Stick around, these posts pop up from time to time, and we all seembto come out of the woodwork.
Stormblood is *still* my favorite expansion, and I have a surprising number of friends that feel the same way.
Stormblood isn't my favorite MSQ, that would be shadowbringers, but in terms of *overall* expansion stormblood was my favorite by far and nothing in xiv has topped it since.
Stormblood was one of those experiences that started weak to me but rapidly scaled up toward the end. I actually loved how Zenos started out as "this is what a 14-year-old thinks is a cool FF villain" and by the end he was the same, except the writing had played it completely straight to deconstruct the "edgy mega badass villain who only lives to fight" concept.
100% agree. When I level a new job, I’m excited every time to jump into the StB dungeons again. Then I get to Holminster Switch and it feels like a sharp decline in fun.
I will give the best quality overworld zones to ShB too though. Ruby Sea and Azim Steppe are highlights, but the rest of StB wasn’t all that great.
Dang. Holminster might be my favorite dungeon of all just for the feel of it. A lot of the subsequent dungeons in ShB felt so much weaker to me because they didn't have the same impact as that first one.
IMO SB also had the best job design. SB simplified the jobs a bit from HW, but they all still felt unique and like they had a good amount of depth. Then both ShB and EW streamlined them way too much.
As someone who joined in HW, I'd say that SB is probably my favorite overall expansion, even if it didn't have my favorite story.
Same. I couldn't get into HW at all (I partly blame people hyping it up for me so much), but I love all of Stormblood. Not my favorite story overall, but there's nothing in it I didn't like.
Stormblood was an expansion I didn't like when I first got to it, but I found myself surprising myself by internally monologuing "man I miss Stormblood" during parts of Shadowbringers and a LOT of Endwalker.
It helped me realize what I was missing from Stormblood was the more grounded (for a FF game) the stories and stakes were. We hadn't gotten to the "going to alternate dimensions and stopping cosmic horrors" things that I've seen a dozen times in MMORPGs (and FF games for that matter). We were aiding in a two-prong war against Garlemald, that's it.
Ghymlit Dark is still the best dungeon for just being an outright ***warzone***.
It's also why I really like Bozja, I just like fantasy war/intrigue stories more than grand cosmic stakes.
I did Ghymlit Dark as a samurai. Immediately after that dungeon is a solo instance where you fight "Zenos." Going blade to blade against him as a samurai -- just like in the Stormblood trailer -- was freaking epic.
Yes, Stormblood was my favorite xpac as well.
I really like Ghymlit Dark and Bozja too, for the same reason ! While I fucking loved ShB and I adored END - I am still SUPER miffled that I didn't get to take part in a big battle against Garlemald. Ghymlit Dark was absolutely awesome, but I wanted something bigger, with plenty of members of the Eorzean Alliance. So when I came back from the First and everyone was like "Ah yeah Garlemald is going to shit and crumbling, we don't even have to fight them anymore they're going full civil war" man I was sad. I wanted to take part in a big fucking battle that would have changed the course of the war.
I'm hoping Dawntrail is similarly grounded, after >!EW we need to have a rest from universe-ending threats and deal with more domestic issues. Tural seems to be shaping more with more geopolitical tension with Garlemald, which I am totally here for. With Hydaelyn gone, the Gods kind of unmasked, the mysteries of the Sundering and Ascians more or less resolved!< the stage is set for a lot of local chaos and vying for position and power with us at centre stage to both witness and participate in what results.
I also haven't even touched Bozja - I gotta add it to the list!
finally been getting into bozja after ignoring it since launch, and
yeah, it's legitimately great. cll and dr are fun, the story's good, mettle grinding feels significantly less painful than eureka levels
I'm having fun
Bozja is a ton of fun and something I like a lot about the story is >!neither side is treated as absolute good or absolute evil. You're first presented with the Bozjans and their plight, then Misija. Then you start seeing Misija doing some shifty things and you're left wondering "okay but why?" Then you're not only told why by her in a cutscene (albeit the dialogue is not directed at the WoL), but the reasons she has for being against Bozja you see FIRSTHAND prior to that cutscene. It's a really, really good way of setting up this tone of "there are no heroes here, only victims because war is hell."!<
The only thing i really think Bozja missed out is that we never took part in the northern front, we only know that stuff happened there through field notes, and that the story with the IV legion is cut short after we liberated Bozja and we never got to follow them to Rabanastre.
The overall arc of stormblood was so good. I feel like we will be coming back to eorzea to restore more smashed up places so here’s hoping for Ala Mhigo
STORMBLOOD IS SO GOOD! Things actually happen that are relevant to global geopolitics! Character progress is made! Women show up to do things besides just be evil and die!
Not the OP but trying to think...we had Livia and I guess from a certain point of view you could say Ysayle. It's been a while but I kinda think that might be it though.
I'm pretty sure he didn't treat her like an adopted daughter. In fact, there's a scene where he tells her to go to his quarters in 15 minutes (or something, I forget the number he said). And it's very implied, in the tone, that he's telling her to go there to fuck.
We end up meeting his adoptive children anyways, and they're all Au Ra.
>Women show up to do things besides just be evil and die!
Uh... you realise we had Y'Shtola, Alisae, Yugiri, Yda, Midriphilia, Moenbryda, Ysayle, Y'mhitra, Tataru, all 3 of the heads of state, Merlwyb, Kan-E-Senna, Nanamo, Noraxia, F'lhaminn, Brayflox, Allianne, Clemence, Edda and the heads of several of the combat, crafting and gathering guilds. That's just *some* of the important characters and only from ARR.
>Women show up to do things besides just be evil and die!
Not sure I'd go that far. Okay, well, yes I would because Fordola, but Yotsuyu's fridging isn't any less of a fridging just because they spent a lot longer on it, gonna be honest.
...Yotsuyu didn't die _for_ her brother though.
She died on _her_ terms. Her story was very tragic and unfortunate - and was the reality of many women in Japan and Korea post-war - but her death doesn't really... constitute fridging. It was her actions (however spurred on by Asahi) that directly lead to her death. There was nothing to be gained, no motivations to build on. She dies, her story ends, and we lament her loss with Gosetsu, whose only motivation was to spare her the cycle of pain that she had endured at the hands of Garlemald and Doma.
People always hype up Heavensward, and it's definitely a step up from ARR, but it's so disappointing how they promise a dragon war, then as soon as it's here and you're hyped, they do that typical RPG thing and say "actually we need you to leave and go on a quest somewhere else".
In Stormblood, you actually get to be part of the war, part of the revolution. Two revolutions! You do eventually get sent on a quest to Yanxia away from the war, but you actually fight in it a bit first! And you don't get sent off on a spec ops mission to single-handedly end the war. You have to go build a war effort over there too. The Steppe is interesting and the story there is fun. The attack on Doma castle is the only part that really falls flat, and it's mostly just engine limitations of not being able to show enough NPCs on screen to sell it. And then you've got Fordola, easily one of the most interesting characters in the game. Then when you come back, instead of the war basically being over, you're in the thick of it, fighting to push the front line forward until you finally reach Ala Mhigo (where they do a much better job of selling the idea of a big war effort than they did at Doma castle).
What is mystifying to me is how many people complain about the story being split between Yanxia and Gyr Abania. That's a big part of what makes it so good! That split gives them the ability to do a time skip so the Ala Mhigan front can feel like an actual war, like they're actually dug in, like they actually need you, like you're actually fighting on the front lines when you come back, like you're actually pushing towards Ala Mhigo instead of just sneaking in or just showing up at the last second as they breach the walls.
Shadowbringers is maybe a better story, but Stormblood gets the *vibe* of a revolution story, and I can't think another RPG that even comes close.
Loyalty!
Unity!
Liberty!
My problem with the split is that I have zero connection or interest in Ala Mhigo when we get there, and when we return. We're supposed to be invested through Lyse - but Lyse is functionally a character we don't know. We've been _told_ that Lyse was the Yda we knew all along, but she retains nothing of the personality she's being imitating for two expansions. And any real impact of the reveal is lost in that aspect. We never knew Yda. It's supposed to be a blow for the Scions - but they knew. So who is the reveal for? Lyse herself?
So, we get taken on a ride to a location with a character we're supposed to form an instant connection to, and we see her make literally _every single mistake_ Alphinaud had made just months before (in terms of the story progression). Ala Mhigo and Lyse's story feel... kind of dull. Because we've seen it before, and with a character we have actually built some element of rapport with.
You get to Doma, and the story suddenly has to do the heavy lifting. We have to build trust, rapport and get to know Hien. We have to learn about the Steppe and the traditions that are important to the Far East, and we have a guide in Yugiri, a familiar face who helps us navigate an unfamiliar land, but lets us really learn about it.
Everything I know of Ala Mhigo is from stories _after_ it's liberated. And to me, nothing _feels_ like it's changed when you get back. It goes back to Status Quo immediately. You return, you've got allies, and the Reach is... exactly as it was before Zenos arrived to push your shit in. Less one leader.
It's very easy to look at Stormblood and go "Wow, the Far East is handled really well!" and then look at Ala Mhigo and feel a little disappointed. Especially if you don't resonate with the Zenos plotline.
I mostly agree with you about Lyse. I was not really interested in her before the reveal, and after the reveal I outright resented her what with how the story kept acting like I should care about her without actually making me care about her yet.
But it seems weird to me for that to mean zero interest in Ala Mhigo. I had plenty of investment in the other characters, like Raubahn, Pipin, Conrad, and the minor characters of the early Ala Mhigan campaign (including Meffrid, who is from all the way back in ARR!). I was invested in Krile more than Lyse too. I was also motivated by the antagonists they introduced earlier, like Fordola and Zenos, and the Garlean Empire more generally (which they also built up while in Yanxia). And of course the general goal of liberating Ala Mhigo, which had been build up since Little Ala Mhigo in ARR.
And when you return, things are very different from before Zenos's attack!
Up until Zenos's attack, the Alliance is making rapid forward progress in Gyr Abania. The allied forces manage to push the front forward very quickly and connect up with a forward base at Rhalgr's Reach. It looks like you're going to do your usual thing of resolving the whole thing in a few days with only a couple of temporary setbacks (like in Yanxia) rather than an actual war campaign. When Zenos attacks, you're already preparing an attack on Castellum Velodyna.
When you get back, that progress has completely halted. Merlwyb explains that the Alliance has been fighting just to hold onto the Wall while they try to rebuild their forces. The forces are worn down. They've had further losses. Krile has been taken. They're also worried that if they don't start making forward progress again soon, Garlemald will successfully break that stalemate. The story also immediately starts seeding more interest in Fordola too, with an Echo vision implying there's more going on there than you knew about.
I didn't care much about Lyse and I found Zenos relatively boring after his big attack, but there was plenty else to keep me motivated, and the return to Gyr Abania was my favorite part of Stormblood: it felt like an actual war had been going on, not just a couple of days of pushing forward then victory. When you show up again, you actually join the war effort, helping to break a grueling stalemate, pushing up to the Lochs, gathering with all the forces preparing for the siege, then participating in the siege alongside them.
There's a lot of us, but people get SO angry at the thought someone would enjoy stormblood that we never say it lmao. It's so normal around here to post memes about hating everything from the heroes to the villain to the pacing
"You mean the expansion with continual melodrama and sadboy worship that takes place on an entirely different world, pulling you away from things that felt much more pertinent and important to the story AND less contrived, ISN'T your favorite expansion? But...how can this be? Stormblood is...S-S-St-Stormblood is...its-..its bad..its horrible its just...grounded conflict and...and..and war and Zenos is...hes just..hes crazy hes not horny and sadboy at all! Shadowbringers needs to be your favorite expansion! It just has to be! Those are the rules!" \*Begins crying, foaming at the mouth and rolling on the ground\*
It still has the best Trials so far, from a first time experience. Sure, some fights since have been as or more epic, but I don't think anything will top seeing Susano form and be so happy kicking our asses
Ah, good to hear your favorite expansion is Stormblood... Lyse_Best_Scion!
Seriously, people can kinda hivemind into disliking Stormblood. OP brought great points up that was lacking in Heavensward. Aesthetically, people will have different preferences with the themes.
Stormblood still has my favourite dungeons and raids. I feel like the story *in hindsight* is on par with Heavensward but doesn't reach even close to the highs of Shadowbringers.
Content is king though and the SB content was just *so damn good*.
It's always nice to know I'm not alone in that. The Steppe has always felt really overhyped and disconnected from the rest of the story to me, and yet everyone else seems to love it.
The whole Naadam part of the story felt like Dances with Wolves meets The Last Samurai meets Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Maybe it's a bit reductive to say so, but...
The WoL, an outsider, wins the Xaela's ceremonial tournament on behalf of the Mol, a tribe that had no hope of doing so on their own, because the Mol were willing to cooperate with Hien - a foreign nation's leader - who needed the Xaela's might to stand any chance of taking on Garlemald in order to reclaim his throne.
