#instead of the actual msq

[yloiseconeillants]

2024 GPose Shots DT Edition (and by Dawntrail, I mean my WILDLY made up continuous dramas about dead robot girls and merchant romances)

moren and ametrine belong to @azure-dragonsinger

[avirael]

FFxivWrite 2024

Day 18 - Hackneyed

With a curious expression A’viloh looked up to the giant statue of some saint in the middle of the plaza. It was beautifully crafted from a block of white stone and depitected a knight wearing cloak and armour. His face was hidden by a helmet.

“Don’t you think they all look the same somehow?”

“A bit. I assume this whole heroically fighting against the dragons story can get a little overused and repetitive in 1000 years…”, Rael offered and turned their attention to the statue in front of them too.

The Miqo’te furrowed his brows.

“But don’t you think each of them must have been a lot more individual than that with their own dreams and hopes? It doesn’t seem fair that they all look the same, their faces hidden by a mask…”

Somehow the idea of having all their stories reduced to almost identical, grey, expressionless faces of stone was a sad one. But Rael assumed that this was what time did to memories sometimes, once no one was left to remember their faces or how things had actuall happened.

“Maybe if our plan works, they one day built one of these for you or me too. The ears should be recognisable at least…”, Rael joked in an attempt to brighten the mood. “Saint A’viloh - he bravely fought against the dragon brood on the Steps of Faith and brought peace to Ishgard…”

But imagining that seemed to make A’viloh even more thoughtful. “I’m not sure I want to fight against the dragons. Vishap was already terrifying, can you imagine how horrible the great wyrms must be? Besides, don’t all saints die some horrible and painful death?”

“True…”, Rael mused. “But even though Iceheart may have a point, I don’t think this conflict can just be ended as easily as everybody seems to hope right now…”

“But aren’t they all tired of fighting by now? Isn’t all this talk of holy wars and heresy getting old?”, A’viloh asked and looked distressed, like he himself was already tired of it.

The Viera sighed and remembered their kins hatred for the Garleans. The conflict for Golmore was by far not that old yet as this war but had already produced so much bloodshed too.

“It’s not that easy, A’vi. A thousand years are a long time. One cruelty avenged by another and another and another. The Ishgardians? They were born and raised in this war, it’s everything they know. And the dragons? You heard Midgardsormr. They live long enough to remember all of this bloody war… It doesn’t matter anymore who was right in the first place. Neither of them are just going to give up and admit they were wrong. Both sides feel justified in their hate and this will make it difficult to find a peaceful solution…”

For a moment A’viloh was quiet, silently contemplating what Rael had said.

“But what can we do about this at all?”

“I don’t know. But you heard what Thordan said. And if the Ascians are involved behind the scenes, we can’t just ignore this. I have no perfect answer for solving this conflict but neither does Iceheart or Aymeric or anybody else… But we have to try anyway. Maybe together we can find a solution…”

[motheatenscarf]

God, I hope patch DT msq is good.

[icicleteeth]

I want so badly to delete that tweet about the post EW patch yellow quest chain so bad because I've been flooded by the most hair tearing out of my skull I-Did-Not-Ask gotchas and um akshullies ever since it was made. But from a lot of replies, it has spread awareness for a lot of people to find the quest chain, so I hope it still does that because they are good quests and they're not the easiest thing to find!! I want to explode!!!

[vounoura]

I like that a lot of monsters (so far) aren't locked behind quest progression and can be encountered at any time - an issue I had w/ DD1 was that w/ a lot of its monsters being locked behind MSQ progress before you could even see them (ie. griffons, cockatrices, etc etc) it felt more like cool new boss encounter than actual creature that just lives in this world

[autumnslance]

The worst part too about the Paladin quests is it's Heavensward that's most egregious. It honestly feels like someone had no idea what was going on, or didn't care, or left, and their colleagues left holding the bag with this mess of a story had no idea what to do with it.

ARR Gladiator quests are fine! They're along the lines of the other Class quests, intro you to the job and a complicated character dynamic, and it's a decent time.

The ARR Paladin quests...are just boring. They aren't actually even that bad, they're just...utterly predictable, bog-standard tropes and plot line where you can see everything coming malms away. But they have an internal logic to them that builds on the politics and scheming in Ul'dah. Jenlyns realizes he's an unwitting pawn of the Syndicate, and he was literally chosen for the job cuz he could be easily duped and controlled. He doesn't even get to have imposter syndrome, he's actually unfit for the job (and then strives to do better, leveraging support from Papashan and Mylla to shore up his own weaknesses, which is admirable!).

