What Zero Could've Been

[SannaR]

What happened? Was it seriously Endwalker's release? I've been only lurking for a year or two, but it seems things changed recently. Before the worst issue here were the constant spam of obvious troll thread, now it seems this place is slowly imploding.

It's like Abismiiliard said it was like this before just toned down and allowed to die or have a breather from. Compared to now where as I've said various times you just hint at the sundering or about how you feel about those who disagree with you on the subject and you can bet the golden scree mount that any and all discussion about any other topic will then slide into round 576 of holy heck Venat is such a B n C (thankfully no one's called her a C word yet.) for sundering the world and anyone who isn't as bothered by it as I am should feel bad and whatnot. Yes I'm exaggerating somewhat. While name calling the other side by some on both sides.

[SannaR]

I Feel like I got lumped into something I wasn't even apart of.....end of the day Ive come out of this today nothing but confused.
But, it sounds like that was the point. Me trying to understand it and make sense was all part of the game. What it accomplished...guess Ill never know.
GG I guess?....

It's how Iscah said it. Which is at least in my mind another way of just calling someone a white knight. I think I might have been partly to blame for Senti's Lyth stuff due to my mentioning of them being burnt out which comes from a thread in the lore section.

Speaking of Magnai she calls him the equivalent of a little boy/child in the other languages. So I'm not sure which comment would be worse. Also holy crap the tags.

[Theodric]

I'm indifferent to many of the Scions, at this point they mostly rub me the wrong way for the same reason that I came to tire of the likes of Anduin and Jaina back in World of Warcraft. Familiarity can easily breed contempt and especially when a consistent presence is coming at the expense of other characters who could step up and get involved.

That aside, as a gay guy who is attracted to masculine men I do find it rather troubling when I see people imply that asking for conventionally attractive, masculine men is somehow a bad or silly thing. Especially when many of the people asking for such have stated that they'd enjoy more variety in general for both player characters and NPC's alike. Furthermore they've even provided examples of what they'd like to see in relevant threads such as this one:

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...=1#post6026267

I also think it's a bit disingenuous to lump everyone who has issues with the Scions together as one big hive mind who always agree with one another on everything.

[AwesomeJr44]

I'm indifferent to many of the Scions, at this point they mostly rub me the wrong way for the same reason that I came to tire of the likes of Anduin and Jaina back in World of Warcraft. Familiarity can easily breed contempt and especially when a consistent presence is coming at the expense of other characters who could step up and get involved.

I haven't played WoW too much (I only tried it for like 2 weeks) so I don't understand the WoW references, but I agree with the part about the scions. Some of them are annoying, and some of them are just... there. I don't feel like any of them really have a particular goal right now other than Yshtola, and I have several other problems with that character.

That aside, as a gay guy who is attracted to masculine men I do find it rather troubling when I see people imply that asking for conventionally attractive, masculine men is somehow a bad or silly thing. Especially when many of the people asking for such have stated that they'd enjoy more variety in general for both player characters and NPC's alike.

I've mainly taken a stance of neutrality on the OP of this thread (and before anyone says otherwise, you can go back and see that I've made that clear multiple times), but I do agree that it's quite troubling that some would like to label such desires for conventionally attractive characters as 'troubling'. Personally, I'm into conventionally attractive women, and no disrespect to anyone who doesn't fall under this category, but if you're not conventionally attractive, I'm probably not going to find you appealing to look at. Now imagine if someone made a thread asking for more overweight characters and I came into the thread complaining that someone was asking for the type of character they liked. I don't think I'd get the same support.

[SannaR]

I'm indifferent to many of the Scions, at this point they mostly rub me the wrong way for the same reason that I came to tire of the likes of Anduin and Jaina back in World of Warcraft. Familiarity can easily breed contempt and especially when a consistent presence is coming at the expense of other characters who could step up and get involved.

That aside, as a gay guy who is attracted to masculine men I do find it rather troubling when I see people imply that asking for conventionally attractive, masculine men is somehow a bad or silly thing. Especially when many of the people asking for such have stated that they'd enjoy more variety in general for both player characters and NPC's alike. Furthermore they've even provided examples of what they'd like to see in relevant threads such as this one:

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...=1#post6026267

I also think it's a bit disingenuous to lump everyone who has issues with the Scions together as one big hive mind who always agree with one another on everything.

