Tired of Zenos (spoilers)

[Stirlingite22]

It was so disappointing for me because while I didn't care much for Zenos in 4.0, it felt like the end of the SB patches left him in an interesting spot. Forced to use lesser, rando bodies to go undetected and work his way towards reclaiming his own body.

Potentially having to actually use strategy and cunning and not just overpower everything.

But in the end, that's all he does. Even in a weaker body he not only bests Elidibus, but MAKES HIM YEET OUT OF HIS BODY AND FLEE INTO THE RIFT. Where as when we beat Elidibus he just gets back up because he's immortal and could beat us through sheer attrition.

And while we don't see the fight the impression the scene leaves is that this too was another easy win for him.

They took what could have been an actual chance to develop Zenos and put him in an interesting situation, and they quickly fast forwarded through it as quickly as they could.

On a more positive note (lol), it's possible that Zenos' reliance on simply overpowering everything will end up proving his undoing when he tries to defeat Zodiark to take his power. Hopefully Zodiark will essentially grind him into dust with a big fat "NOPE", when Zenos confronts him... if he even gets that far. lol

[Lauront]

Same here. Heck, we didn't even get to see him defeat Elidibus to take his body back. It was just kind of one of those "Yeah, by the way, this happened" kind of moments. I know there's a lot of those kinds of moments in the game, but they were already showing Gaius and Estinien in the palace so the fact that they had that "Oh, by the way..." moment just kinda felt... convenient, I guess would be the word? lol

I suspect that is something to do with Elidibus being a primal, since Zenos denies a fight happened and laments that. Elidibus, while not on par with Emet-Selch, is no weakling. So my supposition is that it's an aetheric tug of some sort. When Elidibus pays the body compliments, I believe it's more to do with its ability to conduct aether. Ascians don't care much about physical strength, as they can enhance their hosts (e.g. Nabriales) and take on any form they please, however Emet hinted at the fact that at least for a full powered unsundered like him, the host does limit them somewhat, thus he shed it. This probably has something to do with the Resonance in Zenos's case enhancing the body's ability to conduct aether, hence letting Elidibus in it express more of his power. Either way, it was poorly explained and ad hoc, but hey ho.

On a more positive note (lol), it's possible that Zenos' reliance on simply overpowering everything will end up proving his undoing when he tries to defeat Zodiark to take his power. Hopefully Zodiark will essentially grind him into dust with a big fat "NOPE", when Zenos confronts him... if he even gets that far. lol

Or he gets the "bright" idea that since Hydaelyn "won" the first time round, why not go for her. She's also in the planet and thus hooked into the Aetherial Sea.

[Nothv13]

I suspect that is something to do with Elidibus being a primal, since Zenos denies a fight happened and laments that. Elidibus, while not on par with Emet-Selch, is no weakling. So my supposition is that it's an aetheric tug of some sort.

It also could come down to Zeno's artificial echo as it seems each person's echo allows some sort of different power and Zeno's was able to control a Primal, so with Elidibus being a part of a primal, he may had been able to do something to him to completely nullify him.

[Stirlingite22]

I suspect that is something to do with Elidibus being a primal, since Zenos denies a fight happened and laments that. Elidibus, while not on par with Emet-Selch, is no weakling. So my supposition is that it's an aetheric tug of some sort. When Elidibus pays the body compliments, I believe it's more to do with its ability to conduct aether. Ascians don't care much about physical strength, as they can enhance their hosts (e.g. Nabriales) and take on any form they please, however Emet hinted at the fact that at least for a full powered unsundered like him, the host does limit them somewhat, thus he shed it. This probably has something to do with the Resonance in Zenos's case enhancing the body's ability to conduct aether, hence letting Elidibus in it express more of his power. Either way, it was poorly explained and ad hoc, but hey ho.