...Nevermind that traditional Paladins in general are a bad fit for Ul'dah. The heavily armored Sultansworn makes no sense in that desert environment, and looking at a world map we can even see that Southern Thanalan seems to be on the equator. Like it's not even a case of "it's cooler than it seems cuz they're further north." Because they're not. And I know the devs wanted to have Ishgard perhaps be a starter city but that was scrapped due to time and resources, fine but um.

Dragoons are still trained in Coerthas, by Coerthans. Why didn't they just...do that with Paladins? Keep Gladiator in Ul'dah, where it makes sense as presented. But then have to work with Temple Knights to get the Job. Especially since after Ul'dah's intro, the game just forgets the Sultansworn exist and they have no bearing on the MSQ the way the other factions in Ul'dah do. Not even in the finale of ARR's arc where it would make sense. Gladiators are a constant in other side quests and MSQ both.

Stormblood Paladin is also fine--because it goes back to those Gladiators, and we interact with Paladins and Knights across the realm, and deal with those complicated relationships between the Gladiator guild core members. It's internally logical in its drama about finally restoring Aldis's reputation and place in Ul'dah, against the backdrop of the tournament.

Heavensward Paladin straight up makes no sense. Solkzaygl's actions are entirely contradictory to his character and arc from ARR. There's no way for some of the actions to occur without him working with the outlaws in some way. Instead of teaching Constaint, he sends him on a merry chase across Coerthas to learn on his own, and it's only the WoL's aid that sees the boy live, let alone make progress. A random man dies, guilt-ridden, due to Solk's scheming and lies he confided to this poor guy.

And then Highlander-esque "there can be only one" nonsense. Even as a Highlander fangirl in my youth, it was insulting and awful. Papashan, Jenlyns, and Constaint all call out how nonsense, illogical, unlikely, and stupid this whole story is...all to make a sword shine.

Because there's no internal logic to events, let alone the reason for the string of happenstance that leads to the finale.

And we know it's possible; HW Blacksmith gives us a fantastic paladin story! One that fits Ishgard's storyline and HW's themes. HW Dark Knight is also a good paladin story, actually, as they are meant to be another angle on the concept of dedicated knight defenders. Samurai for the Eastern equivalent, and the concepts and tropes present in those quest chains.

But the job actually bearing the name "Paladin" is left in the dirt. As a fan of the concept across various games (video and TTRPGs both), it's quite frustrating how the devs had no idea what to do with this job, despite other members of the writing and scenario team presenting stories that would have fit perfectly well within the framework. Only some of it is misplacing where Paladins originate in the setting; the rest is not taking advantage of the themes and setting of the expansions, and just not caring enough about the characters and story to even try, compared to the rest. Or worse, they did try, and meant for more, but whatever intrigue and complex plot they wanted to create was too much for 5 quests and no guarantee the arc would continue in the future, even if it had landed perfectly.

[plounce]

my awesome heavensward rewrite thoughts

how loyal aymeric is to the church could be in more doubt (although he's always Handsome And Nice) until we bring him evidence of the history rewrite and he reveals himself as a good guy through and through. we hear rumors of him being the pope's bastard, and that playing into the uncertainty how deep in the church's pocket he is?

there should be very little time between haurchefant's death and confronting the pope - or at least the heavens' ward. if we got a dungeon or a trial where we fight our way through the pope's boys all powered up, and then either 1. we go into primaled-up pope as a trial right after 2. he flees to elsewhere and we pursue - that's where we meet tiamat, maybe?

there is very little reason for haurchefant to be stuck at camp dragonhead for most of hvw. no job/class quests there involve him as a speaking role (or really mention him at all). he should be way more present in ishgard and as a member of your "party."

i feel that stronger connections could be drawn between the gnath/vath and ishgard/heretics (indoctrinated believers of the state religion vs free-thinkers ekeing out an existence on the fringes)

more development of "heretical" beliefs and practices. i feel like we couldve used a cutscene of like... a guy giving a monologue, drinking dragon blood, and then transforming

tbh i don't know what purpose dusk vigil serves for the plot. i think it might be a 1.0 reference, definitely in its story - maybe the location too?? i need to find out more about coerthas in 1.0. i think that dusk vigil could instead be replaced with a dungeon that expands upon "heresy" more - either in what heretics believe/do, or the ways ishgard creates heretics. freeing "falsely accused" people from an ishgardian black site? the ishgardian military being of two arms: the church police being in charge of rooting out heresy while aymeric's temple knights focus on the dragons. inside vs outside.

ysayle... more ysayle backstory... it wouldve been cool if we met someone who knew her before she got brain-blasted with shiva's memories (in tailfeather? giving that town more of a story purpose?).

