#which is like your wol HAS to have this connection with him and if you don’t like it you’re not doing it right

[scionshtola]

i am not really a zenos enjoyer in the sense i think most ppl think of it but i do appreciate what his role does for cori. like i do think it’s neat he looked at them and saw their power and then made up everything about their personality in order to see connection. it’s cool to me that cori gets to be like no, he’s wrong about me. that cori gets to have all this power and still be kind, still not be bloodthirsty in any way, still not want to engage with him. idk i just think it adds a lot!

[picaroroboto]

For the past couple days, I've been unfortunately cursed with thinking about Zenos yae Galvus. I don't even particularly like him - not that I dislike him either, Zenosfuckers you can put your scythes down - but it seems to me like a lot of the fandom either greatly misunderstands him, or doesn't even care to try to understand him, which from an objective standpoint as someone who cares deeply about writing in video games kind of pisses me off. But I'm more pissed about the fact that I'm apparently going to keep thinking about this issue until I actually write a character analysis of him.

Q: "But, what even is there to analyze with him? Isn't he all about wanting to fight the WoL and nothing else?"

Well, you wouldn't be wrong with saying that. That motivation is at the forefront of his character, and even if you look closer, everything about him comes back to either "violence" or "lack of understanding of others". But there are more meaningful sides to his deceptively simple character. That question of meaning is what I really want to look into - what does his character mean, what symbolic or thematic role does he play in this story?

Q: "Better question: why are you posting this on your art blog/Fate meta sideblog?"

Good question, with a stupid answer: I have all of 6 followers on my FF14 sideblog, and around 150 here. Let's go under the cut so they don't have to read a wall of text, unless they want to.

When you look at and compare FF14's villains, you can see a very clear change, no doubts thanks to the change in main writers. ARR Gaius and Thordan are more or less two-bit villains - Gaius's memeable iconic Praetorium speech gives us insight into how fascists try to justify themselves but little into Gaius's actual personality, while all Thordan gets as far as depth of character is an NPC in a sidequest remarking that he wasn't always a bad person and was probably doing what he thought best for his nation. Nidhogg is a little more understandable, since revenge is a relatable motivation to anyone who's been hurt by others. In Stormblood, Zenos and Yotsuyu are both presented as deserving of pity even as they do terrible things. Come Shadowbringers and Endwalker though, the story takes a greater interest on why villains like Emet-Selch and Elidibus do the things they do, and the player is allowed more options to try to understand them and see how similar they are to the WoL. Hell, Hermes and the Endsinger are barely "villains" at all, with the level of sympathy the story shows them.

What I'm getting to here is that Zenos, with half his arc in Stormblood and the rest in Endwalker, is sort of caught in the middle of this shift. He played the role of the rival character in Stormblood really well, but come Endwalker, he's standing on a stage full of heroes and villains with grand causes and deep motivations, as the guy whose sole motivation is fighting for pleasure.

It seems he's not unaware of this contrast himself - when Jullus confronts him for ruining Garlemald for no good reason, he retorts with "Would you be happier had I a good reason?" Zenos makes no attempt to justify his own actions and doesn't care that his reason seems incomprehensible and unforgivable to others. Yet in that same cutscene Alisaie hits him with the fact that if he keeps living solely for pleasure, he'll die alone. When next we see Zenos, he's alone at the Royal Menagerie waxing philosophical about what he really sought in the battle with the WoL.

See, what really motivates Zenos isn't just the thrill of battle - this guy has gotten Battle High and the joy of human connection confused. Really.

Even before he gets so perturbed by the idea of dying alone, there's other suggestions, like his proposal of friendship to the WoL when they fought in Stormblood, and then later his dying words in which he explains that he never understood others - at his core, he's just lonely. I know there's an official side story that tells it, but you don't need to know the exact details to glean that he had some sort of tragic backstory. Sad, but not a surprise, considering he's the prince of the Garlean Empire, raised to take the throne and continue the Empire's legacy of violence.

At his core, he's a very lonely person, but also a thing of violence, raised using violent methods for the purpose of causing more violence. Violence is how he lives and breathes - the only way he gets any sort of connection with others in a world of hurting and being hurt is the brief connection warriors dueling as equals can sometimes find. Don't deny that this sort of connection exists - FF14 is great at making fights that are both fun and tell a story. Hence, why he goes crazy for the WoL, but also refers to them as "friend". In their fights, he senses (or thinks he senses) similarity between him and them. Beneath all the madness is a pure, genuine joy in seeing the self reflected in the other...but he also instantly gets on the train to projection-town, population Zenos, and assumes the WoL is exactly like him, ignoring or failing to notice that they also fight for deeper meanings. The worst part is, he doesn't even notice that what he's actually seeking in fighting them is connection until Alisaie's aforementioned callout.

So he goes and angsts for a while, then turns into a dragon again and flies across the universe to help us kick the Endsinger's tail feathers, then issues his challenge for that duel he'd been longing for. But what's changed is that he starts with a question - "Such pleasures you sought for their own sake, and for no other reason, is that not so?". Dying after the duel, he's full of questions too: "Was your life a gift or a burden? Did you find fulfillment?" Alisaie's suggestion that he'd die alone actually spurred him to realize what he actually sought in the WoL, and now he's asking all these questions in an attempt to, for the first time in his life, genuinely connect with another human being.

The questions aren't important just because they're a sign of how Zenos has changed in Endwalker - they're actually the thematic heart of Endwalker! ARR may have had "Answers" as it's theme, but EW is the expac of questions. Namely the biggest question of all: What is the meaning of life? Different characters have different answers to that, leading to the grand-scale symbolic conflict being the Endsinger's despair - her belief that there is no meaning in life - versus whatever reasons the WoL chooses to live for, left, as always, up to player interpretation.

When you look deeper, Zenos isn't actually as out-of-place in the symbolic conflict as he first seems. His depressed worldview - that metaphor about drowning in a swamp again - seems to align with the Endsinger's view about life being meaningless. But he aids the WoL in defeating her. In that way he serves as part of the answer to her question about the meaning of life. He may have resented life at times, but he still found meaning in chasing pleasure. Not the strongest or most beautiful reason to deny oblivion, perhaps, but it did enable him to help the WoL triumph. I think of Zenos's philosophy as being connected to the concept of "Amor Fati"...largely because this quote explaining it sounds like something he'd say, or at least agree with on some level:

"and if our soul has trembled with happiness and sounded like a harp string just once, all eternity was needed to produce this one event—and in this single moment of affirmation all eternity was called good, redeemed, justified, and affirmed."

So he does have a meaningful role in Endwalker, as the "Amor Fati" against the Endsinger's "Memento Mori". I think that in this the story shows that his reason for living, while somewhat shallow, is not necessarily a morally wrong thing in and of itself (setting aside for a second all the people he hurt in his pursuit of that). It's just that, since it is a lonely pursuit that denies everything except for his target, it still feels empty. The core of the counterargument against the Endsinger's despair is that both pleasure and fulfillment are necessary to live a meaningful life in a meaningless universe, and that's why Zenos is here in Endwalker. Why he even exists in the story in the first place.

Even if you're one of the people who deeply hates Zenos...well, you probably wouldn't have read this whole thing if you did, but I still think it's important to read into characters you dislike, because every character in a story is written for a reason. Plus, trying to understand even their worst enemies is one of the WoL's key traits as of ShB and EW. With his last breaths, Zenos was trying to understand the WoL too - carrying this understanding of him with you as we move into our next adventures is the least you can do for your "friend".

[autumnslance]

Heya

I always like your analysis/view of characters and the Story so I would like to ask you something.

Yesterday I talked with a friend about how I kinda miss Lyse, and than I got the idea that she and Wuk Lamat would probably get along quite well.

Lyse wasn't prepared to step up on the role she has now while. Wuk Lamat is young and "lively" as Lyse, but she had a chance to grow and learn about her upcoming role as a leader of the nation during our journey with her. So I think these two would have some interesting conversations and might learn from another.

I hope, that in future patches, we get a meeting of all the Leaders interacting with another now that we have Thavnaier, Tuliyolal and Garlemald new to the table.

Do you have an opinion on this? Especially since your understanding of SB and it's characters is deeper than mine.

Oh heck you got me rambling about Lyse and Wuk Lamat, so this is going under a cut. Spoilers for Dawntrail 7.0 MSQ and everything leading to it.

I've seen a lot of comparisons between Lyse and Wuk Lamat, being young, energetic women whose stories involved a lot of growth into leaders. How they get there is different, and I do think the writers learned from how they framed Lyse's story, and how Wuk Lamat's needed to be different even if there are ways they are similar.

