Orobashi being barely mentionned is kinda annoying. To the point most of the fanbase forgets he was Watatsumi's god and thinks he was a mindless beast Ei killed some day.
@@treetreetreetreetreetree oh I don't blame you If you're curious you can visit Enkanomiya, it turns out Orobashi was really gentle before Celestia hit him with "-9999 social credits"
I feel like that's a major ongoing symptom of Genshin's story telling, lore that's locked away in events and or hidden in exploration and books, this is not necessarily such a bad thing but it should be more left to certain details and lore that's not critical to the main story than entire story archs that would go a huge way to explaining certain characters and their motives etc etc.
Copium, maybe they will do missions with kokomi and orobashi in the future, and that half dragart girl from the enkanomya event too, kokomi was a bit sus on the event on her reasons to be on summeru, and since is said god dont really die maybe kokomi can actually talk with orobashi, but keep it secret bc forbbiden knowdle idk watatsumi has so much potential is frustrating
It's in her character teaser too. xD Orobashi was part of Ei's posse before they all went crazy and Ei had to kill them. Inazuma had the most giant island sized youkai of any region, but because they aren't divine like archons or dragons the corrosion gets to them faster than the divine. They are youkai likely not that old in comparison to the dragons either. Especially the dendro dragon who was born when the world was. He's somehow still not corroded yet despite being older than everything. xD
I always wished kokomi was a more morally grey character like lyney/lynette and others recently. Would have been an interesting development if kokomi knowingly worked with the fatui to try and win the war in a moment of desperation instead of it just being an oopsie. Or had more of an actual hand in the every event of the war. Like if yoimiya and the kamisato clan were directly in cahoots with kokomi so events like the prison breaks or the peacr talks or the ninja mission were actually from Kokomi's direct orders, making her an actual mastermind in the shadows. But no she legit got nothing.... Also can they please stop making character quests date quests... like at this point just give 5 stars hangout quests and keep that shit to those so we can have juicier story quests.
Depends on what you classify as "juicer" story quests. Because I'd hardly called story quests from Sumeru onward "date quests" (especially characters like Tighnari, Dehya, and Lyney)
All of this. They were literally at war and it would’ve been entirely realistic if they were pushed to morally dubious standards. Heck, Ayato is morally gray so it wouldn’t have been out there. Having Kokomi be morally gray as well would’ve added more moral conflict on whose side we were fighting on, especially since Hoyo tried to give sympathy/redemption for Raiden/Ei at the end anyways lol
Star Rail really improved on the companion quest by making MC more of an observer that is there to witness how others story unfold and even bringing other playable characters into them. (Imbaibitor Lunae and Luka being my favorite recently). Also personal opinion but I think Faruzan and Kevah has the best hangout as it really dive's into how that actions affected their lives.
@@jess4334 True, I mean Ayaka literally guilt trips the Traveler to help fight the shogun by making us meet those who lost their visions. They should has shown her as manipulative yet we'll meaning.
Her character needed to be a priestess only, pushed into a war that she wasn’t ready for and didn’t necessarily want. Gorou needed to be the genius military strategist. They overloaded her.
?? Isn’t Miko already taking the priestess role? And Kokomi is a huge strategy nerd, she was in her element during the war. Maybe if she was in conflict with the actual priestess (made to be a separate character) and led Watatsumi during the war?
@@anotherrandomperson9174 Miko is Miko (or Guuji) of Narukami Sakura, the priestess is not her title Kokomi is the Priestess of Watatsumi island apart from different places, they are called differently on purpose too. Miko is not only a name but a Japanese word
Honestly i think gorou was also affected by this- being a general who does little else but blindly trust his priestess and who doesn't get to really be in charge dampened his potential. Splitting the character traits evenly between kokomi and gorou would have given us two great characters instead of two fhat will never be fully realized in the story
I knew she wasn’t written to be a strategist the second they drove home the point that she writes down hundreds of outlines for each scenario. A strategist would create a plan that already considers all possible weak links and designs counters for them, then manipulates the scenario to bend to their plan. Quantity of plans does not surpass the quality of a single good plan. It just shows you can only problem solve in binaries, not dynamically.
I really hated they did that because they basically showed her as a micromanaging "leader" that doesn't trust her subordinates to think critically about the situations they face and just rely on hoping she already came up with a plan for them to refer to instead of using their brains.
Not really. For example, the US outlined several plans in case of war prior to World War I and II. War Plan Red was created in case of war against the British Empire. And this was divided into several War Plans. War Plan Red was specifically against the UK. War Plan Crimson was against Canada. War Plan Ruby was against India ( the British Raj ), War Plan Scarlet against Australia, War Plan Garnet against New Zealand, and then War Plan Emerald against Ireland. Then there was the Rainbow Plans in case of war on multiple fronts against a coalition of enemies ( clearly the Axis Powers ). War Plan Rainbow 1 was a plan for a defensive war to Protect the US as the Western Hemisphere north of 10 Degrees south latitude. In such a war, the US was assumed to be without Major Allies. War Plan Rainbow 2 was identical to Rainbow 1, except for assuming that the US would be allied with France and the UK. War Plan Rainbow 4 was based on the same assumptions as Rainbow 1 but extended the American mission to include defense of the entire Western Hemisphere. War Plan Rainbow 5, destined to be the basis for the American strategy in WW2, assumed that the U.S. was allied with the UK and France and provided for offensive operations by American Forces in Europe, Africa, or Both. So, what Kokomi was doing there is in fact realistic.
There certainly are plenty of stories in history where that happened. Pretty much all of them were desperation measures, and we tend to only remember the cases where the strategist got lucky enough for their one plan to work out. Granted, this also contrasts with all the great military leaders of history who didn't even make one strategic plan. (This was excusable in the cases where winning the war wasn't the point of entering one, which were surprisingly common.) Pretty much all of the competent strategists started with the assumption they couldn't control the weather (which also meant where masses of people could go), whether the other side would actually show up for any given battle, whether a heretofore unconsidered party would suddenly enter the conflict or start a new one, and other factors. How much overplanning was required would depend a lot on the existing capabilities of the force under their command. Given that Kokomi for the most part had barely trained troops facing a force that honestly could have easily overrun them if it wasn't for the fact that absolutely nobody wanted a massacre (and for a change in the history of civil wars both sides' leadership were competent enough to minimize casualties), I'd say not just writing out her entire military tactical doctrine but being prepared for many of her subordinates to fail to remember and follow that doctrine was warranted.
Honestly, I agree with things said in video cause that's the impression I got from her story quest later too: She's really not a genius strategist (even though she works hard to maintain this image, willingly or not). She's just a priestess forced to give her all, even overworking herself to the point of mental shutdown for saving her people (hence the need to "recharge" every now and then, I really doubt real geniuses are in need of such activities. Even with introvert reasons in the picture). But, honestly, it's not like genshin does anything to support nor to reject that kind of interpretation (unless there's something in the lore that I didn't care enough to read and/or missed the event for). And game's storytelling does play a lot with that kind of imaginary subplots that are logical and sometimes definitely somewhere in the game, but writers can't give a damn for a second to put the right hints where they belong. Which is a shame. They surely know how to. They did that before
it's not that she's not written to be a good strategist but the writers have no idea how to make one and didn't do their research. this whole quest seems like it was made on a time crunch so I'm not surprised that they just winged it
I know Alhaitham is an "acquired taste" since his personality can turn off people but he's a perfect example of a big-brain actually show off their big-brainness
Literally all characters that are considered intelligent like, Yelan , ninguang, Yae(regardless of how she is), EVEN FUCKING KAVEH SHOW HIS BIG BRAIN in his hangout when building that library(?), show their big brainess better than her
true!! I don't like his personality at all, but i do recognize that he is one of the few good writin character. he feels more important to Sumeru's Archon Quest than Kokomi was for Inazuma's Archon Quest so I cannot say that he is a bad character.
As an albedo fan since his release I remember back when we used to speculate about him being a homonculous based on nothing but a few lines in his stories and the names of his constellations...the 2021 winter event felt SO satisfying to play and see the theories confirmed and his lore expanded I simply do not understand why kokomi could not at the very least receive the same grace, especially given how rich in lore enkanomiya is as an area, how relevant kokomi's connections with orobashi and his people are and, most infuriatingly, the fact that the perfect opportunity with the vishap people event was right there ripe for the taking. Kokomi at least conceptually was always one of the most interesting characters in the game for me and as much as she was a victim of inazuma's last act collapsing in on itself I don't think it had to be the end for her (see how ei's second story quest swiftly changed so many people's opinions on her), but unfortunately I think hoyo no longer care.
did you reply to the wrong person? I don't really disagree with this and also what's neuvillette got to do with anything that I said?@@silverhawkscape2677
@@silverhawkscape2677They're not talking about that. They're talking about her connections to enkanomiya, and with enkanomiya comes the lore surrounding the vishaps.
They could’ve EASILY fused her story quest with the enkanomiya side quest .. she should’ve came with us down there and explained everything and when we get to meet enjou and he eventually turns out to be an abyss lector , it would make an amazing cutscene + kokomi would be a huge help as a trial character against the abyss lector since she can break his shield + the pyro lector has attacks that can severely damage the whole team so having kokomi as the healer could’ve added a great experience to that mini boss fight … aaand with the huge lore drop that enjou gave about the book called before sun and moon ( that literally gives the lore of the start of teyvat + it has ties with orobashi ) … man it could’ve been a heavy lore bomb quest with amazing cutscenes and amazing combat aspect but hoyo just wasted this huge opportunity :’) .. ( and * cough * as an enjou simp I would’ve loved to hear his voice acting more but oh well )
Oh god, yes. And the matter of confidentiality regarding Enkanomiya's and the abyss' secrets will be protected, so the devs don't have to make a follow-up quest with her-- what goes on there stays there and needs no continuation. They could literally just clarify she's human or she's actually the final form of revolution for an experimented Vishap and build a base for Neuvilette being the hydro dragon instead. Literally, so much potential wasted.
that would have helped a LOT with enkanomiya and kokomi at the same time, damm, such a horribly missed opportunity, you reminded me of my reaction when we went to enkanomiya for the first time, I said ''Wait, why isn't kokomi coming with us?''
GOD this would have also totally solve the issue too of the trial part of Kokomi's actual story quest being so... laughably bad from what I can remember at least 😭
my only issue with this is that she was released in 2.1 and enkanomiya was released in 2.4.. characters ALWAYS release with their respective story quests on their first banner and at that point in time, only archons got 2nd story quests ( except venti ofc ) but if they did, the quest would be amazing
i remember seeing a short comic about Kokomi being revealed to be a scary twist character drowning the enemy soldiers in the ocean during the Sara fight and saying something along the lines of "you'll run out of men before the ocean runs out of room for the bodies" it's very extreme for Genshin standards and absolutely not something they would have done at that point in the game's history but i still love the idea of this pretty and cute character turning out to be a demon on the battlefield
A cute character that lacks empathy and emotion would've fit kokomi so well. She would come up with extreme and dangerous strategies that would ensure their victory while gorou wants a more humane strategy to end the war. This would've been an amazing sub plot in the inazuma archon quest.
I remember people theorizing she was either fatui or working with them and i feel like that wouldve made more sense than what we got in the archon story. Instead of kokomi being so incompetent that she accepts supplies from an unknown benefactor despite being a "master strategist" id prefer if she was in on the deal and doing it to win the war regardless of the costs
Kokomi and the Inazuman war held so much potential. The greatest tragedy to me is that Kokomi has never met the Raiden Shogun. Not once. Which is a shame because kokomi wanted to be Ei's cheif advisor before she became the leader of Watusumi. She's the perfect character to learn about the truth of the puppet and help Ei realize what she did wrong and teach her about humanity going forward. Both of them together could have repaired the centuries long grudge Watasumi had against the Shogunate and forge a completely new path for Inazuma. Its just sad to see hoyo through her away.
