Critique of Endwalker Characters

[Rulakir]

Imo I don't mind Gra'ha so much.
But I also didn't like how the game treated him as if I as the player thought he was the best thing ever.

This is how I feel about Haurchefant. The WoL has never reacted as dramatically to anything else in the game as his death. Not trying to say he wasn't a good character or that wasn't an emotional moment, but it's always been odd to me that my character was disproportionately torn up about him. There were also several dialog options referencing him that no other character has had and his demise keeps being rehashed, indefinitely it seems. I feel like my WoL had a love affair with him off screen that I wasn't aware about or something. :P

I love G'raha though. I sympathize with the people who don't, I would hate to have a character I disliked thrust upon me the way G'raha is. It's too bad the game doesn't have a favor system or at least allow you to pick your traveling companions, although, I know that would involve a lot of extra dialog (like the inn scene in EW).

Reminds me of when people tried to sell me Zenos as a mirror or foil to the WoL, to me he's just a boring psycho. Villains like him and Hermes need to not resurface again.

Ever since someone compared Zenos to Vegeta from DBZ I've been thinking, darn, he had possibilities! I would love a Vegeta type in game even if it's not him.

I think people will hate any main cast. Even the new 7.0 main cast will be hated. It's a battle that no TV show, movie, video game or story will ever win. It's simply the way it is.

The Golden Girls. :P Interestingly, it's because they were all so different and played well off of each other, something the Scions don't have. They've always been friends, always get along, always agree with each other (what few differences they have don't amount to much). The fact that they're all Archons or from Sharlayan like the twins doesn't help either, aside from who they were before then there's not even much diversity in their backgrounds. The main cast needs some spice.

[Remish]

The Golden Girls. :P Interestingly, it's because they were all so different and played well off of each other, something the Scions don't have. They've always been friends, always get along, always agree with each other (what few differences they have don't amount to much). The fact that they're all Archons or from Sharlayan like the twins doesn't help either, aside from who they were before then there's not even much diversity in their backgrounds. The main cast needs some spice.

I think if you looked in the right places, you'd find some people probably don't like the Golden Girls either. A lot of people don't even know that a lot of people dislike Endwalker that much until they visit these forums. I don't think there is anything anywhere that has a 100% approval rating because this assumes everyone will like it. Businesses will listen to the majority, not the loud unsatisfied minority regardless of their criticism. That's not to say that the criticism isn't validated. But money talks more. You need to speak with your wallet.

[Rilifane]

Ever since someone compared Zenos to Vegeta from DBZ I've been thinking, darn, he had possibilities! I would love a Vegeta type in game even if it's not him.

I believe we sort of had that chance with Gaius but he was unfortunately wasted on an optional side quest and we never saw him again. Oh, well...
- one of our arch enemies since 1.0 and early ARR
- acknowledged and respected our strength and wanted to have us on his side but entirely willing to kill us if we refuse
- a damn good veteran fighter with a lot of precious inside knowledge about Garlemald
- forged his own path after his almost fatal failure and learning the truth about the Empire without doing a 180 and holding fast to some things ("I'm still a son of Garlemald")

The potential for interesting encounters with varios NPCs was immense. It was crystal clear that our path would lead us to Garlemald and he had the most inside knowedge, much more than Nero, Cid or Lucia and Maxima lacked the military background as he was more of a diplomat/ politician.
But since it was only an optional side quest they couldn't do too much with him, his screentime was limited and they had to "get over with it" so they couldn't really add a story that slowly went from open animosity between former enemies over grudging acceptance to have need of each other's skill and knowledge to something like a difficult but still working alliance or even a mutual understanding and respect. The whole "Alright, let's work together!" went over too fast when it could've been made into a story not unlike Estinien's albeit with a former enemy instead of a vengeful ally.
He was a conquerer, he waged wars, strongly believed might gave the right to rule and killed but he also gave a Roe a pretty high rank, was strongly aganist the abuse of non-Garleans, went against the Empire by helping to stop Meteor as well as other needlessly brutal or cowardly methods like Black Rose and took in orphans, ill-fated as their story turned out to be, tried to be a sort of father for Cid and wanted to do better after his failure in Prae.
He admitted to many mistakes and openly acknowledged them in front of others but he also never cowered or denied who and what he was and still is and that some part of him will always be loyal to the Emporer.

Edit: Oh, and while we're at it: Regula. That one would've also made for an interesting character of the same category if only they had allowed him to live.

[aveyond-dreams]

As stated by others, another factor that contributes towards the general boring nature of the scions is that every one of them save Estinien come from the same place, Sharlayan. An entire party of allegedly "learned scholars" who in stark contrast to the other Sharlayans we meet in the MSQ hardly come into any kind of conflict with each other at all. Compared to most other party compositions, the one we've been stuck with is extremely homogenous.

