What's the point with that quite lackluster story in Endwalker?

[Vandelay]

My only real areas of disappointment were 1) that Zodiark kinda ended up being not much in the story (although I guess you could say we already sorta dealt with him via Elidibus in 5.1-5.3, the same way we did Hydaelyn via Venat), and 2) the continued failure to mold Zenos into something more profound than your "notice me senpai" groupie, despite keeping him in the story for three expansions. It seemed like they just never quite figured out what to do with him.

There are some other flabby bits of storytelling that maybe don't hold up to super-close canonical scrutiny, but honestly that's kinda par for the course at this point for all of the expansions.

Overall it's a terrific story, and an emotionally resonant ending for the arc involving the Ascians and mega-primals.

[Lauront]

Glass houses, and all that...

[Jandor]

Glass houses, and all that...

Yeah yeah...

[Maxilor]

I enjoyed Endwalker a lot but as previously mentioned, whenever Time Travel gets involved it almost never works out story wise.

Also, I hated it in World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria and I hated it here, 'feelings' magic is just a boring idea in my opinion. Dynamis just felt like a giant ass pull at the 11th hour and just makes me question how much Dynamis is responsible for everything our PC has done over the years...forget Willpower and Determination...DYNAMIS!

[MagiusNecros]

Just want to comment on Venat a little bit. Kinda have a love/hate kind of deal.

Venat "Mary Sue" Hydaelyn effectively commits genocide by splitting Etheirys into 13 pieces, kills(sunders) every living being on the planet without giving them the option of a choice, condemns everyone to perpetual suffering in order to prevent ever reaching the point of civilization seeking death after attaining perfection so instead they chase something that can never be attained, in a crowning act of narcissism names the Source Hydaelyn after herself, decides that no one can be trusted and withholds information and deceives her friends and foes alike and condemns even more to die such as say Minfilia and several lives on the first and creates the Sin Eaters as a result, has an initial plan of kill Meteion but also has a backup plan to flee the planet although it is eventually revealed that every other planet is a dead world meaning that the finite resources of the Moonship would eventually run out so plan B would ultimately fail and she bound Zodiark to use as an Aether Battery to keep the Aether Shield up but was also siphoning a portion of that Aether to the Mothercrystal making her a monstrous parasite that feeds and hoards the Aether of others. The mothercrystal is insurmountably large and is the result of leeching Aether for 12,000 years.

Other then a few Ascians and the WoL no one and nothing criticizes her actions and is rather seen as a benevolent being that can do no wrong. Likely because every race is a "child" of Hydaelyn and they have a certain attunement towards her leaving them to have favorable opinions of her.

There is a whole lot in her characterization that can paint her as a Mary Sue archetype. And generally with time travel you can't tamper with events but I do feel she unknowingly caused alterations by encouraging you to spill the beans.

Given the nature of events you can easily see Zodiark as being more a hero and Hydaelyn the villain.

Do I think Venat is inherently evil? No but the path of evil is often paved with good intentions. A future was granted but it came at a great cost.

At which point you can objectively see Venat in 2 ways. One as a deceitful creature or as a devout follower who can understand her intentions at the cost of cruel unforgivable choices.

After all Lawful good is not Lawful nice.

But the idea of the Ancients have such powercreep that the Sundering was caused by the entity that effectively created you is interesting in both good and bad ways. Good as a twist but also bad in a "are we the baddies" kind of deal. And I also think it kinda cheapens the overall story quite a bit. It's a whole lot of "To save the world I had to destroy it".

[linayar]

But the idea of the Ancients have such powercreep that the Sundering was caused by the entity that effectively created you is interesting in both good and bad ways. Good as a twist but also bad in a "are we the baddies" kind of deal.

Whether we are the "baddies" is a matter of perspective, and according to the story's pov, we are not.

And I also think it kinda cheapens the overall story quite a bit. It's a whole lot of "To save the world I had to destroy it".