Lyse spent years hiding from herself and her grief, happy to let Papalymo be "in charge" for the most part (though I noted he deferred to her when it came to actually interacting with and understanding the Sylphs and Moogles, and probably other people in the Twelveswood, as "patient" and "personable" weren't exactly his best traits). Lyse was also the person who noticed things weren't quite right with Thancred in ARR, that he was working himself to the bone, but she didn't seem to know how to approach him about it, regretting it later when they realized he'd been possessed.

And in Stormblood, Lyse spends a lot of time trying to understand her countrymen's reticence, their fears, their lack of hope. She worked with Conrad's Resistance cell all through Heavensward, but it seems like the first time she really interacts closely with civilians is Ala Ghanna. In the Far East, Lyse spends time talking to the Domans, and the Mol--her scene with the children is a major one, determining what is "home" and what that means, why Hien (and Lyse) fight for a place.

She feels she isn't a leader, she's just one of the team, and as she gets pushed toward leadership, she feels it's based more on who her father and sister were, the weight of her family legacy. And part of that is that lingering grief, that literal imposter syndrome, that knowledge she isn't the woman Yda was.

Because of course she isn't. She's Lyse. Not an Archon, but a Scion of the Seventh Dawn. Probably still better educated than many, having grown up in Sharlayan, despite book smarts not being her forte. She's very good at punching things. And she has a heart and more optimism and stubbornness than most.

She grows into it, with the help of her friends (which she does, repeatedly, acknowledge the WoL as the hero who defeated Zenos and made it all possible, don't fall into the trap of memeified rewrites of the actual canon). She is only the leader of Conrad's cell (a failing of Stormblood and it's split storyline was talking about multiple cells, but only having us interact with 1 ever before it all became 1 military). And she happily lets Raubahn take command of the army when it forms, calling herself simply the commander of Rhalgr's Reach--but given her role in the war, as a former Scion, and her connections, still acts pretty much as Raubahn's Marshall in all but name.

Lyse was not raised for leadership, not raised to take command, and had to rise to the occasion. And without losing her determination, her caring, her optimism.

Wuk Lamat was born to rule; the Xbr'aal initially, but when circumstances put her life in danger, Gulool Ja Ja adopted her as his Third Promise. Wuk Lamat is a cheerful, optimistic, loving girl who wants to understand and learn about people. She's a "people's princess" we see almost from the instant we arrive in Tuluyollal, friends with nearly everyone. But it's also not hard to see, even in 6.55 and the adventures in Sharlayan, that she's young and green. She has few supporters, and no great deeds or expectations from most of the people. She struggles in the shadow of her older accomplished brothers, wondering a few times what her strength is, what she has gained from their father.

She has not been raised to rule, necessarily; while the Dawnservant has expectations for all his children, and recognizes all of their strengths, he also sees their weaknesses and where they lack. Some of that, perhaps, is on him as a parent, but he knows their potential and possibilities, if they seek the chance to grow and learn. He can only guide them, not do it all for them, if they are to reach those potentials.

And Wuk Lamat does seek, with a zest not seen since Lyse was central, and beyond her, even. Wuk Lamat is not bound by the grief of familial loss and the disconnect of diaspora; she was too young to remember the tragedy that led her to leave Yak T'el as a toddler, and her life since has been a kind and happy one. She's been educated and trained well.

But there are limits to what a girl can learn in a single city, with only one or two visits to other villages now and then. And Wuk Lamat, like Lyse, takes the time to try to learn and understand. She picks up faster than Koana the point of the contest--while Zoraal Ja ignores it entirely, and Bakool Ja Ja has other pressures he's dealing with.

There's another comparison; Lyse's determination to understand Fordola, to change her mind, making her a symbol of all the collaborators. Lyse's determination that all Ala Mhighans must be free and begin anew, to rebuild their society together. To acknowledge the pain but not let it bind them into cycles of violence (which continues in the Endwalker healer role quests, as Raganfrid and Arenvald take up the specific task of reintegrating the collaborators).

Wuk Lamat, meanwhile, struggles to understand the bandits of Kozama'uka, the Chirwagur Yok Huy of Urqopacha, and the Mamook of Yak T'el. She changes Bakool Ja Ja and earns his respect, by perhaps being the first person to demand to know what he wants--and then following through on the promise to find a way to make that wish happen. To find a way all Turali can be free and happy, including the Mamool Ja (who may have tried to kill her as a toddler).

Lyse spends all of Stormblood fighting to free her people from a decades-old foe, forcing her to become a leader. Wuk Lamat's fight comes after she has grown into the kind of leader that can defend Tuliyollal from the threat of Alexandria and Zoraal Ja's betrayal. And even though Sphene can't change her mind thanks to her programmed nature, Wuk Lamat never stops trying to reach the caring personality encoded within.

Because the other person Wuk Lamat compares to is the Assumed Default Warrior of Light. She's a determinator in a similar way; she doesn't easily give up or give in, despite her doubts and the difficulties along the way. She makes friends wherever she goes, forming bonds and connections that come back to help, time and again. She goes from novice adventurer to epic hero, as WoL had to do in ARR; the entirety of Dawntrail seems a compressed version of that story for her, with adventure and events happening in the first half, and then the other shoe drops. For WoL, it was the Waking Sands massacre. For her, the first assault on Tuliyollal. WoL didn't have the benefit of a mentor--with Louisoix long gone and most of the Scions captured--but WoL could be there for Lamaty'i.

How often has that been a fear and regret of the Scions and other friends? How happy they were with the warding scales letting them help with those burdens! How at the edge of existence, the only thing that kept the WoL walking to the end was the memories of their friends and the hopes they had, and in the final battle, the Scions were still with the WoL regardless of distance.

(And Zenos was there. Still the most hilarious entrance ever.)

We stand with Wuk Lamat to the end--and she breaks through to find WoL and Sphene, because Lamaty'i won't give up on her friends. And Sphene could have been, if she had still been alive.

Anyroad. I DO think Lyse and Wuk Lamat would have a lot to talk about, in how they grew to be leaders, in similarities and differences, in their relationship with the Scions and the WoL, about the adventures they've had. I loved seeing Vrtra and Azdaja in Tuliyollal, and that Koana formed a treaty with them, which may indeed mean more interaction with Thavnair in the future. For that matter, the Leveilleur twins' quest to help Garlemald rebuild and reintegrate with the global community may bring some familiar faces from there around...though from the Island Sanctuary quests, we also know those people have never taken vacations and don't know what do to outside of "survive" and "duty." But there's a lot to learn, and seeing how diverse people can live together in peace, after most of a century under Ascian propaganda, would be good for them. Sharlayan tends to have diplomatic relations with various foreign powers, and Tural's no exception, and the use of Labyrinthos research to aid Mamook could become more of a thing to bring some of those characters in for cameos (for that matter, helping the Alexandrians integrate, and studying that phenomenon, as if those scholars could resist!).

I'm a little wary of having all the leaders in a single space; generally that's a plot point reserved for some terrible world wide event or circumstance arising! But it would be nice to have the opportunity to visit with old friends on some kind of tour, to see Tuliyollal make other allies and diplomatic connections, and give such characters those chances to interact.

But if the game doesn't take those opportunities on screen (people often forget that a lot happens out of WoL's POV, too), we've always got fanfiction to make it happen in!

[rune-writes]

Horizon

Fandom: Final Fantasy XIV

Word Count: 946

Rating: G

Pairing: WoL & Thancred

Summary: In which Nayra finds solace in the horizon after the events of Aitiascope.

Notes: I'm slowly posting my ffxivwrite fics on tumblr (though I've only written 5 lol), but yea, Day 2 of FFXIVwrite2024: Horizon. For context, my WoL, Nayra, lost her family in the Calamity. She partially blames herself for it, because she's the only one who survived. She is learning to come to terms with it with the help of her friends. During Aitiascope, she heard her parents' voice urging her forward. This story is set right after.

Read on AO3.

~*~*~*~*~*~

“Fancy seeing you here.”

Nayra turned around and spotted Thancred climbing the winding stairs with two large glasses in his hands. She cocked an eyebrow, lips curling into a tiny smirk. Thancred acted like he didn’t see it and instead held a glass out to her. 

“Care for a pint?” he asked. 

“You know I don’t drink.”

“Very true. Which is why Tataru sent me with another glass filled with juice instead. Apple.” He switched his hands and indeed, the new glass did look like it contained juice—if Tataru didn’t pull any tricks. Not that she would. Nayra smiled somewhat wryly before accepting the glass—one of those wooden mugs from the Last Stand. She swirled the mug, then decided to take a sip. A sharp tang of sourness with a hint of sweetness washed down her throat. Apple, indeed. 

“Thanks,” she said. 

“You’re welcome.” He took the spot next to her, leaning over the railing and resting his arms on the balustrade. 

