Quote Originally Posted by Rulakir View Post
I didn't view Thordan as bad. His intentions were good, but he was taking the authoritarian route to 'save' the world. The Garleans' weren't much different, many of them had the belief that to stop the threat of primals everything had to be under their rule.

Hard disagree about Yotsuyu. Her backstory may have been unfortunate, but she turned into a twisted individual who derived pleasure from torturing innocents. Don't get me wrong, I liked having a strictly 'bad' antagonist for once (other than Zenos I guess), but she had no redeeming qualities until she lost her memory.
Thordan was dealt a very bad set of cards and I think he went ahead with what he saw as the most sensible way of resolving it once and for all. The fact that Varis saw him as a strong leader does suggest he was relatable to him.

As for Yotsuyu? I'll agree she's not that sympathetic, because she's a bit like Amon in that she relishes in spreading misery due to her own internal demons, but she had a really good stage presence which made her memorable. Given that they threw in Fandaniel to compound Amon's woes, I was a bit let down they didn't take the opportunity to add her to the trio of misery.

I usually love sympathetic antagonists, but thanks to ShB & EW I'm over it. I've no interest in continually being presented with conflicts where the opposition loses everything and the WoL/Scions don't even break a fingernail. It actually is starting to feel emotionally manipulative because the writers won't touch the protagonists, so the only way to get tears is to make the antagonists likeable and then take everything from them. Maybe Yotsuyu is one of the writers. ;P
Agreed. I also felt little desire to console Meteion. I fully understand Hermes was to blame for her predicament, but no thanks. Some option here would've been nice. It annoys me a bit because such options are mostly absent with antagonists I like better.