Asking for that is different than wanting or wishing a lot of the cast to be like that in order to like them. Or like them more. That and the way it gets worded by the OP tends to come off as a demand and not an ask. While also making some feel as though anything less then that or a difference in opinion is not acceptable or allowed. Especially when the basis at least this round of the debate if you can call it one starts from disliking a character we just got introduced to. It would be like saying you loathe Teddy Duchamp from Stand by Me from the first few seconds the character is on screen.

[Lunaxia]

On the subject of the Scions, does anyone else crave another situation like Heavensward where we just get dropped into the next expansion by ourselves and have to find our own bearings? I really miss that sense of uncertainty and adventure, and when they were pushing the "you're just an adventurer again" idea I rather hoped that's where they might be going. I enjoyed the presence of the Scions in Shadowbringers, but with Endwalker on top of that plus these latest patches after it was teased we'd be saying goodbye to them (did I imagine that?) I've got heavy character fatigue, as with the majority of our quests feeling like a school trip or that I'm packing an entourage with me wherever I go. I'm more than a little fed up of coming up against a new place or character or what have you and rather being able to acquaint myself with it, I have a Scion loudly shouting down my ear who or what they think it might be.

[Boblawblah]

On the subject of the Scions, does anyone else crave another situation like Heavensward where we just get dropped into the next expansion by ourselves and have to find our own bearings? I really miss that sense of uncertainty and adventure, and when they were pushing the "you're just an adventurer again" idea I rather hoped that's where they might be going. I enjoyed the presence of the Scions in Shadowbringers, but with Endwalker on top of that plus these latest patches after it was teased we'd be saying goodbye to them (did I imagine that?) I've got heavy character fatigue, as with the majority of our quests feeling like a school trip or that I'm packing an entourage with me wherever I go. I'm more than a little fed up of coming up against a new place or character or what have you and rather being able to acquaint myself with it, I have a Scion loudly shouting down my ear who or what they think it might be.

I loved the uncertainty of Heavensward, and slowly getting to know the Fortemps, and them becoming like family to the WoL. They've never quite hit the same feeling since then for me, although I love a lot of the story afterwards. fighting for Ishgard in the competition was such a great moment for me, I really felt like I had a home that wasn't just "go here weapon of light and kill".

[Brinne]

On the subject of the Scions, does anyone else crave another situation like Heavensward where we just get dropped into the next expansion by ourselves and have to find our own bearings? I really miss that sense of uncertainty and adventure, and when they were pushing the "you're just an adventurer again" idea I rather hoped that's where they might be going. I enjoyed the presence of the Scions in Shadowbringers, but with Endwalker on top of that plus these latest patches after it was teased we'd be saying goodbye to them (did I imagine that?) I've got heavy character fatigue, as with the majority of our quests feeling like a school trip or that I'm packing an entourage with me wherever I go. I'm more than a little fed up of coming up against a new place or character or what have you and rather being able to acquaint myself with it, I have a Scion loudly shouting down my ear who or what they think it might be.

Yeah, I feel you on that. Honestly, I generally enjoyed the 6.2 MSQ (Y'shtola aside), but one of the letdowns was definitely that, while I don't mind Zero - I don't have a strong opinion of her yet, beyond "we'll see where they go with her" and "I'm happy for the people who like her archetype" - I was super looking forward to Vrtra/Varshahn as a major "new face" in the party and then it felt like he barely got any focus, even though he was our entire reason for being there. You could just wholesale delete Y'shtola from the 6.2 MSQ and I think it'd only improve it, honestly...

