Quote Originally Posted by TimotheusReed View Post
I feel some people are forgetting the whole "time aspect" when judging Venats actions.
I haven't forgotten, I think it's a terrible justification. "She had to commit genocide because time travel!" No, absolutely not. She's not going to be spared judgement due to a plot contrivance that, IMO, not only ruined EW but retroactively the rest of the game.

Quote Originally Posted by Skyborne View Post
Personally, and this is my own taste, I would've removed timetravel entirely and have had instead use our Echo to peer into the past to find out all of this. Also, having the sundered Ascians show up to help us out -- I wouldn't blame you if you forgot about them, it seems like the writers did too. Venat, I think, works plenty well as a 'villain with good intentions' in the game as is without the narrative propping her up, but her motivations could've been elaborated on instead of being a weird confused mess of a generic 'she loves you!' support blob.
This is essentially my critique too. The only issue with Venat is the game doesn't address her as the ideologue she is. Frankly, all things could remain the same if Hydaelyn tempered. EW actually makes a lot of sense if that's the case. Otherwise, you'd just need to have the characters act accordingly, especially as Venat embodies ideologies the Scions have fought against and condemned in the past. Conversely, you could lean into them being hypocrites and have it be called out that they don't have an issue with villainous actions when they benefit from them. It'd be nice to see the moral paragon Scions knocked down a peg or two and be forced to reflect upon their own cherished values.