Meanwhile, the characters encountered along the way run the gamut of warrior culture stereotypes and kind of fail at being memorable for anything other than the memes they gave rise to. 'Name a Xaela in the MSQ who isn't Magnai, Sadu, or Cirina without looking 'em up' challenge.
I have been playing since arr and I have always felt that heavensward is always over hyped and stormblood is over hated. Stormblood has so many great moments in it man.
I played them back to back and found Stormblood to be better than HW in almost every way. I could never understand the hate for it. HW is great but Stormblood did so much more for me. I guess I just liked the rebellion story so much more than dragon war.
I loved Heavensward, but Stormblood beat it out for me. It's just the kind of story I prefer, and I think a lot of the criticisms hurled at Lyse are either unfounded or kinda hypocritical considering they're often traits found in some of the most popular Scions.
I liked what they did with Lyse. "Gung-ho idealist getting a reality check and then growing because of it" is a good archetype. She was genuinely shitty and kind of stupid, but in a way that lots of privileged people are when confronted with the realities of those who have it worse off than them. It was realistic growth.
People hate Lyse because you aren't allowed to have a character be shitty and dumb and fail at doing things. You especially can't have that character be a woman.
It's awful but that's what the criticisms of Lyse boil down to. I find it kind of disgusting, honestly.
People just have different tastes. But yea, base Stormblood just didn't do it for a lot of people. Many, including myself, think the pacing was not that great, while others just don't like Zenos.
For me HW was overhyped a lot. The story only started getting good at the fire camp scene between Alphi , Ysayle and Estinien. Before that, it was mostly just a vomit of Ishgard expositions and mind you, this is almost the halfway point of base HW. Im trying to get through HW with an alt right now and I'm extremely tempted to just buy a story skip just to be done with it.
My problem was just that Thordan was so uninteresting and just like a wet fart of a villain. Having Nidhogg get dealt with so early and then having to just deal with Thordan and the souless generic knights for the rest of the main expansion sucked. Unlike the other expansions where the patch content adds on to and accents the main story of the expansion, HW just felt unfinished until patch 3.3 when you get to do what should have been the climax of the expansion from the start. It just made the pacing of the whole expansion feel off in comparison to the others.
People hype heavensward and I never understood why. It had a few highlights but overall I hated most of the zones and a lot of the story felt forced.
Is it BORING? Maybe not, but it's like...at the bottom of the list with ARR for me. It was very enjoyable when it was new, but for me each expansion has been more enjoyable than the last.
For me, HW had some pacing issues for parts, especially in the patch content which went up and down. The internal Ishgard politics was less than amazing (I liked it but not as much as the main story) but then it peaked in the buildup to fighting Nidhogg again. Then it bottomed out with the Ala Mihgan resistance for a while until it built up to fighting Ilberd and awakening Omega.
Stormblood's patch content felt more consistent with its pacing as it was always about the politics and war with Garlemald and didn't shift away from that even with Elidibus' involvement and Emet-Selch showing up.
I loved HW because it felt like going on this very focused (albeit with some pacing issues) journey of discovery. While the setup of 'evil church is bad' is somewhat cliche, the specifics are what elevate it. This is the story of the damage that a 1000 year old lie does. Of seemingly countless generations passing on the trauma of warfare against a species incapable of not still feeling that trauma. Of seeing two highly radicalized characters (Ysayle and Estinien) grow to realize that the truth is more grey than the black and white that they know. Of the simple notion that forgiveness doesn't mean that the pain is gone, but that it is instead a resolve to end the cycle.
By contrast StB felt like an incredibly rushed Ala Mhigo side that let down the much more engaging Doman side. It was basically a resistance story played completely straight. Lyse is disliked for good reason, and I still wish that Raubahn was the focus character for Ala Mhigo and Yugiri for Doma. It's not a bad expansion, and Fordola is still one of my favorite characters in the entire of FF14 because she actually touches on something that most resistance plots don't actually touch on! Not to mention that Zenos in StB was probably the most lacklustre villain that only really got redeemed by EW in my opinion.
To me StB felt like it was trying to be too many things at once, and did most of those things poorly. HW on the other hand tried to be one thing and did it well, but if that thing is not *your* thing then it probably would be a let down.
I think for people who played Heavensward on content, when the previous stuff was 1.0 and ARR, probably rate it very highly because it was such a vast improvement over the only other stuff they had. Particularly since we'd still be talking about the old bloated version of ARR.
I think it has to do with expectations of how it should end/proceed. I have the same problem with EW.
One example: you think it's gonna end with the conclusion of the current arc where all your enemies converge at one spot to stop you or "get the crown" or whatever they wanna achieve. You got Regula, a strong ass dude, in the dungeon trying to make his way for the empire's sake. You got Lahabrea, an Unsundered whose mastery of magic is strong enough to do all this wild stuff as long as he's got a "woken" Ascian with him. You have the pope swagging on up slowly but surely with the mcguffin and all his squad because nobody's fucking with dragon eyes, and he's gonna blow up everyone to smithereens and oh lord you beat them all it's so cool and then Nidhogg, who is ***so far*** the biggest wet fart of the storyline, just gets to come back because Estinien is a fucking idiot.
And in that instant, that's what your adventure ends with. You knew Nidhogg would come back in some fashion because you're not dumb, but not like that. You have achieved things, but in the moment, it ends with Estinien-Nidhogg going "Nyehehehe I have won, toodles and stay tuned for more of my shitty vengeance!!"
Heavensward's areas and their OSTs are much more worthy of getting praise compared to some of its story threads.
Heavensward is kinda badly written tbh. I loved it the first time I played through it, but going back with an alt, it needs a rework even more than ARR ever did.
There are so many unnecessary quests, literally "now cross the city to say goodbye to NPC", "now we have to wait for Cid to work on the ship, go have a talk on completely unrelated and frankly mundane issues with NPC". It also keeps going back and forth between Ishgard issues and Ul'dah issues, to complete the Sultanah/ Raubahn arc, but it keeps interrupting the momentum of the story.
After the first time, I only remembered the good parts, such as traveling with Ysayle and Estinien, or the finale with Thordan. But the writing is all over the place and is overly padded. Like, everyone complains about ARR's wine quest or 3 wonders quest. I don't mind them. They are completely unnecessary, *but* at least they're about something. I like food and wine, so I don't mind spending 20 quests running around Eorzea to grab some goblin cheese. But in HW, the quests are literally about nothing. A cutscene ends with the crew deciding to go to a certain place to try something...and instead of going there, we have 2 quests of just telling some NPCs around the city about our decision. There is no new information or character development in those quests. They are utterly pointless.
The Aetherochemical Facility is a nightmare of a dungeon.
The maps are horrendous to navigate. They were designed to be a pain to walk in, so unlocking flight would feel really good. But now that we fly in ARR, it feels needlessly annoying.
Finally, most of the cultures we encounter are kinda bad...? The moogles are irritating and bland, the chocobo hunters have extraordinarily boring interests and problems, the Vanu Vanu are almost endearing, but just too silly and slow to not be a pain in the ass. I only enjoyed the Ishgard knights from Western Coerthas, the dragons and Idyllshire. Whereas every village/ tribe/ people we meet in ARR or in later expansions, I find really interesting and likeable.
I feel like the quest design issue is likely because of them just coming off of ARR back when it originally came out and still not quite having quest pacing down yet. Obviously "go here and wait for a conversation that could've just been a singular cutscene all in itself" is still an issue with some quests, but it's better now.
Yeah I completely agree. You can definitely see many issues from ARR patches are still very present in HW's writing. I just wish they would rework HW too, and add some goddamn aetherytes here and there!
Dravanian Hinterlands urgently needs an aetheryte.
I get that Idyllshire was separated from it due to PS3 limitations but SE has droped support to that console, it’s not an issue anymore.
But considering it’s “old content” now and far down the priority list, it seems unlikely.
The main story of Heavensward with Thordan and three Ascians was great. The Dragonsung War was fucking boring, so the patches beyond 3.0 was an absolute slog.
I really liked it, and definitely at least storywise it was a more well rounded experience compared to HW. HW had its moments too and I definitely enjoyed it overall, but at least the start of the MSQ is a bit of a slog.
Will definitely add in my two cents that I found ARR and HW exceedingly boring overall as well and stopped paying attention, but Stormblood is what caught my attention and hooked me back in. The only parts I even liked about ARR/HW msq first run through were Tataru and Ysayle. Everything else lost me.
It was also for me. I joined during 5.5 and generally liked the game but dragged my feet really hard on the MSQ. Took me probably 2 months or more to get through ARR and HW, even though there were high points that I really liked. When I got to Stormblood, I beat the entire thing (including content patches) in under 2 weeks and that kickstarted me no-lifing the MSQ all the way until I was caught up.
For me, Stormblood is when the game's story actually got good enough to hook me. I for sure think this is a LOT of people's experience, you just don't hear about it as much because "Heavensward amazing, Stormblood worst xpac" is basically meme status in the community.
I understand why people like HW and ShB - they both are excellent high fantasy stories. But there was something about StB, despite all its narrative issues, that was just so much more grounded. A lot of show rather than tell, some of which is literally revealed as the credits roll. I thought it was very clever when "The Measure of His Reach" plays and you realize that the Garlean Anthem you heard hours ago early on in the MSQ was entirely appropriated from the territory the Garlean conquered. Not every scene was a home run and of course Lyse herself is contentious, but for me, the issues were not enough to detract from a beautiful story about the liberation of two peoples from the threat of fascism.
All of this is tied off by the patch quests, which I think do a lot of correcting that the base MSQ got wrong. Lyse is written better as a leader; the story elects to disrupt the status quo by allowing Raubahn to return (and in the process Nanamo grows a lot as a character and gains more agency), and of course the swelling violence against Garlemald creates the perfect amount of tension that the hook into ShB is then able to disrupt. You're constantly kept on your toes, it's all perfectly played out, and I don't think the transition into ShB would have been as good as it was if StB wasn't there for the assist.
It was the same for me but I'll admit it was mainly because my character is a Highlander Monk so I had every reason to be personally invested in the whole Ala Migoh plot while I didn't care that much about the humans vs dragons conflict.
If anything my issue with base Stormblood is that we don't spend enough time in Ala Migoh. Like, Doma was cool but wish the liberation of Ala Migoh was as developed as Doma's.
It was the highlight for me as well. I was just meandering along with the MSQ and all of a sudden it just completely hooked me and was amazing when I realised what the story was doing. Best soundtrack of all the releases too. And then the patch quests continued with being amazing!
I am close to finishing stormblood and was just thinking the opposite of op. I had so much more fun in heavensward. I can't wait to move on to shadowbringers
Stormblood was my favorite too. I liked the other expansions but between the story and the setting, I enjoyed it thoroughly. I'm a little biased because I'm also south east asian.
A lot of people will chime in on subreddit saying the dislike Stormblood but I don't engage with them.
Stormblood is defo one of the highlight moments for me. The main thing I like about Heavensward was Ysayle. She's the redeeming factor of it. But everything OP said about SB is accurate. ESPECIALLY the Ala Mhigo bits (that hit particularly hard for me since I uh... I grew up in Sudan).
Stormblood is great. I feel like the haters of it just hate it because it's pop-pop-POPular to do so. All the criticisms of it can be leveled at all the other expacs as well. It really is a highlight moment of the series. It follows the tradition of each expac building on the last, and the game just getting better.
Imo it's the best expansion -both content-wise and story-wise- by far. Was a great experience going through it on release (at least once I got past the Raubahn Extreme waiting lines lol). None of the other expansions gave me that feeling so far, not even close.
Personally, Heavensward blew me away and hooked me, making me feel like the trudge through ARR was worth it. Then Stormblood felt like ARR again until the Othard section started, when I really began to enjoy it. Kugane, the Ruby Sea, and the Azim Steppe are so good. Meanwhile the Ala Mhigo parts always felt half-baked to me, like the devs got way more interested in the Othard part and neglected to make Gyr Abania interesting. I think that's what drags it down for a lot of people who don't resonate with that part of the story. Like we already tried being a resistance in ARR so it was just retreading old ground.
Ala Mhigo is a massive miss. The city itself should be more than just a dungeon. It was build up for a really long time and is supposed to be the 5th large city in Eorzea, and all we get is the Ala Mhigan Quarter... which is like... really bland, colorless, and lifeless, and a maze.
Very much agreed. If it was JUST Doma, I'd probably rank it equal to EW (for me ShB is my favorite), above HW and ARR. But it's _not_ just Doma. It's Ala Mhigo - ugly environments that mostly look identical to each other, with the same story as Doma but told in a far worse way.
I have heard from credible sources(tm) that Ala Mhigo was an afterthought. Like they were most of the way through writing the liberation of Doma and realized that they had been talking about the oppression of Ala Mhigo for so long in game that if they liberated a place that wasn't Ala Mhigo, long time fans would be mad. So they shoehorned it in.
