Would you be ok with a good rival figure for 7.0+?(6.0 spoilers)

Rival idea: They have the Echo, but it makes them see things through another person's eyes in the present. Combined with echo vision sharing, like how WoL sees Mikoto's future vision, and the ability to share it at a distance, this gives them some ability to control the flow of information within the story.

In the narrative, this means that the player character can now have more of the meta info that's usually reserved just for the player.

This is an interesting thought. They already do have a starting framework for an 'alternative' Echo with the Resonant that they haven't fully explored, given that it theoretically allows them to predict and perfectly evade incoming attacks.

From a story perspective, the primary narrative function of the Echo is to help the audience become more sympathetic to characters, by showing us the causes and influences in a flashback that made a them the way that they are. I wonder if the reverse of this, peering into others' futures to see only the bad outcomes (i.e. the consequences without the causes) would make someone more cynical.

As for branching decisions, I think that solutions like NG+ only work if it's just a once off difference that affects a specific cutscene, like Bozja or the Qitari Tribe quests. The problem arises when you want to set up a flag based off of the decision a character picked which influences future events. Do you set up something similar to the 'Reflect Quest Progression' option in The Unending Journey, which allows you to toggle the how the scene plays out with decision effect on or off?

We already have a rival and anti-hero with a different form of the Echo.

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Originally Posted by nighttimebunny

We already have a rival and anti-hero with a different form of the Echo.

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I agree, Krile should get a top-credited role in 7.0.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

I agree, Krile should get a top-credited role in 7.0.

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No way, I hate her, if I could I would kick her of a Mountain or leave her at the end of the Stars. I don't want even do any of her Quests.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

I agree, Krile should get a top-credited role in 7.0.

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Justice for Yoshi P forgetting to have the artists include her in the poster ):<

I think any rival would be treading dangerous ground with the player base. You’d need to make them simultaneously believable and extremely powerful to match the WoL, Zenos more or less took several expansions to get to where most didn’t outright hate him and even then it’s still mixed. Its a hard balance.

Maybe when we go exploring we find another lands WoL equivalent, have a few fights, see them in action a few times, and then have the story push us in different directions. I can imagine facing the “hero of Meracydia” would be fun.

The notion of someone being mad at Krile is weird to me, she doesn't even register to me as a strong enough character to garner emotional response one way or the other. It's like getting mad at a light breeze.

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Originally Posted by EaraGrace

Justice for Yoshi P forgetting to have the artists include her in the poster ):<

I think any rival would be treading dangerous ground with the player base. You’d need to make them simultaneously believable and extremely powerful to match the WoL, Zenos more or less took several expansions to get to where most didn’t outright hate him and even then it’s still mixed. Its a hard balance.

Maybe when we go exploring we find another lands WoL equivalent, have a few fights, see them in action a few times, and then have the story push us in different directions. I can imagine facing the “hero of Meracydia” would be fun.

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I like the idea of meeting and fighting the local 'great hero', but then I remembered that... well, we got that. That's Ran'jit. Even your example framework was essentially that; we fought Ran'jit in Lakeland, Amh Araeng and Eulmore, and saw him in action without fighting in the Crystarium (to a degree), Il Mheg, and Rak'tika. Hell, you even have to do the fights in a similar structure just to make sure it maintains both variety and believability of fighting someone who could beat you; you fight them equally in the first matchup until they pull out something new and interesting to stop the fight, then in the second fight you go up against and beat that new thing only for the to pull out a last-ditch trick when they're on the ropes, and third fight you go up against the whole repertoire. Stormblood Zenos was roughly the same, too.

I'm not even saying that as something against the structure, I think that structure's the best you could make for it in part because it's definitely a structure that'd work for our own jobs (Summoner as an example, first fight is Bahamut stopped by the egis, second fight is the egis stopped by Phoenix, third fight is Bahamut, the egis and Phoenix). I'm just saying that this structure wasn't popular the last two times we got it.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

The notion of someone being mad at Krile is weird to me, she doesn't even register to me as a strong enough character to garner emotional response one way or the other. It's like getting mad at a light breeze.