That's the thing. The devs want the traveller be the closest to the Archons so they end up having intimate knowledge about them. Venti and Zhongli identity. Ei and her Puppet and the twins. The traveller knows more about Ei than anyone in Inazuma outside of Miko
@silverhawkscape2677 Indeed, and while it works with Venti, Zhongli, and Nahida, that's their greatest mistake when it comes to Ei. I believe, at the very least, Kokomi and Kujou Sara should have found out to advance their character arcs. Ei really needed a new batch of friends to replace her old friends who died 500 years ago. It would have improved her character story and have Inazuma feel more alive, just like Sumeru and Fontaine.
that wouldve been so cool!!! and there is precedent of rulers having vision holder advisors(ningguang, keqing and ganyu) and sara and yae already existing
@@chrisgarbutt1893 I don't see how any of those things would have improved Ei's character arc. You realize that you would need to perform a hypothetical total rewrite of the entire Archon Quest in order to even make your suggestions work, right? And that this would also take away from the Traveler because the Traveler is the main protagonist whereas Kokomi and Gorou are supporting characters?
The archetype of a priestess is to obtain and give forbidden knowledge that is largely overlooked or simply ignored. Kokomi's arc should have been about mystic or esoteric findings about Ei's true nature while everyone is acting a fool.
I have massive problem's with Kokomi's writing, and the way even the good elements were executed. Even her introduction is quite bad - Gorou is the driver of that scene, not Kokomi, even though it was meant to be her grand reveal, something everyone was excited for. Let me explain. In that cutscene you see Gorou and his men fight a battle they cannot win. They're outnumbered and they're going to lose - his men will get imprisoned, the traveler will get captured, and he's going to get his vision taken away. There's nothing they can do but fight until the bitter end. And you can see that defensive aggression in his motions, this is his last stand. Then Kokomi pops up with reinforcement and gives a confident smile - almost telling everyone that they did well holding out, and they'll be okay now. And you suddenly see the happiness and relief in Gorou's face - a moment ago he was set to lose everything, and now he's saved! I wouldn't have been surprised if the guy started bawling from relief then and there. Not only that, but he even sees an old friend - Kazuha is here. All of his allies have come to his aid, and they're all there to fight by his side for their shared goals. Even Beidou joins in, and now THEY are outnumbering the enemy, who has to retreat! Morale rises, and you can see how energized they get - they can win. It's actually one of the best scenes in the game in my opinion. Even though you knew Gorou, a playable character, would be fine in the end, and the traveler will save the day anyway, they still did a pretty good job at making the Gorou, who doesn't yet know his fate, act the way he's meant to. And that's why I say that he's driving this scene. Take Gorou out, make Kokomi save her men with reinforcements, and you lose all of that. It's still roughly the same, but... you lose so much of that personal touch. Take Kokomi out, and have Gorou be saved by Kazuha, Bediou and their men (along with some resistance soldiers sent by Kokomi), and you still get quite a lot of emotions, you just miss out on the first wave of relief. Yes, that still means that you lose out on something, so it isn't like Kokomi's presence is unnecessary there, it's the opposite, she's needed there. But she doesn't drive the scene in the least bit. And considering that this was her BEST moment, that's saying something. After that, the way they use her character only gets worse and worse. I think they just set up that scene and story horribly.
Also I thought about how I would've done it, and I came up with something while I was showering. The classic shower stories, lol. I don't claim that it's particularly good, but I do think it's a little better than what they did with Kokomi. If you want to give it a read, it's here, but it's long. After introducing the MC to Gorou and the resistance, I would've given the MC a mission. Kokomi, the strategist and leader, went away on a mission to resolve the resistance's problems with supply. She should've been back a week ago, but not a message was sent... Gorou can't leave and check, because he needs to hold his ground against the commission until Kokomi returns. So he asks you to go with a small group of soldiers, lead by Teppei, and find Kokomi and her troops. On your journey there you fight enemies alongside the soldiers. Now, because this is a game and not just a story, there has to be a story-fitting battle too. So I say, make the player fight waves of monsters. Then, cutscene: A larger enemy, a mini boss, shows up and attacks the traveler. While the traveler is occupied, another enemy lunges at them while they're vulnerable - and that's when Teppei uses his delusion to block the attack and kill the monster. Have a moment between the traveler and Teppei - a sort of "I got your back" moment, and then return to the gameplay and the battle against the miniboss. The narrative is that Teppei and the soldiers take care of the small monsters, so that you can focus on the big guy. Teppei this way ends up being a lot more useful and (imo ) more likeable than by doing archery and fixing fences. It can also trigger his demise - he used his delusion too much, and now the consequences catch up to him. He's becoming weak after the fight, so you take a rest. By the morning, he's old, wrinkly, grey, and dying. You have a short conversation with him - although he's scared and regretful, he urges you to go on and find Kokomi, because it's already over for him, but the others back at the camp still need help, and Kokomi could be in danger too. So, at the end... You leave him and go on. This way he still dies, you still get a new reason to hate the fatui - probably even more so, because this time around Teppei died a more respectable death. On you go. You eventually reach Kokomi in some part of the islands - maybe you have to solve some puzzles to get past a few barriers or something, then you reach their camp, where you find Kokomi defending her soldiers. You help her out, and then you find out what happened. Kokomi's soldiers are on the verge of death because of their delusions, and they're surrounded by monsters, outnumbered. She and a handful of soldiers have been tending to them while simultaneously trying to defend their camp. The barriers were set up by Kokomi to keep monsters out while she figures out a solution. You find out about the Fatui and the delusions - how Kokomi has been backed into a corner and had no choice but to accept their help, but since she doesn't trust them, she decided to take this opportunity to resolve the resistance's issues and break away from this suspicious third party as soon as possible. She accounted for some kind of price, but not her men dying of old age so quickly - this caught her off-guard, and they became trapped. Now that the traveler arrived and is willing to help, she makes a bold decision and decides to clear out the monsters with the help of the traveler, so that they can return to the resistance camp. Maybe give her a trial, and have her join the traveler's party as the 5th character to fight some stuff - perhaps Rifthounds, healing is useful with those, and Inazuma is crawling with them anyway. And after they win, you can still have them meet up with the reinforcements, like Beidou and Kazuha (and imply that this is something Kokomi set up in advance, making her even better at her role), and go save Gorou. After which you go on like usual, go fight the Shogun, etc. You now also have a reason as to why Kokomi isn't with you; she has a responsibility towards her soldiers, so she's going to tend to them and do whatever she can to get the resistance back into shape. After all, she's a healer, it's natural that she goes back to heal those who need it, and she's the general, she's the one who needs to sort the issue out. I'm not saying that this is the best fan-version out there, but this solves the both the problem of Kokomi not planning ahead and not doing much: she's actively out there risking her life to try and resolve the resistance's issues, while she also shows that she isn't going to rely on some untrustworthy party to win this war, she'll use them to her advantage and get stronger, then break free. Like a real strategist. She also shows her competency; she was put into an unexpected and highly disadvantageous situation, but she keeps her men organized enough to set up a camp, defend it and tend to the wounded, while she also works on finding a solution and setting up additional defenses. And as soon as the opportunity arises (aka traveler arrives), she immediately takes it and lunges into action herself, willing to dirty her hands for the sake of the resistance. Then it gives her a reason to go be somewhere else, if HYV didn't want her to appear for some reason. There's still a lot that I didn't touch on - her reasons, her plan when it comes to the Shogun, and how she handles everything after the war is over. But I already wrote a shorter novel so I'll just stop here.
I don't know about the best scene in the game. Maybe it's just me, but the battle itself sucks. The setup is boring, the choreography is so basic (stand in lines and charge at eachother) and the supposed climactic rescue lacks any meaningful context. Oh they were losing because they were outnumbered, but now they outnumber the enemy so they will surely win. Mind you, this is supposedly our first introduction to Kokomi being a strategic genius. Yeah, excellent idea - just outnumber your enemy and you are guaranteed to win. Maneuvers, ambushes, use of terrain for your advantage or different types of weapons (maybe an arrow rain to halt shogun army's charge)? Nah, we're too smart for that. Just pick a straightforward fight on a flat terrain and send more troops than your opponent. That's exactly what makes a great strategist.
@@kindlingking You're free to disagree, we all have our opinions and each and every one of them is just as valid as the other one. :) In cutscenes I value the characters' actions, how believable they are in that given situation and how they react to what's happening around them, that's why I talked so much about Gorou in the comment - Gorou makes it good for me, because he reacts really well to his situation. I can't recall a single cutscene that nailed character reactions better than that. And for that reason, it's S-tier in my eyes. About everything else - well I already talked about all of that in detail in two long comments, so I'll just leave it at saying that, as stated, they messed up Kokomi's writing and debut.
@@user89389 oh no, I'm not disagreeing with you on the character and emotional responses part, I just dislike the battle itself for how plain and unispired it is. Once again Hoyo could've done so much more and they chose the bare minimum instead. It's serviceable, but in the context of what's to come it just feels even more disappointing to me. An entire civil war reduced to an uwu waifu (two of them, arguably), a tearjerker npc and two generals who feel more like accessories. Talk about wasted potential.
@@kindlingking Yes, I fully agree with that part - compared to what it COULD HAVE been, it's.... not good, to say the least. They tend to do that, sadly. Kokomi being another victim to the waifu personality is very disappointing. But Ei is the most painful one for me, she held the most potential in my eyes. A powerful, flawed antagonist that we even get to fight against, who turns a blind eye to the suffering of her people in order to do what she wants, and swiftly gets rid of anyone standing in her way... ... Reduced into a cute, hot waifu who can't cook and loves dango milk, who didn't do any wrong because it's all the puppet's fault.
It really is sad that the entire Watatsumi cast suffered (and still do after all this time) from bad writting overall, Kokomi "Genius Strategist" part never got really shown and instead they tried to sell us "Inazuma's Jean" in her story quest, and while they had TWO whole patches of Enkanomiya (the patch where they introduced the new area and the patch with the new event surrounding the area) they just never tried to tie her into anything outside of "go explore it for us", while Gorou went from "Military General who cares about his men" to "Bullied by Yae Miko" and "Miss Hina running gag" that quite frankly it got really boring after the 3rd time of "he doesnt know and we wont let traveler tell him", like i'm not kidding when i say from Gorou's debut in 2.3 up until the very last patch of inazuma, there wasn't a SINGLE patch without Miss Hina not being mentioned somewhere, be it in his Hangout, Iodori Festival, Yae Miko's story quest, Liben's event, Itto's drumalong event, heck even Heizou's hangout for whatever reason. It just baffles me how they already have something that they can use to make both of them better and instead both of them get reduced to "joke" characters for no reason whatsoever. (and this really pains me because those 2 are some of my favorites in this game and every time they appear at this point i'm already expecting hoyo to just reuse their same old troupe for the 54th time =/ )
the way they handled gorou actually made me slowly not like Yae Miko as time went on because of the Miss Hina thing, and how she always wants to touch his ears and tails. The first time I was like "okay, she's just teasing him" but then it got to the point where it feels like she's harassing the poor guy. I've always viewed Yae Miko as a morally grey character, especially on how she puts profit before people, but I always felt like her interactions with Gorou just went too far.