Maybe. All I know is that I remember in a cutscene after the palace scene with Gaius and Zenos, etc., they have a scene of Elidibus on the moon not only saying villain things, but also mentioning something along the lines of being surprised that Zenos bested him so easily, possessed of Zenos' body as he was, or something like that. Suggesting that maybe Zenos did just overpower him like just about everything else in his path. lol

[KizuyaKatogami]

Never heard of her until now, so ShB is new to me. Also I worded that poorly, I meant to say some, not one. She gave the other Ascians some depth as well.

Idk, they had depth before. If anything she kind of ruined Elidibus in 5.3. Emet was fine but she tried to repeat the same sob story gimmick with elidibus and it just fell flat and felt incredibly rushed (probably because it was). None of the protag’s really got any depth besides thancred but it’s probably due to again, her not writing the protagonists to have any consequences and having them constantly win due to plot armor and conveniences.

[Lauront]

True, but he never specifies how really, and it's contradicted by Zenos's own recollection, as he states it's a shame Elidibus just fled and he'd have enjoyed a fight against himself, or some such twaddle. Elidibus is powerful enough by that point to at least be able to go against the WoL who had already bested Zenos and his Shinryu form by that point, and who benefits from Hydaelyn's protection via the Blessing.

To suggest he wouldn't even register on Zenos's radar, while Gaius and Estinien would, requires suspension of disbelief, IMO. What does stand out is the fact that he's a primal, and Zenos has managed to take control of one before, and may well have given an indication that he could do so again if he so pleased. So I believe he overpowered him in that sense - with Zenos being a potential asset and with nothing to gain by then in fighting him, he took his leave.

[Rosenstrauch]

True, but he never specifies how really, and it's contradicted by Zenos's own recollection, as he states it's a shame Elidibus just fled and he'd have enjoyed a fight against himself, or some such twaddle. Elidibus is powerful enough by that point to at least be able to go against the WoL who had already bested Zenos and his Shinryu form by that point, and who benefits from Hydaelyn's protection via the Blessing.

To suggest he wouldn't even register on Zenos's radar, while Gaius and Estinien would, requires suspension of disbelief, IMO. What does stand out is the fact that he's a primal, and Zenos has managed to take control of one before, and may well have given an indication that he could do so again if he so pleased. So I believe he overpowered him in that sense - with Zenos being a potential asset and with nothing to gain by then in fighting him, he took his leave.

Another thing worth bearing in mind is that, in 5.2, Zenos revealed that he's had memories of the Final Days plaguing his dreams since he was a child. It's not impossible that the reason for this was a failed attempt by Emet-Selch to ascend him as a member of the Convocation, in which case it becomes a question of who Emet-Selch was attempting to awaken. It could well be that Zenos was able to oust Elidibus without realizing it by virtue of a weird memory-based technicality.

Unfortunately, Zenos has barely ever expressed interest in anything other than his next big fight. I worry that these things will be ignored going forward by virtue of none of the characters in the story caring to explore them. Actually, my biggest worry is that Hydaelyn and Zodiark will be among "these things getting ignored"—I can easily imagine us going the entirety of 6.0 with hardly a mention of either, only to have it be revealed that Zenos dealt with both offscreen.

And it's not like that treatment is unprecedented, either. They killed off Minfilia and replaced her with someone who knows absolutely nothing about Hydaelyn, doesn't care to learn about her, and explicitly can't leave her own world even if she wanted to. And out of the Scions, the only ones who have any sort of connection to Hydaelyn are the Students of Baldesion, of which there are only two survivors: Krile "What story relevance?" Baldesion and... G'raha Tia.

[Lauront]

Good points and the Ryne one hadn't occurred to me in that light. Let's hope they don't just gloss over them. There were some suggestions in some of the JP interviews around 5.2 that Yoshi took the perspective that the primals mattered less than the intentions of their summoners. That's true to a degree but I still would like them to delve deeper into the story of the ancients and not just cast aside the two ancient primals when telling that story through such methods as you describe. So far I'm cautiously optimistic based on the announcement event but tempering expectations.

