#patch 2.5 spoilers

[mumbledramblings]

yanqing is so relatable in the wardance event

[lilbittymonster]

Chapters: 2/2 Fandom: Final Fantasy XIV Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Aymeric de Borel & Estinien Wyrmblood, Warrior of Light & Estinien Wyrmblood Characters: Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Aymeric de Borel, Estinien Wyrmblood, Alphinaud Leveilleur, Haurchefant Greystone, Lucia goe Junius, Thancred Waters, Y'shtola Rhul, Yda Hext, Papalymo Totolymo, Heustienne de Vimaroix Additional Tags: Named Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Au Ra Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Dragoon Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Gratuitous use of cutscene dialogue, Post-Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn Patches 2.0 - 2.5 Series: Part 3 of Of Blades and Blood Summary:

“You know I am not given to empty praise–I named her my equal, and I meant it as such. Though she has yet to see battle with a fully grown dragon, I have no doubts in her capabilities. I….look forward to fighting alongside her, rather than against.”

 Sometimes you have to swallow your pride and play nice with the person who tried to kill you that one time six months ago.

[ohnogachaverse]

Hoyo is at it's best writing-wise when they make a not-protagonist character's story the main story's emotional core

It has happened in 2.1 with Aventurine, and now in 2.5 with Jiaoqiu. His storyline is absolutely the highlight of this patch

[pinkrose05]

And if you close your eyes, it feels like he's actually there....

[hydrachea]

Man, what a great character Hoolay is. Proud, extremely so, but not so arrogant that it'd easily be his downfall. Confident, but not to the point where he believes himself irreplaceable - even the opposite, where he sees the way other borisin see him as a great savior as a weakness. And smart. Very smart. It'd have been easy to make him a savage beast going on a mindless rampage, but instead he was extremely cautious and strategic and was playing mind games with both his hostage and pursuers. And all that made the stakes feel that much higher through the story, because the hunt is a lot more dangerous when the prey is always one step away from becoming the predator.

[a-compass-without-a-needle]

Gotta love when you can tell that a character has absolutely been through/witnessed a form of The Horrors when the metaphorical light leaves their eyes.

[teyvatairconditioningco]

Part 2 of me screaming my head off

SPOILERS FOR 2.5

JINGYUAN IS RACIST, MORE AT 10

No but he's one of my favorite characters and one of the reasons is explicitly said BY HIM, when you live for hundreds of years, sometimes you're going to be a real piece of shit and if you're functionally immortal, you HAVE to grow and you HAVE to deal with the shitty person you've been.

Look I know they go hard with waifus for the paycheck but god damn they went hard with Feixiao and I love them for it. I fucking adore her. You can see her backstop coming, but who fucking cares. And "I never want to see this shit again" (paraphrasing) is great.

Hoolay was so fucking good. "Yeees, you brought me back from my 700 year imprisonment!!...... wait what the fuck do you mean you're so weak you had to bring back a 700 year old prisoner" Yes he was undeniably evil, but he still had his own primal "code" and I just think he was very well done (for someone who existed in 2 patches) okay

THIS was phenomenal. THIS fight kicked the SHIT out of me.

Oh Jiaoqiu. Oh, my darling. I got spoiled on this beforehand and I've never put my phone down so quickly. For like a split second earlier I was like NO. HE SACRIFICED HIMSELF??? Sacrificing your vision is rough but I'm so glad he's alive. And I haven't seen anyone else mention this but he must have gotten a chunk taken out of him and drained of blood??? Like Hoolay was poisoned because he ATE part of him. Bro got CANNIBALIZED.

ANYWAY

Luocha has been carrying around Tayzzronth?? Or a fragment of them??

YOOOOOOOOOO THE DELIVERY OF THIS IN ENG WAS FUCKING GREAT.

I'M SO FUCKING HYPED TO SEE TINGYUN 2 ELECTRIC BOOGALOO

Although if Sunday is coming in that patch... sorry babes, I'll have to get you on the rerun.

[revserrayyu]

2.5 Xianzhou continuance thoughts [part 4]

**SPOILER warning** for the end of the mission, covering the conversations between the Yaoqing trio, the Generals and everything else. If you haven’t cleared the story yet then go do so. Or go farm some relics. Do a ten pull. Go frolic outside. Do whatever you wish except ruin your own story experience with spoilers by reading ahead.

The way my heart sank thinking that Jiaoqiu truly didn’t survive his injuries..

..only for us to see Trailblazer and Bailu messing around, weeping at a hastily put together grave for March because she disappeared out for their sight for two minutes. Hoyo must take great pride in successfully giving me a heart attack.

