When are we supposed to stop fighting?

[Veloran]

Venat's choice was, and I've been saying this for months, morally questionable but strategically correct.

Venat's choice was - "it all worked itself out in the end" aside - strategically miserable.

Let's really think about this for a moment. She knows that aetherial density can counteract the effects of Dynamis. She knows that Zodiark's aetherial shield is tied to his existence and is the only thing protecting the planet. And she knows that Meteion is gathering power at the edge of the universe. In this situation, in what way does it make sense for her to not aid in the planet's defense or Zodiark's creation, and then to sunder Zodiark and reduce the aetherial density of everything in existence by 13/14ths? As it stands the fact that Zodiark's aetherial currents weren't rendered useless by this is a major plothole, from the outset this had the potential to restart the Final Days instantly. Even the idea that this wouldn't dissolve Zodiark or undo his protection through the disruption to his form alone is a major leap. Not to mention that the necessity of using Dynamis to combat Meteion wasn't well established, and Venat saw firsthand that her despair was enough to bring WoL to their knees while the others were unaffected. On the topic of WoL at the very least this allows Venat to know that - Through some series of events (because WoL didn't know the details) and presuming the timeline goes unchanged - the Sundering won't just destroy the planet. But WoL was also from a seemingly doomed future where Venat apparently had no recourse but to try and plan an escape, so moving things in that direction is really not a positive idea. Then there's the fact that she never told humanity about either the threat of Meteion nor the ideals she wanted them to either have or not have, meaning she's providing very little direction here other than "Ascians evil, Zodiark evil, kill", which is counter-productive in the extreme. The very creation of the thirteen shards, whose existence is utterly dependent on the Source's survival yet all of which are isolated from each other and incapable of defending themselves, is really a raw absurdity. Let's not even get into the non-exploration of any alternative ideas for countering Meteion.

I can go on but these are some of the primary criticisms of her strategy.

I think the cause of a lot of these problems comes down to the fact that Shadowbringers was written as a realist narrative ("things happen based on the choices and competing needs of the characters"), while Enwalker is very much an idealist ("things happen for bigger picture, thematically-driven reasons") one. They're fine in isolation, but they go together like oil and water, which is not great since they're so inter-dependent.

Excellently put.