I suppose, more than anything, I'm just disappointed that we're basically meant to not think too deeply on...quite a lot of elements related to the story. That's a pretty stark contrast to what drew me into the world of Etheirys back in the days of ARR and HW.

I also liked the gritty realism. It was closer in style to FFVI, FFVII, FFXII and FFIX which had consequences in spades and many moments where the protagonists genuinely failed in a way that led to lasting aftereffects.

So much of the story in FFXIV, however, seems to involve gifting the Sundered every possible advantage to ensure their victory but then condemning every other faction for not having access to the same set of highly contrived tools.

If nothing else, I think it's pretty telling that both WoW and FFXIV are arguably suffering from similar problems in regards to propping up a specific and very controversial character at the expense of every other faction and character in their respective games.

At least in Venat's case, the writers actually opted to kill her off. We'll see it if sticks since they've said characters were dead before only to have them pop up again in the future.

The next Live Letter will cover 6.1 in a bit more depth and give us some insight into the next story arc. I'm reluctant to get too invested though. There's just too much of a risk that I'll come to like a particular character only to see them given a less than satisfactory conclusion.