Lyse vs. Wuk Lamat

[Gortys]

Wuk is good, she seriously grow with the tasks ahead, Lyse seem more monotome.

But not so much ruining the game as people think, people just got issues with themself and wanting the game to be all about them, but hey, neither of you are developers on this project, it is not your game and that it is not like what you want it to be is much more a blessing than the world is going under during a cataclysm or something down those lines.

Play the game, most of you circus clowns spend more time on the fora, than at the game at all, or story skipped it all and now complain.

Except the critically acclaimed HW expansion wasn't all about us. It was about Aymeric and Ishgard.
I feel like some of the people who have played this game for a long time have amnesia or something in regards to ARR and then the StB and HW expansions. Those were not about the WoL - they were just good stories (ARR and StB debatable obviously).

I shouldn't have to tell you that NG+ exists. Please use it to see how a game can not have the WoL as the focus and still have a well written story and characters the player base can connect to.

[Voidmage]

I understand your frustration, and I agree that personal attacks are not acceptable. It's important to maintain a respectful tone in our discussions.

The comment you mentioned was indeed inappropriate, and defending it isn't my intention. I was trying to point out that sometimes people react harshly when they feel attacked or when the overall tone of the conversation is very negative. It's a reminder for all of us to be mindful of our words and strive for empathy, even when we disagree strongly.

You haven't personally attacked anyone, and I appreciate that. However, I do feel by singling that person out you were being dismissive of their feelings and humiliating them. My main point was about fostering a more civil environment for everyone involved. We can all benefit from taking a step back and considering how our words affect others. If being respectful is your true purpose surely you understand this.

Let's focus on discussing the content of the story and sharing our perspectives without resorting to personal attacks. By doing so, we can have a more productive and respectful conversation.

Lastly, be relieved I don't consider you my personal editor and will continue to speak freely.

Ask for continuing this quarrel I have no intention of doing so.

Ok then. It seems we are of the same mind then even though I don't agree on me sdismissing their feelings but I won't comment further on that.

[Zolvolt]

Lyse is a weird case. She was an incredibly different person the entire time we knew her until pappy left us. Then suddenly her personality is someone entirely different and this ally we had for so long is pushed to the realm of forgotten city-state leaders which undoubtedly hindered the character that Lyse would have become.

Wuk Lamat is different obviously. We had no pre-conceived notions of who she was besides the one EW patch. She stayed true to her character the entire way through the story. She learned to grow into her role as leader, and even learned to delegate appropriately, but she never goes against who she is. She's never written in a way where you would think "what wuk lamat wouldn't do that" or "wuk lamat wouldn't say that" She's pretty much the embodiment of Dynamis power. *queue gurenn lagann song*

I think some people just look at Wuk Lamat as supposed to being someone she's not and then getting bothered by that. She was a fine character.

[Vyrerus]

Genuine question here (because I have never played FFXI) but wasn't your character in that game always sidelined during story content?

No, it's a common misconception though.

FFXI has no voice acting, so you have to read every single piece of dialogue. Then there's a bit of an issue with its translation in some spots, though it's not ridiculously bad or anything. That, coupled with the game itself being very hard and also very tedious was not a good setup for people to pay attention to the storylines.

Couple that with the storylines themselves when current being released piece meal in small or large chunks, whenever the scenario writers/cutscene devs actually finished them. It wasn't so bad of a wait for Rise of the Zilart or Chains of Promathia. Those were either released complete or finished completely shortly after release, long before players got to their current end point.

Later expansions would see heavy delays, sometimes upwards of a few years (looking at you, Wings of The Goddess). So it was not uncommon for new story to come out, and people to completely forget what was happening within FFXI's narratives, leading a lot of people to just develop head cannon that wasn't even true over the years, and confuse themselves horribly when talking about the stories and their characters.

Each expansion features a female deuteragonist that goes on the journey parallel or alongside the adventurer. The first one is Lion, who shows up in the nation missions, and then features in parts of Rise of the Zilart. Rise of the Zilart is very barebones as far as cutscenes go, though it shows and exposits why the setting is the way it is, and sets up why you have to stop the Zilartian Princes. When Lion shows up in cutscenes, she is either getting her ass whooped or imploring you to continue on (and she saves you once at the very start of RoTZ). She kind of gets sidelined by Gilgamesh, her father, trying to keep her safe. In the end she makes a sacrifice play to stop the reactivation of The Crystal Line, and she seemingly dies. The Adventurer is left then with Zeid and Aldo, and they each go their separate ways.