I like the idea of meeting and fighting the local 'great hero', but then I remembered that... well, we got that. That's Ran'jit. Even your example framework was essentially that; we fought Ran'jit in Lakeland, Amh Araeng and Eulmore, and saw him in action without fighting in the Crystarium (to a degree), Il Mheg, and Rak'tika. Hell, you even have to do the fights in a similar structure just to make sure it maintains both variety and believability of fighting someone who could beat you; you fight them equally in the first matchup until they pull out something new and interesting to stop the fight, then in the second fight you go up against and beat that new thing only for the to pull out a last-ditch trick when they're on the ropes, and third fight you go up against the whole repertoire. Stormblood Zenos was roughly the same, too.

I'm not even saying that as something against the structure, I think that structure's the best you could make for it in part because it's definitely a structure that'd work for our own jobs (Summoner as an example, first fight is Bahamut stopped by the egis, second fight is the egis stopped by Phoenix, third fight is Bahamut, the egis and Phoenix). I'm just saying that this structure wasn't popular the last two times we got it.

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Never underestimating the dislike that a person on the internet can develop is unfortunately a common lesson :p. Minfilia was frequently shit on despite being similar to Krile. People have their own reasoning I suppose.

Ranjit was actually exactly who I was thinking of. The issue with him (and Zenos) I think has to do with the fact that they were planned to be temporary at the start (with Zenos becoming more important once the road to SHB and EW became clear). Any rival character I think would need to be planned for multiple expansions and designed accordingly. Ranjit worked for the most part right up until the final fight in Eulmore, where they just kind of threw him to the side in favor of Vauthry. I think if you have that rival stick as a presence in the story you could avoid the issues that Zenos and Ranjit had.

I find it a little odd how we never seem to run into any new heroes who can hold a candle to us or even the Scions.

The leaders of the Eorzean Alliance's city states and their close associates like Yugiri, Pipin, and Lyse are implied be as competent as the latter, but others like people of the First and Thavnair seem to have no such figures to rally behind who can routinely be around to aid them as both the Exarch and Vrtra were implied to be more of a behind the scenes presence and it's made clear that no one in their respective armies is even close to as competent.

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Originally Posted by KageTokage

I find it a little odd how we never seem to run into any new heroes who can hold a candle to us or even the Scions.

The leaders of the Eorzean Alliance's city states and their close associates like Yugiri, Pipin, and Lyse are implied be as competent as the latter, but others like people of the First and Thavnair seem to have no such figures to rally behind who can routinely be around to aid them as both the Exarch and Vrtra were implied to be more of a behind the scenes presence and it's made clear that no one in their respective armies is even close to as competent.

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...that's Ran'jit again. The hero of his people, if not by our external view. And Captain Lyna, if we want to count her.

I think I'm mostly saying it would be a refreshing change of pace have someone on the level of Ran'jit or Zenos who's not a villain, but our assistance is nonetheless needed mostly for the sake of addressing matters that can't be solved with brute force.

It would also be refreshing get a final boss the Scions and others can actually help us with via trusts and they don't either end up separated from us or thoroughly trounced beforehand.

Looking back on it, I feel like our true "rival" was actually Elidibus not Zenos. He was the one that we were actually at odds with most of the last several years. Zenos just feels like a stalker. I wouldn't mind a rival character if it was a more developed version of Elidibus, i.e. someone who actually feels like a continuous threat to the WoL and co and just isn't some guy following us around yelling "fight me!"

I did the final fights of the last several expansions as whm, and while whm has some amazing af, since HW it has been themed either "ball gown" or "nun" and so the big climatic fight always feels a bit silly. As did years of Zenos always wanting to fight my 100lbs when wet Au Ra, who is half his size. I don't really know how much could be done for it since Zenos was clearly designed to be physically imposing even if you are a max height Roe or male Au Ra. No matter what they do sometimes being this dainty dragon girl in a long dresses/robes that everyone runs screaming from is going to feel a bit out of place.

. . . I'll keep my ball gowns though.

That said Zenos was also dressed to the nines for the EW fight, so I felt like we should have been having some sort of posh dance off at the end of the universe instead of a brawl.

To answer OP's question: no.

For the simple fact of all of us have our own views of our WoLs. That's why Zenos doesn't work for so many people. There is no one size fits all rival.