I don't see how that cheapens the story. Rather, it puts into perspective that Venat had faith for our future over the past that the unsundered wanted to reclaim. And it's quite clear that Venat sees us as heirs of the unsundered, presumably helped in part through our interaction. So sundering the world is not really destroying it, but merely creates 13 other possibilities in addition to the original.

[Xuto-cxb]

Whew, this thread took a long time to catch up to. Time I threw in my two cents.

I enjoyed EW. I was happy with it overall, and many aspects of it. That said, it has issues. And some of them come from the decision to want to tie off everything by the end of 6.0. They simply had too much on their plate. To be done with Zodiark, Hydaelyn, Ascians, AND the cause of the final days...with only the base xpac to work with?

My issues:
-The final days were a joke, full stop. Thavnair sure felt it. Garlemald a fair bit. The rest of the game forgot it existed. It did not feel like the "All bets are off, balls to the wall the whole world is on fire" bit it could and should have been, and was sure hyped up to be. It was, frankly, pathetic. Dropped the ball and dropped it hard. The role quests just use the blasphemies as an excuse to tell unrelated stories. They're nice bits of writing, but utterly divorced from EW and the final days in all but name.

-Elpis. I know why they did it, and I know what they were trying to do, but I HATE time travel stories and they botched this one. As others have said, they've now got a contradiction on what happens when you mess with the past, and it's entirely "whatever the plot needs at the moment". Don't like it. And that cutscene on your way out? Issues. We see Venat, not Hydaelyn, sunder the world. When? Where? How? We were told in SHB that Hydaelyn was brought to bear after Zodiark ended the final days and restored life to the world, but that is not at ALL what we see. It's just...bad. All around. I wanted to see Zodiark work his magic, and I think a lot of you did too. And I don't think I'm the only one who wanted to see Hydaelyn stand against him and sunder him. Instead we get some nobody ancients throw a little fit, no grand opposition from anyone meaningful. Just...sloppy. I'm sorry, but it is.

-Metion. Saw trouble with her a mile away. FFXIV is really big on the damsels and their cookie cutter archetype pops up constantly so I knew she was going to be massively important. It's also a classic trope of having some big ancient bad that is the collective something something of all negative something pop up late in the story to be the final boss. I'm thinking Necron, I'm thinking Zeromus. They clearly didn't have any idea what caused the final days when they wrote SHB and had to pull something out of their arse at the last minute to tie things off and it was never going to feel good.

-Zenos. Look, I loved him as a villain and nemesis in SB. I know that's not a popular opinion, but I did. I was pumped to face him down at the end. But I was done with him then and there. I was not happy to see that they were forcing him back. The body swap thing was so cool, but ended with a pathetic whimper. Too much lost potential. I wanted to see the scions forced to contend with his power...MY power, with all the reluctance that would come with it. But we got a "just kidding!" instead. Boo.

[Kolsykol]

We see Venat, not Hydaelyn, sunder the world. When? Where? How?

I am pretty sure she was already Hydaelyn at that point.
In SHB when we see the records where they talk about creating Hydaelyn and Venat becoming her heart she mentions that she'll be able to take the form she wants.
So she was already Hydaelyn she was just using the form of Venat the same way that she manifests as Venat when we see her at the end of SHB and the start of EW.

Emet said in SHB that Hydaelyn and Zodiark had been fighting for a long time before the sundering happened, so the way I interpreted it at least is that Hydaelyn viewed the sundering as a sort of desperate measure because the Ancients wouldn't stop turning to Zodiark.
In the big cutscene in EW she should already have fought Zodiark before to a stalemate.
The way I interpreted it at least is that the sundering was essentially an act of desperation to end the circle and because the Ancients kept sacrificing themselves and relying on Zodiark and she couldn't deal with Zodiark without desperate measures.
Otherwise I dunno why Emet would've emphasized that they '' fought and fought and fought etc ''.