Nayra studied his profile for a moment. She had no reason. She just… watched him. The way he gazed out the open expanse of the sea, how his pupils constricted and his brows winced when the light caught his eyes, how he brought the rim of his glass to his lips and his throat bobbed as pint—or whatever he had brought with him—went down it. It was a moment after he rested his glass arm on the railing once more that he let out a quiet chuckle and glanced sideways at her. 

“You’re gonna bore a hole in my head with the way you’re looking at me.”

Nayra blinked. She hadn’t realized. 

She cleared her throat then took another gulp of her juice. “So what brings you here?” she asked instead. 

Thancred barked another laugh. “For your information, this has been my secret place since before you came here.”

“It’s not so secret with how open it is,” Nayra retorted with a smile. 

They stood on the outermost platform of Sharlayan’s harbor—a circular half tower connected to the rest of the dock by a set of winding stairs. As open as it was, people rarely went there, except, probably, one of the Ironhearts, a family of explorers Nayra never failed to meet in her journey. Babeth Ironheart wasn’t present at the moment, and Nayra had deemed it the best place to be with her thoughts. It wasn’t that she was averse to companionship, but had Ironheart been there, Nayra might have found herself chatting with her about the places they’d visited instead—a feat now made possible with Thancred’s entrance. 

“‘Tis a good place, though,” Thancred concurred. “The sea spreads before you like a glistening sheet of diamonds; the sky expands as far as the eye could see. You don’t often see such an unobstructed view of the horizon.” He paused. “I used to come here because it reminded me of Limsa.” 

Nayra cradled her glass in her hands. She took a sip, then turned around to face the sea. “Did you used to miss Limsa?” she asked.

“I missed the chaos—the cacophony. You have to know: for a street urchin, Sharlayan wasn’t exactly my kind of city.” Nayra laughed; yes, she could see that. “The amount of headache I’d given Master Louisoix and my mentor. Though I ended up acclimating to it, sooner or later, but sometimes I’d go here when I wanted to have some peace of mind.” 

This place did have that calming quality to it, or perhaps it was only their nature to seek the open sky and open sea when their heart and mind lay unsettled. All her childhood, she had always wanted to see where the sky met the earth with neither mountains nor forests to obstruct her view. Her father had been a traveling merchant and whenever he returned home, he would show her the most exotic things he’d found on his journey. So time and again, she would ask to come with him, and she had—she, her sister, and their mother, coming along on his longer expeditions. The first time she’d beheld the sea, the width and breadth had taken her breath away. 

They’d gone to Aitiascope the night before—had met all the people she’d loved and lost throughout the years. Sometimes, Nayra liked to think that she had buried her past behind her, but the moment she heard her parents’ voices as she was making her way out of the aetherial sea, her time had stopped—enough that G’raha had noticed her halt and asked what was wrong. Tears she hadn’t realized she’d been holding trickled down one by one. She’d turned around, expecting—hoping—to see them, to catch a glimpse of them, but she found nothing in the bridge connecting the facility to the elevator. Nothing except coalescing motes of silver light. 

‘Nayra…’ 

Her breath had hitched at the familiar voice. 

‘We’re so proud of you, Nayra…’

Nayra swirled her cup once more. The sky was clear enough that she could almost see her reflection on her drink, murky and dark. 

Thancred hadn’t said anything else. He’d just sipped his pint and looked unflinchingly toward the distant horizon. No doubt he had other problems to worry about, but Nayra had a feeling she knew the real reason he was there. She chuckled to herself. 

“I should thank Tataru for bringing me the juice,” she said. “And an apology. I seem to worry everyone a lot.”

“As long as you know.” Thancred raised his glass. “You’re always there for us at our lowest. I need you to know that we’re always there for you too.”

A small smile tugged at Nayra’s lips. She bowed her head. “Thank you.” 

[elizabethrobertajones]

A Dragoon's Work Is Never Done part... three? four? I did not caption the first in this series with that and so I can't even find it now.

Anyway the important thing is this seemingly completely normal diplomatic mission from Radz-at-Han where the Satrap has brought his sister for Fete Day over to visit the dragons in the other city state perched on a rock with a long history of dragon relations for good or ill. Estinien is refusing to dress up as a diplomat, which he is now when it comes to dragon things, whether he likes it or not. He claims he's just here for the Fete food. G'raha is here because he's glued to Frog and likes witnessing history happening in nice ways.

Day 6: Celebrations | Holidays

Oh, wait the above images were a spot the difference

#I'm so interested in Estinien's and Frog's relationship (platonic) and how he fits into the puzzle now that she and Aymeric are A Thing @lilbittymonster

OKAY this will be unnecessary long to explain why Aymeric is getting so smirky.

So way way way back I did actually ship Estinien and Frog a bit, because I'd done dragoon 50 before HW and was therefore Completely Normal about the Estinien/WoL relationship. But I couldn't quite make it stick in my heart, and for whatever reason despite Estinien actually being, I personally think, the character with the closest bond to the WoL on the deepest levels bar the characters who are literally part of the WoL (you know, like, the 3-5 of them we cram in there), it ended up feeling more like just an unbreakable platonic friend bond. *shrugs* sometimes your heart just decrees stuff.

In Frog Canon this translates to the Stormblood 70 Dragoon quest being a moment where after sharing the dragoon eyeball tether for the first time, Frog and Estinien are riding an absolute high of connection and feeling really good about accomplishing Good Dragoon Things (and the reason I keep captioning Estinien and Frog doing dragon stuff as "work never being done" is them chasing that high again by tying up loose ends like taking Vrtra to visit Hraesvelgr or Middy, or taking Azdaja and Middy out for curry together).

That night on the steppe, they camped out together and shared a drink and the spoils of a hunt, Orn Khai was asleep by the fire. And completely unprompted Frog and Estinien both decided at the same moment to swoop in for a kiss, which lasted roughly 3 seconds and they broke apart like "woah, no, that was weird. We don't need to do that again. Nope. Sorry." and they instead solemnly vowed their friendship, and then laughed about it and decided to take that incident to their graves.

(At this point Frog had no idea Estinien had literally ever had a relationship in his life, never mind having been with Haurchefant as well and technically at the same time as her since Haurche had only nebulously mentioned "other partners"; Estinien did know she had been madly in love with Haurchefant, and Aymeric, who in turn Estinien had his suspicions was madly in love with Frog since like, seeing them interact once even in early HW. So it was a bit of a shock to her but he'd been idly contemplating her place in all this now for a while. But since he, Frog and Aymeric were all technically single or on a break or whatever Estinien thought he was doing while ghosting Aymeric for his own mental health SB > ShB patches, there weren't any of those connections to actually like. Build anything on.)

Fast forward to Endwalker, and I'm fully on the "Ysayle needs to know she won and Estinien has gone full dragonfucker" train, because he and Vrtra are an incredible power couple and it really represents to me a sort of final stop on Estinien needing to come to terms with everything that happened to him ever in his life and having accepted all sides of both the grand scope of history and also his own relationship to dragons, Nidhogg, and relations with dragons. He returns to R-a-H post-EW very very intrigued by what Vrtra wants with him, and they pretty much immediately get together.

I think by this point he's also encountered Aymeric enough times to have started to realise they never really broke up so much as stopped seeing each other, and Aymeric is exactly as devoted to him as he was last time they met, and Estinien only actually feels guilty about avoiding him so long, and mostly because Ishgard itself gives him the heebie jeebies immediately after HW and nothing to do with what Aymeric has done or not. So he's completely ready to resume that and just needs an excuse.

Which of course is Vrtra suggesting gently that there's a valuable connection there for Estinien and for the future of the two cities. AND Frog is on his case about seeing if Vrtra wants to meet the Dravanian dragons. Which he does. And then it only belatedly occurs to him when standing in Ishgard with Aymeric that maybe Frog also was manoeuvring. (I actually credit more G'raha machinations that Frog enacted, if you dig deeper :P)

Aymeric sort of ends up the orbiting twin star to the centre of the Frogicule, since he's the connection to all that and brings this whole side in, and considering all the pining on Frog's side to others, he's really got the more stable side of it all somehow...

She's glad of it because most of why she broke Aymeric's heart in the first place post-HW is because she thought it was cruelly unfair how little time she could spare for him and that he would only be mistreated by her coming in and out of his life at random.

The solution? A SECOND partner who comes in and out of his life at random and has very little tolerance for being in Ishgard! \o/ Between the two of them, maybe they add up to one full time partner?

