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

[KizuyaKatogami]

I don't know what to tell you besides that being a problem of personal taste. Clearly, the argument that he "has had nothing but bad writing", is not universal...as evidenced by said "fan appeal".

Besides that, the situation of him surviving his own half-baked plan isn't really a case of "plot armor". Plot armor is not simply "this character could have died but didn't". The circumstances behind his survival made sense in the story, and likewise served as an excellent villainous moment for Emet-Selch.



I really do not understand why you guys keep bringing this up. The entire point to those moments was that the Scions were running themselves ragged racing from one crisis to the next and sometimes forgot to slow down and find time for their own comfort. Are we going to be angry about a scene of soldiers playing cards and drinking whiskey in a war movie? Hell, the burger scene comes at a time when your party literally has nothing to do but wait, and Gr'aha is the Scion who is least fitting for this criticism, because he's shown multiple times to have overworked himself to the point of exhaustion. He does it so often and so predictably that even Lyna calls him out on it from an entire planet away.



Again, this is rather subjective. Personally wouldn't care, either way, but that's likewise just my personal opinion.

When i bring up plot armor and plot holes, im mainly bringing up things like them telling us hes weaker the farther he is from the tower and that staying too far for too long can have severe consequences. Yet, despite being the farthest away he ever has been from the tower, and for presumably the longest, he is able to cast a spell he couldnt even cast properly once whilst under the full power of the tower, and multiplies it seven fold. Im sorry, but that goes against the lore we were given and seems to serve only as a way to prevent him from having any consequences. Fast forward to 5.3 where Elidibus has numerous opportunities to kill him and...just doesnt.

I think there's two--or three?--different complaints about G'raha sort of running through the discussion here, and some of those reasons I can partially understand, and some are a little more difficult for me. I can absolutely understand the frustration and resentment about G'raha's "success story" and the effort exuded to give him a happy ending whereas certain other characters were denied the same - but that's not something I can really blame G'raha himself for, and moreso is another piece of the overall plotting and thematic shakiness within Endwalker as a whole. And saying G'raha was saved purely "for fanservice" doesn't quite work because, as popular as he is, Emet-Selch outstrips him considerably, and Emet-Selch didn't get to run into our adventuring arms by Endwalker's conclusion, even though he easily could have.

G'raha being saved because we want to give the protagonists as a whole a happy ending makes more sense to me than being angry about any pandering to G'raha fans in particular. As Rulakir pointed out, nearly all the Scions are flourishing in ways that are baffling given their plot contexts. And I can actually even accept that uneven outcome, were it given more thoughtfulness - just like some people die for no good reason and it's arbitrary, the same applies sometimes to people who survive. (This is one of the elements that I loved about Zenos's story.) But it's when coupled with the judgmental factor the Ancients were on the receiving end of, and the opportunities to help them not being taken as aggressively, for Some Reason, it starts to grate.

G'raha's writing in terms of his personality, meanwhile, makes sense to me. Is it the most compelling personality for me in a vacuum? Nah, I like G'raha, but I wouldn't count him as one of my absolute favorites. But in terms of "does it make sense," I think it does. I actually liked the sort of insecure, manic quality to him after the union of his two different selves, and the clumsiness of him trying to navigate the rush of actually getting to do what he wants to do for the first time in over a hundred years. I liked that resuming his Exarch persona in Thavnair was a powerful moment, not just for his actions, but for the weight of him having to resort to acting in that role again as being painful and difficult for him - to the point I wished it had actually been elaborated on further.

The third issue is the uneven tone, pace, and placement and emphasis of the "light-hearted" scenes throughout Endwalker. Again, I think this speaks to probably a larger problem through the whole, but G'raha somehow became an easy target to lash out about something that applies to most of the protagonist group. (I would rather seethe about the Loporrits, personally, as far as that goes. <_<)

I bring up the fanservice thing because the devs themselves confirmed that they had two different endings planned. Combine that with the fact they look to twitter and reddit for feedback around the same time, combined with the fact graha was insanely popular on both platforms at the time and....i dont think its such an out there assumption. While yes, you can attribute a lot of the annoying fluff to other characters as well(ive gone off about alisaie and yshtola like this before trust me) Graha has been the common denominator every time since 5.4+. It just takes away from all the seriousness of any situation. Whenever hes wiggling his ears and fanboying it doesnt make me feel like im playing a dark final fantasy game. Its like im watching a slice o flife visual novel.Also.... they did basically bring emet back because of fan appeal. That much is quite obvious lol. Elpis was just a huge fanservice parade for emet as well as the end of UT. This is pretty obvious when you read his 5.3 short story where he states this is his last act....SPOILER IT WASNT.