Chains of Promathia features and ensemble cast with Prishe being a heavy focus, because she is supposedly, "The Keeper of The Apocalypse." Which is a person who the God, Promathia, will manifest from and destroy the world. This turns out to have been prevented by her undergoing the Baptismal Ceremony with a Zilartian device that crystallized her Emptiness and made her functionally immortal around the age of 16, though her actual age is roughly in her 40s (she is often said to be a loli, but due to being Elvaan is roughly 6 feet tall and never seemed child like to me but I digress. They stand her by the much taller Ulmia who is a full grown Elvaan to make Prishe look short). She's a major player in a lot of Chains of Promathia cutscenes, but she isn't even present in its first 2 chapters until the end of Chapter 2. There are later chapters where the ensemble gets the focus, and it is only the adventurer who is in every scene of the story, even if it's the NPCs doing all of the dialogue (except a few player ones, chiefly the one that drives Bahamut into a furious rage). By the end of the story, the adventurer is the only other mortal aside from Prishe and Selh'teus who can resist Promathia, and the final battle is the first time one of the lady deuteragonists fights alongside the player directly in the battle.

Treasures of Aht Urhgan introduces its deuteragonist about 20 parts in. Her name is Aphmau, and she turns out to be the Empress. The adventurer becomes her bodyguard, and gets called on by name directly from the palace at least half a dozen times to go out and do a task related to the story. She is eventually kidnapped by the Ephramadian Prince, Luzaf, and spirited away to his ship, The Black Coffin. This puts her on the damsel in distress trope, though she actually just winds up bonding with Luzaf heavily upon hearing the dire fate of Ephramad. Once the adventurer has saved her, the Grand Vizier springs his trap to take The Adventurer in, as the Adventurer has been working as a double agent for the Middle Lands the entire time. So Aphmau is there and important, but again, it is only the adventurer featuring in every scene, and they are the lynchpin of the operation to stop the Grand Vizier.

Wings of the Goddess introduces its deuteragonist a lot more quickly than storylines prior, within the first few missions, and she goes along and directs you the entire time. She's a spunky cute half Elvaan Dancer named Lilisette. Together her and The Adventurer wind up being The Wings of the Goddess. Towards the latter half of the story, she is unmade through Atomos starting to consume her timeline, when she believes the past and her parents future have been unmade, thus unmaking her by way of temporal paradox, and it's up to The Adventurer to gather motes of memories of her and return her to existence. She fights alongside you in the final fight against Lilith, but then is also snatched up and fused into Lilith's being to make Lilith Transcendent, and becomes part of the final boss.

Seekers of Adoulin features the deuteragonist Arciela, Princess of Adoulin, and she is introduced in the intro cutscene the first time you travel to Ulbuka. She is nearly omnipresent in the story, and is far more central and important than prior deuteragonists to every leg of the story, but The Adventurer is the backbone of her advancement into the jungle, and eventually is the last of the pair to lose the ability to speak to her brother turned Leafkin through Rosulatia's Pome. She has the Otharsyne, which is a blade that marks her as King August's descendant, and he mastered the denizens of the jungle to a degree where they respect even just his lineage. This allows her to make way for The Adventurer to meet Sajj'akka, a holy dragon who fought with August against the forces of Hades and Tartarus a hundred years prior. She has her soul sucked out by the Inquisitors at one point, and it's up to The Adventurer to save her. She spends many quests off screen studying Ulbukan lore to try and find out what we need to do to face the Serpentine Labyrinth. There's a lot of dialogue options that let you be pervy towards her or respectful, and there's a hidden "friendship" meter that changes how she reacts to The Adventurer slightly throughout the story. The more pervy options you pick, the more consternated she will be, the more respectful the more tender she will be. THey don't impact the narrative, though.

In Rhapsodies of Vana'diel they introduced Iroha, who is the child of a couple of characters from Chains of Promathia, sent back in time from the future to help you become the hero who mentored her in that future. She calls you master at every turn (which makes me feel weird. I went to a maid cafe once and it was like that except even weirder), and is deeply honorific and servile towards you. She's present often, but also dies often due to temporal paradox, but is brought back again and again by Phoenix. She fights with you against The Cloud of Darkness in the end.

The Voracious Resurgence introduces the Gloom Phantom, whose name you later find out is Goblin coded for Goblin female. While she may not be a stunner, this qualifies Gloom Phantom to be the lady deuteragonist for TVR. You fight her several times before ascertaining the truth behind The World Eater Eggs. Then you team up. She's almost more of a comic relief.

[Cerbolt]

The biggest difference between Lyse and Wuk Lamat is that Lyse wasn't glued to your side 24/7 so even if you didn't like her you at least got some breathing room. Whereas Wuk Lamat was always there, you never got a break from her. So if you don't like her you are screwed.

[MoofiaBossVal]

Arciela

At least you could slap her when she was being hysterical. Meanwhile, I have to just stand behind Wuk Lamat while she is moping on the beach and her people need their leader to taking action.

[ForteNightshade]

The thing that stands out to me about the difference between the two is that when Lyse is stupid, it leads to consequences for her being stupid, and no matter how much she talks about "freedom and liberation" just saying those words do not really change the situation.

