Rewritten MSQ - Garlemald and EW

[Enkidoh]

As if we care what millions of people love. Just because it's popular doesn't mean it's good or that we have to like it.

But that in itself is a subjective phrase, when you're trying to argue that the OP's fanfiction is better than the actual canon storyline. I mean, there is nothing wrong with doing fanfic rewrites of stories, but actually stating this how it 'would have been' comes across as pretentious at best and downright arrogant at worst, when, none of us know exactly what ideas SE may have had at first and then discounted as EW's story was developed.

To the OP, you have clearly put a lot of thought into it however, but unfortunately some of your ideas are just things taken from other FF games chucked in for fanservice with little regard for consistancy (of course SE does this too canonically, but you've done far more than what SE did in EW), and some things have been made out of whole cloth.

Also an important thing to remember about EW is the whole point of EW's story was to wind up the original plot as quickly as they could, so alas things like an expanded Garlemald scenario was never going to happen sadly, it's just the nature of the beast (I admit some aspects of EW's story doesn't really sit right with me myself, but they're only minor quibbles that doesn't spoil the entire thing, but that's just my own personal opinion).

I'm really sorry if it seems like I'm attacking you here, but I think your ideas would be better received if you put a cavaet at the start that said this is not canon and never was, and was just a headcanon idea, as you have put a lot of work in making it, so please do not be discouraged by my comments. Keep at it!

EDIT:

I highly encourage you to do this and I look forward to reading it, we have no more story content until September at the earliest so we may as well make our own.

Actually we're likely to get the next content/story patch next month, the next Live Letter which will be showing the first teasers of it is on Friday and they usually do that about 2-3 weeks before the content patch goes live, so 6.2's story quests will probably be next month, so don't get discouraged about that either!

[Knot_D]

Ew, stop putting my mom into a villains there!

[Rulakir]

Putting? Venat is a villain, always has been.

[Knot_D]

Putting? Venat is a villain, always has been.

For the sundering stuff? Sure, since none of them are justified. But NOT on OP's version

[EgilTheStressedMage]

You know they really could have gone with having the WoL be fully capable of speech so that the only thing they controlled was their name. LaTale is an mmo where you are playing an adventurer who has full lines of dialogue and barely any meaningful choices (only one I know of is after you get the third job and go to an npc and answer right, haven't dared to answer wrong yet lol) from start to whatever is the current finish. I'm sure they could have had voice acting and swapped out pronouns and race for when they needed to address the WoL. If not that, then something like in Baten Kaitos where you are the Guardian Spirit and the correct choices will lead to getting better cards and finishers in battle while your partner does all the talking. The problem is they are creating a character over an mmo one where these two were established from the start, but with the former having different stories attached to their creation (I think, it's been a while since I started on anything that wasn't the starting four, I know Card Master had one and so did Demigod) and the latter remaining the same. In that case they should have went with what LaTale did, except not die twice and be on it's deathbed a third time over fourteen friggin years because Actoz doesn't know what they're doing (but the gameplay is far superior to XIV in the sense that you have almost full mobility, it's like an old school Sega Genesis hack and slash but you can fly across the screen with certain skill combos on several if not all the classes).

A less wordy example would be FFX's Tidus but with significantly less WHEEZE-tier voice acting. Probably should have just said that lol.

[AwesomeJr44]

Putting? Venat is a villain, always has been.

Ew, stop putting my mom into a villains there!

Hey, if that upsets you, go talk to Yoshi P.

[Knot_D]

Hey, if that upsets you, go talk to Yoshi P.

Clearly you don't read my post, at all.

[Berteaux_Braumegain]

Putting? Venat is a villain, always has been.

I doubt my comment will sway the tide, but genuinely don't get this mentality.

The Sundering is a morally murky activity, fine. I doubt many people would contest that. Yoshi-P and the writers don't contest that. But I don't get the point of acting like Hydaelyn is a supervillain who only cares about herself and nothing else. For goodness' sake, Primals made from the Ascian's machinations (including Ramuh) talk about her as if she's a good person. Midgardsormr vouches for her acts of kidness. She saves the Warrior of Light from death at least twice in the opening arc of the game. And that's with the expectation that one day they are going to kill her for the sake of a better world once they're strong enough.

It's fine to not like her, especially for the Sundering, but at least dislike her as presented in the game, not based on some caricature that resulted from twisting the lore to fit fanfiction.

[Raoabolic]

I doubt my comment will sway the tide, but genuinely don't get this mentality.

The Sundering is a morally murky activity, fine. I doubt many people would contest that. Yoshi-P and the writers don't contest that. But I don't get the point of acting like Hydaelyn is a supervillain who only cares about herself and nothing else. For goodness' sake, Primals made from the Ascian's machinations (including Ramuh) talk about her as if she's a good person. Midgardsormr vouches for her acts of kidness. She saves the Warrior of Light from death at least twice in the opening arc of the game. And that's with the expectation that one day they are going to kill her for the sake of a better world once they're strong enough.

It's fine to not like her, especially for the Sundering, but at least dislike her as presented in the game, not based on some caricature that resulted from twisting the lore to fit fanfiction.

That's true but where is the line drawn between good will and ensuring your plan works? It's just called being pragmatic, pragmatism isn't necessarily a sign of a good person.

[EgilTheStressedMage]

snip

They literally just had to not make the Ancient society perfect and there wouldn't be so many holes. This is the problem when you make a ancient advanced civilization but most of the time they're long gone at the current point in the story. When you make them literally all God in some way, you'd need to come up with the absolute best possible way to undo them and not half ass it like EW did. They could say that the new lives they were creating were thinning out the life stream and required more and more aether to create, which would eventually reduce the star to the crumble that is The Plenty but they're on dead chunks of rock floating in space. Like if events were happening that were strongly hinting towards that, and despite their best efforts could not find a reasonable way to Meteion, and was proven beyond any doubt, and all this after Venat fully explained what was going to happen, then and only then would the Sundering have been acceptable. Then and only then could we move on. Then and only then would there we some semblance of closure. Hell, you could say they lost their memory because of the Sundering instead of "haha Greek words go brrrr". But Yoshi's obsession with keeping XIV what he wants has harmed this game far more than it should have while what he personally likes remains good. If the Ancients aren't perfect in his eyes, how is Yoshi any better? Yes he saved XIV. Big deal, those days are over. That's like saying NFTlodeon is a good channel because they had Rocko's Modern Life on it in the 90s. Not anymore.

I'm grateful for everything XIV has given me, truly I am. I met some wonderful people from my FC at PAX. I engaged in content I would otherwise never do (RIP HOH at 92, killed by Heavenly Gozus who decided "Your free trial of progress has expired"). I have developed patience for annoying grinds in other mmos. I have the Black Pegasus. But this direction of game and story, it's not for anyone who wants a deep, rich lore. It's also not for people who want to improve themselves either, just look at the Duty Finder thread for details.

I'm going to bed. I have so much crap to do at work for the next two weeks and I need some semblance of mental stability. Just needed to say this, probably won't remember most of it, late night post and all. I spent too long editing this.