Revelations from Patch 4.3

[EdwinLi]

It is far to obvious who Shadowhunter is but you know what they say "No body means he or she is not dead."

We never did find any sign of remains of his body at the end of 2.0 and there should have been one even if it was blasted to pieces since he was still wearing very tough armor so there should have been something if he was dead.

[ObsidianFire]

Spoiler answer for above

Well, it's not that we didn't find Gaius' body at the end of 2.0. We never even got the opportunity to look for it as the place was crumbling around us. Actually, the last our character saw of Gaius, he was still alive. It's just that even we wouldn't have survived the Praetorium collapse unless a lot of chance things had happened. Heck, the Alliance was on the verge of thinking we didn't make it out until they actually saw us. Given that the XIVth Legion didn't act like Gaius was in control of it afterwards, it's a pretty safe assumption to make that he was dead even without a body.

That said, given that Gaius was the one who was running the place, I don't think it's too far fetched to suppose he knew of other ways to get out of there. As far as opportunities to fake your death go, it's a really good one to take advantage of. It's not like people are going to look for you if they know you're dead.

What him being alive really puts a spin on is his "Here my conquest ends" line. It comes off pretty well as a "last words" line, but it also can work as Gaius deciding that's not the route he'll be taking from now on...

As far as how much Gaius knows about the Ascians goals, it's pretty hard to beat the exchange he has with Lahabrea about it right before Ultima goes off.

[Ing-Dono]

Like Theodric said earlier in this thread:

As for the mysterious 'Shadowhunter'...could it be Gaius? I suspect it is, judging by his evasive tone and goals. That leaves the question as to how, exactly, he survived.

The more I think about it the more sense it makes, his skin did look pretty burnt (and Gaius kinda went up in flames back in the day), combine that with his hunting of Ascians (being, or at least feeling betrayed by them) and mentioning having dealt with the Scions before (us)

[MuseTraveller]

MSQ ... I have no idea how to add spoiler tag ^^;; will edit further if needed!
nevermind, I think I got it!

Shadowhunter is definitely Gaius! Look at his weapon and Gaius' concept art, it's the same!

Beyond that, he is the only garlean who could recognize Alphinaud as scion and have beef with the ascians. (I think? Livia is dead and in PotD as far as I know.)

On Yotsuyu, I thought her as primal would be cheap turn but I was so wrong. It was emotional and I admit I got teary in her final moments. Asahi got what he deserved. Patch villains don't live long but in this case I was happy it was Yotsuyu who offed him. The whole story made me wonder how many villains would have been a Tsuyu had they had a different upbringing?

The mysterious Elezen is most likely Zenos. Same eyecolor, same talking style, same move skills, talks about hunting... I only wish he snatched a Hyur body just cause I'm a bit tired of seeing Elezen since Heavensward haha, but it's just personal preference. Plus could been worse if he snatched a lalafell body lol

Anyhoooow, I think we all who speculated Zenodibus was a thing got a moment to point at the screen all - I called it!

All around very pleased with the MSQ and the hints at the new direction and new jobs in 5.0! Good job SE!

[Yamimarik]

MSQ ... I have no idea how to add spoiler tag ^^;;

All you gotta do is [HB ] Spoiler Text/Stuff here [/HB ] BUT w/o the spaces between "B" and "]".

[MuseTraveller]

All you gotta do is [HB ] Spoiler Text/Stuff here [/HB ] BUT w/o the spaces between "B" and "]".

Hmm I tried doing it earlier but got this message "The message you have entered is too short. Please lengthen your message to at least 10 characters." and it didn't allow me to edit it so I thought I was doing something wrong. Odd...

Edit:
Apparently worked with [hb ] text [/hb ] but didn't like them being capitalized, huh...
Thank you, tho!

[VargasVermillion]

MSQ ... I have no idea how to add spoiler tag ^^;; will edit further if needed!

Shadowhunter is definitely Gaius! Look at his weapon and Gaius' concept art, it's the same!

All gunblades look like gaius' one, there's nothing unique about the appearance. There are two versions, large ones that sit on ones back and the smaller ones that sit on the side. I feel like 'shadowhunter' looks a little too young to be gaius but this is FF we're talking about.

[Alleo]

Well much to write.

MSQ:

It was a bit strange with all the Gosetsu x Tsuyu jokes and it was also quite clear that she went out to get him a Kaki. I am not so sure what I think about the people from Namai accepting her fate so fast but at least they were afraid about her for a bit. Also not really sure why Hien told them about trying to kill her right when Tsuyu was standing next to him..

As soon as Asahi was on the scene I just wanted to punsh him and how horrible of him to try to get her memories back with her parents. Her murdering them was not that surprising and honestly I did not feel sorry for them. But it also showed that the old Yotsuyu was still quite messed up (she does share those evil faces with her brother) and that she would have stayed a danger to them.

I did like that they looked for traps and made sure to have an escape plan ready and did not trust him at all. Yotsuyu turning into a primal was something that I believed would happen but was still nicely done. Asahi using this as a way to show that Doma has broken their contract was sly but he did not take Maximus into account. Also great way for him to end by being slain by his sister. But I do was just saying in my mind the whole time: Can both of you just die right now? (Yotsuyu survived quite long afterwards, for someone that has no echo) Yes Gosetsu will be sad that he lost her but it was better that way. A sad past makes her understandable but her actions still were evil and without us she would have thrown all of Doma under her thrall.

[Also that primal fight was another hint that we are doing them alone. No other adventurer was with us and we would not have the time to gather more otherwise she would have just gone and start tempering people]

I am happy that the people from the exchange are alright but I also got the feeling that this was solved a bit too easy. I kinda believed that the story instanced fight would be us, fighting our way out there, while protecting them but it seems that Hien and his people got it all done without us.