(cue both of them getting on ships to Tural without consulting each other)

I don't think she goes out of her way to avoid seeing Estinien and Aymeric at the same time or finds it at all uncomfortable (low boundaries between them after all), but also she and Estinien are mutually uninterested in each other romantically and only passingly physically so aren't really interested in anything more than perhaps sharing a bed for platonic sleeping with a nice comfy buffer of Aymeric. It's easier just to enjoy spending time with them doing fun things like hanging out in the Firmament chatting to dragons and eating fair food, then take her catboy and leave. To the catboy's eternal disappointment. (Sorry G'raha, now this post isn't about you and we're talking Estinien today!)

Aymeric is here at this party realising he'd bed literally anyone there including Big!Varshahn (jury out on how he'd take to actual dragonfucking but it's like. A Catholic guilt loophole meeting a dragon who looks like a guy.) I don't think Vrtra and Aymeric are quite ready for anything but the simple fact of his existence is like an accessory that's making Estinien 1000x hotter in Aymeric's eyes I guess. Ser, that's a fellow head of state, please stop objectifying him.

Aymeric can not believe his luck that in a matter of months he's gone from staring forlornly out of a window alone to glancing between his hot girlfriend and his hot boyfriend, and is suddenly thrilled to go down in history as Ishgard's most eligible bachelor (never married, so many close friendships, all his letters and diaries spontaneously combusted on his death, how sad).

... as stated before, I am such a fan of Aymeric being a messy bitch who lives for drama and also is full of Secret Yearning and Weird Thoughts and would do wildly unstable things while projecting an aura of control and calm. Literally who knows if five to ten actual years down the line he and Vrtra end up publically married to unite their countries forever or something, but for now, this is where we're at.

Frog is just happy everyone is happy, and lacking the Ishgardian upbringing had given zero thought to Vrtra as a sex object and actively restricts herself from patting big!Varshahn on the head like he is still tiny. Little-brother-gender dragon snares another big sister. Estinien's love life remains a blissful mystery to her except for occasionally comparing calendars with Aymeric and swerving around the weekends he's blocked off for Estinien.

[ferrocyan]

ask game bound and secret, for tart? either wol!tart or nonwol!tart, you pick

secret: What's one secret your OC never wants anyone to know about them?

tart is dyslexic, has pretty low reading comprehension and is slow at it. bc of her father's connections she got to attend school in ishgard as a kid but it was a baaad time bc of this. she's really scared of other people finding out as in her experience it's only gonna get her bullied or berated or worse.

bound: Has your OC ever been imprisoned or captured? What happened? How did they get out? Did the experience leave any scars?

ohh my god how have i never made this happen for tart before dawntrail. wait no there's omega. okay so tart (and the ironworks crew) were trapped by omega in the dimensional rift and made to fight otherworldly abominations from other final fantasies yeah okay we know the drill (gunk you HAVE to play the omega raids when you finish stormblood IT'S PEAKKKK) the important part is when omega is done w the games and locks tart in a vacuum chamber to kill her and get it over with. she got out bc midgardsormr smashed it w his teeth, which was rly lucky bc she would've just suffocated in there otherwise. tart doesn't realize this herself but the incident actually left her w lingering claustrophobia. it hasn't been triggered in a major way yet but when she like goes into the elevator in limsa she gets a bit panicked and is confused by that reaction www i don't think she ever reflects to remember where that fear came from though

now for the dawntrail thing. so in my canon after the 99 trial when sphene fucks off to living memory w the dimension key, she also uses the gun from the soldierbot body she was using to take tart's soul and memory with her. lmao. he's not dead per se, it's like the scions when they got soulnapped. sphene uses his soul to run a "it would be sooo good if you join me btw i can bring your parents back and you can live forever as an endless i'm just saying" simulation but tbh she doesn't even fully trap him in there, he can wander to the other living memory areas lol and even talks to cahciua on occasion. a very chill and nontraumatic kidnapping, all in all. in the end tart gets out of it by

sorry what was that. oh yeah by asking her out on a date. of course. and then sphene gives him amnesia for the hell of it. it's all good though ;3

[ffxivaltaholic]

LFRP: Diarmune Rhet-Khas

Character Name: Diarmune Rhet-Khas

The Basics ––– –

Age: 55

Birthday: End of Summer

Race: Viera

Gender: Male

Sexuality: Pansexual

Marital Status: Single

Physical Appearance ––– –

Hair: Quite long and silvery white. It is almost always pulled up in a ponytail. When down it is long enough to sit on (Hence why it is always up)

Eyes: Pale Green

Height: 6"1'

Build: Athletic and fit

Distinguishing Marks: Minimal scars from years of working with dangerous plants and animals. Two sleeves tattooed in a vine and floral pattern with a flower on his shoulder.

Common Accessories: His Gleaner gear, a journal, some kind of plant or flower probably...

Personal ––– –

Profession: Gleaner

Hobbies: Botany and Horticulture

Languages: Common (With a Thavnarian accent)

Residence: Thavnair/Sharlayan

Birthplace: Thavnair

Religion: The Twelve

Relationships ––– -

Spouse: None

Children: None

Parents: Father: Elías- Alive/Silk Maker | Mother: Myra - Alive/Tailoress

Siblings: Sister (Older Twin): Sofina - Alive/Student | Sister (Younger Twin): Helina - Alive/Student

Other Relatives: None that he knows of.

Pets: Korpokkur (Named Plum), Great Morbol (Named Dahlia)

Traits ––– -

* Bold your character’s answer.

Extroverted / In Between / Introverted

Disorganized / In Between / Organized

Close Minded / In Between / Open Minded

Calm / In Between / Anxious

Disagreeable / In Between / Agreeable

Cautious / In Between / Reckless

Patient / In Between /  Impatient

Outspoken / In Between / Reserved

Leader / In Between / Follower

Empathetic / In Between / Apathetic

Optimistic / In Between / Pessimistic

Traditional / In Between / Modern

Hard-working / In Between / Lazy

Cultured / In Between / Uncultured

Loyal / In Between / Disloyal 

Faithful / In Between / Unfaithful

Additional information ––– –

Smoking Habit:  Nope Drugs: None Alcohol: Very rarely, he is quite a light weight and suffers terrible hangovers.

RP Hooks ––– –

SHARLAYAN: While much of the Viera's time is spent away, he does return to his Sharlayan home from time to time, whether it's to bring in a specimen or to simply visit with old friends, he is not to difficult to find there, particularly as his clothing tends to standout against the more conservative and neutral tones of his Sharlayan counterparts. As a significant contributor in his field of study to the vast library over his three decades of work, Dia is most likely found there, but also will peruse the market and visit Labyrinthos from time to time. Especially if any of his projects are flourishing.

THAVNAIR: Born and raised in Thavnair, Dia spent his entire youth there with his family. They are prominent silk makers and tailors, specializing in ornate and delicate garments. He's very familiar with the locals and after the panic of the End of Days subsided, Dia visits far more frequently. He's often found in the Radz-at-han market, out by Palaka's Stand, or in the silk factory pitching in to help his parents. A Thavnarian born, he has an identifiable accent and tends to wear garments that connect him to his home.

GLEANERS: Are you a Gleaner too? Then there is a good chance you have crossed paths with him at some point in time, especially over the years of intense gathering in preparation for the End of Days. Due to the nature of his work (Specifically in regards to dangerous plants and plant-like creatures, IE: Morbols) it's very likely your Character might work side by side with him, or at least in the same vicinity.

TRAVELS/IN PASSING: There are very few places on this grand shard that Dia has not been, which means his availability to meet people is vast and ever expanding! Perhaps you came across him at an Inn, or aboard a ship? Maybe you met him in one of the main cities, or out in the boonies of the continents... Regardless, Dia can be basically anywhere necessary to meet your character. (Note: Not the First however, I'm fairly lore strict on this point since only the WoL can freely travel back and forth at this point in the story and he is not a WoLPC.)

Contact Information  ––– –

I would prefer to be contacted via Tumblr first before giving out my Discord.

In game and Discord RP works for me, though I prefer in game.

His Carrd: https://diarmune.carrd.co/

[tritoch]

Deciding that my wol does not deviate from canon as presented in the game makes every point where I would have deviated so enjoyably juicy. I thought Wolund might be a WAR in Dawntrail after everything with Zenos and tapping back into his love for adventure! I was extremely wrong.

Musings on character class and Dawntrail. Spoilers through the end of 7.0 below.

I don't think the WoL in Dawntrail can be a Warrior, really: rather than tapping into their love of combat, they've clearly learned to take their foot off the gas. All your most interesting moments in 7.0 are when you don't fight someone, or when you are slow to violence. WAR just doesn't fit, to me.

In fact, no tank fits for me: tanking in duty support means pushing Wuk Lamat out of the tank role, or at least the main tank role for the 99 trial, and that just seems wrong to me from a story and vibes standpoint. Similarly, playing a DPS means making Alisaie heal the 93 dungeon and trial, which is insane to me. I don't think it should be legal to staff-chick Alisaie, as it were. I've also never liked healer G'raha, who shows up in the 97, 99, and 100 dungeons if you're DPS; we see him use PLD and BLM (well, their equivalents) a lot in the story, but only rarely, if ever, WHM.

