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

[Theodric]

To be fair, I don't think a lot of people would have sympathised with the Ancients as readily if they had looked like they did in Amaurot. I personally liked that version of their appearance, though back in Shadowbringers I remember some people dismissing them and declaring that the likes of Ardbert were 'better' because he was 'hotter'.

On the other hand, Shadowbringers was seemingly designed to build up sympathy and understanding for the Ancients and their plight but Endwalker just tried to dismiss everything that had been done on that front by trying to claim that they deserved it and their fate was inevitable.

It's almost as if someone deliberately only looked at the feedback from those who loathed the Ancients and Garleans to reinforce the silly idea that both races needed to have every possible tragedy inflicted upon them. Something changed in the development phase - because previously the interviews by Yoshi-P stressed a need to showcase the nuance. Then, for whatever reason, they decided to backtrack.

Having seen how petty the writers back in WoW behaved whenever the audience did not respond as they wanted to Sylvanas and Anduin...I do not doubt that something similar plagues this game. Mostly because it's pretty bizarre for the lead developer to try and declare that a major character is a 'good person' for engaging in genocide. It isn't his call to make as to how people decide to read into a character's motives and level of sympathy nor has he ever tried to enforce it for other characters in the past.