Standing There Syndrome

[Coratanni]

I still remember my first steps in FF14 years ago together with my wife. We take the fight back to the Garleans, and finally end up in the praetorium... to be met with Nero's 3 minute monologue "when I was little, Cid stole my cookie, wah wah" and Gaius' 4 minute monologue "me am the bestestest of the world".
At one point we looked at each other and asked "why are we even listening to this drivel, why don't we just kick this fool's butt?"
And that's the point. Nobody in their right mind would listen to the bad guy going on and on and on and on... - they would just attack. Remember Guardians of the Galaxy 1? Nebula starting trash talking her sister, only to get shot down by Drax "noboy talks to my friends like that". This is the sort of dialog FF14 needs desperately, no more villains holding endless monologues everybody just quietly listens to.

And there are countless examples of this bad anime trope throughout the MSQ. Ilberd, anyone? We find out he's about to summon a primal, so we go there, kick his sorry behind, and it's over - we could just put his head on a pike atop his very own Ala Mighan dungheap, and call it a day. But no, WoL goes into 10 minute standby, while Ilberd does the exact thing we came to stop. Oh my.

Personally I just accepted this sort of nonsense constantly happening to me. But man did it rub me the wrong way when they finished off Gulool Ja Ja while EVERYBODY was just watching. He desperately tried to fend of his son's magical infused attack for 20+ seconds, and NOBODY came to the rescue - all the saviors of the star just standing there, gaping mouth, drooling from the chin.
I liked the character of Gulool Ja Ja a lot, and seeing him getting killed this super cheap way really p*ssed me off. They did the old lizard wrong, and I'm not going to forget this.

It's never been shown to be in our nature, to attack someone else first. We've also let people talk, in the hopes that there might be some diplomacy had. Sure it usually fails, but we're not Zenos blood crazy.

[EchoingPulse]

SE: Gritting teeth and fist clench + stare combo and nod is best we can give you

I believe that they did a lot of that in Yawntrail.

[Cenobia]

It's never been shown to be in our nature, to attack someone else first. We've also let people talk, in the hopes that there might be some diplomacy had. Sure it usually fails, but we're not Zenos blood crazy.

There is a large difference between not immediately launching into an attack and stopping someone who is very obviously trying to do something that you're supposed to stop. Your WoL might be a mouthbreather, but I'd like to think mine isn't, and as such those cutscenes are just absurd. It also doesn't excuse Alisaie often also just standing there.

Someone give that girl a gun already, we'd have been spared so much idiocy.

[TaleraRistain]

I still remember my first steps in FF14 years ago together with my wife. We take the fight back to the Garleans, and finally end up in the praetorium... to be met with Nero's 3 minute monologue "when I was little, Cid stole my cookie, wah wah" and Gaius' 4 minute monologue "me am the bestestest of the world".
At one point we looked at each other and asked "why are we even listening to this drivel, why don't we just kick this fool's butt?"
And that's the point. Nobody in their right mind would listen to the bad guy going on and on and on and on... - they would just attack. Remember Guardians of the Galaxy 1? Nebula starting trash talking her sister, only to get shot down by Drax "noboy talks to my friends like that". This is the sort of dialog FF14 needs desperately, no more villains holding endless monologues everybody just quietly listens to.

And there are countless examples of this bad anime trope throughout the MSQ. Ilberd, anyone? We find out he's about to summon a primal, so we go there, kick his sorry behind, and it's over - we could just put his head on a pike atop his very own Ala Mighan dungheap, and call it a day. But no, WoL goes into 10 minute standby, while Ilberd does the exact thing we came to stop. Oh my.

Personally I just accepted this sort of nonsense constantly happening to me. But man did it rub me the wrong way when they finished off Gulool Ja Ja while EVERYBODY was just watching. He desperately tried to fend of his son's magical infused attack for 20+ seconds, and NOBODY came to the rescue - all the saviors of the star just standing there, gaping mouth, drooling from the chin.
I liked the character of Gulool Ja Ja a lot, and seeing him getting killed this super cheap way really p*ssed me off. They did the old lizard wrong, and I'm not going to forget this.

