Quote Originally Posted by Moomba33 View Post
It's interesting how differently people can view the same story. Some of my friends are still annoyed over the fake outs of 2.55 and hoping the story gets darker with more actual deaths while other people I've talked to feel we lost so much in Heavensward that they don't want to see any more major exits anytime soon.
I don't feel strongly about having more protagonist deaths but I do hope we don't have a repeat of 2.55 with fake outs for the sake of drama that don't amount to anything.

I'm not expecting Zenos to be sympathetic or at least not intentionally. I suspect any Garlean allies we find will be working with us because they believe Zenos to be detrimental to Garlemald's interests and we may offer them some help if the Resistance goes too far.

I hope we don't get Lahabrea or Gaius returning and I'd prefer if Regula was dealt with before Stormblood. Recurring villains just make me feel like we're not making any progress.
The biggest contention I had with 3.0 was how neatly it wrapped up the Ul'dahn Revolution arc and made everything go back to "business as usual." I don't mind if protagonists die, but don't have fakeout deaths and don't have major things like that have no real consequence. Besides implicitly pushing Ilberd into becoming the Griffin, but that is unsubstantiated speculation as of yet.

I don't think the Garleans were ever intended to be sympathetic at all. The main reason any of them are is because, well... Gaius may have been a power-hungry conquistador, but he had standards for kupo's sake, unlike just about every other named Garlean that's not an expatriate, and had valid criticisms of the city-states' governments. As far as villains go, Gaius had honor and class (until you remember he ordered the Waking Sands raid anyway). Other than that... all we've seen of Garlemald is the stereotypical "evil empire," and while that's overdone and boring to some people I get the feeling that's all they were ever intended to be. Stop trying to force your moral desires onto Garlemald! Just let them be a stereotypical evil empire, for now anyway!

I don't mind recurring villains, but they have to pose a credible threat in the first place and continue to do so. While he posed a legitimate challenge in the first (solo) fight, in our last duel he was an utter pushover (I finished at +90% HP). If you're going to have recurring villains, make them a genuine threat. (And Gaius is almost certainly dead; Lahabrea is ambiguous until the Eye is destroyed but since Elidibus had every opportunity to free him but did not I think it's safe to say even the villains don't really care about his survival any more. Elidibus puts Lahabrea into the same category as Igeyorhm, who we know died, so...)