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

[Lunaxia]

From what we hear and read of Varis though if i’m not mistaken he’s referred to as a great and fair leader according to the garlean people. If we go based off of a country’s misdeeds then i’d consider the city state leaders just as abysmal in every single respect.

A great and fair leader (who employed censorship, hung dissenters or else ran them out of the country, and sought to deploy a deadly gas with the potential to kill thousands.) Apart from that, he's a thoroughly delightful chap.

I will say his ending was bizarrely grisly though, I was actually quite shocked they went that far, especially given the overall "lighter" tone of Endwalker. I almost felt sorry for him. I don't think anyone else has come close, except possibly Adeledji.

Agreed. I wouldn't mind finding out more about Garlemald's recent history, but for all the lauding I've seen of Varis, he was an absolutely abysmal leader in every single respect you can possibly imagine and really showed the problems inherent in a system where blood relation is seen as conferring the right to be in charge of a country. I can't see the people that have survived to see the rise and crash of a system of government like that in their lifetime rushing out to put the crown on whatever ninny with a drop of Emet-Selch's blood happens by.

I think by now the Garleans are probably more than a little scarred by their experiences, and the last thing they need is yet another would-be dictator proferring a benevolent hand and promising to guide them out of the darkness. I'd be having war flashbacks (quite literally.)

[aveyond-dreams]

I think by now the Garleans are probably more than a little scarred by their experiences, and the last thing they need is yet another would-be dictator proferring a benevolent hand and promising to guide them out of the darkness. I'd be having war flashbacks (quite literally.)

I'd rather trust a Larsa than a faceless and leaderless senate made up of people who were quite happily towing the line of the previous regime, which is to say nothing of the other problems to which democracies/republics are prone. The simple fact of the matter is that a better story could have been told by fleshing out and devoting more time to members of the royal family and other high ranking officials in Garlemald. Maybe then they'd have a better ending than being beamed up to the Moon.

With Garlemald declawed, coupled with the resolution of the Ancients' storyline, FFXIV's world becomes more boring with each patch. There's hardly anything left of interest left on the Source that the current writing direction is willing to touch - because Bozja was apparently too dark and Ivalice lore was too complex for the playerbase to understand. Instead we get regime change driven by a 16 year old elf in country after country. As a fan of fantasy and medieval settings, all this is just making me less and less interested in a world I used to be a lot more invested in.

The failings in FFXIV's worldbuilding is what is also serving to drive me full force into the arms of FFXVI, which has a far more balanced platter of nations. A duchy, two kingdoms, one holy theocratic empire, and one republic - important to note because the more republics you have the less unique they become. In the monarchies or "dictatorships" as they've been decried at least you have the chance to get a more colorful cast of characters to root for. Am I really supposed to be excited about a senate or parliament whose members are never on screen? Multiplied by 3 in the case of FFXIV? Give me a break.

The only time in media where I've seen a "democracy" have a compelling cast/underlying plot was in Legend of the Galactic Heroes. FFXIV wouldn't dare paint its new cookie cutter regimes in the same light that the Alliance was depicted in that series. Even then, there was usually a better story to consume on the Imperial side. With FFXIV's empire gone along with many other plot elements that people enjoyed, all that is left is a literal Void.