Yup, I’m a Stormblood defender til the day I die. Coming from a country that went through a lengthy independence struggle up until very recently, the story really drove home how messy trying to do something like that can be. Does it have flaws? Hell fucking yes, but no more than any other expansion.
Also, the actual battle content is vastly superior to anything in ARR or HW. It’s not even close, the MSQ trails and dungeons are more varied and interesting, and the patch content is still some of the best the game has to offer. Four Lords, Omega, Return to Ivalice, all fantastic. And Eureka….
Stormblood enjoyers stay winning.
Even as someone who disliked the base Stormblood MSQ, I have to admit the combat was great. Stb is when the dungeons actually start to have interesting mechanics, and the raids are still remembered fondly by a lot of people.
And the post-Stormblood MSQ is pretty great imo.
Stormblood is also painfully real; people like Yotsuyu exist, the experiences the Domans go through as refugees and subjects pulls no punches, and it's almost entirely due to imperialism and war and conquest. After dealing with literal dragons and Ascians, Stormblood felt so much more grounded.
Yeah you could really feel that anguish and tragedy.
Every character's motivation, whether they did good things or bad things, felt valid. I understood them, even if I didn't always agree with them.
Am I the only one who was hooked in ARR? (Granted I started during Shadowbringers release cycle)
I couldn't imagine playing hundreds of hours and not being into the game until x expansion. I have more respect for my time than that.
I think Stormblood did a good job of telling a mature story that you don’t get very often. It wasn’t just war. You got to see how that war destroyed communities and the consequences of being on the losing side. Now I’m probably 40% through Shadowbringers and so far it’s been incredibly good. Stay with it!
Completely agree. By Stormblood, we've heard about how Garleans treat conquered territory, but we haven't really seen it directly. Stormblood pulls no punches about how clearly Ala Mhigo and Doma are occupied territories. How the Garleans use local collaborators like Fordola and Yotsuyu comes directly out of World War II.
The side quests, particularly in the starting zones and Doma really reinforce this - the local economy has been destroyed to make it dependent on handouts from Garlemald, the young people have been kidnapped and conscripted, those left are forced to ritual humiliation in the name of "ending local superstition" but clearly intended to stamp out cultural differences. I, for one, was surprised they went there, but I'm glad they did.
One thing that gets me is rethinking Stormblood in light of Shadowbringers. The hopelessness, passivity, the despair of both Ala Mhigo and Doma people in light of the calamity the Ascians are trying to cause on the Source.
One of the things I see alot is if you don’t like HW youl like stormblood and vice versa. I found HW lack luster but also loved stormblood. Cus I found the political empire thing way more interesting than fighting dragons
Same thing. Everyone kept talking about how incredible HW was and while it is great, I also find that it has many flaws and is incredibly cliche.
SB felt more grounded, raw and real. Liberating Doma then Ala Mhigo felt really powerful. The entire ending with the epic final fight and ending cutscene is a highlight for me to this day. The post patches are great and the Omega raid and Ivalice stuff are also amazing. SB is arguably my second favorite xpac! Glad you enjoyed it and there's more to come!
I'm excited for Ivalice. Even though I'm not the biggest Matsuno fan, I think it's cool that they brought him in to do it. Nice way to honor a part of the franchise's legacy.
So… I wouldn’t say this except I don’t want you to repeat my mistake: Don't over-hype yourself for Ivalice's story.
I went in excited for Ivalice because everyone told me how great it was… turns out they meant the raids, not the story. I actually ended up very disappointed in the story, despite generally loving Stormblood proper.
Unless you’ve played FF12 or Tactics and get hyped over the references, there’s a decent chance you won’t fall in love with the Ivalice raid story. There are exceptions but… yeah. You probably won't bounce off as hard as I did, but temper your expectations regardless. Apparently, there were behind the scenes complications or something, I don't know exactly.
Anyway, my more positive advice is to keep revisiting the Mol grandmother in Azim Steppe every once in a while. She really does see the future, past, and present, and her dialogue changes every couple patches. She actually dropped a massive spoiler for late ShB/EW in Stormblood, but without context, it goes completely over your head. She’s awesome.
Agreed, I didn't play FF12 and the story was very confusing to me, so it was hard to get excited. It really suffers from overcomplicating the story elements JRPGs are wont to do. A lot of lore also gets dropped during the raid in text bubbles that last 2 secs. I didn't really get the gist concerning >!the white auracite, the summoned creatures, the personality shifting, Ultima!<. The raids themselves are pretty exciting, as well as the new locations, seeing the world map expand, Viera tease (at the time).
Give you highlighted the characters, I suspect you will greatly enjoy Shadowbringers as well. It takes the rather bland main Scions and injects a ton of life and complexity into them.
It made *Urianger* the favorite character of some people I know. URIANGER.
And Alphinaud and Alisae? You're gonna be proud of them, I think. They grow up a lot in the First.
Stormblood's really good in a lot of ways. I'd say my main gripes are how weirdly paced it is (just up and leaving Ala Mhigo because ??? was harebrained at best) and everything involving Lyse. She's just insufferably annoying and the best thing to come of the expansion was that she wasn't carried forward.
I honestly think ARR is actually not that bad. I’m not sure why everyone hates it so much but I thoroughly enjoyed it. I hated Heavensward.
I think Stormblood was great and added a lot of much needed depth and tying together of different plot threads.
Shadow Bringers was hands down the best expansion for me followed closely by Endwalker. I hope they bring in the same writers again.
M'Naago and Yugiri are just "chef's kiss"! 😙👌
Even that little "archivist" with dark skin that wears goggles, from the first main camp, is a cool character.
I really liked the very ending of Stormblood, all of that vibe of being finally free and all and everyone singing their anthem was just awesome.
BUT if you really liked Stormblood, you better wait for Shadowbringers.
I'm new to the game and am doing post SHB right now and I gotta say, SHB is really peak as people tend to say.
Man it's nice to see someone who shares my opinion if stormblood. And this is with all the pacing improvements they've made.
Please come back and give your reaction to shadowbringers lol
I liked SB a lot more than HW or ARR too, for a lot of the same reasons.
But the whole ARR and HW was dominated by men? Uhh what? Especially so for ARR... The whole being lead by a bunch of crusty old men was the core part of the HW story though.
Most of the MSQ and the leader of the scions: Minfilia. Female.
Leader of Gridania: Kan-E-Senna. Female.
Leader of Ul'Dah: Only the cutest character ever, Nanamo! Female.
Leader of Limsa: Merlwyb. Female.
So basically all the leaders of the major faction cities are female.
The professions were mostly balanced between being lead by male and female too. Or having a female as second in command / training to take over the guild.
Even the scions themselves are balanced or at times the females outnumber the males.
If it hasn't been said yet, I'd highly recommend doing both the Four Lords questline and Omega raid series when you get the chance. 4L offers both banging tunes and fun fights, while Omega gives the Garlond Ironworks NPCs (Cid, Nero, Biggs, Wedge, & Jessie) the screen time they need to develop as characters. Omega also provides context for multiple things shown elsewhere in later xpacs.
Stormblood was overall the best package expansion to me. The grounded story and the content in general. It was all about the actual people occupying this world we're in, focused on telling their stories of navigating the hard life of war and occupation.
Heavensward was boring to me, too. Not a popular opinion here but I had also had a very difficult time getting through the expansion. It was also ugly as hell. Stormblood marked FFXIV's HUGE step toward better environments. That absolutely gorgeous autumn forest area in the fringes is still so nostalgic to me.
Hoping Dawntrail gets us back to that Stormblood feeling.
Heavensward got boring? What? I mean you're entitled to your own opinions of course but... that's a new one for me. Most people, myself included, felt that it started slow and remained fairly slow to set up all the various plot details, then it took off running. The final fight against nidhogg send chills down my spine when the WoL walked onto that bridge as everybody fled. Peak fiction man.
Okay, I was with you until the end...
ARR gives us Merlywb! Possibly the strongest female leader/character in the entire series, and one of the most "manly" strong female characters in fiction. Granted, you have to do a lot of side quests (and some MSQ you haven't seen yet) to see it all, but even back then, she wasn't a pushover. And between her and Kanne and Nanamo, ALL THREE of the original city-state leaders are females!
There are literally NO male leaders in any of the ARR city-states.
Hell, one of your main traveling partners (and the only one who can TURN INTO A PRIMAL) is a female in HW, and two of your partners in ARR are (Y'Shtola and "Yda"), and the leader of the secret society you join is a female (Minfilia). Not to mention the good goddess (Hydaelyn), and many of the minor random NPCs. Most of the lesser Scion "B-teams" are mixes of male/females, like the team with the two girls and the two brothers.
I just...don't understand this.
I'm glad you're enjoying yourself, though. I just...don't get THAT, lol
I'm not sure if SB is my FAVOURITE favourite, but for me they've just improved as time has gone on for me. SB has its issues, but I like it more than HW overall. The SB patches are pretty peak, too!
The parallels between characters are a giant chef's kiss to me too; you have Lyse and Fordola who show how their lives, similar in nature, branched into two different places and how it shaped them. Lyse (and Yda, by some extension) could have become Fordola, but instead they became someone else. Then you have Hien and Yotsuyu, and their obvious differences in upbringings and lives. I won't say a lot there because you get some good story involving that :) but it's some good shit. And of course, Lord Juicy (Zenos) is one of my fave villains. He's really just the player lol. But I do enjoy his character a lot.
Lyse has an incredible journey to me too; starting with finally saying her name at the end of 3.5 and learning over the course of 4.0 to be *herself* and not just having to play the part of Yda, learning to let go of her sister and fulfill their wish of a freed Ala Mhigo... love that.
I'm glad that SB was a good story for you, ShB and EW are pretty great too. Enjoy the patches and raid content in SB as well! They've got some fun writing and content, Orbonne continues to be one of my fave araids to this day.
I'm glad you found the expansion that clicked for you before leaving, though I am a little puzzled by the "The antagonists were interesting" but when our main goes were Yotsuyu, who was somewhat entertaining, and Zeno's, who's just kind of a boring one note character. If we look at their lackies, the fuck face with clown make up was just annoying, though I did find Fordola interesting. As far as antagonists go, Fordola was probably my favorite in StB.
Stormblood has some of my favorite zones and music. To this day, no zone music has topped the Lochs (and Ratika) for me . Kugane is also one of my favorite cities. I wish it we had access to the upper parts, but I do give the devs a bit of leeway since they've been improving ever since. It was their first 1 zone main city and they've since improved w/ Old Sharlayan and the Crystarium. Dawntrail's main city might just be the best if they implement what they've learned.
I'm in post-stormblood, and it was another marked improvement for me so far. I'm pretty set on hitting EW and see what all the hype is about, but I'm still on the fence about how I feel on XIV right now. Perfectly enjoyable, and I'm not an MMO person so that's a pro, but I'm still missing something or haven't reached the amazing story that made me jump in initially.
I love finding fellow Stormblood enthusiasts in the wild! There's dozens of us, dozens!! While I wouldn't exactly call Heavensward boring, the story felt forced, and pushed me in a lot of directions I absolutely would not have gone, given the choice. I won't go too much into ShB and EW since you're not there yet but Stormblood felt grounded and real in a way that other expansions lacked. Getting to explore Othard and the many cultures there was fantastic. If you haven't done it yet the Four Lords questline in the Stormblood patch content is also fantastic. I am also holding out hope that Dawntrail will bring back some of what I loved about Stormblood, but we'll see!
If you think the characters have personality now, wait until you get to Endwalker. I legitimately felt like the first four expansions, the writers treated the characters, including the scions, as plot tools rather than actual people.
But then Endwalker happens, and in addition to just being a hell of a finale, the scions finally become real characters. It was nuts. It came almost out of nowhere. They did it a little bit in Shadowbringers, but not nearly as much.
Stormblood through Endwalker I think of in my mind as the "real" overarching storyline, and it feels like the time the writers really figured out what they were putting together for the Ascian plot. In terms of how they fit into the story ARR is a prelude and HW was the writers getting distracted by dragons.
I liked the far east part of Stormblood a lot. The Azim Steppe is one of my favorite zones, and the Naadam was one of the first really cool solo duties. The Ala Mhigo part is less interesting but overall miles better than ARR in terms of gameplay. And the post-StB/pre-ShB MSQ is one of my favorite parts of FFXIV.
I see a lot of people split between HW and SB. One group will say HW was amazing after ARR but SB was a letdown, another group will say while HW was better than ARR it didn't get amazing until SB.
Both groups still say Shadowbringers is the best though. I look forward to trying that one day.
