Been playing solo for almost 60 days now...

[Frizze]

We'll call this light spoilers - read at your own peril.

At no point did i ever actually care about Ala Mhigo. When i first met the Ala Mhigan refugees they came off to me as unsympathetic. Their old were defeated, their young were the enemy(trying to summon a primal to their cause - have they not noticed that this basically never works?). What bits of lore i picked up made it sound like they didnt even fight to save their own land from invasion, and instead wanted everyone else to fight for them. We recruited several of them to join our Crystal Braves initiative, and given time they could have won us over and moved us into taking a more proactive position on the Ala Mhigan issue. Instead they betrayed us and set us up. When the Griffin eventually made his big play at the Wall i wasnt moved to see his side - i was upset with him over the level of losses he was willing to accept and the collateral damage from his brash move. So we go into enemy territory. The locals are antagonistic against the resistance. The resistance itself seems fairly hopeless. And sure enough, as soon as they put forth even a token amount of effort(with our help) Zenos shows up and sorts them out. The only reason he doesnt wipe them out is that he's too bored. We leave, and by the time we come back... almost nothing has changed. At this point Zenos is curious if we can get strong enough to give him a real fight, so he has little incentive to really stop us. Instead he puts seemingly everything on his 2nd - whether this is so he can prepare or because he thinks she will ultimately fail im not sure. All along the way the locals are still fairly unsympathetic and the land itself didnt even seem worth liberating. Now Fordola? Her i liked. Her story was fairly cliche, but she fought like a rabid dog to prove herself and keep her position. After failure she didnt blame others, she sought to do whatever she could to improve her lot.

Compare to Doma. When we meet the refugees they are boat people. Theyve been at sea for months trying to find a safe port. There was an attempted uprising, and the empire didnt just put it down but they put it down with authority. They had to flee if they wanted to live. They call upon us for help, and we find them a barren inhospitable place to stay(they get approx the same level of help as the ala mhigans did back in the day). Do they complain? Maybe a little, but by and large they are grateful to have someplace rather then continuing to travel the seas. They have a bit of trouble adjusting, but they make due. One of their leaders even more or less joins the Scions to help us with our troubles because of the help we provided them. So after the rumble at Rhalgrs we get the idea to open a second front and head toward Doma to see what the prospects are. The locals still have a fire in them, but their overlord is twisted and sadistic so they arent super on-board with us stirring up trouble(i also liked yotsuyu). We meet Hien and he's the type of leader they wish they had back in ala mhigo. Hes smart(he has an actual plan!), hes tough, but hes willing to respect his peoples wishes if they dont want him to cause trouble(bonus points for his theme - love me some FF6). The plan was a bit of a longshot, but we pull it off being the warrior of light(because duh). More bonus points for showing up to help us in the battle of ala mhigo(a fight that had nothing to do with him). And i liked his presence during the Asahi story of the last couple patches(which did tie a nice little bow on a couple issues). Also in contrast, the land we free isnt just some barren wasteland - it seems worth fighting for - and not just for strategic purposes.

tl;dr - I thought ala mhigo was the bad part of this expansion. You can force me to fight somewhere but you cant force me to care.

[Alrin]

Snip

Very well written. I feel somewhat same.

I didnt really care about Ala Mhigo, but i was sad that Doma part ended.

And I was Maleficing shit to death until like half of the Azime Steppe and Broiling it from then to lvl 70 when i returned to Maleficing so...

[Iscah]

We recruited several of them to join our Crystal Braves initiative, and given time they could have won us over and moved us into taking a more proactive position on the Ala Mhigan issue. Instead they betrayed us and set us up. When the Griffin eventually made his big play at the Wall i wasnt moved to see his side - i was upset with him over the level of losses he was willing to accept and the collateral damage from his brash move.

I agree with you overall that I didn't like the Ala Mhigan part of Stormblood (though I wasn't all that keen on the Doman side either), but I think you're misremembering this bit. The only Ala Mhigan we recruited to the Braves was Wilred, one of the few 'good' Braves, who was himself betrayed by the others.

And I don't think we were ever supposed to sympathise with the Griffin. The overall plight of Ala Mhigo, yes, but not him.