[SannaR]

On the subject of the Scions, does anyone else crave another situation like Heavensward where we just get dropped into the next expansion by ourselves and have to find our own bearings? I really miss that sense of uncertainty and adventure, and when they were pushing the "you're just an adventurer again" idea I rather hoped that's where they might be going. I enjoyed the presence of the Scions in Shadowbringers, but with Endwalker on top of that plus these latest patches after it was teased we'd be saying goodbye to them (did I imagine that?) I've got heavy character fatigue, as with the majority of our quests feeling like a school trip or that I'm packing an entourage with me wherever I go. I'm more than a little fed up of coming up against a new place or character or what have you and rather being able to acquaint myself with it, I have a Scion loudly shouting down my ear who or what they think it might be.

The statement released to the public is that the band broke up. So that at least on the surface it looks as though they're not an organization. They're trying to go back into the shadows in order to try and let the leaders of the various countries handle stuff on their own. So we start 6.1 looking for adventure and get led to a guy who's got supposedly genuine map of this treasure map. Estinien buys it and we agree to go with. Now we did promise G'Raha one adventure so we go poke him. We also think about Y'Shtola as it's hinted that the mythical ruler might have stumbled onto how to travel the rift. And that's what we know she was researching about. Now I know why we get pointed towards Urianger but he is the only one I feel is shoehorned into our group. Where we also bump into Thancred who is doing whatever after not being able to locate some kind of past mentor. For me the 6.1 grouping makes sense and two of them peace out soon after the dungeon. Now could they have done it differently? Sure, but they didn't. And at least they seem to only be bringing in members when they need to. The only disappointment of 6.2 is that Urianger got used again to be the one who ends up giving our group a macguffin. At least we got him to stop it with the secrets/lies.

I feel part of the reason why Shotla come off as bland is due to her well being raised by Matoya since she was 7. That doesn't really teach a person how to pick up on some social ques. So she went and took a roll of be the cold observer who can be an exposition dumper when it would make sense for her to be the one doing so. We're just now getting to see her open up and pick up on some ques that her time in the First clued her in on.

[AwesomeJr44]

On the subject of the Scions, does anyone else crave another situation like Heavensward where we just get dropped into the next expansion by ourselves and have to find our own bearings? I really miss that sense of uncertainty and adventure, and when they were pushing the "you're just an adventurer again" idea I rather hoped that's where they might be going. I enjoyed the presence of the Scions in Shadowbringers, but with Endwalker on top of that plus these latest patches after it was teased we'd be saying goodbye to them (did I imagine that?) I've got heavy character fatigue, as with the majority of our quests feeling like a school trip or that I'm packing an entourage with me wherever I go. I'm more than a little fed up of coming up against a new place or character or what have you and rather being able to acquaint myself with it, I have a Scion loudly shouting down my ear who or what they think it might be.

I think that would vastly improve the direction of the game's story. We've been around the scions for too long now, and it's time to go on an adventure by ourselves, and meet some new friends.

Honestly, as much as I like the trust system, I feel that's it's almost limited what the writers can do with the story and its characters. 6.1 was supposed to be an adventure with Estinien, yet a bunch of other scions get dragged in because we need NPCs for the trust dungeon. I get why Yshtola needed to be there, but it really felt like we were dragging the scions back in just because we need a *insert role here* for the dungeon. It feels like the story is shackled to the requirement of needing the scions for trusts. Ktisis' trust NPCs were great, but that feels like the exception to the rule nowadays. Perhaps they could take a page out of the ARR trust system's book and have the trust dungeon NPCs be random people if it would fit the story better. About to go into a dungeon and don't have enough scions in the area? Perhaps some random unnamed NPCs that you've befriended and live in the area can show up and help out.

I feel the Trust system could benefit from some randomization going forward. Rather than the Scions (barring dungeons where it is narratively appropriate, of course) accompanying the WoL into battle, the roles could be filled by randomly generated NPCs. It would do a good job of giving that "I'm fighting alongside random adventurers" feel the game lost a long time ago. Couple this with decreased Scion presence in the story, and you've got a recipe for success.

^ This. This is exactly what I'd like to see.

I don’t know why they push Yshtola so much in game, the only thing I can imagine is because she might be popular in the Japanese community since they even made an overpriced doll of her instead of any others.

She's the official mascot for FFXIV in other FF games so the dev team probably has some level of favoritism towards her.