Something people seem to get wrong about E10 is bugging me.

[Eloah]

This seems like a good place to put this since it is lore related. So my static finally cleared E9S, yay us, and we moved on to E10S, and one thing kept happening that just kept irking me. As people are trying to explain the mechanics, they keep calling the boss "he".

The boss is FEMALE

I know it's hard to imagine a female boss that doesn't look like a humanoid woman, but this is one of those rare cases.

To clarify, without spoilers, but if you've done the role quests, you know why the boss is female. It was even hinted to be female in the glitch people saw in the shadow mechanic. Please people remember, females can be unruly monsters too, lol.

Rant over, sorry, lol.

[LineageRazor]

Part of the problem is that this is not common knowledge.

Only folks who have completed all four role quests and then the optional follow-up quest will know the true identity of the Shadowkeeper.

A great number of players don't care much about the storylines and lore of the game - and even among those that do, not all are willing to level three extra jobs just to score another tidbit or two. It would not surprise me to learn that folks who know the Shadowkeeper's true identity - even just from word of mouth from other players - are actually a minority.

[Mavrias]

You only know Shadowkeeper's gender if you've done the last role quest. Nothing in the actual eden quest line specifies if you haven't. Honestly this is a slight spoiler for anyone who hasn't done those quests.

[Eloah]

You only know Shadowkeeper's gender if you've done the role quest. Nothing in the actual eden quest line specifies if you haven't. Honestly this is a slight spoiler for anyone who hasn't done those quests.

True, but I know everyone in my group has done it. It's not important it just irks me for some reason.

[Midareyukki]

"Did you just assume [spoilers]'s gender?" jokes aside...
Even if they have done the quest, it really depends on how much they've been paying attention. Maybe they weren't really paying much attention to those quests, or maybe it just hadn't dawned on them when they were doing the fight? Because I know Ryne points out that E10 is the enemy at the end of Ardbert's journey in Norvrandt, but if they weren't paying attention to that bit, then they're going to assume stuff randomly. Plus, I know plenty of people that haven't skipped the cutscenes but just don't care about the lore to actually bother remembering who she was.
I know I had to explain the entirety of the Ivalice Raids and the Bozja Citadel stories for my friends to understand what was going on because though they saw the cutscenes they didn't register any of it. Several didn't even understand why we had to do Ivalice to begin with.
At least they haven't called her an "it" simply because it doesn't look human. Like several people on DF have.

[Crushnight]

I just correct as and when I see it, if I need to explain it, I will, but it generally don't matter.

What I would have loved is if you did the role quests and choose the option of dialogue that is only there if you did them, it would change the Boss's name from Shadowkeeper to

Cylva

permanently. (Rewatching scene at inn allows you to pick this option or another one to swap between the two name etc) Probably be a bit too much hassle for it but would've felt more personal.

[Payadopa]

Or don't spell out every little detail.
Wouldn't it be a nice oooh moment when players find out after the fact, like, by themselves? I'm quite slow when it comes to these things but c'mon. "That person" says they are the Shadowkeeper who opposed the warriors of light like 100 years ago and then you fight a monster called Shadowkeeper. It's not -that- hard to figure out.

It's kinda like how it was with the van Darnus fight and the character entry in the first lore book.

[WhiteArchmage]

My static tends to forget and suddenly one of the healers will go "wait, she.."

In hindsight, it IS pretty nice we have a bestial female instead of the usual "humanoid but with animal ears" (yes, I appreciate the irony of my character). They really could have just gone with a monstrous elezen and called it a day.

[Iscah]

What I would have loved is if you did the role quests and choose the option of dialogue that is only there if you did them, it would change the Boss's name from Shadowkeeper to

Cylva

permanently. (Rewatching scene at inn allows you to pick this option or another one to swap between the two name etc) Probably be a bit too much hassle for it but would've felt more personal.

I disagree on that. Even if we know the underlying history and who the Shadowkeeper really is, she's not there "as herself". She is the villain known as the Shadowkeeper, and that is the context in which we are fighting her.

Using her real name might bear some weight if this was Ardbert's story and we were truly fighting her, but this is simply a reimagining. We are fighting a phantom.


Also compare some previous instances where someone continues to be known by their title despite being name-dropped in the MSQ - most prominently the Exarch, but also the Warriors of Darkness back in 3.4. We had heard them call each other by their Eorzean names by the time we fought them, but all simply had the labels "XXX of Darkness" during the fight.

[feyii]

Maybe there is a much simpler reason for this - being that we fight the Shadowkeeper in the form of a dog (or wolf, but the difference doesn't matter for this). I'm not sure if it is the same everywhere, but at least where I live, people tend to refer to dogs as "he" no matter the actual gender. Opposed to that, cats are by default referred to as "she", also no matter the gender. If the person is aware of the dog's or cat's gender they might use the correct pronoun, but they usually drift towards the default he/she anyway.