I got really tired about the Miss Hina so fast until I just wanna speedrun whenever they mentioned about it. Like bruh, we have a general being reduced to this everytime he got a chance to appear >>
The best parts of his hangout was learning about how the war affected him since it felt like most of the Inazuma characters were like “Oh the war’s over? Cool ig.” I definitely got more and more disillusioned when the writers instead chose to focus on the most shallow aspects of his character. It seems like we’ve moved on fully from Inazuma but I hope at some point the writers will want to actually do something interesting with its cast rather than… whatever it is they’ve been doing
Good points for Kokomi. I was honestly infuriated in this summer event. Both Eula and Kokomi deserved better than this 5th (with 6th on horizon) Klee event. And what especially made me mad is the end of second part, where Eula tells that she will talk to her parents in future. It's literally Hoyo's way of saying "We wanted to give Eula her event, but we don't care about her. Please, wait another 1.5 years when we do her dedicated event, where she has a conflict with her parents".
@@silverhawkscape2677 Like klee sells? but she gets not 1, not 2 but 3 events to herself meanwhile eula gets throwned in random events. And idk, if eula is so bad maybe make THE ONLY PHISICAL SUPP IN THE GAME THAT SHOULD BE PERFECT FOR HER not shit, or dont let people save primos for over 500 days than be surprised that all the people that would whale for her c6 or weapon or summon for her in general got her for free.
@@akatosh5792Klees banner may not sell, but her personality sure does. Every region has a poster child for events and Klee is the poster child for mondstadt. Mondstadt = klee and venti Liyue = Hu Tao and Kazuha Inazuma = Itto Sumeru = Cyno Notice how majority of those characters are extroverted upbeat types (expect kazuha) who are entertaining or are very memeable (kazuha is very memeable). Eula just isn’t as popular or entertaining a character compared to someone like klee. Even while doing the event I skipped majority of her and kokomis lines cause they were all boring, but Klee and kaeyas playful dynamic was entertaining, adorable and hilarious.
Not that this fixes anything, but I feel like a lot of Kokomi's grandeur and hype is intentionally overblown, because there are a lot of details (especially with Summertime Odyssey) that are more consistent than her track record on the battlefield that seem to paint a more honest picture of the brilliant military strategist we all know. Firstly, Watatsumi is a culture that depends on, and is centered, entirely around her. We're shown in the existence of her secret notes that no one on Watatsumi actually knows how to fight; no military experience, no ranking. They genuinely rely on her directives, cannot think for themselves unless she gives the okay. She DOES say in About Us: Experience that she "spent my younger years traveling between Sangonomiya and the army." I feel like some people see this and assume it's all on Watatsumi, but with everything else we see, this doesn't make sense. It doesn't even make sense for them to have their own army, due to their fealty to the Shogunate. But then the war started and that changed. I'm noting this, because I feel like it explains two things about Kokomi: why she is obsessed with the military, and why her actual strategy is both lacking yet effective. We're never shown her strategies play out, and most people assume it's because of bad writing, but I feel like I see enough details to justify Kokomi's success. Firstly, her passion. Kokomi, from a young age, was taken on trips by her mother across Inazuma. Specifically to the army. For one reason or another, this was cultivated to be her calling, to the point where Kokomi even wanted to be an adviser or general as opposed to the leader of Watatsumi. However, her bloodline does not allow that, the will of their god that flows in her veins. I wonder why this was done by her mother? Perhaps she was forward-thinking, not unlike the Hexenzerkel. Who knows - there's much we don't understand about the Sangonomiya clan, still, and they're a magically important family. But Kokomi doesn't just love the military, she loves reading about it. We're given the impression (told by her) that she reads high-brow heavy reading like Teyvat Art of War, but more often than not, it sounds like Kokomi reads Light Novels, no? From Yae Publishing House, very frequently, which is primarily a distributer of LNs. This always stuck out to me, but Summertime Odyssey emphasized this with Kokomi's panicked cover of her "true" military self, when it was almost blown by that Oceanid. Almost like she was blustering or making up lies to sound impressive off camera, that the Oceanid nearly spoke of and would have subsequently spoiled. This confirms, to me, that Kokomi's knowledge on military tactics largely comes from fiction, and yet, that STILL makes her a more experienced strategist than everyone who looks to her for guidance. And this is important to note, because it explains why Kokomi somehow manages to succeed in this war, despite being so inexperienced she was willing to accept donations from an anonymous benefactor that ended up sabotaging them. Mind you, though, the Fatui ONLY made this move as Watatsumi continued to hold the stalemate. But why? Well, as I said, this is noteworthy because of what it reflects about Kokomi's strangely effective strategy. I'd often wondered what it was, yet, nothing ever clicked with me until - of all things - it was Kokomi's KIT that made me realize her strategy! As her Story 2 puts it, this is Kokomi's "unique tactical style: manipulate the larger strategic situation to force the other side to give up, and to win wars with the least amount of cost possible." So, with all these odds stacked against them, how exactly has Kokomi managed to do this? How does her kit play into it? Well, just look at her passive: the aptly named Flawless Strategy gives a 25% healing bonus with -100% crit rate. That is to say, to me, this indicates the core of Kokomi's strategy is endurance. She keeps her army healed with her insanely powerful magic, so even though they're all peasants who never held a pike in their lives, they're able to withstand the island-hopping of Sara's army and their superior equipment and training. And that -100 crit rate feels like an intentional part of this, a union between story and gameplay: Kokomi is NOT an expert military strategist, that's all bluster with inferences most well-read people can make, and in fact, her "critical rate (of success)" is actually not that high; they stem the tide, but Kokomi is dealing with an army of children and she herself is someone who gets caught up considering every little possible detail and making directives that are ridiculously thick for everyone. All of this is to say, Kokomi's army isn't successful at winning, but defending. Enduring. Healing, and being able to never give up. Again, despite everything I said, I don't think this fixes Kokomi's presentation in the game proper. It's painful, and I would love it if all that I said was made even clearer in future content like Summertime Odyssey made it; maybe the day we learn of Kokomi's true destiny.
I think your statements can be true in fact the only succesfull battle that we had saw its happened exactly that at the start the shogunate was mopping the floor with the resistance than kokomi came and started healing everyone bringing also reinforcement and they beat sara and this would explain why kokomi don't want the delusion not only because the fatui are the "bad guys" but also because the delusion would damage her strategy since they are the opposite of endurance and basically cause irreversible damage for a boost of attak power that would be irrelevant at the hand of inexpert people
Finally, someone that understand Kokomi!!! God, it's kind of painful to me to see a criticism without understanding her. I want to see a critic that actually understand her like what you write here.
I agree with a lot of what you said but I want to add that in history Watatsumi did have an army, specifically during their conquest for Yashiori Island. Back when Orobashi was still alive he was pressured by his own people to push for colonization of Yashiori since they had no form of sustainable resources in Watatsumi due to the soil there being infertile. Orobashi having to go on his mandatory suicide mission anyways, decided to build up a Navy and military for his people. It’s safe to assume that after his death and the end of that first war with Watatsumi and the Shogunate, while the military force was wiped out they still had some form of defense since they still had some valuable resources for trade like Sango Pearls, which are in lore are priceless for trade according to Heizou. It would explain why there was a military in her time even after the island swore fealty to Ei, probably leftover scraps dedicated to protect themselves since they’re still technically outside of Shogunate jurisdiction. Though what makes me more concerned now is that why did she start a rebellion against the shogunate with such little amounts of resources? Honestly if they pulled moral ambiguity and had her be sponsored by the Fatui since the start then it’d make more sense for her to actively push to start it. I love her and her lore but the archon quest really just painted her as an incredibly lucky leader rather than an actual strategist that can manipulate situations to her liking. To put it in comparison it’s as if she’s a chess player that remembers all of the opening moves but crumples the moment something completely unorthodox occurs. She really needs a part 2 for her story since I want to see her strategic mind be explored more outside of “look she’s smart yall!!”
@@browserjunior4707 The "why" of Kokomi's desire to fight is alluded to collectively in her Quotes and Stories. As the current living "will" of Orobaxi, and the upholder of Watatsumi's pact with Narukami, peace between the two island peoples would be maintained so long as their autonomy was protected and respected by the shogunate. Iirc, mind you. And so, Kokomi felt compelled to fight because the Vision Hunt Decree did just that. Combine that with her healing power making a stalemate in perpetuity possible, and their not being stomped was a safe bet to make I'd say.
I've been saying for a while that Kokomi is the result of Hoyoverse trying to write a character who's smarter than themselves. She's _supposed_ to be a prodigy in military strategy, but no one at Hoyoverse actually knew the things she was supposed to know, so they couldn't show her knowing those things. Hoyoverse has definitely gotten better at writing intelligent characters, but there's also the matter of Kokomi's intelligence being highly specialized in a specific field that isn't very common to think or hear about.
yeah, most people won't understand much of the field of knowledge Kokomi specialize in, mainly because its mostly not applicable in daily life and the modern world. Yet its so complicated, that if you try to explain it, it can get way too convoluted. Kokomi skillset lies in analyzing terrain and troop movement, then predicts and choose the best path to take. She is good in preparing logistics as well. She is not the "i come up with something unique nobody thought before" kind of genius, but one that is more of a prediction analyst and making early preparations. The reason she won battles, is because her predictions were spot on and she prepared the necessary counters, not because her tactics were out of this world.
True but this could have been solved if they spent the money and hired a history consultant who specializes in past war events and knew everything about what famous strategists did at the time
@@vis1975 Honestly, they could have done that. They can afford that too. Why didn't they do that? All those history buffs for Yun Jin's accuracy but not one for Kokomi? DAMN
Kokomi is a character that is so defined by what she does and not what she cares about, and I think those should be complimentary, but I think if they wanted to make her better they should’ve made her more thematically relevant and not specifically more intelligent, because I don’t care about how smart she is, I care about why she should matter.
I definitely agree, in Sumeru they really improved the character writing, with more show and less tell. I also liked how they left mysteries, like after seeing Alhaitham steal the forbidden knowledge capsule, I wasn't sure if he'd end up being an enemy until the end of the archon quest. So far Fontaine has been interesting too. Hopefully they can keep it up!
Yeah with Neuvilette out there's like nothing more to kokomi now. She's always going to be the strategist that was executed badly. There's no more out for her story anymore
LMAO I remember after finishing the Inazuma archon quest I didn't really process that the entire Inazuma arc was over because I legit thought there was gonna be more to show like what will happen to the resistance, Kokomi suddenly not important anymore, etc. After a great cliffhanger in Act 1, with Kokomi finally showing up, I was skipping most of the Teppei stuff just to get to the characters I wanted to care about only to realize I finished the entire story quest. Without going online to read what others thought, I remember feeling empty after completing the entire story but I wasn't sure if I missed something important since I did skip a lot. So I wasn't sure if my criticisms were justified because I may have set up unrealistic expectations myself. Glad to hear many people felt the same way about this storyquest. I remember the community crying over Teppei's death and I never understood it because to me he is a basic npc and I cared about other npcs more (Hanachirusato and so on). Kokomi, the smartest general, doesn't realize her troops are using delusions and killing themselves. GTFO of here lmaooo. If they want to write character flaws for Kokomi, that requires you to have a character arc. Teppei getting more screentime than Kokomi and Gorou in the story quest is infuriating and I can not understand why parts of the fandom cry over that npc
Dont forget that they spend like half an hour building Teppei , A RANDOM ASS NPC THAT HAD MORE DEATHFLAGS ON HIM THAN EVERY OTHER CHARACTER COMBINED WHOS WHOLE PURPOSE WAS TO DIE TO SHOW THAT THE FATUI ARE EVIL LIKE WE DIDNT KNOW THAT, while kokomi gets 5 mins.
