discussion [SPOILERS] Stormblood MSQ + Story

[Edda]

- Lyse - Okay, I see where they wanted to go with her. At first she's young, stubborn and due to the defeat in Rhalgr's Reach, she goes on a journey to Othard in order to do soul-searching and help an old friend. And for a while, she actually -does- learn some stuff. However, what she is missing is a 'mentor' character. It would be sappy as hell but I think it would have been better if Hien and Lyse got closer and that Hien would learn Lyse about 'restraint'. When we return back in Gyr Albania, it's as if all the things Lyse learned while being in Othard are gone again and she acts once more like a spoiled child. I really felt we were watching another Cirilla from The Witcher series: Always thinks she's right, screams and rarely listens when others say: Don't do this please. In the end, I don't really like her and I hope they kind of push her aside in favor of other characters from now. 

 

Yeeeeeah this is really well said. Exactly how I feel about her too. If it wasn't for Lyse my feelings towards Stormblood would have varied from ambivalent to happy, but Lyse really just dragged nearly every scene she was featured in down. Like... is this child really getting mad that fucking FARMERS aren't willing to fight against the people with magic death robots at the drop of a hat? God damn.

 

If I do Stormblood MSQ again on an alt without skipping cutscenes, I might as well just drink an entire bottle of wine every time the camera pans to Lyse just silently *clenching fist.* I'll probably die but whatever.

[Kage]

Lyse's reactions to people who really can't afford to just throw down everything against the Garleans: I MEAN, I GUESS. BUT THEY REALLY NEED TO FIGHT THEM.

[Kieron Lohengrin]

those farmers just need to learn how to punch bullets in midair like she does

 

[video=youtube]

[Virella]

"How do you dare to be oppressed, jeeeeeez, just stand up against the bullies! Ermgeeeeerd gais." - Lyse

 

You know, I would have been fine with that if it was just at start of MSQ, but she continues to do this lol. That is what fucking bothers me.

[Teadrinker]

"How do you dare to be oppressed, jeeeeeez, just stand up against the bullies! Ermgeeeeerd gais." - Lyse

 

You know, I would have been fine with that if it was just at start of MSQ, but she continues to do this lol. That is what fucking bothers me.

 

Commander and leader material right here.

 

Yeah. In Disney-ending land.

[Virella]

"How do you dare to be oppressed, jeeeeeez, just stand up against the bullies! Ermgeeeeerd gais." - Lyse

 

You know, I would have been fine with that if it was just at start of MSQ, but she continues to do this lol. That is what fucking bothers me.

 

Commander and leader material right here.

 

Yeah. In Disney-ending land.

She's Bella Swan, without her Edward. :^)

[Edda]

You know, I would have been fine with that if it was just at start of MSQ, but she continues to do this lol. That is what fucking bothers me.

 

Yeah I really don't get the people who are claiming that Lyse grew a lot through MSQ and accomplished so much on her own. Don't get me wrong, I wanted to like her a lot too, but I'm not going to fool myself into thinking the writing around her was good, or that anything about her character 'development' was handled well. She's static from start to finish. Sure, she feels different from Yda, but she's still goofy and selfish and childish... if anything I noticed these traits more in Stormblood than I did before (though that could be because we've simply spent more time with her/my memory is shit). She got two wardrobe changes and made the leader of the Resistance, despite not having any skills a leader might need. The writing around her was as bad if not worse than Minfilia's.

 

Part of me wants to argue 'it's not the character that's bad, just the writing,' like I do with Minfilia... but constantly getting mad at oppressed non-combatants that are just trying to get by for not seeing things YOUR way is a pretty shitty character trait, lol. Ugh god, why.

[Val]

To be fair, SE forgot how to write a good story after 12. None of this surprises me, so I don't really bother with giving it that much credit. For what it's worth, I was pleasantly surprised by some of it--and the rest, such as Lyse being Lyse, more or less reminded me of how awful the writing in the game is/can be.

[Enla]

You know, I would have been fine with that if it was just at start of MSQ, but she continues to do this lol. That is what fucking bothers me.