I was also like "...no Alphy dont go to Garlemald all on your own, with a person we barely know." And I am happy that he is at least still alive (But I gotta teach him some more attacks..having no Dots is a shame!)

Good to know that there are some Garleans that are truly trying for peace and I really hope that Maxima stays on our side and alive..also good to know that this is not Zenos but Elidibus and that he is trying to manipulate Varis..I have a feeling that Varis wont survive it at the end and that he needs to go to truly achieve a great Garlemald. It was great to see the difference in Zenos behaviour thus showing that it might not be him.

It is a bit surprising that Zenos itself seems to have gone into the body of an resistance fighter. Not really sure where they are going with him but maybe he will be our short term ally at the end and the one to take out his father (Would be better than him just wanting to kill us again and again..) I am just not sure why he did not change his form to Zenos? I mean we only know about one instance where someone took over other bodies but the Sahagin priest did change the bodies of the other sahagin as soon as he went into them (if I remember it correctly)...now is that because he wanted to change or because it will happen if you take over a body?

That shadowhunter who is somehow able to slay even Ascians with red mask (but it remains to be seen if he truly killed them or just their host) seems to be Gaius and just like with Zenos, I am not really sure if that is so great. First I never was a huge fan of him. Yes he ruled a bit better than others but he still manipulated children, still used Ultima as a way to bargain and the only reason why he did not want to use poison was to still have people left to rule over..at the same time I do question how he survived the blast...we barely made it out of this and its not like they can teleport..so I will remain skeptic about his revival and hope that it makes sense and is not another character that survived something that should have killed them (like Gosetsu or Yotsuyu..)

At the end its great that both Yotsuyu and Asahi are dead. I really feared that they would go the redemption way with her but it ended with quite a nice if a bit tragic story for her. She got her revenge and we got to see how she might have turned out if she had a better life and this could give Hien the view to turn Doma into a better place. But at the end, no matter how bad your past was, we still have a choice and thus every actions for all these years were her actions and should be punished. But at least she was able to take the three people with her that she hated the most. Doma and its people can now fully rest and rebuilt.

Asahi also turned out to be exactly the bad guy that he was shown at. No sudden or hidden great motivations and this just shows that not every enemy needs to be grey. And even though it was not us that killed him, I still felt that his ending was great.

24 man raid:

I did not really like it. First I kinda question where the epic storyline is that they promised us and where they used all the budget that they said was used for this? First I truly only like Alma and the rest of her family can just die and I would not care. Her father does not even stop his son that much and only seems to care for the data and getting their names clear..who cares that the other group just lost one of theirs..Ramza is annoying me nearly as much as Asahi did..he is a racist and again shows the worst side of Garlemald while his sister is way more reasonable. I did like the two new moogles and the other beast tribe. (Not sure what they are called x_x). I liked the quest with the red chocobos even though I do wonder where they came from. I was also fine with looking around for the leader of the other group and I was awed at the look of the place itself (But every 24 man looked awesome, so thats nothing new there). But damn that wine quest..it destroyed any good will that the other quests created..maybe instead of something like that, have us talk to the people of the group and get more informations from them instead of having to go around for some wine that was only for this woman..If that is a epic storyline then I fear for the future..the bosses itself looked great but I still kinda questioned why those are there. Someone in alliance chat asked why the beast leader turned into THAT boss and I agree with them. Did I miss some information? Because I feel that this is just another fan service thing. (Also didnt they say that crafters and gatherers had something to do with it?)

Anyway we did learn a bit of new information about these stones but you could have cut out 70% of this and still have all the informations you need..

The thing that I did like was the obvious hints that Ramza was not himself sometimes. The way his mimic changed and the way he talked really made me feel like he is kinda possessed after touching the stone and who knows maybe he will be a boss in the last raid...

Namazu:

I really liked the bit of story that was in there. It was a bit cruel at the beginning that we would have just walked away from it but it was probably played as comedy and we did help him at the end. I also liked how different each Namazu was. I am looking forward to see how this story will go and hope that we turn away the dark fate of them. (Because if they are all death who will carry us around?)

Four lords:

I enjoyed this very much. From talking to them all again, to Tataru turning old for a few seconds and to Genbu underestimating Soroban. I loved how Tatarus carbuncle still ran away from her and how she just ran around in panic and sometimes healing me. It would have been strange to just fight along side her like she is some kind of pro so its good that they dont really turn her into a fighter.

We never truly met Tenzen but thanks to their stories he really feels sympathetic to me. And I look forward to seeing how this story will go

[swiss_Momo]

regarding Shadowhunter:

I'm sure that this was already mentioned, but the most clear proof that it's Gaius is the little white mask that got zoomed on. it's the white face part of Gaius helmet

[TheCookieGod]

Well apparently I'm only allowed to write posts 1000 characters long for some reason, so pardon the multiple posts.

The beginning of the patch was, in my opinion, garbage as far as the writing goes. Predictable and contrived just so we could have Tsukuyomi.

Everything in Doma feels like filler for the main events happening in Ala Mhigo (and now Garlemald) and the scraps that are important (Asahi and Maxima, the prisoner exchange in general) could have taken place in Ala Mhigo instead with a little shifting. Moving back and forth instead of focusing on one location weakens the story for both. And I don't hate Yanxia, quite the opposite. There's a lot of fascinating lore and culture to be explored there, so it would have been awesome if we'd had, you know, an entire expansion to do that instead of being shunted back to Ala Mhigo every so often. If the story in Doma had been given more time to breathe, I feel like I'd have enjoyed it, and Yotsuyu, a whole lot more.