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This discourse and Elementals Discourse are the two parts of Final Fantasy XIV where I feel like the writers being mostly Japanese means they're coming at things from a very different perspective than the American audience, even if I'm not sure of exactly how.
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May 20, 2023 10:16
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Ah. A Discourse update. I'll just note as I have before, as unsatisfying an answer as it may be, that I'm fairly certain Lolorito has always been one of Banri Oda's pets going all the way back to the beginning of the game in 2010, and the original plans for his story likely suffered somewhat in 1.0 getting cut short, as there were threads in that involving Lolorito as well. There's actually been hints going well back that he was secretly more soft-hearted than his persona appeared, but, well, some signifcant parts were seasonal only if they weren't in 1.0. In short, he was always supposed to be apparently responsible for all the early evils you encounter in Ul'dah, only to have the curtain draw back some and reveal that it was someone else taking advantage of Lolorito's dark reputation as a blind to keep people from realizing a different hand was at play. That may have always been intended to be Teledji Adeldji, or it's possible that more of the Syndicate was meant to be directly involved. It doesn't really matter at this point since we can only go on what's actually out in the game, so the most that can be done it either believe some of the claims Lolorito made or seethe that he's still too "clean" to get the punishment he richly deserves. I point it out mostly because I do not believe it was only decided as late as Stormblood to try and rehabilitate his image, I think that's just the earliest there was a window in the story to do so after Nanamo's revival. (As a side note, we've actually had Lolorito's unmasked face dating back to the Heavensward short story For Coin and Country wherein the actual discussion about Teledji's finances took place with Nanamo.) 
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May 20, 2023 10:23
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It’s so weird that they had the funny underpants man who runs the world’s largest Dave & Busters and plays Santa Claus every Starlight explain economic realpolitik and talk about welfare queens and such. I do think it’s a little more interesting and nuanced than my initial knee jerk reaction to it but it’s still one of the most bizarre choices they could have possibly made. And yeah I really can’t see Lolorito as being anything but extremely self serving and being too smart to openly act like a goddamn villain. Ironically the fact that he is intelligent enough to be able to recognize that he should stop being openly evil makes him the most unrealistic portrayal of a rich person I have ever seen. Maybe his Rich Person Stupidity is limited entirely to weird dietary choices, like he thinks Ala Mhigan salt will make him immortal.
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May 20, 2023 10:25
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It's pretty much what people are suggesting in my opinion, Lolorito isn't any better a person, he's just in a situation where the path to his own safety/money is aligned with the heroes instead of against. Notably, Nanamo is no longer planning to disrupt the whole nation, which was more or less why he (after finding about Teledji's own poisoning plan) did what he did in ARR.
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May 20, 2023 10:44
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Yapping Eevee posted:A very minor side question: Now that you've seen him with the mask off, how old would you say Lolorito is? I wanna say... late 30s? Early 40s? The mask certainly makes him look older by putting all the focus on that pale moustache. I didn't even realize he was blonde rather than grey.
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May 20, 2023 10:45
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Sanguinia posted:I wanna say... late 30s? Early 40s? The mask certainly makes him look older by putting all the focus on that pale moustache. I didn't even realize he was blonde rather than grey.
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May 20, 2023 11:09
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Now I am forever going to think of this part of the discourse as the Mander-Mander-Manderville Plan, so thanks for that! I think. I do appreciate the genuinely thoughtful analysis of what's going on past the initial dissonance of Godbert going all "handouts make people lazy", because it is more complicated than that. (Though is it really Godbert if he's wearing pants? Hmmm...) I think that no amount of varnish slapped over Lolorito is ever going to make people like him or forgive him, whatever the writer's intentions in that regard may be, but he works just fine as a figure that you can boo like a pantomime villain every time he gets mentioned or brought on to the scene.
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May 20, 2023 11:13
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I for one think that Lord Lolorito is very cool and has done absolutely nothing wrong. This advertisement has been paid for by the East Aldenard Trading Company.