@@akatosh5792not even showing how «bad» the Fatui are but the reason for the duel with La Signora (the char with a good potential yet HoYo developed her so grotesque - «I'm bad because I'm a villain»). And the worst thing is that HoYo puts Scara and later Lynnette & Lyney as playable characters and the ones with whom we communicate so much screentime (Tartaglia's included). Such a contradiction. And the reason for such contradiction is a flat scenario. Life is much deeper than B&W separation. Even villains should have their reasons, opinions and aims in a good story. Yet to show such depth one definitely should be on George Martin's level. It's too high for a gacha game. N.B. IMHO, I see progress with each region and Archon's Arc. By this moment Fontaine's plot is almost flawless. And even in side stories such as of the Narzissenkreuz Ordo and Mary-Ann's. Only Enkanomiya's story, The Chasm's story and Act I of Nahida's Archon quest have such a well-written plot. It's a great leap ahead.
i mean, scara, lyney+lynette (and freminet) and childe at least make sense to join us somewhat - all signora has left for herself after becoming living flame in the ice (thanks to delusion), is being bitter and salty over 1 death. @@abehaibane
conclusions for the inazuma arc was basically told through inazuma story quests (kokomi's, kazuha's, and ei's mainly). they were used to fill in the gaps.
@@goodietwoshoes7238 obviously i know that. Would have been better if they didn't boxed themselves in a 3 act structure and expand into more arcs in the ARCHON quest like Sumeru
Kokomi's introduction was AMAZING, which is why her downfall hit so hard. What's sad is that Alhaitham was unironically an amazing strategist/planner in Sumeru... if Kokomi had gotten that writing, GEEZ. The fact that they show Kokomi as a "genius" in an event by having her win TCG is just a joke too... I mean TCG in general is a joke, but still. TCG requires absolutely 0 skill, it's literally just luck, based on the dice rolls you get. What's even funnier is they PROVE this by having you fight Itto using his awful deck, and he uses a "meta" deck, and your winning is entirely reliant on getting good RNG on the rolls. What a joke.
That ending cutscene for Inazuma Act II was amazing, Kokomi's introduction set high expectations on her character considering she's the grand strategist of The Resistance. Even though they were fighting a losing battle, it would've been great to see what she was capable of. It's a shame that the delusion plotline obviously shoved her character into the ground, not to mention the lack of Gorou, Kazuha, and even Beidou. Edit: oh yea, she never even meet the Raiden Shogun either. So many missed opportunities with the Inazuma Archon Quest 🥲
It kind of shows when my favorite kokomi moment is from the genuius invocation TCG, her talk (after? Before? The duel) where she explains how the relations between the islands/peoples is still bad and that her participating helps. Her using the fact that you can not see watatsume from the capital as a physical / visual way to show fit so well in showing how she is smart and even in explaining. Anywho, i think the poor gorou display in active story moments only hurts not only his character but kokomi as well. As much as i think the whole yae miko teasing him / miss Hina bit is funny its basically the only angle they exppores, and it makes him look stupid. We hear about his great advice even see him give it but the hard angle on the teasing makes it fall to the wayside. And as the second in command general, him looking stupid makes kokomi also look stupid. Because if this is the great general how great is the leader actually... :/ As somone who enjoys gorou it pains me time and time again when the fans continuously rake him through the mud and have him way off character.
11:43 hilariously in the recent GAA Kokomi just didn’t even feel like a character… like the entire time I suspected she was also some sort of construct. But no apparently nothing is going on????
recent GAA felt like it was Kaeya and the girls honestly. Kaeya is my main so I enjoyed it, but I was honestly hoping for *something* to happen more with Kokomi and Eula. Collei kinda just seemed there for the fun of it though, so I didn't mind the limited role she played.
I've noticed that most female Genshin characters have progressively become more and more 'submissive and meek' anime girl stereotypes ever since the intro of Inazuma. Even Ei who was introduced as this cold and ruthless goddess of war throughout the history of Teyvat now just appears in the occasional event as a nice dessert-loving mommy character. Dehya and Candace came close as in the lore they are both strong self-sufficient women leaders but you never get to see that part of them past their introductions.
yeah, as i noted somewhere else - genshin knows when not to use "meek and submissive" personality type to drive the character, and when they do - the character personality-wise comes out VERY well. most male characters and some of the female ones are like that (male ones because they dont husbando-ify them as much as they do with female characters, and even if they do - they dont do it in such a way as female ones are done, like... thoma) @@Ansytea
Personally I disagree with the second statement. Ei was not presented as cold and ruthless throughout the history of teyvat if this history also includes the opinions of people close to her. Was she a soldier and still seese herself as one? Yes but that's not all she is. She was a god living through an a war (Archon war) so she saw it fit to focus on nothing but training to protect her people and the ones closest to her. That does not mean she didn't have any hobbies outside of training. Her own story even tells a tale of how she occasionally played Karuta with Saiguu, Makoto, Chiyo, and Sasayuri despite being a busy samurai. She even bothered her friends so much for a rematch in Karuta just so she could beat them and get Saiguu's victory pastries and did the classic victory fist pump when she won. My point is that she's always has these traits and just because she went through an intense grieving period doesn't mean she's lost said traits. Choosing to view her so one dimensionally for either side (candy loving mommy or only cold and ruthless) is weird in my opinion.
the thing is - her personality might exist, but the game and her story barely touch upon it, instead being like "tee hee, lets not remember that my actions led to death of many of my people and instead talk about me not knowing what a kamera is", etc. like, its one thing if it was just players rendering her to such (like how wanderer is sometimes rendered into "little emo meow-meow") - but its the game itself that basically renders her into that kind of blob. even zhongli, with all his "big brain" idea of letting his people in danger (no thanks to mister international) had him a plan to still save them if harm actually to come their way, and practically speaking the 3 other archons are just written... way better than her. for now, the only other annoying archon so far is Furina, but at least in her case its just her personality being... not very pleasing, but it exists and isnt hidden behind fluff as of now @@RomBeams8840
I feel like the writers just legitimately have no idea what to do with Kokomi. Like yeah Inazuma Act 3 hurt her but it hurt basically everyone who appeared in it. But the difference is most of the other characters (Ei, Miko, even Gorou in his hangout) have improved since then with much better story arcs. Meanwhile Kokomi is still just... kind of there, and most of her character traits (including her supposed intelligence) are informed rather than shown. The recent GAA solidified this more than anything. Kokomi literally is just there to be there. She had nothing to add or contribute, aside from very generic advice and having Paimon go "Wow, Kokomi is so smart!" in response. She was just a waste of time. Her popularity is carried by her design and meta relevance. But her actual writing is easily the weakest of the playable characters right now overall.
Tbh I love Kokomi being a nice person who has issues, but I would’ve really liked if she was just so much blunter, and a little irritated. Because there’s so many things going on of course she’d end up being a little strained. I just would’ve liked a character to not show their struggles with just.. being so “I need help..I’m overworked ..” like Jean or something not saying that it’s a bad thing but we already have so many characters who get burnt out, just somebody actually getting angry and watching them overtime get more and more angry, and then actually walking away to calm down so she doesn’t explode on somebody would’ve just been so different for once at the time. And I would’ve like to see that. But it’s also just- kind of a bunch of pet peeves I have..
I liked Jean because in the Archon quest, she looked so cool and responsible. And then they made her into a doormat and I lost my interest and respect for her character. I'm ok with her being this burnt out, overworked person. But she's overworking herself for the stupidest reason. It kinda makes her look stupid. Also, people say she's one of the nicest characters in the game. Yet, she can't keep her temper when it comes to Klee. (a child who doesn't know better) Jean also doesn't explain to Klee, why fish bombing is bad and why she has to be put in solitary confinement.
@@NaturalParadox Yeah, Jean needs to work on delegating jobs for others to do instead of doing all the work she obviously can't handle herself. It does lead to cute moments where Lisa forces her to have tea with her or Kaeya picking up for her. But then her character stopped growing. This is the reason I didn't like Keqing at first too, Ganyu too I guess. Overworking is not a cute personality nor is it one. Maybe this is why I love Alhaitham's character. He is smart, for sure, but he showed us how he works smarter, not harder.
@@floofthedoof I actually like Keqing and I'm indifferent towards Ganyu. (Yeah, I agree. Being overworked is NOT a cute personality. Also, they glossed over the fact that being overworked can cause health problems.) I liked Keqing because she kinda hated the gods at first. Like, she doesn't want her hard work to be thought of as blessings from the gods. I liked that she's a skeptic. I don't remember much about Ganyu, I think she feels out of place, she's one of the few adepti that lives near people. Also, she's trying hard not to gain weight. She dislikes Keqing at first because she's a skeptic. Jean's personality is overshadowed by her overworking tendencies. People kind of forget the other parts of her personality. (I don't blame you if you forget, Hoyo always makes the characters talk about how overworked she is.) That she feels responsible for the safety of her people, because she's a knight, it's her duty. Jean was taught and raised to be a knight. But honestly, like Diluc, I wish she would find her own purpose, instead of doing what she's told.
@@NaturalParadox yeah, she’s super conflicting at all times. Sometimes it feels like she’s just being added stuff to for the sake of it. And her personality sometimes just feels like a reskin..
The generations of potential beef between the watatsumi people and the narukami people was such a ripe area for development. How cool would it have been if Kokomi’s genius was just her writing really rebellious newsletters to rile up all the people affected by the vision hunt decree and you’d get to see more and more people migrate to watasumi just to learn more about this mysterious author and then bam it’s a cute anime girl
19:00 yee yee!! I don't think Ayato is that really "badly written", because he really did fit the role of someone who "works in the shadows" well. If Hoyo placed Ayato as a major part of the AQ and have him in scenes where he openly supports the resistance and then forcibly sells us that he's some guy who you'll never expect to be behind the ambush in his story quest- I feel like it would've been another Kokomi situation. I think showing that in his trailer alone is great enough. Especially since **he is meant to show loyalty to the shogun.** Unlike Ayaka who's the youngest sibling and can tell the traveler she's willing to betray the shogun for them in the voicelines, Ayato's restricted by his position as clan head so ¯\_(ツ'')_/¯ I'm a full blown Ayato main so maybe that's biased. But I'm not without some criticisms, I wish that they focused on his role as the leader of the Shuumatsuban. I think what he's doing is nearly not so different from what Arlechinno's doing. He's adopting orphans and making them into his own private soldiers iirc and that "oh it's a lore you'll only piece out in his friendship lvl stories, sayu's existence, and voiceless quests that can be a bit time-gated (Shuumatsuban Operations)" thing me wish so much that his story quest was more about that side of him ಥ_ಥ But I guess making him look like an honorable noble in the traveler's eyes by doing all the Chisato work is also a very Ayato-esque move to gain their trust lmao
It's been a while since I played or even really thought about the Inazuma storyline, but if I recall correctly, what kept Ayato from directly interfering was that he was performing obedience to the shogun the whole time. Unlike Kokomi, who was in open rebellion, or Yae Miko, who was kind of free to do her own thing regardless, Ayato had to act like a dutiful retainer until the battle reached a tipping point, hence why his sister had to do most of the secret support of the rebellion.
We also have to remember that Ayato was still working with Yae Miko. The turning point was when they both noticed that Ei took notice of the Traveler during the ceremony. The main problem, is that nobody could talk directly to Ei, only the puppet. So they both worked together to use the rebels to "recreate" the same conditions to get Ei's attention. Which is why the rebel forces got so close.