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Originally Posted by Naria

Looking back on it, I feel like our true "rival" was actually Elidibus not Zenos. He was the one that we were actually at odds with most of the last several years. Zenos just feels like a stalker. I wouldn't mind a rival character if it was a more developed version of Elidibus, i.e. someone who actually feels like a continuous threat to the WoL and co and just isn't some guy following us around yelling "fight me!"

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Just Zenos with a sign saying “Fight Me” like this outside of Sharlayan.

https://i.imgur.com/mCJ3J1x.jpg

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Originally Posted by Naria

That said Zenos was also dressed to the nines for the EW fight, so I felt like we should have been having some sort of posh dance off at the end of the universe instead of a brawl.

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Any rival needs to have constant outfit changes, just make them the new Rowena.

I think Elidibus effectively disqualified himself from being a worthwhile 'rival' when Zenos showed up in the body of Imperial Soldier A, chased Elidibus out of his own body, and permanently put an end to Elidibus' plan to kill millions with the Black Rose. When the real villain shows up, beats you at a massive disadvantage, and then tells you that your evil plan is just cringe, you really need to rethink your life goals.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

I think Elidibus effectively disqualified himself from being a worthwhile 'rival' when Zenos showed up in the body of Imperial Soldier A, chased Elidibus out of his own body, and permanently put an end to Elidibus' plan to kill millions with the Black Rose. When the real villain shows up, beats you at a massive disadvantage, and then tells you that your evil plan is just cringe, you really need to rethink your life goals.

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This is still hilarious to me.

Much rather have a “betrayal, corruption” ensue from within the circle of people you’ve met; a drastic change

Had enough with this scions, wol, evil bad,

We need sonething original rather than far antagonize one or two key figures,

Incite conflict & unusual trusts amongst themselves; Scions & grand companies,

No more blessing this, chosen whatever,

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Originally Posted by Vencio

Much rather have a “betrayal, corruption” ensue from within the circle of people you’ve met; a drastic change

Had enough with this scions, wol, evil bad,

We need sonething original rather than far antagonize one or two key figures,

Incite conflict & unusual trusts amongst themselves; Scions & grand companies,

No more blessing this, chosen whatever,

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That was 2.x.

...and 2.0, actually, with Lahabrea sabotaging the Scions while possessing Thancred.

To be honest I felt that, in a sense, they hit the right notes with the Warriors of Darkness when they first appeared. Granted it was a deception but it was still an interesting concept. I mean, look at the first meeting we had with them - the Scions hurrying to combat a Primal only to find that the Warriors of Darkness got there first and had already defeated it, essentially doing something that, technically, only 'we' were supposed to be able to achieve at that point. And they were presented as being capable enough to fight the Ascians in their time, and were at least a match for the Scions and WoL.

And that isn't to say that the direction the story took with them was disappointing though, as it really wasn't - but it was certainly an interesting scenario.

And I don't enjoy Zenos in any way, shape or form and find his motivation a bit silly - his singlemindedness means he doesn't appear to have a true endgame*. I presume that, if he won, he'd pretty much have to return to sitting around being bored all the time. it is the epitome of the 'And then what?' trope.

* I have to note that I say 'appear' since I'm only in the early Endwalker stage of the game and therefore not privy to the part he plays later on.

I dont really need a "Rival". If they decide to do it.... ok. But Im happy to go on new Adventures with my Buddies the Scions.

Rivals are tricky, because they are essentially forcing the player character to form a somewhat meaningful relationship with the antagonistic character, because they are a crucial story element and an important figure when it comes to molding your character and their story. Thus, if you don't end up liking your rival, or don't feel that they should have such a big influence on your character and their story, it can get pretty obnoxious. I feel like that's partly why a lot of people don't really enjoy Zenos.

The thing is, there are very few antagonists and villains who specifically have an interest in the WoL. Most of the time WoL is just an annoyance who is foiling the villains plans, and need to be taken care of. That is the most that usually happens. But with Zenos, his story eventually revolves around the WoL, and WoL meets his first match in Zenos, thus it's hard to really ignore his presence if you don't end up enjoying what he is bringing to the table. That's why it's really hard to implement a rival, especially one that stick around for several expansions.