Yeah, like, nonstop tension isn't good for a story and that's clearly what EW was verging on were there any actual tension felt. The slice of life scenes hit a lot different for people who actually felt that tension.

And, I've said it before and I'll say it again, G'raha actually dying would've been a betrayal of his character. He was literally called out on his eagerness to sacrifice himself and nobody bought his attempts to make his death any easier to handle. Personally, it showed me that he didn't understand what it really meant to be a hero (especially since his leadership as the Exarch, which, y'know, requires him to be alive, was more heroic than any attempt he made to sacrifice himself) and validating that lack of understanding would've been a character assassination worse than anything that happened in EW. The fact that he found a way to live on in the face of death is frankly one of the best moments in Shadowbringers.

Please tell me how im expected to feel any tension whatsoever when the final days only really comes to 2 zones in the entire expansion and the protagonists never have to face any consequences or ever get hurt or anything? Please explain this to me because i truly dont understand. This expansion when bad things happened, it was to nameless or only just recently met npc's. Never any main characters outside of the antagonists.

[aveyond-dreams]

Yeah, like, nonstop tension isn't good for a story and that's clearly what EW was verging on were there any actual tension felt. The slice of life scenes hit a lot different for people who actually felt that tension.

And, I've said it before and I'll say it again, G'raha actually dying would've been a betrayal of his character. He was literally called out on his eagerness to sacrifice himself and nobody bought his attempts to make his death any easier to handle. Personally, it showed me that he didn't understand what it really meant to be a hero (especially since his leadership as the Exarch, which, y'know, requires him to be alive, was more heroic than any attempt he made to sacrifice himself) and validating that lack of understanding would've been a character assassination worse than anything that happened in EW. The fact that he found a way to live on in the face of death is frankly one of the best moments in Shadowbringers.

The expansion was set against the backdrop of the literal end of the world. Of course there was supposed to be tension. And it could have been alleviated every once in a while by scenes far less ridiculous than the hamburger sequence. As others have mentioned, it isn't that we were immune to the tension, we expected and wanted to see it instead of the fluff scenes. If we wanted to play a silly high school style game then we would be playing Persona instead of Final Fantasy XIV.

I once again insist that G'raha Tia's writing represents both a failure of the writers to commit to meaningful sacrifice (a trend we later saw repeat itself in Endwalker) and the prioritization of comfort over substance. Heroes staying alive is more heroic than sacrificing themselves for the causes they believe in? I'm sorry but are you kidding me? I think we have completely different definitions about what it means to be a hero. The High Summoners of FFX were praised as heroes because they gave their lives in order to bring peace to their world even if it was only temporary because they held on to hope, even if they were not told the full story of Sin. Noctis in FFXV saved the entire world by sacrificing his life after having enjoyed a relatively privileged life up until the invasion of Insomnia. Need I go on?

What we saw there was the product of "covid writing" where during that era I noticed that many writers (myself included) were unwilling to put their characters through a lot because of how bleak everyone's irl situations were. I recognized what had happened there on the spot. He didn't get a happy ending because he deserved one, he got one because people were understandably not in the mood to write that kind of ending for him at the time, even if that was what would have made the most sense for the story. 2 years later we are still paying the price for that decision, with one of the best characters in the game reduced to a bad joke.

[CrownySuccubus]

When i bring up plot armor and plot holes, im mainly bringing up things like them telling us hes weaker the farther he is from the tower and that staying too far for too long can have severe consequences. Yet, despite being the farthest away he ever has been from the tower, and for presumably the longest, he is able to cast a spell he couldnt even cast properly once whilst under the full power of the tower, and multiplies it seven fold. Im sorry, but that goes against the lore we were given and seems to serve only as a way to prevent him from having any consequences.

The reasons he couldn't cast it properly in the Tower was because he was trying to summon entire whole people with bodies, memories, abilities, etc., intact. It's stated in 5.3 that the spell is significantly easier to cast if you don't care about summoning entities with their entire spirits and powers. In that moment, all he needed were seven temporary allies to assist the WOL.

Fast forward to 5.3 where Elidibus has numerous opportunities to kill him and...just doesnt.

Elidibus makes it clear that the WOL is his target, and no one else. The only time he ever attacks Gr'aha is in order to gain the power to summon other WOLs, and both Gr'aha and Beq Lugg use their power to escape.

I'm not seeing the problem, nor the "plot armor".

