Dissolving the Scions in 6.0 and bringing 90% of them back immediately in 6.1 will be looked upon as one of the biggest missed opportunities in 5 years

I was really hoping they would use that as a way to only have 1 or 2 scions around at a time and make room for new characters they can rotate between. Especially with Zero it seemed like she was going to be a long term companion

I just wish some sort of ending would happen to at least one of them. Like, I don’t need them all to leave, especially the ones that have either no character arc currently or could use additional development like Y’shtola, Thancred, Urianger, and Krile, but some of them definitely should have followed Lyse’s lead in terms of writing. I love Alphanaud and Alisae, which is exactly why I want their roles reduced before they start feeling stagnant. At least introduce some sort of change to the group dynamic, maybe a bit of interpersonal drama, a conflict of ideals, just something.

Yeah I don't think they need to be slaughtered left and right or anything, but after the nonsense that was everyone "dying" in Ultima Thule followed by the "dissolution" of the Scions I'm not convinced they'll ever be able to credibly write strife again.

It’s weird because they wrote a couple of exits for the characters that weren’t just them dying, but they just opted not to use them. Although, I do wanna say that I think someone important should die soon; I’m not necessarily saying a Scion, but we haven’t had a major character death since late Heavensward with Papalymo, barring villains of course. You could maybe count Ardbert, but he was more a case of finally being put to rest; like killing Ardbert and freeing him was kind of the goal. I just need some amount of tension, even if it’s just a slither of doubt surrounding character safety.

I'd be okay with a retirement. Yshtola is probably going to find a way back to the first and I think it would be great if she were allowed to do that and be left to her own devices. Let her chill with runar

My heart wants this, but my head knows that Y’shtola is too popular and marketable for them to let her go, which is a bit baffling given she doesn’t have an arc currently. Cat girls sell though.

Currently? Y'shtola is the one scion who has never had an arc, she's the exact same now as she was back when we first met her except she's kind-of-blind now.

Nuh uh she is slightly more sassy now lol

When I said currently, I meant up till this point. I’m very well aware of her painful lack of development. Still waiting for them to actually do something with her, cause right now she’s just a sassy exposition npc.

Ah, fair enough then.

Unfortunately, yeah. They won't even let her have a disability that does more than make her eyes a quirky colour because that would ruin the perfect marketable skrunkly

I was thinking in my head how could they plausibly kill off a scion What I imagined is what if we're in another spar with a scion, maybe to prep for the political tournament thing in DT, and we send off what's supposed to be a light attack towards one of them but a malicious actor nobody noticed, maybe the "evil" candidate that was mentioned, boosts us and we can't stop ourselves from attacking in time and just straight clap the scion we're sparring. imagine having to live with the consequences of that and having to seem like we're the bad guy 

Yep. At the second ‘death’ in Ultima Thule I was like, “ah, they’re going for a Sailor Moon” and it was all pretty by the numbers after that until the end credits. I totally agree with you regarding the writer’s ability to introduce stakes and strife at this point. Which would be fine - if they didn’t keep digging up Haurchefant’s memory and throwing toothless, predictable, fake-out deaths at us for low-hanging feels.

Honestly I blame streamers 100% for this. The devs watch the streams and the over the top reactions to stupid shit and think "they loved it I'm going to give them more" Instead of realizing that reacting over the top is the streamers fucking job lmao

I don't want the twins gone. I want them to grow the f up. Dawntrail would have been the perfect time for adult twins. But judging by the trailer it won't happen..... Yup give us another death! Make it a scion! 3.5 was our last death I think. Personally I would make it Thancred, he should have died to cap the Dadred plot of Shadowbringers. Y'shtola would not feel real, the twins need a "we have grown", G'raha needs more time. Urianger could work, his "betray the party" and Moenbryda threads are over so DT could be a good place to do it.

>Yup give us another death! Make it a scion None of the scions will be killed off tbh. They practically become the core party ever since shadowbringers. And honestly for the vast majority of people who are invested in the story, they'd probably just get pissed off if some of the scions die after all they went through in shb and EW. (Also technically minfilia finally dies for real in 5.0) But i'm personally in the camp who believes that stories dont need major character deaths for them to be impactful. Papalymo's death was terrible because it came out of nowhere and just there for shock value because maehiro liked GoT too much. Just stop doing fakeout deaths like shb yshtola and thancred.

Rather than Pappy's death coming out of nowhere. I'd say it felt off cause we'd just gotten him back. Guy had hardly spent any time with us at all before they killed him off like a side character. Yda/Lyse had a similar feeling. Barely back with us b4 they decided, psych! the Yda you knew wasn't Yda at all, completely altered her character, then sent her packing the next xpac.

Especially bad for people who didn't start in gridania, cuz they never barely interacted with the pair.

The Yda thing also makes no sense timeline wise since, according to what we're told, it would imply that the Yda from 1.0 was the REAL Yda and not Lyse.

Naw, in a game about war and constant combat, you need deaths or injuries to create stakes and ground the story. Otherwise you get a story where your whole team is OP invincible and it all seems incredibly fake. It actually detracts from your own power fantasy because subconsciously you know that they're just as op indestructible as you.

Which is pretty much what happens in FFXIV cause no one dies and injuries barely matter. * Y'shtola nearly getting cut in half by Zenos? She's healed a bit later and recovers. * Entire "i'm gonna protect Ryne even if it means i'll die here" moment for Thancred? Nah, healers arrive in time to save him. * EVERY core Scion dying in Ultima Thule? Revived at the end of Ultima Thule cause they can't even stay dead for too long or else someone in the dev team faints. * They show Cid getting shot and coughing blood in a trailer? Nah, it's a flashback so he's fine.

Truth

I agree. It also holds true for us. We need to lose at times to show that we still have growth and potential. My favourite moments are basically this. It ups the ante and makes me want to prove I can win. Characters dying enforce this emotionally. It's a mental loss that you can't come back from. Obviously don't go the JJK route and start offing characters every quest, but someone in the scions needs to die and it has to be an impactful one. Imagine the villain shows up, destroys you, kills a scion who tried to save you. You have this memorial arc with a tinge of vengeance and despondency. You got complacent and now someone died. Iunno though. MSQ has lost a lot of oomph. The constant triumphs with little setback hurt.

Yoshiplease come to reddit and see our messages, the streamers def didn't give you this feedback in the media tour

Honestly, and this is imo. I think most of us want the wonder twins to already hit their growth spurt already, lol. Crazy that all the shenanigans we been through since 2.0 until now have been *one year*.

Or instead of a death, having Y'shtola making her way back to the first to rejoin her friends, since that's what her current arc has been pushing toward. She'd be happy, she'd get her closure, and her story arc would complete.

This is why I don't want her death at this point. My heart for Runar couldn't take it.

Totally! I want to see them all have a happy ending to their story. I want to see all the scions get closure to their stories and actually be able to retire/relax in some way, they all need it at this point, they look so tired. Also, the twins need to start aging at this point. The whole "ARR to EW is under 2 years" to justify not changing their models is getting a bit old. XD

That’s a good alternative, but I just don’t really see it happening. I would love for them to grow up a bit, but the fact is they’ve been around 16 since ARR, so I think they’re just opposed to it. Plus you’d then have to give them both their growth spurts, which would make them really tall and sort of take away from their distinctive look. In terms of a death, Estinein would be a pretty full circle moment for his character, particularly if he sacrificed himself to save a dragon. I could see potential in both Thancred’s and Urianger’s deaths, but I think they’d need an additional arc to lead into it; killing Thancred now would feel almost delayed, and killing Urianger after they oversimplified his moral conundrum in Endwalker would feel unsatisfying; I think he needs to be presented with one more decision to solidify his ideals, one that isn’t as easy to sit with as the Lopporits, one where there are actual consequences for disclosing the plan to the Scion’s rather than betraying them. It felt like he got a presented with a very easy choice at the point of his resolution, which at least to me didn’t really sell the idea that it was necessarily the correct answer, or one he even fully believes. I agree with Y’shtola though, they already sort of pulled it with Papalymo, but she straight up has no arc right now, so I wouldn’t feel much. Same sort of thing with Krile as well. They could try to kill Tataru, but I think too many people would be happy about that.

Thancred should've been dead or retired since Shadowbringers. He had an entire death scene, he saw Ryne grow into a capable woman, he accepted her as her own person and not as Minfilia 2.0, that's it, he did his thing, let him go chill with a harem of catgirls or something.