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Originally Posted by Tehmon

The thing is, there are very few antagonists and villains who specifically have an interest in the WoL. Most of the time WoL is just an annoyance who is foiling the villains plans, and need to be taken care of. That is the most that usually happens. But with Zenos, his story eventually revolves around the WoL, and WoL meets his first match in Zenos, thus it's hard to really ignore his presence if you don't end up enjoying what he is bringing to the table. That's why it's really hard to implement a rival, especially one that stick around for several expansions.

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There are a few unfinished "villain" characters that could potentially fit the bill for a rival. I keep tossing Noah Gabranth out there simply because of how he has a vision, will take a back seat if somebody will get it for him, tends to be manipulative, and in general just feels like somebody who could be our friend at one moment and an enemy at another, and probably have no hard feelings between us. A case of "I understand what you're doing, I applaud what you're aiming for...but I'm fighting you because I don't agree with the method."

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

There are a few unfinished "villain" characters that could potentially fit the bill for a rival. I keep tossing Noah Gabranth out there simply because of how he has a vision, will take a back seat if somebody will get it for him, tends to be manipulative, and in general just feels like somebody who could be our friend at one moment and an enemy at another, and probably have no hard feelings between us. A case of "I understand what you're doing, I applaud what you're aiming for...but I'm fighting you because I don't agree with the method."

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Spoilers for Bozja

Misija came close to that for me, but the no hard feelings wasn’t exactly met lol

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Originally Posted by EaraGrace

Spoilers for Bozja

Misija came close to that for me, but the no hard feelings wasn’t exactly met lol

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ten letters

for the life of me i just cant bring myself to sympathize with misija and the garleans. especially when they resorted to tempering and experimental super soldiers.

I think that there absolutely should be hard feelings. We've had an overly amicable relationship with most prior antagonists to date. Villains start off as cartoon villain chaotic evil, complete with wide eyes and maniacal grin aimed at the ceiling, and then get rehabilitated into relatable, sympathetic, and tragic antiheros as we get to know them better (because everyone is good and wonderful deep down when they set aside the crazy). The problem is that neither end of this spectrum is particularly intimidating, which is what you really want in an opponent. Most of the assorted Ascians that we've killed off seem to have attended the Ardyn Izunia school for the dramatic arts, but none of them managed to successfully exude the sheer amount of menace that he did. They're interesting characters but not effective villains. Most of the really memorable Final Fantasy villains definitely made things personal.

Lolorito is probably one of the few antagonists that we've faced off against that doesn't really fit the above mold, in part because you're not usually allowed much emotional insight into his actions. He's also fairly calculated in his moves, rather than having an overarching plan to 'cause random mayhem'. His primary disadvantage is that he's not particularly menacing. But you could take a few pointers from his character.

I think that they should give the misguided yet relatable lunatics a rest for a bit and try to create an opponent for us that is not easy to read or relate to and is genuinely menacing. And most importantly of all, make them unapologetically malicious towards us when they finally show their hand. Not because the world happened to break them. But because they are specifically are out to break us.

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

There are a few unfinished "villain" characters that could potentially fit the bill for a rival. I keep tossing Noah Gabranth out there simply because of how he has a vision, will take a back seat if somebody will get it for him, tends to be manipulative, and in general just feels like somebody who could be our friend at one moment and an enemy at another, and probably have no hard feelings between us. A case of "I understand what you're doing, I applaud what you're aiming for...but I'm fighting you because I don't agree with the method."

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Further Bozja spoilers.

Gabranth is dead; he was dying of natural causes, but possibly killed anyway. Actually, the only notable characters in the IVth Legion explicitly stated to still be alive and un-captured are Lyon, Pagaga, and Sicinius (the scientist); there's a couple others like Clarricie who were alive last we saw them, but got no presence in the epilogue.

Misija was good for what she was, but what she was wasn't supposed to be 'sympathetic rival character'. You're supposed to recognize that she had a point and a valid reason why she took the stance she did, but that those reasons didn't excuse the actions she took--but as a flipside, that the actions she took do not invalidate her reasons for doing so.

