Thank you for returning to "original stories" for Raids in Endwalker

[Iscah]

Coils had us venturing down into the Binding Coils in search of Louisoix and Bahamut. Alexander had us fighting through the Illuminati's defense forces and warmachina to stop a time-warping primal. It's really just Omega where most of the fights were pure fanservice in between bits of story.

I think the thing here is teasing apart whether it is the fights that tell a story or the overall raid.

With Omega, obviously a lot of the fights contribute nothing to the story itself. Except for the last few tiers of Alphascape, they are self-contained and don't contribute to the plot.

The arenas for Coils and Alexander are more integrated into the plot, being parts of an overarching setting, but the fights themselves are just as isolated. Most are just random monsters or robots with no significance, and the few characters we fight come out of nowhere with no prior story references, like the mad scientist and mercenary goblins. They're never seen in the story, they just exist for that one boss fight. There are only a few battles that actually contribute anything to the story, which is mostly told through the cutscenes between the fights.