I'm sorry but are you kidding me? I think we have completely different definitions about what it means to be a hero. The High Summoners of FFX were praised as heroes because they gave their lives in order to bring peace to their world even if it was only temporary because they held on to hope, even if they were not told the full story of Sin.

........And the lesson of FFX is that they were wrong.

The entire point of FFX's story is that sacrificing your life without even looking for an alternative is stupid. Everyone praised the Summoners and their deaths because they falsely believed that if they did it enough times, Sin would be gone for good. Auron's entire plot is that he died trying to get revenge when he realized how senseless his friends' deaths were, and he spent the whole game nudging Yuna's party into seeing the truth. When Yunalesca makes it perfectly clear that sacrifices will NEVER make Sin go away, the party renounces the entire system of sacrifice and resolves to find another way. And to put emphasis on this point, Yuna is likewise upset that Tidus sacrificed himself without warning her, and multiple times when someone offers to sacrifice their lives as a solution, Yuna shoots them down immediately and tries to find another way.

You picked probably the WORST miniseries in the franchise to cherry-pick here.

Noctis in FFXV saved the entire world by sacrificing his life after having enjoyed a relatively privileged life up until the invasion of Insomnia.

Yeah, and it's hinted throughout the story (as well as the entire point of every DLC after) that the entire sacrifice was a rigged game set up by the start by the corrupt gods of the FFXV world. Noctis sacrificed himself to save the world, specifically because human lives were being used as playthings. His sacrifice is more tragic than it is heroic, and the DLC make the argument that it probably shouldn't have happened that way.

Need I go on?

Considering your examples thus far disprove your point, I think you should.

[Rulakir]

What we saw there was the product of "covid writing" where during that era I noticed that many writers (myself included) were unwilling to put their characters through a lot because of how bleak everyone's irl situations were. I recognized what had happened there on the spot.

Too bad that didn't carry over enough into EW, which was depressing AF if you were an Ancients and not Scions fan. Their whole arc was basically a torture p*** snuff film. I'm honestly aghast whenever someone says they're glad it had a happy ending.

[KizuyaKatogami]

The reasons he couldn't cast it properly in the Tower was because he was trying to summon entire whole people with bodies, memories, abilities, etc., intact. It's stated in 5.3 that the spell is significantly easier to cast if you don't care about summoning entities with their entire spirits and powers. In that moment, all he needed were seven temporary allies to assist the WOL.



Elidibus makes it clear that the WOL is his target, and no one else. The only time he ever attacks Gr'aha is in order to gain the power to summon other WOLs, and both Gr'aha and Beq Lugg use their power to escape.

I'm not seeing the problem, nor the "plot armor".



........And the lesson of FFX is that they were wrong.

The entire point of FFX's story is that sacrificing your life without even looking for an alternative is stupid. Everyone praised the Summoners and their deaths because they falsely believed that if they did it enough times, Sin would be gone for good. Auron's entire plot is that he died trying to get revenge when he realized how senseless his friends' deaths were, and he spent the whole game nudging Yuna's party into seeing the truth. When Yunalesca makes it perfectly clear that sacrifices will NEVER make Sin go away, the party renounces the entire system of sacrifice and resolves to find another way. And to put emphasis on this point, Yuna is likewise upset that Tidus sacrificed himself without warning her, and multiple times when someone offers to sacrifice their lives as a solution, Yuna shoots them down immediately and tries to find another way.

You picked probably the WORST miniseries in the franchise to cherry-pick here.



Yeah, and it's hinted throughout the story (as well as the entire point of every DLC after) that the entire sacrifice was a rigged game set up by the start by the corrupt gods of the FFXV world. Noctis sacrificed himself to save the world, specifically because human lives were being used as playthings. His sacrifice is more tragic than it is heroic, and the DLC make the argument that it probably shouldn't have happened that way.



Considering your examples thus far disprove your point, I think you should.

Again, we are bashed over the head constantly about how he gets weaker the farther he is. Yet there’s 0 signs at that point of him being weakened despite almost passing out by being in just Kholusia. It makes 0 sense that he’s able to summon 7 people across worlds whilst being away from the tower for DAYS. It goes against what we’re told. As for Elidibus that excuse is beyond idiotic. And again, i bring up the devs themselves confirming two endings were planned. Let’s not be needlessly obtuse here.

[CrownySuccubus]

Again, we are bashed over the head constantly about how he gets weaker the farther he is. Yet there’s 0 signs at that point of him being weakened despite almost passing out by being in just Kholusia. It makes 0 sense that he’s able to summon 7 people across worlds whilst being away from the tower for DAYS. It goes against what we’re told.