iirc ysayle's crisis of identity just sort of happened, she left the party in the churning mists to freak out, popped up in ishgard to stop a heretic/underclass uprising (let them revolt!!), and then she kills herself without like speaking to you again. you don't really get to meaningfully say goodbye. i feel that her and haurchefant's deaths could been more of a one-two punch (if she Has to die).

i think ysayle could have not died. i think she could have just run away to try to become Nobody. and then she could return later. i think her deathierves a "well... guess she must redeem herself through death...." which: boooooo. boringggg.

to be frank i don't think the sea of clouds as a location is essential to or really serves heavensward's story. i feel that somewhere else would have been more beneficial. perhaps a map that includes the ruins of ferndale (estinien's hometown)? maybe that's been taken and re-settled by "heretics"?

i think that haurchefant should have been a more consistent party member. he could be used to provide two different perspectives: 1. someone who has lived within and understands ishgardian nobility 2. an ishgardian who is open to the outside world and has had regular contact with outsiders. i feel that we don't really get a sense of his own personal beliefs outside of "i'm in ishgard's military" and "im on your side my angel!!". it would be nice if we got more reactions to msq events from him - like alphinaud (our buddy) but with the ishgard perspective

if the uprising in the brume was actually allowed to happen... ok earlier in the expansion we meet hilda and she's like hiiii. buzz off ♥ [more children throwing snowballs at us] and then later on we return to ishgard from the churning mists, new lore in our minds, to a city in chaos (ysayle has faked her death & her followers think she's been assassinated, they launch an uprising? there's been an order for mass conscription, the poor have had it and don't want to die en masse?), and we actually have to INTERACT with a class uprising with hilda as a leader of the poor. and then negotiations are being made, haurchefant and alphinaud are trying to handle it - aymeric is like hey. you guys seem really strange. what's going on. and we tell him ishgard's true history, and then.... whew! he's like Oh Fuck. i need to go confront the pope (my dad). don't let talks disintegrate, i'll brb. and then in the middle of things, one of hilda's agents and lucia break down the door - LORD AYMERIC IS BEING HELD HOSTAGE BY THE POPE, DEMANDING THE HOUNDS STAND DOWN! maybe hilda gets kidnapped too...? idk theres a lot of ways you could order these things bc ishgard could be suuuuuch a powder keg.

haurchefant should have been killed in full view of the ishgardian population so that he's the people's martyr as well + more reason for ishgard to turn on the old ways

alphinaud should have had equally strong relationships with estinien and with ysayle. for a game with a blank-slate protag you can't count on every player thinking about their character forming those connections with either/both characters, so alphinaud works well as an audience substitute. and seeing this littleboy care about them may also bolster the audience's feelings toward them - i only cared about estinien for most of the game because alphinaud cared about him.

so in that way i do think it's good for him to go on the camping trip. plus it's good for his character arc to have to learn camping. gather sticks, boy. also, hvw is the alphinaud expac where stb is the alisaie expac - if we keep one, we keep the other. i like the balance of that.

alphinaud also keeps us tied into our character's history in ARR - it would be kinda weird if we got an entirely new cast of core characters, and it helps us remember the scions and kind of worry about them in the back of our minds. plus we instinctively want to protect him.

the dravanian hinterlands only play into msq in that "we have to go get the doodad from matoya to break into azys lla!" which is stupid. it's VERY important in the patches though so we gotta keep it. i would add an aetheryte though. stares.

i also think idyllshire serves a good purpose of showing "here's a different way of living - here we are, living with people who are different from us, and getting along." compare to the various ways in which ishgard, the heretic settlement in ferndale, and tailfeather live. it's a nice spot of hope.

my restructuring thought is that we get into the hinterlands via a secret route that heretic rebels reveal to us because we're following thordan's aether trail or whatever. azys lla is hidden directly above new sharlayan/idyllshire - that's one of the reasons why the forum decided to settle there, matoya reveals to us.

we hear from our contacts in idyllshire (who we know from our friends among heretics and outcasts) (also, idyllshire as an outpost for people escaping from the war?) that there's an old witch guarding the entrance to the tower that can help us breach azys lla. it's matoya!

y'shtola's body recently appeared in matoya's cave. she won't wake up. matoya's been taking care of her. we learn about their relationship. matoya being sad about yshtola's current state mirrors our grief over haurchefant. matoya agrees to help us and let us through the first of the barriers to azys lla because we're shtola's little friends.

sharlayans keeping secrets, reaching high into the sky (HEAVENSWARD, EVEN - it would be cool if almost every dungeon had you going up in some way) (and then low into the ground, in the patches). a tower that is the way to azys lla, but many barriers exist to keep intruders out.