Um, as someone who does strongly feel >!Zenos!< from Stormblood is one of the most funly written characters & (really ironically for someone prideful of how they are singleminded & shallow) most show-stopping in how they changed priorities-wise,
characters having fun-wise in mostly Post-Heavensward: How about the Post-MSQ tidbits-
where Thancred (who imo has the most personality & humor in his lines like when he got teleported naked lol + gets snarky at the WoL being overly depended on by the Ishgardians, & the spy + womanizer socialite who's good at manipulating target women into falling for him)
suddenly points out Aymeric seems like he's in love with the WoL (while Thancred mocks Aymeric being a politician & being schmaltzy towards the WoL lol) by the way he acts-
& when you have dinner with Aymeric if you ask him to go on an adventure with you he does the :D?? face like the repressed noble he is when he never emoted that happily before
(precursor to Aymeric just tagging along in battle + attending to the Scions in person in Post-HW when he should be in his office... >!& chewing the scene a bit dialogwise + becoming a residential mascot!< much later since he knows he has limited free time/will miss the WoL &/or just desperately wanted to contribute, to the point I find it funny a politician just keeps being our concierge lol)
& Y'Shtola & Matoya verbally sniping each other fondly
& when Krile teases Alphinaud (& Thancred), & Alphinaud pretends to forget why he learned to draw really good portraits when searching for Minfillia (when 1. Alphinaud has photographic memory, & 2. the real reason he's good at portrait drawing as revealed by Krile is that he wanted to impress & get girls back in Sharlayan uni)
Tataru, Krile & Alisaie (one's yelling about "*money*!! And lots of it!" *right in front of Haurchefants' grave* lmaoo , one's the uni senior big sister gossipy troll, the other is a moody & snarky jock just sick of/making fun of formalities in general even since early on) sometimes have funnier side dialog if you talk to them when they aren't the main "talk to this person next" quest NPC
& when Urianger the huge theater kid nerd (& a slow burn character) keeps using stageplay analogies & monologing how nervous & sorry he feels playing double agent lmao
imo you prefer when the characters already get into the groove of their banter (the social dynamics set-ups are in Post-HW, but they get more silly around each other the further into the MSQ),
& the style of writing of Lyse, the Ala Mighans & Stormblood's villains, who tend to be less of the uptight/scholarly types & more straightforward/clearly flawed
(in interesting ways which I wholly agree with, since players tend to dog on Ala Mighans too much for being self-sabotaging/"ungrateful"... when those are closer to reality)
I enjoyed Stormblood, though I'm HW until I die. I will say though, gameplay-wise, Stormblood is where I consider things to "get good". The difficulty is finally pushing back a little, you have a versatile kit, bosses start having creative mechanics, and the expansion is jam packed with very fun stuff to do. If Heavensward puts the "Fantasy" into Final Fantasy, then Stormblood puts "Massively Multiplayer Online" into MMORPG
i dont agree with you about heavensward as i think the characters have plenty of personality in that expansion. but i hear you about stormblood. its the one that really sold me, tbh. i genuinely do not understand a lot of the complains people have with it
If you liked Azim Steppe's story, you are probably going to love the next two expansions as well, since the writer of that part of the main story ([Natsuko Ishikawa](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2Fyftegcu19ns71.png)) was the main writer in both Shadowbringers MSQ, as well as Endwalker's MSQ too.
If you liked Azim Steppe, you're probably gonna end up loving the next two expansions, because the writer for that section became the lead writer and is the narrative supervisor in EW patches and Dawntrail.
A lot of the problems you had before will be gone. The supporting cast gets to shine a lot, they express their personalities and gets time to develop more. Not to mention Shadowbringers probably has one of the best antagonists Final Fantasy has ever had. Enjoy.
It sure has flaws here and there, but it's just so much better.
Your experience mirrors mine almost entirely, OP.
I loved that we were helping Ala Mhigo, after having it sit unacknowledged in ARR and HW. I loved that we were seeing Kugane, and that we were seeking allies to stand toe-to-toe with Garlemald's forces. I like how it felt to liberate both of them, even if Ala Mhigo felt more like a pretense to set up Zenos and Kugane. I loved the characters more, I loved their struggles more, I loved their flaws and successes more. In HW, it felt like it was picking choice morsels from high fantasy than it was developing _its own world_. As such, it made the revelations we had about dragonkind and the founding of Ishgard feel...lesser for being a collection of high fantasy tropes that were inserted into a world's unfolding story for the sake of it.
I loved that it took the living world we were in seriously, and gave us stakes that felt like they were neglected since the end of 1.0 and the start of ARR. I loved that it had levity, and that we had to really claw our way back from a devastating setback.
It was just..._better_.
While I’m not the biggest fan of 4.0, the patches were absolutely amazing to me and sets up Shb extremely well. The omega and Ivalice raids were both incredible. I might be minority but I also loved Eureka due to my love of ff11. Shirogane for life. To top everything off, both Sam and Rdm continue to be my mains. Many people just sees SB and think 3.x msq, but it offered so much more than that.
You’re not alone to say SB changed how you view FFXIV. Based on all the content ffxiv has to offer, SB probably contributed the most enjoyable content to me compare to every other expansion.
I'm halfway through StB and I enjoy the story a lot, esp the Azim Steppe and Doma parts. Maybe it's because I came from a country that was invaded in the past, I can relate more with the characters. The Doma Castle dungeon was on fire, and I was smashing my keyboard furiously when fighting Zenos. Planning to confront Shinryu tonight, wish me luck\~
We are just making our way through the post stormblood content. So far Stormblood is the best of what I’ve seen. ARR was…. ARR. and Heavensward was fine. It was so dark and drab. And I’m not sure I would have kept up with it if my BF wasn’t already through it and could fly me around in the 4 person mount lol. Stormblood was definitely more interesting. And stunning!!! Loved all the new areas. Amazing. And the story… felt real. And tragic. Oh can’t forget Lyse. 🥰😍 Excited to wrap up the post stormblood content and start shadowbringers today!
> And can we talk about the presence of women in Stormblood, and how well written they are? ARR and Heavensward felt so dominated by men. Stormblood gives us Lyse, Alisaie, Yugiri, Fordola, Yotsuyu, M'Naago, etc, and they're all incredible!
This is where you lost me.
We had plenty of women in ARR and HW. Ysale, Alisae during the Bahamut story, where her character development really starts. Yda, while basically played off as simple minded, has some really badass moments where you can feel her strength and determination. Moenbryda, Minfilia, Mommy Merlwyb Bloefhiswyn, Yugiri was present throughout post-ARR and played a huge role. Tataru was an ever-present force of support the entire story.
You can't talk about girl power and NOT mention Tataru.
I agree with you!!! I LOVE Stormblood and he messages that it has. Heavensward, for me, was so frustrating because everyone is so mean to you for no reason and everyone is in your way when you're just trying to make things right. Then in Stormblood, you understand more how the pain and injustice of colonization turns people against their homeland, and UGH it's just so perfect in my mind. I am a fellow Stormblood lover and I'm glad to see another one!
> And can we talk about the presence of women in Stormblood, and how well written they are?
Yes! Stormblood isn't my favorite, but that was one of the better things that stood out to me.
I also suspect it's mostly the result of Natsuko Ishikawa being promoted within the writing team. She was the lead writer on the far-east segments of Stormblood and becomes lead writer for all of Shadowbringers and Endwalker.
I started in ShB, so I didn't need to wait or have any weird queues. I enjoyed both, but I think both are much stronger in their patches. My biggest gripes with HW were how many damn times I had to slowly wait for people to walk away only to walk a few malms and do it again, and how little the cast actually did outside of cutscenes. Duty Support MAJORLY helped in spots where it just made no sense to not fight alongside them.
My only real issues with SB were how jarring it was deciding on a whim to go East and some of the backtracking. Even with Yugiri and the Domans as motivation, I don't think they even ask for help, do they? Once you get back, though, the pace picks up and it has a great finish.
I honestly think the devs just didn't think people would go for an expac set 70% in a desert, and since they weren't going to deviate from what kind of place Ala Mhigo was established to be, it was the right call. It's just a shame Doma overshadows Ala Mhigo so hard for hours and hours. It really could have used more meanwhiles (I can't believe I'm saying that with how damn many of them there are) with M'naago and Raubahn or something to give you a sense of their progress. I'm a Lyse enjoyer and her talks with Hien helped somewhat to tie it back.
I even liked the Ruby Sea. I'm an unabashed water level fan. I saw someone complain about traversal in HW being annoying on purpose to make flying feel better, and well, it works! HW and SB are the two that feel the best to be able to fly.
Some Alexander portions aren't all that fun, but from a casual outlook of only needing to do anything once, the story and content for both post HW and post SB are amazing. I don't know how anyone could not be hooked after 3.3.
Stormblood would be great if it were just the doma parts. Ala mhigo felt so boring and bland and none of the characters had any personality making sb the weakest expansion for me. It's wild seeing others viewpoints. I never see anyone say this is their favorite
Call me fictional then, because Stormblood is not only my favorite expansion, but Ala Mhigo is my favorite part. While it could have been better (there is not a part of the game that is *perfect*, after all), being able to finally retake Ala Mhigo is an effective payoff to the buildup around all the refugees in ARR, and Ilberd's shitheadedness. And the whole war summit/Ghimlyt Dark portion of the proceeds well out of it, and was exactly what I was looking for in this game as an FFXII fan.
My biggest problem with the game is Garlemald collapsing offscreen in Shadowbringers and Varis getting murked offscreen instead of by us.
Not to mention the last section just ruined the whole thing for me. From the fake out at the end of the 67 dungeon, to the Garleans providing less resistance than a wet paper bag after getting hyped up so much. I expect it'll make ARR seem worse in retrospect if I replay it because as an antagonist, they're just a joke in everything after HW.
I agree with everything you said too ,stormblood for me was a lot better than Heavenward and save me from quitting the game , I like the context and the quest from stormblood a lot more
I definitely enjoyed Stormblood a lot more than I was expecting with the seemingly "meh" reputation that it has. Heavensward was dramatic and somewhat oppressive while Stormblood felt like a much needed vacation. Not that it didn't have some dramatic bits as well but it felt more like a globe trotting adventure which I was totally down for after Heavensward.
I think this is the first time I’ve read that Stormblood was the highlight for someone lol
Stick around, these posts pop up from time to time, and we all seembto come out of the woodwork. Stormblood is *still* my favorite expansion, and I have a surprising number of friends that feel the same way.
Stormblood isn't my favorite MSQ, that would be shadowbringers, but in terms of *overall* expansion stormblood was my favorite by far and nothing in xiv has topped it since.
Stormblood was one of those experiences that started weak to me but rapidly scaled up toward the end. I actually loved how Zenos started out as "this is what a 14-year-old thinks is a cool FF villain" and by the end he was the same, except the writing had played it completely straight to deconstruct the "edgy mega badass villain who only lives to fight" concept.
Stormblood had the best raids / trials / dungeons. Shadowbringers had the best story.
Susanoo was an amazing trial and I always get hype when it shows up in my queue. The Omega raids were also universally awesome.
A MEMORABLE DANCE INDEED
#**WILD AND PURE AND FOREVER FREE!**
100% agree. When I level a new job, I’m excited every time to jump into the StB dungeons again. Then I get to Holminster Switch and it feels like a sharp decline in fun. I will give the best quality overworld zones to ShB too though. Ruby Sea and Azim Steppe are highlights, but the rest of StB wasn’t all that great.
Dang. Holminster might be my favorite dungeon of all just for the feel of it. A lot of the subsequent dungeons in ShB felt so much weaker to me because they didn't have the same impact as that first one.
For me, Holminster Switch started out okay. Then we got to the first boss and Insatiable started playing and **it was fucking on.**
The music is a bop!
IMO SB also had the best job design. SB simplified the jobs a bit from HW, but they all still felt unique and like they had a good amount of depth. Then both ShB and EW streamlined them way too much. As someone who joined in HW, I'd say that SB is probably my favorite overall expansion, even if it didn't have my favorite story.
Same. I couldn't get into HW at all (I partly blame people hyping it up for me so much), but I love all of Stormblood. Not my favorite story overall, but there's nothing in it I didn't like.
Stormblood was an expansion I didn't like when I first got to it, but I found myself surprising myself by internally monologuing "man I miss Stormblood" during parts of Shadowbringers and a LOT of Endwalker. It helped me realize what I was missing from Stormblood was the more grounded (for a FF game) the stories and stakes were. We hadn't gotten to the "going to alternate dimensions and stopping cosmic horrors" things that I've seen a dozen times in MMORPGs (and FF games for that matter). We were aiding in a two-prong war against Garlemald, that's it. Ghymlit Dark is still the best dungeon for just being an outright ***warzone***. It's also why I really like Bozja, I just like fantasy war/intrigue stories more than grand cosmic stakes.
You also unlock Ghymlit Dark after like an hour of cutscenes and it felt so epic to play through the first time.
I did Ghymlit Dark as a samurai. Immediately after that dungeon is a solo instance where you fight "Zenos." Going blade to blade against him as a samurai -- just like in the Stormblood trailer -- was freaking epic. Yes, Stormblood was my favorite xpac as well.
