I feel like it does a major disservice to the writers for people to claim that his death was 'meaningless'. People have a habit of becoming quite nasty when their favourite characters are killed off, or they sink into a state of denial. It would have made for a very dull story if we waltzed into Ishgard, changed the way the city and culture operated and then killed any and all who stood in our way. We needed to lose something precious - especially since the Archbishop and his companions were not outright villains and actually had misguided motives that could be sympathised with to some extent.

Killing off a generic 'red shirt' that we didn't care about wouldn't leave a lasting impact. What would it accomplish, exactly? Now, killing off Haurchefant...that accomplished something. People got angry, upset, some even felt happy! The fact that there's such a strong emotional connection to the character suggests that the writers did, in fact, do an excellent job.