 

Yeah I really don't get the people who are claiming that Lyse grew a lot through MSQ and accomplished so much on her own. Don't get me wrong, I wanted to like her a lot too, but I'm not going to fool myself into thinking the writing around her was good, or that anything about her character 'development' was handled well. She's static from start to finish. Sure, she feels different from Yda, but she's still goofy and selfish and childish... if anything I noticed these traits more in Stormblood than I did before (though that could be because we've simply spent more time with her/my memory is shit). She got two wardrobe changes and made the leader of the Resistance, despite not having any skills a leader might need. The writing around her was as bad if not worse than Minfilia's.

 

Part of me wants to argue 'it's not the character that's bad, just the writing,' like I do with Minfilia... but constantly getting mad at oppressed non-combatants that are just trying to get by for not seeing things YOUR way is a pretty shitty character trait, lol. Ugh god, why.

 

Like Ave alluded to, Lyse has a bad case of what I would call Bella Swan syndrome. We're told countless times throughout the story how competent she is, how good she is, how right she is for the position; how we're supposed to care about her and her struggles, and how she truly earned everything she was given. Yet the writing does not fall in line with these sentiments. The writers failed the most basic of writing tropes with Lyse in that we're TOLD about how worthy she is, but never actually SHOWN it. A fact which trips up many a person it seems and allows them to falsely believe the spiel without hard evidence to back it, which happened similarly with discussions about Bella's inflated status as a feminism symbol when she was anything but.*

 

Don't get me wrong, I'm praying Lyse develops properly in the coming patches as I've always had a soft spot for characters who start as unlikable and end up being something so much more than even they could have dreamed of. Yet unlike the Youko Nakajima's of the world, Lyse has been placed so high upon a pedestal already and basically told that her naivete isn't an issue that I can't see how they're going to fix this convoluted mess they've created. Not without pulling the same stunt they did with Alphinaud and the Crystal Braves.

 

Which to be blunt, is what Lyse's writing reminds me of. She's a bastardization of Minfillia, yes. Yet more than that she's following right in ARR Alphinaud's footsteps down to the inflated sense of importance the plot is trying to contrive upon her. Why they're making near the same mistake, down to the plot beats, is boggling my mind given the fact that we needed an entire expansion after the fact to redeem Alphinaud of his mistakes.

 

*This is not to say you can't like Lyse or her arc, but the similarities between her and Twilight's titular character in terms of raw WRITING MISTAKES cannot go unstated.

[Nero]

One thing that really bothers me about MMO stories in general is that most of them try to pull this "YOU are the ONLY ONE who can STOP THEM" thing. Which I Hate, with a capital "H" and the fiery intensity of a million Foreman grills, because MMO stories can never decide if the Hero actually is the Chosen One or not.

 

Up until now, I had been under the impression that the Warrior of Light had been defeating the Primals by themselves, at least ever since Thordan. Which is acceptable, that's what the WoL is renowned for, the god killer, the eikon slayer. Which is also why Zenos bothered the shit out of me; it's implied that he's some kind of experiment or clone or something, sure, but this wahoo with a golf bag and huge shoulder pads is on-par or greater than shit like King Thordan and Sephirot? Really?

 

As I recall, there's also zero reason given as to why we are capable of defeating Zenos in the Ala Mhigo dungeon; maybe he was literally just waiting for the Warrior of Light to hit Level 70, I don't know.

 

Anyway, I thought that the Warrior of Light was THE CHOSEN ONE, defeating the primals by themselves (and requiring help for larger scale things like Castrum Meridianium and the Steps of Faith). I didn't have a problem with that.

 

What I did end up having a problem with was the story talking about how the Warrior of Light needs the help of friends to defeat primals like Susano, along with some OOC forum talk that "obviously the WoL didn't defeat primals by themselves, they had a bunch of help! It makes sense that Zenos beat them!"

 

Which bothers the shit out of me, because narratively speaking, why aren't these other heroes mentioned? Either the Warrior of Light is The Chosen One, or he isn't, and if he isn't, why doesn't the narrative acknowledge the army of other loot-crazed wahoos that are clearly present in the setting and who also happen to be just as capable of killing Primals? Wy are these other heroes who are so clearly integral to my success not ALSO realm famous?