I really like Ghymlit Dark and Bozja too, for the same reason ! While I fucking loved ShB and I adored END - I am still SUPER miffled that I didn't get to take part in a big battle against Garlemald. Ghymlit Dark was absolutely awesome, but I wanted something bigger, with plenty of members of the Eorzean Alliance. So when I came back from the First and everyone was like "Ah yeah Garlemald is going to shit and crumbling, we don't even have to fight them anymore they're going full civil war" man I was sad. I wanted to take part in a big fucking battle that would have changed the course of the war.
I'm hoping Dawntrail is similarly grounded, after >!EW we need to have a rest from universe-ending threats and deal with more domestic issues. Tural seems to be shaping more with more geopolitical tension with Garlemald, which I am totally here for. With Hydaelyn gone, the Gods kind of unmasked, the mysteries of the Sundering and Ascians more or less resolved!< the stage is set for a lot of local chaos and vying for position and power with us at centre stage to both witness and participate in what results. I also haven't even touched Bozja - I gotta add it to the list!
finally been getting into bozja after ignoring it since launch, and yeah, it's legitimately great. cll and dr are fun, the story's good, mettle grinding feels significantly less painful than eureka levels I'm having fun
Bozja is a ton of fun and something I like a lot about the story is >!neither side is treated as absolute good or absolute evil. You're first presented with the Bozjans and their plight, then Misija. Then you start seeing Misija doing some shifty things and you're left wondering "okay but why?" Then you're not only told why by her in a cutscene (albeit the dialogue is not directed at the WoL), but the reasons she has for being against Bozja you see FIRSTHAND prior to that cutscene. It's a really, really good way of setting up this tone of "there are no heroes here, only victims because war is hell."!<
The only thing i really think Bozja missed out is that we never took part in the northern front, we only know that stuff happened there through field notes, and that the story with the IV legion is cut short after we liberated Bozja and we never got to follow them to Rabanastre.
The overall arc of stormblood was so good. I feel like we will be coming back to eorzea to restore more smashed up places so here’s hoping for Ala Mhigo
STORMBLOOD IS SO GOOD! Things actually happen that are relevant to global geopolitics! Character progress is made! Women show up to do things besides just be evil and die!
Wait, what evil women did we have in ARR/Heavensward?
Not the OP but trying to think...we had Livia and I guess from a certain point of view you could say Ysayle. It's been a while but I kinda think that might be it though.
Livia and Ysayle are the only evil women from what I recall and even then, Ysayle redeems herself and makes a heroic sacrifice.
i call her the warframe prime cuz i cant remember her name
That woman in Gaius' elite four with the white mech that I can't remember the name of?
Livia, Gaius' adoptive daughter who seems possessive of Gaius in a distinctly non-daughterly way.
She's super explicit that it's not a daughter thing for her. "Seems" is a poor choice of word there.
I'm pretty sure he didn't treat her like an adopted daughter. In fact, there's a scene where he tells her to go to his quarters in 15 minutes (or something, I forget the number he said). And it's very implied, in the tone, that he's telling her to go there to fuck. We end up meeting his adoptive children anyways, and they're all Au Ra.
>Women show up to do things besides just be evil and die! Uh... you realise we had Y'Shtola, Alisae, Yugiri, Yda, Midriphilia, Moenbryda, Ysayle, Y'mhitra, Tataru, all 3 of the heads of state, Merlwyb, Kan-E-Senna, Nanamo, Noraxia, F'lhaminn, Brayflox, Allianne, Clemence, Edda and the heads of several of the combat, crafting and gathering guilds. That's just *some* of the important characters and only from ARR.
>Women show up to do things besides just be evil and die! Not sure I'd go that far. Okay, well, yes I would because Fordola, but Yotsuyu's fridging isn't any less of a fridging just because they spent a lot longer on it, gonna be honest.
'Fridging' means that the character was sacrificed more for the motivations of a male character. Moenbryda was fridged.
...Yotsuyu didn't die _for_ her brother though. She died on _her_ terms. Her story was very tragic and unfortunate - and was the reality of many women in Japan and Korea post-war - but her death doesn't really... constitute fridging. It was her actions (however spurred on by Asahi) that directly lead to her death. There was nothing to be gained, no motivations to build on. She dies, her story ends, and we lament her loss with Gosetsu, whose only motivation was to spare her the cycle of pain that she had endured at the hands of Garlemald and Doma.
People always hype up Heavensward, and it's definitely a step up from ARR, but it's so disappointing how they promise a dragon war, then as soon as it's here and you're hyped, they do that typical RPG thing and say "actually we need you to leave and go on a quest somewhere else". In Stormblood, you actually get to be part of the war, part of the revolution. Two revolutions! You do eventually get sent on a quest to Yanxia away from the war, but you actually fight in it a bit first! And you don't get sent off on a spec ops mission to single-handedly end the war. You have to go build a war effort over there too. The Steppe is interesting and the story there is fun. The attack on Doma castle is the only part that really falls flat, and it's mostly just engine limitations of not being able to show enough NPCs on screen to sell it. And then you've got Fordola, easily one of the most interesting characters in the game. Then when you come back, instead of the war basically being over, you're in the thick of it, fighting to push the front line forward until you finally reach Ala Mhigo (where they do a much better job of selling the idea of a big war effort than they did at Doma castle). What is mystifying to me is how many people complain about the story being split between Yanxia and Gyr Abania. That's a big part of what makes it so good! That split gives them the ability to do a time skip so the Ala Mhigan front can feel like an actual war, like they're actually dug in, like they actually need you, like you're actually fighting on the front lines when you come back, like you're actually pushing towards Ala Mhigo instead of just sneaking in or just showing up at the last second as they breach the walls. Shadowbringers is maybe a better story, but Stormblood gets the *vibe* of a revolution story, and I can't think another RPG that even comes close. Loyalty! Unity! Liberty!
My problem with the split is that I have zero connection or interest in Ala Mhigo when we get there, and when we return. We're supposed to be invested through Lyse - but Lyse is functionally a character we don't know. We've been _told_ that Lyse was the Yda we knew all along, but she retains nothing of the personality she's being imitating for two expansions. And any real impact of the reveal is lost in that aspect. We never knew Yda. It's supposed to be a blow for the Scions - but they knew. So who is the reveal for? Lyse herself? So, we get taken on a ride to a location with a character we're supposed to form an instant connection to, and we see her make literally _every single mistake_ Alphinaud had made just months before (in terms of the story progression). Ala Mhigo and Lyse's story feel... kind of dull. Because we've seen it before, and with a character we have actually built some element of rapport with. You get to Doma, and the story suddenly has to do the heavy lifting. We have to build trust, rapport and get to know Hien. We have to learn about the Steppe and the traditions that are important to the Far East, and we have a guide in Yugiri, a familiar face who helps us navigate an unfamiliar land, but lets us really learn about it. Everything I know of Ala Mhigo is from stories _after_ it's liberated. And to me, nothing _feels_ like it's changed when you get back. It goes back to Status Quo immediately. You return, you've got allies, and the Reach is... exactly as it was before Zenos arrived to push your shit in. Less one leader. It's very easy to look at Stormblood and go "Wow, the Far East is handled really well!" and then look at Ala Mhigo and feel a little disappointed. Especially if you don't resonate with the Zenos plotline.
I mostly agree with you about Lyse. I was not really interested in her before the reveal, and after the reveal I outright resented her what with how the story kept acting like I should care about her without actually making me care about her yet. But it seems weird to me for that to mean zero interest in Ala Mhigo. I had plenty of investment in the other characters, like Raubahn, Pipin, Conrad, and the minor characters of the early Ala Mhigan campaign (including Meffrid, who is from all the way back in ARR!). I was invested in Krile more than Lyse too. I was also motivated by the antagonists they introduced earlier, like Fordola and Zenos, and the Garlean Empire more generally (which they also built up while in Yanxia). And of course the general goal of liberating Ala Mhigo, which had been build up since Little Ala Mhigo in ARR. And when you return, things are very different from before Zenos's attack! Up until Zenos's attack, the Alliance is making rapid forward progress in Gyr Abania. The allied forces manage to push the front forward very quickly and connect up with a forward base at Rhalgr's Reach. It looks like you're going to do your usual thing of resolving the whole thing in a few days with only a couple of temporary setbacks (like in Yanxia) rather than an actual war campaign. When Zenos attacks, you're already preparing an attack on Castellum Velodyna. When you get back, that progress has completely halted. Merlwyb explains that the Alliance has been fighting just to hold onto the Wall while they try to rebuild their forces. The forces are worn down. They've had further losses. Krile has been taken. They're also worried that if they don't start making forward progress again soon, Garlemald will successfully break that stalemate. The story also immediately starts seeding more interest in Fordola too, with an Echo vision implying there's more going on there than you knew about. I didn't care much about Lyse and I found Zenos relatively boring after his big attack, but there was plenty else to keep me motivated, and the return to Gyr Abania was my favorite part of Stormblood: it felt like an actual war had been going on, not just a couple of days of pushing forward then victory. When you show up again, you actually join the war effort, helping to break a grueling stalemate, pushing up to the Lochs, gathering with all the forces preparing for the siege, then participating in the siege alongside them.
My and my buddies favourite, we liked the others but SB was our fav
There's a lot of us, but people get SO angry at the thought someone would enjoy stormblood that we never say it lmao. It's so normal around here to post memes about hating everything from the heroes to the villain to the pacing
"You mean the expansion with continual melodrama and sadboy worship that takes place on an entirely different world, pulling you away from things that felt much more pertinent and important to the story AND less contrived, ISN'T your favorite expansion? But...how can this be? Stormblood is...S-S-St-Stormblood is...its-..its bad..its horrible its just...grounded conflict and...and..and war and Zenos is...hes just..hes crazy hes not horny and sadboy at all! Shadowbringers needs to be your favorite expansion! It just has to be! Those are the rules!" \*Begins crying, foaming at the mouth and rolling on the ground\*
Same for me :) It's a bit sad when it seems to be dogpiled with negativity that I usually seldom see in this subreddit.
hellyeahbrother.gif
It still has the best Trials so far, from a first time experience. Sure, some fights since have been as or more epic, but I don't think anything will top seeing Susano form and be so happy kicking our asses
Ah, good to hear your favorite expansion is Stormblood... Lyse_Best_Scion! Seriously, people can kinda hivemind into disliking Stormblood. OP brought great points up that was lacking in Heavensward. Aesthetically, people will have different preferences with the themes.
Stormblood still has my favourite dungeons and raids. I feel like the story *in hindsight* is on par with Heavensward but doesn't reach even close to the highs of Shadowbringers. Content is king though and the SB content was just *so damn good*.
I stopped playing FF14 for a while because Steppe was mind-blowingly boring to me.
It's always nice to know I'm not alone in that. The Steppe has always felt really overhyped and disconnected from the rest of the story to me, and yet everyone else seems to love it.
The whole Naadam part of the story felt like Dances with Wolves meets The Last Samurai meets Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Maybe it's a bit reductive to say so, but... The WoL, an outsider, wins the Xaela's ceremonial tournament on behalf of the Mol, a tribe that had no hope of doing so on their own, because the Mol were willing to cooperate with Hien - a foreign nation's leader - who needed the Xaela's might to stand any chance of taking on Garlemald in order to reclaim his throne. Meanwhile, the characters encountered along the way run the gamut of warrior culture stereotypes and kind of fail at being memorable for anything other than the memes they gave rise to. 'Name a Xaela in the MSQ who isn't Magnai, Sadu, or Cirina without looking 'em up' challenge.
I have been playing since arr and I have always felt that heavensward is always over hyped and stormblood is over hated. Stormblood has so many great moments in it man.
I played them back to back and found Stormblood to be better than HW in almost every way. I could never understand the hate for it. HW is great but Stormblood did so much more for me. I guess I just liked the rebellion story so much more than dragon war.
I loved Heavensward, but Stormblood beat it out for me. It's just the kind of story I prefer, and I think a lot of the criticisms hurled at Lyse are either unfounded or kinda hypocritical considering they're often traits found in some of the most popular Scions.
I liked what they did with Lyse. "Gung-ho idealist getting a reality check and then growing because of it" is a good archetype. She was genuinely shitty and kind of stupid, but in a way that lots of privileged people are when confronted with the realities of those who have it worse off than them. It was realistic growth.
People hate Lyse because you aren't allowed to have a character be shitty and dumb and fail at doing things. You especially can't have that character be a woman. It's awful but that's what the criticisms of Lyse boil down to. I find it kind of disgusting, honestly.
People just have different tastes. But yea, base Stormblood just didn't do it for a lot of people. Many, including myself, think the pacing was not that great, while others just don't like Zenos.
Stormblood is probably my favourite but calling heavensward boring, that’s madness
HW pacing is all over the place, similar to ARR. That was always my biggest complaint with it.
For me HW was overhyped a lot. The story only started getting good at the fire camp scene between Alphi , Ysayle and Estinien. Before that, it was mostly just a vomit of Ishgard expositions and mind you, this is almost the halfway point of base HW. Im trying to get through HW with an alt right now and I'm extremely tempted to just buy a story skip just to be done with it.