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May 20, 2023 11:20
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 This cutscene of Nanamo and Raubahn was actually originally in 1.0, albeit without voice acting. I remember seeing it on YouTube once, so I was surprised to see it brought back in Stormblood. The seriousness of a scene Godbert is in correlates to how many layers of clothes he's wearing. This is also a good way to gauge the level of comedic violence that will ensue. And yes, needless to say, there was a fair amount of discourse around Godbert's counter-proposal, even though I'd say that he made some very fair and sensible points. On the topic of Lolorito, I'm not really sure how to feel about him. On one hand, it is very strange to come from ARR where we continually see how he's a very corrupt man with a lot of corrupt people in his pocket, particularly if you start with a class that begins in Ul'dah. It also feels like it diminishes the corruption among the Monetarists to "Oh, it was just Teledjii, and now that he's dead everything is fine." On the other hand, him having more depth than initially shown is a bit refreshing, and it is surprising to see that he has some semblance of reticence and remorse for his actions in ARR, particularly after he made a big display of rubbing what he did in Raubahn's face in HW. I will admit that I advocated for Ilberd's buddies to be executed because I hated both of their guts. But, thinking back on it, it is a little odd for Raubahn to advocate for Fordola to not get the axe immediately only to turn around and go "Alright, but how quickly can we execute these two?"
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May 20, 2023 11:31
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Lolorito is interesting in that even as incredibly selfish as he is, long-term stability for Ul'dah is in his own interest.
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May 20, 2023 11:34
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Blueberry Pancakes posted:I will admit that I advocated for Ilberd's buddies to be executed because I hated both of their guts. But, thinking back on it, it is a little odd for Raubahn to advocate for Fordola to not get the axe immediately only to turn around and go "Alright, but how quickly can we execute these two?" Fordola is an enemy officer, these two are allied traitors.
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May 20, 2023 11:38
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Fair enough.
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May 20, 2023 11:47
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He was also possibly being honest when he said that Fordola had value to Ala Mhigo as an intelligence asset. And he didn't say that he didn't want her executed, just that he didn't want her lynched in the streets. Guy called Zenos' death justice, implied that his version of justice for those two would absolutely be their deaths, no reason to think he doesn't believe Fordola should be getting a short drop and a sudden stop once her usefulness has ended. And he does defer to Lyse's judgement on the issue of Fordola in much the same way he defers to WoL regardless of his personal feelings. So that's consistent.
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May 20, 2023 12:00
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Lord_Magmar posted:Fordola is an enemy officer, these two are allied traitors. More importantly than that however, is that I feel like his complicity in Ilberd's betrayal and massacre deserves either the death penalty or life imprisonment, and with a war going on the death penalty is probably the most expedient solution. He and Yuyuhase have the blood of everyone who followed the Griffin to the wall on their hands, and they knowingly murdered every single one of them. They were the ones who pulled the switch on the final attack, after all. That's why I said they should be executed.
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May 20, 2023 12:14
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Laurentius is kind of a weird case for me personally because he sucks rear end but at the same time I kind of wonder what would have happened with him if we hadn’t basically handed a sad loser ripe to be radicalized into some crazy rear end bullshit right to Ilberd. I mean granted the same thing was potentially true of Wilred and he was killed for having moral fortitude, so it’s not like Laurentius had no agency in it or anything. He could have made choices that weren’t terrible. But I still felt considerably weirder about the idea of reveling in his potential death than I did Yuyuhase who is just an rear end in a top hat. Speaking of people who suck rear end while I have mixed feelings on whatever the authorial intent is with Lolorito I genuinely love Hancock. He is an awful slimy weasel man and is treated as such by the narrative and yet he is legitimately nothing but helpful to you in the areas he’s knowledgeable about and that’s so funny to me.
