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

[Rulakir]

How unfortunate, then, that they're never at risk of any harm befalling them in the majority of cases. A fact many of their fans know all too well, I suspect. So it's pretty easy for them to shrug in indifference because even when one of the allies to the protagonists such as Hydaelyn does something messed up it's never going to be aimed at the protagonists so in their eyes it doesn't matter.

I didn't become resentful of the Scions until EW. They have everything handed to them by virtue of being joined at the hip to the WoL. I found it ridiculous they were somehow the poster children for strength through suffering when they're some of the most privileged lot I've ever seen. It probably won't happen given past history and the narrative of 6.0, but I felt that they needed to do some introspection when it comes to Venat embodying the ideologies they have consistently opposed except when it benefits them. I would like to see our 'moral paragons' have to reflect upon their own values (and hypocrisy) for once.

The WoL, equally, needs to start doing some level 30-50 DRK questioning of themselves if they always do the right thing or like whey they have to do (that the Scions typically push them into doing). This would make the characters and story exponentially more interesting to me. As it is, the Ancients are far more compelling because they do experience tragedy and loss. An extinction level event came and went with both the Scions and the world seeming completely unfazed.

Bringing this up because I was reminded of it recently, I am going to quote Hythlodaeus’s statement from Ultima Thule, which in retrospect seems like such an unbelievable thing to say now:

This appears to be an EN localization issue. Surprise, surprise. He doesn't say that in either FR or DE, as far as I know. It's:

"Don't be like that, it was fun. Look at them running about all agitated."
"It would be a shame if we were to disappear before this spectacle is over."

Side note, if you join the thread discord you get to see FR and DE translations. :P

We really need someone on the level of Aymeric or Nanamo to die.

Nanamo, yes. Aymeric, no. Every other city leader's head can be on the chopping block but his. :P

[MikkoAkure]

My dream Garlemald expansion would have us not fundamentally altering their political system; I want to send a message that the whole system isn’t broken just because of corrupt people who abuse it. I also want to honor that some things are intrinsic to a nation’s heritage, and it’s not my business as an outsider to change that.

When we’ve already been told that the political system was purposefully created by an Ascian to be broken, the idea of keeping it doesn’t exactly hold as much weight. It was made that way on purpose to cause a mess when Solus made his exit and it worked, twice.

The empire is the way it is by the end of Endwalker because of how it was built. Both the Lemures and the Populares saw that things weren’t quite right and tried to change it in their own way while keeping the pride of the empire intact and it didn’t work out for either of them.

I also wouldn’t call a 60 year period where they were the tool of an Ascian, conquering lands on false premises, and committing war crimes “intrinsic to the nation’s heritage”.

[anhaato]

When we’ve already been told that the political system was purposefully created by an Ascian to be broken, the idea of keeping it doesn’t exactly hold as much weight. It was made that way on purpose to cause a mess when Solus made his exit and it worked, twice.

The empire is the way it is by the end of Endwalker because of how it was built. Both the Lemures and the Populares saw that things weren’t quite right and tried to change it in their own way while keeping the pride of the empire intact and it didn’t work out for either of them.

I also wouldn’t call a 60 year period where they were the tool of an Ascian, conquering lands on false premises, and committing war crimes “intrinsic to the nation’s heritage”.

I know I've replied with these words a lot these past few days, but I really don't care. Doesn't matter who founded it, the nation's makeup is its heritage. An empire or a monarchy is not inherently broken, even if the ascians wanted it to fail eventually. The Garlean people can reclaim it for themselves.

[MikkoAkure]

I know I've replied with these words a lot these past few days, but I really don't care. Doesn't matter who founded it, the nation's makeup is its heritage. An empire or a monarchy is not inherently broken, even if the ascians wanted it to fail eventually. The Garlean people can reclaim it for themselves.

Isn’t writing a story without caring about what has come before and doing their own thing what y’all are complaining about the original writers doing though?

At that point may as well just write something up and put it on AO3. Or just make your own story completely detached from FFXIV like how a Twilight AU fan-fic turned into 50 Shades of Grey.

[anhaato]

Love all that I've read so far, don't allow yourself to be restricted by lore police. Do what feels natural for your story. The zones you've described have peaked my interest and there is a good balance of biomes/cultures to visit and experience. I look forward to reading more of your worldbuilding and seeing more pictures that shed light on your vision for Ilsabard.

Radz-at-Han being the marketboard city makes a lot of sense given how large it is in game, and the train station serving as an endgame hub also would be the sort of area that I'd casually afk in or craft there. All you've written about Nhalmasque sounds solid, and your allocation of Corvos/Dalmasca+Nagxia to their respective other content and expansion is also a good use of the regions.

Thanks, I liked the ideas you were putting for locations in your thread too and honestly I would like to riff off of some of those ideas, especially the airship zone, but I wanted to expand as much of terrestrial Ilsabard as possible. I think a dungeon set across that giant fleet of airships would be dope, and it could be an accessible minor zone like the Menagerie, serving a similar function as the end of the dungeon that leads into the final trial.

[anhaato]

Isn’t writing a story without caring about what has come before and doing their own thing what y’all are complaining about the original writers doing though?

At that point may as well just write something up and put it on AO3. Or just make your own story completely detached from FFXIV like how a Twilight AU fan-fic turned into 50 Shades of Grey.