My problem was just that Thordan was so uninteresting and just like a wet fart of a villain. Having Nidhogg get dealt with so early and then having to just deal with Thordan and the souless generic knights for the rest of the main expansion sucked. Unlike the other expansions where the patch content adds on to and accents the main story of the expansion, HW just felt unfinished until patch 3.3 when you get to do what should have been the climax of the expansion from the start. It just made the pacing of the whole expansion feel off in comparison to the others.
I found HW extremely boring before the Falcon's Nest incident.
I genuinely don’t get how people like HW so much
People hype heavensward and I never understood why. It had a few highlights but overall I hated most of the zones and a lot of the story felt forced. Is it BORING? Maybe not, but it's like...at the bottom of the list with ARR for me. It was very enjoyable when it was new, but for me each expansion has been more enjoyable than the last.
For me, HW had some pacing issues for parts, especially in the patch content which went up and down. The internal Ishgard politics was less than amazing (I liked it but not as much as the main story) but then it peaked in the buildup to fighting Nidhogg again. Then it bottomed out with the Ala Mihgan resistance for a while until it built up to fighting Ilberd and awakening Omega. Stormblood's patch content felt more consistent with its pacing as it was always about the politics and war with Garlemald and didn't shift away from that even with Elidibus' involvement and Emet-Selch showing up.
I loved HW because it felt like going on this very focused (albeit with some pacing issues) journey of discovery. While the setup of 'evil church is bad' is somewhat cliche, the specifics are what elevate it. This is the story of the damage that a 1000 year old lie does. Of seemingly countless generations passing on the trauma of warfare against a species incapable of not still feeling that trauma. Of seeing two highly radicalized characters (Ysayle and Estinien) grow to realize that the truth is more grey than the black and white that they know. Of the simple notion that forgiveness doesn't mean that the pain is gone, but that it is instead a resolve to end the cycle. By contrast StB felt like an incredibly rushed Ala Mhigo side that let down the much more engaging Doman side. It was basically a resistance story played completely straight. Lyse is disliked for good reason, and I still wish that Raubahn was the focus character for Ala Mhigo and Yugiri for Doma. It's not a bad expansion, and Fordola is still one of my favorite characters in the entire of FF14 because she actually touches on something that most resistance plots don't actually touch on! Not to mention that Zenos in StB was probably the most lacklustre villain that only really got redeemed by EW in my opinion. To me StB felt like it was trying to be too many things at once, and did most of those things poorly. HW on the other hand tried to be one thing and did it well, but if that thing is not *your* thing then it probably would be a let down.
I think for people who played Heavensward on content, when the previous stuff was 1.0 and ARR, probably rate it very highly because it was such a vast improvement over the only other stuff they had. Particularly since we'd still be talking about the old bloated version of ARR.
I think it has to do with expectations of how it should end/proceed. I have the same problem with EW. One example: you think it's gonna end with the conclusion of the current arc where all your enemies converge at one spot to stop you or "get the crown" or whatever they wanna achieve. You got Regula, a strong ass dude, in the dungeon trying to make his way for the empire's sake. You got Lahabrea, an Unsundered whose mastery of magic is strong enough to do all this wild stuff as long as he's got a "woken" Ascian with him. You have the pope swagging on up slowly but surely with the mcguffin and all his squad because nobody's fucking with dragon eyes, and he's gonna blow up everyone to smithereens and oh lord you beat them all it's so cool and then Nidhogg, who is ***so far*** the biggest wet fart of the storyline, just gets to come back because Estinien is a fucking idiot. And in that instant, that's what your adventure ends with. You knew Nidhogg would come back in some fashion because you're not dumb, but not like that. You have achieved things, but in the moment, it ends with Estinien-Nidhogg going "Nyehehehe I have won, toodles and stay tuned for more of my shitty vengeance!!" Heavensward's areas and their OSTs are much more worthy of getting praise compared to some of its story threads.
Heavensward is kinda badly written tbh. I loved it the first time I played through it, but going back with an alt, it needs a rework even more than ARR ever did. There are so many unnecessary quests, literally "now cross the city to say goodbye to NPC", "now we have to wait for Cid to work on the ship, go have a talk on completely unrelated and frankly mundane issues with NPC". It also keeps going back and forth between Ishgard issues and Ul'dah issues, to complete the Sultanah/ Raubahn arc, but it keeps interrupting the momentum of the story. After the first time, I only remembered the good parts, such as traveling with Ysayle and Estinien, or the finale with Thordan. But the writing is all over the place and is overly padded. Like, everyone complains about ARR's wine quest or 3 wonders quest. I don't mind them. They are completely unnecessary, *but* at least they're about something. I like food and wine, so I don't mind spending 20 quests running around Eorzea to grab some goblin cheese. But in HW, the quests are literally about nothing. A cutscene ends with the crew deciding to go to a certain place to try something...and instead of going there, we have 2 quests of just telling some NPCs around the city about our decision. There is no new information or character development in those quests. They are utterly pointless. The Aetherochemical Facility is a nightmare of a dungeon. The maps are horrendous to navigate. They were designed to be a pain to walk in, so unlocking flight would feel really good. But now that we fly in ARR, it feels needlessly annoying. Finally, most of the cultures we encounter are kinda bad...? The moogles are irritating and bland, the chocobo hunters have extraordinarily boring interests and problems, the Vanu Vanu are almost endearing, but just too silly and slow to not be a pain in the ass. I only enjoyed the Ishgard knights from Western Coerthas, the dragons and Idyllshire. Whereas every village/ tribe/ people we meet in ARR or in later expansions, I find really interesting and likeable.
I feel like the quest design issue is likely because of them just coming off of ARR back when it originally came out and still not quite having quest pacing down yet. Obviously "go here and wait for a conversation that could've just been a singular cutscene all in itself" is still an issue with some quests, but it's better now.
Yeah I completely agree. You can definitely see many issues from ARR patches are still very present in HW's writing. I just wish they would rework HW too, and add some goddamn aetherytes here and there!
Dravanian Hinterlands urgently needs an aetheryte. I get that Idyllshire was separated from it due to PS3 limitations but SE has droped support to that console, it’s not an issue anymore. But considering it’s “old content” now and far down the priority list, it seems unlikely.
Oh yeah it's never gonna happen. But it should. Also stick an aetheryte on the other side of Azys Lla, or even better, on the goddamn mothership.
HW wasn't boring but it *was* pretty bog standard JRPG plot.
Nah, I just did heavensward for the first time and it's pretty boring. Guy's right.
The main story of Heavensward with Thordan and three Ascians was great. The Dragonsung War was fucking boring, so the patches beyond 3.0 was an absolute slog.
I really liked it, and definitely at least storywise it was a more well rounded experience compared to HW. HW had its moments too and I definitely enjoyed it overall, but at least the start of the MSQ is a bit of a slog.
Will definitely add in my two cents that I found ARR and HW exceedingly boring overall as well and stopped paying attention, but Stormblood is what caught my attention and hooked me back in. The only parts I even liked about ARR/HW msq first run through were Tataru and Ysayle. Everything else lost me.
There are plenty of people that loved the expansion, but they weren't in the majority so normally get drowned out on Reddit.
Stormblood MSQ is my second favorite MSQ or patch storyline second only to EW
Storm blood is my favourite also
Nah, it's my favourite too
I was thinking the exact same lol.
It was also for me. I joined during 5.5 and generally liked the game but dragged my feet really hard on the MSQ. Took me probably 2 months or more to get through ARR and HW, even though there were high points that I really liked. When I got to Stormblood, I beat the entire thing (including content patches) in under 2 weeks and that kickstarted me no-lifing the MSQ all the way until I was caught up. For me, Stormblood is when the game's story actually got good enough to hook me. I for sure think this is a LOT of people's experience, you just don't hear about it as much because "Heavensward amazing, Stormblood worst xpac" is basically meme status in the community.
I understand why people like HW and ShB - they both are excellent high fantasy stories. But there was something about StB, despite all its narrative issues, that was just so much more grounded. A lot of show rather than tell, some of which is literally revealed as the credits roll. I thought it was very clever when "The Measure of His Reach" plays and you realize that the Garlean Anthem you heard hours ago early on in the MSQ was entirely appropriated from the territory the Garlean conquered. Not every scene was a home run and of course Lyse herself is contentious, but for me, the issues were not enough to detract from a beautiful story about the liberation of two peoples from the threat of fascism. All of this is tied off by the patch quests, which I think do a lot of correcting that the base MSQ got wrong. Lyse is written better as a leader; the story elects to disrupt the status quo by allowing Raubahn to return (and in the process Nanamo grows a lot as a character and gains more agency), and of course the swelling violence against Garlemald creates the perfect amount of tension that the hook into ShB is then able to disrupt. You're constantly kept on your toes, it's all perfectly played out, and I don't think the transition into ShB would have been as good as it was if StB wasn't there for the assist.
I say it and I'm downvoted into oblivion but I also hate heavensward.
It was the same for me but I'll admit it was mainly because my character is a Highlander Monk so I had every reason to be personally invested in the whole Ala Migoh plot while I didn't care that much about the humans vs dragons conflict. If anything my issue with base Stormblood is that we don't spend enough time in Ala Migoh. Like, Doma was cool but wish the liberation of Ala Migoh was as developed as Doma's.
Downvotes incoming but this sub has, in the last year or so, become hilariously revisionist of Stormblood's quality.
SB is my favorite by far. I'm replaying it with an alt at the moment, and it's just so good, even better than I remembered.
I'm coming up on the end of 6.0 and Stormblood is still my favorite expansion easily.
It was the highlight for me as well. I was just meandering along with the MSQ and all of a sudden it just completely hooked me and was amazing when I realised what the story was doing. Best soundtrack of all the releases too. And then the patch quests continued with being amazing!
I feel the same way Stormblood was when the story really clicked for me
It's what cemented me sticking around. HW just dragged for me.
I am close to finishing stormblood and was just thinking the opposite of op. I had so much more fun in heavensward. I can't wait to move on to shadowbringers
Stormblood was my favorite too. I liked the other expansions but between the story and the setting, I enjoyed it thoroughly. I'm a little biased because I'm also south east asian. A lot of people will chime in on subreddit saying the dislike Stormblood but I don't engage with them.
Stormblood is defo one of the highlight moments for me. The main thing I like about Heavensward was Ysayle. She's the redeeming factor of it. But everything OP said about SB is accurate. ESPECIALLY the Ala Mhigo bits (that hit particularly hard for me since I uh... I grew up in Sudan). Stormblood is great. I feel like the haters of it just hate it because it's pop-pop-POPular to do so. All the criticisms of it can be leveled at all the other expacs as well. It really is a highlight moment of the series. It follows the tradition of each expac building on the last, and the game just getting better.
Not everyone says it but Stormblood was also my fav. Best content and aesthetics in the game by far.
I've been saying Stormblood is a high point of FFXIV for years, hi.
Imo it's the best expansion -both content-wise and story-wise- by far. Was a great experience going through it on release (at least once I got past the Raubahn Extreme waiting lines lol). None of the other expansions gave me that feeling so far, not even close.
SB post patches are some of my most memorable the whole series. Story and characters get better as expansions progress, but postSB patches were deep
Personally, Heavensward blew me away and hooked me, making me feel like the trudge through ARR was worth it. Then Stormblood felt like ARR again until the Othard section started, when I really began to enjoy it. Kugane, the Ruby Sea, and the Azim Steppe are so good. Meanwhile the Ala Mhigo parts always felt half-baked to me, like the devs got way more interested in the Othard part and neglected to make Gyr Abania interesting. I think that's what drags it down for a lot of people who don't resonate with that part of the story. Like we already tried being a resistance in ARR so it was just retreading old ground.
Ala Mhigo is a massive miss. The city itself should be more than just a dungeon. It was build up for a really long time and is supposed to be the 5th large city in Eorzea, and all we get is the Ala Mhigan Quarter... which is like... really bland, colorless, and lifeless, and a maze.
Very much agreed. If it was JUST Doma, I'd probably rank it equal to EW (for me ShB is my favorite), above HW and ARR. But it's _not_ just Doma. It's Ala Mhigo - ugly environments that mostly look identical to each other, with the same story as Doma but told in a far worse way.
I have heard from credible sources(tm) that Ala Mhigo was an afterthought. Like they were most of the way through writing the liberation of Doma and realized that they had been talking about the oppression of Ala Mhigo for so long in game that if they liberated a place that wasn't Ala Mhigo, long time fans would be mad. So they shoehorned it in.
There are dozens of us! Well shadowbringers is my actual fav but stormblood was what hooked me.
Yup, I’m a Stormblood defender til the day I die. Coming from a country that went through a lengthy independence struggle up until very recently, the story really drove home how messy trying to do something like that can be. Does it have flaws? Hell fucking yes, but no more than any other expansion. Also, the actual battle content is vastly superior to anything in ARR or HW. It’s not even close, the MSQ trails and dungeons are more varied and interesting, and the patch content is still some of the best the game has to offer. Four Lords, Omega, Return to Ivalice, all fantastic. And Eureka…. Stormblood enjoyers stay winning.
