Wow, Wuk Lamat is really single-handedly ruining the DT story...

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Originally Posted by LisseyCrowe

Not to be a party pooper but I think you guys are thinking too hard about the rubber bullets, or at least backwards. That is to say, I was under the impression that the rubber bullets were exclusively for duels, not the other way around, hence the red-headed guy going "Using rubber bullets, of course", as if to bring attention to the fact that that's not the usual ammunition in those guns.

Granted it's still dumb, like someone got worried duels to the death would be too savage or uncivilized (which, to be fair, I agree with) but that's where you probably add a "If the duel ends in death, there are no winners and the killer gets jailed" rule instead to enforce some civility.

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I agree with you.

It's a stupid scene and no one would have said anything if they never mentioned the rubber bullets in the first place.
Just shoot the weapon out of the hand and done. No cringe rubber bingo, no eyeroll, not even blood.

The whole western thing was stupid anyway.
The only reason it is liked so much (me included) is because no Wuk.
It's just a really broing filler zone otherwise.

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Originally Posted by lolnotacat

You bring up a good point. They were trying to be "respectful" of cultures, but then they sanitize something that was a part of early American culture? Yes, duels didn't historically happen all the time like in the movies, but they did happen. Hell one of our founding fathers was killed in a duel with the vice president. And one of our presidents, Andrew Jackson was a notorious duelist.

If they didn't want to have the duel end in death, there are ways around it. Historically, many duels were about honor. Both participants would just shoot into the ground because they had no intention to harm each other. Also before the invention of rifling, a lot of duels just ended with both participants missing each other, shrugging their shoulders because honor was satisfied, and goin home.

Whatever "cultural sensitivities" CBU3 was adhering to seems to be directed towards a group of people who wouldn't care that they got American culture wrong.

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zone culture good unless they're guns obviously since guns bad. they should have just used NERF guns in that duel, at least it would have been funny.

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Originally Posted by localareanetwork

zone culture good unless they're guns obviously since guns bad. they should have just used NERF guns in that duel, at least it would have been funny.

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I was promised a vacation, at least make them water guns.

Dawntrail MSQ is quite the experience, I will never forget Wuk Lamat 137 times talking to her for my quest.

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Originally Posted by LisseyCrowe

Not to be a party pooper but I think you guys are thinking too hard about the rubber bullets, or at least backwards. That is to say, I was under the impression that the rubber bullets were exclusively for duels, not the other way around, hence the red-headed guy going "Using rubber bullets, of course", as if to bring attention to the fact that that's not the usual ammunition in those guns.

Granted it's still dumb, like someone got worried duels to the death would be too savage or uncivilized (which, to be fair, I agree with) but that's where you probably add a "If the duel ends in death, there are no winners and the killer gets jailed" rule instead to enforce some civility.

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It's a symptom- of the sanitation of the whole expac and its "cultures", and also of the discordant imagery ("duel" and "rubber bullets" obviously don't mesh).
It's a minor part of a wider trend in XIV- this game really pulled no punches with its lore in the past. I remember doing a post-moogle quest in Gridania where it was outright stated some of the corrupt Serpents manning the border were SAing Keepers of the Moon, or how people who were tempered were to swiftly and summarily be put to the sword, as that was the greatest mercy you could give them, or even how some adventuring parties failed and met a brutal, gruesome end when tackling more than they could show (Edda and all).
I don't think all of XIV has to focus on this, or that this needs to be the primary focus, but the world isn't perfect. There's evil in every country or civilization right now. XIV did well to show the good and the ill of every nation, and how the scions and especially the WoL were a beacon of hope and kindness is a sometimes harsh, cruel world.
Not only does this make the world less believable, it has the actual issue of leaving no threads for players to follow on. A lot of these problems- the greed of the monetarists, Ala Mhigan refugees and their sentiments of revolt against the Empire, the whole Dragonsong war- would later become either large quests or story arcs for the msq. I still think about the plot thread that there might be a Duskwight settlement in the ruins of Gelmorra, who are racially discriminated against in Gridania (the PotD questline was originally hinting at this, until we swerved into Tactics Ogre necromancy).