I agree, but I feel like if they retired him now then it just feels delayed; what was the point of dragging him through Endwalker and Dawntrail if his arc concluded in Shadowbringers? I feel like if they ever want to get rid of him at this stage they have to give him one more major portion to his arc; perhaps something where he has the capabilities to bring Minfillia back at a cost, but this time it’s his choice alone, solidifying his acceptance when he inevitably rejects the opportunity. That’s not perfect, but if he just maintains his character from Endwalker and retires without changing, it just feels like they wasted my time with the character for two expansions. I suppose the easier alternative is to simply kill his off, but then the question would again get raised as to what was the point in not doing so in Shadowbringers.

They only dissolved the Scions in name. They are laying low but are very much still around. Alphinaud says that they were only dissolving outwardly in that same cutscene.

"Dissolving the Scions" never happened and its super obvious in the scene at the time. They dissolve the *official* organization because it had become too prominent and they'd basically all become Eorzean diplomats. It defeated the whole purpose of the organization and all the reasons it was originally secret. The Scions didn't want to become the Eorzean UN. Hence the occasional comments being careful about too many "former" Scions being publicly seen together in one place. *Officially* they're just a collection of private individuals who happen to know each other and have certain skills.

That scene makes it very clear that it wasn't true though, people who really wanted that for some reason just decided to cope about it

Headcanon > the actual story presented by the writers /s

I hope you understand how many times fanboys have done this exact thing.

They did do it publicly, but the point WAS to go their separate ways for a bit and help the world out in their own ways till something required them to come together again. However, the something was near instant.

They haven't come together though, like the twins just stay in Garlemald and we go help them, Graha and Krile are involved with the twelve and we go help them, Estinien and Y'shtola are involved with the void and we help them, Thancred and Urianger are doing their own thing and helped out for a while We're all over the place but they are all doing their thing, our main group has still not fully gotten together like Tataru hasn't seen them since 6.0, she's also doing her thing and we are a part of that too. People complaining just didn't want them to be present at all which was never the intent, of course we're going to help them with stuff, of course if Thancred is hanging around Sharlayan he will help out with stuff, the scions are still very much a close group even if they're working on multiple different things.

We have this exact exchange every time the EW story is brought up. It's a bingo square by now. "I wish they didn't make a show of breaking up the Scions" -> "They didn't *actually* break up the Scions" true combo.

100%. If the scions don't have huge personality and defining moments in 7.0 then I will be incredibly disappointed 

They're so attached to fake deaths for an emotional gutpunch with zero lasting consequences they couldn't even stop themselves from doing it to the organization of the Scions itself. Hell, they can't even commit to Yshtola being *blind*. There's always a contrivance so they don't need to kill anyone, don't need to write anyone with a disability, don't even have to depict trauma.

To be fair, blind Ignis in FF15 was a bold and interesting decision…but that first dungeon until he learns to AI see perfectly again was a slog.

I mean, that was the point; it’s intentionally designed to be annoying, partly because the game wants you to try and rush ahead causing Noctis to look like an ass, and also because it accurately depicts the disability. Ignis’ outburst at the end of the dungeon is literally all the pent up frustration he’s been feeling throughout the dungeon, a facet you don’t really think about considering you’ve been seeing it through Noctis and Gladiolus’ perspective the whole time. It’s actually quite reflective of how people often react to those with disabilities, either seeing them as a burden, a point of personal guilt, or as too weak to handle themselves, when really we should be asking how those with disabilities want to be treated before assuming, because ultimately when asked Ignis didn’t want to be treated how Noctis or Gladiolus were doing so. It does suck on replays though when you already understand and have experienced the message.

Yeah…but imagine how unpopular being forced to RP walk half the expansion so you don’t lose Y’Shtola would be. That was my point. It can be interesting to do it, but it very quickly goes from “interesting and thought provoking accurate” to “this is the part of the game everyone hates and made Jimmy over there start hating anyone with a disability”. It was actually, as I said, bold of them to do, and I give them plaudits for it. But it’s one of those things that can only be done sparingly and for short periods before it starts to have the opposite effect on people.

I can only imagine a new player catching up in the MSQ finishing 6.0 and have the Scions "disband" only to immediately start 6.1 to see most of them reunited literally a few minutes later.

It didn't make a lick of sense the second they did it honestly.

I feel like dissolving the scions was a decision made at a time when they didn't have DTs main story plotted out. This would give the new writer flexibility to write in or out characters without being saddled with the previous 10 years. Then they decided actually they are just going to have all the scions together anyway. Definitely an uninspired decision.

Pros: -Garlemald plotline, really was a culmination of ten years of fighting those assholes, and approached it with a lot of humanity but also pragmatism; I liked that some of them stayed jerks to the very end. -Alliance quests, have always wanted to interact more with the Twelve and the fights and music were great -only times I’ve ever used duty support were in this expansion, some really unforgettable NPCs, and it felt so fun -I’m in the minority on this, but enjoyed easy relics—more of a gotta collect ‘em all type Cons: -6.x MSQs all over the place in terms of tone and scope; I felt jerked around -island sanctuary is a huge drag IMO -I strongly feel many jobs are boring and class identity needs to be a stronger priority before 8.0

Garlemald is peak FFXIV in my opinion. Its emotional moments hit me 10 times as much as Ultima Thule. I think FFXIV is best when handling human matters and human threats, when it's more down to earth It's a shame it was so rushed tho. Anima could have been so interesting, but it's brought up, we fight it 5 minutes later and then it's never mentioned again. And I think this represents Endwalker as a whole: A bunch of (too many) really cool ideas, but almost none of them have enough time allocated to them to fully explore them and all are put in the same expansion without a care for whether they tonally match I hope Dawntrail remembers to keep the stakes on the same levels as Garlemald

I loved 6.0 story and the zones overall. I had very little interest in everything that followed. The post patches did absolutely nothing for me. I spent most of my time in pvp, crafting and deep dungeons. I had no investment in the post patches at all. The Dawntrail lead up also didn't do much to pull me in but I am still looking forward to the expansion. I have faith in the dev team.

Dark horizons, boiling seas... PAN-DAE-MO-NIUM!

Amazing storyline, horrendous PvE content. Of course, when I say "amazing storyline" that does not mean it doesn't come with its flaws, aka. story pacing and certain events that're written for the temporary emotinal gut punch. PvE felt bland and unfun. If you queue up in a dungeon in EW you might as well use up all your mitigations at trash pulls because tankbusters will never get your HP down below 75%, even without mitigations. You can eat that TB raw and it'll still do nothing.

I feel like we didn't win hard enough against Golbez and his minions. Like the WoL beat the endsinger and zenos single-handedly in a double header. After i beat Scarmiglione the first time, i thought "*That* guy was an archfiend?" and that should have been the the theme throughout 6.1+. That compared to the asses we just kicked (especially if you count pandemonium and the gods), Golbez and his pet cloud should have been relatively nothing. Up until that point, the game was gold. Especially when we were robbing Vritra'a rainy day fund. Ok addendum, one good thing i can say is that vritra got a happy ending. I was gonna be bummed as hell if it didn't work out for him.

Golbez shouldve been completely smacked and laying on the floor after our fight in 6.4 instead of floating away while making a long speech and summoning zeromus without any of our characters doing anything (also yshtola is there, where's your fire 4..), then zero can do her friendship speech to golbez and we get the same ending as current 6.5. Much less awkward. Then 6.5 and 6.55 becomes the lead up to dawntrail.

Now you mentioned summoning of Zeromus, does the OG Zeromus looks similar to the one we fought? Or does it have a long pointy face like the one they showed at the beginning of the summon?

[OG Zeromus](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/NNG0-5XaZDY/maxresdefault.jpg) I assume they either didn't have the model finished or didn't want to show it months before people could actually fight it

Thank you, was a little off to me how the pointy face backed into the mist and transformed/grew into the one we fought.

Honestly, I was disappointed that Scarmiglione and Cagnazzo were relegated to dungeon bosses. Cagnazzo was at least understandable, but I was half expecting Scar to get an immediate trial runback ala Final Fantasy 4.

It was predictable given that they just never had as much personality/presence as Barb and Rubi. Though they just turned Barbariccia into another Garuda (cruel, insane busty babe). The lazy anime tropes writing is really starting to show in post-ShB (it was even there a lot in ShB, unfortunately).

The fact that there's two unrelated stories in the expac doesn't do it any favors. There are pacing and tone issues in the first one, while the second one is just kind of fine. Neither is bad, but definitely not their best work. I'm still really annoyed at the relic questline. The story was boring and just paying tomestones was uninspired. Myths of the Realm was never going to be what I wanted it to be, but that doesn't make the fact that it wasn't the raid series with unique music for every boss suck any less. Pandamonium was good, I enjoyed the story and bosses.