great gubal library is such a weird fuckin second-to-last dungeon - it takes place in between the vault and ARF!! what? huh? we're breaking up that high?

the first part of the dungeon is just the sharlayan defenses, but... something's kind of weird. and then you're fighting the first boss, a mammet, and halfway through it gets killed by a member of the heavens' ward! who took over the tower, and heard you when you came in! and then rest of the dungeon is fighting through them in the ruins theyve made of sharlayan stuff - something something 'the church destroying history and knowledge to retain its power'.

finally we reach azys lla. tbf i don't think the empire needs to be there. cut the garleans. some leavings of sharlayan are around, though.

thordan has activated some allagan defenses, we deal with those as we navigate through the zone. shouldn't take that much time. the important thing is that we talk to tiamat, who is also grieving and hates what that grief drove her to do. that's such an important conversation. also leaves a bit of potential character stuff for the player's brain, if you choose to draw the connection between your wol and tiamat - is this how your wol will process grief? are they grieving?

we confront thordan - estinien is so fucking mad that the cause he's been fighting for, the war that ruined his life, has all been a lie meant to prop up this man. the anger overtakes him, he transforms, he flies off.

we left alphinaud back at the sharlayan tower - he's been trying to fix the controls so we can get back down (and, if you were defeated, to call for help) btw. estinien does fly by him and he's like NOOOOO ESTINIENNNNNNN and estinien SLICES HIM WITH HIS SPEAR and alphinaud FALLS DOWN AND IS BLEEDING!! this is a cutscene, the wol isn't there, but YOU see it and it adds to your stress. :D

thordan's like "oh so sad... you don't have any friends... WELL I DO HA HA HA" and then he brings out the ascians he's been conspiring with!! the first half of the fight are lahabrea/igeyorhm combined into ascian prime (you defeated me as one... but can you defeat TWO ascians??), and then when you finish them - cutscene. thordan eats them for power. mwa ha ha ha!! PHASE TWO. we fight him, we kill him. he doesn't bring his boys out but does some crazy dragon-blood shit - kinda like golbez - and maybe some ascian stuff.

alphinaud's okay - he patched himself up. he should probably see a doctor though. you limp away, having won and survived, but with lots of rebuilding and healing to do...

the post-credits cutscene montage, in no particular order: y'shtola's eyes opening. thancred appearing in the dravanian forelands - we don't know it's him by sight. we don't see his face or identifying markings. niddstinien Lurking Around. people leavings flowers and votives at The Grave Of Lady Shiva - ysayle is assumed dead by her followers. (she is not. she is comatose in a small isolated village in dravania where non-ishgardian elezen have been carrying on pre-dragonsong war beliefs and practices.)

[candycryptids]

It’s skate or die dude! You either skate, or you-

Oops…. I tried to make Chuu look cool for once but her skate caught one of the supports and she went sailing…. And the poor Corn servant! Squished straight out of his husk…. Rustled..

Cut for some alt angles !

I’ve just been skating around Solution 9 for actual hours vibing to Cyberpunk-themed Lo-fi instead of doing MSQ.

And yeah I’m gonna be tagging Solution 9 related G-Poses as spoilers for another bit or so. I don’t… have to? But I liked having most of Solution 9 being a surprise so I’m trying to give people the option for that same Surprise! Feeling.

[capriccio-ffxiv]

Big rambly thoughts / speculation post.

I only JUST cleared the level 99 trial (I am in Job Search Hell and don't have a lot of free time) and have yet to actually enter the final zone, but, have a wild headcanon:

The original Sphene was a Hermes shard.

This is PURE headcanon, by the way, I have 0 canon evidence, but I do have a lot of incidental evidence/themes that fit, and I am Choosing to Go There.

Completely unable to accept death to the point of it being pathological

When confronted with "Honey you gotta let it go," reaction is instead to try to kill everyone

Green

The pattern was also true of Amon. Well, we don't know if he was green, I guess. But "unable to accept death" and "I will start murdering everyone and every thing rather than let people take the thing I love away from me, no matter how bad that would be for the universe, and if the thing is taken from me anyway then I'm just gonna kill EVERYTHING."

Further thoughts: This being a memory simulacrum of the original Sphene, her actual soul was probably slated to be used up a long time ago. (I may be contradicted on this shortly? Please don't tell me anything until I've said I've cleared the rest of the MSQ...) That's perfectly fine for Ascian purposes, & Emet-Selch may well have just quietly plucked that soul up and tucked it away for use later if/when their Fandanial got his ass perma-killed. Even better, if it was put through the memory tumbler, there'd be no pesky mortal memories to cloud up this new Fandaniel. Further thought: the entire thing as a prototype for future Ascian creation, given that Fandaniel was likely unstable from the get-go, and he probably wasn't the first one whose mortal memories caused Problems. Also for retrieving Ancient memories from the Aetherial Sea, which we know is possible thanks to Athena.