I can't believe a world with this development level (now talking about Tural) where there's no cruelty, no violence and no friction of any kind. Worse, this place is already perfect. Apparently, all the dickery was concentrated on Zoral Ja and his dumbass henchman who got gutted by the golden gate. We killed that guy and now it's all rosy and fixed. We have 0 lingering issues or plot threads. Even Mamook got reformed in 10 minutes of dialogue and Bakool Ja Ja's 180 personality twist.
The role quests also do nothing to help this matter. The LNC job quest dealt exactly with that Duskwight discrimination problem, the ARC one with the Keeper one, the ACN one with Limsa's pirates and human trafficking (with some grim implications for the ACN miqo prodigy...)... I could go on, but you get the idea.
If nothing is wrong with the world, what's the point of the WoL and the Scions? We might as well retire for good, apparently we solved evil.

Yea yea, we can go to Meracydia next... my point is that if it follows what we saw in Tural, we can share some vegemite toast and crack a cold one, and everything will be fixed in a couple of days, tops.

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Originally Posted by localareanetwork

zone culture good unless they're guns obviously since guns bad. they should have just used NERF guns in that duel, at least it would have been funny.

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Zone culture good as long as "culture" is really stupid, surface level stuff like "tacos" and "we like alpacas"!

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Originally Posted by lolnotacat

Zone culture good as long as "culture" is really stupid, surface level stuff like "tacos" and "we like alpacas"!

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You know, when the game was down and they entertained us with the fake tourism site in the meantime, I had fun with that and joked about how tacos and alpacas are the main promised features so far. Back then, I thought it was a joke and we'd obviously get more depth and go in a wholly different direction by level 83 or so. When the game hit, out of the first two zones, I did the alpaca zone first because haha alpacas, let's continue the joke, and alpacas are cute. I thought, OK it won't be the immediate banger zones of early Shadowbringers with everything so wonderfully disconcertingly wrong with them and the striking locales, but maybe something more like Endwalker's early Thavnair, where it's a bit quaint and colourful and you have the nice elephant people, but also the obvious signs of despair and future plots to come.
But the depth never came, and the joke never stopped. It was alpacas all the way down.

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Originally Posted by PaleYonder

It was alpacas all the way down.

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https://i.imgur.com/ObK9I9D.png

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Originally Posted by lolnotacat

Zone culture good as long as "culture" is really stupid, surface level stuff like "tacos" and "we like alpacas"!

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okay honest question. Aside from le tacos xD , what was the culture in each zone? It's been like 3 and a half weeks since I finished MSQ, I don't remember a lot about the first two zones, but I do remember a big emphasis on the cultural mishmash and everyone being super happy together. Except there isn't really anything going on in any zone culturally speaking (again, aside from food..?)

Or are they saying stuff like "yay lizard people live with human people"? Or "someone we loved died, we'll remember them despite that" for the giants (this is common sense to me idk)

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Originally Posted by localareanetwork

okay honest question. Aside from le tacos xD , what was the culture in each zone? It's been like 3 and a half weeks since I finished MSQ, I don't remember a lot about the first two zones, but I do remember a big emphasis on the cultural mishmash and everyone being super happy together. Except there isn't really anything going on in any zone culturally speaking (again, aside from food..?)

Or are they saying stuff like "yay lizard people live with human people"? Or "someone we loved died, we'll remember them despite that" for the giants (this is common sense to me idk)

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Pelu Pelu = We like trading and alpacas.
Hanu Hanu = We like festivals and reeds.
Giants (Because I can't remember their names) = Our dead live on as long as someone remembers them.
Texas = Rubber Bullets
Big Cat & Lizard Zone = Special Tacos and Dead Babies.
Heritage Found, Living Memory, and Solution Nine = Phantasy Star Online and We Love SPEEEEEEEN!

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Originally Posted by localareanetwork

okay honest question. Aside from le tacos xD , what was the culture in each zone?

