Revelations from Patch 4.56

[LineageRazor]

i'm left wondering if there was supposed to be more msq updates but they forgot/ran out of time.

Interestingly, in retrospect I think that they produced precisely as much story as they planned to. If you recall, it was noted in Patch 4.5 that there were more Main Scenario Quests than usual. At the time, I took that to mean that they had a lot of story left to tell, and that there'd be a lot to sink our teeth into both then, and again now at this patch. Now, instead, I suspect that they simply had run into the problem that the Ghimlyt Dark just couldn't be penciled into the schedule any earlier than it was - and since they HAD to have a dungeon added with 4.5, they were left but no choice to give us the lion's share of the remaining MSQs in that patch, leaving us the pitiful two quests we got to wrap things up in 4.56.

So, the problem wasn't running out of time or budget, but simply that the story they decided to tell was poorly plotted. Taken as a whole, the the 4.5 + 4.56 MSQs work a little bit better. Folks were excited about the revelations in 4.5, and talked about it in the forums for months. If those MSQs had been released NOW instead of THEN, the hype could have tided us over for most of the three months until Shadowbringers. Unfortunately, the 4.56 quests pretty much did nothing but maintain the status quo, so there isn't really anything new to get hyped about.

I will say, though, that even taken as a whole, the MSQs really ought to have done more to cement our reason for playing along with the Enigmatic Dude. Right now, we don't have an awful lot of reason to trust him - he's clearly the ones responsible for the Scions' current state, after all. We had definite goals at the end of ARR (clear our names!) and HW (prepare for war!), but our intentions right now are a lot more nebulous. The Garleans are a clear and present danger, but we're somehow supposed to be faffing about with the Enigmatic Dude? Perhaps the expansion will offer a good reason why we'd choose NOW to go to the First Shard, but I honestly wish we'd gotten some of that in this patch.

[RenewalXVII]

Interestingly, in retrospect I think that they produced precisely as much story as they planned to. If you recall, it was noted in Patch 4.5 that there were more Main Scenario Quests than usual. At the time, I took that to mean that they had a lot of story left to tell, and that there'd be a lot to sink our teeth into both then, and again now at this patch. Now, instead, I suspect that they simply had run into the problem that the Ghimlyt Dark just couldn't be penciled into the schedule any earlier than it was - and since they HAD to have a dungeon added with 4.5, they were left but no choice to give us the lion's share of the remaining MSQs in that patch, leaving us the pitiful two quests we got to wrap things up in 4.56.

So, the problem wasn't running out of time or budget, but simply that the story they decided to tell was poorly plotted. Taken as a whole, the the 4.5 + 4.56 MSQs work a little bit better. Folks were excited about the revelations in 4.5, and talked about it in the forums for months. If those MSQs had been released NOW instead of THEN, the hype could have tided us over for most of the three months until Shadowbringers. Unfortunately, the 4.56 quests pretty much did nothing but maintain the status quo, so there isn't really anything new to get hyped about.

I will say, though, that even taken as a whole, the MSQs really ought to have done more to cement our reason for playing along with the Enigmatic Dude. Right now, we don't have an awful lot of reason to trust him - he's clearly the ones responsible for the Scions' current state, after all. We had definite goals at the end of ARR (clear our names!) and HW (prepare for war!), but our intentions right now are a lot more nebulous. The Garleans are a clear and present danger, but we're somehow supposed to be faffing about with the Enigmatic Dude? Perhaps the expansion will offer a good reason why we'd choose NOW to go to the First Shard, but I honestly wish we'd gotten some of that in this patch.

Taking both your points into account, my gut says that this is a bit of storytelling that will feel better in a single big binge than played on release. I think (or at least hope) that there's a big, complicated story arc being built up that will make a lot of sense fully laid out in hindsight with 5.0 out, but is currently lacking because of the enforced periodic release schedule of an MMO. Kinda like the opposite of the 2.X series in terms of pacing, which infamously have the daunting reputation of 100 MSQ in a single block.

Anyway, much moreso than 2.4 and 2.5's build up to 3.0 and 3.4 and 3.5's to 4.0 with their climaxes, 4.5 feels a lot like the middle part of an arc started with 4.4 and will hopefully be fully resolved in 5.0. And this ultimately might be better narratively. Like, considering the deaths thread currently in the forum, 2.5 was very climactic but ultimately wrote a lot of checks for the narrative that ended up bouncing--it was a very hollow climax. 4.5 is kinda lacking in any significant climaxes and revelations, but that just might mean a better payoff come 5.0. Just my thoughts on the situation anyway, in trying to make the most of my mild dissatisfaction with 4.56's presentation.

[Iscah]

(When do we actually stop putting spoiler tags on everything? It should be safe to leave MSQ spoilers uncovered now, right? It's been a week and a half, and we've accidentally slipped out of it anyway.)

I will say, though, that even taken as a whole, the MSQs really ought to have done more to cement our reason for playing along with the Enigmatic Dude. Right now, we don't have an awful lot of reason to trust him - he's clearly the ones responsible for the Scions' current state, after all. We had definite goals at the end of ARR (clear our names!) and HW (prepare for war!), but our intentions right now are a lot more nebulous. The Garleans are a clear and present danger, but we're somehow supposed to be faffing about with the Enigmatic Dude? Perhaps the expansion will offer a good reason why we'd choose NOW to go to the First Shard, but I honestly wish we'd gotten some of that in this patch.

At this point, even if our character doesn't trust him at all, he's our best (and only, and important) lead on what has happened to the other Scions. So for now we *do* have to play along, at least until we can work out what's happened to them and how we can bring them back.

We want to rescue our friends, of course, but we also need their support to be able to stand our best chance against the Garleans and Ascians. So it's still furthering our goals in that way as well.

On the pacing of 4.50/4.56, I wonder if ideally the Ghimlyt Dark was meant to happen in 4.56 - or maybe there wasn't supposed to be a 4.56 at all (or had further plot ideas that got pushed into 5.0 instead), so they insisted on splitting it.

I was rewatching some older cutscenes to review what we've heard from "the voice" each time the Scions are taken, and the last is Alisaie in the post-dungeon scene there - shortly before 4.50 comes to its awkward halt and we get sent back to the Rising Stones to rest up for a vague amount of time.

But in 4.56, when we wake up after that vision... one of the specific dialogue choices we get is between [Is Alisaie alright?] or [How are the Scions?] - and it seems really odd to single her out like that if it's been some time since she fainted, but makes perfect sense if we went straight from Ghimlyt into the battle sequence of this patch.

It also accounts for the time anomaly of Edmont telling us that Artoirel had just departed for Ghimlyt in 4.56, despite Emmanellain telling us that back in 4.50.

So if that's correct, the intended progression would have been:

- The Ghimlyt Dark, with multiple teams of characters on the battlefield.

- post-Ghimlyt, Alisaie faints; maybe we return to Raubahn at the base and get some combination of the end-of-.50/start-of.56 scenes with him.

- "Zenos" arrives on the battlefield, and fights Hien, Yugiri and Lyse.

- everything else plays out as for 4.56.