Even if she is using her original soul (doubtful), the above would *still* stand, because the process used to create her would have still cleared that soul of memories entirely, leaving it as basically "just" a power source.

Tbh Pandemonium actually primed us for A LOT of these concepts -- the Erich we meet in the Sea specifically is a random memory-less soul that Athena glued his memories to (and Athena was using his actual soul via Claudian as fuel for her attempts at true soul creation). ... we are EXTREMELY lucky that Sphene never met Athena. Holy crap, Athena would have been even more dangerous with the kind of tech and research Alexandria had done.

I'm also getting FF7 Shinra / Midgar vibes from some of Alexandria vis a vis the souls as power source & literally sucking up the lifestream of the planet to sustain a specific lifestyle.

[nshi-ao3]

OK so I'm reading as I'm playing through arr, it's the only thing getting me actually doing my msq and not the tone of side quests available slash leveling up my crafting (I don't really care about spoilers)

I got to the bit of joker getting the kupos (fat mood joker, me too, I've started stimming it) and I then thought of something cursed. Would joker kupo instead of yell if he got scared. Or dropped something?

Bc thinking about the others just hearing

*loud clang of joker dropping something*

*loud kupo*

Joker voice: FUCK. I'M OK!

Hah!! I love this mental image, so yes!

I imagine it would sound something like this!

[acccursed]

I really wanted to love Dawntrail. I loved Tural, I loved Wuk Lamat, & I loved all the original things that they introduced in this expansion. However, I still left MSQ feeling unsatisfied.

A lot of players feel the same way, but they pin the blame on Wuk Lamat instead of the real culprits of Dawntrail's mediocrity— the Scions of the Seventh Dawn.

(TLDR: this expansion should've had a non-Scion majority cast of companions)

Wuk Lamat doesn't have enough supporting characters around her that have good chemistry with her or who fit nicely into this story about learning about the other cultures & connecting with the other peoples of Tural.

The Scions can't & don't really contribute to Wuk Lamat's (or Koana's, or Erenville's, or…) character development, so their main role becomes looking &/or smiling at each other knowingly in stilted pauses of cutscenes that are focused on a non-Scion character, or to fill the role of Trust/Duty Support NPCs. This heavily drags down both big & small moments in the story & I think that it's the origin of the many complaints about Wuk Lamat being on screen too much.

I get the feeling that the developers included all of the Scions in place of well written, new companions because of some obligatory most marketable/popular character inclusion &/or they just didn't have faith in the player base being interested in any other long-term companions they could cook up for this next story arc of FFXIV.

Despite their attempts to justify the inclusion of the Scions, I just can't suspend my disbelief when it comes to most of them coincidentally ending up on Tural after disbanding & going their separate ways after Endwalker, & again after Endwalker's post-patches. They've become a crutch that is holding back FFXIV's story after the end of the Hydaelyn-VS-Zodiark arc.

If they had bothered writing a new supporting cast of companions that actually had some chemistry with Wuk Lamat, Koana, Erenville, & so on, that were much more invested in & connected to the Promises' causes, Tural, & Alexandria, we would be much more inclined to care about these characters, places, & story beats, & MSQ would have been leagues more impactful than it is.

Sure, let the Warrior of Light, Krile (who wants to track her grandfather's activity overseas), & G'raha(who we have been promising adventures to for the last two expansions) go to Tural as Wuk Lamat's foreign allies in the rites.

Instead of Alphinaud & Alisaie insisting they join Wuk Lamat's crew, why not let Wuk Lamat recruit Turali hunters/warriors to her cause as she completes the rites? She would have had much more characters to get along with & learn from that could actually contribute to her character development & Dawntrail's story.

Instead of recruiting Thancred & Urianger, why doesn't Koana recruit one or more of his combat-capable friends/peers from his days at the studium? It makes more sense than two strangers that are conveniently Scions, & we would learn more about Koana in a more natural way besides.

Instead of Estinien conveniently coming along for MSQ 97+, why don't some of the Alexandrian rebels who want to put an end to Zoraal Ja's reign & the regulator system actually join us in battle when we go to fight him & then go to shut down the supercomputers motivating Sphene-bot to harvest all life outside of Alexandria? They deserve to play a bigger role than just being cannon-fodder to push the plot forward or part of Gulool Ja's cast of baby sitters.

Instead of Y'shtola showing up just to explain interdimentional portals, why don't we allow other characters to be intelligent enough to reach those conclusions?