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Birds like wind magic and reeds, easily forget about big wind magic float making it so they have reeds.
Goblins like kidnapping people who make stuff, have turned to legal means of doing it.
Short people like alpacas, booze, and trading. They also wear big goofy masks.
Giants enslaved people, but it's ok now that they only just recently stopped and became historians.
Cats like tacos, dislike lizards but get along anyway because big lizard liked tacos.
Lizards have a eugenics program that necessitates a dead baby storage area, dislike cats but only some can get along because they hate living in a pit.
Bunnies and non furry cats have banditry, and banditry disguised as law enforcement. Also farming, the only thing they wouldn't give up when conquered by a super advanced society.
Advanced society worships a god queen computer, erased the concept of death by way of mass brainwashing and treating souls as currency but not actually solving death itself.
Deadman Disneyland.

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Originally Posted by localareanetwork

okay honest question. Aside from le tacos xD , what was the culture in each zone?

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Pelupelu: Mostly trading focused but also Alpaca farmers.

HanuHanu: Reeds are important to their culture/way of life, so much so a Harvest-like festival is about them.

Giants: Afterlife stuff based around memory to keep them “alive”. To the point that important events or deeds are recorded in stone (p.much long form epitaph) even while the person is alive.

Xbr’aal & Mamool Ja: ?????
The tacos came from a combination of foods from both zones but that didn’t really seem culturally important? Felt more like if one side had fries and the other had chili and they made chili fries as a sign of peace/unity, but weirdly only one side embraced it as special. I think them putting aside their differences was the “culture” thing but that really just resulted in a long term ceasefire since they didn’t intermingle ever and still were secretly trading goods between one another.

Western Town: Wild West is the culture…probably?

Heritage Found/S9/Living Memory: Similar to giants philosophy but put to the extreme via AI Ghost made with memories, and also erasing memories of the dead from the living so they don’t have to deal with the sadness and suffering of loss.
Also using souls as a resource, such as 1UPs with human souls and “performance enhancer” with beast/non-human souls.

The fact that I can't even tell how Tural is governed or what a Dawnservant even does says a lot more how much world-building was truly done. It gets stranger by the minute just how much of practically everything was dedicated to the Wuk. Gulool Ja Ja connected all these factions together 80 years ago and ... and ... and ..? And then we're culture-rich? Yeah?

ARR presented us with 3 fleshed out hubs and even hinted at future ones. DT gave us more questions than anything and everyone, be it supportively or not, is building their own theories to make sense of it all. The Night's Blessed are more developed than either Hubs here.

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Originally Posted by LisseyCrowe

The fact that I can't even tell how Tural is governed or what a Dawnservant even does says a lot more how much world-building was truly done. It gets stranger by the minute just how much of practically everything was dedicated to the Wuk. Gulool Ja Ja connected all these factions together 80 years ago and ... and ... and ..? And then we're culture-rich? Yeah?

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Yep, they dedicate so much of the writing to make sure the players can see and appreciate Wuk that there isn't much space left for other thing. You raised a good point, we are often given a good picture of how the government of the place we visit, and Tural is like the first one that were just kinda brushed over.

We had more insight on the social structure and fuction of the Azem steppe tribes in one zone than Tural in the whole expansion.

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Originally Posted by LisseyCrowe

ARR presented us with 3 fleshed out hubs and even hinted at future ones. DT gave us more questions than anything and everyone, be it supportively or not, is building their own theories to make sense of it all. The Night's Blessed are more developed than either Hubs here.

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I want more Eorzea zones tbh. Honestly I dream of them having the connected map from 1.0 somehow readded into the game, it will never happen but the idea of travelling that giant bridge to go to into the city of limsa is so cool.
Also want to actually see more of ala Mihgo there's no way that area in stormblood is the entirety of it, like come on it should be as big as uldah.

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Originally Posted by Ramiee

I want more Eorzea zones tbh. Honestly I dream of them having the connected map from 1.0 somehow readded into the game, it will never happen but the idea of travelling that giant bridge to go to into the city of limsa is so cool.
Also want to actually see more of ala Mihgo there's no way that area in stormblood is the entirety of it, like come on it should be as big as uldah.

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I agree, it is probably about time they start bringing back 1.0 stuff.