She was inevitably kinda gonna get taken poorly by the playerbase, because she does stand at odds with what the FFXIV playerbase has historically liked out of villains; as an overall community, we like a sympathetic enemy with emotionally relatable motivations, even if their plan is bonkers-ass nonsense (hell, I'd argue especially if their plan is bonkers-ass nonsense; the nonsense means the cost is abstracted and only the motivations remain humanized). We're less inclined to like someone whose motivation is largely grounded in fact, no matter how correct that fact may be.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Misija was good for what she was, but what she was wasn't supposed to be 'sympathetic rival character'. You're supposed to recognize that she had a point and a valid reason why she took the stance she did, but that those reasons didn't excuse the actions she took--but as a flipside, that the actions she took do not invalidate her reasons for doing so.

She was inevitably kinda gonna get taken poorly by the playerbase, because she does stand at odds with what the FFXIV playerbase has historically liked out of villains; as an overall community, we like a sympathetic enemy with emotionally relatable motivations, even if their plan is bonkers-ass nonsense (hell, I'd argue especially if their plan is bonkers-ass nonsense; the nonsense means the cost is abstracted and only the motivations remain humanized). We're less inclined to like someone whose motivation is largely grounded in fact, no matter how correct that fact may be.

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Honestly, all they needed to do to make me have a higher opinion of her would've been to just not make her so senselessly vindictive and sadistic towards the Resistance and its allies as a whole, especially Mikoto.

Fordola was in a similar position, but only ever seems angry and frustrated with the lot she was dealt in life which made her feel worthy of sympathy even before her past comes to light, whereas Misija basically just degrades into a completely unlikable villain the instant she shows her true colors. Though Bozja as a whole kind of suffered from that with the 4th legion basically being team war crimes with how unapologetically evil virtually all of their notable characters were despite the supposedly great and honorable man their leader was.

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Originally Posted by KageTokage

Honestly, all they needed to do to make me have a higher opinion of her would've been to just not make her so senselessly vindictive and sadistic towards the Resistance and its allies as a whole, especially Mikoto.

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Okay, that's nice, but you've assumed you're supposed to. And I don't think you are.

Misija is basically a character made out of that 'Heartbreaking: Worst Person You Know Just Made A Great Point' Clickhole article. Yeah, she's by no means a good person, and kinda proves that every step of the way but the last; her final act to protect us from the Diablo Arrmament is basically the only good thing she ever does for anyone that isn't the Empire. But not one single sin of hers takes away from her entirely valid point that the IVth Legion genuinely does treat the common folk better. Hell, her saving us at the end was probably more out of that than the goodness of her heart; I think she saved Bajsaljen because he was the only person of authority in the Bozjan resistance to actually listen to her point; if he dies, nothing gets to change.

I think you like Fordola more in that way because you're actually supposed to like Fordola as a person. Misija is just a character with fundamentally different construction and intention, and while you could certainly improve her, I don't think the angle is to make her nicer. I sort of think the purpose of her character is to bring us that extreme of 'terrible person, still right', to show us that while lofty ideals don't forgive evil acts, so too do evil acts not invalidate lofty ideals.

I'd say her MSQ equivalent in that might not be Fordola, but of Emet-Selch's largely emotionally-driven exploration of the same thing. Emet-Selch did objectively bad things because of strong emotional reasons, can you forgive that? Similarly, Misija did objectively bad things because of a strong logical reason; can you forgive that? And if that's the intention, asking for Misija's point to be cut with sympathy before you think better of her sort of disarms the whole point of the question--or rather, says that your answer is most assuredly 'no'.

I think Misija's one of those difficult sorts of characters to talk about 'liking', because she kinda stands apart from all the other characters in the game in terms of how you're supposed to like her. Which is 'not as a person'.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

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imo her whole point is hurt because we're never shown the ivth interacting with civilians (iirc) but we do see them use expendable super soldiers and experiments. yeah we're told their laws help non garleans and the resistance leader adopts some of said laws but we never see it in action. granted it was a battlefield.

It's clear they knew a lot of people would dislike her given that the choices you're allowed to make in Zadnor, though not even her logic felt very sound when they did virtually nothing to humanize the 4th Legion and make them actually seem better then the Resistance in any way aside from lacking stuffy nobles/elites who trash talk their "lessers" behind their backs, which was offset by having compassionate leaders who desired the removal of the status quo (As opposed to Menenius who spares no words in making it clear how utterly expendable she was to them).

I guess she ultimately just didn't feel fulfilling to me on either front...though she did at least succeed at being one of the few characters other then Zenos I felt an intense desire to send to an early grave.