Hydaelyn may have had the power to sunder the world as a means to deal with Zodiark temporarily/ imprison him but not kill him.
But it doesn't seem like she had the power to subdue him without such desperate means.
And she had the Ancients just constantly empowering him back again it was a futile effort and fight the sundering from her pov seem'd rather necessary.
I mean either that or start slaughtering her own people I guess?

[AziraSyuren]

-Elpis. I know why they did it, and I know what they were trying to do, but I HATE time travel stories and they botched this one. As others have said, they've now got a contradiction on what happens when you mess with the past, and it's entirely "whatever the plot needs at the moment". Don't like it. And that cutscene on your way out? Issues. We see Venat, not Hydaelyn, sunder the world. When? Where? How? We were told in SHB that Hydaelyn was brought to bear after Zodiark ended the final days and restored life to the world, but that is not at ALL what we see. It's just...bad. All around. I wanted to see Zodiark work his magic, and I think a lot of you did too. And I don't think I'm the only one who wanted to see Hydaelyn stand against him and sunder him. Instead we get some nobody ancients throw a little fit, no grand opposition from anyone meaningful. Just...sloppy. I'm sorry, but it is.

I think a big problem with that cutscene was that it wasn't at all clear what was metaphor, what was not, and when it took place.

My interpretation of it is as follows:
1. First sacrifice happened.
2. Second was about to happen.
3. Venat confronted the Ancients in the scene, and that's when she decided to oppose any future attempts at summoning Zodiark. I don't believe that was the Sundering scene, I just think it's when she resolved to oppose Zodiark. It's just that the opposition was a little more violent rather than merely diplomatic and political.
4. The second happened. The laws of the world were weaved anew, and new life was breathed into the world.
5. -unknown gap of time-
6. Debate over the third sacrifice happened.
7. -unknown gap of time-
8. Hydaelyn vs Zodiark happened.

I also don't believe the time travel part was necessarily contradictory, I just think it's unclear how the rules work. If they never explain why the Exarch could change the past while our actions could not, though, then yeah. It's a problem. They might've actually done that, but I don't remember if they did. I think it's possible to read in between the lines and figure out a good explanation, but if something is a mechanic inherent to how the world functions, I don't think it's best to go that route.

snip

I just think people are shit at media analysis.

[Xuto-cxb]

I think a big problem with that cutscene was that it wasn't at all clear what was metaphor, what was not, and when it took place.

My interpretation of it is as follows:
1. First sacrifice happened.
2. Second was about to happen.
3. Venat confronted the Ancients in the scene, and that's when she decided to oppose any future attempts at summoning Zodiark. I don't believe that was the Sundering scene, I just think it's when she resolved to oppose Zodiark. It's just that the opposition was a little more violent rather than merely diplomatic and political.
4. The second happened. The laws of the world were weaved anew, and new life was breathed into the world.
5. -unknown gap of time-
6. Debate over the third sacrifice happened.
7. -unknown gap of time-
8. Hydaelyn vs Zodiark happened.

I also don't believe the time travel part was necessarily contradictory, I just think it's unclear how the rules work. If they never explain why the Exarch could change the past while our actions could not, though, then yeah. It's a problem. They might've actually done that, but I don't remember if they did. I think it's possible to read in between the lines and figure out a good explanation, but if something is a mechanic inherent to how the world functions, I don't think it's best to go that route.



I just think people are shit at media analysis.

Considering she is giving a speech about having to sunder everyone to make it impossible to return to paradise, and then says literally "I sunder us"...I don't see how it could be taken to be anything other than what it was. The entire cutscene is a disaster and I suspect localization issues aren't helping. It felt incredibly rushed and in dire need of a few more passes before it was anything near finished. That said, I'm not convinced it was hydaelyn either. It didn't look or sound like the venat-esque version we see in "present day" stuff. Whatever they were going for, they swung and missed by a mile.