YoshiP “Torn" Over What to do with the Scions (Interview)

Honestly, they just need a good writer who can make them laugh, fight and have a ... I don't know a PERSONALITY beyond being plotdrivers and exposition dumps.
I've had time to think on this, I don't feel like it's an issue of the Scions arcs being over, or them being boring. It's their writing being boring and them being used for plot reasons and not to show how they FEEL or THINK about situations, they don't have their PERSONAL goals, they just TALK about them.

SHOW, don't TELL

I like traveling places of significance with Scions that have strong narrative connections to them, sure. I would have even been happy if we had all traveled to Tural, gone our separate ways, and in our journey around the nation we would have seen the learning/inspirational impact each one would have had, and at most we would have traveled with Krile at our hip to give her more emphasis on the much greater impact the nation was supposed to have to her story while we mentored Wuk Lamat in what it means to be an adventurer but also bear great responsibility on our shoulders.

Instead we got paraded around like the entourage to a Taylor Swift Tural Tour, constantly praising Wuk Lamat without offering a single word of criticism or encouragement to try new approaches to situations. Every single character was overshadowed by that NPC when she was on-screen, and off-screen there was actual growth and development with other characters because they had room to speak and to share their thoughts. We didn't even have to hold Lamat's hand; we could have just been a referee, adventuring leisurely while monitoring all four Promises during the competition without being used as a gatcha-five-star golden character that we were actually used for by Lamat in order to win. Every place we went there was almost no opposition to Lamat, and yet the issue brought forth was that she hadn't 'achieved' anything. Good God, she didn't even know about the cultures of the nation she was supposed to rule; why was the learning process to becoming Dawnservant happening NOW? Of all times? The Scions had very little to do with any of the proceedings and were there for flavor. I've never felt Y'shtola so out of place before, and while she isn't one of my favorite Scions I still think these characters deserved more than what we got.

To put it more succinctly: we could have had very little time with the other Scions in contrast to the new characters and it still would have made the intended mark if they hadn't pushed Wuk Lamat down our throats so gorram much. There is so much wrong with the set-up and that character that it was a genuine slap to the face for me. I don't have much to complain about the other encounters, only to think back on what could have been, what should have been, and what we ended up getting. A distracted Yoshi-P (being split between projects and direction) didn't help this entire ordeal, that's for sure.

I will rethink my desire to follow patiently along the MSQ if they make Wuk Lamat a bloody Scion. For all that is holy, leave her on the damn island and let us leave her behind.

I'm lukewarm on most of the scions, I think most of them could still be interesting if you cut the cast down to a single one on each expansion kinda like what they teased with Krile in DT before leaving her with nothing to do for 90% of it.

Only character I fully want them to retire is Estinien. I hate that he had to show up in DT just to deal with remote controlled cannon fodder, and I hate that his personality seems to have changed from "gruff soldier with a heart of gold" to a freespirited wanderer who loves travelling and fighting. It just weakens his ending from Heavensward to me.

If you're going to have them around, have them do stuff and not just be set pieces. Otherwise, don't have them at all. Easy enough.

Just make them side characters like you did with Cid.

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Originally Posted by Kusanagi7

Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't shtola supposed to be dying cuz she went into midstream or am I misremembering?

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She's not dying per se, but Matoya says that Yshtola's using her own aether to "see" which can shorten her lifespan if done in excess. We also don't know how often Yshtola actually does it... she could possibly just be functionally blind a lot of the time and just uses aether in bursts when there's something she needs to pay attention to or examine.

Of course if the writers were so inclined, they could certainly accelerate this at some point in the future for drama or something, but I feel like she's had so many fakeout deaths at this point that they wouldn't do that unless they were reeeeaaally out of ideas

Speaking of the Scions of the Seventh Dawn. There's a lot more members than just the Circle of Knowing members, the Twins, Krile, G'raha, and Estinien.

We've missed out on countless opportunities over the years to flesh out Riol, the Boulder brothers, Coultenet, Aenor, Clemence, Aergmhus, Bloumwyda, Alianne, Isildaure, Homei, Ephemie, and Wigstan.

Yes, I had to use a Wiki to look up the ones I couldn't remember (and are still alive).

Our friends absolutely could've taken a break (except for Krile, Estinien, and G'raha) and any of the others could have taken their places in Duty Support in this supposed "fresh start".

Arenvald is literally the only other Scion to have gained relevance and he's wheelchair-bound now.

IMO they should go back to doing the Heavensward approach (minus a bunch of them disappearing): Have one or two Scions be relevant and have the others stand back. There's still a few they can build on as characters (Y'shtola... please...).

Scions need to be side characters or not even appear in 8.0, I mean they kind of were side characters 7.0, but you still brought them around for some reason, I don't mind scions showing up once in a while they're your friends but lets be real they have had character development and we know that they're never going to be in any real danger because that would annoy the fans of that character it's kind of too late at this point.