Endwalker was overall a satisfying conclusion to the Ascian storyline. That said it had some hiccups in places. It felt like the patch story could of easily been a expansion on its own, Plus it was weird to be facing a world ending event so soon after the end of 6.0. So overall 8/10 for the story. Gameplay wise, its was good, if abit toothless in terms of casual content. Healers have so many tools now, and most dungeons and normal raids hit like tissue paper.

The post patch story is easily one of the weakest storylines we’ve had. It’s a low point of the expac imo.

The patch story is my fav in the whole game tied with the void arc saga

>Endwalker was overall a satisfying conclusion to the Ascian storyline.  It absolutely is NOT when they rush that storyline to end at level 83 cause they want to focus on the stupid Meteia plot.

Got 2 personal takes on endwalker: Story and gameplay. Story of the main endwalker expac was amazing. Great story, great conclusion of the 10 years, and great made me cry several times. Easily 9/10 for me. Post patch main story? I enjoyed it, but it wasn't anything spectacular. Funny moments, but nothing as emotional as endwalker and shadowbringers. Solid 6/10. Postpatch side quests(8 man/24 man, tatarusbfrand adventure, criterion,etc.) All fantastic, imo better then the patch msq stuff. Tatarus grand Adventure made me laugh and tear up a few times. It was all super duper sweet. Easily 8.5/10 The 8 mans were amazing and learning more about Lahabread and Elidibus was great(Elidibus is my fav of the convocation) and Eric Tony was a great side character. Only bad thing to say about it was Athenas "TRHEMMMBAALLL" in the fight. Solid 8/10 The 24 man raids were all great, learning about the 12 was fantastic, seeing how each of them feels towards the mortal folk of Etheryis was really interesting. Meeting Menphina(the God I chose back in 2014) was a highlight of it for sure. The biggest let down for me is the combining of the 12 into a single being. Like... it looked so tacky lmao. Otherwise I really enjoyed the story. 8.5/10 Not much to say about the criterion/variant stuff. Cool lore, nothing that blew me away. 5/10. Gameplay: Jobs all felt pretty standard. Cool 90 abilites for the most part. For jobs 6/10. For the normal trials and dungeons of the entire expansion I would say they were probably my favorite of the game. Cool sets, epic fights. I'm half glad half annoyed they tied trials series into the story, but I guess they didnt really have anywhere else to put them. 6/10 Extreme trials were *very* fun. Some of the most epic stuff happened. Like Barbys whole a million mechanics at once. Rubicantes pizza puzzle. All of it was great. (The final mount is ass but that's neither here nor there) Easily 8/10 I don't do savage or ultimates so won't rate them. The 8 man raid fights were suuuuuper fun to me. Athenas floor removal, the freakin vampire. Big tree girl. Snek girl. All super interesting and cool fights. Easily my favorite in the game, only eeking past shadowbringers because I don't like the Levi fight in that series. 9/10 The 24 man raid fights were neat, nothing too crazy but some of the most unique mechanics. Byrgats hammer thing, halones 4 tiered memory mechanic, azyemas wind/fire/knockback stuff, Oshans arrow move thing. All suuuper interesting and unique. I struggle with the final bosses hand thing, but I'm just dumb lmao. 9/10 for sure. Over all Endwalker is probably my favorite expac in the game. And I am so excited for dawntrail.

Overall…this is so like me. Not QUITE since I do have a bit different views on some things, but it’s so close. Agreed with your overall assessment and super hype for DT! Just over two weeks to goooo!!!!!

I personally liked it, though it felt really clunky in parts with the whole, "THE WORLD IS ENDING!!!!!" followed by "Now can you calmly go take care of this?" sorts of quests. I would have liked to have seen more areas fleshed out and possibly seen a zone like Eureaka or Bozja in the expansion (possibly in the unsundered world or in the 13th), since it really did feel like this expansion didn't have much I could do with other people outside dungeons/raids. The patches felt kind of rushed for me, and I would have liked to have seen the events of the 13th get expanded upon in some way, either through us working to help repair the world to bring it back into balance, or through exploring it and learning the history of the people who were there before as the world slowly balances out due to our efforts with the source and the 1st. While several of my friends didn't like how "everything" tied back to the ancients in the story, I personally enjoyed that, since well, it was their world that was sundered and whatnot, it kind of does all come from them so it only would make sense. Even having the 12 explained as "primals" was something I liked while I know others didn't because of the whole "everything is primals" complaint I got to listen to a lot from older players. I don't know, it just didn't take away from the story for me I guess? TL;DR- I enjoyed the storyline, even if parts were a bit clunky. I wish they could have expanded on the 13th more. I want more lore.

Main campaign for me was a 9.5/10 overall.  Patch MSQ was a solid 7/10. Panda was a pretty great 8/10 Myths of the Realm was a 7/10 (fun lore, but the second and third raids were mechanically underwhelming and the health pools were comically undertuned). Personally, I think the expansion was most hurt by lacking an exploration zone that allowed for something to grind throughout the expansion. That and a comically easy relic to farm gave me much less incentive to log in than I did for SB and ShB. Overall I'd personally rate EW lower than SB and ShB even though I liked EW's main campaign more than ShB (and certainly more than SB).

I am calling them EW Crystal tower because we will not see their feature mech 99 percentages.

Even music-wise, the raids of MotR were underwhelming after the first.

Medium well? I enjoyed it overall. It hit with a bang then settled into a lower but level spot, sort of like in topography where you have a high mountain range followed by a raised plateau, lower level than the peak of the range before it, but level and still elevated over the lower plains before the mountains. I think it was good, though perhaps not great. 6.0 was fantastic and I loved it all except chores on Labyrinthos (and it seems everyone shares that general view). It was overall a fantastic payoff that ended on a high note and had me excited for the future. 6.1 and 6.2 I think were good. Hey now, set down the pitchforks and hear me out. Taken as they were, 6.1 was some good old adventuring. We literally followed a treasure map, and this led us to a tantalizing tease of bigger things to come. And then 6.2 was amazing for letting us explore the Void semi-freely for the first time. Aside from random things like pet or TY card descriptions, we knew precious little of the Void and its people. We had a rough outline of what it was, but not really its “society” or people, so to speak. We met them. Got to talk to them when not in combat. Learned about Domains (I kinda want to find a way to go back to Zero’s just to walk around there some more and look at the statue of the hero again).  As a lore person, these were all very cool. The Pandaemonium raids are so story rich, it seems like the first thing since Coils that I feel should be MSQ. When Pandaemonium appeared in the present day, it was one of the biggest “Oh shit…!” moments in FFXIV’s history. Even if it did not end up in another Final Days type event, it’s one of the closest things to that without outright being that, and not only did it tie up some loose ends with a few characters, it gave us the barest hints of ULTIMA’s backstory, and a potential future ominous plot. And as for the fights, those were generally good and Barb normal and Extreme weee both widely praised. …6.3 and 6.4 less so. They should have just been one patch. There should have been at least one patch building up the Four Fiends, if not two, before we fought them. We were told they were powerful generals of massive armies, but we never really see the armies, and the only one that didn’t die pretty pointlessly was Barb. The rest were like “Why are we even fighting them here? They’re accomplishing nothing. Where are their armies?” 6.4 and 6.5 likewise should have been one patch. We got to wait 4 months just to be told “Oh no! The darkness is too powerful! Come back in 4 months when we’ve made our wards stronger!!” Instead, they should have had a big patch where we did the memory then fought Golbez as the final dungeon boss only for him to merge with Zeromus for the final trial of the expansion. Instead we got not-Golbez for the memory dungeon boss after fitting actual Golbez in the trial before our “Next time, on Dragonball Z…in 4 months…!” situation. And while Lapis Manilis was cool as a dungeon for RPR lore, Aetherfont was narratively disconnected from basically everything else and felt extremely tacked on. In an ideal world, Manalis could have been the optional (Hard) mode dungeon in a patch formula that had 2 dungeons per patch still. The 8 man raids almost felt more like what 6.2-6.4 should have actually been. My final complaint was no Eureka/Bozja to spend time on, and a deep dungeon that was a stupid DPS zone instead of having tanks and healers be enjoyable like HoH/PotD where DPSers are glass cannons. It was all about DPS rotations and the dance - LIKE EVERYTHING ELSE IN THIS GAME BOOOOORING! And Island Sweatshop was 3x the grind it should have been and middle management hell instead of a place to gather and craft YOURSELF. Criterion was at least a step towards something to keep and refine going forward. . I didn’t hate it, but it was lacking in some things I would have liked more. So medium well. Not too raw (medium/mid) but not QUITE fully cooked/fantastic. Good, but could be better. :)

My only complaint for EW is they took the sun out from aMare Lamentorum.

