7.2 MSQ opinions (spoiler obviously)

[Carin-Eri]

Whilst I've always said I didn't hate 7.0 (or 7.1 for that matter) I definitely felt 7.2 was a step-up.

As many others have said, Real Sphene is a treasure - immediately likeable and relatable and I look forward to seeing where the story takes her. I do fear that she's going to put that crown on resulting in something unfortunate occurring - I just hope it isn't TOO unfortunate!

Calyx was a sinister little creep and I wanted to kick his ass following what he did to Solution 9. The hallmark of well-written villain in my opinion. Definitely an interesting, and different, antagonist. Actually already hoping they don't take him down a 'I've seen the error of my ways' story path.

They dialled back Wuk Lamat. I, personally, never hated her but I will concede that she did receive far too much focus in 7.0. Eitherway, the balance was far better for 7.2 - she's still present but certainly isn't the main focus.

It was great to see the Warrior of Light being taken seriously again too.
The electrope 'sniper attack' was actually some pretty smart planning when you consider that pretty much everyone else who has ever challenged the WoL did so face-to-face and, 99% of the time, was defeated. I couldn't help but think back to the Queen Eternal fight where we were identified as the "single greatest threat" - seems Calyx was paying attention!
And as someone else identified, the electrope attack demonstrates that the WoL is (obviously) not invincible - and the dialogue indicated that a stronger blast might have been fatal.

Arcadion was good too, and the fights were great - although have to admit I'm not that keen on Eutrope being held hostage. To me, it feels like an unnecessary plot point since there was no scenario where 'we' weren't going to fight in the Heavyweight division and not sure we needed the motivation outside of raising Yaana's anxiety levels.

[DreadCrow]

She hasn't contributed anything to the MSQ. So it really wouldn't matter at all if she was just suddenly dropped without explanation.

Except it would. When she's co-leader, and effectively the face of her country, and they are currently trying to make peace with their sudden neighbors and you removed her completely it would be stupid. Especially if you're only doing it to just placate the people that have a vitriolic hatred for a such an unoffensive, milquetoast fictional character that just ended up annoying. The fact that people hate her more than the guy who said he can't judge a sex trafficker is just so bizarre and I can't take it seriously.

[Zackneifein]

I want real Sphene (and maybe Krile due to her origin) to be the first member of our new interdimensional traveling team, replacing the Scion for everything that doesn't concern directly the Source and with Y'shtola as our link between both group.

It unfortunately probably won't happen.

[Mondschnee]

The dungeon was kinda boring, too easy for my taste. That was a little disappointing.
The trial for me, too, was honestly too easy, not enough going on, a little uninspired? And I'm not even a raider.


The 7.2 story, in a vacuum, surprised me in a good way, and marks a step in a good direction.
Emphasis on "in a vacuum". Anything that reminded me of 7.0-7.1 really just put me in a bad mood, but I did appreciate that they were trying to answer to some of the complaints people had after 7.0, namely, why the heck did no one address the cure to aethersickness? So that's been done now, finally, even though it's a shame that there wasn't a single word about that in 7.0.

The real Sphene, while there's still many questions, was well handled imo. I was extremely worried about that, given that Dawntrail so far hadn't shown strength in character writing, but real Sphene feels like a believable character.
Unpopular opinion I guess? But I also like Calyx as villian/antagonist and I'm curious to see which direction they take him into.

Overall I was a little bit checked out until Calyx and fake Sphene appeared. I struggled to connect with the citizens of Solution 9, but the events after changed that slowly but surely.

I'm SO GLAD that this overly tropey writing wasn't present in this patch and the overall pacing improved, too.
The story seems to have a clear direction now, and our Warrior of Light finally seems to be part of the story again, too. I really liked the bit where we were allowed to make some calls via linkshell, and I liked the bit where Calyx tried to measure our strength which concluded in us using Azem's crystal. That's fun stuf one can theorize about.

Yeah, I hope they can keep this up, build upon this, improve even more and never repeat whatever the heck 6.1 - 7.1 were.


Edit: If I could give one more input to the devs, then it'd be that I really really hope the devs do something to surprise us.
While 7.2's writing was better, it still wasn't necessarily anything unexpected.
I want them to pull something cool like at the end of 1.0, when they dropped this huge trailer on the players from back then, or something like what they did with the lead up to 5.0. Something we don't see coming.

[Gwenkatsu]

nobody thinks that crown we took without second thought might be a trap?
our enemy is an electrope-genius. and yet we just take that thing and let real sphene take it without checking it on hidden malicious traps?

i feel like sphene will put it on while trying to calm down the people in 7.3... and then either her memories will be manipulated heavily or something takes over her body.

Well that sounds a bit far fetched, don't you think? I mean, we're in a city were everybody's wearing headgear that can manipulate their memory, their soul, and what not. So why should we be concerned when the villain master mind leaves us a piece of headgear as a gift? /s

That none of the scions felt the need to comment on that very very VERY obvious fact really concerns me. I hope they're not going down that road in 7.3, might roll my eyes so hard they finally pop.

[hydralus]

Thought it was pretty funny how they started talking about Zelenia like 5 minutes before you have to fight a mechanical version of her. Little on the nose, isn't it?

[CaptainLagbeard]

Thought it was pretty funny how they started talking about Zelenia like 5 minutes before you have to fight a mechanical version of her. Little on the nose, isn't it?

It's major fault of the patch that they really didn't set any of this up at all. It all just suddenly pops into existence and into the story.

But between talking to wuk lamat, talking to wuk lamat, talking to wuk lamat and talking to wuk lamat, there really wasn't a point where they could have built any of it up or even foreshadowed it.

[Sekundessounet]

Thought it was pretty funny how they started talking about Zelenia like 5 minutes before you have to fight a mechanical version of her. Little on the nose, isn't it?

A bit yeah, but to be precise, RealSphene talks about her when she wakes up too.

[Catwho]

The ONE THING I think was a missed story beat would have been G'raha Tia specifically saying to Real Sphene: "hey, for what it's worth, I sort of know exactly what you're going through because I went through the exact same thing in an alternate timeline - went to sleep, woke up 300 years in the future when the world was completely different, everyone I knew and loved was dead, and I'm being asked to help them fix a problem."

His journey ended very differently, but he's quite literally the only character in the cast who has any idea what kind of emotions she might be feeling waking up - in fact her situation is better because her post apocalyptic survival city is already built and thriving! G'raha had to build it from scratch on the First.

[Catwho]

Gulool Ja also has absolutely no right to be King after what Zoraal Ja did, I'm surprised there's been no kickback, if you put this into any other real world scenario he'd be killed in a riot or chased off to some foreign country, something that earlier XIV story telling would have told very well.

I don't think they CAN just kick him out. Eternal Sphene transferred her military rights to Zoraal Ja, and Zoraal Ja gave them all to Gulool Ja. That cannot be overridden by the system or else Calyx would have done it already. The baby would have to willingly give up those rights to someone else. Maybe he can pass them along to Real Sphene?