Pfftt, I’ll enjoy the lighthearted conversation while I can though I guess. We truly didn’t do much during this mission with all the POV switch ups that happened, though I still love that they’re allowing us to speak more. All the Trailblazer voice actors are great and I hope we continue to hear them more often in the future.

Annndd that the panic settles back in. Jiaoqiu’s injuries were no doubt the worst, while Feixiao probably faced some drawbacks from all the fighting and madness she endured, but Moze too? I guess he did get attacked by Hoolay and his followers once the warhead realized he was spying on them, but then Moze was seen later on the Skysplitter when Feixiao at the bloody heart and he did eventually find Jiaoqiu somewhere with the help of the Trailblazer, so surely he couldn’t have been that hurt if he was running around everywhere, yeah? Perhaps exhaustion caught up with him after all the chaos, or he knows how to deal with pain rather well. Possibly both.

Why am I not surprised to hear that Feixiao is the kind of person who can’t be confined to a hospital bed. Even if she left in plain sight, I’m sure she would’ve quick enough that no one could even catch her to bring her back.

Seems the whole Yaoqing trio shares this mindset too. Moze could easily sneak out in the shadows whereas Jiaoqiu probably just walked himself out with an excuse like “I’m a healer, trust me when I say I’m fine” or something.

Oohhh buddy.. I love it when characters have different roles in status or have to act a certain way around each other but one of them tells the other to forget the formalities and just be truthful because their relationship is worth so much more than that, like yes she’s his general and he’s her healer, but I have no doubt they’ve become such close friends over the years too. Also, the way the scene doesn’t show his entire face.. god, what nice foreshadowing.

Aww sweetie nooo! Please don’t blame yourself! If anything, blame the plot. It’s like the four stars had a rough time in Penacony and now it’s the five star’s turn on the Xianzhou. And I’m sure I mentioned it before but the trio’s voice actors are all so talented and completely nailed these two story patches. The emotions are perfect.

WHAT IF I CRIED HUH?? Is that what Hoyo wants? For me to become a sobbing mess after thinking Jiaoqiu healed perfectly fine?? AAAaahh.. I’m not entirely sure if the blindness is a result of Hoolay’s attack or a side effect of the poison Jiaoqiu drank, but either way I’m so incredibly sad. Our handsome foxian has already been through hell from being Hoolay’s hostage, did we really need to take away his eyesight too?? Man.. if anything, I will say it was clever of Hoyo to make the one character who always has his eyes closed end up blind because then they wouldn’t have to change up his model at all. It might seem off-putting whenever people use his ultimate and see his eyes now though. Aah, his pretty golden eyes.. I’ll admit that they did seem a bit dull during that one scene of him all slashed up and bloody on the floor, but I didn’t think it was anything serious. More like it was an art style choice and he was so worn out from the attack and knocking at death’s door.

Tell me why I don’t believe his smile and that’s he’s only saying such a thing so Feixiao doesn’t bury herself under all the guilt she feels. Looking back now though, I can appreciate the subtle hints about his condition before Feixiao revealed it. I remember Jiaoqiu mentioning how he recognized the sound of Feixiao’s footsteps when she approached him, so pair that with how the game framed his face before in the previous shots where his eyes weren’t visible and yeah.. smart moves. Sigh.. he once left his role as a military healer to prevent himself from watching more people rush towards their death and now he’s not gonna see much of anything.

Bruh.. he faced the foxian’s worst enemy, got taken hostage by them, watched people die in front of him, got seriously attacked and purposefully drank poison at some point, yet despite all that trauma, he solely cares about how Feixiao is feeling? GOD HELP ME he’s too precious and sweet! I adore him so much and his devotion to her has me so giddy and weak. In a shipping context or not I fucking I love the bond these two have y’all.

I mean.. I guess? In exchange for losing his sight, Hoolay was definitely defeated, which grants all the foxians a big sigh of relief to finally be rid of the monster that haunted them and treated them as slaves for centuries.

More importantly than that (to me at least) is knowing that Feixiao’s moon rage was actually taken care of. Part of his ‘About Feixiao’ voice line is “I cannot leave this world before she's cured” and our man really kept his promise. I wish he didn’t have to go through such extremes to achieve one of his biggest goals in life but hey, if Jiaoqiu says he’s fine, I’ll choose to believe him. Just a little bit.

The way Moze was here the entire time and he didn’t even know… aaahh. Considering Moze was here way before Feixiao first showed up, he probably moves too quietly for Jiaoqiu to even hear him. I wanna bet that Moze left the Alchemy Commission after Jiaoqiu did just to make sure the guy didn’t get himself lost or walk into any danger.