We're going on new adventures after the conclusion of the Hydaelyn-VS-Zodiark arc, so why aren't we getting enough new characters to carry that new story too?

Heavensward was great because the story was carried by our Coerthan & Dravanian companions.

Stormblood was great because the story was carried by our Othard & Gyr Abanian companions.

Dawntrail was mediocre because Wuk Lamat was forced to hold the story up alone most of the time.

[scrollsfromarebornrealm]

Unhinged Ranting about Zone 6

Major spoilers below, don't click if you wanna be unspoiled, this is just my personal opinion.

Alright. So I've been briefly glancing at social media now that I've cleared MSQ, and I've seen bits here and there that DT is basically repeating Endwalker (and to a degree Shadowbringers') plotline. But if I may offer my humble opinion...

They are, and they're not. Instead what Dawntrail gives us is so much fucking worse in terms of horror. I am going on the record right now that for me personally, Living Memory beats the hell out the city of Amaurot. Why do I think that?

Amaurot, we only experience at a *remove*. Yes we live through the city's destruction, but the version that's there in the First? That's Emet-Selch's creation, made out of grief/depression/rose-colored glasses view of Ancient Society. With the exception of *one* person, we do not see (as far as I know because I didn't really sidequest there so if there's anything otherwise, please let me know) actual physical legitimate people (I'll get to that in a minute hold on). Please take a look at the fucking wreckage that was Emet-Selch's thought process at that point and tell me that man had the capacity to think up an entire city of millions, each one with their own individual personality. All those people are chilling in Zodiark.

(yes yes I know gameplay mechanics and the like BEAR WITH ME HERE WE'RE GETTING TO THE POINT)

And when we do encounter those souls of the city? Those precious lives the Worst Ever Coworker trio wanted to save? They are a mess. They are a wreck. All they can do is mourn the life they had before and beg for it back. They have been steeping for millennia in guilt/regret/longing for the old days to the point that it's all they are. You could argue they're not even themselves anymore.

Living Memory is worse because we're not dealing with a 'one size fits all idealized memory of how I thought this random person of society should be'. Living Memory is you fucking staring at your beloved Aunt Remy who used to wear pink ribbons in her hair and always chugged that shitty store-brand beer at every sports game for her favorite team and couldn't pronounce your name just right so she gave your a nickname and you just rolled with it. Only it's not your Aunt Remy, it's a goddamn computer copy of her.

Even worse, it may not be the Aunt Remy you remember. Living Memory changed its inhabitants to reflect the happiest times of their lives. Aunt Remy may not be the adult you remember her as, she's probably going to be a damn sixteen year old experiencing the first time she met their favorite pop idol!!!

Pick your poison, which one is worse?

A. A rose-colored glasses one-size-fits-all construct version of your loved one.

B. The soul of your loved one so tainted by and warped by longing for the 'good times' that they're no longer who they once were.

C. A fucking exact copy of the person they used to be, who may be changed so that they reflect the happiest time of their life?

Shadowbringers and Endwalker were honestly the theory aspect. Dawntrail is the actual physical horror manifested.

┻━┻ ︵ ＼( °□° )／ ︵ ┻━┻

[aotopmha]

I hate that all of the fun adventure stuff in FF14 is so terribly paced.

(Spoilers for everything.)

I adored the underwater setting of The Ruby Sea, but it was right in the middle of another series of fetch quests after an overwhelming amount of them in the above-ground area of The Ruby Sea.

I adored Azim Steppe, but it was at the top end of another series of fetch quests right after anything in The Ruby Sea.

I adore Il Mheg, but it was much less economic with its storytelling than the zones before it.

All of ARR is a pacing mess, making you go to six different places once and then do it again instead of focusing on the zones one by one.

And this continues in Dawntrail. The entire first "half" of it has a much better structure than ARR, but I think each area outstays its welcome to some degree.

I love being in them, as I've said, they're some of my favourite zones in the entire game, but once again, so much of exploring them is just reading a expositional wall of text.

I think the Valigarmanda set piece is one of my favourite "adventure" set pieces of the game, and the Yok Huy are probably the most interesting specifically Turali culture out of all of the cultures explored in Dawntrail (so far) with all of their connections.

Why can't we have a story that is substantial all the way through, even during these slow and adventureous parts?

I've made a couple of posts about really enjoying just going on an adventure and just exploring a new land and our role as mentor/support in this expansion, but I have criticisms within this microcosm.

You can use the intro areas of a story to just go all in on fun character interactions and to make all of the relationships you play with substantial.

Aside from treading old ground with some of the themes, I think the expositional nature of Dawntrail is my personal second major criticism of it.

