I don’t think trusts as a feature is bad, I think the problem is the trust system enforces weird story decisions to have certain people available at any random time to fill needs

As pointed out above half the scions should not have been able to access the 99 trial as they did, graha being in living memory was a flimsy excuse simply so he could be there for the 100 dungeon (honestly graha’s entire “randomly shows up after making a scene of staying behind” feels like a way to bring back an all rounder so Alphinaud wouldn’t always have to be around to be the healer). Alphinaud and alisaie also feel like their entire purpose in the story was being trust fodder

About the only time the trust system felt organic was everyone putting the right of succession on hold for vali but vali already had other problems around his non existent build up

So yeah trusts are fine, weird story decisions to enforce comps for trusts is not good