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

[Teraq]

Hello there, lurker! Do you want a safe space to take a massive dump on Endwalker, its incredibly obvious emotional manipulation, convoluted "That Happened™" plot, its objectively terrible and tired plot devices – including such brilliant examples as time travel, an intended time loop of misery, a convenient memory-wiping device and The Power Of Friendship that really has no reason to exist as it does other than to be yet another (kinda bad tbh) justification for genocide –, its rather pathetic excuse for an antagonist, its brilliant but perfectly unintended portrayal of Venat as a narcissistic ideologue with the world record of longest-standing bald-faced lie, its dehumanizing narrative and its double standards around the Ancients, what happened to Garlemald (still the best 6.0 MSQ segment in retrospect though), how much you can't stand the christian rock in space and how cheesy that entire section was… but you're turned off by the constant pushback by white knights telling you that you obviously were not paying attention to this incredibly deep and philosophical storytelling (or that you are paying too much attention and are nitpicking and really just turn your brain off – frankly I cannot tell anymore!) and/or can't post on the forums?

We still have a discord server here: https://discord.gg/3Hnn8jHm , and it's still popping.

Bring candied apples…

Imagine resorting to make a troll account to try to discredit one side of the conversation instead of, I don't know, using arguments to defend their positions.

And reported it again, this time explaining the reason for the name and the incredibly targeted nature of it, and its posts.

For the poor newbies unaware: I won't go into detail with the troll's name, but simply know that the fact that Graeham spoke normal English in its first posts before settling on its rather heinous caricature.

The most pathetic thing about it is that it's been posting for months and that it is still referring by name to posters that are no longer active because they've unsubscribed. I cannot emphasize how incredible the derangement here is. The person behind the account (I am hoping they're just a friend of someone, and not someone paying for two accounts…) urgently needs to touch grass. We do have suspicions, but that is neither here nor there.

He is pretty funny actually. And all he writes are exaggerated versions of actual arguments made by the residents in this thread. Ofc, that is why you would block him because reading his posts show just how ridiculous this thread has been, and we can't have that.

Well, of course you find it funny: the people he is falsely characterizing are not "on your side", therefore this blatant, targeted troll is just fine. It is mean-spirited caricature, and the fact that it's been active since June is not a very good look for this forum's moderation, honestly.

This thread has had valuable genuine discussion and has been a safe haven for many of us who have been pushed out of FFXIV space because story dissent is not easily tolerated.

But of course, it's very simple not to address the well-written and reasonable posts on here and simply call them "ridiculous" as a blanket statement. Go on then: where are we wrong or ridiculous? I've seen Kage asked for evidence of "blatantly false" information discussed here – I'm still waiting. Most of the blatantly false talking points I see come from the Endwalker defense squad who spout headcanon we've all heard a hundred times before, such as Zodiark being some sort of blood god, Venat's reasoning being unassailable, the subjects of the third sacrifice being sapient because that is totally obvious and spelled out and fits the THEMES (wildlife can "inherit the star" by the way, to say otherwise would be rejecting Endwalker's aggressive Aesop of non-Ancient life being just as precious – and if that was your only argument for sapience when there is objectively no proof of sapient life other than Ancients as of Endwalker, then you might be stretching just to fit your agenda of Mommy Good), which does not even matter in the first place to Venat's motivations as revealed by EW...

It's exhausting.

Some time ago, people used to do that. Then, they were just told they were wrong/stupid/fanboys. So yeah, I stopped doing that, and others did as well. Idk if the people haunting this thread are the same that used to a year ago, but they weren't here to argue, they were here to vent about how they didn't like the story. Once that was figured out, this thread is just as Striker said, an echo chamber of negativity.

Nothing wrong with its existence, but don't expect people to act respectfully in here, whether they agree with you or not.

Oh, please stop painting yourself as the poor persecuted victim here. You are the one who came in here gatekeeping depression and that is totally why we don't like EW. You were given precisely the amount of respect you deserved for thinking you even had a point in the first place.

Friendly reminder that Hermes was never disclosed to be intended as a portrayal of depression, and attacking people who do not like his character or the story on the basis of "you just don't understand depression!!!!" is absolutely inane.