I feel like there are so many points where they could've gone the extra mile with character interactions, but they just didn't.

We're just "told" some of the fun moments we could've seen.

But then when we do actually get substantial character moments, they're some of the best moments in the story.

Even just making the different claimants interact with each other much more often would've already made a much more substantial substory that can stand and still be good on its own, not just be a lore seed, which you can turn back to when you need it later.

I think the Endwalker patch content actually did this balance pretty perfectly.

Some great character moments combined with exposition and learning about a new culture.

6.1 is still my favourite bit of "adventure" storytelling in this narrative because we got all of that together.

The hate for those patches can suck it.

It's such a prevalent problem with the writing of this story that I'm not sure it'll ever go away, but I sure wish it did.

It just desparately either needs more editors or a realisation that more words don't always make for a better story.

I'd be fine to get a shorter MSQ if every part of it was immediately relevant and meaningful.

[igayorhm]

94 msq spoilers musing on Bakool Ja Ja

I have to say I am very surprised to see the game has actually managed to make me feel sympathy for Bakool Ja Ja. While I certainly didn't hate his character I certainly wasn't fond of him either cause I knew he was going to be a nuisance down the line. However, when we meet him again in Mamook we get to learn more about him and the weight he has been carrying around with him. And why he's so intent on winning the rite no matter what.

Because if he doesn't win then the death of his siblings was for nothing. Countless lives sacrificed just so he could be born. The guilt he carries with him was be immense. And we see that in the way he laments even being born in the first place because he feels he's failed these poor children.

Many times throughout the story we hear Bakool Ja Ja reference his siblings. "We do this for our siblings" he'd often say and it's probably something many people would have dismissed being too distracted by whatever conniving plot he's coming up with it. But it then hits harder when we learn how two-heads are born and you learn of how many siblings he lost in order to even be brought into existence. Siblings his own father called "useless".

And suddenly Bakool Ja Ja is cast in a new light. No longer is he a greedy and violent brute intent on claiming the throne through dishonest means. But rather as a broken down and guilt-ridden child of his people. Burdened by the hopes and expectations of his people to lead them from cursed darkness. And he's desperate to prove himself worthy of it. Desperate to make sure the sacrifices made for him were not for nothing.

Bakool Ja Ja so easily could have been an obstacle we killed off later in the story. But instead we're shown he's a much more layered and complicated individual. Seeing him mature and actually help Wuk Lamat because he knew it would help his people was just *chef kiss* I love that sort of writing. I love when there's more to characters than what we see at surface level. He received some very wonderful character development in this section of the story that actually made me like him a little more.

Anyway that's it for my short little rambling. Onward with the story!

[mrlarkstin]

Zoraal Ja x WoL Ramblings Part 1

Good morning, below the cut is a bunch of ramblings about Zoraal Ja, Eramus and Jazu (Eramus' Alexandrian shard). Buckle up! There is a LOT to unpack with this lot.

So on my private twitter I went off about Zoraal Ja, Eramus and Jazu and thought I will share it here now since I can actually type the whole fucking thing out instead of doing tiny bite sized pieces.

Rambling is kinda all over the place

Jazu is Eramus' shard and the old Grand Champion of the Arcadion. Undefeated for years. He fought with a Basilisk Soul and fire. I haven't worked out his arena name just yet but thats coming! (I am open to ideas if you have any). Anyways, Jazu was born and raised in Solution Nine.

During MSQ, Eramus had, had enough with Zoraal Ja and snuck off one night to tell him to tell him off- the two fought and while Zoraal Ja was a formidable foe, Eramus laid him low, barely breaking a sweat in the process. That fight, it stirred something in Zoraal Ja, instead of anger at being beat, he felt...curious, drawn to the male. Who was this man that his sister brought from another land? It made him feel...strangely drawn to him. He wanted to get closer to him, but fought it difficult with his companions.

So he bided his time and finally had the chance one night while Eramus was exhausted and passed out in his inn room. He snuck in and low and behold, there he was. Exhausted, stretched out on the couch over looking the water. Zoraal Ja crept over, he had never seen the man so exhausted, a stark contrast to the fiend he had just fought not to long ago. He ran his claws along his skin, noticing that he had scales along his body, something he kept hidden during the day it seemed. Scales, scars- so many scars. The male was battle hardened, more so then himself. His claws traced patterns along his skin, lifting his shirt delicately and- what was that? His middle was...swollen? He looked, well, pregnant- but that didn't make sense, a week ago when they fought he was the furthest thing from- reality dawned on him, he had heard that Eramus fought his father and his father was known to indulge after his duels if they were particularly good, he did with Estinien after all, his father must have inserted an egg assuming it to be a dud yet- he could feel the life within, doubtful that Eramus even knew the full reality of his situation.

