About Wuk's strength [Ending spoilers]

I think this illustrates another issue with this character. We don't know much about her backstory other than she's a princess. She has had some fight training, but she seems to be capable of channeling aether as well. I don't like Lyse, but her backstory is known since we "lived" some of it with her.

Bakool Ja Ja is more a bully than a fighter. Once Wuk got over her self-doubt and found her resolve, she easily bested him in their duel. A lot of the dialogue during the fight is Bakool freaking out over the fact that Wuk is actually standing up against him. Zarool Ja also beat him in a single punch. He may have been born exceptionally strong, but that doesn't make him an exceptionally strong fighter. He has been relying on intimidating people with his natural strength but both times his intended victim stood up against him, he lost.

Quote:

---

What about Wuk then? What kind of heritage does Wuk have that she physically manages to surpass the Wol in one expansion by doing more damage for example against Sphene in the same fight? How can she suddenly suddenly block Sphene's attacks when not even a day ago, she was struggling against Kabool?

There's not a single logical explanation behind her sudden increase in strength, she doesn't wield any relics or actually had training wielding Dynamis. We're not even shown a single scene where the Wol trains her. I read the dialogue carefully but there's no hint of her having a special soul and she's been already around for her to be a reincarnated unsundered.

---

Honestly this is just gameplay over narrative. She is not stronger overall than the WoL. She has some seemingly stronger unique talents the WoL doesn't, but so do a lot of NPCs.

I'm wholly not against the use of dynamis for these situations but I feel like the expansion was very poorly paced, and Wuk's character development didn't feel like it hit properly for me. I feel like to really grow she should have failed more and really had a bigger moment of questioning everything she is and whether she was worthy of being dawnservant. I think she should have lost to contest to Koana or maybe even to Zoraal Ja (who would still go on to the city of gold in an attempt to get power to surpass/kill his dad and triggering the sequence of events).

They should have explored the limits of Wuk Lamat, and it would be towards the end that her resolve would win out and make it seem feel like the Dynamis was more earned. But I just never felt like she grew that much. Sure, she learned about her people and learn to ask for help, but... for an expansion that was hyper-focused on one character that just wasn't enough. The ending was just Wuk Lamat continuing to be "I will save everyone, yippee" as she was throughout the whole expansion

More key NPCs do more damage than the WOL, for an instance the Nier Raids.

This is why the whole concept of Dynamis is stupid. Are we supposed to believe if Wuk Lamat, the incompetent catgorl can now just pull it out of her ass through sheer determination that the Ancients couldn't? They were far more advanced and couldn't figure it out. Reminds me of the ending of FFXIII, the party comes back from being turned into roboid zombies by the roboid god curse just because of their friendship, implying that no one before them had the same kind of determination and had family members or friends they cared for enough to break through the curse. Just bad writing in my humble opinion.

It's the power of friendship my dudes.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Boblawblah

I'm not really a fan of using Dynamis as a reason for why someone is suddenly unstoppable. I feel it will lead to very lazy writing.

---

This here, so much this.
I like the introduction of Dynamis but it makes it way to easy to handwave stuff without a proper explanation.

I also have my problems with attributing Wuk's strengh to it alone.
Even for Dynamis there is a limit. The reason we are so good with it is that we are the Warrior of the stupid light, the main character and even then we mostly use it to break our limits like regenerating HP or limit breaks. We don't just do millions of damage.
Other characters are more in line with Thancred against Rajit, were he went beyond his limit.

Wuk Lamat managed to hold back the damn last boss, blocking his attacks, doing more damaged then all eight players combined and inspiring us.
That's not dynamis that's a writer wanting his character in the spotlight yet again.
If we would use Dynamis here to analyse that would mean that she became stronger then the WoL. While i won't say there can't be a person like that (Zenos came close) that's horrible writing.
Even if we use her getting stronger by beating Bagool JaJa and trading blows with Zural Ja that would mean that she has such an awesome growth that she surpassed us.

If the writers wanted to make her stronger then us sure whatever but then they can kiss my sub goodbye because I don't play this game to be reduced to an NPC or not even that, just the camera just so a writer can sleep well with the idea his written character is awesome. At least with this type of character.
If they want to do that then they should learn how to write and get to work.

Rant end. As someone who really cares for the MSQ this scene made me actually close the game.

They should have just made it so that she put everything into BLOCKING Sphene's attacks, and also made it so that healers had to make sure she was topped off during that victory lap, maybe have the boss aim a tankbuster at her as the mechs go off or something

I feel like that final trial would be way less contentious if she was on the defense putting everything she had into lessening any of Sphene's attacks instead of casually slapping the boss for 13 million damage

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Themarvin

More key NPCs do more damage than the WOL, for an instance the Nier Raids.

---

Yet from a gameplay perspective Wuk doing a crap ton of damage in a single hit is also terrible encounter design because it literally deprives us of having a longer victory lap, especially when people gain ilevels because the boss is going to be finished off by Wuk just slapping them in the face to steal the kill.

The best part of the EW last trial is literally the cutscene and victory lap, or at least the coolest part is, and while I don't think Wuk coming in is cool, some other people may love it, but because Wookie Sue wants to smack the boss so hard there isn't even time for the two to finish their dialogue lines before the boss keels over.

Okay so if using Dynamis is so simple even Wuk Lamat can do it with no experience, why doesn't everyone?