What's the point with that quite lackluster story in Endwalker?

[KizuyaKatogami]

snip

2/2

A lot of your post is speculation and headcanon supported by very little. For example, we don’t even know if Venat told the ancients of Meteion. We don’t even entirely know if she told her followers, they just knew that Zodiark wasn’t a permanent solution. We don’t even know if they knew of the sundering or that they would be sacrificed, as in the Anamnesis cutscene, they only lament the loss of Venat. As far as the sundered being more durable than Elidibus or Emet etc. I really not sure how you came to that conclusion. We needed higher up entirety help everytime we fought against them lol. Venat is, in the end, a hypocrite and a liar. She preaches about suffering and hope, yet she inflicted mass amounts of suffering on her own people and gave up hope on them. Her confronting the ancients after the final days already hit means very little. She could have prevented the event altogether. Instead she kept quiet, lied, and let it all happen from what we’ve seen. She was friends with Emet, an incredibly intelligent individual. You mean to tell me the two of them couldn’t have figured something out? If Hermes is a problem Pandemonium exists for the time being. There were numerous ways she could have gone about it.

[Lauront]

It is clear that Venat does not agree with the convocation's point of view about it's importance over "lesser" beings. On the contrary, Venat does what she can to learn about us as a person, the world we live in and the people in it. She clearly empathises with us as explorers, sundered though we may be and does not automatically dismiss us as some lesser familiar but as a creature in our own right that actually isn't that dissimilar to the ancients themselves.

Yeah, partly because...

Venat: You know I am!
Venat: Now then, you are...?
Venat: I say...have you perchance come from the future?
Venat: I do not believe we have ever met, yet I sense my magick upon you.
Venat: Therefore if I wove the enchantment, I could only have done so at a later point in time.
Hythlodaeus: What manner of magick is this, if I may ask?

In fact, she has the knowledge that the sundered WoL and friends are much more durable and capable than even an unsundered ancient in Lahabrea, Emet-Selch and Elidibus.

First was severely weakened due to body hopping and was defeated whilst the blessing was active plus due to Thordan's presence as a primal. Second took 8 champions, all that built up lightwarden light, further soul fragment rejoining to wield that light plus the benefit of the Blessing. Third again took 8 champions and Emet-Selch's intercession. Thus the need for you to say "and friends" for the latter two in the first place... plenty of extrinsic help here.

I'd like a citation as to where she told any of the ancients about Meteion, because her faction does not mention it at any point during the Anamnesis Anyder scene. Even her moon janny is unaware of it. There is also no evidence she took on Hermes's view as such on creations. Her concern is specifically defeat of Meteion and avoiding the fate of the Plenty (which she feared would be the outcome of pursuing the perfection of the star.)

[KariTheFox]

The reason Meteion and the song of oblivion are not mentioned during the Anamnesis Anyder cutscene is pretty simple: that cutscene came out before Endwalker and the revelations about Meteion were known to the playerbase. It'd be frankly, some pretty confusing and bad "maid and butler" dialogue for Venat and her followers to be all "as you are all already aware, Meteion and her song of oblivion continue even after Zodiark shrouds us temporarily her influence...". (Who's Meteion? Why is Venat telling her followers something they all already know? Why is this exposition so bad?)

[Lauront]

Yes, so there isn't a single piece of evidence that can be adduced that she told either her followers or their broader society about Meteion and there is no basis on which to categorically state that she did. In fact we know she did not want it to become common knowledge:

Venat: In spite of this, we cannot allow the report that set this calamity in motion to become common knowledge. Were the masses to learn the fates of the other stars, I fear the situation would spiral out of our control.

So even if I were to grant that she had shared it with her followers, we know there was no intention to do so with the broader society, or the Convocation, for that matter.

[colnix]

I like the story. Though it's not the level of shb and has couple of drowbacks (imho). For me it would be better that wol still is dead in the end, and everyone decides how to live without him (but we've seen this in 1.0 shutdown already)

btw, has someone noticed any dialogue diffs with venat with a legacy acc? or is it all the same?

[KizuyaKatogami]

The reason Meteion and the song of oblivion are not mentioned during the Anamnesis Anyder cutscene is pretty simple: that cutscene came out before Endwalker and the revelations about Meteion were known to the playerbase. It'd be frankly, some pretty confusing and bad "maid and butler" dialogue for Venat and her followers to be all "as you are all already aware, Meteion and her song of oblivion continue even after Zodiark shrouds us temporarily her influence...". (Who's Meteion? Why is Venat telling her followers something they all already know? Why is this exposition so bad?)

