Awfully weak story... or is it? [WARNING:SPOILERS]

[Astarica]

It was so lazy and stupidly written. So let me get this straight. Me, guy who slayed two primals, has the backing of the three Grand Companies, a member of the Scions, and all around awesome guy, has to jump through a thousand hoops simply to find out each a-hole I aid, can't help me open a friggin' door so I can go through more hoops just to recover a ship, that willl help save the world. and my character just stood there and took it

Don't forget you also have Cid with you, who is a living legend. You should've just knocked down the door on Stone Vigil and see who and what army was going to stop you. I mean you have to kill a dragon to get the Enterprise back. Somehow I doubt the Ishgardians will be harder than that. Speaking of which, I don't get how Lahabarea basically just kicked a sleeping dragon and then slipped away and now you've to deal with Isgebind.

[Dano]

The story, for the most part, is insultingly bad.
So many sections of story quests that are built around the exact same same premise, of "proving yourself" to people, long after you shouldn't have to. All avoidable, if the main character wasn't a doormat, and your allies simply opened their mouths and vouch for you.

The Costa Del Sol feast was awful enough, but I think I was most insulted by the Coerthas quest line.

It was so lazy and stupidly written. So let me get this straight. Me, guy who slayed two primals, has the backing of the three Grand Companies, a member of the Scions, and all around awesome guy, has to jump through a thousand hoops simply to find out each a-hole I aid, can't help me open a friggin' door so I can go through more hoops just to recover a ship, that willl help save the world. and my character just stood there and took it

im surprised you actually read the dialog and knows the story.

[PapesseLudovique]

As for the OP, there is always that subsection of fandom that really wants to paint the bad guys in a positive "misunderstood" light. The empire is evil. Its like when fans do mental gymnastics to justify why the Sith aren't evil, when Lucas has made it clear to everyone else that they so totally are.

[Astarica]

The Empire is probably on the 'bad' side of the spectrum but Eorzea is not a world where it pays to be a good guy. Realistically, the only country that has a prayer of survival is Giridina and that's because their neighboring opposition is weak/peaceful (Sylphs). Although the Beastman tribes are more or less on an existential conflict with the various humanoid races of Eorzea, and that defense against tempering is extremely rare, the Beastman tribes somehow have not completely wiped out a bunch of feeble opposition that can only get weaker over time due to tempering. Realistically the Empire ought to be more woried about what if Eozrea got wiped out by a Beastman tribe and everyone turned into thralls of any given Primals as opposed to any threat posed by any humanoid faction of Eorzea. The Empire might be evil, but being evil is better than being dead, which is what should've happened to LL and Uldah given they shown no ability to defend against a threat that is the classic 'each guy you lose they get stronger' type. From what I can tell the Beastman tribes are at least equal in power to the major factions (Gaius didn't try to wipe them out until he had the Ultima Weapon so they're clearly a serious match even for the Garlean Empire) and throw in tempering, there's no way the Beastman tribes can lose.

[KoujiGeki]

Gauis is a joke they've been hyping him up since 1.0 and when we finally fight him he was 17 times easier than hard mode 1.0 ifrit. Hes a pathetic bad guy not worthy of the title black wolf. The was no thought behind his fight. nothing to dodge nothing to even worry about. Nael Van Darnus is and will be the only threat the Garlians had. The Ascians are a joke Team Rocket is better than them im not at all entertained but them, except that one from 1.0 the skeleton one that everything ran from you had a sense of dread like one i hope it cant see me but i think it can. Seriously the prove to me youre a hero by fetching cheese better god damn stop, it better be actually interesting story.

[KoujiGeki]

he never killed anyone, ment that normally they just kill the conquered people. and the description says it to that Gauis didnt care about his birth, truly evil people would care about stuff like that.

[Astarica]

I think it's silly to attempt to view the actions of the Garlean Empire with a real life perspective. Even in the World Wars, you're not talking about an existential conflict where the other side is trying to wipe you off the face of the planet. Eorzea is constantly in such a battle against many of the Beastman tribes, and no doubt the Garlean Empire is also aware of the threat the Beastman tribes present. If you're fighting a foe that is clearly comparable to you in overall strength, arguably more advanced in some ways (Cobalt, the highest grade of metal, comes from the Kobolds as per the crafting quest), and have a divine power that seems to be far easier to invoke then your own Gods (Primals sure seem to show up far more often than the Twelve), you ought to be worried about your survival and not take any chances.

It's actually far more bizarre that anybody would attempt to make peace with the Beastman tribes, and even more bizarre that various Eorzean factions haven't been completely wiped out by a primal yet. And since the Primals gets more followers via tempering, there's nothing wrong with the 'purge the weak' attitude the Empire have, because if you don't purge them, you'd be fighting against them when they get tempered by a Primal. When you consider a Primal's strength is directly tied to how many followers it have, it's basically asking for genocide. Remember, the Beastman tribes are very strong themselves, so it's not like you have the luxury of playing safe because due to tempering, any small change in balance can quickly result in a complete steamroll for the Primals. In fact even the Warrior of Light does this when he finally realizes that he's not beating Garuda without killing the followers first, and you'd think that'd be elementary tactic against the Beastman tribes, except it is not.

If you're the Garlean Empire, you probably view Eorzeans as a bunch of idiots that's about one disaster away from becoming the thralls of a Primal. Gaius shows considerable restrain to even negotiate with a bunch of morons that are likely to become servants of a Primal as opposed to actually do anything useful against Primals.

[KraggyKor]

After taking some time to digest the story of FFXIV:ARR and confirming its weaknesses

Basing an entire 'conspiracy theory' (which is what you end up with at the end of your wall of text) based on your own PERSONAL view is, I suggest, crass.

[Blarp]

It was easily the worst Final Fantasy story I've played through. It's just so damn generic and so heavily padded by, "Go prove yourself" type of stuff. I stopped caring about all the characters and their troubles around Costa del Sol when I was made to fetch dinner so I could be trusted to kill Titan. Killing Ifrit and battling through several dungeons isn't good enough? Or is the story so flimsy that without all the padding it would end too quickly? Not a single character I'm supposed to have an attachment to is likable or interesting in any way and almost all of them are completely incompetent and have the personality of a red brick. The one chance they had to keep me interested was with Thancred and they completely puss'd out and blew it. To top it off the English voice acting is ATROCIOUS! I feel bad saying that because real people worked on it and probably did their best, but it's pretty terrible. I expected way more coming from Final Fantasy. Hell, even the early Final Fantasies like 3 had more charm and cohesion than this mess does.

Right now I'm supposed to do Praetorium, but my experience with the previous instance was so awful that I really have no desire to even finish the story. I try my best to be pleasant even when things go very poorly in an instance because at the end of the day nobody deserves to be treated like dirt when they screw up in a video game. Everybody was so impatient and refused to explain a damn thing and basically just dragged me through the instance. Watching cutscenes is like some cardinal sin that will get you reamed. At one point we wiped and the blame game started and the elitist douche attitudes prevailed. If this is the XIV endgame community, then I am done. I've never even seen such vitriol and rudeness doing LFR in WoW. I get it, the Internet Dickwad theory and whatnot, but I wasn't expecting it to be so true in this game.