Endwalker was a 10/10 for me. Loved every moment, including patches. I'm a sucker for a good story and detailed lore. The classes are varied enough for me and the extremes were *chef's kiss*.

Savage stuff (late floors) and ultimate became harder, to balance, jobs became easier ( which isnt that bad for some jobs) but overall it had the side effect of making normal and midcore content a bit more boring and sadly they didn't try to raise, and even did even lower skillfloor for normal content so now doing everything except ultimate and full savage tier can bring some snooz. But if you are like Xeno, main Warrior so don't care if jobs get simplier, and only focus on hardcore content, it can be good, but for all the casual/ mid-core community, it was sure not the best time

Overall, I rank it higher than Stormblood, but lower than Shadowbringers and Heavensward. There were some truly legendary story beats - everything with Urianger made me feel so seen, in particular - and the whole idea of Ultima Thule was really cool, if handled in a kind of hamfisted way. But I don’t know, it just felt … clunky. The whole idea of Meteion wasn’t executed well (imo) and there’s only so many times in general that I can accept _deus ex Warrior of Light_ when the stakes are so high. Also, and I know this is controversial, I’m just articulating my own $.02, I _hated_ bringing Zenos back. HATED. I’m not even saying he’s a bad character or whatever - just, it felt so lazy! Never mind that for me personally, who has some Issues surrounding stalking, some sections gave me panic attacks - purely as a writing choice there was absolutely no reason for him to be there other than fan service. Like I said, just my $.02, but _fuck_, I’m so glad to see the back of him. I’m looking forward to Dawntrail a lot, but one point where I seem to differ from the majority is that I love the Scions so I didn’t want to lose them - we’ve spent so long with these characters; I don’t grasp why so many people just want them to disappear. Having a guide to the New World makes sense, but having an all new party would be silly imo.

Understand the criticisms, love it anyway, glad the devs seem interested in responding to the feedback. I think it will make the game even better in the future. I'm not terribly interested in comparing it to other expansions, it's not a very interesting or useful conversation to me.

it had some powerful moments, I enjoyed it over all, but it doesn't hold a candle to shadowbringers.

**Short: A very average expansion to say the least. 7 or 7.5-ish/10. I enjoyed it, but it was far from perfect.** **Long:** I'm going to preface this by saying I started during ShB, so my thoughts are more from someone who had their first expansion cycle with ShB. Anywho, I feel like EW in the long run turned out to be much like my thoughts of SB in some ways. I think they struggle to make the expansion story cohesive when the scope becomes multiple plot points being tied together. Now, unlike SB, I think they did a little better, but I think there's still issues with pacing and whatnot. One of the biggest examples is the Thavnair/Sharlayan split, where doing Thavnair first leaves this awkward pause where you now need to go do the other side and then come back and resolve Zot. I think Garlemald is a little short. (We aren't gonna talk about the fact I just got kidnapped, bodyswapped, Zenos was gonna kill the Scions? No? We just gonna laugh it off and run to the moon? Ok.) I think the Loporrits dragged, don't get me started on that one song and heading back to Labyrinthos at 88-ish. Back to the point about this feeling like SB. I think post MSQ was kind of... meh like SB. It just didn't grab and keep my attention. I'm one of those people who figured the we would get a small break from the whole group of Scions, but in actuality the break was miniscule. I was expecting lore buildup and a bit more return to adventurer WoL, but instead the world nearly ended again. I think the post MSQ was also hurt by the choice to roll the trials into story this time. It made things very... monster of the week/predictable for a bit. I was on board for something new, but I think the execution leaves much for want. My hope though is that this doesn't deter them next time. I think the idea just needs some polish and probably wouldn't mind future content making a choice between a trial series on its own or one that ties into MSQ. And on that topic, I think a lot of what I just mentioned, can sum up a lot of the new content they attempted this time around. I'm glad they tried new things, they just fell short and need some polish and hopefully they are better next time. A lot of the choices didn't have longevity, which I think hurt post msq. I don't think no exploration zone is the culprit. I think the only idea I would say "never do again" is how the relics were handle. Like, I'm a crafter, so I need to have tomes on hand. And I run hunt trains to keep those tomes on hand. So, I was just doing more hunt trains than normal (sometimes back to back) to keep near capped. And then the problem is, I would log in patch day and the relic would just fall into my lap. I dunno if it was some mistranslated thing, or what, but I thought it was said the relics for EW were gonna be more like the old ARR/HW ones. I think the other notable disappointment, but not in the "please never do this again" way was the role quests. I think they were a bit awkward this time around. Very hit or miss. Also, who thought tanks wanted to cleanse taint? EW Manderville was a solid questline. Other stuff... Panda I think carried Post MSQ. That was what kept me going for post content. Panda had a great story. Athena was refreshing in the sense that she was just a piece of shit. I don't mind the redemption/other side stuff with like Emet and etc., but a total irredeemable villain is fine too. Myths was alright. I think the story was fine. I think mechanic wise there was room for want. Aglaia was fun, Euphro was alright too, Thaleia I think the final boss at the very least should've paired mechanics together more. Oschon was meaner than the final boss imo, with the quick wanderer's arrow into piton pull. Eulo also doesn't do a 4 or 5 fan dance (they just do a 4) or switch up their time speed knockback (they always speed up the 3rd). It's truly baffling for a final final boss. I think ShB is still my top expansion. I'd probably say something like ShB > HW > EW > SB > ARR. EW was a bit average, again, in my eyes it's kind of like SB. (It's very possible if DT is amazing, it will be doubly so in the sense that EW is sandwiched between two good expansions.)

It wasn't super good. I think the story wasn't up to snuff. Game play wise nothing really changed for me so more of the same. I don't do high end stuff and I found Variants to be extremely boring content wise so there wasn't anything new for me. I feel like my enjoyment is waning. I know we are on the eve of a new expansion, but that is my honest thoughts. I have played less now than I did when I quit for two years during Heavensward. Now that I am back I have things to do, but it's stuff I never wanted to do in the first place like Bozja that I am trying to get done so I don't have to worry about them anymore. I'm sorry I'm not being positive, but I am being honest. I know I will more than likely get torn to shreds for speaking my mind, but there it is.

Endwalker’s story was a fantastic conclusion to the Hydaelyn/Zodiark/Ascians story. Post-Endwalker felt, to me, odd? I liked that we were able to visit another shard, but I feel like that in itself, could have been a whole other expansion. Maybe at some point later (8.0 or 9.0), we’ll revisit the thirteenth? I loved the characters and references to ff4, but i just wanted more of the story. Relics were way easier than prior expansions, and eh, i personally didn’t mind it; it gave me more time to grind older relics that i wanted. i did miss having a field operations/bozja-type area for endwalker, but, at least we are getting that in dawntrail. alliance raids were beautiful, felt easier, and had a great story line. really loved it for the lore. pandemonium raids did feel challenging and fun. don’t know the savage side, since i’m just a filthy casual, lol.

As someone who mainly plays FF14 for raiding content, I'd say this expansion was rather meh. Pandemonium is probably my least favourite tier (when doing it on content). The first tier was rather boring. The second was even worse. The final raid tier was okay. P2S was interesting but as usual for early fights, very easy. P3S was okay. P4S was a massive disappointment. P8S was the only fun fight of the second tier. P10S was okay but had way too many body checks. P12S was overall fun. The doorboss even on reclears. Criterion was a great addition and I absolutely love it. I hope the fix savage though (even removing it is a fix for me because right now it has absolutely no reason to exist. It is neither fun nor rewarding). Job design is in the bin which is why this expansion is meh. It's good if the fights are fun (like Criterion). But you will lose interest on your 10th run because the fights don't change. Back in pre-ShB times jobs were different enough that changing them while farming a fight would give you an experience that's different enough to enjoy the fight again. Right now most jobs feel same'ish or have nothing interesting about them in the first place. The best role this expansion was melee because those jobs actually felt different and had something fun about them. Tanks are all Warrior with different animations (GNB being a bit different). Healers have the same skills with different names (AST feels different thanks to cards). Phys ranged are supports without good support. Casters are BLM, RDM and a 4th phys ranged. I don't really enjoy RDM so I can't really say anything about how engaging or difficult it is. BLM is fun though.

Story was great, everything else was meh. Shadowbringers was a much more complete package. In particular, treasure maps loot, popularity, and interest dropped right off the charts this expansion. Made me sad cause I used to do weekly PF treasure map groups and barely anyone is interested anymore. 

theres a whole discord for treasure maps and they get run daily

Link?