I fucking hope they can find someone to help him! Also, I absolutely LOVE that it’s her now making a promise to find a way to heal him! All those years of Jiaoqiu stressing about finding a cure for her moon rage and Feixiao gets the chance to pay back all his efforts. Kinda surprised that Bailu couldn’t do anything about Jiaoqiu’s sight, but perhaps she doesn’t know how to or isn’t strong enough for such a thing yet? Not even Lingsha could’ve helped I guess. Who knows.

Ma’am.. I love each and every little thing about you, but can you relax? Please?? You just snuck out of the Alchemy Commission, which means you probably aren’t even full healed yet, and we’re already chatting about rushing into more battles? How about we take a break for a little bit and go enjoy the real Wardance. Sound good?

Me and Jiaoqiu sharing exactly one brain cell.

Just hearing her say “wildfire” made me miss our favorite Underworlders even more. At least we’ll get to see a whole bunch of Luka during the Wardance event.

Ah, even more name drops to taunt my hopes with. I’m still bitter we were teased with Jingliu’s return. Speaking of a certain blonde man though, can we ask him to cure Jiaoqiu’s eyes? We don’t exactly how skilled Luocha is with healing since everything about him is a giant mystery, but I think it would be a nice reason to bring him back, if only for a moment. I know he’s still locked up but whomever does eventually heal Jiaoqiu will be put on my good side.

Well, at least we finally get an idea of what our “traveling merchant” has been carrying in that coffin of his.

Having the Swarm be mentioned right before Ruan Mei.. oh dear. What kind of chaos are we in for next time there’s a mission on these ships.

Now then, I know our mad scientist was mentioned at the very beginning of the quest by Himeko regarding some fossils, then again once more towards the middle by Feixiao when she was chatting with Yukong about how the Verdant Knights found the wreckage of Whistling Flames ship, so that of course got my hopes up that we might finally learn more about Tingyun.. but I wasn’t expecting to hear her speak!! Thank heavens she’s actually alive! Whether by chance or because Ruan Mei has already.. you know, used her as a test subject, who knows. I’m leaning towards the latter option personally but regardless! I’m so thrilled for her! I’m not even that big of a Tingyun fan but my mouth was literally hung open in a huge grin when I heard her voice again. I can’t imagine how her voice actors must’ve felt being called back after so long in to give just a single line for this character again after what happened during the main story.

Speaking of powerful one liners, Feixiao receives a second one about Jiaoqiu after you complete the entire mission. Ain’t that grand.

Behold! I’m finally done with all this rambling and I can finally start the Wardance event! I’ve already seen some characters and cutscenes that I’m excited to learn more about. I do enjoy Luka but hopefully I can just breeze through it and not take an abundant amount of screenshots this time.

[finisnihil]

I JUST FINISHED 2.5'S QUEST SPOILERS BELOW THE CUT

OKAY FIRST OF ALL

I WAS RIGHT LUOCHA DIDN'T PLANT THE STELLARON

Onwards

THAT WAS ONE HELL OF A TWIST! Honestly i'm totally on board with this answer. Ever since Swarm Disaster, Yaoshi and Tazzyronth's connections have been called into question. The idea that Tazzyronth can be used to stop Yaoshi is DELICIOUS and it totally recontextualizes why Ruan Mei was experimenting with the Swarm Emanator (RUAN MEI NATION WE ARE WINNING!!!)

Honestly I did not expect this possible team up. Ruan Mei was such a perfectly maneuvered character, everything set up around her suddenly clicks into place. Tingyun being brought back raises questions. It seems Ruan Mei is the one facilitating this revival of her so it begs to question if the "fossils" Welt and Himeko were delivering were actually Tingyun's body. In that case, who took the body and if it's Phantylia, does that mean they're working together?

This also calls Luocha into question. How did he get his hands on a piece of Tazzyronth, a piece of the Divine Body left behind from Qlipoth's hammer? How did they make a deal? This is so juicy and i've got so many more questions than answers at this point. I have so many thoughts I need to gather them in the meantime so brace for more analysis.

Also if that truly is a piece of Tazzyronth body, it must have a relation to Yaoshi's existence because it takes the form of vines. It has some kind of consciousness. The fact it's seen as a "final nail" is so interesting.

Also this is more of a personal note, but I wonder if Luocha can heal Jiaoqiu's eyes. He was able to heal Xueyi's mechanical body so I don't think it's outside the realm of possibility.

It sucks we're probably gonna be going back to Penacony next patch, hopefully we at least get playable Sunday out of it.