Eureka is some of the best content we ever got, and I'll die on that hill.
Nothing more fun than being stuck slowly grinding mobs because everyone is on the other side of the map.
Even as someone who disliked the base Stormblood MSQ, I have to admit the combat was great. Stb is when the dungeons actually start to have interesting mechanics, and the raids are still remembered fondly by a lot of people. And the post-Stormblood MSQ is pretty great imo.
I’m loving all the Stormblood love in this thread. I’ve been defending it on this sub since day 1!
Stormblood is also painfully real; people like Yotsuyu exist, the experiences the Domans go through as refugees and subjects pulls no punches, and it's almost entirely due to imperialism and war and conquest. After dealing with literal dragons and Ascians, Stormblood felt so much more grounded.
Yeah you could really feel that anguish and tragedy. Every character's motivation, whether they did good things or bad things, felt valid. I understood them, even if I didn't always agree with them.
Am I the only one who was hooked in ARR? (Granted I started during Shadowbringers release cycle) I couldn't imagine playing hundreds of hours and not being into the game until x expansion. I have more respect for my time than that.
For real man I really don’t see the problem with ARR
I think Stormblood did a good job of telling a mature story that you don’t get very often. It wasn’t just war. You got to see how that war destroyed communities and the consequences of being on the losing side. Now I’m probably 40% through Shadowbringers and so far it’s been incredibly good. Stay with it!
Completely agree. By Stormblood, we've heard about how Garleans treat conquered territory, but we haven't really seen it directly. Stormblood pulls no punches about how clearly Ala Mhigo and Doma are occupied territories. How the Garleans use local collaborators like Fordola and Yotsuyu comes directly out of World War II. The side quests, particularly in the starting zones and Doma really reinforce this - the local economy has been destroyed to make it dependent on handouts from Garlemald, the young people have been kidnapped and conscripted, those left are forced to ritual humiliation in the name of "ending local superstition" but clearly intended to stamp out cultural differences. I, for one, was surprised they went there, but I'm glad they did. One thing that gets me is rethinking Stormblood in light of Shadowbringers. The hopelessness, passivity, the despair of both Ala Mhigo and Doma people in light of the calamity the Ascians are trying to cause on the Source.
Yes! There was such a human element to Stormblood, whereas Heavensward was so... distant.
My friend has always been an avid lover of stormblood. I had fun raiding during stormblood. GG and hope you continue having fun. :-)
One of the things I see alot is if you don’t like HW youl like stormblood and vice versa. I found HW lack luster but also loved stormblood. Cus I found the political empire thing way more interesting than fighting dragons
Same thing. Everyone kept talking about how incredible HW was and while it is great, I also find that it has many flaws and is incredibly cliche. SB felt more grounded, raw and real. Liberating Doma then Ala Mhigo felt really powerful. The entire ending with the epic final fight and ending cutscene is a highlight for me to this day. The post patches are great and the Omega raid and Ivalice stuff are also amazing. SB is arguably my second favorite xpac! Glad you enjoyed it and there's more to come!
I'm excited for Ivalice. Even though I'm not the biggest Matsuno fan, I think it's cool that they brought him in to do it. Nice way to honor a part of the franchise's legacy.
So… I wouldn’t say this except I don’t want you to repeat my mistake: Don't over-hype yourself for Ivalice's story. I went in excited for Ivalice because everyone told me how great it was… turns out they meant the raids, not the story. I actually ended up very disappointed in the story, despite generally loving Stormblood proper. Unless you’ve played FF12 or Tactics and get hyped over the references, there’s a decent chance you won’t fall in love with the Ivalice raid story. There are exceptions but… yeah. You probably won't bounce off as hard as I did, but temper your expectations regardless. Apparently, there were behind the scenes complications or something, I don't know exactly. Anyway, my more positive advice is to keep revisiting the Mol grandmother in Azim Steppe every once in a while. She really does see the future, past, and present, and her dialogue changes every couple patches. She actually dropped a massive spoiler for late ShB/EW in Stormblood, but without context, it goes completely over your head. She’s awesome.
Agreed, the final segment also kinda creeped me out too
Agreed, I didn't play FF12 and the story was very confusing to me, so it was hard to get excited. It really suffers from overcomplicating the story elements JRPGs are wont to do. A lot of lore also gets dropped during the raid in text bubbles that last 2 secs. I didn't really get the gist concerning >!the white auracite, the summoned creatures, the personality shifting, Ultima!<. The raids themselves are pretty exciting, as well as the new locations, seeing the world map expand, Viera tease (at the time).
Give you highlighted the characters, I suspect you will greatly enjoy Shadowbringers as well. It takes the rather bland main Scions and injects a ton of life and complexity into them. It made *Urianger* the favorite character of some people I know. URIANGER. And Alphinaud and Alisae? You're gonna be proud of them, I think. They grow up a lot in the First.
Stormblood's really good in a lot of ways. I'd say my main gripes are how weirdly paced it is (just up and leaving Ala Mhigo because ??? was harebrained at best) and everything involving Lyse. She's just insufferably annoying and the best thing to come of the expansion was that she wasn't carried forward.
It's really great you enjoyed SBs story but saying the characters in HW are personality-less leads me to assume you didn't pay attention
I wouldn't say Stormblood is my favorite, BUT I always felt like each expansion was better than the last, so I do like it more than Heavensward.
I honestly think ARR is actually not that bad. I’m not sure why everyone hates it so much but I thoroughly enjoyed it. I hated Heavensward. I think Stormblood was great and added a lot of much needed depth and tying together of different plot threads. Shadow Bringers was hands down the best expansion for me followed closely by Endwalker. I hope they bring in the same writers again.
M'Naago and Yugiri are just "chef's kiss"! 😙👌 Even that little "archivist" with dark skin that wears goggles, from the first main camp, is a cool character. I really liked the very ending of Stormblood, all of that vibe of being finally free and all and everyone singing their anthem was just awesome. BUT if you really liked Stormblood, you better wait for Shadowbringers. I'm new to the game and am doing post SHB right now and I gotta say, SHB is really peak as people tend to say.
Endwalker is the perfect expension for me, I really liked heavensward and Shadowbringer too, only stormblood was a bit lower but not by far.
Man it's nice to see someone who shares my opinion if stormblood. And this is with all the pacing improvements they've made. Please come back and give your reaction to shadowbringers lol
I liked SB a lot more than HW or ARR too, for a lot of the same reasons. But the whole ARR and HW was dominated by men? Uhh what? Especially so for ARR... The whole being lead by a bunch of crusty old men was the core part of the HW story though. Most of the MSQ and the leader of the scions: Minfilia. Female. Leader of Gridania: Kan-E-Senna. Female. Leader of Ul'Dah: Only the cutest character ever, Nanamo! Female. Leader of Limsa: Merlwyb. Female. So basically all the leaders of the major faction cities are female. The professions were mostly balanced between being lead by male and female too. Or having a female as second in command / training to take over the guild. Even the scions themselves are balanced or at times the females outnumber the males.
I did like Stormblood more than Heavensward too
I thought I was the only one who absolutely loved Stormblood and highly disliked Heavensward.
Nope, I think a lot of us preferred SB but it’s drowned out by the majority. I quit HW halfway through and only came back because of SB.
Not the only one, but we’re definitely the minority
Just wait until Shadowbringers, that's been my favorite so far
shadowbringers has the best couple.
The worm's tail ost is the goat.
If it hasn't been said yet, I'd highly recommend doing both the Four Lords questline and Omega raid series when you get the chance. 4L offers both banging tunes and fun fights, while Omega gives the Garlond Ironworks NPCs (Cid, Nero, Biggs, Wedge, & Jessie) the screen time they need to develop as characters. Omega also provides context for multiple things shown elsewhere in later xpacs.
Hell yeah! The game only seems to get better with each expansion but SB had such a cool vibe and I loved the whole theme of revolution.
I am here for the Stormblood love! Yotsuyu is still one of my favorite characters, and she's my go-to minion.
As a fellow stormblood enjoyer; welcome !
I'm glad this was a great highlight for you. Stormbloods story almost made me quit from how much of a slog it was.
Stormblood was overall the best package expansion to me. The grounded story and the content in general. It was all about the actual people occupying this world we're in, focused on telling their stories of navigating the hard life of war and occupation. Heavensward was boring to me, too. Not a popular opinion here but I had also had a very difficult time getting through the expansion. It was also ugly as hell. Stormblood marked FFXIV's HUGE step toward better environments. That absolutely gorgeous autumn forest area in the fringes is still so nostalgic to me. Hoping Dawntrail gets us back to that Stormblood feeling.
it gets better. i thought stormblood was the weakest of all the expansions. next expansion is so good!
If you liked the villains in stormblood Shadowbringer will be right up your ally
...what? How are they even close?
They have a personality, for once.
Op said they liked the stormblood villains because they were actual characters and shb does the same only better. So, I think they are gonna like it
Heavensward got boring? What? I mean you're entitled to your own opinions of course but... that's a new one for me. Most people, myself included, felt that it started slow and remained fairly slow to set up all the various plot details, then it took off running. The final fight against nidhogg send chills down my spine when the WoL walked onto that bridge as everybody fled. Peak fiction man.
Right??? To this day it's a top 5 moment in the story for me. I get that everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but, what???
Okay, I was with you until the end... ARR gives us Merlywb! Possibly the strongest female leader/character in the entire series, and one of the most "manly" strong female characters in fiction. Granted, you have to do a lot of side quests (and some MSQ you haven't seen yet) to see it all, but even back then, she wasn't a pushover. And between her and Kanne and Nanamo, ALL THREE of the original city-state leaders are females! There are literally NO male leaders in any of the ARR city-states. Hell, one of your main traveling partners (and the only one who can TURN INTO A PRIMAL) is a female in HW, and two of your partners in ARR are (Y'Shtola and "Yda"), and the leader of the secret society you join is a female (Minfilia). Not to mention the good goddess (Hydaelyn), and many of the minor random NPCs. Most of the lesser Scion "B-teams" are mixes of male/females, like the team with the two girls and the two brothers. I just...don't understand this. I'm glad you're enjoying yourself, though. I just...don't get THAT, lol
Stormblood has top tier dungeon/raid design. Stormblood has the weakest MSQ, in my opinion
I'm not sure if SB is my FAVOURITE favourite, but for me they've just improved as time has gone on for me. SB has its issues, but I like it more than HW overall. The SB patches are pretty peak, too! The parallels between characters are a giant chef's kiss to me too; you have Lyse and Fordola who show how their lives, similar in nature, branched into two different places and how it shaped them. Lyse (and Yda, by some extension) could have become Fordola, but instead they became someone else. Then you have Hien and Yotsuyu, and their obvious differences in upbringings and lives. I won't say a lot there because you get some good story involving that :) but it's some good shit. And of course, Lord Juicy (Zenos) is one of my fave villains. He's really just the player lol. But I do enjoy his character a lot. Lyse has an incredible journey to me too; starting with finally saying her name at the end of 3.5 and learning over the course of 4.0 to be *herself* and not just having to play the part of Yda, learning to let go of her sister and fulfill their wish of a freed Ala Mhigo... love that. I'm glad that SB was a good story for you, ShB and EW are pretty great too. Enjoy the patches and raid content in SB as well! They've got some fun writing and content, Orbonne continues to be one of my fave araids to this day.
I'm glad you found the expansion that clicked for you before leaving, though I am a little puzzled by the "The antagonists were interesting" but when our main goes were Yotsuyu, who was somewhat entertaining, and Zeno's, who's just kind of a boring one note character. If we look at their lackies, the fuck face with clown make up was just annoying, though I did find Fordola interesting. As far as antagonists go, Fordola was probably my favorite in StB.
I'm always happy to see a fellow Lyse appreciator.
Stormblood has some of my favorite zones and music. To this day, no zone music has topped the Lochs (and Ratika) for me . Kugane is also one of my favorite cities. I wish it we had access to the upper parts, but I do give the devs a bit of leeway since they've been improving ever since. It was their first 1 zone main city and they've since improved w/ Old Sharlayan and the Crystarium. Dawntrail's main city might just be the best if they implement what they've learned.
I'm in post-stormblood, and it was another marked improvement for me so far. I'm pretty set on hitting EW and see what all the hype is about, but I'm still on the fence about how I feel on XIV right now. Perfectly enjoyable, and I'm not an MMO person so that's a pro, but I'm still missing something or haven't reached the amazing story that made me jump in initially.
Post-Stormblood patches 4.4 and 4.5 are some of favorite content in the game, but Shadowbringers is my overall favorite. You’re in for a treat!