[MarsAstro]

She also wrote the drk quests did she not? Which also ended up being crazy sob story. I felt the ascians had depth because ever since arr [... snip for character limit ...] They gave him only 2 patches to try and flesh out his character and failed miserably, whereas we have zenos now who’s had more screen time than him and he’s only been around since 4.0 whereas Elidibus has been around since 2.0.

I think it's a bit disingenuous to reduce the DRK questline to just a "crazy sob story", but otherwise I see where you're coming from. I'm still not sold on Elidibus being a repeat of Emet simply because they did similar things though, fundamentally they were quite different characters. Even if the conclusion to Elidibus was a little weak, it was still different to Emet's character arc. You can make anything sound like they're the same thing if you simplify it enough, but if you look at the details they are clearly two different characters arcs. I wish they'd spent more time fleshing out Elidibus too, but it wasn't terrible. I'm assuming they rushed it a little bit to get it out of the way before Endwalker, since the whole "sympathetic Ascians" were probably supposed to be a Shadowbringers thing. I'll be disappointed if they pull something similar for Zenos and/or Fandaniel, I'd hate if they try to flesh them out as a tragic sympathetic villains too. I don't expect them to do that though, I'm pretty sure that was simply a theme for Ascians in Shadowbringers.

Ishikawa is a good writer, but adopting the same approach to sympathy building across more antagonists will get old quickly for me. I am a person who is more interested in setting lore than feelz, and I want Fandaniel at the least to deliver on the former, if nothing else. Applying such an approach to Zenos would disappoint me even more, particularly after Yoshi has said they don't do half-measures when it comes to sympathetic vs unsympathetic characters, and he specifically names Zenos as an example of the latter. So I am not taking a blind faith approach in her writing ability to "improve" him.

Yeah, personally I don't think Zenos needs to be, or even should be, "improved" as a character. His personality and motivations are pretty fixed at this point, and trying to rewrite him into something else would feel dishonest and forced to me. I think the way to improve his continued inclusion in the story will solely have to be through setting a stage in which his personality fits the narrative and offers an interesting dynamic between him and the other characters, all while keeping him true to his character so far. Giving his part in the story a conclusion that's unexpected but fitting would also be nice.

[KizuyaKatogami]

I think it's a bit disingenuous to reduce the DRK questline to just a "crazy sob story", but otherwise I see where you're coming from. I'm still not sold on Elidibus being a repeat of Emet simply because they did similar things though, fundamentally they were quite different characters. Even if the conclusion to Elidibus was a little weak, it was still different to Emet's character arc. You can make anything sound like they're the same thing if you simplify it enough, but if you look at the details they are clearly two different characters arcs. I wish they'd spent more time fleshing out Elidibus too, but it wasn't terrible. I'm assuming they rushed it a little bit to get it out of the way before Endwalker, since the whole "sympathetic Ascians" were probably supposed to be a Shadowbringers thing. I'll be disappointed if they pull something similar for Zenos and/or Fandaniel, I'd hate if they try to flesh them out as a tragic sympathetic villains too. I don't expect them to do that though, I'm pretty sure that was simply a theme for Ascians in Shadowbringers.



Yeah, personally I don't think Zenos needs to be, or even should be, "improved" as a character. His personality and motivations are pretty fixed at this point, and trying to rewrite him into something else would feel dishonest and forced to me. I think the way to improve his continued inclusion in the story will solely have to be through setting a stage in which his personality fits the narrative and offers an interesting dynamic between him and the other characters, all while keeping him true to his character so far. Giving his part in the story a conclusion that's unexpected but fitting would also be nice.

Personally i felt the Elidibus writing was done incredibly poorly, especially because it just comppletely trashed everything interesting about him in ARR and it seems like they just completely forgot what they wrote back then. A lot of the things just seem pulled out of nowhere like the memory issues again, to push the sob story narrative. Unfortunately its what the community eats up as seen with various other things. I think base shb was pretty good, my main gripe being ti was advertised as this dark gritty expansion where we face our strongest foes yet, but the protag side faces no consequences at all. If this is whats gonna happen in Endwalker as well, i dont see it being very popular.