YoshiP “Torn" Over What to do with the Scions (Interview)

[MsQi]

They need to stop trying to force us (our WoL) to feel a certain way about people. We should get to create our own team.

[BakoolJaJa]

All the recent interviews are so tone deaf. All of them. Every single one. It actually makes me worried.

Somehow literally none of the feedback from the past years has been understood it seems. None of the current feedback is understood. "Wuk Lamat is not confident enough" is NOT the takeaway! "Seems like players can't manage a second with the entire cast of scions breathing down their necks" is NOT the takeaway! "7.0 was a testing ground for character arks, and uhh, idk, players not happy for some reason" when Krile/Erenville get 5 minutes of screen time is NOT the takeaway!

This is all the same crap as the viper changes. "We're listening to feedback." What feedback? Where? Literally nobody is giving you this feedback, not in a single country, language, social media, etc.

I really hope they manage to get back on track somehow and start monitoring feedback properly. My copium for 8.0 improvements is starting to run out, I feel like they'll do something even more stupid next expac. Like idk, send the WoL and only Wuk Lamat to Meracydia, act like "look, you didn't want scions and we were playing with the idea of sending WoL alone, but that would be too much, so here! Enjoy! Also she's more confident now! And all the cool shit we put into side quests, the MSQ is literally just talking and fetching stuff for Wuk Lamat!"

[Raven2014]

I highly recommend YoshiP to go play Trails of series if he's struggling with handling old characters. The trails series at this point has dozens of games that spans over a decade, so it has accumulate a massive roster of characters. And while you can debate certain aspect of the story just like everything, its handle of old characters is always good. The series regular introduce new cast and put the focus on them, but it also regularly rotate in the old cast. And the way it does it, each time it feels like a love letter to old fans and it makes me feel good about their appearance.

Funny enough, there is someone among the Scion that I think has always be handled in similar way to the Trails game, and that's Estinien. He's not constantly at our hip or on a speed dial with us, but each time I run into him I giddily with excitement. Remembering back to ShB we haven't seen him in a while, then suddenly after a long absence we saw him breaking into the Garlemald base with Gaius and that was so cool. It's the only instance in the entire game that I didn't mind playing an NPC.

[Zaniel]

I'm for a slow approach, ease them out but hold them in the wings for very brief and only directly appropriate cameos.

The other issue is who has finished their personal story?
- Thancred: has come home completely, the only outstanding matter is his being able to reunite with Ryne, that is it, his personality and story are complete. He's become the father of his lost love's "daughter", it doesn't get more complete than that.
- Estinien: his role as opposite and compliment to the dragons has come full circle, he's at peace, comfortable with his life and happy to just relax in the sunset. His home country has overcome its problems and he's overcome his anger and needs.
- Urianger: Not quite complete but he's never really had a personal journey other than the pain of Moenbryda. That's resolved and he's found a home helping the Loporitts.
- G'raha: Mixed bag, obviously his main story is complete in a pretty total and final fashion but he still has some story to tell as his younger self, in many ways he's a better "narrator" than Alphinaud because he's even older and wiser. I'd keep him around not because he needs to develop but because he's the valuable sage to provide counsel. Doesn't need to be omni-present.
- Krile: Obviously a long way to go story-wise: keep.
- Y'Shtola: Probably the Scion who most needs to go, she's become a weird deus ex machina who gets trundled to solve magic problems and her personality is dying. She's the Scion who is most suffering as a character by being held onto. Just have her pop back in once she solves dimensional travel then she can retire on the Source.
- Alphinaud: Has become his father and grandfather in one, he's come home after exile, his great goal of ending the continental wars has essentially been realised and his story is far better served in the halls of power as a "young Fourchenalt" than out on the field. Check in with him as we need in various capitals but not as a companion.
- Alisaie: Probably the last original Scion who hasn't finished growing, she still puppy-dog's the WoL a little instead of becoming her own self (in spite of her major accomplishments). She needs a final run to become a complete person.

[BabyYoda]

No expansion will be as good as ShB until there is change in narrative design.. change scions.. change formula of storytelling

[AnnRam]

The whole cast were completely useless 90% of the time at DT.

But in terms of what companion should be removed ASAP is Eren I mean why in the world you put this guy as your side kick when he can't fight, doesn't bring any useful information and only stands there just like WOL.

[Raven2014]

Somehow literally none of the feedback from the past years has been understood it seems. None of the current feedback is understood. "Wuk Lamat is not confident enough" is NOT the takeaway! "Seems like players can't manage a second with the entire cast of scions breathing down their necks" is NOT the takeaway! "7.0 was a testing ground for character arks, and uhh, idk, players not happy for some reason" when Krile/Erenville get 5 minutes of screen time is NOT the takeaway!

