Y'shtola's "Marketing Armor"

[TheMightyMollusk]

Maybe they could at least use the next fake out on someone else. I don't think Urianger's had a turn yet.

[Schan]

Maybe they could at least use the next fake out on someone else. I don't think Urianger's had a turn yet.

or... they could just drop the fake outs altogether. It gets annoying after a while.

Every highly community loved character has had a fake out so far. Remember when Ayemeric got stabbed?

[frostmagemari]

So, a few times these past couple of weeks, forum posters and youtubers and other people on other socials have asked or put out polls and things wondering, "Who do you think will be the next scion to die?" or "Which Scions would you like to see killed?" and other such similar things.

It seems, almost every time I say Y'shtola, somebody jumps out of the woodwork saying, "She's the face of FFXIV! She's like Cloud for FF7. They can't kill her off, or they will lose money. She is invulnerable/untouchable/can't be messed with."

So, what do you think, reader?

https://www.strawpoll.me/20714364/r

Personally, I think they've been building up to killing her off as a very emotional moment for FFXIV people, and the build up has been taking so long that by the time we get to the moment in the story where they finally decide to stop writing her out of death we'll basically be like, "Get on with it!"

They're not going to kill Y'shtola off, because Y'shtola doesn't actually exist. Her personality changes for every expansion pack, and she just becomes the character that they need her to be for that expansion pack. Its like what they did to Yda/Lyse; they just made her the character they wanted her to be for the expansion and haven't picked her up again yet to do it again.

or... they could just drop the fake outs altogether. It gets annoying after a while. [HB]Every highly community loved character has had a fake out so far. Remember when Ayemeric got stabbed?

They'll never stop the fake-outs. The writers depend on those to create false tension to situations; I think the only one they didn't reverse within the next hour of story after a fake-out was Nanamo.

[Jennah]

Yeah, Urianger hasn't gotten a fakeout death yet. Unless you count the "as if they'd really kill off half the cast" fakeout when all the Scions went into comas in 4.5.

He did get at least two "look, he's secretly evil!" fakeouts, though.

[BlitzAceRush]

I don't feel death adds anything to a story, I won't deny it can if done right but I've never been of the belief that you need to kill off characters to tell an engaging or high stakes story, if you need that just to make things compelling or feel high stakes than I fell the story was pretty weak to begin with.

Final Fantasy X for example, the story in that is very high stakes, you're literally trying to reverse the whole way the world works and kill an other worldly being that isn't supposed to be killed, while everyone and their mother tries to stop you. The tension is high and you spend a large part of the back end of the game literally running from everyone and then having to run into the heart of the enemy territory before having to escape again and resume running.
The stakes are massive, the situation dire and your heroes aren't even sure what they're trying to do is possible and all of this is achived without a single main party member dying, not untill the literal closing act.
At no point during any of that did I feel like any of my parties deaths would have "enriched" the narrative, nor did I feel the stakes lacking and if only they'd kill someone so I could feel the weight of those stakes! .... no... I was more than capable of feeling that weight due to the story and it's delivery.

Death can be done and well but I've always felt it is the cheapest way to "raise the stakes" or "show the gravity of the situation." because especially in a long story you're sacrificing everything else just for a quick cheap emotional hit further cheapened when they're instantly replaced because in an ongoing narrative like 14 killing someone just means you need to rotate someone else in who's only there because you killed someone, and round and round we go, or you just run out of characters and to me that just feels cheap, I'd rather have long standing characters than that.

[Theodric]

If the intention is to tell a serious and compelling story, then character death is a necessity. At least for something that spans years of development. FFXIV is an ongoing project, with a very large cast of characters that grows with each new content patch. It's not unreasonable to expect some of them to perish as the story advances.

The single player games are a different beast altogether, since they're - usually - not an evolving story but a one and done deal. Even then, quite a few single player Final Fantasy games have killed off major characters. Including playable ones.

If given the choice, I don't doubt that many people would opt to keep their favourite characters alive throughout any and every trial and tribulation put before them. Yet that's arguably bias speaking. Some of my own favourite characters have been killed off, though I made my peace with it having happened. It's not like there's a shortage of characters to choose from as favoured individuals.

