Garlean Playable Race (?)

[Jandor]

Like it or not, much of the world is not a friendly place to/for Garleans. Being able to start as one makes almost no sense. The twins wouldn't warm up to a Garlean. Yda wouldn't warm up to a Garlean. The idea that a Garlean could remind the City-State leaders of the Warriors of Light from Carteneau is also incredibly laughable.

Being able to play as one in general makes no sense.

Neither Gaius nor any of his subordinates bringing it up in Castrum Meridianum, the Emperor and Hydrus just ignoring it when you meet in the Sea of Clouds, no one raising an eyebrow as you enter the resistance camp (followed shortly by Zenos) in Gyr Abania, Hien returning to Doma to lead a rebellion at the urging of a Garlean, the resistance in Bozja freaking out about Cid but being chill with you.

They don't fit as playable characters in the base game nor any of the expansions.

[KizuyaKatogami]

Again, why do y’all keep using the lore excuse when SE has shown multiple times they literally do not care about it. They will bend and shape it however they see fit to make something work. You literally said the same exact thing about male viera and look what happened. You people claim to care so much about the lore but then shut up when you’re proven wrong multiple times by the devs themselves. Like, how many times is it going to take to knock it into your heads that they literally don’t care when it comes to giving things to the playerbase. Wearing a chicken suit when going to meet the Emperor doesn’t fit. Wearing a chicken suit to fight Gaius doesn’t fit. Wearing a chicken suit to fight Zenos doesn’t fit, but guess what? It’s because it literally doesn’t matter. You can use the engine or graphics excuse perfectly fine yet you continue to use literally the most worthless excuse of “muh lore, muh immersion.” Despite being proven wrong multiple times in that respect.Then have the audacity to say well there’s not many people advocating for them. Yeah because you all gatekeep and instantly shut down anyone who mentions anything regarding them even when those people give you multiple pieces of proof, and you then look for other ways to attack the idea. It’s no wonder more people don’t want to bring it up or talk about it. I guess this is the famous “Great Community By The Way” hm?

[Theodric]

Being able to play as one in general makes no sense.

In your opinion, certainly. An opinion some others share.

In my opinion - which is again shared by others - I think it does make sense, because it isn't any more jarring than any other number of potential lines of questioning that the MSQ's could put forward based on countless different hypothetical and actual scenarios.

We already know that there's a precedent for just adding additional playable races to the game with little to no tweaking. Same goes for modern styled glamour, crossovers with other games and other such scenarios. The concept of lore purity is, at this point, simply gatekeeping and rarely if ever applied fairly across the board by those supporting it.

The canon Warrior of Light is the guy in the cinematics, at any rate - so everybody's character is effectively a 'what if' scenario anyway. Because there's one main Warrior of Light responsible for most of the game's events and it wouldn't be fair to pick out one player to say 'yeah, that's you' to leave a million or so other players out.

It makes much more sense for the canon Warrior of Light to be the guy used in promotional footage for the game - and since we know that there isn't literally millions of Warriors of Light crowding around the Limsa aetheryte on any given day I don't think it matters all that much what other people are doing with their character race/gender or glamour of choice.

Personally - and as I've said many times before - I'd settle for a third eye glamour. I can already design a Pureblood Garlean to my liking using a Midlander or Highlander model. It'd be neat if the customisation options were expanded at some point, either with an update to character customisation and/or new playable races altogether.

Luckily the game has been set to be supported for at least another ten years - so there's plenty of potential there.

[Jandor]

In your opinion, certainly. An opinion some others share.

In my opinion - which is again shared by others - I think it does make sense, because it isn't any more jarring than any other number of potential lines of questioning that the MSQ's could put forward based on countless different hypothetical and actual scenarios.

Dude, a story where the main character works against their own people but where no one on either side ever acknowledges or comments on it would be poorly written rubbish, it would also be exactly what the MSQ would be if you could start it as a Garlean.

It's one step below starting the game as a minor Ascian, floating into Ul'dah with your ominous purple aura and bright red glowing face runes and asking for directions to the adventurers guild.

[Theodric]

Dude, a story where the main character works against their own people but where no one on either side ever acknowledges or comments on it would be poorly written rubbish, it would also be exactly what the MSQ would be if you could start it as a Garlean.

It'd be poorly written rubbish in your opinion. Yet that is an opinion that is not universal across the board.

I happen to think that 5.3 could be described that way in regards to G'raha and the laughable amount of plot armour used to keep him around. Though it is what it is. Others, however, are fine with it.

I'm also of the firm belief that not every little interaction or circumstance even needs to be explained in the first place. Especially when creating a new character involves picking a race, a guardian deity, a gender, a starting class, a starting city state and then being thrown into the game world with little to no fanfare.

With how much Hydaelyn proclaims to love all of her children, who knows? Maybe she opted to activate the Echo in a handful of Pureblood Garleans. Especially if she identified them as having the potential that see shes as beneficial to the Source and herself.

As mentioned prior, a clear distinction is made between Pureblood Garleans aligned with Imperial Garlemald and those who are not. We consistently see other races fighting alongside Pureblood Garleans in the Empire. Elezen, quite commonly - and very zealously, too.

A lot of plot elements are hand waved in this game in order to make things work. I don't see how it'd be any different in the case of a Pureblood Garlean. Some of the same people speaking out against their inclusion, after all, already spoke out against the inclusion of male Viera and a darker/voidsent themed job before either were confirmed - and yet we ended up getting both.

I'd rather not see the game stagnate and be held hostage to needless restrictions to maintain a biased sense of 'lore purity' that is more to do with personal tastes than any real limitations.

The Source and First are wonderfully nuanced locations and I think there's a lot of potential in the option to play through the MSQ's as a Pureblood Garlean. I think it'd fit very well with a lot of the story elements in play, such as learning to 'move on' and finding ways to break the cycle of conflict and petty grudges.

There's nothing stopping a Pureblood Garlean from deciding to work against Imperial Garlemald. We see it happening many times already for various reasons.