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Originally Posted by sylphlands

How did Hiroi land this job? How did zero editors fix these brutally repetitive, pointless sections? How much of a say did Ishikawa actually have in any of this? This isn't just bad, it's worryingly bad.

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Didn't Hiroi used to run his own theatre company? His plays must've been atrocious.
Considering his other works, I do question if he had an editor influence him. Mangakas often have an editor to work with and they'll give advice and what not, so it wouldn't be strange to have an editor oversee his writing. The writing just feels so off, to the point that I expect that someone else had a strong involvement with it. Wouldn't want to blame it all on Hiroi when his other works were at least acceptable.

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Originally Posted by sylphlands

WL comes to our room clearly anxious about something. My ears perk up because I usually love quiet scenes like this where we have a 1:1 convo with an NPC! She looks shifty and concerned - wow, maybe there's something important on her mind! Maybe she's doubting her worldview a little. Maybe she's been challenged!

...

I knew that!! It's never been challenged by the narrative even once! Why would I have forgotten this?? Why are they treating this scene like it's a grand revelation on WL's part? Absolutely nothing has changed! Why was she anxious to restate this character motivation?!

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They did it because it was done before with the like of G'ahara, with Albert of the first, or other scions near the end of EW ... the problem they copied the act, but not the essence.

A lot of things in DT felt like the writers watch a great performance of a certain singer with a certain song and think it's just the song, and as long as they use the same song it will always be a great performance as long as they use the same song ... regardless of the singer.

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Originally Posted by Daralii

Emet's first appearance in Stormblood had him get shot dead with a closeup on his corpse's face, and the post-Elpis cutscene with Venat had her caked in blood. They can't have a character collapsing in a pool of their own blood for age rating reasons, but they didn't shy away from pushing what they could get away with either. A duel using real bullets, someone taking one, and having some red around the wound and on the ground wouldn't be at odds with how things were in the past.

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Don’t forget estinien killing nidhogg and effectively using his blood (that came out like a fountain) as a dye for this fukking armor. Like they did way way way way gruesome stuff over the years but stop at wild animals western duels and rubber bullets. Like reading this dialogue made more wheeze so bad I needed water afterwards because of how pitiful this idea was.

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Originally Posted by Mortex

Don’t forget estinien killing nidhogg and effectively using his blood (that came out like a fountain) as a dye for this fukking armor. Like they did way way way way gruesome stuff over the years but stop at wild animals western duels and rubber bullets. Like reading this dialogue made more wheeze so bad I needed water afterwards because of how pitiful this idea was.

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Last expac someone "rubber-bulleted" themselves in the head and the bloodsplatter was there for months >.>

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Originally Posted by ViaDesperare

snip

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In my opinion even his other works weren’t really good.

Werlyt only functions because it was already established that Gaius actually cares about the conquered zones and is not a battle hungry maniac.
Even in ARR his men loved him.
The whole kids sacrificing themself is stupid. The whole battles are unnecessary in itself.
We could have went against evil dude together in secret.
I like Allie but her actions with the robot were dumb.

The dancer quests is too short to fail and also has a bit of happiness wibe (our dance helps the hearts of the people). That’s not bad in small doses like there but not an entire expansion.

The bard quest ist alright at best and meh at worst.

Pandaemonium is quite good (not for me personally) but also extremely short and some things don’t make any sense for me.
Extremely dangerous creatures the ancients lock away instead of erasing like they do with far, far more innocent creations.
We also already knew much about Themis and a bit about Lahabrea so he didn’t really invent new things. He just took the established Ancient stuff, made a short story with (for me) predictable plot and a really flat antagonist (also for me).

I think in some of them he also was only guest writer?

The only reason most of his stories worked is more because they are too short to break down or have already established characters he can use.

Maybe there is editor meddling, maybe the supervisor slept. Both should be held responsible for this but Hiroi really doesn’t seem to be a particularly good writer himself.

Now let’s look at ARR because that was also a beginning and is normally used as an example of old and bad writings.
Quite a number of things was from 1.0 so it had a bit of groundwork already like the city states and some characters.