Villain monologuing is a JRPG trope (that Stranger of Paradise poked fun at in a hliarious way) but it does make sense as another poster said because the WoL does tend to try to hear people out. Gulool Ja Ja I will agree was just stupid, though. At the very least we would have tried to disarm or incapacitate Zoraal Ja. All they had to do was throw some tech at us to disable us. We can be disabled by tech. It's happened before. We could get locked up in something like the guy in the gunbreaker job quest used and there would be nothing to stop Zoraal Ja from killing Gulool Ja Ja but we wouldn't be standing around like idiots with Wuk Lamat going on about his "honor" or something when he's getting murdered in front of us. Gulool Ja Ja can be mad at my WoL later. I'd be saving him. That's what the WoL does. They put themselves between the bad things and others.

[CuteBucket]

As a writer, a big part of your job isn't to just come up with a plot, but to justify it happening. This one wasn't even particularly hard, Hiroi is just a hack.

Now now, let's be fair to Hiroi. He was only one of three writers. Kawasaki, who brought us Shadows of Werlyt and [checks notes] was a co writer for Nurse Love Obsession, is also a hack!

[Raven2014]

The most offensive scene for me in this regard was the end of the Tsukuyomi trial in Stormblood where the WoL just stand there and watch Ashasi abused a dying Yotsuyu on the ground. And I was like ... wtf you're doing? DO SOMETHING?!?? It was so ... inhumanely out of character for the WoL that the only explanation I can come up with was whoever wrote that scene had a monumental brain fart. It took me years to eventually put that absurd scene in the back of my mind. And the Gulool Ja Ja basically brought back that horrible flashback that I almost had a whiplash. I admit it's one of the many reason why I hate DT's msq as much as I do, it's like bringing back a childhood PTSD.

[Cenobia]

The most offensive scene for me in this regard was the end of the Tsukuyomi trial in Stormblood where the WoL just stand there and watch Ashasi abused a dying Yotsuyu on the ground. And I was like ... wtf you're doing? DO SOMETHING?!?? It was so ... inhumanely out of character for the WoL that the only explanation I can come up with was whoever wrote that scene had a monumental brain fart. It took me years to eventually put that absurd scene in the back of my mind. And the Gulool Ja Ja basically brought back that horrible flashback that I almost had a whiplash. I admit it's one of the many reason why I hate DT's msq as much as I do, it's like bringing back a childhood PTSD.

That scene was so egregious that it eventually led me to write a 42 thousand words fanfic with the sole goal of giving Yotsuyu a happy life. It took turning the canon upside down, still worth it.

[SillyCrow]

I think the WoL is just letting things escalate to have strong opponents to fight.

Hard to think they would get caught off-guard by someone charging a light spear, drink spiked beverages, let suspected individuals walk to suspicious relics and pick those up, etc.

[MsQi]

It's never been shown to be in our nature, to attack someone else first. We've also let people talk, in the hopes that there might be some diplomacy had. Sure it usually fails, but we're not Zenos blood crazy.

That should be a choice. We are not playing a premade charter. We are not Cloud, or Squall or Lightning. We should have some say in how our characters react. I think the biggest problem with the new MSQ is the same it's always been: The story assumes we like these people. Half the time I saw Zenos I wanted to shoot him in the face, but when he wanted the final showdown I wanted to just walk away and leave him crying. Every dialogs choice is pointless, most don't even have a witty retort. So much "Sorry, no you can't do that", or "that's probably not a good idea right now"

[Coratanni]

That should be a choice. We are not playing a premade charter. We are not Cloud, or Squall or Lightning. We should have some say in how our characters react. I think the biggest problem with the new MSQ is the same it's always been: The story assumes we like these people. Half the time I saw Zenos I wanted to shoot him in the face, but when he wanted the final showdown I wanted to just walk away and leave him crying.

We've never truly had much choice though when it comes to our characters. In any Final Fantasy game. FFXIV gives you an illusion of choice of dialogue sometimes. You can choose which alliance to side with during a competition at the end of Heavensward iirc, but that's about it. Our character is still a sundered reincarnation of Azem, and Azem is a certain way, just as we, and Ardbert were. It's just built into our character whether you or others like it or not.

Where I have a problem, is when the writers clearly don't understand Azem's character, and the Warrior of Light's past actions, and turns them into something they've never been through a base game and 4 previous expansions.