I really think that basicaly Al Haytham and Nahida is an ,,updated version" of Kokomi, they saw what went wrong with her writing, and did it better and now did'nt care to go back and fix Koko-fishy. It's sad, becouse (as soo many other characters in the game) she had so much potential. And i really think that, the base for the Akasha system problem was Kokomi's micro management habit. Like...it's basicaly the same thing, when a 3rd party telling you what's the right thing and what not for so long, people will be helpless when they face a problem that they had to solve themselfs. It was the same with Kokomi's plan book (idk what it's called, i just try to find words from my language), than with the Akasha. I heard people saying ,,Sumeru was not THAT good". Like...YES, it was and still is. Not perfect, i don't say that. But it was a really action-filled and well written version. So tldr, i think Hoyo tried to fix the problems they made with Inazuma, and just dropped the ,,fix bomb" right onto Sumeru XD
Actually I always feel like some Sumeru character is a direct upgrade from Inazuma character. Almost feel like writer's redemption arc some sort lol. Nilou as upgraded Yoimiya. Both are wholesome and good with their own thing, play a role in early part of the story but miss the action since they can't fight. Unlike Yoi that completely forgotten, Nilou is back and play quite a big role during final act. Al-haitham as upgraded kokomi. Literally show you what it means to be a genius strategist and not just character that being called a genius strategist. Cyno as upgraded Gorou/Sara. Actually show what a general or military trained people should look when work also how strong he is physically. Not just a bit scene of they commanding their soldier. Scara as upgraded Signora. Like, actual backstory and motivation shown in the main story and not locked behind artifacts. Also a valid reason to fight traveler and not just a 'you're annoying so let's fight to the death' excuse. It's kind of funny but even npc like Dunyarzad feels like the better executed Teppei lol. I mean, we know her motivation, problem, and what kind of life she's been through during our time with her. Then problem appeared, traveler tried to save her but in the end failed her, feel angry and depressed before finally motivated again for her sake. Even though she can be considered as plot device like Teppei, the execution is just way smoother and she didn't even have to actually die for at the top of that lol. It looks like a big slap for Teppei's story where he was just rambling nonsense one sidedly, constantly reappearing to show his changed hair color, then proceed to die so traveler has reason to go alone and not bring her entire team because angry mode. Only for all of it to not relevant anymore a few minutes later, lol.
@@thitharaudiya8033 and thats exactly the reason why, despite Fontaine is here, I still love Sumeru. Every bit of it. Well, I dont lie, I like Fontaine but Sumeru still have a special place in my heart ^ ^
I like to believe that he said that so he can bait people to comment and boost his video. I dare say that Inazuma is the weakest archon quest. Had an amazing start, slow and sluggish middle and a terrible anticlimactic end.
I mean why you gotta bring him up? Though I do agree he has some bizzare tastes. He probably thinks its the best because of the long break he had from genshin. Each to their own no need for tectone hate in a lore video
I never liked Kokomi, but yeah, Hoyo did her dirty. The dragon theory was an interesting one in my opinion, but there is way too much conclusive evidence pointing towards Neuvillette being the dragon‘s reincarnation that I don’t want to believe Kokomi is anymore.
I'm just keeping in mind that the hydro sovereign was reincarnated as human. Which leads big arrows to kokomi oooor neuvillette is the dragon that will reincarnate into kokomi.
it was all only a bunch of theories. she's most likely just a descendant of the vishaps. i doubt they meant for her to be the dragon in the first place cause it was already stated way before that the reincarnation would be human (pure blood and not of vishap blood) and it's been hinted a lot that kokomi is likely to be related to vishaps - her eyes, her hair ornaments, etc. that thing about the reincarnation using a cane too (albeit can be a metaphor, it's moreso used as a hint for neuvillette now)
The prophecy said that the dragon would be reincarnated in a form of a human, not that it would be exclusively reborn as a human being though.@@Icantfeelyousugah
@@Icantfeelyousugah I'm pretty sure the prophecy in enkanomiya says the dragon of water will be born in a human form, not born as a human, and neuvillette use hydro without a vision, and if you play the AQ there's a big hint towards him being the dragon
what's more i dont like about her is how they made military her whole personality like if you listen to her voicelines its as if she makes almost everything about her to be related to military stuff. kokomi what's your hobby? reading military strategy books cause im a military general. what's ur fav food? something thats convenient during war situation cause im a military general. even when you bring her to your teapot she cant stop going on about how she cant help but think of strategic military points around the teapot and whatnot, and that she requests to have her own room so that she can open maps and read her strategy books in peace, cause, you know, she's a military general. its like her writers are desperate to tell you that she is indeed a genius military general by screaming about it at you about it every 5 seconds
Her story quest was barely memorable but i remember that its all about keeping her awake and she talks more about the military and how overworked she, is barely exploring the character itself like Diona’s hangout event had more character explenation than her
Kokomi is part of a character archetype that I really dislike, and that is something that I call the "super planning genius", it's the same that Yae Miko and Ayato also have where when a character is shown you know the writers made it so they planned for this to happen or are actively making a plan as we speak with them but compared to the other two Kokomi is the weakest of them in her intelligent persona because she almost always says something that is "smart" but is unnecessary is telling us this "intelligent" conclusion she came to because it's usually just explanation of how something works but never actually advances what we are doing. I think the time that shows this the best was the recent event we had with her explains how I feel the best, she's just kinda there Apparently ahead of us and whenever something comes us she tells us something explaining whatever is happening but making no progress and generally not fitting in compared to the rest of the cast feeling like she's with us because they needed someone to explain stuff to us. And I do think the event was her at her worst but she still went through it, it didn't not happen we still sat through it learning nothing from her while being told she was super smart who can make a plan in any situation.
Classic case of aggrandization + "tell, don't show". Recently this has gotten better, for example in the Sumeru archon quest or Kaeya hangout you get to *see* someone be smart before its explained to you how they were being smart, even if the traveler knows already. It leaves far more of an impression.
funny how the one character that hoyoverse did go back and reexplore the character(and very good execution at that) and put them in an archon quest again after 3 years is the Mr. Worldwide, Childe and the other characters should honestly get the same treatment too like Kokomi, Cyno, Diluc(mostly about his conflicts to the Fatui), Albedo etc.
I think the problem with Genshin is that they have too many characters, and still need to introduce new characters. So many characters will has limited screen time.
i think heidzo's hangout shows more kokomi's genius strategy than her entire quest. like she didn't have much choice but allow contraband just for her people to get products
I think all rebelion attempts started while knowing they can't win, but the rebellion is not about winning. Its all about people so oppressed that they'd rather die fighting than continue living under the oppression. Its not an operation you plan to win, its just something people do out of despair, its more like suicide. Kokomi taking the leadership was their blessing, because if she didn't do that, they'd just died one way or the other, fighting or being executed, all of them.
A more tactical take would be that Kokomi was fighting for a favourable surrender. Like, the Shogun sending soldiers instead of immediately nuking the rebellion indicated that she’d prefer occupation over destruction. And while defeating the Shogun was out of the question, convincing her that concessions was a better way to get what she wanted than force is a more realistic goal. It’s also something that actually happened in Chinese history. Strategist Zhuge Liang became famous not for winning against an invasion, but for holding off the invaders until they agreed to accept a surrender that was basically a favourable merger
I can't remember if it was an event or her story quest. The one where she meets with Yae Miko to discuss the merger of Watatsumi island into Inazuma again. That's exactly what that was their favorable surrender. Normally they'd all probably be executed for treason regardless of how it turned out, but because of that event they got to keep their Freedom, independence, Lives and Military as evidence of their loyalty to bettering the nation. Still even that one was pretty poorly written, but it makes the most sense that, that is what it was supposed to be. It helps that Yae didn't go there with bad intentions either. xD
@@YuyuHakureiAgreed, and that is what explains why all of Watatsumi basically worships Kokomi seemingly out of nowhere. In reality, this admiration has really deep reason, albeit poorly explained by the game's narrative.
@@YuyuHakurei it would make sense- in polish history people uprised many times knowing they are going to die, but wanted to show that they wont be defeated and their beliefs are still strong. Many died and took many years but even after Poland was erased from maps their beliefs made it come back after 100 years. Sometimes its not about winning.
also I want to mention: don't you guys think that it's stupid that Beidou, Kazuha and Gorou all fight mostly with their weapons and not elements? It's just stupid for me! Kazuha could make a big wind area like his ult and Beidou could Electro-charge enemies or something like that... I don't understand why Hoyo is so lazy when it comes to cutscenes and why are they always forget that characters have elements?! That one scene where MC fights with eremites and doesn't even use his Anemo powers is still beyond me! 😭
It’s funny bc any actual war in Teyvat would be won by whoever has the most vision holders on their side. That could’ve been something brought up in the Inazuma story to give Raiden’s faction some credibility
@@raidenmakoto7168 Or perhaps used to persuade Raiden that taking away visions from people who could use them would weaken her nation against enemy forces. I would have liked to see the Fatui (or some enemy faction) actually try to seize power from Inazuma using that plan.
@@petersong974 They're improving sure, but ONLY A TINY BIT. Most times they pretend that Traveller cannot continuously use all their elements simultaneously hit after hit without exhaustion like they did in Liyue (at this point, i expected a quest where they learn how best to utilize their multi-elements in fights) and that characters besides Traveller can quite literally use their Visions with the same Ult animations they have in cutscenes. So far i believe i have seen Traveller fainting in crucial moments more than Traveller kicking ass as the strongest person in the room.
I sometimes think about that one comic where she was at some point cruel saying to Sara "the ocean is infinite" referring to no matter how many people Tenryo sends, they will all in the end drown in the sea and i would actually loved seeing this type of character but ig mihoyo cant risk it especially when people cant even stand yae because she is slightly mean
IKR , making the game toddler friendly isn't doing it any favors (and I said toddler because kids, or more like TEENAGERS , the target audience of the game, can handle dark themes like that with no problems) , sometimes I wish they did more mature things in the game and not just really tame stuff all around
It never hit me that Kokomi didnt have a plan for the Shogun. Holy crap, the likely outcome if the resistance came to the Shogun's doorstep was that they just get cut down like flies by the puppet.
"Her kit had a redemption with the release of Dendro" No, she was never bad. But I do agree her writing could have been better than just a mere plot device for the archon quest then afterwards she's just kinda... there.
I pulled for her the first time and that part had me like "What?" also. Her kit was never bad but others didn't want another "healer" now she's seen good because of her hydro application and healing but she was always like that for me, since i originally used her in permafrost teams.
I really like your idea in the last part! Her quest could even be about the impact of having to make these tough decisions, it’s common for the guilt that comes with that sort of thing to be soul-crushing after all
I find it hilarious, to say the least, that a dancer who received Hydro Vision had more relevance in the main story of her region than a strategic leader of a rebellion against a god. Hoyoverse really knew how to use the characters well in Sumeru, Nilou's scenes are important, significant and very exciting, the scene of her undoing Samsara with a bossa nova and all magical ambiance, or the scene of her risking being arrested without knowing if the plan It would work, just by trusting your teammates were AMAZING, unfortunately we didn't have the same with Kokomi.
Same with ayato man... He was supposedly to be the one pulling the strings, kinda like a mastermind but hoyoverse flopped him so bad 😭😭😭 Poor inazuma characters...
Kokomi reminds me of Fu Xuan from Honkai Star Rail, but her military strategy and and leadership is way more competent and explored. Her leadership was passed by Jing Yuan in an impossible position as she's not fit for the role. Throughout the story, she manages to lead the cloud knights to a victorious result but at the cost of their lives being strucked by the mara and actually captures Kafka at the end, rather than the story telling us she's a military genius instead of showing us because she's trying to pursue the sanctus medicus leader being the main culprit behind her cloud knight's infection she cares about leading to protect Xianzhou under Jing Yuan's command. Kokomi on the otherhand, we never got to explore why she was a leader in a flawed position in the first place, only for her so called "military genius" get downplayed by her overwork waifu trope and being absent at Act 3 of Inazuma like a goldfish brained leader she is. While Fu Xuan is still active and flawed as a leader near the end of Act 3 in the Xianzhou luofu quest, finally overcoming the sanctus medicus priestress with the help of trailblazer.
