Building a better Alphinaud

[CrownySuccubus]

As for the other stuff, Alphinaud tends to assume good faith of other people, and is often shocked or thrown when someone turns out to be acting in bad faith, or just trying to mislead him.

Honestly, every single heroic character in FFXIV tends to be suicidally optimistic and naive when it comes to walking into villains' traps. Often, it's because of that assumption of good faith you mentioned, as with Ilbred...but sometimes it's because there's a presumption that not falling for the trap would be "unfair" or something. For instance, nobody trusted Asahi as far as they could throw him even before he went Mask Off in front of the WOL, but everybody, including Hien, just walked into his trap. Likewise with Shanti in 4.1, whom they KNEW was Tempered and literally could NOT be acting on good faith as a result of said Tempering, but still let her into the conference at the palace and thus almost got the conference leaders turned into slaves.

[Avidria]

I feel like things like Alphinaud's optimism blinding him to obvious traps isn't just a him thing. One of the few consistent things that's bothered me through the MSQ in general is plot convenient stupidity for... All of the characters, including the WoL. It's part of why I disliked the Bozja story as a whole so much, and lost interest in it entirely less than halfway through. It felt like my character just woke up without a brain in the morning for half of it.

So yeah that's not a fault of any one character, it's just 'convenient' for the plot.

[Raven2014]

Hingashi is way worse than Ishgard. While yes Kugane has consulates and stuff but with Hingashi, we are just on the smallest island of Shishu and there's still the whole main island of Koshu that we never even get to get close too. Its like Camp Dragonhead / Ishgard proper x10

How does any of that make Hingashi "way worse than Ishgard"!? Even if you want to argue Kugane is the equivalent of Camp Dragonhead, it's 100x more elaborated. Camp Dragonhead is basically just a security outpost to receive traveler with minimum accommodation and definitely not a commercial hub. It's basically a gatekeeper. Kugane has diplomatic mission, is MEANT to be a commercial, transportation, and culture exchange center and amplify those function to the max. Kugane is like New York city while Camp Dragonhead is like ... Midway, not even comparable. Also the Hingashi citizen embrace interaction with foreigner while Isghardian were just straight up xenophobic (which is a common straight for hardcore isolationist).


And the reason we never visit the Hingashi proper because we never have a need to, that does not explicitly say anything about its access comparing to Isghard, which is EXTREMELY hard. You may had forgotten and taken for granted now, but we didn't just willy nilly walked pass the Gate of Judgement to get into the city. Haurchefant went back to fill out the paperwork before we could go in. We were only allowed to enter the city after House Fortemp (one of the 4 great houses) agree to sponsor us as their charges.

[Lauront]

I wish they would just delete him.

Same. That's the only improvement I want when it comes to him.

Frankly after the disbandment of the Scions at the end of EW...that should have been it. New Adventure means new groups to roam with. But no...less than 5 minutes later it's "Hey we should get the gang back together again".

Delete them all I say. Maybe not Estinien. He keeps it real.

This too.

[CrownySuccubus]

How does any of that make Hingashi "way worse than Ishgard"!? Even if you want to argue Kugane is the equivalent of Camp Dragonhead, it's 100x more elaborated. Camp Dragonhead is basically just a security outpost to receive traveler with minimum accommodation and definitely not a commercial hub. It's basically a gatekeeper. Kugane has diplomatic mission, is MEANT to be a commercial, transportation, and culture exchange center and amplify those function to the max. Kugane is like New York city while Camp Dragonhead is like ... Midway, not even comparable.


And the reason we never visit the Hingashi proper because we never have a need to, that does not explicitly say anything about its access comparing to Isghard, which is EXTREMELY hard. You may had forgotten and taken for granted now, but we didn't just willy nilly walked pass the Gate of Judgement to get into the city. Haurchefant went back to fill out the paperwork before we could go in. We were only allowed to enter the city after House Fortemp (one of the 4 great houses) agree to sponsor us as their charges.

Frankly, I don't have a horse in this race as I don't particularly care whether Hingashi or Ishgard are "more isolationist" than each other.

That said, Kugane is the equivalent to the city of Dejima, just like Hingashi itself is based on Edo-period Japan. Like Kugane, Dejima was the only city where outsiders (particularly the Dutch) were allowed to dock and trade with the Japanese. Shirogane, likewise, is considered a big deal in Kugane specifically because it's the only place that foreigners are allowed to live in the country.

I say this to emphasize that the comparison to New York isn't really accurate, either.

I'm more interested in the unique elements of every nation and culture we come across rather than listening to the Scions and City State leaders engage in their usual sophistry. As an example, the presence of organisations along the lines of the Illidari in WoW or the Reachmen of Markath in ESO never bow down to the player character but still persist in the world as a force that stand as either allies or opponents as the situation demands it. Such need not come at the cost of the Scions, either - you guys can still have them front and centre if you so wish. It's just that some of us - again - simply want some variety. For characters and factions to exist that are not simply there to be fodder to be cut down and come to align with everything the player character and their immediate social circle so desire.

I still really do not understand this argument. I know that you and Aveyond like to repeat it a lot, but I don't get what you guys want.

When someone mentions Thavnair is still a monarchy, it doesn't count because you don't like it. When they point out that Doma or Hingaghi are as well, you say "it doesn't matter because it's not relevant to the story anymore". Mention the Viis or beast tribes, and they're not European enough. The mention of Dalmasca earlier went completely ignored.

As I said before, it comes across as super strange and random that a gaggle of monarchies are being called "variety", but different democratic states with their own struggles to overcome and baggage to deal with are considered a "lack of variety".

[AngelCheese77]

I have enjoyed the story and growth of Alphinaud and Alisae. I don’t want them to change a think.

Perfect characters are boring. I ‘d rather have characters who have players/readers divided on their personality than everyone loving them.

[GrizzlyTank]

We have the technology.

We can rebuild him!

Behold the new and improved Betinaud!

[Rulakir]

HW is the only time I've liked Alphinaud. I couldn't stand him in ARR and he's just kind of been there ever since. Unlike Estinien, I don't believe we have enough realists, certainly not among those surrounding the WoL.

It's unfortunate he's Yoshi-P's favorite because I'd really like an extended break from him. I don't even know that 'fixing' him would help, I'm just tired of him at this point.

[Lunalepsy]

Endwalker is just one big filler.

[Zanarkand-Ronso]

Endwalker is just one big filler.

What if 6.0 is just a Trailer for 7.0?