B-but….they always foreshadow everything right?! Everything is always planned! Tbf even if this was the case i don’t think it would’ve necessarily been bad info. It would leave people questioning and theorizing who is Meteion. what is this song of oblivion etc. It would at least be SOME reference to it rather than it being thrown in at the end of the story lol. This doesn’t change the fact though there’s no mention whatsoever of her followers knowing of the sundering or that they’d be sacrificed. I mean they wouldn’t even have to name Meteion. They could just say “the convocation is busy with Zodiark blah blah but we know he isn’t a true solution, the real foe is still here etc

[Teraq]

I am so glad this thread is making me feel... sane? I resonate so very much with the viewpoints of KizuyaKatogami, Lauront and Rulakir. It's just incredibly comforting to know I'm not alone, especially when talking about a story I was so invested into for the last 5 years. For the past 2 months I feel like my mind has done nothing but incoherently rant about Endwalker, which often felt like screaming into the void. (I wonder how many of us who are vocally disappointed in EW are Ascian fans?)

I have a LOT of things to say and I'm not sure my brain is up to the task of organizing my points in any fashion that makes sense, but I'm going to give it a try :

- I thought this expansion was going to be about Hydaelyn and Zodiark? As it turns out, it's about Hydaelyn and The Sound. Zodiark was literally just an afterthought, a plot device to usher in the real plot. I keep seeing people say that making Zodiark more of a presence at all (or even just a more glorified fight than the level 83 trial, but I digress) would have been "predictable" and that they "subverted expectations", to which I would ask: is "subverting expectations" supposed to be a good thing when you hype something up for years? Does "predictable" have to mean bad and boring rather than a logical and satisfying climax? Perhaps people who argue this simply do not care this much about Zodiark and the Ascians. Fine enough, we all have different opinions on characters, but I just wish the writers did care more.

- "Zodiark couldn't have been much more than an empty husk anyway idk what you were expecting". Boy howdy I'm glad we get to talk about my favorite character and how he was treated in Shadowbringers onwards! And exactly what the 5.2 revelation of him being the literal acting consciousness of Zodiark had me expecting. I'm not going to lie, 5.2–5.3 was my favorite stretch of MSQ, but it left me with a twinge of disappointment: it felt way too rushed, in light of: 1. we're talking about literally the longest-standing antagonist in the story, aren't we? / 2. everything Emet revealed in 5.0 gave an entirely new context to Elidibus and Lahabrea both and it stood to reason (to me) that the writers would explore their PoV (nevermind the Bread being dead – has this ever stopped flashbacks?) / 3. LITERALLY ZODIARK!!
But I forgave patch 5.3 and what I felt was its super rushed character development, based on the premise that seemed completely, utterly, 100% obvious to me: 6.0 was going to be about Zodiark and Hydaelyn. Why would they casually tell us that Elidibus is/was Zodiark at the same time as they introduced Venat otherwise? Just to justify the power-up and epic fight in 5.3? Come on, obviously not – I mean, it was a cool fight – because like, are we just gonna leave him there locked up with his massive guilt over having failed to save anyone he loved? Without ever recognising and remembering Azem? Or remembering the oath he swore and to whom (us, it was us, wasn't it?), or what about the horror of realising he most likely forgot his name, his family? But he got his memories back at the last minute, so surely he has SO MUCH to tell. What if there is still a part of him inside Zodiark, barely still conscious and struggling against Fandaniel? And if there truly isn't, is there a way we could, uh, for lack of a better word, shove him back in there to fight off Zenos/Fandaniel? Or even just have him accompany us when we fight them? You wouldn't just not–

He also wasn't summoned back along with Emet and Hythlodaeus, wasn't present during their walk past us during the credits, and wasn't featured in the post-credit art either. Since he "died" sending the WoL to the past you think he'd be seen somewhere along the way.

I felt this.
And when all is said and done, he finally, very literally, gave his soul to do something that would end up saving the planet from the apocalypse – literally his initial duty – this is ... never brought up by literally anyone at all .......?
Look, what I'm saying here, is that the entirety of 2021, with its Endwalker reveal, teasers and eventual release, was one year-long Mr Incredible becoming uncanny moment. I went through all of Endwalker in 3 days at release and all I got was this lousy minion of a genocidal, white-robed Ancient Heart of an Elder Primal, but it turned out not to be the one I ordered. (Cute dog though!)