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May 20, 2023 12:27
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Nanamo showing up wearing a mask is as you said a fun little power move. It is especially so because as one of the side stories put it:Tales from the Dragonsong War, “For Coin and Country” posted:It was considered a sign of great disrespect to wear such accoutrements to an audience with the sultana, but the Monetarist had always excused his discourtesy with the claim that his eyes were sensitive to bright light. And, of course, Lolorito shows no sign of discomfort to the light once unmasked.
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May 20, 2023 12:27
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I feel a lot of the problem with Godbert, besides the politics which I am not the person to ask about, is predicated on his tone. "Don't, Period" vs a preferred "I wouldn't recommend it as someone you're seeking advice from". That said, from a writing perspective, I do get that if anyone else who was syndicate-aligned, such that one Lalafell women with the cone hat, said that I would dismiss it completely out of hand. As for Lolorito (and the Crystal Brave goons) it's one thing to forgive, to no longer feel anger at their sins against the WoL and Their friends. To seek retribution out of a need for vengeance. That's what I read the choice about the goons' fate as being about, you can ether let the courts deal with the process as is proper (and they've confessed, they're probably hosed) or leverage your being the WoL to ensure their deaths out of a need for their blood. It's quite the other, however, to forget those transgressions outright. Lolorito wants that for himself, he's tried to buy his way to absolution a few times already, but he'll never get it. He's not in any immediate threat of being chopped like the potato Teledji was but that doesn't make him any less rotten a spud. ConanThe3rd fucked around with this message at 12:39 on May 20, 2023 |
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May 20, 2023 12:30
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Sanguinia posted:Nanamo starts the conversation off with a minor power move: this gets me every time lol
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May 20, 2023 13:02
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SirSamVimes posted:Lolorito is interesting in that even as incredibly selfish as he is, long-term stability for Ul'dah is in his own interest. He's sort of the "ideal" capitalist, the one who controls a significant amount of wealth and power but understands that the lower classes need bread and circuses or they might start getting revolutionary. The writers' efforts to deal with Lolorito have always felt like them realizing they bit off more than they could chew with the Bloody Banquet. But they did the right thing by not just retconning it or ignoring its potential consequences. Lolorito is an aggravating little poo poo who deserves worse than he's gotten, but at the same time, he's not a problem that can be punched through. Eorzea being a place where economics and class dynamics exist and can't be easily overcome by a Chosen One doing Chosen One stuff is ultimately better for the consistency of the setting and story, even if (or perhaps because) its frustrating.
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May 20, 2023 13:27
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Theres also the small matter of if he does try it on for size at this juncture, a) the WoL will probably live through whatever poo poo is pulled and b) absolutly kick his arse into space for it.
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May 20, 2023 14:07
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1stGear posted:The writers' efforts to deal with Lolorito have always felt like them realizing they bit off more than they could chew with the Bloody Banquet. But they did the right thing by not just retconning it or ignoring its potential consequences. Lolorito is an aggravating little poo poo who deserves worse than he's gotten, but at the same time, he's not a problem that can be punched through. Eorzea being a place where economics and class dynamics exist and can't be easily overcome by a Chosen One doing Chosen One stuff is ultimately better for the consistency of the setting and story, even if (or perhaps because) its frustrating. Yeah a lot of my conclusions about Lolorito are less about the text as written and more about the subtext of story structure and the decisions the writers make; it seemed pretty clear that they wanted either Lolorito or a character like Lolorito to stick around long-term to help expand the supporting cast for Ul'dah going forward. That wouldn't work if he stayed a sneering villain commanding an army with a spot in the cinematic intro to Heavensward. Everything since then has been a moderation of his initial scenes and general personality. Now you can read him as the Moral Capitalist with less vicious intentions then initial presented, or you can read him as the kind of intelligent villain who is aware that while he loves being a rich rear end in a top hat his #1 priority should be making sure someone else is the WoLs #1 priority at all times and sometimes that means reining in the greed and ambition while we're around.
