Final Fantasy XIV Hot Takes

[SomeoneElse]

I know you aren't necessarily looking for input in a thread like this... but I'ma toss in my two gil anyway lol.

I do think that SB is a lot more consistent in quality than HW overall, and I think it's more successful at telling a nuanced story about war -- by a wide margin. But for me, I found characters like Ysayle, Estinien, and Aymeric more compelling than pretty much anyone in SB's cast (other than Yotsuyu), which made HW more compelling for me to follow in general. And, anecdotally at least, it seems like that's the consensus among players like me who favored it: they cared more about the characters, so they cared more about the story. SB's just seemed to struggle to hook some of us despite its relative compexity.

In terms of actual content, though, SB absolutely takes the cake, imo.

Doesn't matter to me, mate. Input if you want. I hated Ysayle with a passion personally and wasn't overly attached to Aymeric nor Haurchefaunt but I'm aware I'm in the minority with that. I will say though that SB was not void of unlikeable characters for me. Lyse in particular was quite annoying. I'd rather deal with more Ysayle over Lyse, but overall I liked more SB characters than HW.

[Shurrikhan]

Doesn't matter to me, mate. Input if you want. I hated Ysayle with a passion personally and wasn't overly attached to Aymeric nor Haurchefaunt but I'm aware I'm in the minority with that. I will say though that SB was not void of unlikeable characters for me. Lyse in particular was quite annoying. I'd rather deal with more Ysayle over Lyse, but overall I liked more SB characters than HW.

Same, though with Lsayle and Lyse being equally meh to me. The rest of the Ala'Mhigan resistance, especially, were mostly likeable, even if that was definitely the weaker half of Stormblood, and the Doman/Othgardian(?) side was decently well written. Was fine with Zenos, even, for what it's worth, and StB was probably my favorite expansion over the time I was playing it, with some of the least low lows.

(I thought ShB's MSQ had higher highs and, even, a better average than StB's, but the rest was a merely okay expansion to me, honestly. EW? Maybe faintly better, outside of the MSQ feeling as rushed as StB's. I feel like most of the gameplay issues I feel with Endwalker, apart from maybe SAM's, were things already wholly present in Shadowbringers, and just better worked around now. /shrug)

[VeyaAkemi]

Being only able to have 3 Specialist Crafters is cringe when all 8 crafters operate exactly the same, just let us have all 8 at once, as it is it just causes me annoyance when setting up macros cuz I have 3 crafters that have higher stats than the rest, and I need to account for them.

[pikalovr]

zero would've been better if she stayed in her voidsent form both thematically and story wise at least until i'd say around rubicante fight where upon hearing her words about humanity hydaelyn's light finally allows her to transform to her human form aka current zero

[MatchaokaCha]

EW's story was worse than StB.

[Ranaku]

The biggest problem was that EW seems to be so rushed in my opinion, we had no time to see the zones and learn to like people. HW was so great cause it had the focus solely on Ishgard and that for the entirety of the expansion almost.

In Endwalker we go: Sharlayan -> Thavnair -> Sharlayan -> Garlemald -> Moon -> Thavnair -> INTO THE PAST CAUSE WHY NOT?! -> Garlemald -> Sharlayan -> TO THE EDGE OF THE UNIVERSE!

Stormblood suffered from the same, we saw Ala Mhigo, Doma, the people of the ruby sea, the Xaela, Hingashi and none of these groups of people got nearly enough time. After dealing with Nidhogg who got build up for an entire expansion...Yotsuyu was so underwhelming and not cinematic.

[Mimilu]

The biggest problem was that EW seems to be so rushed in my opinion, we had no time to see the zones and learn to like people. HW was so great cause it had the focus solely on Ishgard and that for the entirety of the expansion almost.

I think another problem with EW is that what they were selling us about it before it was released isn't what we actually got.
With how they were talking during fanfests and live letters, it sounded like we were finally going to Garlemald to bring the fight to Zenos and the Empire but I think they were trying too hard to one-up ShB with things like a bigger, metaphysical threat and Ancients fanservice. (*´﹃｀*)

[TheMightyMollusk]

I think another problem with EW is that what they were selling us about it before it was released isn't what we actually got.
With how they were talking during fanfests and live letters, it sounded like we were finally going to Garlemald to bring the fight to Zenos and the Empire but I think they were trying too hard to one-up ShB with things like a bigger, metaphysical threat and Ancients fanservice. (*´﹃｀*)

I feel like that was the original plan, before they decided that a purely Garlemald-themed expansion wouldn't be popular enough and just mashed it together with what was planned for later. If you really look at EW, it has the plot structure of one expansion (everything up to Zodiark), a patch cycle (the beginning of the Final Days, up to the 85 dungeon), and then another expansion (dealing with the Final Days, up to the Endsinger). I'd even argue that making peace with the beast tribes was setting up for role quests, where we could've helped the different tribes deal with the Towers and Lunar Primals in their territories, but that got lost in the condensing, so the Towers just go away when Anima dies.

[hynaku]

The expansion I like the best was Heavensward next Stormblood. My guess 7.0 going to be about more space travel.

[Mimilu]

As for my favorite expansions:

Story-wise
ShB > HW > EW > SB > ARR

Content-and-Gameplay-wise
HW > SB > ShB > ARR > EW

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