A game for 4 year olds

[kaynide]

All these words salad, when the solution is pretty easy. Just make us lose our blessings of light

Cleretic and you both have ideas that are both fine for how to move forward, and there are probably lots more on the table.

The problem with losing the light becomes one of what next? What happens after we invariably get super strong again? We can probably pull a megaman and lose all our powers once before it feels cheap..and we kinda already did in Heavansward.

For me, I think the simplest thing is to do what they do to Superman- he’s super powerful sure, but he can’t be everywhere at once. A lot of tension to be had when you can’t save everyone.

[Cleretic]

Cleretic and you both have ideas that are both fine for how to move forward, and there are probably lots more on the table.

The problem with losing the light becomes one of what next? What happens after we invariably get super strong again? We can probably pull a megaman and lose all our powers once before it feels cheap..and we kinda already did in Heavansward.

For me, I think the simplest thing is to do what they do to Superman- he’s super powerful sure, but he can’t be everywhere at once. A lot of tension to be had when you can’t save everyone.

Something to point out with saying 'we should just lose the Blessing of Light' is they already did that once, and the fact that doesn't seem to occur to people suggesting it is evidence that won't really hit, because it's commonly forgotten that they already pulled that, and I think all it really did was give Nabriales the confidence to come die to us. In fact, if they pull that it's likely to do even less than it did before, since primals and Ascians both are less of a problem now; the hell are we gonna use the Blessing against? A particularly menacing gigantoad?

I don't usually like comparing us to Superman, but I do like that notion of 'we can't be everywhere' as a way to heighten tension; there's appeal in making something out of the fact that for once we aren't somewhere when shit goes really far south. I still think they don't need to do anything to factor in our beefiness when what they really need to focus on is actually selling what we're going up against as a legitimate threat, but just in terms of doing new and interesting things, yeah, pulling the 'you can't protect everyone at once' is an untilled field, and not one without merit.

[Travel]

Yeah that's exactly how one of WoW's expansions started, and said expansion saw an absolutely enormous drop in players that the game still hasn't recovered from 4 years later. Destroying beloved people and places simply for misery porn is a horrible idea, and there's already a perfect example of the consequences it would have on the game to show just how bad an idea it is.

Yeah... post-apocalyptic areas can be really fun to run around, but smashing up everything for the sake of drama feels cheap.

Something to point out with saying 'we should just lose the Blessing of Light' is they already did that once, and the fact that doesn't seem to occur to people suggesting it is evidence that won't really hit, because it's commonly forgotten that they already pulled that, and I think all it really did was give Nabriales the confidence to come die to us. In fact, if they pull that it's likely to do even less than it did before, since primals and Ascians both are less of a problem now; the hell are we gonna use the Blessing against? A particularly menacing gigantoad?

I don't usually like comparing us to Superman, but I do like that notion of 'we can't be everywhere' as a way to heighten tension; there's appeal in making something out of the fact that for once we aren't somewhere when shit goes really far south. I still think they don't need to do anything to factor in our beefiness when what they really need to focus on is actually selling what we're going up against as a legitimate threat, but just in terms of doing new and interesting things, yeah, pulling the 'you can't protect everyone at once' is an untilled field, and not one without merit.

That feels like the route the game might be taking in the future; granted, I'd prefer we take care of everything on the Source first before moving on to other shards, but I'll take what we can get.

[Cleretic]

That feels like the route the game might be taking in the future; granted, I'd prefer we take care of everything on the Source first before moving on to other shards, but I'll take what we can get.

Honestly, we don't even need something that big; we just need two things to happen at once, anywhere, to split our focus. Especially if someone thinks to knock out an aetheryte (which we already know works from Stormblood), or one of those events is far enough away from one in the first place.

And a bit of an 'unseen storm' character would certainly be new. I feel like to some, the fact Zenos and Ran'jit were quantifiable foes that they could theoretically win fights against made it hard to swallow actually losing to them, but going up against someone who's won before we even turn up would really build up some mystery.

[KageTokage]

Honestly, we don't even need something that big; we just need two things to happen at once, anywhere, to split our focus. Especially if someone thinks to knock out an aetheryte (which we already know works from Stormblood), or one of those events is far enough away from one in the first place.

And a bit of an 'unseen storm' character would certainly be new. I feel like to some, the fact Zenos and Ran'jit were quantifiable foes that they could theoretically win fights against made it hard to swallow actually losing to them, but going up against someone who's won before we even turn up would really build up some mystery.

I think just having more problems that can't be solved with our specialty of brute force is enough to keep things interesting. A villain who's flexing political influence as opposed to raw strength could present a unique problem., and they already dabbled in that to a degree with the Monetarists though the issue kind of ended up resolving itself given that Lolorito decided it was in his best interests to not continue working against the Scions in the long term.