 

Like, did everyone forget about Aragorn and Gimli and Gandalf and everyone else in the Fellowship because Frodo (well, technically, Sam) is the one who destroyed the One Ring? What kind of sense does that make?

 

And yes, you can call this being extremely anal retentive and nitpicky and me being unable to suspend my disbelief or whatever, but it still bothers me. Clearly, in order for WoL to have help in fighting primals, the other 7 people would need the Echo or else be tempered, right? Why is the WoL the only one getting credit when everyone--at least everyone in the Scions--seems to know that the WoL needs help to defeat primals? Why don't they ever ask any of these other heroes for help when Ala Mhigo's shit is getting pushed in?

 

Or I guess it's just a plot hole.

[LiadansWhisper]

Well, as far as the other people needing the echo, we are shown just before Lakshmi that the Warrior of Light can apparently full-on block a Primal's attempt to temper other people.

[Gegenji]

Maybe they're just supposed to be other members of the Scions who just so happen to also have the Echo... but not all the other cool tricks and status that the WoL has? I dunno. It would definitely be a step in the right direction if they either used a plural - Warriors of Light, and just having your PC being the chosen head - or giving a proper name to the other Primal-slayers beyond just "your buddies."

 

I never really thought much about it, but now that it's been brought up... it definitely doesn't seem fair that the WoL has at least seven other people who help him out on a regular basis that get no recognition at all.

[Kieron Lohengrin]

"Warrior of Light" is actually the collective name of his/her raid static and they're all just off-camera in every cutscene

 

Camera angle doesn't catch them because the other seven are all popotos

[LiadansWhisper]

"Warrior of Light" is actually the collective name of his/her raid static and they're all just off-camera in every cutscene

 

Camera angle doesn't catch them because the other seven are all popotos

 

Seems legit.

[Kallera]

I hope Lyse's attitude causes problems in the aftermath of 4.0, maybe get hit hard with the realities of freedom and liberty meaning not everyone has to listen to her or think she's doing a good job of things. Or that her and hien's message of rebellion sprials out of control intro an endorsement of terrorism. But maybe I'm a touch jaded with recent rl episodes of people talking "freedom from tyranny"...

 

What I hope doesn't happen is that her personality problems gets resolved in some off screen epiphany or one of SE's fan fiction entries.

[Edda]

Like Ave alluded to, Lyse has a bad case of what I would call Bella Swan syndrome. We're told countless times throughout the story how competent she is, how good she is, how right she is for the position; how we're supposed to care about her and her struggles, and how she truly earned everything she was given. Yet the writing does not fall in line with these sentiments. The writers failed the most basic of writing tropes with Lyse in that we're TOLD about how worthy she is, but never actually SHOWN it. A fact which trips up many a person it seems and allows them to falsely believe the spiel without hard evidence to back it, which happened similarly with discussions about Bella's inflated status as a feminism symbol when she was anything but.*

 

This is a very good point and one I did not consider, thank you.

 

Don't get me wrong, I'm praying Lyse develops properly in the coming patches as I've always had a soft spot for characters who start as unlikable and end up being something so much more than even they could have dreamed of. Yet unlike the Youko Nakajima's of the world, Lyse has been placed so high upon a pedestal already and basically told that her naivete isn't an issue that I can't see how they're going to fix this convoluted mess they've created. Not without pulling the same stunt they did with Alphinaud and the Crystal Braves.

 

Which to be blunt, is what Lyse's writing reminds me of. She's a bastardization of Minfillia, yes. Yet more than that she's following right in ARR Alphinaud's footsteps down to the inflated sense of importance the plot is trying to contrive upon her. Why they're making near the same mistake, down to the plot beats, is boggling my mind given the fact that we needed an entire expansion after the fact to redeem Alphinaud of his mistakes.

 

I hated Alphinaud during the entirety of 2.0, but thanks to Heavensward I can say that I actually really like him now, and enjoy watching him on screen. Having watched him grow over the course of so many patches really warmed me to him, and I'd say he's proof that Square Enix can write good, believable character development... provided they get enough time and breathing room. Sadly, I don't think Lyse is going to get that treatment, as much as I'd like her to. It's more likely she's going to be relegated to Aymeric status, a boring figurehead for an expansion, and will become irrelevant the second Stormblood starts to draw to a close. Something game changing and major that would prevent this would be awesome, but I'm not gonna hold my breath.