This maybe copium talk but I honestly don't think Yoshi is that stupid, and the backlash is strong enough that he had probably at least went through it himself. There is an old saying "sometime you learn more by observing what people don't do, rather than what they do". His responses to the MSQ doesn't sound honest and more like deflection, so the question is ... why? If he doesn't think the issue is serious, he would address it directly. The fact he's trying to deflect make me think he does know how bad it is. One of the thing Yoshi is known for is that he's fairly protective of his staffs as far as public relation goes. I forgot under what circumstance it happened but in the past he had called for players to stop being viced and harass his staffs because they're human too. IMO he's choosing a diplomatic approach and make it sounds like a collective failure rather than throwing the currents writers under the bus.

I doubt Yoshi is the only one reviewing the situation, the feedback is strong enough that it's probably an all hand on deck situation that included the previous senior writers. And if you notice that in their own interview about the issue, they too pretty much tried to dance around the issue as well.

[Voidmage]

I'll be blunt.
All the interviews with Yoshida right now read as damage control in my eyes.
I want to have faith but I can't completely believe that they planned all this to "see how the players would react".

Anyway on topic:
I think the devs are more afraid of leaving the scions behind than the players. Yes there will be voices over them not being in the expansion but I only see two fractions of that tbh.
G'Raha Tia had enough adventures with us for a while now, no matter what his hardcore fangirls think but tbh he is the one I'd have the least problems with (if they keep his crushing on the WoL in check).

The twins are just annoying at this point.
Alphinaud is complete with his character ark and Alisaie is just obnoxious now and only has her sass as a personality trait all centered on us.

Thancred, Urianger, Y'sthola could use a little break and Estinien has no idea what he wants to be now.

Krile is barely a scion and needs far more time to be fleshed out.

Let them take a break (minus Krile) or only have one or two of them with us and give us new characters for an expansion.
The idea of Wuk Lamat was good but horribly used.
The WoL and Krile should have had her, Koana, Bakool JaJa and Zoarl Ja in a team, rotating and interacting with each other.
Later Otis and Sphene would have also joined and done... a good team that had made the betrayal and all the stuff far more meaningful.

Tldr:
Scions need a break,
new characters can work if they actually interact with the WoL (like the scions in the past),
Devs are the ones afraid of leaving the scions behind and not the players.

And yes, I am someone who likes the scions and who has Thancred as one of his favourites.

[Infindox]

I think how Estenien is portrayed in DT is how it should be with most of them: they are still there in the background, working on their own goals or just adventuring, and showing up when needed. The twins had a good reason for coming along this time, and G'raha literally was there just because of all the Alligan parallels with Alexandria 's use of beast souls. (And while people like to think the gondola scene was a "date scene", it was an interesting thought from him about if he went about things the same way Sphene did. Also no, Twitter, that scene wouldn't have worked with anyone else.) And of course Krile was there because it was her time to (though she didnt get enough imo). Otherwise that whole plot with Thancred and Urianger was pointless, and I felt that Y'shtola didn't even need to come to begin with.

[Khryseis_Astra]

People will only complain if you don\\\\'t give us a good enough REASON for their absense. If I feel the only reason a character isn\\\\'t included in the story is because the writer didn\\\\'t want them there, then I\\\\'d be upset (like I was in Dawntrail). If I feel like "ok, that makes sense, and we will meet them again and see how that went afterwards", and then we get to see the result of their work at a later time, then it\\\\'s satisfying.

I love the Scions. I don’t want an expansion where they don’t show up at all. But yes, I want a reason for their presence and/or absence. I want them to feel like an active part of the story. While I enjoyed the MSQ, I did feel like most of the Scions, and at times even my own character, were just tagging along.

For DT, it was fine that the twins went… but even though they had a few speaking parts here and there, they didn’t really feel like themselves. Krile should definitely have had more spotlight… half the important reveals in her story were done offscreen! And we should have had more conversation with Erenville during his arc… I know we’re not quite besties at this point, but he got a pretty heavy emotional bomb dropped on him, and I know my WoL would’ve wanted to at least try to console him and talk about it!

As for the others, I see a lot of missed opportunities. We should’ve had at least one fun friendly sparring match with Thancred & Urianger as a solo duty type thing. Other than that, they had a reason for being there, and were actually relevant to Koana’s story. Graha was okay, and in particular, the gondola scene was great, but they could’ve given him more in the lead up to LM. Y’shtola I feel will have more of a role in the patches, as we (hopefully!) research the key and see what it can do, but didn’t seem like she was utilized as well as she could be where she appeared.

I wrote this in another thread, but I would also like NPCs in general, but big ones like the Scions in particular, to be more interactive outside of the MSQ. Some of the examples I used were “mini-quests” like dropping in on Y’shtola for a cup of tea and chat about the latest (plot relevant) book she found in the restricted section, or go bar-hopping with Thancred, or stargazing with Urianger? Teach Alphinaud to swim? Have a sparring match with Alisae? Learn to paint with Krile? And most of those could have been done in Tural too. We could’ve went back to that taco stand with Graha and finally gotten our taco!

But it would be nice if we could get more than a one-line response from the big NPCs after the MSQ has concluded, like actually spend some time with them. It would also be a way they could still be included during storylines that don’t really have a major plot point for them, so the people that dislike them don’t feel like they’re being shoehorned in, but those who enjoy them don’t feel like they’ve been left out.