Why do the writers hate Foulques?

[Bishop81]

Being trapped in the past seems to be a common issue for the celestial dragons.

That's because they live ultra long lives. Although it happened 1000s of years ago, to them it seems like yesterday. They have a totally different perspective of time.

Nidhogg is still in a fit of rage over what happened over his brood sister. His brood brother still seem to be in grief.

[Ayuhra]

Dragons sleep for what passes as decades to mortal races...but that's another conversation from this Foulques topic completely.

This wasn't a matter of trying and failing to save a lost soul. This was the story presenting a character who had struggled constantly against a society who knocked him down at every opportunity, and then dismissing the character's struggles as hardly worthy of note. I felt like my character was complicit in Gridania's racism, not a good person trying to stop someone from making a decision that could hurt them.

Look at the ARC questline in contrast. Silvairre's surface racism towards non-Wildwood is both acknowledged and treated as a thing to not be admired. Leih struggles with acceptance in a society she is constantly being pushed out of, and her plight is not diminished or ignored by the player character. While the two stories differ in details, there are some shared themes. The difference is in the LNC quest, you are repeatedly encouraged to ignore Foulques and wave away his complaints, and you go along with that. If the WoL was at least able to acknowledge Foulques in a meaningful way, and accept his issues as valid, instead of just nodding as Ywain offers a throw away, "Oh how tragic, moving on," then the story would have had more impact.

^I didn't see this originally and I agree with this point. This is also part of why the LNC quest doesn't work for me. You feel like you are helping people in other class chains, or you are fighting against a true evil. Foulques does bad things but he is hardly evil. Our characters don't seem to see him as evil. Trouble is we don't acknowledge any potential good in him either. I think if this chain had been about us, on behalf of the Lancers, trying to reach out to Foulques and apologize for what the last generation had done to him it would have been a much more powerful story. Foulques could still have hated the Lancers until the end and stepped off a cliff in a mindless state of fear. I don't mind him dying, really. But if we had been trying to help him instead of just dealing with him while going about our trials, if we were trying to set an EXAMPLE for the wayward Duskwight through our actions, then the Lancer Quest would have actually been about something. It would have also been more in line with other class quests.

As it is, it's a bit....odd, seeing the Warrior of Light just nod along with Ywain and ignore Foulques's suffering. If your WoL is also a Duskwight then the Lancer's Guild's ludonarrative dissonance is palpable, man.

[Samcaesar]

That's because they live ultra long lives. Although it happened 1000s of years ago, to them it seems like yesterday. They have a totally different perspective of time.

Nidhogg is still in a fit of rage over what happened over his brood sister. His brood brother still seem to be in grief.

Kinda connected because people talk about it in the thread as well, more on Foulques and further issues at the end after this blip.

And like, let me preface this with "I'm a massive dragon sympathizer", but like, I don't even blame the dragon's warped perspective over the whole "Nidhogg is in constant seething hatred" deal. Like, correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't the Prince know he was doing a bad thing when he was seeking revenge against Nidhogg for Thordan? The way I'm seeing it Nidhogg was chilling in his domain satisfied to have killed Thordan, then Haldrath and Knights 12 came around for revenge, carve out Nidhogg's eyes, which then leads to Nidhogg going to Hraesvelgr demanding an eye so he can seek revenge against Ishgard? It doesn't really help Ishgard's case too whenever the remaining 99% of the population makes no attempt of like rebellion once Thordan attacked Ratatoskr, you're telling me like all of Ishgard totally believed a whole "Ratatoskr suddenly attacked! I had to defend myself because dragons are evil!" after 200 years of peace with them that could've easily decimated you? Or like, no one at all in Ishgard attempted to store away the truth of them having 200 years of co-existence with the Dragons and we had to wait til someone with the Echo before someone found out? Plus like, Ysayle's Echo visions seemed believable enough to convince enough people to form a formidable foe in the war for Ishgard (Heretics) yet most of Ishgard acted absolutely bewildered at the idea of the Dragons not being some evil entity of suffering, what convinced those Heretics to turn that didn't also convince others?

Like.. Really I wish there was more of an effort in the story of us helping the dragons caught in the crossfire of the war (Like, I'd love if there was more than one friendly dragon hub besides Anyx Trine), something that actually felt like we gave a darn about the dragons and their issues too.. Instead we helped the few friendly dragons we meet with a foe we probably would've dealt with anyways (Ravana) and a few side quests.. Maybe in a future patch we'll revisit Anyx Trine, but I doubt anything note worthy will really happen.

I'm a little curious about those people talking about "Redemption" for Foulques, but like, why are we only concerned about his redemption and not addressing the real issue here, ie the racism against Duskwights in Gridania? Like.. It'd be nice if we got an ended where Foulques doesn't go "MWhaha! I'm evi- Oh no, wait I'm faaaaalling!" and had him not die, but him suddenly becoming friendly with the Lancer guild doesn't fix any of the issues of why he's so angry and it'd really seem like a complete 180 on his priorities.

[Belhi]

Remember, the reasons why Thordan VII was an antagonist was because:

- He was complacent in the lie toldthroughout generations by Ishgard's Four Houses.
- He sided with The Ascians halfway to further his own ambitions.
- He and his Heavens Ward, were responsible for Harchefaunt's death.
- He became a Primal.

The Archbishop knew that their religion was a complete lie, but, instead of attempting to reach diplomatic solutions with the dragons, Thordan VII wanted the power to destroy. The Archbishop wanted to destroy the Dragons and The Ascians both while placing himself as a God above his people. It's one of those situations where his motives were good on paper, but the devil was in the details.