It had caves with old enslaved giants wanting revenge,
a haunted manor with gruesome transformations,
a foreign army short of conquering the continent,
an isolated city state we only heard intriguing tales the entire time,
Beast tribes summoning gods and factions inside them that went against them,
the scions more or less fighting a losing battle and being more and more involved in politics,
political machinations every way and even used as weapons against us,
our base being found by the enemy and our allies slaughtered, some of them being from 1.0 even.

It’s laughable how different the takes of these stories is.
The only problem ARR had was it’s extremely slowpaced questing and narrative.

Even if they wanted lower stakes or a more uplifting tone. They clearly failed in that regard and overdid it by multiple magnitudes.

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Originally Posted by LisseyCrowe

I was promised a vacation, at least make them water guns.

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Dead or Alive Beach Volleyball is a more authentic holiday experience than we got in Dawntrail. ;o

and so my sub ends, I'll be taking my actual vacation (to other games) just like what Yoshi-P wanted...will never pre-order again. so much regret!

I wish I can delete 6.1-7.0 and Wuk Lmao from my memories

It just dawned on me. Mch are most likely using rubber bullets as well.

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Originally Posted by fioravictorine

and so my sub ends, I'll be taking my actual vacation (to other games) just like what Yoshi-P wanted...will never pre-order again. so much regret!

I wish I can delete 6.1-7.0 and Wuk Lmao from my memories

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Yeah mine runs out on the 30th... but new PoE season starts in 11 hours so.... buh bye xiv. See you in the next patch maybe.

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Originally Posted by localareanetwork

zone culture good unless they're guns obviously since guns bad. they should have just used NERF guns in that duel, at least it would have been funny.

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the problem is that zone is very cowboy america themed but all the names are native american
they should've picked one not both because thats just weird imo

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Originally Posted by Reimmi

the problem is that zone is very cowboy america themed but all the names are native american
they should've picked one not both because thats just weird imo

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Which is weird, since some of the first stuff added related to the New World was imported clothing based on traditional Native American cultures, and I don't think there's a single NPC that wears it.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=WyJ7fxN5YQ0

She was a good edition to me. Y3s she does seem a bit like Naruto.. but she was funny on many occasions. I liked her.

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Originally Posted by jadan2000

She was a good edition to me. Y3s she does seem a bit like Naruto.. but she was funny on many occasions. I liked her.

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And that's awesome for you, really. Glad some people got what they wanted.

Imo, she's as funny as the supposed funny kid in class.

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Originally Posted by jadan2000

She was a good edition to me. Y3s she does seem a bit like Naruto.. but she was funny on many occasions. I liked her.

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I do wanna say this, because it isn't always clear.

Wuk Lamat as a person? Fantastic. She's lovely, friendly, respectful, etc. She is an incredibly pleasant individual and anyone who'd claim otherwise is being petty. It's once you take a step back and start judging the story as a whole and the writer's use of the character that things start to take a turn for the worst

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Originally Posted by Keiizah

I'm a tad late to the rubber bullet discussion, but to add to how ridiculous thing is, when Zoral Ja's army tried to attack again, they defeated armored soldiers and ships by shooting them with rubber bullets. Unless I missed something and they suddenly switched to actual bullets, none of this makes sense. Because in the very first attack on Tuliyollal you can see that steel weapons aren't enough to break their armor. If anyone wants to see https://youtu.be/WDRv6jQrOgc?si=nJK-98yp0IXVnv3D 1:00 where Gulool Ja Ja can't pierce this soldier with his heavy weapon but I guess rubber bullets can smh)

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I assumed they would obviously be using normal bullets. Which doesn't make the scene any less stupid. These incredibly advanced war machines being destroyed en masse by cowboy guns...

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Originally Posted by LisseyCrowe

I do wanna say this, because it isn't always clear.

Wuk Lamat as a person? Fantastic. She's lovely, friendly, respectful, etc. She is an incredibly pleasant individual and anyone who'd claim otherwise is being petty. It's once you take a step back and start judging the story as a whole and the writer's use of the character that things start to take a turn for the worst

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I agree.