Oh yeah, forgot to mention that having Ayato send a half-dozen nameless nobodies against the Shogun makes him look really dumb too, and he's another supposed "smart" character. Like what are they going to do against a woman so powerful she can literally cleave continents in half? Truly a "hydrogen bomb vs handful of coughing babies" moment.
No, that was Ayato working with Yae Miko. They both were trying to "recreate" a moment for the Traveler to enter Ei's world. Those nameless nobodies were all pawns for that goal which made them both look Big brain.
gonna put my own two cents on this, he probably sent them to help the traveler rather than to defeat the shogun. he most likely already knows the traveler's going to tenshukaku since yae sent them there, and yae also probably told him her own plans on sending the traveler to plane of euthymia. they scheme together a lot (like in the youkai event), so i wouldnt put it pass them to plan out the whole last act too. though this could all just be me filling in the gaps with my personal interpretation lmao
Hoyo has a pretty big problem with “telling and not showing” where they straight up directly characterize a character to our faces (through paimon especially) instead of actually SHOWING us what they can do. It’s definitely gotten better with Sumer and Fontaine, but then there’s still paimon who is a flying “direct characterization” machine. With Kokomi, they keep telling us she’s a strategic genius but we never REALLY get to see her go all out and show us what she can do. Gorou…as much as I love him, he’s an errand boy at best. Again they repeat the fact that he’s a very young general and only show him “leading” an army once or twice. Their handling of watatsumi and enkanomiya in general was pretty lackluster which is upsetting because they have my favorite settings and lore.
I loved the idea of her being like low key evil by showing her drowning the shogun’s army and also using the deaths of the war to power the eldritch resurrection of Orobashi to fight the Shogun. Genshin isn’t really that kind of game though so I see why they didn’t do it.
They got the chance to do it with enkanomiya, but as we know... thats so sad to see that she's locked behind the shy waifu for the traveler its disapointing
hi fren, i've been a launch genshin player but recently gotten the lore bug and found your channel in the process of binging lore videos. i've been lurking for a hot minute, and one day when i was discussing kokomi's characterization with a friend i was immediately reminded of this video. Linked it to my friend and they practically agreed with all of the points you made. I did the rounds again and all your analysis have held up really well, maybe even better than some of the bigger lore/story channels imho. You really deserve more subs, and i hope you will get ALL the subs in due time. Just wanted to drop in and say i'm really looking forward to hear your take on fontaine and future story!
The fact that Gorou also suffered because of this poor writing is what bugs me. They both could have been their own interesting and developed characters, but instead we got 1 which is just a walking stereotype designed to be likable (and mind you, there are already like THREE other characters that fit this role of being "always overworked, tired, with a great sense of responsibility"(them being Jean, Keqin, and kinda Noelle)). And the other one is just an addition to Kokomi. A great general of the Watatsumi Island. And that's his entire personality. All of his lines are about how everything he does is related to his "duties" and so on. It honestly feels like he doesn't even have a personality and that's just so disappointing because I really like him overall. All of his event entries so far have been for like 5 minutes of screen time and they weren't really informative in terms of expanding his character imo.
I’m SO GLAD someone else is talking about Koko. I did a whole project for school about how mishandled and sexist her writing is 🥲🥲 I love her sm but she really is a whole mess
@@flayawag4334 she falls into that tragic “overworked waifu” archetype that otsuucurry mentioned before! Hoyoverse tends to undermine their powerful female characters by making them a sort of “damsel in distress” type situation where the traveller needs to save them from overworking themselves. It’s unfortunate because like otsuu said, Koko has potential. It’s just that she was written in a way that makes it seem like she can’t fend for herself. Really what makes it seem sexist is the fact that this is a pattern with Hoyoverse’s female characters (Ganyu, Keqing, Jean, etc.)
@@Tk-qm8ud Thank you! It's the most annoying "personality" in the game. It's not cute, it's overused, it's hurtful, it's shallow and it doesn't have any character growth aside from "come with me to get some rest from your work before you get back to a whole lot of imaginary work that'll drive you to exhaustion but don't worry it's cute how overworked you are"
I'm sad about what happened to kokomi, but I'm glad hoyo has learned how to write better. you can see it in all of their games. all 4 of the global ones.
What i hated about kokomi story quests on top of the points u mentioned is that it felt like to make kokomi seem like the brightest person in the room they had to make Sara look dumb and pretend like she made a mistake and didnt discipline or monitor her army properly for her to miss the fatui connection right under her nose
The main problem of Genshin is the same thing that makes it "popular": It is a GACHA game masquerading as an JRPG. All the worldbuilding is there, but since the game's story and events' main purpose is to serve as banners' advertisement first and foremost most of the potential ends wasted. That's why they introduce many new characters each nation, but then fail to either give them all meaningful time in the spotlight to develop them, or give proper reason for their absence. ( Ayato being one of of the worse offenders. ) They have a business schedule and products to sell. And, of course, they can't have the characters stray too far from their stereotypes either to risk their "desirability". And it is specially bad for female characters, because they can't be too competent lest they lose the "waifu" appeal.
I feel like this is an unpopular opinion, but the character who was written even worse in the Inazuma archon quest was Teppei. For a character that was supposed to die and make Traveler mad enough to go after the Fatui, his writing was shit. I was honestly irritated by his character and disliked him, and it really doesn't help that we knew next to nothing about him that gets us attached to him (like why was he in the war? Does he know someone who lost a vision? What does he gain from this? What's his backstory? Would he have any regrets if he died?) There was so much space for development, but all we got was his annoying habit of exaggerating all the action, and the fact that he wants to be stronger. He wants to be stronger. This could be a set up for a backstory with him and someone he cares for - possibly a vision holder - becoming separated during the war, and the fact that they're possibly dead, hence why he's fighting against the Shogunates and why he wants to go up through the ranks (+ accepting the delusion), because the more power he has, the more he can contribute to ending the war (possibly end it faster) and he can finding them again, even if they are dead, and that could be why his death was so upsetting to the Traveler. He's a friend who fell victim to the Fatui's plot, in a war he wouldn't have been in otherwise, and the only reason he was a victim of that plot was for someone he loved. Even more angst is if we meet someone who lost their vision and hints towards looking for someone they loved in the resistance (but was barred entry because of security issues), and that's why we went to see him. However, seeing his state, traveler instead asks if he's okay, and he dies before we could confirm. and we have to go back to tell the person Teppei died. Post shogunate defeat reveals that yes, the person we met was the one that got separated from Teppei. Honestly I wish the resistance member we befriended was Nathan instead, and we get hints of the fact that he might be betraying the resistance, but we never followed through with investigating him, and that's why Traveler was so mad about the Fatui. (Or I should say, mad at themself). If the traveler investigated based on their concerns, they would have found out about the Fatui plot sooner, and maybe the resistance wouldn't have lost so many good people (flashback to some interactions with other NPCs maybe). Teppei could just incidentally being the last soldier we saw and the one that died, which motivates traveler to go after the Fatui, because while it might be too late to save those soldiers, Traveler could still go and stop the plot now, and maybe save more lives.
I've noticed some of the same problems and have been wondering if it's a translation issue. Is Kokomi called an equivalent of a strategy _genius_ in the original Chinese? Because she really does come off as a strategy _nerd_ at best. Then again, that may just be a limitation of the writers. IMHO, the quality in writing dipped quite a bit in general around the time that second part of Inazuma quest came out.
Kokomi was a missed opportunity in regards to writing, we got an actual stategist character in Alhaitham, and a morally grey character in Lyney and Lynette which (I would've liked Kokomi to be). I do kinda like her character in itself though, but she kinda feels like a mary sue that isn't a mary sue.... I don't know how to explain it.
I would like to see you do a video on Signora if you can since she’s my favorite character and personally I feel like she got done dirty as well, also I agree Kokomi got done so bad and she had so much potential
Glad i am not the only one who felt Kokomi's writing is terrible. I told my brother and he didnt believe me. Hoyo kept selling her as a genius WAR strategist. We saw no war related strategy used. To me, getting back up only is not enough of a war strategy to be considered a genius cos any military leader could do it. Heck, even Sara can do it. I was looking forward to her using her own home turf topology and geography to make a battle plan that is sound and works. It would be really cool that she won the war with the little amount of people she has with a brilliant strategy. Drives home even more about the genius war strategist. But nope, we get no explanation whatsoever just backup and now is our moment then war won. To me TCG is just a tie to Yu-Gi-Oh. We all know that real smart startegy people play chess. Then her story quest, although i was not expecting anything good, i did not expect it to be that bad. Whats with the plus one energy minus one energy. This only works when they were actually successful in showing that Kokomi is smart in the archon quest. I know they were gg for some gap moe but gap moe can't work if there is no visible gap to begin with. Also writing a textbook thick possibility on what to do if negotiations with sara goes south is dumb. The smart people are the ones who grasp the main concepts abd writes the textbook to be thinner and thinner. Paimon struggling with said textbook while war btwn sara n Kokomi also break out again just goes to show how inefficient it is. Real strategist would know their goals and convince the other party they are negotiating with that their own goals are the correct option to take. Real smart negotiator pulls the wool pver your eyes n make u do their bidding. They have a battle plan and makes sure it succeed, can change said plan on the fly should they deem fit. I have given up on hoyo giving kokomi the brilliant smart brained war strategist and negotiator a redemption arc. She is the first female character from genshin that i love the design and doesn't look revealing even when clothed, only to be butchered like this... (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻ Hot take: to me, Nahida's writing about how shes a god of wisdom doesnt show. I was expecting her to be this other worldy high being kind of smart with kindness and compassion. IQ, EQ, you name it she have it. Its fine if she cannot fight physically but she should not lose any brain fights whatsoever. She should have the brain power to win a psychological battle with 6 sages combined. For her to lose to Azar and Dottore, it only gives me the princess peach vibes. Can't do anything, waits to be saved. Even green tea n white lotuses are better than her. Also, for her to act rashly to save those cute tinies living in apep is just... Unbelievably irrational. She cute, must protect, but doesnt pass my wisdom vibe checklist.
At the beginning it felt like there was a option for a plot thread where Kokomi could have been using the traveler for her own ends. which was the reason she promoted them to the captain of swordfish II. Its fairly common to do things like that to flatter people when you intend to later influence them. If they had gone that route I could see the title of her being a good strategist fitting, also it would have been very thematic with Ayaka pulling the traveler into a conflict they weren't interested in participating in.
What I wanted of Kokomi during the war? Actual WAR tactics. Imagine: Kokomi: "Okay Traveler, here's the plan. You're going to lead Swordfish II and lure the Shogun's army to this island so I can drown all of them with a tsunami." Traveler: "What?! But Kokomi thousands of people will die instantly." Kokomi: "That's the point. Traveler, I dunno if you've noticed, but this is WAR. There is no mercy when your people's lives are on the line and we're so outnumbered."
I haven't watched the whole video yet so please forgive me if this is something you already addressed but I've been saying for years now that the fatal flaw of Kokomi is that she is an expert strategist written by people who don't know what actual expert strategizing looks like. An actual expert strategist is someone who can react to newly introduced variables in real time and adapt their strategy to fit their new circumstances; NOT someone who meticulously writes down every possible scenario regarding literally anything ever, like some freaking Laplace's demon.