Not only do we have no idea how this distance weakness works while we're in...whatever space anomaly we fight Emet-Selch in, but while in Kholusia, Gr'aha was about to cast a spell to absorb all of the excess light off the WOL and yeet himself to an entirely different dimension. Considering that his entire plan was based on a web of lies, and this moment was the entire crux of said plan, then either A) Gr'aha didn't tell us the whole truth, B) he made sure he saved enough energy no matter what to be able to employ his masterstroke or C) both.

As for Elidibus that excuse is beyond idiotic.

What "excuse"? Gr'aha was in danger and got away instead of fighting a battle he couldn't win. And then, Eldibus got what he needed anyway.

And again, i bring up the devs themselves confirming two endings were planned. Let’s not be needlessly obtuse here.

And? Are we supposed to call every story that goes through revisions where characters do or don't meet certain fates bad writing now? The first Rambo movie was supposed to end with him dying until audiences disliked it. The original Alien was supposed to end with the Xenomorph biting Ripley's head off and sending a distress signal with her voice. But neither of those things happened, so I guess they're just objectively bad movies now.

[KizuyaKatogami]

Not only do we have no idea how this distance weakness works while we're in...whatever space anomaly we fight Emet-Selch in, but while in Kholusia, Gr'aha was about to cast a spell to absorb all of the excess light off the WOL and yeet himself to an entirely different dimension. Considering that his entire plan was based on a web of lies, and this moment was the entire crux of said plan, then either A) Gr'aha didn't tell us the whole truth, B) he made sure he saved enough energy no matter what to be able to employ his masterstroke or C) both.



What "excuse"? Gr'aha was in danger and got away instead of fighting a battle he couldn't win. And then, Eldibus got what he needed anyway.



And? Are we supposed to call every story that goes through revisions where characters do or don't meet certain fates bad writing now? The first Rambo movie was supposed to end with him dying until audiences disliked it, so I guess it's just an objectively bad movie now.

When they contradict their own themes to do so and can’t even show on screen the big issue of consent? Yes, it’s bad. It’s no different than what they did in UT. Elidibus had again, NUMEROUS CHANCES to kill Graha, he chose not to because of idiotic writing. Like, come on now one of the biggest complaints of both ShB and EW is the lack of consequences for the main cast.

[CrownySuccubus]

When they contradict their own themes to do so and can’t even show on screen the big issue of consent? Yes, it’s bad.

You and Theodric have this weird thing about claiming Gr'aha liking you being a "consent" issue, when it isn't. Gr'aha isn't doing anything but asking to go adventures with the player, and this isn't the type of game where you get to pick and choose your party. If he got replaced with Aymeric or something, it's not like the game will ask you if you want to tell Elf Knight to take a hike.

It’s no different than what they did in UT. Elidibus had again, NUMEROUS CHANCES to kill Graha

Dude. Gr'aha was NOT his target. What are you talking about?

You might as well be complaining that Elidibus had several chances to kill Chai-Nuzz and never bothered. You're welcome to your opinion, but I don't see how Elidibus never becoming a Gr'aha-killing Terminator is at all relevant or valid.

[Theodric]

Yeah, the game seems to be saying that there's nuance but then mysteriously sets up a scenario where the antagonists always lose everything they ever cared about, including their ideals and loved ones. So I do think it's pretty jarring when a big death is set up for one of the protagonists only for nothing to actually happen.

It's almost always the antagonists who are written to concede or offer up a kind gesture that proves to be their downfall as well. Elidibus knew that Emet leaving G'raha alive backfired so having Elidibus make the exact same mistake felt very silly to me.

Especially when the protagonists get almost everything they desire. It's been pretty obvious for a while that the main cast are clad in exceptionally thick plot armour and that just erodes away the tension for a decent amount of us. Especially those of us who give Hollywood style storytelling a hard pass. The game arguably shifted its genre completely after a certain point - perhaps around the same time that it began desperately bending over to appease the social media sphere first and foremost.

You and Theodric have this weird thing about claiming Gr'aha liking you being a "consent" issue, when it isn't.

I'm not sure how it's 'weird'. I quite simply don't like the character. He looks strange and acts in a manner I find disagreeable. There's nothing controversial about that stance.

[CrownySuccubus]

I'm not sure how it's 'weird'. I quite simply don't like the character. He looks strange and acts in a manner I find disagreeable. There's nothing controversial about that stance.

I'm not talking about you liking the character or not. I'm talking about you believing that not liking the character makes it an issue of "consent" which, it isn't.

It's a problem of linear narrative, not consent. Mario can't decline saving Princess Peach for the 1 billionth time, but that isn't an issue of non-consent.