The twins, nerds who just graduated high school/university. Y'shtola, sassy nerd. Urianger, bullied nerd. G'raha Tia, uwu nerd. Though some are orphans, they largely seem to be unaffected and straight up don't care about the fact they have no families.

Meanwhile, on the other hand we have:

Estinien - revenge driven soldier who lost everything because of Nidhogg
Ysayle - heretic driven by faith and is unafraid to challenge her ideological enemies
Hien - a prince who lost his family and his kingdom, and leads the charge to retake it, with an army whose acquisition he single-handedly orchestrated himself
Ryne - locked in a cell most of her life, a damsel in distress who becomes her own person by her story's end
Hades - a grouch who despite his naysaying cares about the wellbeing of his inner circle
Aymeric - the bastard son of the head of state, who unlike a certain catgirl is actually capable of displaying traits such as humility! Imagine that.
Hades - his background is the most interesting of them all, a genuinely complex character who is consumed by his burning ambitions who made the most of every second he was on screen.

Compared to these characters, the scions have suffered practically nothing.

[Nav_Fae]

Sorry but Etsy is a bad comparison and is going to continue to be for reasons already mentioned but feel free to continue to use it if you think it justifies your hatred for things. It won't change anything in the end.

[Rulakir]

and in terms of villains-because the absolute last thing we need is another Hermes: Thordan, Kuja, Kefka, Ardyn, Gabranth, Caius

Also important to note is that at least once Yoship managed to acknowledge the fact that Hermes was a divisive figure in an interview sometime in January, I think.

Ardyn. <3 He and Emet are my two all time favorite antagonists. I can't handle another Emet or Elidibus though if they go the sympathetic antagonist route. My heart broke for them so I hated having to defeat them (worse when Alphinaud is basically like "ding dong the witch is dead" after Emet >_>) and that, by comparison, the Scions lost nothing while the Ascians/Ancients lost everything.

Hermes I didn't find sympathetic at all. Had the game not tried to gaslight me that he was he might've been a more enjoyable antagonist.

Honestly, I'd like another Yotsuyu. She was enjoyable as a villain, but I did not feel conflicted about defeating her.

[Iscah]

You do have me quite curious. At what point do you think would have been a good place for a main character death if an apocalypse that once decimated the entire planet isn’t one? And fights against the unsundered aren’t one as well.

My point was that there are no events where as it played out you are left thinking "that character could/should have died in that situation and I would be narratively okay with that".

Thancred giving his all to distract Ran'jit was a point like that: an emotional high point and he achieved what he needed to do. It's quite possible he only survived because at that point we had no other trust tank available.

Y'shtola falling down the hole in the Qitana Ravel was not. Too sudden, no buildup, rather contrived as a plot point – in this case they writing-wise were basically looking for an excuse to force her to use Flow so Emet could pull her out again, but if they were hypothetically looking for a chance to kill her off permanently then as it stands it was a weak way to go.

And in Endwalker I don't think there were any clear "should have been" points for a character death. The general vibe of disaster calls for places where maybe someone along the way could have been written to die, but who and when? The closest thing is Zenos turning up at our camp, but that is still "someone could arbitrarily be picked to die" and not a particular moment that works for a specific character.

It is again quite possible that all of them "had" to survive for the practical gameplay purpose that they need seven allies available for the level 89 trial.

[KizuyaKatogami]

My point was that there are no events where as it played out you are left thinking "that character could/should have died in that situation and I would be narratively okay with that".

Thancred giving his all to distract Ran'jit was a point like that: an emotional high point and he achieved what he needed to do. It's quite possible he only survived because at that point we had no other trust tank available.

Y'shtola falling down the hole in the Qitana Ravel was not. Too sudden, no buildup, rather contrived as a plot point – in this case they writing-wise were basically looking for an excuse to force her to use Flow so Emet could pull her out again, but if they were hypothetically looking for a chance to kill her off permanently then as it stands it was a weak way to go.

And in Endwalker I don't think there were any clear "should have been" points for a character death. The general vibe of disaster calls for places where maybe someone along the way could have been written to die, but who and when? The closest thing is Zenos turning up at our camp, but that is still "someone could arbitrarily be picked to die" and not a particular moment that works for a specific character.

It is again quite possible that all of them "had" to survive for the practical gameplay purpose that they need seven allies available for the level 89 trial.

Ah i see what you mean. Yes it’s an incredible shame in the grand scheme of things, that none of them really faced individual peril until the final zone and even then it was all immediately averted. As far as the trial goes, they could have just not had the trial be a trust based one. While i do understand why they did it, i personally don’t think it should influence the story.

[BlueLulu]

Honestly i didnt care for much of the scions other then maybe alisaie and uri all the others were kinda meh or didnt stick out to me much with most of them feeling kinda bland or boring

[Seymour_Rainecourt]

You like Alisaie and Meteion, but dislike Urianger and G'raha. Come on! I agree with IttyBitty: sorry for your public admittance of your terrible opinions. ._ .