Dawntrail Predictions

[kaynide]

The broad strokes of this prediction I'd have called pretty safe, but kaynide was right about the turn being at level 95 exactly, and that's impressive.

To be fair, almost every expansion to date has been kinda this way in -some- way.

That is to say, other than Stormblood, we typically get something that we couldn't have guessed before the expac launched at around X5 level.

-Heavansward Around 55 is where we "defeat" Nidhogg and the narrative shifts back to Ascians and the pope.
-Stormblood is a wildcard, they were still figuring it out I guess.
-Shadowbringers is when Emet joins the party more...formally? And reveals the whole Hyd/Zod are primals bit.
-Endwalker we saw Elpis

It was a guess, but it's also pretty formulaic by now to reveal -something- new story-wise by X5.

[fulminating]

I don’t really know how visible named characters have to be to count. I think endwalker base probably beats dt, shb might too.

Arr: the waking sands guys including lettuce and amnesiacs, dolorous bear’s team and edda’s fiancé, namingway the spy [~11]
Hw: ysael, haruchfant, lahabrea, iggy, thordan, a dozen knights but they don’t really count. [5-17]
Sb: old resistance man, Zenos, namedayboy, papalymo just missed out by a hair, the guy Zenos or fordola killed from arr [~4]
Shb: tesleen, vauthry, hades, ardbert and his friends. Also alphinaud, alise and the player character in the calamity timeline [8-11+]
Ew: king man, hermes, zenos, fandaniel, hydaelyn, zodiark/elidibus, quintus, (Elvis and the contacted civilisations if they count too) [7+]
Dt: 57 year old nurse, gajaja, zaja, untrustworthy vizier, erenville ‘s mother, (all the npcs in living memory), the head of reason can count separately. [6+]

[Cleretic]

I don’t really know how visible named characters have to be to count. I think endwalker base probably beats dt, shb might too.

Arr: the waking sands guys including lettuce and amnesiacs, dolorous bear’s team and edda’s fiancé, namingway the spy [~11]
Hw: ysael, haruchfant, lahabrea, iggy, thordan, a dozen knights but they don’t really count. [5-17]
Sb: old resistance man, Zenos, namedayboy, papalymo just missed out by a hair, the guy Zenos or fordola killed from arr [~4]
Shb: tesleen, vauthry, hades, ardbert and his friends. Also alphinaud, alise and the player character in the calamity timeline [8-11+]
Ew: king man, hermes, zenos, fandaniel, hydaelyn, zodiark/elidibus, quintus, (Elvis and the contacted civilisations if they count too) [7+]
Dt: 57 year old nurse, gajaja, zaja, untrustworthy vizier, erenville ‘s mother, (all the npcs in living memory), the head of reason can count separately. [6+]

My metric is specifically 'on-screen death, or confirmation of death, of a named character with on-screen characterization, that is not reversed somehow'. Basically, someone that your average player could at least plausibly recognize, remember and describe. There's some iffy ones, but I lean towards allowing the weird edge cases. And specifically looking at the MSQ, which I'll concede does shrink ShB and EW's counts.

That counting basically leaves Dawntrail with Namikka, both Gulool Ja Ja's heads (I agree on counting them separately), Sareel Ja, Zoraal Ja, Otis, Cahciua, Sphene, and I'd personally count Krile's parents but I recognize that's an odd edge case. That's ten by my count before we get to patches.

Thanks for lining up the others, so I can say that I'd personally put EW at six (I do count Hermes and Amon-Fandaniel separately, but I don't count Elidibus), ShB at four (I would count Ardbert, I wouldn't count the rest of his crew if only talking MSQ), StB at a surprisingly low four (five if we stretch to allow Yotsuyu), and HW at a... kind of indeterminate amount, depending entirely on how many of the Heaven's Ward we decide crossed the threshold of 'is an actual character'; personally I'd go for four (the three Vault bosses, and the guy in the courtroom), bringing that expansion to a pretty competitive nine, but I admit that feels generous. I'd really have to replay ARR to get my count for that.

I admit I lean towards the generous count for every expansion, and DT has a few edge cases not everyone else would count, but I feel like it's unarguably pretty high up there.