Will post again soon, mwah!

[tater-tot-jr]

Honkai: Star Rail fans, I’m here to yap. Major spoilers for 2.4.

So, I’m the certified number 1 space china hater. I hate that place, I don’t trust it, I didn’t like its first story arc that much. But holy shit that ruled. That was awesome. It’s obviously impossible to follow up Penacony and outdo it, and you can certainly nitpick some faults, but the war dance arc thus far was super enjoyable to play.

Let’s start with the fucking Yanqing character development holy shit?? Seeing the ways he matured and humbled himself was super fucking cool, and his dynamic with Yunli was peak comedy. His monologue about why he wields a sword was completely awesome, very well done by the VA. Hoyo making sure to let us know that both him and Yunli are literal child soldiers and we should be concerned about that was based. The conflict between him and Yunli was actually presented really well. (I haven’t done the new march event yet so maybe I’ll come back and edit this if I remember) The didn’t really push someone as correct or incorrect, they just showed us the situation and let us form opinions. Yanqing getting some character development was awesome and I love that for him.

The plot? It still had some of that trademark complexity but it was much easier to follow this time around. It felt like events naturally lead to one another and the characters reacted as they actually would instead of just reacting as necessary to move the plot. It gives you a shocking amount of player agency to succeed or fail and I really enjoyed the stakes that came with that. I’m liking how dark some of it is, it’s not crazy but there are certainly some moments.

I love all the new characters, they’ve all managed to endear themselves to me very quickly. Even the characters I was meh on like Jiaoqiu and Lingsha managed to worm their way into my heart a little. Feixiao is a total badass and Moze really interests me. Yunli was really funny and I enjoyed her shenanigans. As much as some of the mechanics and designs of these new characters disappointed me I still found them compelling in the narrative.

And the fucking angst? Hello?? It was peak.

This might be a hot take but I think the shackling prison is my new favorite singular section of the game. I love Dan Heng, I find his lore and personality fascinating and was dying to see some more of it. His VA did a great job this entire patch, Dan Heng is very stoic so it was impressive how his VA managed to portray the general unease he felt being back in the Luofu. He was just normal enough to not have anyone make a big deal out of it but you could tell that something was just under the surface. Then you get to the shackling prison and it just… man. You get to the door and you hear his voice just break. For someone so stoic you hear him overwhelmed with emotions, and it’s so juicy. Wonderful way to set the tone, Hoyo. Then you get inside and wow it’s evil looking in there. The other chance you get to chat with Danny boy before shit hits the fan is just as good. They decided to give me personally a treat with his lines like, and I’m paraphrasing here, “it’s just as cold as I remembered.” And telling the trailblazer they “shouldn’t have to see this place.” Hoyo chose violence with that shit. Also, Fox Boy™️ literally got held hostage and (kinda) enslaved. Incredible.

The pacing of that section was awesome. Seeing Xueyi get destroyed and then rushing down with Hanya was a simple trick but goddamnit it worked. The way it managed to portray that rushed and dangerous feeling without going overboard on the monsters around you was impressive. It was so much fun to watch the mystery come together in a way that felt like both a climax and a cliffhanger somehow. The cinematic stuff was so well done, it was all so pretty. There were plenty of POV swaps but they felt natural and necessary to the plot. I was unenthusiastic about going back to space china but goddamnit Hoyo has done it again. Fuck.

It was just a really fun patch, 2.5 feels so far away…. :(

[mumbledramblings]

HSR patch 2.5 spoilers

idk about you guys but i found it quite disappointing that none of the characters that confronted elder taoran had anything to say about the fact he had a literal branch growing out of his head

like dan heng made ONE (1) comment on how he seemed healthier than last he saw him but like that's it. nothing else. not even from jing yuan............

idk i just think that visual evidence that the vidyadhara preceptors might be messing with the Ambrosial Arbor—you know, the plaguemark that has haunted the xianzhou natives and the alliance since basically their beginning—would be a bigger deal than just "wow. you were on death's door last i saw you, and now you're not. wild. anyway–"

[neoninky]

Today I started therapy again for first time in a few years.

Immediately after I took a nap and played the 2.5 HSR patch….

Now I’m just laying on my bed, feeling like whatever this emotion is:

Spoilers kinda?

HSR Gacha System: here you go, you can have the silly pink fox man!

Inky: YAY! :D

HSR Storyline: …..now SUFFER

Inky: Noooooooooo D8

Jiaoqiiiiuuuuuu 😭 whyyyyyyyy *hugs him and feeds him yummy things*

[miradelletarot]

LORE/TIMING HELP!

