Koana will save the hhetso

[glassflower]

Is he, though? Is anyone in Dawntrail?
I dare anyone to point out one moment where we actually SEE him being smart. Not solving things off-screen and hearing about it later, not suddenly turning up with a solution to a problem from somewhere, not characters saying "Koana is smart". Actually doing or saying something that shows us he is smart.

Or better yet, try to do the same with any supposedly smart character in Dawntrail.

For 'anyone', I'll raise you Erenville. His emotional intelligence toward animals as well as knowing their habits and patterns is undeniably a mark of his intelligence that we see repeatedly throughout 7.0 and the patch. As for Koana, I can agree that we don't see his moments on screen, though I'd venture he's pretty intelligent just by, I dunno, the whole fact we're meant to give suspension of disbelief to the fact that he's able to use the abilities we see in the instance.

[chizLemons]

For 'anyone', I'll raise you Erenville. His emotional intelligence toward animals as well as knowing their habits and patterns is undeniably a mark of his intelligence that we see repeatedly throughout 7.0 and the patch. As for Koana, I can agree that we don't see his moments on screen, though I'd venture he's pretty intelligent just by, I dunno, the whole fact we're meant to give suspension of disbelief to the fact that he's able to use the abilities we see in the instance.

Fair point about Erenville, I remember that one quest. Not in detail, but fair, it counts. Erenville was honestly one of the better written characters in the expansion. Most of my problems around him are actually how everyone else acts about him instead of his own actions. Though I do remember a few out of character moments, but anyway.

For Koana and everyone else though...no, I'm sorry, but I don't buy the "suspension of disbelief", or am I supposed to suspend disbelief about everyone and everything, whenever anyone acts weird or out of character? That'd be a lot.

I've been bothered ever since EW patches that any "smart" character just...never acted smart on screen, ever again. During the Zero arc, Y'sthola solves everything off-screen and then comes up with the solution at the start of the patch and makes us follow her. This happens over and over again through 7.0. Koana "protected" Tullyolal from the attack, but we don't ever see him doing anything. He is supposedly knowledgable and built a ton of stuff, but whenever he was on screen, he was either fanboying Sharlayan or his sister. She kept repeating over and over about how he was her smart brother...but I never see it.

And now, he is supposedly the HEAD OF REASON and a leader, and suddenly he is ready to throw his life away for one single animal he only got to know in the last few hours or so? How is that smart? Wouldn't a smart leader of a nation be able to put his emotions in check and think of a better way to deal with the situation?

[glassflower]

snip

I dislike Y'shtola as well and audibly groaned when I found out that we would be having to spend a 'significant amount of time with her' this patch. I do think they should expand more on how these characters are actually solving these problems and don't like that they are off-screened, for whatever reason that might be. We also have to look at like, the interaction here though -- he's her older brother, and he studied in Sharlayan, a naive Wuk Lamat is going to praise her doting older brother as smart.

I can see where you're coming from in regards to him being able to reel in his emotion -- but it's not inconsistent with his character. He's originally presented as calm, detached and reasonable, but we learn very quickly that this is not all that there is to him. Underneath of that mask, he is hot-headed and passionate, especially when it comes to protecting others that he cares about. I think it's pretty disingenuous to be like 'he was going to throw his life away for some cows', even though, yeah, it was honestly a pretty dramatic act. But given that he likely blames himself for his father's death, plus his newfound duty as Vow... He's just connected with a culture that he knows is his own, but one he has an utter disconnect with. He realizes that these people treat these animals as beings part of their community instead of 'just animals', and realizes that, for the Hhetsarro, this is no different than if their beloved sister were harmed.

It's also worth noting that the... yes, relatively shonen-esque way that he speaks in Japanese does say something different than the English. Instead of saying, "I will say the hhetso!", Koana says "皆を護ってみせる……！", essentially, "I will save everyone!" Now, since I didn't read the entire thing for context, he could be referring to all hhetso, but it's also very possible he is talking about a collective everyone under his rule here. I think given that, it's easier to contextualize his feelings in that moment and see the full picture more clearly. And perhaps someone will take notice that Koana does do reckless things when he's faced with someone or something precious to him being harmed -- it could be another point of growth to learn to control that. We've seen G'raha do much the same in the past, albeit he had much more time as a ruler, perhaps he was similar when he began? I would love to see Koana and G'raha interact and see what growth they can lend each other.

[Hypnotic13371337]

If not for the thiccest coat of plot armor that only gave him cracked glasses, we would've had the singular Dawnservant once again. He may be smart and a machnist, but getting hit by such creature at such speed should incapacitate a person real good, if not killing them outright.

His gun diddn't even get bent from a hit that sent him flying lmao

[Daralii]

His gun diddn't even get bent from a hit that sent him flying lmao

Please understand, modeling a bent version of his gun would take artist time that could be used on Unnamed CS3 Project 4.

[Xelanar]

Ah yes. The moment we're supposed to feel sympathy for his heroic act of rescuing a random animal.
Let's hope he'll never encounter an adventuring party doing FATEs I guess.

[Valence]

One of the cringest moments of the whole msq so far. We've gone full shounen now, and not the good kind either.

[Duskleaf]

I can't shake the feeling this scene was originally planned for Wuk. But who's to say.

[CNitsah]

I can't shake the feeling this scene was originally planned for Wuk. But who's to say.

I had the same feeling. There was 2 points in the msq where I felt they brought change because of the feedback. This one and the "go alone to the outskirts", which I feel was supposed to be a "go with Wuk Lamat".

But this is a good example that the problem never has been Wuk Lamat, but the writing. If apply that writing to another character, it will be as bad. Once again, I fear that SE didn't get the right things from the complaints (but to be fair, the feedback from players focusing mostly on Wuk Lamat didn't help). I hope this is due to 7.1 being already too far in the production pipeline to massively change it, and not the answer to the feedback.

[glassflower]

Wow! Thank you for pointing this out, I didn't even draw a link between Koana not being able to save his father and feeling eternally guilty for it and paying it forward to save this animal he'd only just bonded with. I think he doubly earned his moment and we'll see him push forth in protecting whatever he's able to, now.