Of course, playing healer means DPS Alphinaud in the 91 dungeon. That means an ideal "everyone stays in their ideal roles" job means being able to flex DPS or healing. And that leaves me right back where I started the game, withl CBU3's Blessed Siblings: SMN/SCH.

SMN has always been so canon to me: it's FF's special-est magical girl class, it involves claiming your enemies' power for your own, it gives a lot of weight to you as "the savior of the savages" in the eyes of the empire, Y'mhitra shows up in MSQ, Fordola and Arenvald show up in SMN quests. You get the Hydaelyn&Azem-esque Solar Bahamut this time out! Very main character stuff.

And SCH! Dawntrail is, to me, such a healer expansion. Only once, at the very end, do you really bring your own might to bear, and then in the form of the classic Azem trick, Instant Queue Duty Finder. You spend a lot of the MSQ and every role quest mostly playing the role of support, backing people up and rarely taking point. Serving as Wuk Lamat's emotional support is most of the expansion, and MSQ is pretty pointedly about how you're not really the main hero this time out.

So the idea of a WoL who mostly doesn't fight (okay he's spamming Art of War II. It's a gain on 2, Wuk Lamat), but calls directions, warns of incoming attacks, throws up shields, pulls people out of AOEs, that's very good to me. And healer can be the only role you need to pull you over the finish line, as myself and a cohealer learned today when I burned everything to heal him through repeated AOEs (thanks Dissipation and Seraphism) so he could pull off a healer LB3 (double mhroth scholar team, to boot) in the final trial. And wouldn't it make sense for Azem to play that role of battlefield tactician, coordinating their disparate friends? It's also the only role Emet and Hythlodaeus lack between them...

We're not taking center stage and holding aggro this time out, and that's a fun change! Curious to see how it plays out in patches. But rather than having his blood up and pumping again, Wolund seems very much at peace, and I'm excited to see how that plays out.

also biolysis-swiftcast-recitation-adlo-deployment tactics into a raidwide hits so fucking good. that shit's like candy to me.

miscellaneous related thoughts:

- SCH and SMN are also connected to arcanima and the South Seas Isle Lalafells, who seem like they might suddenly be somewhat more important than expected

- I feel bad for many scholars because I know Seraphism doesn't fit your class fantasy. But if you're playing SCH as "this is just the WoL class this time" it hits so good. You're a secretive mentor figure with a secret special ANGEL form that maybe is due to the time your soul was almost permanently warped by light aether or maybe is a fusion with your summon, both of which are basically boss phase concepts to me tbh.

- also looking on Twitter it looks like Seraphism functions normally for most people but uh it removes Wolund's hrothgar coeurlstache. I choose to believe it's light aether fucking him up and if you could see under the hood he basically looks like Forgiven Reticence its NOT his real face

- his pets are ruby (SMN) and emerald (SCH) carbuncle, to avoid scaring people and to keep a low profile.

[candycryptids]

17.out of all the scions, which one is the one your wol gets along with the best? what about the one they get along with the least? why?

20.what is your wol's best quality? what's the thing that they do that really gets stuff done of makes people like them? hard mode: their own perception vs. a friend or partner's perception.

both for Chuu!

Of the Scions….. 🤔 that’s toughies ! I think she tolerates Estinien’s presence the most since he lets her alone. But I don’t know if he counts- by EW he’s on payroll, but the second choice I have is Thancred for similar reasons- she’s not super sociable for crowds of people and they’re the most likely to break off from the crowd for similar reasons so it’s easy to just be people-watchers on the fringes. (Though I imagine Thancred is just taking ‘breathers’ and gets back in there after a few minutes).

In the Universe where she is THE warrior o light her favorite is Y’shtola though. There’s something really satisfying about her trust in you to back up her batshit plans that coincides with Chuu’s own batshit plans. Hack it until it works and failing that? blow it up so it’s not a problem anymore. EZ. (She also actually gets on quite well with Tataru, a friendly and smiling face she can count on to be there when she comes back from whatever armpit mission and pour her some tea while she bitches about the heat, the fight, the petty politics.)

She has the most trouble getting on with Alphinaud. In the Chuu Is The Wol-iverse she carries a sore spot for the Crystal Braves and using pocket change to partially fund a personal army- but she recognizes that it’s largely a case of. Being a child with too much accolades and praise and expectations heaped on his shoulders to the point where he keeps rising to it without so much the experience to match? It reminds her of somebody. …. In non-WoL usual canon though she has trouble getting on with Tataru PURELY because she knows how to find her and WILL call her if they need her help. She’s one of four people trusted with her linkpearl connection and it took some heavy convincing for that much.

FOR THE SECOND QUESTION, THOUGH,

Chuu sees herself as The Guy you see when a technical thing is giving you trouble, or if you want to rig your manacutter to go far and beyond the safe speed because you and your Miqo’te traveling companion want to recreate pod racing through Azys La. Her assistance was crucial in the building of that weird machine to go through all of that Allagan Research. Not that she makes it terribly easy to get in touch… but she believes her best quality is being The Expert™ that you call in when you’ve exhausted all your other options and she gets to step into the scene and Fix It. And then vanish again, crucially, she does not want to keep the spotlight.

My wrist is acting all kinds of unkind so writing a bunch more is giving me trouble but I’ll tell you Nero’s perception of her is that she’s a One-Upping, Show-Offing Arrogant Pain In His Ass, who is specifically showing up whenever he’s trying to look like a competent authority on whatever they’re dealing with just to dump a milkshake in his lap and make him look stupid.

Because she is. It is her passion in life to make Nero look stupid as hell.

[Pre-DT ?’s prompt!]

[mariyekos]

Listening to the Endwalker OST again, specifically Flow and Close in the Distance, has kind of nailed down why I didn't really care for Dawntrail as much: I just wasn't emotionally invested.

There's only one scene in Dawntrail that I can think of that really impacted me, and it was the gondola scene in Living Memory, which came at the tail end of the story. Now, oftentimes emotionally impactful scenes occur during the climax of the story. But the thing about Living Memory was that honestly? Most of it felt okay. Certain scenes were strong, yes, but none of them were like that gondola scene, which spoke to some really deep emotions I've held onto for...almost three quarters of my life. The idea of what you would do if you could bring someone back from the dead. What you'd give. What it would be like. I'll summarize my feelings on the matter as this: I spent years sobbing over this. When G'raha brought it up, those memories flooded back in and I started crying there too.

The thing is: there's a difference between being invested in the story, and in finding a theme or scene emotionally impactful. There's a difference in feeling a connection to something and being reminded of something. There's a difference between following a character to the end and reaching some sort of grand conclusion or emotional catharsis that builds on everything you've been through with them, and having someone new (or old, in a way) pop in last minute to give you the grand conclusion the people the game has tried to get you invested in have failed to come to. That G'raha comes and says it almost makes it feel like the writers *knew* you wouldn't be very invested in Erenville, Krile, or Wuk Lamat, so they delivered an old friend they knew you *were* invested in to have him deliver it instead, relying upon your past investment to make the scene as poignant as they needed it to be.

EDIT: Okay I can't believe I forgot impactful scenes number two: the Skydeep Cenote. That scene hit really hard too, and I will maybe come back to this later to elaborate, but basically yes that hit me hard because the story led to it very well, the characters got emotional, and I got emotional. It was unfortunately lessened a bit by the 180 Bakool Ja Ja did, but overall it was good, even if a bit sudden on the characterization front. Still: 2 emotionally impactful scenes across 40 hours isn't great. You could maaaybe throw in Otis' sacrifice and Gulool Ja questioning his existence a bit, but those were relying more on character tropes than investment, and while I enjoyed them, they were a little less intense than other similar scenes in other expansions.

I liked Gulool Ja Ja, but I wasn't weeping at his death, because it was not only a long time coming, but because the WoL (and Wuk Lamat! Who is the MC of DT) just didn't even try to help, which is different from scenes in which you try to help but fail. It's not you watching from a distance while the baby's mother gets flung into the pool in early Endwalker; it's not you being in the middle of fighting and protecting yourself from the destruction when Conrad dies; it's you standing ten feet away and watching as someone's very preventable death is not prevented. There are things to be said about respecting one's values/wishes, yes, but that's another topic I'm not going to get into here. The point is that the scene left me more upset with the WoL and Wuk Lamat's inaction than sad about Gulool Ja Ja's death. More than other scenes, it felt artificial, in that Gulool Ja Ja died because the story needed it, not that the baby's mother or Conrad died because we could not save them. Learning about the Pelupelu and Hanu Hanu was interesting, but it wasn't the gut wrenching culture loss of the people of Coerthas or Ala Mhigo; it was more removed, which makes sense given part of the premise of the story was that Gulool Ja Ja fixed their problems long ago, but meant that I simply didn't get as invested.