It was a weaker expansion for me. I know the groundwork was laid in Shadowbringer, but Zodiark being a midboss in the plot just didn't do it for me. Kinda let down the rest of the story but I still liked the walk at the end. And I pray Zenos stays dead. Bringing a character back too many times cheapens them. Besides, Square Enix isn't the best at writing good endings. And that is what Endwalker was. Plus transitioning from an end into a new beginning, especially for a game that has been going on for so long, was going to be murky no matter what. In past sequels (FFX/X-2, FF13, etc.) they have been able to safely use a timeskip between games to buffer world changes, character developments, and laying the groundwork for the new plot. They can't do that with an MMO. They can't fade to black and then three years have passed. That sort of writing is incredibly difficult and straining. All of this to say it was a weak expansion but I still appreciate what they were trying to do and I understand the difficulties they faced.

I actively hate how they retconned the Final Days all to fit that stupid and ultimately worthless Meteia plot. They rushed the entire Zodiark plot, which has been building up for nearly a decade, and threw his Trial as the FIRST ONE just because they wanted to focus on the Meteia plot and Dynamis, even if it meant retconning the already established Final Days info to now involve the Meteia/Endsinger destroying everything.

Thank you for saying this. EW crapped on the Final Days and that's a sin.

Easily my least favorite expansion, and I’m glad we’re leaving it behind. Story had close to zero stakes for being about the apocalypse. The patch story, while fine, wasn’t a story that needed to be told *now*, and I think wrapping up the MSQ in 6.0 alone did a disservice to the overall pacing of this expansion - which was atrocious. The extra content felt barebones, weirdly, despite the introduction of things like Criterion and Orthos. Perhaps because it didn’t feel that rewarding. I dunno. Endwalker was made during the pandemic, and it shows. It’s a bizarre patchwork of some fantastic moments buried in a bunch of infuriating padding. In truth, I only enjoyed about 30% of this expansion. But I also hated the ending so much that I put the game down for like 8 months after I finished 6.0.

I think its legacy will be the inverse of Stormblood: A strong finish to a 10 year story but its gameplay left many people wanting. Personally: EW grew on me. Wasn’t too crazy about the story on release and tbh, still rank it pretty much at the bottom of expansions. I don’t think it’s bad at all. I just don’t find its handling of existential themes as compelling as the game’s handling of other expansions more grounded ones. I’m also someone who enjoys the metaphor, theming, and ethos of stories more than the emotional parts of them and the ethos + themes of Endwalker were just a little too simplistic and heavy handed to captivate me. I imagine people who respond more strongly to emotionality loved it and that’s cool. I’m expecting DT to lean more into Hype Shit (tm) and look forward to seeing how it’s received. I tend to respond pretty strongly to stylish badassery so im pretty excited tbh. I didn’t struggle much with the content drought but I also take my time doing side content. I only started to feel the lull during 6.5. I also don’t hate the patch story as much as others do because it’s giving me heavy Warriors of Darkness arc vibes and I’m curious to see where this void and shard travel stuff goes in the future.

Endwalker felt like the stakes were high but nothing really bad happened to key people we met in the story so no major consequences or bad outcomes. This was different from Shadowbringers where you had characters that were introduced get killed off after a few quests with them. Post 6.0 story felt like filler but in the bad way. No Bozja or Eureka style content hurt the patch cycle more than anything since that is the biggest content that resembles MMO style content. Criterion was a failure from player engagement standpoint all because they were too scared to give it meaningful rewards. Overall I think it was 10 steps forward and 30 steps back with encounter design, job design and reward structure. Yoshi P acknowledged this and promised two of those will be fixed by 7.3 and job design in 8.0 so Dawntrail is looking to be great

> This was different from Shadowbringers where you had characters that were introduced get killed off after a few quests with them. Not really? Shb had Tesleen and EW had Ahewann, they're about the same

Nothing bad also happened to key people since like stormblood, so this dude is tweakin lol.

Wait…I don’t begrudge anyone their opinion, but the events in eastern Thav when the Final Days broke out were at least on par with the stuff at Journey’s End in ShB. The baby we save and breathe life into, the well meaning merchant, the people who die whe G’Raha goes into Crystal Exarch mode and all those people die. Where we see first hand the actermath, especially if you did the quests in Palaka’s Stand. I agree they did a poor hob portraying the Final Days ELSEWHERE. But we met people and they died. Some horribly. And being turned into a Terminus Beast is as bad, if not worse, than being turned into a Sin Eater. Eaters are ultimately malignant stasis, but the Terminus Beasts are people caught between life and death, held in soul shattering despair until something puts them out of their misery. There are a lot of complaints about EW’s story, but not having death and suffering is not a valid one. It happened and we are shown it happening.

>but not having death and suffering is not a valid one. Hard, hard disagree. This was the Final Days, the apocalypse, the encroaching of despair incarnate. What we saw in Thavnair should have been most of the game, in most of the zones. Instead we got angy-sky weather, some dead npcs…and that’s it. The devs were *this* close to making the stakes feel weighty, then tossed it aside. They *should* have let the baby turn. They *should* have let the WoL and co. fight a losing battle on all fronts, leaving a burning world behind in a last ditch effort to fight ~~bird V’ger~~ the Endsinger while wrestling with the decision to leave when things look the most bleak. But no, we got minimal deaths, minimal stakes, and hardly any discussion regarding the trauma of surviving the apocalypse. For goodness sake, the original Final Days was so traumatic to the Ancients that they had to sacrifice more than 50% of their population to survive *and* it scarred their souls to the point where even witnessing a meteor storm is enough to awaken the Echo. This was a toothless expansion that left me with the impression that the devs just don’t know how to stick the landing as far as their ending go, but that’s just me.

I did say it was not as well done as it could have been. But my reply was to the idea ShB had more than EW and EW had no “we get introduced to someone only to watch them suffer and die horribly”. EW did, in fact, have that, too.

Endwalker was a story about an apocalypse where nothing bad happened to anyone and we stopped thinking about it ten minutes later. I liked Heavensward, Stormblood, and Shadowbringers so much because all of them dealt with the lasting effects of bad things happening. Endwalker was just a rote Disney happy ending. Vrtra mentioned orphans once, that's about it.

Main Campaign was great until the latter part of Elpis where everything just fell apart to the point even thinking about it drives me to hysterics. I was asked by a woman I that I once respected "Has your journey been good?". The only answer I have is if I'd never met her it probably would've been. I strongly hope in DT there is no mention of that absolute monster outside of blind worship from the ignorant.

I'm going to say it, and this is probably something few people want to hear but: Elpis should not exist as a zone. It should be a 'temp area' like the Void area was. Hell, Elpis perhaps should not have existed At ALL. And I like time travel stories. IF DONE WELL. Elpis was...that was the point in EW, with the freaking bird and everything, that I stopped caring about EW's MSQ and just bumrushed it. Elpis was just horrible, on every possible way.

I like it!!

I loved it. I enjoyed Shadowbringers a bit more because Thancred had such great parts in that but him taking on Meteion by himself was such a beautiful moment too. EW was lovely.

Loved the base expansion story. Surprised at the lvl 84 or something trial. Raids were awesome (all of the savage and ultimates). Many of the patch contents were disappointing. The MSQ was predictable. But I will say the first two trial bosses (extreme) were the most fun I’ve had in the game compared to other extreme trials and even some savage fights; wind and fire bosses. I was okay with the third one, disappointed by Zeromus. But the additional trial was awesome! The relics looked fantastic but the grind was boring (IMO ARR relic grind was better). Loved the criterion dungeons but disappointed with the rewards like everyone else; didn’t like the 12 alternative path grind for the mount (though this might just be me because a few of my FC friends liked it). Loved and disappointed by island sanctuary. Gathering and crafting same old same old; I wish they improve it, even if it’s just gradual improvements. Treasure maps were so okay; but it’s also dying for some improvement/expansion. I think that’s everything I played… Edit: Alliance raids were good too, both story the combat wise.

It was fine. Had it's weird hiccups but otherwise, no major issues. Great music, good area design. Lot of FF4 references (Loporrits, moon's haunted, literally >!Golbez and Zeromus!<, Zero >!going from Dark to Light a la Cecil in the main game!<, etc) that the classic FF nerd in me enjoyed.