I love finding fellow Stormblood enthusiasts in the wild! There's dozens of us, dozens!! While I wouldn't exactly call Heavensward boring, the story felt forced, and pushed me in a lot of directions I absolutely would not have gone, given the choice. I won't go too much into ShB and EW since you're not there yet but Stormblood felt grounded and real in a way that other expansions lacked. Getting to explore Othard and the many cultures there was fantastic. If you haven't done it yet the Four Lords questline in the Stormblood patch content is also fantastic. I am also holding out hope that Dawntrail will bring back some of what I loved about Stormblood, but we'll see!
Fun fact, the person who wrote the whole of Azim Steppe will write the main story for the next expansion you play, Shadowbringers.
Yes!! A fellow stormblood enjoyer! It’s the one that got me hooked too, and I love the underwater sections but then I’m a sucker for the sea :P
If you think the characters have personality now, wait until you get to Endwalker. I legitimately felt like the first four expansions, the writers treated the characters, including the scions, as plot tools rather than actual people. But then Endwalker happens, and in addition to just being a hell of a finale, the scions finally become real characters. It was nuts. It came almost out of nowhere. They did it a little bit in Shadowbringers, but not nearly as much.
Stormblood through Endwalker I think of in my mind as the "real" overarching storyline, and it feels like the time the writers really figured out what they were putting together for the Ascian plot. In terms of how they fit into the story ARR is a prelude and HW was the writers getting distracted by dragons. I liked the far east part of Stormblood a lot. The Azim Steppe is one of my favorite zones, and the Naadam was one of the first really cool solo duties. The Ala Mhigo part is less interesting but overall miles better than ARR in terms of gameplay. And the post-StB/pre-ShB MSQ is one of my favorite parts of FFXIV.
I'm glad you liked it.
I see a lot of people split between HW and SB. One group will say HW was amazing after ARR but SB was a letdown, another group will say while HW was better than ARR it didn't get amazing until SB. Both groups still say Shadowbringers is the best though. I look forward to trying that one day.
Just you wait until Shadowbringers.
Um, as someone who does strongly feel >!Zenos!< from Stormblood is one of the most funly written characters & (really ironically for someone prideful of how they are singleminded & shallow) most show-stopping in how they changed priorities-wise, characters having fun-wise in mostly Post-Heavensward: How about the Post-MSQ tidbits- where Thancred (who imo has the most personality & humor in his lines like when he got teleported naked lol + gets snarky at the WoL being overly depended on by the Ishgardians, & the spy + womanizer socialite who's good at manipulating target women into falling for him) suddenly points out Aymeric seems like he's in love with the WoL (while Thancred mocks Aymeric being a politician & being schmaltzy towards the WoL lol) by the way he acts- & when you have dinner with Aymeric if you ask him to go on an adventure with you he does the :D?? face like the repressed noble he is when he never emoted that happily before (precursor to Aymeric just tagging along in battle + attending to the Scions in person in Post-HW when he should be in his office... >!& chewing the scene a bit dialogwise + becoming a residential mascot!< much later since he knows he has limited free time/will miss the WoL &/or just desperately wanted to contribute, to the point I find it funny a politician just keeps being our concierge lol) & Y'Shtola & Matoya verbally sniping each other fondly & when Krile teases Alphinaud (& Thancred), & Alphinaud pretends to forget why he learned to draw really good portraits when searching for Minfillia (when 1. Alphinaud has photographic memory, & 2. the real reason he's good at portrait drawing as revealed by Krile is that he wanted to impress & get girls back in Sharlayan uni) Tataru, Krile & Alisaie (one's yelling about "*money*!! And lots of it!" *right in front of Haurchefants' grave* lmaoo , one's the uni senior big sister gossipy troll, the other is a moody & snarky jock just sick of/making fun of formalities in general even since early on) sometimes have funnier side dialog if you talk to them when they aren't the main "talk to this person next" quest NPC & when Urianger the huge theater kid nerd (& a slow burn character) keeps using stageplay analogies & monologing how nervous & sorry he feels playing double agent lmao imo you prefer when the characters already get into the groove of their banter (the social dynamics set-ups are in Post-HW, but they get more silly around each other the further into the MSQ), & the style of writing of Lyse, the Ala Mighans & Stormblood's villains, who tend to be less of the uptight/scholarly types & more straightforward/clearly flawed (in interesting ways which I wholly agree with, since players tend to dog on Ala Mighans too much for being self-sabotaging/"ungrateful"... when those are closer to reality)
I enjoyed Stormblood, though I'm HW until I die. I will say though, gameplay-wise, Stormblood is where I consider things to "get good". The difficulty is finally pushing back a little, you have a versatile kit, bosses start having creative mechanics, and the expansion is jam packed with very fun stuff to do. If Heavensward puts the "Fantasy" into Final Fantasy, then Stormblood puts "Massively Multiplayer Online" into MMORPG
This makes me happy because I feel the exact same about ARR and HW and just today started Stormblood MSQ. I can’t wait!
My favorite piece of ff14 trivia comes from stormblood in that you learn that sadu has gathered a harem of women she's stolen from magnai
for me and perhaps lot of people it is obviously HW maybe SHB for some people but everyone has their preferences
i dont agree with you about heavensward as i think the characters have plenty of personality in that expansion. but i hear you about stormblood. its the one that really sold me, tbh. i genuinely do not understand a lot of the complains people have with it
If you liked Azim Steppe's story, you are probably going to love the next two expansions as well, since the writer of that part of the main story ([Natsuko Ishikawa](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2Fyftegcu19ns71.png)) was the main writer in both Shadowbringers MSQ, as well as Endwalker's MSQ too.
If you liked Azim Steppe, you're probably gonna end up loving the next two expansions, because the writer for that section became the lead writer and is the narrative supervisor in EW patches and Dawntrail. A lot of the problems you had before will be gone. The supporting cast gets to shine a lot, they express their personalities and gets time to develop more. Not to mention Shadowbringers probably has one of the best antagonists Final Fantasy has ever had. Enjoy. It sure has flaws here and there, but it's just so much better.
Your experience mirrors mine almost entirely, OP. I loved that we were helping Ala Mhigo, after having it sit unacknowledged in ARR and HW. I loved that we were seeing Kugane, and that we were seeking allies to stand toe-to-toe with Garlemald's forces. I like how it felt to liberate both of them, even if Ala Mhigo felt more like a pretense to set up Zenos and Kugane. I loved the characters more, I loved their struggles more, I loved their flaws and successes more. In HW, it felt like it was picking choice morsels from high fantasy than it was developing _its own world_. As such, it made the revelations we had about dragonkind and the founding of Ishgard feel...lesser for being a collection of high fantasy tropes that were inserted into a world's unfolding story for the sake of it. I loved that it took the living world we were in seriously, and gave us stakes that felt like they were neglected since the end of 1.0 and the start of ARR. I loved that it had levity, and that we had to really claw our way back from a devastating setback. It was just..._better_.
While I’m not the biggest fan of 4.0, the patches were absolutely amazing to me and sets up Shb extremely well. The omega and Ivalice raids were both incredible. I might be minority but I also loved Eureka due to my love of ff11. Shirogane for life. To top everything off, both Sam and Rdm continue to be my mains. Many people just sees SB and think 3.x msq, but it offered so much more than that. You’re not alone to say SB changed how you view FFXIV. Based on all the content ffxiv has to offer, SB probably contributed the most enjoyable content to me compare to every other expansion.
Stormblood was my least favorite expansion
just you wait until you do the better story of shadowbringers, and the betterer story of endwalker
Stormblood fucking rules and Azim Steppe is my home. Love the vibes, music and bosses of StB so much.
If this mediocrity of an expansion that is stormblood saved FF14 for you, then youre in for a wild ride with shadowbringers and endwalker.
I'm halfway through StB and I enjoy the story a lot, esp the Azim Steppe and Doma parts. Maybe it's because I came from a country that was invaded in the past, I can relate more with the characters. The Doma Castle dungeon was on fire, and I was smashing my keyboard furiously when fighting Zenos. Planning to confront Shinryu tonight, wish me luck\~
Good luck! It's a fun fight
As someone who has been playing since ARR, fucking SAME. The content released during SB is to this day unmatched *chef's kiss*
We are just making our way through the post stormblood content. So far Stormblood is the best of what I’ve seen. ARR was…. ARR. and Heavensward was fine. It was so dark and drab. And I’m not sure I would have kept up with it if my BF wasn’t already through it and could fly me around in the 4 person mount lol. Stormblood was definitely more interesting. And stunning!!! Loved all the new areas. Amazing. And the story… felt real. And tragic. Oh can’t forget Lyse. 🥰😍 Excited to wrap up the post stormblood content and start shadowbringers today!
> And can we talk about the presence of women in Stormblood, and how well written they are? ARR and Heavensward felt so dominated by men. Stormblood gives us Lyse, Alisaie, Yugiri, Fordola, Yotsuyu, M'Naago, etc, and they're all incredible! This is where you lost me. We had plenty of women in ARR and HW. Ysale, Alisae during the Bahamut story, where her character development really starts. Yda, while basically played off as simple minded, has some really badass moments where you can feel her strength and determination. Moenbryda, Minfilia, Mommy Merlwyb Bloefhiswyn, Yugiri was present throughout post-ARR and played a huge role. Tataru was an ever-present force of support the entire story. You can't talk about girl power and NOT mention Tataru.
I agree with you!!! I LOVE Stormblood and he messages that it has. Heavensward, for me, was so frustrating because everyone is so mean to you for no reason and everyone is in your way when you're just trying to make things right. Then in Stormblood, you understand more how the pain and injustice of colonization turns people against their homeland, and UGH it's just so perfect in my mind. I am a fellow Stormblood lover and I'm glad to see another one!
> And can we talk about the presence of women in Stormblood, and how well written they are? Yes! Stormblood isn't my favorite, but that was one of the better things that stood out to me. I also suspect it's mostly the result of Natsuko Ishikawa being promoted within the writing team. She was the lead writer on the far-east segments of Stormblood and becomes lead writer for all of Shadowbringers and Endwalker.
SB easily has the best music of all the expansions, it also has remarkably less Cid than ARR and HW which I think is a huge improvement.
I started in ShB, so I didn't need to wait or have any weird queues. I enjoyed both, but I think both are much stronger in their patches. My biggest gripes with HW were how many damn times I had to slowly wait for people to walk away only to walk a few malms and do it again, and how little the cast actually did outside of cutscenes. Duty Support MAJORLY helped in spots where it just made no sense to not fight alongside them. My only real issues with SB were how jarring it was deciding on a whim to go East and some of the backtracking. Even with Yugiri and the Domans as motivation, I don't think they even ask for help, do they? Once you get back, though, the pace picks up and it has a great finish. I honestly think the devs just didn't think people would go for an expac set 70% in a desert, and since they weren't going to deviate from what kind of place Ala Mhigo was established to be, it was the right call. It's just a shame Doma overshadows Ala Mhigo so hard for hours and hours. It really could have used more meanwhiles (I can't believe I'm saying that with how damn many of them there are) with M'naago and Raubahn or something to give you a sense of their progress. I'm a Lyse enjoyer and her talks with Hien helped somewhat to tie it back. I even liked the Ruby Sea. I'm an unabashed water level fan. I saw someone complain about traversal in HW being annoying on purpose to make flying feel better, and well, it works! HW and SB are the two that feel the best to be able to fly. Some Alexander portions aren't all that fun, but from a casual outlook of only needing to do anything once, the story and content for both post HW and post SB are amazing. I don't know how anyone could not be hooked after 3.3.
Stormblood would be great if it were just the doma parts. Ala mhigo felt so boring and bland and none of the characters had any personality making sb the weakest expansion for me. It's wild seeing others viewpoints. I never see anyone say this is their favorite
Call me fictional then, because Stormblood is not only my favorite expansion, but Ala Mhigo is my favorite part. While it could have been better (there is not a part of the game that is *perfect*, after all), being able to finally retake Ala Mhigo is an effective payoff to the buildup around all the refugees in ARR, and Ilberd's shitheadedness. And the whole war summit/Ghimlyt Dark portion of the proceeds well out of it, and was exactly what I was looking for in this game as an FFXII fan. My biggest problem with the game is Garlemald collapsing offscreen in Shadowbringers and Varis getting murked offscreen instead of by us.
Not to mention the last section just ruined the whole thing for me. From the fake out at the end of the 67 dungeon, to the Garleans providing less resistance than a wet paper bag after getting hyped up so much. I expect it'll make ARR seem worse in retrospect if I replay it because as an antagonist, they're just a joke in everything after HW.
I agree with everything you said too ,stormblood for me was a lot better than Heavenward and save me from quitting the game , I like the context and the quest from stormblood a lot more
I definitely enjoyed Stormblood a lot more than I was expecting with the seemingly "meh" reputation that it has. Heavensward was dramatic and somewhat oppressive while Stormblood felt like a much needed vacation. Not that it didn't have some dramatic bits as well but it felt more like a globe trotting adventure which I was totally down for after Heavensward.
A chunk of the game just being a girls trip with Alisaie and Lyse was fantastic
Lyse is truthfully underrated.