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

[Rilifane]

My personal hope is something like "you set sail to the new world but shipwreck and are alone in a strange land with new people" or "you get sucked into another shard by yourself this time".

But I doubt Square would dare to leave you scion-less for too long.

One of the reasons why I enjoyed HW was the way we got embroiled in the conflict.
We were refugees accused of regicide. We were unbelievers from outside. Ishgard has been completely closed off for several years not granting entry to people from other city-states, it was embroiled in its own war and saw outsiders as a nuisance and a hindrance in their war. Many citizens showed a very clear dislike of us, ranging from grudgingly accepting our help to outright insulting us. We had allies with the Fortemps but Edmont always stressed how important it is to step carefully and that he can't support us too openly. Artoirel was against us at first. Alphinaud and Tataru got accused of heresy in no time and it escalated into a trial by combat. Some people were sympathetic and nice towards us but the reactions were extremely mixed.
It just felt natural.
The people didn't fawn over us and worshipped the ground we walked on the moment we stepped inside the city. We weren't constantly surrounded by a holier than though squad of foreign scholars that always knew everything better than everyone else (including what they and their nation wants). Two characters didn't get along with each other at all and they didn't did a 180 because we said so. We lost two established characters, one with a very nice character arc and both have been around for some time prior to their death. We saw the direct consequences of the end of the Dragonsong War, it wasn't suddenly alright for everyone.
Many people still had their misgivings about us, doubted us and even decried us and it was completely understandable; we couldn't even resent them because we would've likely reacted the same way.
Some random from outside waltzes in and tells us all our loved ones died for a lie after we've been taught something for hundreds of years? No, sir. Not buying it. Bugger off, unbeliever.
And all of that without the Scions constantly giving exposition speeches that all sound very same-y and make clear that why, yes, of course they know better than everyone else and that their way is the right way.

We got the full scope of reactions from the characters, we weren't introduced and treated as the hero that is here to solve all your problems (whether you like it or not), we were proper refugees that had some friends in the right places but also definitely some enemies in the wrong ones.
It's almost as if a nice story functions without the Scions and constant WoL fawning. How shocking.

[Theodric]

I'd love to see more conflict and different reactions to things in general where the protagonists are concerned. I was having a discussion earlier today, in fact, about how I felt that it was a missed opportunity for at least one of the protagonists who died to not be bitter about their demise. Someone can be a good person and yet still have bubbling spite in response to being cut down before their time. Certainly, that sort of reaction would make the allies of the player character seem more authentic instead of generic 'good guys' who never, ever do anything bad whatsoever.

[PawPaw]

It's almost as if a nice story functions without the Scions and constant WoL fawning. How shocking.

I agree and I can't even pinpoint the exact moment the game went from the subtle, powerful storytelling of HW to the outright player character simping and fanservice of EW. Was is during ShB?

[aveyond-dreams]

I agree and I can't even pinpoint the exact moment the game went from the subtle, powerful storytelling of HW to the outright player character simping and fanservice of EW. Was is during ShB?

5.4, specifically when they put in the first uwu sparkly eyes G'raha Tia scene.

[PawPaw]

5.4, specifically when they put in the first uwu sparkly eyes G'raha Tia scene.

It definitely hit its stride there but I feel it also had its seeds in Alisae's constant worship of our character. That was the EP where she began to be annoying for me with the everlasting need to have contests that she can never win. And since 6.1 has set itself up with the same slice-of-life, UwU scenes that we got in EW, I do wonder if we'll be able to naturally return to the darker writing and storytelling of the past.

[aveyond-dreams]

It definitely hit its stride there but I feel it also had its seeds in Alisae's constant worship of our character. That was the EP where she began to be annoying for me with the everlasting need to have contests that she can never win. And since 6.1 has set itself up with the same slice-of-life, UwU scenes that we got in EW, I do wonder if we'll be able to naturally return to the darker writing and storytelling of the past.

With a writing team who prioritizes fanservice over action scenes and a localization team more preoccupied with discussions surrounding the pronouns of faeries than fleshing out the world, I do not have the confidence we will see a strong recovery until FFXVI releases and liberates the Heavensward team from whatever obligations they still hold.

[CrownySuccubus]

WOL fawning has literally existed from the start of the game.

You literally cannot start the game without people preening over how awesome and wholesome and sweet and caring and powerful you are. You can't refuse to save Gridania's Guardian Tree, or not to help the Sultansworn, or not save a town from the Sahagin. You can't choose NOT to become the "personal envoy" of your chosen city-state or NOT to save that one random woman in Ul'dah from a racist merchant and his thugs.

It's basically been this way from the beginning. The only difference is that we're no longer saving individual factions and getting praised for it, but entire nations, worlds and universes.

[Theodric]

I'm not convinced that it was 'always' this way. In ARR most characters were too distracted by the various dangers that existed to worry about fawning over the player character. I quite liked the infamous 'prove yourself' quest chain in Costa del Sol, not because it wasn't tedious but because it was thrilling to me to see the player character's ego knocked down a few pegs. The game was a lot grittier and mature in general and if we'd had the likes of G'raha batting his eyelashes and jumping up on down in excitement because he wanted to go on an adventure, I can honestly say that I never would have bothered investing beyond that point. I just hope that the guy responsible for ARR and HW makes a return once FFXVI is released because his style of storytelling is much more to my liking.

[CrownySuccubus]

I'm not convinced that it was 'always' this way. In ARR most characters were too distracted by the various dangers that existed to worry about fawning over the player character. I quite liked the infamous 'prove yourself' quest chain in Costa del Sol, not because it wasn't tedious but because it was thrilling to me to see the player character's ego knocked down a few pegs. The game was a lot grittier and mature in general and if we'd had the likes of G'raha batting his eyelashes and jumping up on down in excitement because he wanted to go on an adventure, I can honestly say that I never would have bothered investing beyond that point. I just hope that the guy responsible for ARR and HW makes a return once FFXVI is released because his style of storytelling is much more to my liking.

Yeah, but who was the person who typically saved them FROM those "various dangers"? The entirety of ARR was basically, "Thank you gallant hero, for saving us from [insert hostile thing here]. We will deal with the fallout for now, but we know that we can depend on thee to defend us when the time comes, oh brave hero."

ARR was pure fluff set-up without resolution. Throwing out as many concepts as possible and seeing which ones land for future quests/stories. But 90% of all of them go through the same "Zero to Hero" routine.

And yes, again, I get it: you don't like G'raha. He's the symbol of everything wrong with the game, apparently. But, for better or worse, you are in a substantial minority.

[Theodric]

It's hard to say who is the actual minority when it comes to the likes of G'raha. Plenty of people disliked Mikasa in Attack on Titan but had death threats sent their way if they spoke up within the fandom. Characters such as G'raha, which exist solely to fawn over the player character, are generally very polarising. There's a reason most RPG's have the dignity to allow the player character to consent to crushes and outright relationships. Especially in games where the player character isn't a pre-created one but one with significant room to tweak them to one's liking.

Consent in general is the issue with this game's story. The Ancients didn't consent to genocide. There's no ability to consent to having weird one sided crushes forced onto the player character by various NPC's that we may or may not even like or be interested in.

Of course, anyone who points out such issues on either front usually gets subjected to gaslighting in response...