- Going on an Elder Primal tangent here, what was the point of Hydaelyn being a Primal at all and the ominousness with which this information was treated? Nothing negative came out of her being the second oldest and second most powerful Primal of all time. Tempering? Endwalker hastily tosses out this potentially very problematic plot point. Sucking the aether dry? Well it seems she made this big crystal over time down there, but there doesn't seem to be any negative repercussions. Having sacrifices made in her name to fuel her? Oh golly no! Kicking her ass in an epic cinematic trial fight? Well, technically yes, but it was entirely on her terms and all according to her For The Greater Good plan, rather than out of any sort of disagreement about... well... everything.

- Oops sorry, I got a little sidetracked talking about Zodiark (and a bit of Hydaelyn)! Let's talk about all the Ascians that are still left then: how they feel now that the Unsundered are (largely) gone, how each of them relate to their Sundered status – we've seen 2.5 of them post-5.0 lore dump and they all had different takes on what being a reincarnated Convocation member meant to them –, how they feel about Fandaniel being a goddamned gremlin... surely at least some of them would oppose complete destruction of the Source? How about Gaia...? Oracle of Darkness...?
(shrugs)

- Better people than me have gone on at length in this thread about the genocide of the Ancients not being as justified in-universe as the writers would have seemingly liked it to be. Main reasons being: they could have most likely fought Meteion given proper information beforehand; they were capable of creating Dynamis-powered familiars (did this depressed edgelord not keep any record of his research?) and spacefaring bunnies (which implies that Ancients either had space travel capabilities themselves or that they could create familiars that eventually would do that for them); they could artificially diminish their own aether; they obviously dealt with negative emotions (Pandaemonium??????); they were full of hope for their planet and respected life (pretty much all Elpis sidequests)...

- But outside of these in-universe considerations, I wholly disliked how the story seemed to be very heavy-handed in how it wanted to make me feel. I feel like it very much wanted me to think Venat and Hermes had a point. Like they were good people driven to take terrible decisions because the Ancient world was a horrible, no-good, Stepford Smiler dystopia (ironically, there is a Stepford Smiler dystopia in this game... and it's a level 90 dungeon, with "smiley" trash mobs that cast spells like "Vacuity of Existence" (FR), and there are Hydaelyn glyphs all over it. Oops!). And yet I'm not sure how to interpret the scene of Hermes mourning the Lykaons as anything but a mentally unbalanced vegan having a far too over-the-top reaction to what was probably a frequent occurrence in a job he was not equipped to handle and literally should have never been doing in the first place for his own well-being. (A situation I have personally been in. Imagine how dissociated Hermes's character made me feel.)
Then of course, we also have the Ra-La guys, a contrived strawman presented to us as an obvious "gotcha" parallel, yet it seemed to me to be such a nebulous, hypothetical scenario (what is "perfect", and how would you ever reach such a state?) that I simply could not relate it to what the rest of the game showed me of the Ancients.
It feels like the story is gaslighting me about Venat and Hermes in particular to sweep under the rug the balanced, shades-of-grey Hydaelyn/Zodiark conflict presented in Shadowbringers to not-so-subtly present Live-Laugh-Love's genocide in a much better light, like the writers are telling me "see? The Ascians didn't have this much of a point, because they were pretty bad and never had any hope against Meteion". We wouldn't want to feel too bad for them after all, would we?
And if that's the direction the story truly wants to go, then I am honestly not interested.

- Dynamis! For a concept brought into the story in its last part, Dynamis can sure do a lot, can't it? Never mind Limit Breaks (let's not even get into Seat of Sacrifice here by the way), it's the dark energy that can power little bird girls to travel to planets god knows how many light-years away, it can create an entire region of space and its inhabitants out of dark matter, it can also make said region of space tangible and create a breathable atmosphere there, it can make your remote teleporter appear out of nowhere after the final fight, because... well... you see... feelings. I saw one of the questions asked in the French Q&A thread (for the upcoming Live Letter) ask why Meteion would appear so short to us in Ultima Thule while she was initially supposed to be short only by Ancient standards when we see her in Elpis, and I'm afraid the answer here is obvious: Dynamis. Dynamis is Calvinball, where the rules are made up as the writers go along. If I had to give Dynamis itself a tangible, visible shape, it would be roughly plot-shaped.
Though by far its most remarkable accomplishment was telling us (though not convincingly, as far as I am concerned, but I realise I am very much told to accept it) the Sundered were just plain better than the Unsundered at dealing with the existential threat to the universe.