As for Gridania? The Lancer quests aren't the only quests there rife with racism and bigotry. The White Mage quests, the archer quests, and even the opening cinematic for characters who start in Gridania. You are immediately warned that Gridania is a beautiful, but unwelcoming place. Most story characters in Gridania go out of their way to constantly remind you that you don't belong there, and they really like reminding you that you're not one of them.

One of the main points in HW is diplomatic solutions with the Dragons don't exist.

The Heritics were just puppets and being used. This is the realisation Iceheart reaches starting with when the moment she breaches the city for the Horde they start slaughtering innocent people. Nidhogg isn't going to forgive. There is no way out of the war without Nidhogg's death and the Horde's defeat.

Im not arguing that he was right or that he was a hero but reason he acted the way he did was driven by a damned fate Nidhogg had forced them into. The who Dragonsong war story kept reminding me of Novv and his story in the Sahagin beasttribe quests. His viewpoint and his belief in placing the future of your children above your own hate played out in a perfect demonstration in this case.

As for Gridania, they are suspicious of outsiders but not without reason. If you lived in the twelveswood you would keep a damn close eye on anyone visiting. The Elementals are brutal when pissed off. I don't instantly call this racism since mainly it comes from people in authority and once you are seen to behave in a trustworthy manner the people generally are less hostile. As for the rest of the examples you mentioned:

White mage quests don't treat you with bigotry. White Magic is banned and for very good reason. Its not a lie to say its abuse lead to the end of the 5th astral era. It, like Black Magic, is a forbidden form of magic, only trusted to the Padjal who are born chosen by the elementals. The WoL being trained in White Magic is a massive thing. Its a huge thing being trusted to a random adventurer affinity or no.

The Archer quests did have racism and bigotry but there was a story to it and it was mainly from one person. That person had his compassion and trust abused by an outsider and that lead to people getting hurt. Its his shame and his feeling of being betrayed that lead to bigotry. Its ironically a flipside situation to Foulques. Plus in the end we deal with that. After that he is still arrogant and critical but I suspect that's more because he is a bit of a pretentious ass rather than racist.

Cant really summarise the rest but I feel its important when ever dealing with Gridania to remember they are always thinking about the elementals. This is important. If the elementals get pissed off people start to die and not always just the fool who pissed them off in the first place. If the elements get pissed off enough no one will be welcome in the twelveswood, including the Gridanians.

[myahele]

Gridania's andIshgard's xenophobia is somewhat understandable. Ishgard has heretics that can infiltrate and sabotage.

Gridania has Elemental who, prior to the Calamity, can kill people people for simply cutting down the wrong tree. Outsiders just think the Elementals are this boogieman that Girdania like to talk about, but their real.

With Elementals, they don't care if it's poachers or Garleans that are setting fire to the forest. They'll punish anybody within the vacinity as can be seen here:

[Novaura]

Ummm... there are antagonists like this in every class/job final challenge. The point is to beat them and teach them a lesson. And in some cases, the antagonist dies. If the Lancer challenge story appals you, you won't like how many others do the same thing and you might feel inclined to stop playing the game.

[Walluh]

I think the worst part is how they killed him.

Oh no! A complex situation! Has he finally gone completely mad? Will we kill him? Will we try to reason with him, calm him down? Will he refuse to the last breath and attack us again?

Nope, he tumbles off a cliff like an idiot. Because why bother actually giving the character actual closure. He just dies because of inconvenient terrain.

[ChazNatlo]

Ummm... there are antagonists like this in every class/job final challenge. The point is to beat them and teach them a lesson. And in some cases, the antagonist dies. If the Lancer challenge story appals you, you won't like how many others do the same thing and you might feel inclined to stop playing the game.

Jobs, yes. I think Foulques might be unique in that as far as Classes go, though I haven't done them all Maybe the Gladiator will surprise me. As stated before Both the Summoner Quest line and the Dragoon ((Appropriately enough)) Quest lines have similar characters.

However, the OP seems less disgruntled about Foulques being a tragic character than how the story handled his tragedy. It was given a few throw away lines but otherwise he was a huge jerk. I left the level 30 Lancer Quest line thinking "what a waste". I wasn't angry persay, just... sortof disappointed.

[Samcaesar]

Snip

One has to really wonder, why the heck are people living in Gridania considering the Elementals will vaporize friend or foe if they're ticked off.. Plus.. While the xenophobia is understandable (Well I don't agree with it but I see why it's a thing that occurs) the racism isn't. Duskwights and Moon Keepers aren't all poachers, and it's not like the Elementals expressed some issue with them in the past.

Ummm... there are antagonists like this in every class/job final challenge. The point is to beat them and teach them a lesson. And in some cases, the antagonist dies. If the Lancer challenge story appals you, you won't like how many others do the same thing and you might feel inclined to stop playing the game.

The point of the OP kinda flew over your head I think, but.. Foulques in no way had to be the antagonist, neither did he really have to die. With the end of the Lancer questline the moral of the story isn't just "Don't be like Foulques!" but also "Don't get mad at people who are either complacent or aiding in oppression" which.. Just seems like bad writing because we know the Duskwights don't deserve the stuff thrown at him. If your lesson to Foulques is "Don't be mad about the oppression of your people or we'll beat the living snot out of you/kill you til you be good" you're not doing a heroic thing.

[myahele]

SNIP

Yeah, Gridanians relationship with the Elementals remind me more of abusive households: As long as they don't do anything to upset the abuser then everything is fine ... for the most part. Heck even then their best efforts aren't good enough and it takes a skilled Padjal to pacify them for the time being.