Just clarifying a common misconception about Orobashi: we have no evidence he was a Sovereign or even related to Vishaps. In fact, he was leading the experiments on them in the laboratory in Enkanomiya which if was a dragon... doesn't really make sense. He was definitely under the control of Celestia since that's why he was punished for reading Before Sun and Moon. But! Kokomi is definitely supposed to be his spiritual reincarnation which is meaningful as leader of the descendants of his people. Neuvelette is definitely the human-form reincarnation of the Hydro sovereign since all the lore fits him to a T
I think people forget that in her story quest she kinda talked about being overwhelmed that everyone is depending on her and that she only really gets her ideas from books that she reads. Kokomi looks to be in her late teens or max early 20’s. It’s pretty hard for someone of that age to have an idea to beat a god and lead a resistance. Everyone saw her as a genius when in reality she read war books and got lucky. She was never a genius, it’s just her people thinking she was.
I find it hard to believe that she's a military genius after she read just a couple of books from Yae's book store. That could actually have been some decent character development, where she's struck with the reality that she's actually a dumb dumb. Also, as someone who is a bit of a nerd when it comes to military history... Kokomi is, in fact, a dumb dumb. All of her plans rely on the assumption that her enemy is stupid and not doing their best to kill you at the same time. Believe me, if what she calls strategy was put into practice irl, she would lose 9 times out of 10. As another comment pointed out, this may be because Hoyo tried to write a character they didn't know how to. I know a lot about this kind of stuff and can quote many different figures from history who would make Kokomi look like an absolute idiot, but it's such a niche topic that not many even think about it. I honestly can't blame the writers for failing to depict warfare accurately. Whole damn subject is a rabbit hole.
I don't like her playstyle, I hate her visual design and animations, HOWEVER I still think she was handle really poorly. Part of it, might be cuz Miojo (Hoyoverse) is too cowardly to create real conflict between playable characters, so Raiden for example, couldn't be shown as a really ruthless dictactor
That happens when genshin is created in the Chinese dictatorship. Rather, it is said that the CCP got involved with the Inazuma story and that the original writers resigned.
Is so funny to me how the game tries so hard to tell the player that Kokomi is this 300 IQ character but every time she is on screen she is just.... meh.
19:31 if i were to hazzard a guess, its because 1. mihoyo at the time really wanted to keep Ayato's character design a secret until his chara banner, so ppl will feel the fomo and pull from him when he is revealed nearer to his release date. 2. They dont want Ayato to steal the spotlight of the other characters present
It's frustatin how the game gives us charaters with such interesting backstories or future possibilities but you just know they will never be relevant. Like Kokomi, Sara, or how Albedo's current story is lock in events. But my main nitpicking is Collei, who I really hoped would be seen more in the main quest. Specially because it was hinted some type of connection or interaction between her and Dottore could happen.
I firmly believe that at the end of Inazuma they finally hired some actually good writers and that's why we see such an upgrade in storytelling not only in archon legends but even in hangouts. Unfortunately, Inazuma was already unsalvageable by that point, as well as Kokomi.
Some of the honkai impact 3rd team was invited to help write for inazuma, ie kazari's quest so there's a chance they helped out with parts of the inazuma script that hadn't been completed yet as well
This is a really good video! I agree with basically every point you have on how Kokomi was butchered by the story and deserved better. When listening to how you think it should’ve gone I kept thinking of this one fanfiction called “The Art of Love and War” that does basically everything you said should’ve been done with her writing. Funny how the fans can do better than a whole writing team.
I was absent for many of the Inazuma events. Also behind on the archon quest and kinda rushed through them to get ready for Sumeru. I liked Enkanomiya a lot, but it had such an empty feeling because it was only traveler helping nps. Kokomi should have been there too, since she has the deepest connection to it. I liked the Chasm because Dainsleff was accompanying us.
Great analysis. I think the issue with Koko is that she is supposed to be like Zhuge Liang, the genius strategist from the 3 kingdoms, who was the sleeping dragon and the reason behind koko constellation. The issue is that Kokomi needed a Redcliff moment, a point in which she showed her military genius. She would also benefit from having a Liu Bei, a person she served as strategist and called the shots. Kokomo is both Liu BEi and Zhuge Liang in her own story, and falls flat in both roles, which is a shame because as you said she had a ton of potential to be explored.
The whole Inazuma archon quest was disappointing. It had a lot of potential but fell short. by a lot. Ayaka semi-manipulated us into helping her. Ayato wasn't even shown but I guess he was a more behind the scenes guy. Hell even Sara i would argue had better screentime than her. Itto and Kuki got their vision taken away and not a lot was given about that. Not to even mention Heizou and how he could have added more to how the Tenyrou Commission was handling the decree. He literally didn't show up until 2.8 almost a year after the main story finished. Heizou and Kokomi could have interacted and battlled wits. Anyway this isn't about him. Kokomi was misunderstood, from her kit to her lore. The whole thing with Wastasimi's god and Enonomiya is pretty much forgotten by the entire community. The only time she was actually shown using her big military brain was during freaking TCG. (side note her va had her voice more high pitched but i guess that was the director's fault) And the 3.8 summer event, she was just there. I don't even recall why but something about a lost artifact. She was also there to pass on a gag about how rollercoasters make people sick. Missed potential for lots of lore. But hey, fanfics exist so if anyone wants to see them more fleshed out then try to find them on ao3 or smth idk.
When Beidou showed up I thought Ningguang/Liyue is behind the resistance or at least made a deal with Kokomi, wouldn't that be cool? And I forgot when and where but Hoyo hinted Yae Miko hold secret talks with Venti. Is this Genshin or is this Game of Thrones, idk!
Excuse me what? It was explicitly stated in the story that Ayato is a neutral party. If you remember Sayu helping us in the Archon quest to save the fake vision dude - that's his agent, she's from Shuumatsuban - Ayato's unit. He is unable to act directly due to his position, so he tries to improve the situation in the realm he's the best in - politics. He was also hyped up in the story to be this mysterious mastermind behind the curtains, that's why there were Ayato fans since Inazuma release - waayy before we even got to put a face to his name, but unlike Kokomi he did live up to the hype. I guess it's easy to miss if you didn't care about him from the beginning.
tbf - most of the male characters, ayato included, seem to live up to what they are supposed to get and usually have better built stories than female characters... mostly cuz the game doesnt try to husbando-bait them as much as they waifu-bait female characters, at least from what i've noticed
I hate how they did "Im A sTrAtEgIsT" her ENTIRE personality. I get it with Klee or Xiangling, but Kokomi seems like grown up woman and ALSO she is a priestess, who pushed into the war thst she didn't want to be part of. And I don't actually see her preistess part in story quests AND in her voicelines AND in voicelines of other characters. All she say is that "I'm a strategist" "that's a good strategy" :It's strategicaly anefficient" "strategy is not so simple" "ah and also I'm a little bit intorvert" "did I mention that I'm a good strategist?" it's feels almost insulting that character that played such big role in Inazuma story was flated out to be JUST the strategist. To such point that her obvios victory against Yae in card duel felt much less deserved. And that also sad that with Kokomi the Priestess being The brains of an army, Gorou the General was nothing to do but to be a dog comic relief. Like HOW did you get your general status? I thought that he will be as strict and experienced as Sara, almost mirroring her. BUT NO, antipode of Sara is Kokomi, and general of an army is a silly puppy who scared of a sly kitsune lady
I agree with your argument but the charter combat wise is good a proper Kokmi can deal 10k/atack (i cont in the meduza) damage per attack, while healing the team and 26k damage in every 5 second from clamp set while she is indestructible (she literagy tank the Mangokenki in tower 12, and wracks Asdaha)
yeap the show-don't-tell principle is really not that difficult to practise; cannot understand why story writers keep falling back to tired exposition again and again.
Orobashi being barely mentionned is kinda annoying. To the point most of the fanbase forgets he was Watatsumi's god and thinks he was a mindless beast Ei killed some day.
I'm part of the fanbase that didn't know
@@treetreetreetreetreetree oh I don't blame you
If you're curious you can visit Enkanomiya, it turns out Orobashi was really gentle before Celestia hit him with "-9999 social credits"
I feel like that's a major ongoing symptom of Genshin's story telling, lore that's locked away in events and or hidden in exploration and books, this is not necessarily such a bad thing but it should be more left to certain details and lore that's not critical to the main story than entire story archs that would go a huge way to explaining certain characters and their motives etc etc.
Copium, maybe they will do missions with kokomi and orobashi in the future, and that half dragart girl from the enkanomya event too, kokomi was a bit sus on the event on her reasons to be on summeru, and since is said god dont really die maybe kokomi can actually talk with orobashi, but keep it secret bc forbbiden knowdle idk watatsumi has so much potential is frustrating
It's in her character teaser too. xD Orobashi was part of Ei's posse before they all went crazy and Ei had to kill them. Inazuma had the most giant island sized youkai of any region, but because they aren't divine like archons or dragons the corrosion gets to them faster than the divine. They are youkai likely not that old in comparison to the dragons either. Especially the dendro dragon who was born when the world was. He's somehow still not corroded yet despite being older than everything. xD
I always wished kokomi was a more morally grey character like lyney/lynette and others recently. Would have been an interesting development if kokomi knowingly worked with the fatui to try and win the war in a moment of desperation instead of it just being an oopsie. Or had more of an actual hand in the every event of the war. Like if yoimiya and the kamisato clan were directly in cahoots with kokomi so events like the prison breaks or the peacr talks or the ninja mission were actually from Kokomi's direct orders, making her an actual mastermind in the shadows. But no she legit got nothing....
Also can they please stop making character quests date quests... like at this point just give 5 stars hangout quests and keep that shit to those so we can have juicier story quests.
Depends on what you classify as "juicer" story quests. Because I'd hardly called story quests from Sumeru onward "date quests" (especially characters like Tighnari, Dehya, and Lyney)
All of this. They were literally at war and it would’ve been entirely realistic if they were pushed to morally dubious standards. Heck, Ayato is morally gray so it wouldn’t have been out there. Having Kokomi be morally gray as well would’ve added more moral conflict on whose side we were fighting on, especially since Hoyo tried to give sympathy/redemption for Raiden/Ei at the end anyways lol
Star Rail really improved on the companion quest by making MC more of an observer that is there to witness how others story unfold and even bringing other playable characters into them. (Imbaibitor Lunae and Luka being my favorite recently).
Also personal opinion but I think Faruzan and Kevah has the best hangout as it really dive's into how that actions affected their lives.
I think a lot of characters in Inazuma should have been more morrally grey
@@jess4334 True, I mean Ayaka literally guilt trips the Traveler to help fight the shogun by making us meet those who lost their visions.
They should has shown her as manipulative yet we'll meaning.
Her character needed to be a priestess only, pushed into a war that she wasn’t ready for and didn’t necessarily want. Gorou needed to be the genius military strategist. They overloaded her.
Agreed
?? Isn’t Miko already taking the priestess role? And Kokomi is a huge strategy nerd, she was in her element during the war. Maybe if she was in conflict with the actual priestess (made to be a separate character) and led Watatsumi during the war?
@@anotherrandomperson9174 Miko is Miko (or Guuji) of Narukami Sakura, the priestess is not her title
Kokomi is the Priestess of Watatsumi island
apart from different places, they are called differently on purpose too. Miko is not only a name but a Japanese word
@@anotherrandomperson9174I mean they don't serve the same god so...
Honestly i think gorou was also affected by this- being a general who does little else but blindly trust his priestess and who doesn't get to really be in charge dampened his potential. Splitting the character traits evenly between kokomi and gorou would have given us two great characters instead of two fhat will never be fully realized in the story
I knew she wasn’t written to be a strategist the second they drove home the point that she writes down hundreds of outlines for each scenario. A strategist would create a plan that already considers all possible weak links and designs counters for them, then manipulates the scenario to bend to their plan. Quantity of plans does not surpass the quality of a single good plan. It just shows you can only problem solve in binaries, not dynamically.