Yda/Lyse is actually one of my most favorite Scion. If you ask me who among the Scion I want to have as a RL friend, not sure she will be top of the list but she gonna be damn close it. Now I don't think she should be enstrusted with leading an army or making big decision ... but who doesn't want to have a sun shine, happy go lucky, earnest, naturally air head and good vibe side kick? (In the appropriate amount of course).

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Originally Posted by Raven2014

I agree.

Yda/Lyse is actually one of my most favorite Scion. If you ask me who among the Scion I want to have as a RL friend, not sure she will be top of the list but she gonna be damn close it. Now I don't think she should be enstrusted with leading an army or making big decision ... but who doesn't want to have a sun shine, happy go lucky, earnest, naturally air head and good vibe side kick? (In the appropriate amount of course).

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Difference is Lyse is a believable earnest good vibes person. Wuk Lamat is like a child's depiction of a happy go lucky person who loves everyone and wants to see them all happy.

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Originally Posted by jadan2000

She was a good edition to me. Y3s she does seem a bit like Naruto.. but she was funny on many occasions. I liked her.

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That's the unfortunate thing. She's not a bad character. I've seen many, myself included, who enjoy the character in moderation. The problem is her presence was so constant and overwhelming and overbearing that it gave a lot of players Wuk Lamat fatigue.

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Originally Posted by ReynTime

Difference is Lyse is a believable earnest good vibes person. Wuk Lamat is like a child's depiction of a happy go lucky person who loves everyone and wants to see them all happy.

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And that's exactly what coming back to what we're talking about how the character is used. If Wuk Lamat is used the same way as Yda in 2.0 without all of the Dawnservant BS, her reception probably would be night and day difference.

There is nothing wrong with the archetype if it's put in the right place. If you have a Rake, it's fantastic tool for ... raking. The problem with WL is you may have a decent rake, but you're using it for ... snow shoveling.

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Originally Posted by Reimmi

the problem is that zone is very cowboy america themed but all the names are native american
they should've picked one not both because thats just weird imo

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Huh? There's a ton of places all across America that are named after native things. The problem is that the towns in Shaaloni are inauthentic - they look like they threw random syllables together in order to "sound" native. I can pronounce the majority of native American-named towns in the real world....but that Miqo'te village? Forget about it.

One of the main problems with Wuk Lamat is that they decided to make her a sheltered princess without justifying why she's a sheltered princess. I'm guessing we're supposed to infer that she's young, based on her exuberance, but it's never really spelled out. Moreover, being young in FF14 has never really been a reason for naïveté (see also: the twins, who have been teens/young adults forever). That her brothers are far more accomplished and knowledgeable while she's seemingly learned nothing from their exploits is also baffling.

I think they should have leaned far more into her defining character trait - her love for her people - and inverted her role in the story. Make her the outsider who left home early to live and work among the people. The Turali princess adventurer. That would immediately lend her credibility, both as a traveling companion and Dawnservant claimant. It would also provide multiple avenues for conflict - with Erenville, because she knows the continent better than he does due to his absence; with the other claimants (and the people of Tuliyollal) because she's an outsider by choice. Her growth would stem from transitioning from solving immediate problems as an adventurer to learning how to balance the needs of multiple people and cultures.

I stand by what I say. Wuk is just unrealistic, and the story treats her unrealistically.

Lyse is like a real person and the story handles her as such. She shows up, thinks she can rally everyone, and gets a big cold reality check several times in Stormblood. Even though you could call her temporary raise in lone leadership unearned nepotism it took until the end for her to fully understand what it took to gain people's trust in a rebellion.

Wuk Lamat is like furry jesus. She has no reason to know exactly how to solve everyone's problems and instantly gain their adoration the way she does, given her background of not even leaving her city much. She gets all the perfect qualities of a loving leader injected into her seemingly from birth and that somehow translates into her suddenly being physically stronger than the opposition at one point as well.

Again, someone like Wuk Lamat literally doesn't and could never exist in the real world. She's an idea. Not a person.

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Originally Posted by ViaDesperare

She makes axes sell. It's crazy.
https://i.imgur.com/zkz5lKs.png

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"I'm Commander Wuk Lamat, and this is my favorite store on the Citadel."