 

That being said, I wonder which of the Three Ladies is going to get the most wholesome and believable character development? Lyse, Fordola or Yotsuyu? Vote now on your phones.

[Momo]

One thing that really bothers me about MMO stories in general is that most of them try to pull this "YOU are the ONLY ONE who can STOP THEM" thing. Which I Hate, with a capital "H" and the fiery intensity of a million Foreman grills, because MMO stories can never decide if the Hero actually is the Chosen One or not.

 

Up until now, I had been under the impression that the Warrior of Light had been defeating the Primals by themselves, at least ever since Thordan. Which is acceptable, that's what the WoL is renowned for, the god killer, the eikon slayer. Which is also why Zenos bothered the shit out of me; it's implied that he's some kind of experiment or clone or something, sure, but this wahoo with a golf bag and huge shoulder pads is on-par or greater than shit like King Thordan and Sephirot? Really?

 

As I recall, there's also zero reason given as to why we are capable of defeating Zenos in the Ala Mhigo dungeon; maybe he was literally just waiting for the Warrior of Light to hit Level 70, I don't know.

 

Anyway, I thought that the Warrior of Light was THE CHOSEN ONE, defeating the primals by themselves (and requiring help for larger scale things like Castrum Meridianium and the Steps of Faith). I didn't have a problem with that.

 

What I did end up having a problem with was the story talking about how the Warrior of Light needs the help of friends to defeat primals like Susano, along with some OOC forum talk that "obviously the WoL didn't defeat primals by themselves, they had a bunch of help! It makes sense that Zenos beat them!"

 

Which bothers the shit out of me, because narratively speaking, why aren't these other heroes mentioned? Either the Warrior of Light is The Chosen One, or he isn't, and if he isn't, why doesn't the narrative acknowledge the army of other loot-crazed wahoos that are clearly present in the setting and who also happen to be just as capable of killing Primals? Wy are these other heroes who are so clearly integral to my success not ALSO realm famous?

 

 

I was fine with us playing the "may or may not be the chosen one" sort of card, and I like Zenos, in part because I find him attractive in some way, but also because he feels like what a being confined to a normal sized physical body, should feel like if they are powerful. There seems to be a balancing act on amount of aether and strength of will/aether usage as far as primals and powerful figure goes, so his power and ability didn't really feel off to me.

 

I will say! The fact that he felt like we were weak to start made no sense to me, seeing as he tried to attack us, and was in some way beaten back even if only for a time. If you want me to feel someone is truly more powerful than me, throw me in a scripted defeat in the DF or give the enemy some ability which I cannot withstand outrightly and give a reason, not just he hit you with a sword and you were taken down though you didn't need healing and weren't knocked out. Given his transference into Shinryu giving him some real power, that made sense to me, because bosses who are in physical bodies similar in size to the player, often feel easier to defeat and limited by the space usage they can perform, so his progression made sense, but his start didn't for me?

 

Finally, I didn't ever like that we fought with other people and it wasn't mentioned, so I had this whole theory in my head where different realities converge into a single point of battle, combining the WoL from different unknown realities into one space which helped us defeat a common enemy. It was a little ridiculous, but not entirely implausible, but now we have "friends" so that is out the window lol. Not sure what to make of this newer mention thing that is happening, where I call on my "friends". It makes more sense to the mechanics of the game, but not sure it makes sense to the nature of the story.

[Caspar]

Like Ave alluded to, Lyse has a bad case of what I would call Bella Swan syndrome. We're told countless times throughout the story how competent she is, how good she is, how right she is for the position; how we're supposed to care about her and her struggles, and how she truly earned everything she was given. Yet the writing does not fall in line with these sentiments. The writers failed the most basic of writing tropes with Lyse in that we're TOLD about how worthy she is, but never actually SHOWN it. A fact which trips up many a person it seems and allows them to falsely believe the spiel without hard evidence to back it, which happened similarly with discussions about Bella's inflated status as a feminism symbol when she was anything but.*

 

This is a very good point and one I did not consider, thank you.

