For visual reference...
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It's not just the face that matches, but also the colour scheme of the costume.
Indeed - the raid doesn't become compulsory, but "re-encountering" characters you don't know should be a prompt for you to go back and play the raid, so you fully understand where they're coming from.
I don't think they would set up a "the story happened, but with another adventurer in your place" scenario though, because then it gets extra-messy when the player does go back to do it.
I'd say the story either has to be written as if you already did the raids, or they use time travel to get around the inconsistency.
But really, half the issue is that the writers can't decide whether they plough ahead with the grand scope of the story, MSQ and sidestories all happening at their fixed times, or whether certain things need to be walled off so we don't cross the streams - even if they should be relevant. *coughunukalhaicough*
There was a brief flashback of G'raha (and of Mide) during the Omega quest though - I have to wonder if you still got those if you hadn't done the quests. Or are the writers running on the assumption that if you're doing this optional quest, you probably did the past optional quests too?
"Setting him up" in the MSQ now would depend on how they're (hypothetically) handling the Crystal Tower continuity. If it's 'assumed to have happened' then yes, having Cid or Nero allude to these past events would be the best way into it - but at the same time, difficult to explain everything that happened without holding up the plot to review those events.
Alternately, if Krile knows him, then she might be a better candidate for recognising him and asking for an explanation, because she's unaware of what happened at the Tower. (Which could be skimmed over with something like "it's a long story, but the gist of it is, I've been entrusted with these special Allagan powers. Now I need your help with [new plot point]...")
If we simply get (re)introduced to G'raha himself, either time-travelled or (rather more messily) simply emerging from the Tower again, regardless of whether he was in there in the first place.... he's in much the same place Estinien was if/when we 'first' meet him post-Heavensward.
The ARR DRG quests are an important part of Estinien's introduction. They set up his backstory, and the fact that he has already briefly fallen to Nidhogg's power once before. We aren't given any of this information if we missed it "earlier"; we have to go back and play the DRG quests ourselves - which is probably more of a story barrier than having to complete a sidequest you can do with any job.
If a player hasn't been through the Crystal Tower yet, then G'raha would be a stranger to them upon his re-introduction - but then it's no different to if he were a completely new character introduced for 5.0. (Again, just like Estinien being a "new" MSQ character for Heavensward.) It would affect some initial dialogue, but then we get down to the core of it (last guardian of Allag; able to unlock the Tower's secrets) and the story carries on the same, whether you are previously familiar with him or not.
I agree that I'm not particularly wanting it to be G'raha, but rather that the clues seem too undeniable. I'm hesitant how it will play out, but then I'm feeling like that about Shadowbringers in its entirety...
I don't agree that the robes look "Ascian" though. We either discussed it here earlier or elsewhere, but they look more Allagan to me - which would fit with his "last of the Allagans" thing now.
It's only the hood that makes it look somewhat Ascian, but the overall costume is a different style to their usual robes (more drapey and a lot more colourful) and leaves the arms bare. And even the hood looks closer to the ornate Dreadwyrm Hood of Healing than the plainer hood on the Ascian cloaks. (See also: the thaumaturge guildmasters, who are dressed at least as ominously, although their being Lalafells mutes it somewhat.)
Overall the costume design puts me more in mind of the main character from The Last Guardian - which could be read as another conspiracy-theory stealth hint, I suppose, although only the English version of the game has that title.
If anything, the closest suggestion that he might be a villain is that he's placed opposite Solus on the poster, where the other balanced pairs (Y'shtola and Urianger; Alphinaud and Alisaie) are allies. Though it also could be misdirection, or a simple case of them being "leftovers" without obvious pairs.
As I mentioned above, there is important stuff that goes down with Estinien "before" you meet him if you didn't do the DRG quests.
And honestly, Thancred (and all the Scions) have the ultimate "important past events you missed" backstory because of 1.0 being eternally cut off for new players.
We spend time with Thancred in ARR before he got possessed in ARR, and with Estinien in Heavensward before he got possessed (is this a pattern?!) at the end of Heavensward. Therefore it seems to follow that we would be hypothetically spending time with 5.0 G'raha before 5.0 stuff goes down, to make that feel significant regardless of whether you have earlier history with him or not.
Krile's been an MSQ character through post-Heavensward and Stormblood, actually. It's only her role in Eureka that's forced her to step out of active events during post-Stormblood.
It's only cleaner if they want to go the "Crystal Tower already happened, don't you remember being there?" route - which itself is messy.
If they want to take the "timeline preserving" route where it only happened if you personally saw it happen, then Cid and Nero aren't currently aware of it either. In which case time travel DOES become the clean option that avoids the tangle by shifting G'raha to being from a point where the events have definitely happened and had their impact on him, even if they haven't for you yet.
Ahaha, I think he might need cake and some kind of (post-timewarp-shock) counselling regardless. Certainly cake. He's been locked up in there for gods-know-how-long and he's probably pretty hungry at this point.
But for a disguise and/or dramatic reveal? I don't see a problem with him temporarily wearing a hood that flattens his ears. (Cats' ears do have that flexibility, don't they?)
Maybe he just couldn't find any Allagan robes with ear-flaps sewn in.
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