Yeah... post-apocalyptic areas can be really fun to run around, but smashing up everything for the sake of drama feels cheap.

I am kind of hoping that if we go to Ilsabard one of the zones will be a place that was badly damaged by the Final Days as a tangible reminder of how horribly things could've gone for the entire world if we hadn't won. Right now, it feels very...forgettable given that nobody of particular import succumbed, nor can you tell anything even went wrong in the first place in any of the existing zones.

Even though things were largely fixed up after the seventh calamity, those giant masses of corrupted crystal left in Bahamut's wake serve as a permanent reminder of destruction he had wrought.

[kaynide]

I think just having more problems that can't be solved with our specialty of brute force is enough to keep things interesting. A villain who's flexing political influence as opposed to raw strength could present a unique problem., and they already dabbled in that to a degree with the Monetarists though the issue kind of ended up resolving itself given that Lolorito decided it was in his best interests to not continue working against the Scions in the long term.

This is a good direction also;

I kind of thought we might have gone that way in Garlemald...but ehh.

I had suggested months waaaay back as an idea to come to a situation where our team simply doesn't have or can't offer the best solution. Not that we are "wrong", but that our ideal is just not the solution. The point being that we have to learn what's best for the people in question and then offer to assist in a way that they want.

Dealing with the remaining legions could be a good way to do this- as I hope the goal would not be to subjugate them or even remove them from Corvos, but help them find a way to settle somewhere peace peacefully... probably with a lot of politics in play.

[Cleretic]

I think just having more problems that can't be solved with our specialty of brute force is enough to keep things interesting. A villain who's flexing political influence as opposed to raw strength could present a unique problem., and they already dabbled in that to a degree with the Monetarists though the issue kind of ended up resolving itself given that Lolorito decided it was in his best interests to not continue working against the Scions in the long term.

I think the struggle with presenting those sorts of opponents in a game like this is... well, how do you resolve it? Okay, they're a character that manipulates the situation politically to make it so that we, as someone whose skillset is primarily Big Fight Idiot, can't just muscle in on; that's actually pretty decent as a starting pitch for how to add complications, we've seen shades of that with the Syndicate, with Thordan, with Yotsuyu, even with Vauthry.

But how do you actually get that problem solved in a satisfying way, in a game where the main content is pretty much entirely combat-focused? If it just devolves into a fight, then the end climax for that villain completely throws away their main appeal and skillset up to now (which incidentally is the main reason I hate the Tsukuyomi fight). But if it ends in a way that's much closer to their side of the court, like how the Syndicate usurpation storyline went, then that feels like an anticlimax from the angle of 'but why don't we get to punch out the bad guy'.

It's not a completely unsolvable problem, and plenty of games people actually quite like have ended in 'now fight the king/emperor/pope who may or may not have a super form', but it's one you have to handle carefully, otherwise you end in some form of anticlimax. I think FFXIV actually got closest with pre-patches Yotsuyu; I think they could've really gotten somewhere making Doma Castle essentially her 'boss fight' without her actually fighting if you bigged up her actual presence in it. I once heard the suggestion of her giving increasingly furious and unhinged PA system commands during it, let the VA go full Rita Repulsa, that would've done great to essentially give her a finale without forcing a character not suited for fighting to fight us.

[Kesey]

Cleretic and you both have ideas that are both fine for how to move forward, and there are probably lots more on the table.

The problem with losing the light becomes one of what next? What happens after we invariably get super strong again? We can probably pull a megaman and lose all our powers once before it feels cheap..and we kinda already did in Heavansward.

For me, I think the simplest thing is to do what they do to Superman- he’s super powerful sure, but he can’t be everywhere at once. A lot of tension to be had when you can’t save everyone.

I think you're right on the money with this one. Granted we still have 3 major patches before 7.0, but the fact we are playing around on another shard forces us into a situation where we aren't on the source taking care of the problems that will arise there. A rebellion in old Garlemald territories against the remaining ruling legions, Hingashi's next political move now the Empire is fallen, the threat of the relics that Lyon and Noah have obtained, and whatever Golbez's crusade is really about and his true identity--all potential plot points (not mention something straight out of left field) we really don't have hand on as the WOL, because we are just trying to save a dragon from the 13th. That's super limited in scope storywise for a game this big.

The story has to take us down a peg to build tension and suspense but doesn't really require us being de-powered to accomplish it. Clearly being on another plane of existence while crap goes down somewhere else is the play they're going with. And I, for one, am excited to be surprised.