This game lacks a good villain

[Alberel]

I think we are going to learn more about both Hydaelyn and Zodiark going into 4.0 and 4.0 expansion itself. I think between the two there is a gray area on both sides. I don't think Elidibus is wrong when he says there is no balance and it is too strongly in favor of the light. Having both light and darkness to balance the world. Perhaps both us and the Warriors of Darkness see this imbalance and work on defeating the extremes on both sides so order and balance put back into place. I am just throwing theories out of no where though, so anything could happen. Maybe it is just straight forward one side is very evil and needs to be stopped and the light is the only real way to go.

I'm personally hoping that we'll end up destroying both Zodiark and Hydaelyn, which should allow Light and Dark to return to their balanced state prior to Zodiark's excision. We still don't really know why Hydaelyn banished her other half and until we have that answer I'll remain skeptical of her motives.

I really don't want this story to be an outright good vs evil scenario at the end. Such climaxes are extremely boring and predictable.

[myahele]

Thou must needs to go forth a spread thine light to all creation and banish Darkness on the world

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[Dualgunner]

Spoilers below:

Am I the only one who's noticed that, as Warriors of Light, we've had our asses destroyed on multiple occasions? Somebody mentioned, for instance, in 3.2 spoilers that:

The guy who shot the arrow should have been us.

Well, it couldn't have been. Because in all of our stress of running around, we exhibit the most human trait of sitting down and accepting some tea from somebody. We were then poisoned and unconscious for a while; I expected more out of it but despite everything we as the Warrior have learned, we neglected to not let our guard down all the way.

One could argue that several events of 3.2 should have had far more consequence: Vidofnir lived through Nidhogg's attack, the Fortemps kid did not face worse consequences for his actions than "Go fight a mock war, boy!" and a right hook from Thancred (which, I mean, I guess would hurt like a bitch since he later uppercutted a cyclops, but I digress). The WoD had little to no influence in this patch besides stalking us.

However, we have been defeated at least three times that I can count off the top of my head, and probably more: When we first fought Ifrit, we were captured by Amal'jaa and sort of forced into the fight. We were captured because we were outmaneuvered and betrayed.

We were defeated by the Ul'Dah Syndicate (a defeat that kind of still lasts today) when we were politically outmaneuvered, forced to watch all of our friends die, get maimed, flee, or leave them behind as we ran away powerless. That's probably the most humiliating defeat we could have had because, as martially powerful as our Warrior is, it showed that we are not the brightest when it comes to the political spectrum, and when pushed even we have to retreat from the army hunting us.

Other, smaller defeats:

We couldn't save Moenbryda; we couldn't kill Ascians without Moenbryda; we couldn't save Iceheart from her death by cannonfire; we couldn't prevent the Triad from waking up; we couldn't save Estinien from becoming Nidhogg.

Finally, the defeat I listed above compounded with being forced to watch as Nidhogg/Estinien nearly killed Vidofnir. We're really darn strong when it comes to just kicking ass but all this "plot armor" really devolves to "we're good at not getting killed by the stuff we fail at doing".

[TheFatHousecat]

You mean to tell me you don't find nonsense-talking goblins to be memorable or interesting villains? GASP