Can I have my Scions back?

[Keumjo]

I miss the Scions too, but whoever we got in Dawntrail weren't the Scions proper. They were shells of themselves offering nothing more than any other character in their place would have because they were devoid of any personality with very little care to the growth they have had or their dynamics with each other.

The Scions currently have the same issue as whenever a Persona game gets popular and they start making spinoffs: all the main characters are just caricatures of their personality. They want the character but they don't want to mess with them too much so they make them have a few identifiable quirks and that's it. They don't want to use them but they don't want to change them so now their presence is just kind of there for fans when it should be for the story (imo).

[RaideDuku]

1. If they can't find something for them to do in the story, they shouldn't be there just to be there.
2. Can't miss them until they're gone.
3. There's no tension with the Scions. I'm not saying that one or more of them need to die, but let's just say they have used up their "Fake Death" cards at this point. When was the last time any of them even severely injured for any significant period of time? Y'shtola in Stormblood? I'm at the point that I do not believe that the Scions are any sort of mortal danger no matter what's happening in the story. Some characters more then others...looking at you, little miss jumps in the Lifestream for lols.

[TemporalFruitsAndVeggies]

"Every patch is the same, this game sucks"

"Can we get the old characters we had every patch for 10 years back please"

[Auro_Seldaris]

I would rather new characters with the scions playing a smaller role. Just not poorly written and horrendously voice acted characters like Wuk Lamat. I don't want to see Wuk again after this expansion, not even for a throwback 'hey look our old allies showed up to help'. Throw her in the bin ty.

They had so many good moments to put in some heavy stuff with the scions, like Y'shtola and her eyes, she was using her life force to see and yet nothing has come of it. Bored of the plot armour the scions have. There's no stakes in the story with the scions being the main cast.

Totally agree with you on point one. I never, ever want to see Wuk again, ever. Not even in the inevitable next "all our friends show up to help" scene. Let's just forget Tural even exists. I wish 7.5 would end with something hitting my WoL on the head and waking up back on the docks in Sharlayan, all of Dawntrail being a concussion-induced dream.

AS for your second point, Y'shtola's eyes killing her is a thing that ONLY exists as a weird translation error/ localization issue in the English version. And only in English. In all other languages, it's just that she uses slightly more aether than a normal person does. That's only one of many strange differences between the English language version of the game and others.

[Gyson]

I would rather new characters with the scions playing a smaller role. Just not poorly written and horrendously voice acted characters like Wuk Lamat. I don't want to see Wuk again after this expansion, not even for a throwback 'hey look our old allies showed up to help'. Throw her in the bin ty.

I enjoyed Dawntrail and Wuk Lamat. The character's voice acting was fine enough for me. My biggest criticism with Dawntrail was actually Bakool Ja Ja and how rushed his transition from jack@#$ villain to hero happened, and how easily he was forgiven.

[Gaddes]

I really thought at the end of Endwalker that the Scions were going to actually split off and do their own thing, but that unfortunately only lasted like a week for them. They really should've stuck to that plan and only had maybe one or two of them meet up with us periodically, or better yet have one of them be our traveling buddy for a while

... Yes, I'm basically saying Estinien should've been our traveling pal in the New World. It's wild that he was off having seemingly more interesting adventures while we could've been exploring a new land with him; like they actually set up the perfect buddy travel story and then never did it.

[CidHeiral]

I don't really get that. I look forward to MSQ updates because I think of the Scions as my character's close friends, and it's just naturally nice to have those friends around. I don't look at my real life friends and think "Bob needs to show some radical growth or transformation or I'm just not interested in being in his company any longer". Sometimes it's just nice to be in the company of people you like and are comfortable with.

I can see where you're coming from and from that perspective I don't think you're wrong, but I don't have the same outlook on the Scions. I'm not hanging out with my real life friends, I'm experiencing a story, and characters that are there just to be there don't add much to a story. They need something to make them compelling and justify their inclusion in the narrative.

I actually thought the idea of some of the Scions being at odds with our character in DT was an interesting concept when it was teased but then it turned out to be nothing. I need something interesting going on with these characters beyond them just showing up and going through the usual motions.

I see this sentiment being repeated. But it's all in the hands of the writers. It's their responsibility to create good stories for the characters.

That's exactly my point. Write something interesting for the Scions and if you can't do that then bench them until you figure it out. Trotting them out every expansion just because they need to make an appearance doesn't serve the story or the characters.

[Gaddes]

I think one of the big problems is that not everyone feels the same way (understandably) about the Scions. Not everyone feels like their WoL is super best friends with them, but it seems like the writers are afraid to put any of the Scions truly at odds with the WoL perhaps out of fear of alienating people that like particular Scions... which is probably why the bait about Scions vs Scions in DT ended up being a fakeout.

Rather than continually trotting out the Scions every two seconds into the MSQ though, if they want a character that feels connected to the WoL on the level of a companion they should bring back the concept of the Path Companion.
Back in 1.0 you could customize the Path Companion to look how you wanted and I think there was an aspect of adjusting its personality too.

This wouldn't be the same path companion per se, but make some plot development like this: The Scions are officially disbanded by end of EW, but the WoL still needs help now and then keeping the world at peace, so he/she revisits the Path of the Twelve organization and sees who is still loyal to that group to look for representatives to help him/her keep an eye on worldwide developments. During that process the WoL decides to choose someone in particular to act as their second-in-command, a companion who may sometimes travel with them on missions but also serves as an intermediary for other groups to keep the WoL connected to important events and news around the world.

In this recruitment process, your WoL would be allowed to "recruit" (aka customize) a Path Companion, customize them like you would with a retainer and select one of two or three personality traits to affect their speech. They should also have voiced lines in relevant MSQ missions like any other NPC, which would require a few variations, but in the grand scheme of things a character like this that the player has such control over creating would be ideal and would let us make someone who we could feel actually was a true friend of the WoL, rather than a bunch of Scions we are forcefully friended to with no input on their characterization. It honestly makes more sense that we would come across someone like a Path Companion far more frequently than forcing the Scions back onstage every other mission, and it would add a little uniqueness to how we each view our own WoL's personality and preferences through that Path Companion.

[NanaWiloh]

Send the WoL to another plane where they are weak and helpless. Forced too earn their op status back and a way home.

[Kozh]

I'm of two minds about this. Contrary to what some people might think, I actually love the Scions. Not only that I myself personally like them, my WoL also love and consider the Scions as his found family. But I also hate how boring they have become ever since EW.

I was hopeful that DT would make them fun again since yoshi-p teased how the scions will compete with each other (yes, I know it would be a fun competition between them), yet that doesn't happen either. What's worse, Krile is sidelined so bad she isn't that much relevant to the story even though this is supposed to be her expansion as well.

It's a very frustrating situation, because I know the Scions still have the potential. Now, I get that almost all of them have completed their character arc and received closure, but honestly I think it won't be a problem if they still have negative trait or even regress back, so long that it is acknowledged (so people won't think that it is a bad writing/retcon/etc). After all, people irl don't change too much and most will repeat the same mistakes.

But alas, I doubt things will improved in future expansions judging by how they handle DT and 7.x patches so far.

*Also, they need to stop playingg favourite with graha again, it's super annoying and I'm tired of that catboy.