What kind of villain do you want to see in the game?

[Keumjo]

During my annual re-watching of Gravity Falls, it reminded me of how much I love Bill as a villain. He's cunning, chaotic, self-centered, and arrogant. A love to hate/hate to love type.

We've had an assortment of villains in FFXIV, but what would your perfect villain be? What kind of villain is most compelling for how you see your WoL?

Feel free to dive into it, I'd love to read your interpretations of your WoL and their best possible antagonist.

[BokoToloko]

i think I've had enough of sad backgroun/misunderstood villain. I want to be back to one we can simply love to despise (and that we can actually make them eat dirt *stares at Teledji, Yuyuhase, Asahi and Ilberd*).

Or a completely deluded and off their rocker villain.

Or a villain that mixes both.

[Andevom]

No more villains that look like teenagers.

I would honestly prefer a villain like Lavos - just a force of destruction that can't be reasoned with.

[Shinku_Tachi]

A villain that is evil for the sake of being evil because they enjoy being evil and revel in doing bad thing.

We kinda have an overload of sympathetic / misunderstood / actually they weren't all bad type villains across all media.

[Exmo]

A villain who was previously an ally.

I was hoping Wuk Lamat was going to have that trajectory where she realizes what's best for her people puts us in direct opposition to her. This would be a way to develop her character in an interesting direction while offering depth that's compatible with the simplicity of her stated motivations. It would work best if she were to not be made to commit atrocities and was not mistaken or mislead in her policies, so as to avoid easy invalidation of her methods/goals.

Doesn't look like that will be the case, sadly.

[Grimforth]

i think I've had enough of sad backgroun/misunderstood villain. I want to be back to one we can simply love to despise (and that we can actually make them eat dirt *stares at Teledji, Yuyuhase, Asahi and Ilberd*).

Or a completely deluded and off their rocker villain.

Or a villain that mixes both.

It's funny you say that because even if the devs did that some fans would still think they are misunderstood, especially if they make the main villain very attractive looking.

Sephiroth is a prime example of a deluded off their rocker villain, but fans still want to get in his pants because he's very attractive looking.

[Grimforth]

A villain that is evil for the sake of being evil because they enjoy being evil and revel in doing bad thing.

In other words someone like Kefka.

[All_Nonsense]

Personally I'd like it if they brought back the Ascians after attempting to replicate Shadowbringers and failing. I think that would be the best way for the devs to show that they're not out of touch and actually care about how the players perceive their "story as a selling point" game. Trying new things is risky and we have bottom lines to pad after all. More ascians please, that'll save the story

[Alice_Rivers]

I want another villain like Emet-Selch who actually has a valid reason for being a villain, doesn't necessarily have to be evil even, I'm bored of villains who are evil for the sake of it - nothing made me more apathetic about characters like Asahi, Zenos or Zoraal Ja than those times when they were evil for the sake of being evil. I know the idea in the writer's heads is "if we make them do really evil things then the players will feel more invested in bringing them down" but it just does the opposite to me. I suppose our most recent villain fits that mould but he never had the time to be fleshed out and get any depth before his arc ended and he was superseded by our new big bad, maybe if they had laid hints that he existed in the latter parts of 7.0, and built up to a reveal in 7.2, we could have had his arc end in 7.5 and the big bad show up ready for 8.0 and on. That might have allowed him to be a better character, also if his ego weren't bigger than his intellect, that might have helped too.

Emet in my mind was a good villain because we knew he was our enemy from the get-go and he never pretended otherwise but he didn't just go around committing wanton acts of evil either, he'd even entertain us now and then while we learned why he did what he did.

[Catwho]

Thinking about my fav villains from FF:

- Villains like Seymour from X. Think's he sexy, but actually slimy and gross and undead. Pretends to be your friend. (Actually, Zenos had a lot of those traits, but with an extra layer of stalker vibes and ennui as his motivation.) Dr. Evil also fits this trope.
- Inhuman cosmic horrors like Jenova from 7 or the Starscourge from XV. Maybe even [spoiler] from XVI. You can't reason with a virus.