch we had 2,8k que) is like, 40.
Dungeon ques were nonexistent on whm during msq, but now that I'm trying to level dps I regularily get 40 minute waits. Kinda debating if I should just switch to sch and level summoner with that, then swap back and learn to play it on like last dunegon or something.
Fates seem to give like half a mil exp (exp boosted ones give double iirc), so I've just been doing them while sitting in que.
Yet to try picto or viper but they look fun.
Azem mark on the key thing just before the final fight made me immediately think about Eleos coming to help his lovely little shard again 🥺
Koana has very nice jp voice, but I can't shake the feeling I know it from somewhere. Apparently I managed to get a screenshot of credits where his VAs are shown and *jazz hands* his seiyuu is Kaito Ishikawa. So it's probably his role as Iida (BNHA) that I'm recognizing since I've been watching bnha while eating for past few weeks. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Oh right and since I mentioned that N'jinh would go with Hawu'li this time: I'm slowly putting everything together after MSQ but I think he'll come along right from the start. Tural catboy lore doesn't fit him too well lol.
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