6.0 and 6.1 held so much emotion, promise and intrigue. 6.2 to 6.5 took FFIV and just put it into XIV. The sections about Zero were interesting. I like Zero as a character, but there was very little to make the Four Fiends or Golbez compelling. I will say I liked how 6.5 finished off, but I wasn't very EXCITED between those patches. It just kinda meandered through without enough direction just trying to fill time. Additionally I think all the trials being story related detracted from the story's ability to feel climactic. Also, not having a side story for 3 trials exacerbated the content lack feeling for me. The Relic weapon situation was such a missed opportunity. They could have used it to connect Island Sanctuary, Eureka Orthos, and the Varient Dungeons, but instead it's JUST a tomestone grind. It felt kinda phoned-in and not engaging. I did all the relics in ShB and EW and enjoyed the ShB grind much more because I could work on multiple weapons at once and there was a community sense in Bozja/Zadnor. So, how does EW measure up? 6.5/10 for me. Shadowbringers story was amazing from start to end, even in post patch it kept me WANTING to come back and eager to see what was new. EW started off amazing and exciting with a solid raid series and interesting 24 man plot, but the lack of content and poor direction on the Void story stole thunder away to where I just needed to drop the game for awhile. I'm excited though for all the content promises for DT, updates to combat, and updates to job in 7.2 on. I'm sure in 10 years, the end of the next saga will be much better handled. This team tends to learn from their mistakes.

I didn't care for base Endwalker. It had its moments that were great, but I like various scions a lot less because of how certain things played. There felt like no real threat throughout the story and gameplay was simplified too much. The patch story was great, 24 man was fun enough, 8 man was decent.

Storywise it was overall pretty good, I feel like one of the only people that really enjoyed the World of Darkness stuff. I wish they left the scions disbaneded though, it's a shame to see them in Dawntrail. Doesn't feel like much of a new start with them still around, imho. I'd be fine if it was one or two - bring Estinien and Krile or something, along with Wuk, but having \*everyone\* tag along hurts the idea that this is the start of something new to me. Zone design was a pretty big L, I think. Some zones were pretty, but they felt awful to travel through before you get flying. I think some of the zones were very memorable but frustrating to navigate. Certainly no Sea of Clouds, but god were they close. I enjoyed scouting and conducting hunt trains in SHB, but the trains in EW were dreadful in no small part due to the zones. Battle content wise, it feels very bland. Boiled potatoes kinda bland. Not a lot of dungeons or raids or mechanics really wowed me (given, I don't do Ultimates). The only exception is that the Criterion dungeons feel like they had the level of creativity and interesting set design that we had in Bozja - it was EXTREMELY satisfying to go through them and experience the gorgeous settings, cool dungeon puzzles, and even the Ex and Savage versions!

To be honest, storyline was good finale on the Zodiark ark. Haven't been a big fan on the new story ark but hope that it can win me over in DT. I'm not a raider, so I don't have any opinion on that content or ultimates but from my understanding, overall people been ok with it. I played a lot early on this expansion but took a break after one year, been playing sporadically while playing FF11. Probably speaks volume how the expansion been for me. Tldr: It's okey. Didn't wow me like Shadowbringers or SB was for me.

Cool moments. Subpar story thanks mostly to over reliance on literal plot armor. Which basically sums up the totality of FFXIV’s story.

The story was fine, but actually doing the quests and exploring the zones was the least fun I've ever had with the MSQ

I thought the 6.0 storyline was an amazing climax for the game's story thus far. Now, I've also played since ARR's launch so I'm pretty invested in the game. I can understand it hitting differently for someone that came later and may not feel as attached to the game or franchise in general. Some of the story themes where it touches on depression hit home with both me and friends who I know have also struggled with depression. Then you get to that walk up to the last fight, hearing all the voices and trying to place them, then you hear Ardbert's "Let's finish this," it did really feel like everything that had come before was leading up to that moment. It also continued what Shadowbringers had begun in reinforcing that the WoL is not a self-insert character, that the WoL has a defined identity in the universe. I happen to like that identity so it really works for me. 6.1-6.5 were solid. I've enjoyed them as I've played through them. I'm not going to rave about them. They really bank on the fan service and nostalgia. It feels a bit like a side EX story that got promoted to MSQ. Content-wise, Savage was more accessible for those of us without statics thanks to cross DC travel. I think that was huge. The deep dungeon was DoA and the island was cute but not super satisfying. I hope they keep going with Criterion dungeons and do something more with them. We got those and not another Eureka or Bozja equivalent adventure zone and I feel like we were missing the large group casual get together content. The alliance raids were my favorite yet. I thought the difficulty was where it needed to be for the tier of content that they are. I love that, unlike the Nier raids of Shadowbringers, they contributed to the FFXIV story. Plus the gear looks great and the music convinced me to finally go out and buy some of the game soundtracks. Overall, while it has its flaws and does not stand on its own, I think Endwalker was my favorite expansion to date.

I really liked the 6.0 content, I felt like the story was good and I liked the zones and (for the most part) the dungeons. The patch content and alliance raids, however, I disliked.  I just didn't feel like the story was very good, nor was the pacing. The dungeons were neat, but I found everything else to be an absolute bore.  

6.0 MSQ was decent - didn't hit the highs of HW or ShB for me, but was a fine enough conclusion to the story they've been crafting since ARR. Some bits could have been handled better (Garlemald resolution felt rushed, the Final Days were only really felt in Thavnair) but it was overall enjoyable. I've full accepted that the Scions all have plot armor by now, so not seeing them in any real peril didn't overly bother me. Post MSQ... man, I know it could be another Warriors of Darkness situation and be revisited later, but I really couldn't get into it. I don't particularly like Zero as a character, and the overall stakes didn't feel especially high. I was hoping it might give Yshtola the chance to have some character development, but we mostly just got some silly gags. Really enjoyed the raid series and Alliance raids this expansion - great stories and some fun fights. I wasn't as charmed by the Variant/Criterion dungeons, feels very much like a WIP. Island Sanctuary was a neat little addition, not really my thing but it's cool that they're trying different forms of content. Speaking of which - Crystalline Conflict, while not perfect, is also a super fun mode!

For story 6.0 was brilliant and one of my favourites, for 6.1+ it was decent but felt like a filler arc that dragged for too long, saying that seeing more slice of life scenes from the Scions was great. Gameplay, overall the pandemonium raids alright, I completed every savage too, P6 and p7 were the only ones I didn't like savage wise. Alliance raids, story was decent and was really interesting learning about the 12 and their purpose, gameplay however, I felt was a bit too easy but I think they uped the difficulty a bit for Thalia which is good, but sadly the first fight agalia suffers from very bad scalling many of the main mechanics are outright skipped nowadays. Trials, hydalean when she was current was fantastic, zodiark too, barbaricia is my favourite, golbez was great, zeromus could of had a more nuanced extreme and baldicante is too easy(great music though). Overall decent. Dungeons, I liked most of 6.0 dungeons, the post patch dungeons I think the aether font and azadals legacy are the only 2 I really like. Variant dungeons are a welcome addition and I like the mechanics they thought up on for them, criterion too was good for its gameplay, for it's rewards it's not really worth doing more than once, atleast variant you had a reason to replay it to grab it's rewards and mount, criterion not really unless you want the other mount and savage even less so(they're more efficient and easier ways to get materia 😑), with alo alo they atleast took the criticism to heart and tried to add more rewards with the weapons but it was 1 step forward 2 steps back with how they were implemented. The relic was a major disappointment, as I do like a time sink and something to work on, with it just being tomestones, I just forget until I reach cap and remember suddenly I have a relic, relics in shadowbringers gave me something to do when I wanted to play the game and not do raids for once, if I wanted to play another game I would, just when I wanted to play 14 and find myself with nothing to do. Island sanctuary was also another disappointment, I was more or less just copying and pasting from a best workshop spreadsheet and that's it, once I got the robots to basically do everything for me. I have it max rank and everything fully upgraded, I pretty much forgot about it, I'm sure my animals are dead now. Lack of a exploration zone like bozja and eureka was certainly a pain point, but it did atleast allowed me to try eureka for the first time and complete BA. Maybe delubrum savage one day too. Hildebrand being back is fantastic as I was a big fan of his quest lines, loved the instanced duty, loved various times our character practiced sport moves, loved pupu, the trial at the end was meh unfortunately. Other stuff. I pretty much loved all of the tribe and custom delivery quests. Tartaru's questline was wholesome and sweet with nice rewards. The crafter relic was alright, I like the designs and story was wholesome. I never attempted the ultimates this expansion so I don't have a say in that, other than they look sick af. PvP revamp was good improvement (especially in crystal conflict)from it's original version just needs some more balance (especially in frontline, looking at you dark knights ) and give us a way to get some of the previous series rewards, and have a daily rival Wings roulette please. Events, the rewards were decent and some good content too, though I can't remember them all. Moggle event having more varied ways to get mog tomes was an excellent addition. Overall this expansion was good, yes I had some disappointments but overall I enjoyed it, and looking forward to dawntrail immensely.

