Alphinaud is a Wide-Eyed Idealist; he has the heart and is doing the right thing, but as others said, he is too inexperienced and sheltered to really know how things work and he figured what he had at the time of 2.X was enough. Remember the meeting in 2.5 where he throws a fit over the leaders refusing to aid Ishgard? His ego and foolishness was getting the better of him and he thought the city states were being petty because of how Ishgard snubbed everyone in the past.


Alphinaud is basically the typical JRPG hero who thinks doing the right thing and inspiring everyone to help the cause is the way to do things and it took a big fat slice of humble pie to bring him down to reality.