A good story also respects all its characters. Enough to know that sometimes the antagonists need to not only have compelling, sympathetic motives but to also secure victory from time to time. Which, yes, leads to character death now and then. That's one of the things FFXIV has, sadly, not really pulled off well yet. It's not really a case of people asking for death for the sake of death. More so a case of wanting realistic consequences thrown into the story every now and then. Not just for secondary throwaway characters and antagonists but major figures as well.

[BlitzAceRush]

I fully disagree with that notion, I do not feel serious and compelling stories require character deaths, there are so many ways to add weight to a story without having to kill someone off to quickly gain it.
Rather than having someone die and then everyone react to that, having that be the seriousness and the weight you can just as easily have them react to the horror of the event.
Having a villain come, devastate the party, bring them to the brink without them being able to do a thing, all of them forced to stare at their own mortality while they can do nothing to protect themselves or their friends.
Can be just as compelling as villain comes, kills X and now everyone is sad.

An ongoing plot like 14 can certainly function without killing off the main cast, using Game of Thrones, as an example, why me and some others I spoke with couldn't get into it is some of us use other characters as our vehicle for the story and not everyone is fond of changing cars every few miles down the road when our currently one inexplicably bursts into flames for the tenth time.

I don't think death shouldn't be used or can't be, I'm simply not a fan and feel it's something that can be done, not something that needs to be done.
Using FFX again, it's ending is gut punching but I feel it could have elicited different but equally as powerful emotions if things played out differently, conversely FFX-2's good ending is right up my ally and I feel was just as impactful and meaningful.
Good writing makes a good death, a good death dose not make good writing and good writing can be good, serious and compelling without death.

[Vyrerus]

I don't feel death adds anything to a story

What you're essentially arguing is that you don't need to add death to make good writing, and perhaps a step further that adding death negatively impacts a story. For you, that may be the case, but that's just for you.

For people who are invested in the serious aspects of a story, it negatively impacts the story to know that there is no tension at all, because ultimately there is no risk, worry, or suspense. For instance, despite never having played FFX, having read the spoiler(I don't care about spoilers BTW), I have even less of a desire to play it due to knowing that there will never be a pivotal moment where someone makes a grave choice or pays the ultimate price.

As far as death being a quick and easy thing in writing... well, yeah. It's easy to write. It's not so easy for readers to get over though. It's quite divisive, because some readers feel betrayed when a character they love is no longer active in the story. So it's not cheap at all. It's actually quite costly, and most writers usually feel its weight.

As for death being pointless in a long running narrative... well... no. They rotate characters anyway due to wanting to focus more on particular ones per whatever are the writers' goals. Death is a way for them to basically martyr and venerate a character that is never going to be a major player in the story anymore. Hence the whole, heroic sacrifice trope. In this narrative that revolves around violence, combat, martial prowess, war, politics, national relations, and good vs. evil, it weakens the narrative for there to never be any major character death. It may as well be a game of bowling to the good guys, where the villains are just bowling pins that can talk and occasionally force gutter balls.

Obviously I agree they can't over do it, but it's really honestly under done. And the unrestrained use of fake-out deaths is all the more insulting to the audience as a compliment to this fact. Obviously, they try to get by on other vehicles of tension and other methods of raising the stakes, but nothing really does it like the threat of death or death itself. The biggest limiting factor on FFXIV's story is that even though we as the main protagonist are central, nothing bad can permanently befall us ever, due to the nature of MMOs. It falls to the NPCs.

[TheMightyMollusk]

Death for the sake of just killing someone off for shock value adds nothing to the story. It's only enriching if it's meaningful. There's a reason people around here still bring up Haurchefant or Moenbryda or Papalymo but nobody ever mentions Conrad.

[Fayt1203]

Death for the sake of just killing someone off for shock value adds nothing to the story. It's only enriching if it's meaningful. There's a reason people around here still bring up Haurchefant or Moenbryda or Papalymo but nobody ever mentions Conrad.

this ^^ also everyone seems to have forgotten about Meffrid but that is kinda understandable since he was just a minor character