Something about that, angered, annoyed Zoraal Ja and he slipped back out of the room. Heated that the thing HE wanted, the thing HE felt entitled to, the thing HE thought belonged to him was taken from him by his father.

Fast forward to Solution Nine, he comes across Jazu Nica, the current champion of the Arcadion and notices something strange...he is JUST like Eramus, from how he fights to his personality...he is JUST like Eramus... and this time, he will not allow him to slip between his fingers.

[genericpuff]

welp, i finished the Dawntrial MSQ last night

it was

uh.

i actually enjoyed a lot of the things people were complaining about in the beginning, because while i could understand their criticisms, to me its flaws felt like something it would grow past as it was establishing a new foundation for a new story, which was what was promised to us, and obviously that's gonna require slowing down the pacing and lowering the stakes, which is fine!

but then the second half of the MSQ hit and i just-

on paper it should have been amazing

on paper i should have fucking loved it

but in execution, i stg trying to finish the lvl 98-100 MSQ took years off my life, even tho the majority of them took me a single night to beat, it still felt like it both overstayed its welcome and also did way too little with what it was trying to present us with

i know this is vagueposting because i don't wanna spoil, but man. "divisive" is definitely a word to describe the Dawntrail MSQ with, especially considering how many people were telling me "it gets better in the second half!" and again, I thought the first half of it wasn't as bad as people were saying, so I was HYPED for the second half, and instead I was brutally disappointed by what I got instead u.u

that said, the dungeon and trial gameplay mechanics are great, when the expansion remembers that it is in fact a video game it does it really well, it's just unfortunately not often enough for it to make up for the sloggy pacing of the story

the music is a bop, there are a couple tracks that i was a little eeeh on because they just felt really saccharine in a way that just clashed entirely with the tone of XIV and made me want to throw my headphones in the garbage, but the majority of the soundtrack was otherwise really well done, soken was really channelling his inner david wise here with the donkey kong vibes LOL but there are some somber tracks that are great too, there's a lot of range here in the soundtrack that should be appreciated despite the odd cringe track

environment design was solid, there were some zones that were questionable in their design because some of them felt pitifully empty despite promising bustling populations (looking at you, Tuliyollal and Solution Nine >:x)

but man , the last zone was brutal and that sucks because again, on paper, the concept SHOULD have been awesome, but ultimately it's still relying on the exact same plot devices in the past (insert lost civilization whose previous inhabitants/rulers are hellbent on keeping it alive even at the expense of current civilizations here) and the gameplay itself deadass forgot it's a game because there isn't a SINGLE instance of necessary combat or gameplay during all of it and so when the final quest (as per tradition, named "Dawntrail") finally pops up, it's like wait what ? that's it?? thankfully the last quest has both a dungeon and trial in it but it feels less like thought out design and more like the game devs remembering they had to actually include some gaming in their video game at the last minute LOL

i think the extra burden of directing FF XVI definitely caught up to Yoshi-P on this one, as well as the budgeting problems that still exist from COVID, and the fact that much of that budget clearly went to overall QOL changes like the graphics engine getting an almost complete rehaul (even in the previous expansions which is. a lot of work. like they want to re-texture ALL of the gear in this game and THAT'S A LOT, literally thousands of items!). where this expansion wins, it wins big, but those wins aren't enough to carry an overall lackluster experience that drags itself out way too fucking long for its own good. the story could have absolutely used a few more rounds in the writing room, if they couldn't afford more voice acted scenes then they should have simply just cut down on the amount of cutscenes, and i think the devs need to seriously ask themselves if the Trust system is worth dragging the Scions back into every adventure even when they have nothing to do (and it shows). like idk, just spitballing here, but the Trust system might be a good chance to re-introduce the GC squadrons, no? maybe go back to the roots a little bit and buff up the stuff that could still have a lot more life if given a chance?

anyways my experience with DT has been about a 6/10 and that score in the end will depend on how the patch quests go over the next couple years, I still prefer it over Stormblood (fr fuck SB lol) but it definitely feels like it's trying too hard to be like EW and ShB while missing what made EW and ShB so good in the first place (or acknowledging why its flaws were forgivable within the context of their respective designs, like yeah EW's pacing was iffy too but it at least had a lot more going on in it to justify it, DT is just grasping at straws by comparison). and in that sense it winds up being a lot more like ARR, where it's just kind of lost in what it's trying to do and creates a worse experience by the end. hopefully like with ARR back in the day the devs will figure out it's time to shake things up and try something new without using the old as a crutch.