I kind of feel like "the brothers" from each city's Intro should have a deeper role

I always found it sort of curious the brothers (Brendt, Brendan, and... something else?) were not only essentially the same character but in all three starting zones, but they obviously show back up in a moment up great need -- but only the one *you* started with.

Equally curious, I thought, is how you seem to meet the same character when you first arrive on... the First. He seemingly suffers a terrible fate, but it seemed like more than just a simple "callback".

In my mind, it sort of felt like perhaps those brothers might serve some greater role? We do know that all three brothers exist, given they show up in the Waking Sands are various points (and I believe all three are present when you first beat ARR's MSQ?), so perhaps not something as simple as "some omnipotent character in disguise".

But I guess to me, part of it reminds me of "the Old Man" from Final Fantasy: Mystic Quest. A mysterious character who helps guide you, but in that game, reveals himself to actually have been the physical form of the Crystal of Light.

It feels like their presence in the story is a somewhat unexplored mystery. The fact that they're all present at such important moments in your journey, yet are technically separate characters (instead of just being the same character, like Alphi and Allisae), seems quite odd.

I almost wonder if their seemingly humble nature(s) masks some potentially greater role? If they might be more aware of events than they let on, and serve to guide us only in those most crucial of moments? Perhaps they are truly brothers, or perhaps they are just manifestations of a singular being?

Who knows!

But I think there's something kind of fun about speculating, if they did indeed have a greater role in the story, what that might be.

Something missable throughout ARR is that the brothers are part of the evolving scene in the Waking Sands main hall. Every few quests the people in the room get moved around and have new dialogue, among those you have one of the brothers occasionally visiting and each time asking if you've seen the other two. Eventually the three of them are there together.

There's also a brief callback to them far later in the game too, at the beginning of Shadowbringers' story (spoilered for new players)-

when you arrive in the First your character wakes up to a merchant standing over them who very closely resembles one of the merchant brothers from the beginning of ARR, with the insinuation that he's the ARR merchant's 'soul fragment' incarnation on the First.

Unfortunately, no sooner do you part ways with him that he quickly meets a very sticky end - he's assumed to have either been killed by a sineater or been turned into one himself (a sineater attacks at the gates of the Crystarium that is then quickly killed by Lyna and the Crystarium guard, which leaves behind a distinctive ring that the WoL recognized as that merchant was wearing, seeming to hint that the sineater was them, or had eaten them).

Either way, it was a further interesting, if somewhat tragic, reference to the merchant brothers from the start of ARR.

Yeah, it was funny (albeit tragic) to see the ShB “brother” killed off so unceremoniously.

Either way though, I feel like it would be cool to see them come back somehow.

TIL they were brothers and not the same character.

I have a conspiracy theory that people who consistently roll high, and win loot picked the 'amass a fortune' dialog option when they first started the game. Yes, I'm trying to find patterns, and explain my terrible rolls.