I think the Zadnor choices are as much about giving the reborn Bozja a moral framework as it is about Misija herself. Remember that she was going to be essentially the first case in the reborn Bozjan justice system; whether or not she gets a fair trial, regardless of how inevitable the verdict is, could be a huge tone-setter for the future, especially as they deal with Bozjans that joined the Legion.

I do think it could've helped to find a way to make the central core of Misija's point clearer by showing on-screen that the IVth Legion treat the common folk better. We do get a direct scene of the ex-upper-class members of the Bozjan resistance treating Misija like crap for being a commoner, and we do learn through field notes that the IVth Legion have people who never would've gotten a chance except through the IV Legion's meritocracy (Clarricie and Pagaga off the top of my head, as well as Misija herself), so we know that's clearly the established intention, but it could've used a direct scene about it as a 'say it louder for the people in the back' beat. Have a scene of Gabranth checking with Lyon or Menenius about that very thing, or something.

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Originally Posted by sidurgu-12

ten letters

for the life of me i just cant bring myself to sympathize with misija and the garleans. especially when they resorted to tempering and experimental super soldiers.

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Understandable.

Misija's problem is that she went off the deep end and took it out on everybody instead of just the nobles, and did a number of horrific things without being ordered to, such as what she did to the Blades by combining them. We can empathize, but dear god we had to take that crazy woman out.

The idea for the tempering and experimental super soldiers was Menenius. Not sure if I'm remembering wrong or if it's mentioned elsewhere, but wasn't Noah against all of that up until Save the Queen started? I speculate the discovery that he was going to die soon forced him to escalate his plans in a way he would not have ever wanted to take if not for that.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Further Bozja spoilers.

Gabranth is dead; he was dying of natural causes, but possibly killed anyway. Actually, the only notable characters in the IVth Legion explicitly stated to still be alive and un-captured are Lyon, Pagaga, and Sicinius (the scientist); there's a couple others like Clarricie who were alive last we saw them, but got no presence in the epilogue.

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About that...

Gabranth is SUPPOSEDLY dead. Except he was introduced to a scientist who can make perfect clones of people in everything from memory to aether signature. Shortly after, Lyon just betrays him when he has worked for both Noah and his father for decades, and doesn't give a damn unless there's a battle to fight, and it's mentioned that Noah didn't fight back? Since then Lyon gave the scientist up, and has been chased by the Resistance. And people have seen the "ghost" of Noah in places? I'm sorry, that sounds like Noah has been cloned, and Lyon is leading people on a goose chase after him to keep them far away from the clone. Noah ain't dead, he's going to show back up one of these days. Save the Queen may be done, but that doesn't mean he couldn't show back up again, especially since Matsuno said he was up for doing something else with the dev team.

Misija definitely had that common villain problem of having the goal to combat the glaring inequality of the status quo, but because their cruelty (caused by their understandable trauma) is not narrowly focused on the perpetrators and main beneficiaries alone of the imbalanced system = less sympathetic villain. Similar to Yotsuyu, and a lesser extent Fordola, and why Bozja felt like a continuation of SB. I was worried when she was first properly introduced as a character to establish pre-conquest Bozja's classism that she would be the villain, and thus not surprised with how she was developed. And while she never garnered the emotional attachment that Fordola did, at least I can say that I did feel something for her and that her ideals and loyalty had a point. It's funny you mention Emet Selch, because he never crossed over to sympathy or regret for killing him in Shadowbringers or Endwalker, but Misija earned my begrudging respect and a twinge of regret.

You're probably more likely to dislike a villain for demonstrating incompetence or weakness than you are for them doing something morally controversial, regardless of how it gets justified after the fact. They could be an absolute monster with no redeeming sob story to explain their actions, and people will still find ways to believe that deep down they're a jerk with a heart of gold if they're powerful or charismatic enough.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

You're probably more likely to dislike a villain for demonstrating incompetence or weakness than you are for them doing something morally controversial, regardless of how it gets justified after the fact. They could be an absolute monster with no redeeming sob story to explain their actions, and people will still find ways to believe that deep down they're a jerk with a heart of gold if they're powerful or charismatic enough.

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zenos being the former living definition of this for a lot of fans.