Tangent: Lyse's ignorance of her people in Stormblood worked much better than Wuk Lamat's ignorance, because Lyse was taken from her country as a child whereas Wuk Lamat lived in the country, even visited some of the people with her father in childhood, and was in line for the throne, which makes her ignorance kind of egregious. How did she not know these things? Lyse at least had the excuse of not only not growing up in her motherland, but ended up in places like Kugane and the Azim Steppe which she had an even greater excuse not to know about. Furthermore, the setup of the story in which you could go to either Urqopacha or Kozama'uka meant that Wuk Lamat unfortunately had to backpedal some character development after whichever zone you went to first so that she could get that same development in the other zone, just in case you went to that one first. This is not to say that the general path of Wuk Lamat's character development, or her overall character, is bad. It's to say that the writers did her character a disservice by allowing you to go to either zone and having her come to the same conclusions. While I understand they have the two options to split players' paths and reduce congestion, it would've been nice if they added a handful of extra lines here and there, or had a handful of alternate lines, so she could acknowledge the fact that she'd already gotten some experience and come to some conclusions that the second are was reaffirming.

(Tangent of a tangent: while I know budget is a thing, if the game can afford to do a She and a He version of every line for the WoL, they can include an extra 10-20 lines for Wuk Lamat to go "Seeing the Hanu Hanu's use of reeds showed me how important the survival of local culture can be, but seeing how the Pelupelu rely on trade has really made me appreciate how *many* different cultures there are, and how what's important can vary place to place!" instead of "Wow, seeing the Hanu Hanu has made me realize supporting local culture is important. I have never thought about this in my life" into "Wow, seeing the Pelupelu has made me realize supporting local culture is important. I have never thought about this in my life (including 2 hours ago when I came to this exact same realization which I have conveniently forgotten)." It's not about the realization being bad- because it's a good one!- but that the lack of ability to acknowledge zone order means Wuk Lamat has an unfortunate character backpedal that makes her seem dumber/more ignorant than she actually is. She's quite a receptive person, so for her to backpedal like this doesn't align with much of the rest of her story and sticks out as particularly egregious character writing.)

Going back to Lyse versus Wuk Lamat: it's the contrast between a character who wants to get to know the people she never had a chance to know, and a character who wants to get to know the people she kind of very much had a chance to know and should logically know about. I got more invested in the character getting to do something she dreamed of than the character who didn't bother (or who didn't do it because of poor parenting that she does not treat as poor parenting, if you want to blame Gulool Ja Ja for not giving Wuk Lamat some more worldly knowledge, which tbh he should've, but the game doesn't want to treat him as a bad father so much as Zoraal Ja as a bad son with a father who maybe could've been a teesny weensy but better, but was overall great!). It was easier to get invested in the girl who got very angry because she saw her people being beaten and had to be reigned in by a comrade who told her that no, she shouldn't step in, because that will actually make things worse, than the girl who got very angry because the guy who made her drop her taco showed up and made fun of her.

Really this all boils down to *stakes*. Yes, the stakes of Wuk Lamat losing and Tural going to Bakool Ja Ja or Zoraal Ja *were* actuat high, because Bakool Ja Ja seems like an incompetent leader by virtue of being kind of dumb, and Zoraal Ja is ambiguously evil and expansionist (the latter of which should've been emphasized more, imo, but the game seemed to care more about Krile saying he just seemed super evil which was made so ominous but hardly followed up on to my disappointment). But those stakes felt much more removed than the stakes of you and Lyse *watch* a man be beaten into the dirt while being told that if you tried to do anything, that would happen to everyone, or the stakes of you going through Doma and looking at how poor and scared the people were and knowing this would continue if you did nothing, or the stakes of you going to the Ruby Sea and *watching* as a man was told to kill his parents in a way that would continue if you did nothing. Stakes which materialize are much stronger than vague stakes which are only referenced. The stakes of Bakool Ja Ja becoming leader actually grew higher when he released Valigarmanda! That was a great story moment! Or would have been, were he disqualified, which he *absolutely should have been*.

See, that's where Dawntrail shoots itself in the foot: there are all these talks of stakes which just never come to play. In a story, you should not bring attention to something if you are going to pointedly ignore it (with a few exceptions that do not fit into Dawntrail). Very early on, Dawntrail called attention to the fact that one of the main rules of the contest was that you Could Not Attack an Elector. Doing so would result in immediate disqualification. But then you get to the actual story, and this Does Not Happen. Bakool Ja Ja loosed a Tural Vidraal, injuring many (tens? dozens? hundreds? not a few) people, of which I thiiiink the elector may have been one, but my memory is shaky enough that I'll leave it as maybe. If you ask me, he should've been immediately disqualified for hurting an elector's people, and releasing a giant monster. He was not. This felt bad. Then he kidnaps another Elector in Yak'tel (Wuk Lamat's father, Hunmu Rruk), threatens to harm him, and is STILL not disqualified. I tried to explain it as Hunmu Rruk maybe not disqualifying him because it might bring attention to Wuk Lamat's parentage, but in the moment it still felt dumb. Why was it that Zoraal Ja would get disqualified when Bakool Ja Ja got so many chances? Plot convenience. The stakes only matter when you want them to. This is not the constant reminder of stakes that was Stormblood. Stormblood isn't the only example of this- my favorite expansions are Heavensward and Shadowbringers, which also have their moments I'm not going to inflate this essay with- but I bring it up because it and Dawntrail (and ARR, to an extent, though les so for the points I bring here) have the most similarities.

In a way this tangent has wrapped back around to the point of this post-turned-essay, which is that I struggled to get emotionally invested in Dawntrail, and that lack of emotional investment is what made it fall so flat. The story was okay. It had some interesting moments. But the highs of Dawntrail were by and large much lower than the highs of the expansion that came before, and while the lows weren't really *too* too low, the average was pretty meh. Overall, it was an okay expansion. Overall, it wasn't very memorable. Even four years after playing it, I can name far more memorable scenes from Stormblood than I can an expansion I played six months ago. I call out Stormblood because by the end of Endwalker, it sat with ARR as my firm least favorite expansions, so the point I'm trying to make here is that even my so called "low" expansion had greater highs than Dawntrail.

Now, Dawntrail was often a much happier, less serious story than previous expansions. Not always, but often. Different types of story come with different levels of emotional investment. Dawntrail was exceptionally silly in a fun way when it wanted to be silly, which is to say at times it did things very well, and I feel it succeeded at what it was going for. It's just that emotional investment wasn't one of them. If a story is trying to treat something as light (or "shallow") and it feels light, then great! It did a good job, and I think that's perfectly fine. But if it's tryign to treat something as heavy, but it doesn't *feel* heavy, that's where it fails. It's Zoraal Ja's death speech (I just wanted to be...da king of the playground, anyone?) which had me kind of going uhhh, okay? It's the game simultaneously having Erenville and Wuk Lamat be horrified at what happened to Yyasulani while all the people there are just like "eh, it's fine" which makes it harder to be emotionally invested when the game is trying to downplay something in the same moment it's introduced. It's about one of the main messages of the expansion being that you should respect and utilize local cultures to make for a richer, healthier society, while having a major quest line go "oh yeah, to make things good for everyone we tossed out their culture and adopted a foreign one" (so none would get special treatment by being *the* main language, which is a point I suppose, but abandoned the big idea of using something from everyone to make something good).

Dawntrail is the beginning of a new story, and I understand that means you have to slow down and lay things out. You're setting up the foundation for investment, and can't rely (much, see the point about G'raha's gondola speech) on past investment very much. Logically, there will be less investment.

But even ARR had points of emotional investment. The Massacre at the Waking Sands, in which the people that I spoke to over and over, that I personally went out of my way to talk to when I didn't have to and learned to care for, suddenly died. When your friend was taken by the enemy, and you had to rush to save him. When Cid reclaimed his identity and went up against the empire he'd abandoned (which admittedly isn't as strong as the first two, but is something). Importantly: ARR usually didn't feel as if it were trying to make a huge deal out of something it thought I should be emotionally invested in, when it wasn't something I was emotionally invested in. For most of the things I didn't care about, the writers seemed to know I didn't care about them and didn't make a huge fanfare out of it. Dawntrail did.