I don't care how minor the history was, I don't care who started it, none of that delegitimizes the fact that it is an empire founded in the north of Ilsabard, and that there is a culture built around that. That is its heritage. Oh no, the empire was started by an ascian, big deal. The Garlean people existed long before the empire. Emet's involvement doesn't mean the people can't reclaim it and prevent it from falling. After all, Ishgard was also founded on a pillar of lies, why do they get to avoid complete self-annihilation?

[Rulakir]

He is literally mankind's final hope, a manifestation of the Ancients' desire to struggle and suffer in the pursuit of life, which is more than a little contradictory to the Plenty's endgame. Do the writers want us to believe that Emet-Selch struggled to resurrect his people for 12,000 years because the Ancients were ultimately apathetic to the point of self-destruction?

Zodiark, relegated to an "ill-fated wish". :P The only explanation I can think of is that for some bizarre reason they didn't expect players to look into the story too deeply. Several people have wondered if Yoshi-P even played through the side quests in Elpis, which paint a different picture than what's presented in the MSQ (not coincidentally from the POV of two of the world's dissidents).

I've said many times EW didn't feel like the spiritual successor of ShB and that the story felt like it had been handed off to someone else. It's hard to tell if ShB was truly a fluke or if EW is the result of an overworked Ishikawa who didn't have the same level of creative freedom. I suppose we may never know, but there are so many inconsistencies and contradictions between the two for me that I couldn't arrive at the same conclusions EW demanded in order for the story to work.

Did the Ancients need to be Sundered because they were too close to said line? If so, how does Sundering them and wiping them out resolve this problem? Would sensitivity to Dynamis prevent this ultimate fate, or were the Ancients essentially dealt an impossible hand in life? Are the Sundered going to be at risk if they advance too far, or are they immune to such apathy and/or existential dread because they have Dynamis?

This is yet another timeline issue (and something else I suppose will never be clarified). While we don't know for sure, it seems like the length of time between the summoning of Zodiark and the sundering was a matter of months. It doesn't sound like Venat and her crew spent any significant amount of time trying to encourage change and, frankly, I don't believe that was realistic in what was essentially a post-apocalyptic world at that point. The cutscene that is so celebrated appeared to me as tone deaf since these people were still in the midst of trauma and grief having scarcely escaped an extinction level event.

Assuming they were going to go the way of The Plenty it likely would've taken a significant amount of time to do so. This makes Venat, Miss "Nothing Is Impossible", look like she's given up on them before they can even get back on their feet in order to pursue "perfection". I can't even solely attribute it to her lacking patience because it's that she wouldn't tell anyone the truth. I don't know how reasonable it was of her to believe she and her 12 followers could change society based on whatever platitude they were peddling.

Then you add dynamis into the mix, which causes one to question how earnest her attempts to change society were if she truly believed the Ancients incapable of defeating Meteion without being sundered. So, in order for her to have "tried" then you'd have to accept that they could have come up with a way to defeat Meteion and that's not what the game leads you believe (or, in fact, many of its fans will argue). Otherwise, everything she did was all for show (or possibly even a ruse to amass followers) and her intention always was to sunder everyone.

Not to mention her making Etheirys substantially more vulnerable to other 'dead end' fates they previously weren't at risk of falling to is conveniently never addressed.

The Ancients are in a rigged, unwinnable situation because they're battling plot contrivances designed to kill them.

Essentially, yes. Worse because EW took what was presented in ShB as a tragedy and spun it as them having deserved their fate one way or another. It felt gross and unsatisfying. Particularly so when the characters who are responsible for the Final Days and the Sundering are depicted as being sympathetic and overall correct (if you apply Ishikawa's statement regarding Hermes being the "first step" for mankind).

[Rosenstrauch]

It's kind of silly to insist that fanfiction writers must strictly adhere to the game's lore with no deviations whatsoever. Especially since the game's own writers have no such restrictions and are free to upturn or throw away anything that gets in the way of the story they want to tell.

And yes, that is what this "alternate story" stuff is. Fanfiction. It's not a dirty word, and it bothers me when folks treat it like one.

Speaking of which, I am finishing up chapter 10 of my own fic. I may have to take a bit of a break after this, just to suss out how I want the rest of the story to unfold. I say this because the current chapter feels a bit directionless.

EDIT: And it's uploaded. 10 chapters down, no idea how many more to go. It occurs to me that I might as well get over my hang-up regarding self-promotion and just actually share my work, seeing as how I do it on my Twitter account anyways.

https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnonymousXIV

Amidst the Ashes of Paradise is probably going to be the last FFXIV fic I write, all things considered. This once a week schedule I've been holding myself to has been burning me out, and the monthly at best schedule I adopted for Candle in the Dark ended up rolling over into Endwalker's release and the "Emotions isn't Aether, it's Dynamis!" stuff, which... really put a damper on my Dark Knight love.

[Rulakir]

I've thought about it, but I honestly didn't care about most of what happened in EW. Were it not for Elpis it'd be a middling expansion for me at best (why I rated it a 5). Even with Elpis, it's both the part I loved and hated the most. I'd mostly rewrite it and the moon. I can't be bothered to try to make Thavnair or Labyrinthos interesting. :P

I'll think on it and maybe present what I would've liked to have seen for Ancients.

[Theodric]

So! What's everybody expecting for the Live Letter on Friday?