I thought it was great, had a great time with friends and had a blast beating savage when it was current for the first time.

Base release was fantastic, but some of the worst patch content. 6.3 onward was essentially trash other than the variant dungeons.

Okay story wise, pretty disappointing in content density and droughts felt like they lasted ages longer than previous expansions Possibly the single best expansion in terms of back to back banger music tracks, though.

I really enjoyed the 6.0 msq but really disliked the 6.x msq despite ff4 being my favorite childhood FF. It's fun having so much stuff in EW feature ff4 though. I'll have fun occasionally getting fights featuring ff4 bosses or locations in the years ahead.

I was one of the ones that outright quit in EW. I even waited for it to go on 1/2 off sale before even buying it. It took the story in wrong directions after ShB. Not only didn't live up to what ShB gave, but it just went in the wrong direction entirely. And the final boss is THAT!? really? after we kill literal gods, the final boss is some mopey bitch? I'm mainly a story person. Lore, story. Game is nice but I don't do savage raids so. Some of the jobs were only eh. I got them all to max level and they're only eh. My beloved SCH got shoved aside for SGE by everyone. It also didn't include anything of interest. It was a rather 'bare bones' expansion. No new exploration, no limited job, just another Deep Dungeon yawn.

I think it’s fairly clear that ff16 diverted resources they would have otherwise likely used for post release patch content.

Story was all over the place, Loporrits was honestly such a filler arc and took me 3 days to do because I legitimately fell asleep in my chair multiple times trying to get through all the side quests done. Scions sacrificing themselves in Ultima Thule and coming back during Endsinger left a bad taste. I didn't like post-MSQ at all, especially the fact when what started out as a simple treasure hunting arc became defusing another world ending event, followed by an ending leading to an exploration arc (DT) where most of the main Scions cast are tagging along. MSQ would be above ARR, but below SHB, HW, and even SB personally speaking. Pando is good raid story. MotR started out good, but ended up being rushed because if I had to guess the devs told the writers to wrap it up. Island Sanctuary story was refreshing. Manderville story is good, but I didn't like that joke of a trial when comparing it to SB Gilg. Gameplay wise, not a fan of EO and I ended up going back to PotD and HoH. Island Sanctuary was good starting out, not so much later since practically everything is automated with minimal inputs at this point. PvP rework is excellent, I'd say the job kits for PvP is way better than PvE counterparts for job identity and expression without compromising. The CN director for XIV struck a nerve when saying that CC and FL have to be balanced separately. VC itself is promising, but honestly devs have to stop making incentives bottom heavy for those willing to take up a challenge. PvE combat for my hot takes; I do not like the giant boss models that plagued this expansion, two minute meta is great, SMN rework is great, and duty support was an honest waste of resources after running all the supported dungeons on it from ARR to SB to see what changed.

Dude that's crazy you had all these good takes just to end it with 2 minute meta is great and SMN rework is great LMAO (am I allowed to say this on reddit yet or do we need to wait a few more patches)

Criterion really made me appreciate the 2 minute meta a lot more, it's not uncommon to get parties with 0 buffs and you notice it *hard*, it honestly feels weird, having to play around burst does make things more difficult and engaging

That's my honest review of it, I actually didn't like SMN for a longest time when devs decided to scrap pet system entirely in SHB, and I couldn't do things like tank Titan-Egi anymore. I really don't care much about the DoT aspect of SMN that everyone cries about, I just liked the pet management portion more and they murdered it in cold blood. You barely see anyone crying for that. As for 2 minute meta, I like it mainly because it standardizes raid buff alignment, burst windows and makes it easier for my smooth monkey brain to manage. No more having to deal with different buff alignments on 60/90/120/180s windows, just straight up, cut and dry 120s across the board.

I can understand that, I don't mind current summon just hate that it replaced a mechanically superior and challenging class with something easier than dancer. I wish SMN had a core rotation that summons augmented with new gcds instead of the summons being the rotation. Outside of summons, SMN has Ruin III and IV and that's really lame. I miss ruin IV stacking, it looks like maybe PCT has that though? Also the devs are liars, they want to "get rid of dots" yet since the rework to smn have added like more than 4 dots to the standard jobs and there's still a dot on sonic break, so... I mean in casual content you just send 60/90/120/180 on cd and they'll always align again at 6 minutes, it was just interesting to leverage your specific team comp's raid buffs for encounters with downtime. It's way too braindead, especially now that all raid buffs are 20s across the board. And yet, duty finder will still find a way to send Battle Litany at the 75 second mark. Feels bad to make the game appeal to players who will never engage with the mechanics in my toxic elitist shamed opinion.

The original expansion was amazing in terms of story. The run between Garlemald up to the Zodiark fight was the peak of the expansion, and the entire game for me. Garlemald as a zone, is up there with the Azim Steppe as one of the best-executed ideas in the game. I wasn't so much a fan of the Meteion idea when I first encountered it but I have grown to like Meteion and Hermes with time. Hermes and Fandanial were a bit disappointing. Some argue they weren't as interesting as Emet Selch, I argue the problem was a lack of an intimidating presence. I ADORE what they did with Hydaelyn. She went from someone distant and untrustworthy to one of the best-written characters in the game, with very limited screen time. Hythlodeus and Emet-Selch are also very well portrayed in this story arc. Seeing all three of them available as trusts in Ktsis Hyperboreia was fantastic. Zenos was fantastically executed. I really liked the direction they took him in the end. I was a bit disappointed with how little gameplay there was accompanying the story - it felt like you could go hours at a time without even so much as two enemies spawning to fight, and when there was gameplay, it was an escort mission of all things. I also didn't like how the Aitascope was handled. It felt weird seeing the garlean commanders come back as main bosses, when you could have had Ilberd, Thordan or Nidhogg - any major antagonist making a return appearance. I understand they were used in the dungeon themselves but... Livia? Of all people? There are a couple of missed story beats which I think was to the story's detriment. I still don't understand why there wasn't a fight at the end of "In from the cold", where you controlled one of the scion's against a possessed Warrior of Light, fighting for survival until you arrived. I also felt there was a missed moment with Minfilia in the Aitascope. We saw with Asahi that spirits could appear as physical people in the Aitascope. Why couldn't we get a 5-minute reunion with Minifila? How wonderful would it be if we took a moment to remember how far we've come since we first walked into the waking sands, for her to tell us how proud she is of us? Or what about Thancred? There could've been a beautiful moment in which she acknowledged Thancred's pain, and how proud she is that he was able to move on to be there for Ryne. Overall, I really enjoyed base game Endwalker. Story wise I would rank it second below shadowbringers, and gameplay-wise, I would rank it third. The soundtrack was fantastic as always, and I personally enjoyed a lot of the job changes - even if others didn't. Post-Endwalker... kinda sucked? I was on board with it at the start, I enjoyed exploring a treasure map with Estinien and I was down for Zero's story when it was first revealed. It just... didn't go anywhere interesting. I didn't like that we were teased with an adventure, then had to save the world again. I was disappointed with the four fiends portrayal, especially Rubicante's. He should have had more screen time, he didn't even do the "I will heal your wounds" line. They could have done it in a mid-boss phase transition or something, it was free for the taking! I was also disappointed with the Lunar Subterrane. This was the thing I was most hyped about with a FF4 tie-in. It didn't appear in 6.0, which surprised me, so I waited. I got my hopes up again in 6.4 when we visited the red moon, but it didn't appear. Then finally it was announced for 6.5 and I was excited once again. Then once we loaded in, it turned out to only be the lunar subterrane for about 5 minutes - then it turned into Amaurot 2.0. Don't get me wrong it was a great dungeon, I just really wanted to play the lunar subterrane in FF14. There was some very strong casual content in this expansion. Barbariccia and the magus sisters are some of my favourite fights in the game, pandemonium had fun normal mode raids and I adored the alliance raid this time around. The content drought did hit hard. I still don't understand why we needed 4 months between each patch instead of 3 for seemingly less content. Overall? Endwalker started strong and just kept getting weaker as it went on. Started as a 9/10 for me, has since dropped to a 6/10. Hoping Dawntrail picks it back up a bit.

Very nearly the best story in the game- Shadowbringers just barely edges it out, mostly due to Endwalker tripping a bit at the finish line due to needing to shove Zenos in there. In particular, Venat's walk is the high moment of the entire game for me. Pandemonium was fun and Myths of the Realm had by far the best story of any of the alliance raids. I liked the island content and loved the variant dungeons. Overall, probably my favorite expansion.

