The Actual Problem With Dawntrail

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Originally Posted by FudoMyoo

Too high expectation(s) from player base. IMHO.

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They charged real money and released deluxe versions of it.

Like seriously what kind of argument it's that.

The whole MSQ could it be a 2 hours YouTube video from SE Because FF14 it's reaching the point of not being an online video game anymore.

the main thing wrong with dawntrail all comes back to the writing, the plotpoints and the premise was fine. the execution was really bad, the characters were really bad. the plotholes were really bad, scions not acting like themselves. the big bads had terrible idiotic motivations and ideas that made no fucking sense. zoraal ja is cool but wtf was his problem. his ideas were all vague and dumb and never properly addressed. sphene was just insulting, the constant overexplaining, handholding and repetitive boring writing and absolutely no feeling, no emotion. the npcs we meet seem lifeless. theyre only there to progress the main story. they dont feel like real people that live there.

which is what this game was so good at. the whole reason I love the story and im sure many of you can attest. is because they felt real, theyre deep and flawed and unique, they talk and act and behave and interact with eachother in such ways that we started caring about them. ive never cared so much for game npc characters in any game too date and ive been gaming since i was 8.

is there anyone here that has a new favorite character in dawntrail? one that tops any of the other characters? one that really stood out. one that if you watch a scene of them years later you still get tears in your eye?

ive been playing old tribe and crafting/gathering quest storylines from shb and endwalker. and theyre more interesting and better written than anything from the dawntrail msq

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Originally Posted by AngaratoSvartberg

scions not acting like themselves

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I specifically said to a friend during 6.4 that the scions didn't really feel like themselves. My specific words were "the scions have lost their voice and now they feel like different people". I was told I was overthinking it, but sadly I was vindicated in DT.
Go back and watch the EW patch cutscenes again. The scions feel like cliffnotes versions of themselves even then.

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is there anyone here that has a new favorite character in dawntrail? one that tops any of the other characters? one that really stood out. one that if you watch a scene of them years later you still get tears in your eye?

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Maybe not to the extent of the last point. But I actually really liked Bakool Ja Ja the mighty. I laughed at him at first as the goofy "Har har I'm the villain". He's also huge and buff; neat. But then when you got to the point in the story, where it explores why he is what he is, and the responsibility he is trying to bear... I actually grew to understand him a bit and I actually found myself connecting with him more..... and ...and... then they just "Lets be friendsed" it... and ... I just thought the missed a really good opportunity to flesh him out further... like the build-up was there, and they just dropped friendship on it, and kind of left me longing.

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Originally Posted by FudoMyoo

Too high expectation(s) from player base. IMHO.

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Yes heaven forbid we have basement levels of expectations.

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Originally Posted by StormChase

This may or may not be me about the kick a hornet's nest but I'll say it anyway.

I think a lot of players are missing the forest for the trees. Wuk Lamat isn't the problem.

If she wasn't around during most of the scenes where she is then it'd look like she's just sitting on her hands and doing nothing. The first half is her journey to leadership and the second half is how she handles leading. We can help her but we can't do the job for her. She has to be the driving force. When the game tried something like this in Stormblood there weren't many scenes showing Lyse's skills as a leader until the patches, and players thought she was unqualified because of it. The writers didn't want to repeat that.

I think the actual problem is this: Dawntrail is too short. 2.0 had about 160 quests (even more originally) to reintroduce players to Eorzea. 7.0 has only 100, even though we're exploring a whole new landmass and a nation from another shard. That's why these players feel exhausted. Everything is crammed together and there's not enough time to fully explore what the writers want to explore. Wuk Lamat takes the blame for this larger issue because she's the most prominent character.

Dawntrail isn't a bad expansion and the patches might improve it, but Square Enix should be less afraid to make longer expansions. I know a lot of people dislike A Realm Reborn for being tedious, but in the case of Dawntrail I think that kind of length could help.

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Dude... It may have the least ammount of quests but it still has the most time spent in cutscenes of any FFXIV expansion to date. It's almost 21 hours long.

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Originally Posted by Papayatar

I agree that Wuk Lamat is not solely the problem with DT, but her 24/7 presence was more like icing on somewhat edible cake.

I don’t agree that the story was too short though, the length is decent but I feel the split priorities between right of ascension arc and then cyber city arc hurt the story, and mostly because the merging of the two areas was a bit of whiplash when you get to the second half. Plus I think because they tied up like all the plot threads real quick making a lot of the story arcs seem short because how quickly issues were resolved.

I think if they had tied more of the golden city/S9 into the first part, like throughout the entire story and not just bits and pieces when we get to the Giants area. And also not doing the whole, you can’t see what the Golden City now come back later, thing either.

Then if we see it sooner or what have you then it wouldn’t feel like all these plot threads were rushed to finish. And then it could maybe set up Sphene for an heel turn type antagonist for later patches, kinda like Yotsusu getting more story and stuff later in StB.

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I'm guessing they did what they did with Shaaloani because they realized there wasn't much break time, so they wanted to give the player a breather before going right into the Alexandria stuff. Also to set up the whole deal with Erenville and his mom.

The main reason I think it's an issue with the expansion's length is because some story beats feel like they happened too soon and some feel like they happened too late. The point where Wuk Lamat admits she has a problem is at level 91. We don't get to see Alexandria and be actually introduced to Sphene until level 97, and we don't get much time with her before it's revealed she's a villain. Maybe if they cut out the Shaaloani part that could've helped, but I'm not sure if even that would be enough with 100 quests.

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Originally Posted by StormChase

I'm guessing they did what they did with Shaaloani because they realized there wasn't much break time, so they wanted to give the player a breather before going right into the Alexandria stuff. Also to set up the whole deal with Erenville and his mom.

The main reason I think it's an issue with the expansion's length is because some story beats feel like they happened too soon and some feel like they happened too late. The point where Wuk Lamat admits she has a problem is at level 91. We don't get to see Alexandria and be actually introduced to Sphene until level 97, and we don't get much time with her before it's revealed she's a villain. Maybe if they cut out the Shaaloani part that could've helped, but I'm not sure if even that would be enough with 100 quests.

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I looked up how many quests that section is. There are seven quests from the point you travel to Shaaloani to before the dome appears.

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Originally Posted by lolnotacat

Want a real kick in the balls? We literally resurrected a race of people who had placed their consciousness in robotic bodies and didn't even consider consulting them.

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They seemed to have taken the soft reboot idea seriously because it's almost like Endwalker never happened. Hardly any mention of the effects of the Endsinger or dynamis or anything aside from a few off-handed comments.

It's not so much the character as the Childish writing. If I were a tween then this would likely be fun. Trouble is, I don't think most players of the game are children any more.

The story could have been great. But the writers lets us down, the English localisation let us down, and whoever cast the English voices let us down.

At least, the one saving grace, we can tell people "Don't skip ARR with a story skip, because the story only gets worse than collecting ARR's cheese and wine"