i'm not done with the post-HW patches but you know what. i'm gonna talk about my opinions on finishing HW msq. ffxiv spoilers ahead

[ffxiv spoilers, heavensward spoilers]
first off ysayle was by far my favorite character of the expansion and i'm furious that the writers pulled another moenbryda with her. still pissed about moenbryda for that matter. anyway ysayle is cool

[ffxiv spoilers, heavensward spoilers]
hraesvelgr forcing ysayle to confront the fact that the primal she channeled was a fake shiva from her own dreams is the kind of character conflict i live for. and even if i disagree with how it ended, her big moment in azys lla was hype

[ffxiv spoilers, heavensward spoilers]
im focusing on characters rn i guess. i like alphinaud a little now! he got some growth. i like estinien because of how he bounced off ysayle. who else oh lucia i also like her quite a bit! she's kind of a neat foil to cid

[ffxiv spoilers, heavensward spoilers]
speaking of, cid got some screentime and involvement, love that for him. idk if i ever said before but i like ffxiv cid. he's the hottest scion

[ffxiv spoilers, heavensward spoilers]
i wish lucia talked a little less about aymeric because i find aymeric... pretty bland compared to his subordinate. he and haurchefant were kinda letdowns for me from how people talked them up

[ffxiv spoilers, heavensward spoilers]
maybe i was braced for it because i'd been spoiled ahead of time, but i really didn't feel much over haurchefant's death. don't get me wrong, i think he was admirable and kind and had the WoL's back throughout, but his death was an Eh moment

[ffxiv spoilers, heavensward spoilers]
i gotta move away from characters. uhhh storywise the introduction to ishgard was decently paced, i LOVED the entire section of the story traveling with ysayle alphinaud and estinien that was the highlight for me

[ffxiv spoilers, heavensward spoilers]
things dragged a little after idyllshire/matoya... oh confession i didn't realize yshtola could see until matoya said she couldn't. like i heard she was blind and saw aether before starting ARR so i assumed she was Always like that??? hfjkg

[ffxiv spoilers, heavensward spoilers]
i should talk about trials. ravana and bismarck and thordan were all pretty dang cool, though the former two felt... idk, a little slow as far as trials go? thordan was a fun final boss and his knights made it interesting

[ffxiv spoilers, heavensward spoilers]
it was the escalation and the drama of "ok im a primal god now" that revived my flagging interest in the plot near the end. allag and ascian stuff felt... disconnected, so i'm glad HW finished off with Ishgard Plot Resolution (Sorta)

[ffxiv spoilers, heavensward spoilers]
this thread was not meant to be this long i apologize. anyway while i certainly have some Gripes and certain story beats didn't hit as hard as they could've, HW was overall enjoyable! a marked improvement over ARR, i'm glad i got to play it