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May 20, 2023 14:32
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Ran Rannerson posted:Ironically the fact that he is intelligent enough to be able to recognize that he should stop being openly evil makes him the most unrealistic portrayal of a rich person I have ever seen. Maybe his Rich Person Stupidity is limited entirely to weird dietary choices, like he thinks Ala Mhigan salt will make him immortal. Unfortunately in the real world we don't kill rich people for being too villainous. If we did, it might not be unrealistic. Just as Nero knows that if he wants to do mad science, he needs to do it for the good guys or you will stop him, I think your presence at this meeting is very much an implied threat. Raubahn isn't the only person the Sultana knows who would be willing to slice a fool in half. Yapping Eevee posted:The actual answer, which I presume was from the first lorebook and thus okay to discuss at this point: He's 64. I guess Lalafells age really gracefully? He's not just a member of the Hair Club for Popotos, he's the president.
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May 20, 2023 14:34
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this is slightly askew to the question of how the character is written and the way StB and patches handle him, but for me a lot of the stuff involving lolorito feels like ultimately a concession to the unchanging nature of the MMO world. you can get away with a lot of stuff when there's a statue of you in a key non-instanced MSQ zone and countless random npc lines in ul'dah that hinge on your existence and you're in the CUL quests etc. e: agreed as well that a lot of the godbert convo probably hits somewhat different if you are writing/reading from the perspective of someone living in a country that considered itself a great power at the turn of the 20th century, then within living memory was horribly scarred by (self-instigated) war and then an extended occupation, that retooled itself into a fairly specialized economic powerhouse in part by closely tying itself to a former enemy. i don't know how, exactly, and i'm not convinced it would be different enough to affect how i feel about the scene, but i know it's gotta be at least a little different than me reading this with only the context of american bootstraps rhetoric. Hogama posted:(As a side note, we've actually had Lolorito's unmasked face dating back to the Heavensward short story For Coin and Country wherein the actual discussion about Teledji's finances took place with Nanamo.) hasn't it been known since minute 1 of ARR, since it's the same face on his statue in vesper bay? Valentin fucked around with this message at 15:10 on May 20, 2023 |
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May 20, 2023 14:56
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When I played through this part of the story, this felt like a final statement that they were dropping the Lolorito storyline. The Heavensward bit restored the status quo but didn't offer any resolution, so this tries to provide it. He's gonna be nice now, so stop worrying about him because we already have too many other stories to tell going forward.
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May 20, 2023 15:07
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Yeah, the takeaway I always had from Lolorito is "he's put himself in such a position that removing him from it, violently or politically, would cause far more problems than it solves." And that's in addition to the way his personal aims (long-term stability for the realm and profit for himself) will bring him in line with our goals just as often as it sees him against us.
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May 20, 2023 15:29
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GilliamYaeger posted:The children yearn for the salt mines. Yeah and it's so annoyingly in character for him as well. As much as he loves making himself richer he also likes himself and his country to be safe. He wants stability and a knowable status quo more than anything. It's why he betrayed the braves and teledji's plans. Previously that set us at odds with him because we are agents of progress and change more often than not but now with this absolute defeat of the empire on the continent things are going to change no matter what. So he wants to set things up the provide stability for Ul'dah since having Ala mhigo as a desperate neighbor state previously in history led to the Garlean invasion. Aid them and line his pocket and 'everybody' wins. He hasn't really changed and I don't think they're white washing his history. Even him supplying the Domans really just reads as "It's pennies to me and if they manage to win an entire nation owes me its freedom". I read all the Stormblood revelations less as a reveal he's actually a good person secretly and more as "This guy wants to make sure anyone he can is in his debt so he can pull more strings" like he does in that convo with you and Nanamo. ZenMasterBullshit fucked around with this message at 15:42 on May 20, 2023 |
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May 20, 2023 15:38
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I do wonder how Doma feels about Lolorito. On one hand, yeah, those weapons sure came handy. On the other hand, Yugiri will be able to give first hand account how Lolorito was fine leaving the refugees to starve on their boat.
