7.3 Hopefully the end of talking to Wuk Lamat

[Atma]

Yes. At the time it was said. Not now.

My counter to this is that certain elements of the community use it as an excuse to deflect criticism of the team back onto YOU, the player. It's become a catch-all for excusing complacency from the dev team, excusing lazy design, or just outright getting rid of people that certain parts of the community find troublesome.

"You're just burned out/a hater/not a TRUE fan, go play other games like Yoshia said."

Counterpoint: It is also used as a criticism as if it were just said yesterday and not almost 2 and a half years ago. So that knife does cut both ways.

I mean they have a lot of work to do, but my opinions on what needs to happen to make that happen typically go against the complacent userbase. I think 8.0 needs to be a 2.0 level re-imagining of entire core systems in addition to a compelling story. Tomestone farming needs to give way to scaling equipment from dungeons with variable difficulty (mythic+, etc), the game needs to stop being 'Boss Fight Simulator', no more ..|..X..|..X..|..Z - lots of things. But this is mostly a story thread, so sticking to that I mean yeah. They need to figure out how to hit a home run, but I still haven't made a personal determination on likelihood we're going to Meracydia or through that big glowing portal for next xpac yet. Sphene and her development is a potential interesting point to me. I'm not in the 'Wuk Lamat hater' club personally.

I'm not a fan, but I also just really don't care what happens with her. I'm really more in the camp that the constant complaining about Wuk Lamat has reached the point of being far, far more annoying than going through the MSQ with Wuk Lamat at this point. They've either gotten the message or they have not... complaining about the character has long since played its course for being relevant. If any adjustments were going to be made, they've either been made. If not, I sincerely doubt current day complaining will have any impact on future patch plans.

Edit: I'd add that how people feel about Wuk Lamat is basically how I've felt about Alphinaud for about 3 expansion packs, even with him mostly being shoved into the background.

Edit #2: And don't even get me started on how Graha has just become 'food meme guy' and it will not surprise me in the slightest if in the buildup to 8.0, 80% of Graha conversation is just people caring more about what oversized food item they're going to meme him eating, because that's become more important than the character himself.

[Auro_Seldaris]

I mean they have a lot of work to do, but my opinions on what needs to happen to make that happen typically go against the complacent userbase. I think 8.0 needs to be a 2.0 level re-imagining of entire core systems in addition to a compelling story. Tomestone farming needs to give way to scaling equipment from dungeons with variable difficulty (mythic+, etc), the game needs to stop being 'Boss Fight Simulator', no more ..|..X..|..X..|..Z - lots of things. But this is mostly a story thread, so sticking to that I mean yeah. They need to figure out how to hit a home run, but I still haven't made a personal determination on likelihood we're going to Meracydia or through that big glowing portal for next xpac yet. Sphene and her development is a potential interesting point to me. I'm not in the 'Wuk Lamat hater' club personally.

I'm not a fan, but I also just really don't care what happens with her. I'm really more in the camp that the constant complaining about Wuk Lamat has reached the point of being far, far more annoying than going through the MSQ with Wuk Lamat at this point. They've either gotten the message or they have not... complaining about the character has long since played its course for being relevant. If any adjustments were going to be made, they've either been made. If not, I sincerely doubt current day complaining will have any impact on future patch plans.

Edit: I'd add that how people feel about Wuk Lamat is basically how I've felt about Alphinaud for about 3 expansion packs, even with him mostly being shoved into the background.

Edit #2: And don't even get me started on how Graha has just become 'food meme guy' and it will not surprise me in the slightest if in the buildup to 8.0, 80% of Graha conversation is just people caring more about what oversized food item they're going to meme him eating, because that's become more important than the character himself.

Other than the fact you're talking smack about my adopted son, Alphy, I completely agree with you on all points. The changes you point out to the combat design and reward structure would be wonderful, but again it would fly in the face of those who are content for the game to stay exactly the same for eternity. I would love it if there were no tomestones ever again, no Dance Dance Revolution, adding horizontal job and gear progression... but this community would have an absolute meltdown over it. I agree it should be a total rework from the ground up. In fact, I'd argue that DT should have been, it felt like a good time for major changes in many aspects both story and gameplay, but they just... copy/pasted the same things they always do. Dungeons, and trials, and raids, and tomestones... dungeons and trials and raids and tomestones...

Llama Tea to me is just the canary in the coal mine for DT. I've said for a while that once the outrage over her finally ended, people would see that DT's problems are a lot deeper than just Garfield. Just shows that the MSQ really was the "load-bearing poster" of FFXIV.