 

Don't get me wrong, I'm praying Lyse develops properly in the coming patches as I've always had a soft spot for characters who start as unlikable and end up being something so much more than even they could have dreamed of. Yet unlike the Youko Nakajima's of the world, Lyse has been placed so high upon a pedestal already and basically told that her naivete isn't an issue that I can't see how they're going to fix this convoluted mess they've created. Not without pulling the same stunt they did with Alphinaud and the Crystal Braves.

 

Which to be blunt, is what Lyse's writing reminds me of. She's a bastardization of Minfillia, yes. Yet more than that she's following right in ARR Alphinaud's footsteps down to the inflated sense of importance the plot is trying to contrive upon her. Why they're making near the same mistake, down to the plot beats, is boggling my mind given the fact that we needed an entire expansion after the fact to redeem Alphinaud of his mistakes.

 

I hated Alphinaud during the entirety of 2.0, but thanks to Heavensward I can say that I actually really like him now, and enjoy watching him on screen. Having watched him grow over the course of so many patches really warmed me to him, and I'd say he's proof that Square Enix can write good, believable character development... provided they get enough time and breathing room. Sadly, I don't think Lyse is going to get that treatment, as much as I'd like her to. It's more likely she's going to be relegated to Aymeric status, a boring figurehead for an expansion, and will become irrelevant the second Stormblood starts to draw to a close. Something game changing and major that would prevent this would be awesome, but I'm not gonna hold my breath.

 

That being said, I wonder which of the Three Ladies is going to get the most wholesome and believable character development? Lyse, Fordola or Yotsuyu? Vote now on your phones.

 

Literally from my phone I say it will be Yotzie.

[Kieron Lohengrin]

spoiler

 

it a tree

 

[video=youtube]

[Virella]

[Momo]

Personally I never really liked Lyse/Y'da, she only had interest for me because of her relation to a main Lalafell character, which she has proceeded to lose for the time being. As long as SE continues to be afraid of side characters accomplishing too much, we will likely continue with these disjointed feelings about "character evolution" or lack thereof. I was surprised and happy to see a lot more character participation in many parts of the MSQ though, it did give me the feeling they were there with us actually doing shit for once. That is far better than Minnie who literally showed up after battle every single time.

[Gegenji]

Personally I never really liked Lyse/Y'da, she only had interest for me because of her relation to a main Lalafell character, which she has proceeded to lose for the time being. As long as SE continues to be afraid of side characters accomplishing too much, we will likely continue with these disjointed feelings about "character evolution" or lack thereof. I was surprised and happy to see a lot more character participation in many parts of the MSQ though, it did give me the feeling they were there with us actually doing shit for once. That is far better than Minnie who literally showed up after battle every single time.

 

... Sorry, I read that and I just thought of this again:

 

cuELXU0OEs4

[Kage]

spoiler

 

it a tree

 

[video=youtube]

I am disappointed that I did not actually get a tree.

 

Can I at least climb kefka god?

[Gegenji]

Depending on whether or not my hunch on how Omega will go is right... we could potentially fight the tree later. If they make NeoExdeath a battle in the next "wings" of it. He did get pulled into the Void rather than disappearing like the others.

[Dravus]

I echo the desire for Lyse to have a major wake up call. I hold the firm belief that Gyr Abania was liberated far too easily. They did a better job with Doma, I feel, since even if no major characters perished there you still spent a significant amount of time gathering allies. Hien proved to be a very intelligent, bold and charismatic leader figure too...and his plan to sacrifice Doma Castle was a pretty sound one.

 

By contrast, most of Gyr Abania's liberation happened off screen and revolved around the Garleans in the area working against Garlemald's interests, being completely incompetent or just having convenient reasons to be overrun.

 

Sure, Meffrid and Conrad died but they seemingly only died for the sake of clearing the way for Lyse to be handed leadership of the Resistance for reasons I cannot comprehend. I'm surprised they didn't kill off M'naago and Arenvald as well...though it's possible that they were never real contenders for Conrad's position due to the circumstances of their births.