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May 20, 2023 16:07
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1stGear posted:Lolorito is an aggravating little poo poo who deserves worse than he's gotten, but at the same time, he's not a problem that can be punched through.
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May 20, 2023 16:09
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I started the game in Limsa, and one of the themes early on in ARR that I liked was the forgiveness potential. There's a story early on about a guy who has been running a farm to provide jobs, and one of his workers started being wooed back to piracy. When you bring the guy back, the storyline ends with him being escorted back to Limsa to plead to his crimes, but the guy running the farm tells him that a job will still be available for him after he's paid his time. The Crystal Braves story also touched upon the Thanalan story about the youth hoping to summon Rhalgr, and again, though they do not get off free of consequence it's understood that Little Ala Mhigo will welcome them back after they've served justice. Following in that example, as far back as the Crystal Braves enlistment I really didn't want to see Laurentius to die because again I appreciated the optimistic view that people can change if giving the opportunity to. He was one of the characters I recognized because of how he tried to get us personally captured (and while doing so called my fem-character a bitch, which was notable considering how little your character's gender matters outside pronouns), and in his last cutscene at Baelsar's Wall the guy was clearly not happy with how things had progressed and was being pushed on by Yuyuhase. For all that I looked at it like while I could see the argument that Yuyuhase's unrepentant treason should deserve some sort of penalty, I was willing to let him off in order to also spare the guy he pushed on. The other character I didn't want to see come to harm was the guy from the Little Ala Mhigo storyline we found dead in a river. RIP. The choice ultimately is a closure on the ARR storyline that brought us here as a simple binary option without any consequences to be felt one way or another, and the themes of what I experienced initially exploring La Noscea touched with me more here than Heavensward's lesson that sometimes you have to force an old institution's demise to stop the bleeding, or Stormblood giving me Zenos's worldview wherein the value of life is felt only in how much struggle and resistance there is in taking it away. EDIT: ZenMasterBullshit posted:So he wants to set things up the provide stability for Ul'dah since having Ala mhigo as a desperate neighbor state previously in history led to the Garlean invasion. Aid them and line his pocket and 'everybody' wins. There's also this. Eorzea's last dealings with Ala Mhigo was everyone, Ishgard included, showing up to tell them to gently caress off. That left them vulnerable to Garlean invasion, at which point the Sharlayans packed up and left, and here we are. Investing into Ala Mhigo's infrastructure not only helps give Ala Mhigo some much needed foundation to establish relations, it gives Nanamo cover to say that Ul'dah is getting something from the exchange, but it also means Lolorito sees many of the refugees living on the streets no longer needing to be sheltered in Ul'dah and the status quo becomes more sustainable. Fewer mouths seeking nourishment makes it less offensive for him to be opulently wealthy. So for all this, it's understandable why Lolorito would put money into Ilberd's rosy ideal, but then cut him off when the rhetoric changed into a vendetta plot to drag Eorzea into a war. In some ways the blame for everything that happens splits in half: Alphinaud is at partly at fault for trying to build a force "for the good of Eorzea" and forgetting to include Eorzea's old black sheep region anywhere in those plans, and Ilberd's also very much fault because what he lacked was manpower and instead he figured the problem was Raubahn for being an icon of success in a new country, when the figure who fought one, possibly two Legatus and is known in Garlemald as "the champion of the savages" is standing right there to use as a rallying figure. Craptacular! fucked around with this message at 17:17 on May 20, 2023 |
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May 20, 2023 16:25
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Everyone is talking about the Discourse™, but I'm here totally surprised that Yuyuhase and Laurentius survived the massacre at Baelsar's Wall  I was under the impression that everyone died. Buscarron does mention that he'll give Laurentius a walloping but I just thought he didn't know.