I hope they introduce a new cast, I'll just give a example here but imagine exploring a new shard with a group that mostly comes from that place, having risks involved such as characters not all surviving, if this "new" cast was written decently you'd possibly be able to have something pretty interesting going on. then the only issue would be the WOL's power level being so high which can be solved by either the nature of the shard or some event that puts the WOL more down to earth, which isn't perfect, but the story should still focus on how the WOL interacts with the group instead of one person in the group being the new center making the main character a side character...

I'm not saying it's easy to write stories, I'd have no clue where to start, but depending on the scions isn't going to work out, theirs pretty much nothing interesting you can do with them anymore.

Give them stuff to do, and more character development, or get them out of the way. If the writers have an actual story they want to tell with the twins, for example, that's fine, but don't bring them along just to meet the quota for Duty Support.

Bizarre to me that they made it so the Scions would "disband" and all go to their own ways, opening the perfect opportunity to have the WoL to go to Tural alone (and this would even help justify the emphasis on Wuk Lamat so much, even if just a little bit), but then they just force the Scions in anyway just to have them stand around and do nothing.

I think they had two paths: Keep the scions and make it a typical expansion, or remove the scions and try something different. But they wanted to have it both ways, and the result ended up sitting poorly with most people. Either they are significant to the story, or they shouldn't be in at all.

Honestly, Krile's writing was the most insane to me. They put her front and center going into the expansion as she complains "I don't want to be left behind anymore" and then make a whole ass expansion where you could remove all mentions and instances of Krile and absolutely nothing would change in the least.

He needs to figure out how to fix the tank and healer problem before he worries about the scions.

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Originally Posted by Bunyon

Bizarre to me that they made it so the Scions would "disband" and all go to their own ways,

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Which didn't even last through the next line in the very same cut scene and was pretty clearly just an excuse to get the Eorzean Alliance to stop dropping every single problem on the Scions all the time.

Dealing with the scions is easy:
Thancred, Y’shtola and Uri get retired to the First as they have family there
Twins are busy in Garlemald
Estinian is on a walkabout
Kyle and Graha are in the annex
Tataru is in business meetings

There you go, pull them out as needed or leave them there. No need to kill them like some want as that would paint yourself into a corner story wise.

If we need information, link pearls fix that.

Ultimately, the japanese subscribers will determine the fate of the scions, that much's apparent. Not gonna bother going to deep into what I'd like but I'd like to see them go away, their time ran out; they reached the end of their line. They fulfilled Louisoix's dream of uniting the world in endwalker; they're now sticking around for fun. When you stick around for "fun" you have no real story arch or story growth left.

I liked how they were used in DT but going past DT xiv needs something fresh and different. Another 9 years of scions is not the right move.

SE already has a track record of trying to please everyone and coming to an awkward if not downright terrible middle ground and I'm not surprised to see it again with how the Scions were handled this expansion.
I was in the group of people who wanted to see the Scions retired. Throughout the course of the entire saga my opinions of them have certainly fluctuated but by the end of EW I felt like I was ready to be absolutely rid of some of them and others I simply wouldn't have minded not seeing again anytime soon. One can imagine how much I rolled my eyes when they showed up in the trailer for DT, but I knew we weren't going to be rid of them that easily so whatever.

I want to adventure with fresh blood. Which makes Wuk Lamat's poor arc and writing all the more disappointing to me because SE will likely shelve her because of the bad reception she's been getting. I'm not particularly fond of Krile or Erenville but I am baffled by the lack of screentime they got despite the relevance they should have had.

Alphinaud and Alisae's presence made sense I guess so I didn't mind them too much. Thancred and Urianger's role in the story made me laugh because oh my god this is the Xth time Urianger has been a duplicitous freak (not really but still). Y'sthtola really had no point being there and I absolutely groaned when G'raha showed up. I knew he was going to appear at some point because of that damn taco eating moment in the trailer, but I wish he had just stayed home all the same.

The only one whose presence didn't make me roll my eyes was... unexpectedly... Estinien. Ironically it was because he really had no role in the story other than to show up and be a chill dude that made him a welcome sight for sore eyes for me. It was actually kinda fun seeing him do his thing and I was left looking forward to bumping into him again, whenever that might be. I wish I felt that way about the other Scions.

I still strongly believe that they should be retired and we're given some new characters to interact with. But if they are hellbent on using them still, cycle them in/out and use the ones that can actually have relevance to the story. Someone mentioned earlier having the NPCs out in the overworld somewhere so the people who like them can still visit even if they're not currently in the story.

@The Scions:I've had the right amount of you.

Just bench the scion for 1 expansion then come back with fresh new stories to bring them back.

Or better instead of fetch quests, introduce long sidequest where the Scions are part of.

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Originally Posted by Laerune

Just bench the scion for 1 expansion then come back with fresh new stories to bring them back.

Or better instead of fetch quests, introduce long sidequest where the Scions are part of.

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Or role quests ? Those could feature them.