- It feels obvious the plot has been compressed to fit into 6.0. This has been brought up in this thread but it bears repeating: the final patches of post-ShB and the first third of Endwalker felt like they belonged to another expansion that was aborted. Zenos's dreams and his own self-hype taking the moon in his hand (lol) and going on about his infinite rage, Fandaniel's mention of Emet-Selch accomplishing...something...?, Y'shtola's horror at the core of the Tower of Zot that I didn't even know was actually expanded upon before reading it in this thread, the body swap plot that amounted to literally nothing (it was pretty hype but what was the point?) (can we talk about the fact that an Ascian literally just teleported and incapacitated the WoL out of nowhere???? lol). Anima even got his own MSQ-trial-like full-fledged artwork! Consider my expectations subverted again!
Ishikawa herself has mentioned she would have liked the story to conclude in 7.0 and 8.0, and wow, yeah, I get it.

- God I wish the Final Days had been so much more final and widespread and impactful because I found Thavnair to be super hype, but either this just wasn't meant to be that kind of apocalyptic game/story (completely understandable, have a nice day) or, again, this suffered from plot compression.

...

- As a conclusion of sorts, I will bring up this anecdote of my reaction to getting the Endsinger in trial roulette: it's undeniably epic and gorgeous, and it feels good as a fight. It feels unambiguously good and awesome, because you are literally kicking the personification of cosmic despair in the face with the power of hope, love, friendship and Calvinball. It's a much more fist-pumping moment than watching a man desperately flail at you because you are using against him the power that broke his world, erased his entire civilisation from History and in-all-but-name killed everyone he knew and loved, then quietly accepts defeat and asks you, the barely-recognisable remnant of his veryveryvery good friend (polite cough), to remember them as he fades away. It's also a much more fist-pumping moment than mercy killing the little brother figure neither you nor he remembers, as he dies remembering all the people that put their faith in him whom he could never save.
It just feels shallow.

Anyway. I have accepted that I am now solely looking forward to the Castlevania crossover, preferably with each new boss getting progressively gayer for Lahabrea, as Ancient Greek God Dracula basically yells "TITS OUT FOR LAHABREA" right in front of Lahabrea's estranged son and Elidibus. Let it be known that I am 100% here for this.

(If you've just read everything I wrote, whether you agree or not, thank you very much and, um, congratulations for being incredibly persistant in reading my ramblings.)

[KizuyaKatogami]

Snip

Elidibus is probably my second favorite character in the entire game so believe me when i tell you i relate to what you said so much. Both him and Zodiark got absolutely shafted in favor of other characters and it shows. He’s been built up since the beginning of the game and he only gets 2 patches to really shine and then gets a 5 minute cameo before sacrificing himself to save us which is also just never ever even brought up. He’s never shown again after that. Isn’t given a scene in the credits or on Ultima Thule. It’s just Emet Emet Emet. You can tell just how much the writers pander to the community honestly. We saw it first with Graha and now Emet and don’t get me wrong, i love Emet, but it’s like they completely ripped Elidibus’ role and presence away from him and gave it to Emet and Elidibus was just written off despite being the other heart in the saga of the two elder primals. Just so disappointing what they did with him and i’ll say it, imo it was an incredibly bad writing decision.

[OhNooo]

I am so glad this thread is making me feel... sane? I resonate so very much with the viewpoints of KizuyaKatogami, Lauront and Rulakir. It's just incredibly comforting to know I'm not alone, especially when talking about a story I was so invested into for the last 5 years. For the past 2 months I feel like my mind has done nothing but incoherently rant about Endwalker, which often felt like screaming into the void…

(If you've just read everything I wrote, whether you agree or not, thank you very much and, um, congratulations for being incredibly persistant in reading my ramblings.)

Bravo. I read every word and I pretty much had the same observations throughout my play through of the msq during early access. For a while I was very disappointed and felt like I had nowhere to vent until I saw the threads popping up about it. It felt good to get it all of of my chest.

Now I feel like I’m finally ready to move on so I didn’t renew my sub. I just got an email today reminding me that my sub ends tomorrow lol. I feel like I stick around the forums now for entertainment cause there is definitely some hilarious drama that happens sometimes.

[SpectrePhantasia]

So essentially what we've gleamed from this thread is