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May 20, 2023 17:26
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Kazy posted:Everyone is talking about the Discourse™, but I'm here totally surprised that Yuyuhase and Laurentius survived the massacre at Baelsar's Wall They set up the slaughter of the lower recruits specifically. No way Yuyuhase was going to press that switch if he thought it would end his life, he is here to get payed rather than ideology.
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May 20, 2023 17:27
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I can't remember, why they heck were they following you instead of catching the next boat to Radz-at-Han or otherwise getting themselves as far away from this mess as possible.
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May 20, 2023 17:41
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Yeah, not a fan of how Lolorito basically got to treat the Ala Mhigan refugees like crap and now gets to continue to exploit them (but in a more capitalist way) but I do agree that this is probably a Japanese perspective thing. I think. I do wish he would just gently caress off so we don't have to deal with him, let alone having the 'good' syndicate member tell us that charity is bad and we need lovely capitalist people.
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May 20, 2023 17:45
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Galaga Galaxian posted:I can't remember, why they heck were they following you instead of catching the next boat to Radz-at-Han or otherwise getting themselves as far away from this mess as possible. We're never given a reason. Maybe they hoped to approach me personally to seek a pardon or protection. Maybe they wanted to kill me for a Garlean bounty. It's left a mystery. Which is kind of neat to me.
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May 20, 2023 18:13
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Add me to the chorus of people who hate this chunk of the msq. It's not the worst, and it's not one of the parts I have written essays over, but I just don't think it's well-written overall. The individual plot beats could all be handled better but mostly aren't themselves intolerable. Godbert's writing here is weird, especially in contrast to how he's written elsewhere even if you take into account the comedy filter he usually has—to the point where it makes me wonder if this plot beat was actually intended for him initially—but the big bugbear is, as usual, Lolorito getting off scot free, again, without having to give anything up.
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May 20, 2023 18:15
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Galaga Galaxian posted:I can't remember, why they heck were they following you instead of catching the next boat to Radz-at-Han or otherwise getting themselves as far away from this mess as possible. I’d figure that they kind of put themselves in a position where they couldn’t easily get out of Ala Mhigo, since Garlemald controlled pretty much every way out from the east, and the Alliance forces came in from the west and would be on the lookout for them. So their choices were either “get caught by the Garleans and get conscripted or summarily executed for being part of the rebels”, “get caught by the Alliance and get imprisoned or executed for being traitors”, or “hunker down and look for an escape route to open up in the chaos”, and considering the WoL’s well-earned reputation for messing up the empire’s holdings…
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May 20, 2023 18:16
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Galaga Galaxian posted:I can't remember, why they heck were they following you instead of catching the next boat to Radz-at-Han or otherwise getting themselves as far away from this mess as possible. I've got even odds on them deluding themselves that they could ambush and subdue the WOL. That or they were spying on the WOL for the Imperials.
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May 20, 2023 18:16
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Hellioning posted:Yeah, not a fan of how Lolorito basically got to treat the Ala Mhigan refugees like crap and now gets to continue to exploit them (but in a more capitalist way) but I do agree that this is probably a Japanese perspective thing. I think. I do wish he would just gently caress off so we don't have to deal with him, let alone having the 'good' syndicate member tell us that charity is bad and we need lovely capitalist people. There are huge problems with Japanese work culture, but their CEOs make something like 10% of other regions. Yoshi-P went from a guy being handed the company's least enviable job to the board of directors in eight years, so this game isn't likely espouse that capitalism is inherently broken or work without universal income is just another slavery. That isn't to say that your feelings aren't valid, you're just not going to get validation here because the later stages of capitalism are just not gonna be discussed. Craptacular! fucked around with this message at 18:21 on May 20, 2023 |
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May 20, 2023 18:17
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I mean I'm not even asking for that I just want to stop having to constantly work with the lovely capitalist.
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May 20, 2023 18:47
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But you're not. You're helping Nanamo try to flex some leverage on the lovely capitalist.
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May 20, 2023 18:49
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