OK BG3 and Forgotten Realms/ D&D people! I need your very high intelligence rolls tossed my way! So! I am trying to establish a semi-accurate and realistic time frame for between Acts 1-3. Possible (though very mild) Act 3 spoilers (not pertaining to anything patch 5 b/c I haven't gotten there yet so PLEASE don't discuss anything of that here...but general stuff may be mentioned so please proceed with caution).

So, in Act 3, if we don't play as Gale, we meet Tara on the roof. Now, She was left back in Waterdeep so assuming there was no Greater Teleportation spell available to her, it would take her about 45 days to get from there to Baldur's Gate. (Source) I can't recall anything being mentioned anywhere that anything like this was available, but if I'm wrong please lmk. Obviously, actual gameplay doesn't take this long, but I want to focus on what could actually be a realistic timeline. Think of any D&D campaign and you are gonna have fighting days, resting days, travel days, even shopping days. This is (sorta) reflected in game, but you can just play and play, and get thru everything in days frankly. I have spoken to a few people and some have said 1-2 months while others have said only like 2-3 weeks have passed. Which brings me to my next point: Weeks are separated into tendays (literally...10 days in a week). A month, is about 3 of those (with a few odd days tossed in through the year) which you can see in the image below. You'll notice that the events in BG3 take place just before Feast of the Moon (not important i guess, but interesting!) **more after the image**

So, if that's the case, that would put BG3 events taking place within a month's time, but even that seems short. There's so much to explore, so many people to help, etc etc. I had estimated (generously I'm sure) that each act took about 2-3 tendays each which would give us a roughly 2.5 to 3 month timespan. If this only goes for a 2-3 week span, then Gale is certainly rushing into the whole idea of marriage tbh lmao!! Like "babe, i know we have only dated for like a tenday, but marry me?" xD though, to be fair, even if we go for the 3 month (very generous) timespan bbygirl is still rushing into things, but I think we can give him a pass since they all fought for their lives and all lol. I just wanna get everyone's big lore dump info on this matter b/c I honestly wanna know, AND I am gonna use it to help time parts of my next fics. The timing is kinda important to help me plan things and also to make sure I am not doing some weird time dilation head canon shit that could mess everything up in the world LOL

[la2yn0va]

Just finished the 2.5 HSR update trailblaze mission and feixiao is a sexy badass (the things I'd let her do to me?) and I hope we see more of Luocha in the future and some other xianzhou characters from the other ships in the future and also SPOILER

Tingyun is alive

I finished that patch the DAY it came out.

Also, imma say it… Tingyun should’ve stayed dead. You wanna bring back someone or something, bring back my boy jiaoqiu’s eyes back! (lol)

[moonraging]

so i've finished most of the 2.5 story quest and just wanted to share some of my thoughts - spoilers beneath the cut!

boy howdy was i surprised to see them take that direction with hoolay. i fully expected them to go on the straight and narrow, keep him as a brute of a character whose only priority was to take revenge etc.

so! i was pleasantly surprised to see them put more thought into the way he strategised. the plan to turn a former war slave into a warhead because that would simultaneously shake manga's plan and deal a devastating blow to the alliance? his ability to maintain his value of 'strength' over even any innate concern for the borisin? good stuff.

also!!! his ost in the boss fight utilising the short sharp notes we see so often in horror motif was a super nice touch. i loved the all-round focus on lupitoxin and fear, as well as the fact that hoyo really didn't shy from being a bit more graphic this time round ( the entire jiaoqiu thing, the CG with the crimson moon ).

finally, finally. the animations in this patch went hard. i have no words.

[haloguyfttp]

HSR 2.5 very brief Main Story thoughts (absolutely 0 spoilers dont worry)

I'd say a solid 7/10. Cleared up a bunch of questions from the 1st half, although some felt more like they were holding important information for no reason. I liked this one much more than the previous patch, and I like that it provided a proper direction for future Xianzhou stories in the epilogue bits.

I didn't like all of it, no spoilers so I won't say anything but there's still some stuff I think they did poorly, but for a 2 hour non-major patch it was enjoyable. I liked the boss fights too, simple but fun mechanics to play around.

The biggest negative is definitely the music. Maybe it's just because I was more focused on the story and the mid-battle dialogues, but despite this patch releasing 2 major bosses, neither had music that stood out to me. Compared to Something Unto Death's horror jazz vibe, SAM's metal-style mechanical beats, Sunday's like electric-guitar-choir-thing? This was a sudden drop in boss theme quality to me. A real shame since I still consider Phantylia's theme my favourite in the entire game.