Anyway, to close up a long rant: I just...didn't really care about Dawntrail. It was okay. It happened. My list of expansions goes ShB=HW>EW>SB>DT=ARR. (Tbh ShB proooobably outranks HW, but I feel like it's a betrayal to bump HW down....). I don't think any of them were bad, I just think some were okay, some were good, and some were great. I do want to clarify: this is all my *personal opinion*. I know there are people put there who got much more emotionally invested than I did, and I'm happy you were happy! I just wasn't. Dawntrail wasn't for me and that's okay- not everything has to be, and I'm glad they went to new places, because I know there are people out there who had the most fun with Dawntrail of everything in FFXIV, and diversity in storytelling is healthy for a long running MMO. My old favorites are still out there for me to replay, and the story can always change again. We'll just have to wait and see where it goes.

[sjofn-lofnsdottr]

6. Who was their Azem? What were they like, and were they different from your WoL? Who were their family, friends? Or, if you don't care for the Azem angle or went in your own direction for their past self, how so? How does your WoL feel about their Ancient identity?

Boy, is Azem something I haven't really ... firmed up much about, as you could probably tell, given I've been sitting on this ask for longer than I normally would. It's a great big space to fill in, which is fun, but as a result, I change my mind about it all the time. But! I can answer for this moment in time, with the understanding it's not carved in stone!

I change my mind on Dusk!Azem's name all the time, but I come back to Apollo a lot. He's got stuff vaguely in common with the Apollo, enough to give him the name maybe. He has an artist's soul, he has a twin sister (yes I know about canon Artemis, shush), and Themis sort of implies Azem has some sort of prophetic nonsense going on. There's also the actual sun connection the game itself makes, and even before we found any of that out, I associated Dusk with the sun.

Personality-wise I think they're pretty close. Extremely powerful busybodies who have a lot of love for everyone they meet and the world around them, who are very stubborn in their belief they can Fix Everything. I like to think Azem sleeps better than Dusk ever has, though.

I haven't really fleshed out Azem's family at all, save for thinking he had a twin too. I haven't decided if his twin was Dawn's Ancient, or someone else. Both ideas kind of appeal to me. I don't think his twin was Artemis, though. That doesn't ... feel correct, to me.

I think Azem, friend-wise, was similar to Dusk: loads of people who consider him a friend, and he is happy to consider them friends right back, but close friends, there are only a handful.

Dusk thinks of Azem as his own separate person, just like he thinks of Ardbert as his own person. Hell, he thinks of Fray as a separate person from him. As a result, he occasionally wonders what he was like, but it doesn't usually give him any sort of identity crisis. It's more a piece of interesting trivia to him. The only time it bothers him is when he thinks back to how furious Emet-Selch seemed that Dusk couldn't handle all the light on the First ... it makes sense to him in retrospect. Emet-Selch was hoping Dusk was Azem, and he just ... wasn't. And could never be. He doesn't think that's a failing on his part, but he does think it's sad.

[wisismydumpstat]

Tell us everything you feel about Ascians and Shadowbringers, do! You only get to do this for the first time once after all, and we're all dying to know what you think is going on, what you are pretty sure is going on, what you are positive is NOT going on and every speculation and heart palpitation you got so we can all bask in the confusion and hand flapping by proxy.

Sorry about the late reply, this week has been A Week!

I was kinda waiting until I was a bit closer to the end of 5.0 before doing this, but it sounds fun and I think it's funnier if I do this now and then I keep updating all the things I was wrong about as I get closer and closer to the reveals!

So! I am currently on quest Return to Eulmore, 24 quests left to reach the end of Patch 5.0, and those are my opinions and feels about... stuff!

Spoiler-filled text dump incoming!

Ascians Ascians are cool! :D I'm a sucker for immortals of any kind, I do like their possession gimmick, I like that they're way too intense no matter what they're saying. I don't particularly sympathize with their revealed backstory so far, and I'm glad the game brought up the whole "Cool motive, still murder" aspect of it. And that's just assuming I actually trust Emet-Selch, which would be a stretch.

An Emet-Stretch.

Please laugh.

2. Shadowbringers

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

I am really enjoying this expansion. I don't think it's a surprise to anyone at this point that I greatly enjoy drama and emotional pain, and this expansion is giving a lot of both in a very realistic way. I like the WoL's dialogue prompts getting angrier and snarkier as they get fed up with everything, I like people getting tired of all the secret-keeping and the moral ambiguity (Great for a plot, bad for a team), I like how hot Urianger is now, I love Alisaie having a well deserved turn on the spotlight, I like how hot Urianger is now, I like the whole "Ardbert and the WoL are friends now thanks to their mutual existential crisis" arc, I freaking love that Thancred is a dad now, and HAVE YOU SEEN URIANGER THIS EXPANSION??

3. Random speculation and thoughts!

I would like to punch Emet-Selch on the face. Amazing voice actor tho.

The whole absorbing-light-thingie is clearly bad. I would love to have something like an inner soul battle or something to destroy your corruption. Very Kingdom Hearts.

I... don't know what to think about the whole "Vauthry controls Sin Eaters" thing, but the way this expansion is going I fully expect to get into Eulmore and discover he has a disgusting one chained in a dungeon or something. Either that or Eulmore itself is a sin eater somehow. That'd be cool.

I don't trust the Crystal Exarch. At all. I would also like to punch him on the face, once I'm done with Emet-Selch. Which, admittedly, will take a while. This game has taught me that people with hoods and/or any way to cover their face are evil. Privacy bad.

Hydaelyn being a Primal makes So. Much. Sense. I was suspecting something was afoot since I realized every other deity and figure of legend was just a primal, but somehow I never made the connection.

Does that make the Echo just a very polite way of tempering?? Are the random flashbacks actually a "Go do my will" tactic instead of just a convenient plot artifact??

Someday I'll get Titania's theme out of my head.

It isn't gonna be today.

Help.

FALALALALALA

[weirdspriggan]

7 12 24 25 for virion 👉👈

7. What's one way your OC has changed since you first came up with them?

I think since I first made him, he's just become a lot softer? like I remember his original "canon" jobs were like mch, gnb, nin, and he really is just not that edgy. he's a culinarian/goldsmith/general craftsman who does archery sometimes. if he can talk his way out of combat, or otherwise avoid it, he will.

12. Is your OC self-destructive? In what ways?

I think he used to be but since meeting adrien, endwalker finishing off, etc, he's taken more time to focus on self-care. but especially up to his early adulthood, he really struggled with his confidence/self image due to growing up in gridania. while never like... blatantly self-destructive, he hid who he was (in almost every aspect) for the sake of not drawing attention to himself, and in turn, this caused a lot of negative thoughts to fester. so like ? self-destructive mentally, and i think this caused him to make some reckless decisions since he just didn't care too much for himself, but nothing really physical.

24. What is an alternative life path your OC might have gone down? How different would their life be if they'd made those decisions?

my instinct scenario was if he had never broken up with his abusive ex. I really haven't thought too much about them or their relationship (or even who said partner is really) (mostly because I don't have the experience or knowledge) but I think what probably would have happened is he would have just become secluded, probably would not talk to his family too much, etc... which would result in him probably becoming more self-destructive (connection to the previous question) in the ffxiv universe he probably would have just... never became the wol? I would like to think of something that isn't relationship-related, but this is what I have for now jfgdfklh

25. What is your favorite thing about your OC?

I think it's gotta be how much he's developed over the years. I don't know that I've had an oc that's stuck for so long or gotten past surface-level development, but I feel like while the process is slow, virion keeps becoming more realistic which idk I think is cool ?? also his green hair.

[shivasdarknight]

A random wolqotd from my train ride today- In your story, how did Thancred/Estinien feel during That Scene at the end of EW as the only ones that can’t use healing magicks?  Especially curious for ThanWoL and/or EstiniWoL but would love to hear from anyone (spoilers in answers)

YEAH FUN THING ABOUT THAT SCENE.  So it’s Surkukteni that’s the subject of that (specifying since I do write a multi wol story, but she is the Main Wol), which means both of them are In A Situation just differing situations. (more below the cut)

With Thancred, that’s one of her closest friends.  Of course he’s worried.  Of course he’s frustrated he can’t help.  He’s angry that she’s done so much to help him and he’s useless in this situation - more so because they’ve a second connection: her twin, Katsuro, is one of Thancred’s lovers.  Damn well might as well be a sister in law at this point and someone he’s known for seven years - that he’s useless?  It’s a terrible offense, he feels.

And as bad as the stuff with Thancred is, it’s ten time as worse for Estinien.  One of her fiances.  Leading up to her body being dropped off with them by her voidsent, he’d gotten into it with an absolutely irate Katsuro since - as usual - her brother was making himself the center of the issue.  Making it out like he had it the worst off due to his concerns about the soul connection bullshit (fair point, but the patches literally make you two independent people so shaddup).  And obviously this really pissed Estinien off since he had been sitting there dealing with a distraught Ysayle, knowing that they’d have to tell Aymeric about this, that they’d have to tell Allie - their newly adopted daughter - about this, and that their infant children would have to grow up without ever knowing Surkukteni.  He’s knowing he has to be the bearer of bad news and already thinking to how they’ll have to cope without her and how many more people this affects with her being gone.