Also, yeah Food Cat is insufferable, please let this meme die. If I'd known that this is what he would become, I would have rather he just stayed a fancy paperweight in the Crystal Tower on Norvrandt.

[Atma]

Also, yeah Food Cat is insufferable, please let this meme die. If I'd known that this is what he would become, I would have rather he just stayed a fancy paperweight in the Crystal Tower on Norvrandt.

It was kind of sad that we can actually point to the exact moment a character's development completely died, and who would have thought that would come in the form of a cheeseburger.

[TeresaFortell]

The amount of people that have left or are only just maintaining a sub speaks for itself.

The negativity surrounding the game is closely tied to the story. The games doesn't stand on it's own well, not without a good story.

Hopefully this horrible self-insert fan fiction ends and we get a real vacation from this nightmare.

I don't think it would be that simple. From the patches that came after the main story from the expansion, we see that this "self-insertion" is still present without any significant alteration. Though 7.3 would be the end of one arc, it is unlikely that these characters would not return for the stories that have yet to be told.

[Yoshihara]

People greatly exaggerate how "bad" the story actually is.

They really don't. FF14 sold and marketed itself on the story and quality of the writing. Just because other MMOs lack it completely doesn't give FF14 a free pass to have poor writing because those other MMOs didn't ever try to market itself on the writing.

[MicahZerrshia]

It was kind of sad that we can actually point to the exact moment a character's development completely died, and who would have thought that would come in the form of a cheeseburger.

Whoever started inserting their food/vore fetish into every storyline needs to be put on Wuk litter box duty. Food scenes are annoying enough at this point, but the way they eat, with the over exaggerated bites and sounds that make your spouse think you are watching something 18+ is just creepy.

[Atma]

I don't think it would be that simple. From the patches that came after the main story from the expansion, we see that this self-insertion is still present without any significant alteration. Though 7.3 would be the end of one arc, it is unlikely that these characters would not return for the stories that have yet to be told.

Eh, nation leaders very rarely show up in the overarching plot once we are past 'their area.' I think people's fears of 'Wuk Lamat becoming the next scion or something' are drastically overblown.

[Yoshihara]

It was kind of sad that we can actually point to the exact moment a character's development completely died, and who would have thought that would come in the form of a cheeseburger.

He still had one moment during the End Days of Thavnair, but outside of that, a lot of the character developments and and story arcs of the scions came to a screeching halt.
Thancred: Outstayed welcome after lvl 87 in Ahm Araeng
Urianger: Had his happy ending at the end of Endwalker
Twins: Had their happy ending at the end of Endwalker
Graha Tia: Exists to fanboy over you and "Remember how cool this character once was?"
Estinien: Exists to "Remember how cool this character once was and still kinda is?"
Krile: Complete character development and backstory assassination. It's like when you have so many possibilities for the character, leaving you to guess where it could've gone, but they it's like they intentionally went out of their way to make sure she could never be relevant ever again in the space of a few minutes.
Yda/Lyse (and by extension Hien, Yugiri, and Papalymo): Stormblooded, arguably got off easy compared to Krile and whatever Wuk Lamat was supposed to be. Instead of fixing her character she got her butt glued to Ala Mhigo because of fan backlash of how poorly written and handled she was.

It's been a habit of CBU3 to just conveniently discard unfinished ideas and projects, instead of fix problems because they lack the talent or insight to understand why things didn't turn out the way they wanted, or why reception to the content, story or the game itself was luke warm at best.
Character is written poorly and widely disliked? Quietly bin them and shove them on a boat out of the story.
Content wasn't popular or people complain about it? "I guess we didn't have the resources to do a good job" / "Everything is too hard to implement" / "It's the players who are out of touch, not us" / Apologize without openly stating what they've learnt from their attempt and how they can refine and build upon it -> GO NEXT.

[MartinFreeman]

No nuance is needed here. It's a clear tell as to whom you spend your time surrounded by and from whom you derive your opinions and worldview. None of them are the cause of, or solution to, Dawntrail's problems.

The only tell you're showing is your lack of intellect to be turned off by someone mentioning trigger words.

[TeresaFortell]

Whoever started inserting their food/vore fetish into every storyline needs to be put on Wuk litter box duty. Food scenes are annoying enough at this point, but the way they eat, with the over exaggerated bites and sounds that make your spouse think you are watching something 18+ is just creepy.

Reminds me of Food Wars with over-the-top food-eating scenes. It was ridiculous there, and it was ridiculous here. What is more unbelievable is that by mixing the culinary methods of Mamool Ja with meats from Xbr'aal to make xibruq pibil, we have seemingly forged a unity between the two groups. I know it was a contest, but we really could have used that opportunity to learn more in-depth as to why there were conflicts between them.