When Wuk is stupid, its just a funny slapstick moment, and otherwise she's written as a near-untouchable writer's insert. She can go on and on about how much she loves her "papa and peace", and everyone is just in awe of her. She's never truly challenged, not outside of the Saturday morning cartoon villian that is part 1 Bakool anyway and its not like that amounts to anything. We don't even get to see her paired up with Zaraal or Bakool in the Team Good Guys vs Team Bad Guys cooking competition. The contest she brought us over resulted in two of the contestants forfeiting, to support her. And the last one just kinda left.

Lyse is incredibly more nuanced while Wuk is a flat line.

I've long argued Lyse suffers from the story being told around her. She's blindly idealistic and the narrative is guilty of supporting her stance when it should really take a more neutered perspective. You see this more in the second half of Ala Mhigo. They also didn't setup her leadership ascension well whatsoever when Raubahn is widely the superior candidate based on the narrative we're given. I know it's a typical Japanese trope the young upstart is made leader over the "old" veteran but it really didn't work. That being said, Lyse, herself, is a perfectly fine character. More importantly despite the occasional favoritism, she repeatedly fails. Heck, if it wasn't for us stepping in Fordola had her dead to rights and Zenos would have killed before the plot even kicked off if Y'shtola hadn't jumped in. 4.1 has her made an incredibly naive decision, which I don't think from a writing perspective seeing it feels like she forgot tempered beings can't be reasoned with but at least the narrative doesn't hold back calling out how dumb the decision was.

Contrast all of this with Wuk Lamat and it's a night and day difference. She literally never fails once the entire expansion. Her moments of insecurity don't feel like genuine attempts at character building but rather tossed in to portray a very surface level of "weakness" in an otherwise nearly perfect character. It doesn't help she keeps bringing them up again and again. All while everyone tells her how incredible she is. It's noticeable how much more the Scions fawn all over Wuk compared to Lyse despite the latter being a friend and colleague for much longer.

I don't understand the hyper focus on Wuk Lamat. Whether it's Koana, Zoraal Ja, Bakool Ja Ja, Ketenramm, I can't even remember Erenville's mom's name, etc. You're talking about all the same things. And the few times they do come up against challenges or have development, it's so ham fisted and cliche.

This fanbase has a weird obsession with criticizing female characters and comparing female characters.

Bakool Ja Ja gets away with releasing a deadly beast...we turn off the Endless just because Erenville's mom wants to and thinks it might help defeat Sphene (it doesn't and who would even think that?)...Zoraal Ja gets disqualified but just goes into a room and steals and artifact...dawntrail just sucks guys, I'm sorry.

This is just silly rage bait nonsense. Lyse and Wuk Lamat are two divisive characters who lead their respective expansions. Of course they're going to be compared against one another whether fairly or unfairly. It has nothing whatsoever to do with them being female. The "hyper focus" on Wuk Lamat is because she's front and center for nearly the entire story. She has more spoken lines than every character you listed combined. Naturally, she's going to be the focal point of criticism. That tends to happen in any medium where you prop a single character up as the "lead", and said character is poorly received.

With that said, I'd argue Koana is the only character you've listed that is largely consistent from beginning to end. In fact, I'd argue the story would be significantly better if told from his perspective. We actively see growth and change from his "technology and advancement above all else" to "accepting and embracing culture alongside those advancements."

[Maxilor]

Remember that episode of The Simpsons where Principle Skinner admits to being a fraud and is actually a guy named Armin Tamzarian who assumed Seymour Skinner's identity because he didn't want to tell his mother that he died, ruining this legacy character that we all knew and loved since the beginning?

Yeah, that's Lyse. And then at the end of Stormblood she goes:



Wuk Lamat just seems to be a cat who tries to be Monkey D Luffy but acts more like Naruto.

[Raven2014]

The main difference about Lyse is she never wanted to lead or rule in the first place. She only became a reluctant leader at the beginning of SB because there was no other option. The resistances were fractured and distrust of outsider, the only way to reunite them is using her family name, which is weight second only to the royal family. Unlike Wuk, I don't think Lyse ever think she were ready or deserved it, she did it because it was the only way. That's why as soon as someone more qualified become available she immediately defer. In the end she was the one who advocated to abolish the monarchy system, yield all military matter to Raubahn, and often call herself as a simple messenger for her people. Wuk on the hand is overwhelmed with self-righteousness and suffer from a severe case of main character syndrome.

[Somnolence]

Except the critically acclaimed HW expansion wasn't all about us. It was about Aymeric and Ishgard.

And yet, in HW the antagonists we face were beyond Aymeric and Ishguard - Ascians, Primals (Remember post-Thordan "Who are you?" line from the elf pope?) and Great Wyrm himself.

In ShB its the same. Zenos couldn't care less about Lyse and Ala Mhigo resitance, only we can fight him and Shinryu.

WoL takes center stage as a hero in all expansions but DT where are the sidekick and primary credit goes to Wuk Lamat.