Estinien is the one who intercepts Diarmuid to keep the Scions from immediately attacking the freaky voidsent out of habit.  Estinien’s the one who rushes Surkukteni into the Ragnarok, immediately confronted by the reality of her condition and how utterly useless he is there.  Why’s he not as close to her as he wanted to be?  To not get in the way and so that those who are capable can have full access to help her through it.  He’s not distant.  He’s not sure she’s coming back from this.  He’s giving people space to work while he’s trying his damndest to console Ysayle and keep her and frankly himself from acting rashly - talking her down is a distraction from his own feelings winning over.  And yeah, for once in his life he’s finding himself praying to whoever may listen - the Fury, Twelve, whoever is out there - that they don’t have to return with a lifeless body and they can uphold their promise to Aymeric.  So needless to say when Surkukteni does pull through, he’s not leaving her side for the rest of the trip as it’s...really all he can do.

And fun addition because I’m deranged: Ysayle’s there and in the same fucking boat as the other two.  She’s a thaumaturge and gladiator canonically; even if I have her hone those skills further and take up Red Magic, there’s nothing she can do in that situation and would be equally as much of a burden as Thancred and Estinien and it fucking ruins her.  She’s inconsolable, she’s despondent, she’s a fucking wreck.  She’s still not fully convinced that this isn’t all some elaborate torment from one of the Hells - considering the trauma of very nearly dying twice combined with the conscious dreams I put her and Surkukteni through - and there’s not a lot people can do to convince her otherwise as it’s a paralyzing fear.  She finally was beginning to feel as if things would go well, and then this?  Worse is that she’s feeling this all so much more intensely because she and Surkukteni are quite literally soulmates, which isn’t anything either of them are aware of.  A connection tying them together as far back as their ancient selves that fucking shatters them should something come of the other, be it separated by the rift or premature death - see Surkukteni’s STB-SHB depression; see Ammut’s violent reaction upon Macchi’s death that made the voidsent that then killed Ammut feel so guilty about it that he carried it with him three-thousand years later; see Philomene’s despondence when Zirnghota was ripped from the Fourth to the Source; see Saoirse’s vicious campaign of her trying to find those that were close to her; see Cylva’s request after the role quests (that thank god you can only outright deny) and own issues in combination with Saoirse’s “disappearance”, her brother’s “disappearance,” the destruction of the Thirteenth, etc. - and of course, see the rampage Charon went on when Khione died, leaving them a broken and vengeful mess that consumed them during the End Days.

So when Surkukteni pulled through, Ysayle was on her immediately.  There was no separating them, not that anyone had the heart to.  Even if it did physically hurt to be crushed in her suffocating embrace, Surkukteni couldn’t say anything about it to stop her and remained like that until they were moved somewhere private so the three of them - Surkukteni, Ysayle, and Estinien - could have some time alone after all of that chaos.

...Yeah needless to say, no one’s okay and there’s a lot of guilt, frustration and anguish.

[motheatenscarf]

Alright, lore bombs aside, man they are doing such a good job at making the Scions more likable and fun to interact with. Y'shtola and Urianger especially.

Urianger got a really sweet moment with Ryne by comforting her back when she was still Minfilia. Reminded me that he was literally the only one to express horror and concern at how traumatized the twins must be after the Bahamut Coils. It was played for laughs then, and his connection to them through the whole Warriors of Darkness thing was clumsily handled, so I kinda dismissed him as an emotionally driven character despite the crack in his mask after Moenbryda got fridged. He's still odd, but they're letting him a.) take ownership of how weird he is, which makes him fun, and b.) making sure to take the time to show him in quiet moments of empathy and connection so he comes across as sweet and particularly good with the kids. That is something this group has NEEDED. I'm really coming around on him, I'm legit glad he's here.

Y'shtola was always at her most likable when she was catty and acerbic, so I'm glad they're leaning into that and having people react accordingly. She really took Thancred to task for how he was behaving around Ryne, and she's even more sarcastic than ever and is the only one able to talk to Emet without giving in to his taunts. They're also letting her relax and have fun and tell more jokes now, though, like how she laughed at herself for how reckless she was in yeeting herself off a cliff to secure an antidote to save the Night's Blessed. We finally got back to the Crystarium, and she full on berated Talia telling her that she was FORBIDDEN from helping or lifting a damn finger and needed to rest. Talia got to be sassy with her and replied, "Yes, mother," before sulking off, but not before Y'shtola said something to the effect of, "Girl, try it, I will spank you," and I have never laughed harder at someone talking back to Talia before. There is a genuine fondness from the way she's catty and short with people, yes both puns were intended there.

I absolutely buy that both she and Urianger are fond of the WoL now.

Amazing what like... competency in humanizing your characters and giving them consistent and present personalities does for them! Not just using them as fonts of information when the story demands it! Letting them have feelings and react to things!! More of this!!!!!

[dezemberzwolf]

Ff14 for 3 and 5, and zenos with 6 and 8

fandom ask meme!! ask me.... memes >:3

thamk u ilu....

3. which scene I would like to erase from the universe and why.

it technically was erased from the universe via retcon but every time someone mentions to me about the original moenbryda minion desc. that implied urianger was creepy towards her it makes me want to bite the writer again. also yknow what?? the lancer quest where foulques dies. my boy deserves to live so many other random ass shitty npcs get to live. like ok foulques was a dick but like he was a dick because every he knows decided to be racist at him and he HAD a POINT. like maybe some people deserved a stabbing. and yet 'known canon rapist npc ungust' gets to live? im sure theres 800 other things ill think of later bc its not as if the game is free of weird narrative choices, but ill be real. most of the time theres something where im like "this shouldnt Exist" i just vaporize and rewrite it in my mind LMAO. hear me out about werlyt

5. the scene from it that lives in my head rent free.

everything urianger has ever said in his entire life and also 90% of shadowbringers. its really good. for no particular character reason i think a whole lot about when you and the scions go to storm eulmore and u walk in on vauthry and ryne immediately screams 'no, make him stop' bc hes eating a pile of meol and i know. i know. in my heart. that if it wasnt gonna be too heavy gore and a bunch of graphics, the story intended that to be read as him ripping into and eating that lion sin eater that always sat in that exact spot. i know in my heart they ran in on him mid transformation eating a lion raw with his hands. i know this. shadowbringers is normal and fine for everyone involved.

also yknow in endwalker after [6.0 SPOILERS BEGIN] meteion reveals thancred is dead, urianger speaks and she immediately turns to him and goes 'youre full of loathing and dont even know why you still exist here'. that fucks me up every day. do you know how much has to happen for urianger, whose entire motivations this entire time is that he loves people so so much, to Actively Loathe you. to Hate a scared child. and he hates her because she killed thancred. and he doesnt know why its never him who gets to be the one sacrificed. im fine thats fine [END 6.0 SPOILERS]

6. the scene that I think shows just how awesome they really are.

The final fight with him here he speaks to the wol "not as a hero, but as an adventurer", and asks if your journey was a blessing or a curse. I like zenos because he is very much an exact foil for Laurel and that scene just shows that. hes aware of how close they are, and he cares.. he wants to know if someone 'like him', as the wol is, ever actually had a chance to live a life that could be enjoyable. he's trying to connect this entire time the only way he can understand you... i get if people dislike zenos. tbh im like, zenos agnostic outside of the context of him and the wol LOL but. i think at the end hes able to show that he really truly did connect with the wol. he managed to make a bond and some kind of understanding.

at least, with a wol like laurel.... with my other WoLs its like "YOU DONT GET SHIT GO AWAY!!!!!!" poor zenos. anyways him calling you an adventurer instead of a hero at the very end is neat. he cares about you he wants to understand very badly. he loves laurel hes her princess ok in this zenoswol laurel essay i will,

8. a headcanon I have about this character.

theres so much horny zenos fanart and i respect this i understand where it comes from but im also like. this man does not practically know what sex is and cannot flirt. he has only the hunt. if he fucks he does it almost by accident and it started as a fistfight or he has to be instructed into it. he has never seen pussy before. the wols gotta give him a diagram bc he understands concept but not execution. hes got other priorities.

also in In From The Cold when he possesses the wol the actual first thing he does is fall flat on his face because the center of gravity is way too different and hes not used to walking. and laurel specifically is lightly digitigrade and trekking around the snow in stiletto heels zenos gets into her body stand dramatically and then immediately eats shit because what the fuck how are you standing up like this.