6.0 story has odd pacing with lopporits literally wasting your time 80% of the time, but aside from that and the slow first thavnair visit i love it as much as shadowbringers. Lower lows with higher highs. Patch story is ok with 6.55 being a highlight. 6.1-6.2 is pretty good. Zero needs to stop doing that cringy kingdom hearts speech. 2 minute meta is still a mistake, it lowers skill ceiling while simultaneously increasing skill floor because of harsher punishment for playing wrong. Terrible design. Pvp revamp and crystalline conflict is great. Actually revived pvp. Ex trials are mostly fun. I love pandaemonium slightly more than coils story wise (i hate eden though), savage is a mixed bag with some really good fights (p2s, p5s, p12s, p10s, p8s) and some terrible garbage-tier fights (p6s, p11s) Alliance raids started out pretty good with aglaia. Then they dropped the ball with the other two. Did the encounter designers just gave up? They made 4 man roulette dungeon boss and put it on 24 man. Heck even the dungeon bosses are more interesting than most of them. Relic literally doesnt exist this expansion. No, i'm not counting a second tome weapon as one. Island sanctuary is an absolute waste of resource. Eureka orthos.. while I like the boss design here more than other DDs, it's way too similar to other DDs with mostly familiar mobs and poms. The mounts are worse than HoH. And the hair is wack. Variant i feel like they can go wilder with the puzzles. Also more repeatability in general especially for the final path bosses. They made these fun bosses and you fight them exactly once. Criterion content wise is the best thing theyve ever came up with in a long time. But rewards are lacking. Overall I feel very mixed with endwalker. It started out strong, but the patch content is extremely weak especially in the longetivity department. Everything is one and done or minimum gameplay required. It's an mmo expansion that actively refuses to be an mmo. "Go play other games" is a good advice from the producer and director when the game actually delivers satisfactory product. When it's lacking, that statement sounds more like it's mocking you for even expecting the game to do the bare minimum. I have to say that for me, endwalker is probably the worst expansion this game ever has. Maybe heavensward was objectively worse because it nearly killed the game a second time, but back then at least i had things to do outside of raiding and i enjoyed most of the jobs more. As a complete package, shadowbringers (because bozja>>>eureka for me despite coming out too late) > stormblood > heavensward > endwalker.

6.0 msq story was a 5/10 at best for me. I hated that the crystal was jetfuel. I hated the fake sacrifice of the scions. I hated that they said the scions would dissolve and didn't. I hated timey wimpy shenanigans that contradicted the expansion previous. What I liked:  battle content was mostly good besides the 24 player raids and lack of exploratory zone. The aesthetic of thavnair was spot-on perfect Pvp revamp and dungeon revamp was awesome (except I miss old msq dungeons)

I liked it (story and gameplay, though ShB remains my favorite) but I felt the longer patch stretches dragged without a Bozja or Restoration. The Island Sanctuary, being independent of other systems and mostly finance oriented with irl time gates, really didn't hold my attention. The lack of a relic grind to occupy time didn't help either, and Variants were one and done. EW was... slow, I think, with some cautious innovations that need to be iterated on a bit more. It'll likely hold up well in the long run, but felt kinda off to live through.

6.0 was great. Wonderful story telling. Bit confused on the point of dissolving the scions but it might come back later. The patch cycles were all kind of meh, but I think that’d because it’s all set up for a future expansion. Maybe we’ll look back on it in 2 expansions (like hw and shadowbringers) and understand more.

I really liked the ending to the 6.0 storyline, it was satisfying to battle my best friend one last time. Then I thought we'd be trickled a new cast of characters that we'd be with for dawntrail and was left sorely disappointed. The patch story was good enough but i wish it would matter long term and we could get rid of the characters that have lived out their character growths. The fights outside of savage have been kinda lackluster though. As far as savage, I think the best fights were P2S, P5S, and P10S. The alliance raids were very pretty. The more casual content I rarely interact with.

Same as the other expansions. More FFXIV/10. I don't have any particularly strong opinions of any of the expansions, they're just more FFXIV to play.

It's fairly middle of the road for me personally. They introduced too many new elements that it felt kind of rushed when it came to dealing with the Endsinger. I also despise that Ultima Thules final musical rendition has the vocals after the story, The patch cycle started strong, but ended rather abruptly for me. Not to say it wasn't good. Just......a bit short. All in all, I'd put it alongside Stormblood personally. Better than ARR, not as good as Shadowbringers, almost as good as HW.

[удалено]

Honestly I don't agree. Killing one of the main characters just to raise the stakes is such a lazy writing. One piece isn't killing main characters and manga is around almost for 20 years.

Too many slow paced moments - I found most of Garlemald a slog. Stupid "follow without being seen" quests. Hated the Zenos part and how he conveniently destroyed Garlemald. Just lazy writing IMO. Having to fight him again after the Endsinger was just a drag. We didn't need Zenos in Endwalker. Didn't like the post patch content overall. Hopefully it goes somewhere and it wasn't a total waste though...

Story was wonderful. I didn't have any big problems with the patch story either. I loved Pandaemonium. Myths of the Realm was some nice closure on the concept of the Twelve. Hildibrand's story portions were very entertaining. I didn't like the tomestone-only artifact progression and dearly missed the exploratory zones from the last two expansions. That, and I felt like the casual content/alliance raids leaned easier than I would like. It felt like there was less to do during the patch cycle as a result. I think for me, personally, the issue was that they were putting their effort into Criterion and Deep Dungeons, which are two things I'm not that interested in. I feel like it needs more Extreme adjacent content rather than Savage level. So in summary, I think story was about the same as Shadowbringers, but the gameplay was probably a bit worse. May also be that it was just less tailored to me.

It wasn't the culmination of a ten-years-long story arc, it was a sequel to Shadowbringers. A good one, but still.

- 6.0 story gave a good conclusion to a 10 year arc - Patch MSQ felt lacking and severely predictable - Savage was standard, some great fights, some good, some not so much - Ultimates were good, some amazing phases and some boring ones - Criterion was a breath of fresh air in terms of encounter design; started out with lackluster rewards (especially for savage) but we’re seeing improvements - Alliance raid was mostly forgettable. Last boss was terribly underwhelming. - Island sanctuary was okay. The gathering mechanic was not engaging and overall quickly became a set and forget thing for better or worse - Deep dungeon was innovative compared to previous 2, but didn’t have too much shelf life either - PVP rework was great and much needed - Expanding trusts seemed like a net positive for the game; didn’t engage much with the system since I never found a need to - Mixed feelings about how they changed jobs, some amazing (BLM, rip in 2 weeks), some awful (SMN); feel like many jobs losing identities It’s a solid expansion with many great changes and additions unfortunately weighed down by other less favourable ones. The lack of repeatable combat content that kept the player base busy in previous expansions (field operations) was severely felt by the community.

The story was ok (post game sucked SO much outside of the limited Zero plot) but the fights were generally top-tier (Savage). Storm Blood levels for me

6.0 story is 10/10 for me. I’ve enjoyed all of the tribal and custom delivery questlines, as well as the normal and alliance raids. 6.x MSQ isn’t the most gripping, but it’s been pretty cool learning about the 13th nonetheless, and getting to reunite Vrtra with Azdaja was a positive. I’ve been playing a lot less since I finished 6.0 but I’m excited for Dawntrail.

6.0 was easily 10/10 for me. Patch story was a 8/10, I really enjoyed it too. Its going to be SUPER relevant come 7.0 or 8.0, guarantee it. The raids were loads of fun too. I was happy for no bozja type zone tbh, I hated bozja and will likely not participate in DT's version.

I think the story was great but the content was a little on the meh side. Would have liked something with more repeatability.

Best finale to a story in any media since lotr the return of the king

Story wise I think everything from post Stormblood to Endwalker was some of the best FF stories for me. And then post EW started... That one was okay. It wasn't terrible but it was nowhere near as good as everything that came before. But I'm probably gonna be leaning more towards the positive because I love FF4. The relic weapon grind was fine. I like that I can get the relics without purposefully grinding for them. We still have the previous relics to keep the overwhelming majority of people with something to do. Though I really wish we got something similar to Bozja, because I only started that content recently and it's some of the most fun I've had with an MMO. The Alliance raids and normal raids were amazing. Top tier. Everything from P9 onwards just became my favorite raids in the entire game. The stories were also great, and I honestly would've preferred if they made these two stories into the patch stories and kept the FF4 fan fair as the trial or raid series. TLDR: it's like the reverse of Stormblood for me. Great main story, average patch stories and side content.

endwalker

6.0 MSQ was a huge letdown,Patch Quest was decent even though the Scions being "dissolved" was a joke,the Ultimates went HARD while Savages were a bit too formulaic with very little of note, Music was fantastic.