I really hated they did that because they basically showed her as a micromanaging "leader" that doesn't trust her subordinates to think critically about the situations they face and just rely on hoping she already came up with a plan for them to refer to instead of using their brains.
Not really.
For example, the US outlined several plans in case of war prior to World War I and II.
War Plan Red was created in case of war against the British Empire. And this was divided into several War Plans.
War Plan Red was specifically against the UK. War Plan Crimson was against Canada. War Plan Ruby was against India ( the British Raj ), War Plan Scarlet against Australia, War Plan Garnet against New Zealand, and then War Plan Emerald against Ireland.
Then there was the Rainbow Plans in case of war on multiple fronts against a coalition of enemies ( clearly the Axis Powers ).
War Plan Rainbow 1 was a plan for a defensive war to Protect the US as the Western Hemisphere north of 10 Degrees south latitude. In such a war, the US was assumed to be without Major Allies.
War Plan Rainbow 2 was identical to Rainbow 1, except for assuming that the US would be allied with France and the UK.
War Plan Rainbow 4 was based on the same assumptions as Rainbow 1 but extended the American mission to include defense of the entire Western Hemisphere.
War Plan Rainbow 5, destined to be the basis for the American strategy in WW2, assumed that the U.S. was allied with the UK and France and provided for offensive operations by American Forces in Europe, Africa, or Both.
So, what Kokomi was doing there is in fact realistic.
There certainly are plenty of stories in history where that happened. Pretty much all of them were desperation measures, and we tend to only remember the cases where the strategist got lucky enough for their one plan to work out. Granted, this also contrasts with all the great military leaders of history who didn't even make one strategic plan. (This was excusable in the cases where winning the war wasn't the point of entering one, which were surprisingly common.)
Pretty much all of the competent strategists started with the assumption they couldn't control the weather (which also meant where masses of people could go), whether the other side would actually show up for any given battle, whether a heretofore unconsidered party would suddenly enter the conflict or start a new one, and other factors. How much overplanning was required would depend a lot on the existing capabilities of the force under their command. Given that Kokomi for the most part had barely trained troops facing a force that honestly could have easily overrun them if it wasn't for the fact that absolutely nobody wanted a massacre (and for a change in the history of civil wars both sides' leadership were competent enough to minimize casualties), I'd say not just writing out her entire military tactical doctrine but being prepared for many of her subordinates to fail to remember and follow that doctrine was warranted.
Honestly, I agree with things said in video cause that's the impression I got from her story quest later too:
She's really not a genius strategist (even though she works hard to maintain this image, willingly or not). She's just a priestess forced to give her all, even overworking herself to the point of mental shutdown for saving her people (hence the need to "recharge" every now and then, I really doubt real geniuses are in need of such activities. Even with introvert reasons in the picture).
But, honestly, it's not like genshin does anything to support nor to reject that kind of interpretation (unless there's something in the lore that I didn't care enough to read and/or missed the event for). And game's storytelling does play a lot with that kind of imaginary subplots that are logical and sometimes definitely somewhere in the game, but writers can't give a damn for a second to put the right hints where they belong. Which is a shame. They surely know how to. They did that before
it's not that she's not written to be a good strategist but the writers have no idea how to make one and didn't do their research. this whole quest seems like it was made on a time crunch so I'm not surprised that they just winged it
I know Alhaitham is an "acquired taste" since his personality can turn off people but he's a perfect example of a big-brain actually show off their big-brainness
Literally all characters that are considered intelligent like, Yelan , ninguang, Yae(regardless of how she is), EVEN FUCKING KAVEH SHOW HIS BIG BRAIN in his hangout when building that library(?), show their big brainess better than her
He is a great example of genius strategist but he's also kind of a garbage person lol
true!! I don't like his personality at all, but i do recognize that he is one of the few good writin character. he feels more important to Sumeru's Archon Quest than Kokomi was for Inazuma's Archon Quest so I cannot say that he is a bad character.
I think this just shows Hoyo improving their writing since Inazuma
@@petersong974THIS!! They're learning from their mistakes (well... SOME mistakes at least)
And we know they can write big brain genius' because, like you said, Nahida and AlHaitham even pulled the wool over my eyes
Technically its just them improving their writing after the critics of Inazuma
from what i know, the team that wrote inazuma story isn't the same that wrote the sumeru story or liyue story.
from what ive heard, a honkai story writer helped with the sumeru arc after inazumas critisism@@petersong974
Kokomi is forced to be a tactian and leader for certain circumstances. Just that. She only take notes for possible scenarios,
As an albedo fan since his release I remember back when we used to speculate about him being a homonculous based on nothing but a few lines in his stories and the names of his constellations...the 2021 winter event felt SO satisfying to play and see the theories confirmed and his lore expanded I simply do not understand why kokomi could not at the very least receive the same grace, especially given how rich in lore enkanomiya is as an area, how relevant kokomi's connections with orobashi and his people are and, most infuriatingly, the fact that the perfect opportunity with the vishap people event was right there ripe for the taking. Kokomi at least conceptually was always one of the most interesting characters in the game for me and as much as she was a victim of inazuma's last act collapsing in on itself I don't think it had to be the end for her (see how ei's second story quest swiftly changed so many people's opinions on her), but unfortunately I think hoyo no longer care.
Just stop. Neuvillette is the True Hydro Dragon Sovereign. The True Hydro dragon Reincarnation. Kokomi was just a red herring.
did you reply to the wrong person? I don't really disagree with this and also what's neuvillette got to do with anything that I said?@@silverhawkscape2677
@@silverhawkscape2677They're not talking about that. They're talking about her connections to enkanomiya, and with enkanomiya comes the lore surrounding the vishaps.
@@silverhawkscape2677 I'm so disappointed that this is the case, Kokomi should have at least one W
@@silverhawkscape2677Its not talking about that reread the comment
They could’ve EASILY fused her story quest with the enkanomiya side quest .. she should’ve came with us down there and explained everything and when we get to meet enjou and he eventually turns out to be an abyss lector , it would make an amazing cutscene + kokomi would be a huge help as a trial character against the abyss lector since she can break his shield + the pyro lector has attacks that can severely damage the whole team so having kokomi as the healer could’ve added a great experience to that mini boss fight … aaand with the huge lore drop that enjou gave about the book called before sun and moon ( that literally gives the lore of the start of teyvat + it has ties with orobashi ) … man it could’ve been a heavy lore bomb quest with amazing cutscenes and amazing combat aspect but hoyo just wasted this huge opportunity :’) .. ( and * cough * as an enjou simp I would’ve loved to hear his voice acting more but oh well )
Oh god, yes. And the matter of confidentiality regarding Enkanomiya's and the abyss' secrets will be protected, so the devs don't have to make a follow-up quest with her-- what goes on there stays there and needs no continuation. They could literally just clarify she's human or she's actually the final form of revolution for an experimented Vishap and build a base for Neuvilette being the hydro dragon instead. Literally, so much potential wasted.
that would have helped a LOT with enkanomiya and kokomi at the same time, damm, such a horribly missed opportunity, you reminded me of my reaction when we went to enkanomiya for the first time, I said ''Wait, why isn't kokomi coming with us?''
GOD this would have also totally solve the issue too of the trial part of Kokomi's actual story quest being so... laughably bad from what I can remember at least 😭
omggg why didnt they do this instead im so mad
my only issue with this is that she was released in 2.1 and enkanomiya was released in 2.4.. characters ALWAYS release with their respective story quests on their first banner and at that point in time, only archons got 2nd story quests ( except venti ofc )
but if they did, the quest would be amazing
i remember seeing a short comic about Kokomi being revealed to be a scary twist character drowning the enemy soldiers in the ocean during the Sara fight and saying something along the lines of "you'll run out of men before the ocean runs out of room for the bodies"
it's very extreme for Genshin standards and absolutely not something they would have done at that point in the game's history but i still love the idea of this pretty and cute character turning out to be a demon on the battlefield
omg I love those types of characters, do you remember the name of the short comic?
@@Rose-85 okay ty
seymmm I WISH SHE WAS LIKE THAT!!
Thats sick as hell omg
A cute character that lacks empathy and emotion would've fit kokomi so well. She would come up with extreme and dangerous strategies that would ensure their victory while gorou wants a more humane strategy to end the war. This would've been an amazing sub plot in the inazuma archon quest.
I remember people theorizing she was either fatui or working with them and i feel like that wouldve made more sense than what we got in the archon story. Instead of kokomi being so incompetent that she accepts supplies from an unknown benefactor despite being a "master strategist" id prefer if she was in on the deal and doing it to win the war regardless of the costs
Omg yes that would have been amazing
Kokomi and the Inazuman war held so much potential. The greatest tragedy to me is that Kokomi has never met the Raiden Shogun. Not once. Which is a shame because kokomi wanted to be Ei's cheif advisor before she became the leader of Watusumi. She's the perfect character to learn about the truth of the puppet and help Ei realize what she did wrong and teach her about humanity going forward. Both of them together could have repaired the centuries long grudge Watasumi had against the Shogunate and forge a completely new path for Inazuma.
Its just sad to see hoyo through her away.
That's the thing. The devs want the traveller be the closest to the Archons so they end up having intimate knowledge about them. Venti and Zhongli identity. Ei and her Puppet and the twins.
The traveller knows more about Ei than anyone in Inazuma outside of Miko
@silverhawkscape2677 Indeed, and while it works with Venti, Zhongli, and Nahida, that's their greatest mistake when it comes to Ei. I believe, at the very least, Kokomi and Kujou Sara should have found out to advance their character arcs. Ei really needed a new batch of friends to replace her old friends who died 500 years ago. It would have improved her character story and have Inazuma feel more alive, just like Sumeru and Fontaine.
that wouldve been so cool!!!
and there is precedent of rulers having vision holder advisors(ningguang, keqing and ganyu)
and sara and yae already existing
sadly, their overall take on making the world alive is to center some quests around npc
@@chrisgarbutt1893 I don't see how any of those things would have improved Ei's character arc. You realize that you would need to perform a hypothetical total rewrite of the entire Archon Quest in order to even make your suggestions work, right? And that this would also take away from the Traveler because the Traveler is the main protagonist whereas Kokomi and Gorou are supporting characters?
The archetype of a priestess is to obtain and give forbidden knowledge that is largely overlooked or simply ignored. Kokomi's arc should have been about mystic or esoteric findings about Ei's true nature while everyone is acting a fool.
I have massive problem's with Kokomi's writing, and the way even the good elements were executed. Even her introduction is quite bad - Gorou is the driver of that scene, not Kokomi, even though it was meant to be her grand reveal, something everyone was excited for. Let me explain.
In that cutscene you see Gorou and his men fight a battle they cannot win. They're outnumbered and they're going to lose - his men will get imprisoned, the traveler will get captured, and he's going to get his vision taken away. There's nothing they can do but fight until the bitter end. And you can see that defensive aggression in his motions, this is his last stand.
Then Kokomi pops up with reinforcement and gives a confident smile - almost telling everyone that they did well holding out, and they'll be okay now. And you suddenly see the happiness and relief in Gorou's face - a moment ago he was set to lose everything, and now he's saved! I wouldn't have been surprised if the guy started bawling from relief then and there.
Not only that, but he even sees an old friend - Kazuha is here. All of his allies have come to his aid, and they're all there to fight by his side for their shared goals. Even Beidou joins in, and now THEY are outnumbering the enemy, who has to retreat! Morale rises, and you can see how energized they get - they can win.
It's actually one of the best scenes in the game in my opinion. Even though you knew Gorou, a playable character, would be fine in the end, and the traveler will save the day anyway, they still did a pretty good job at making the Gorou, who doesn't yet know his fate, act the way he's meant to. And that's why I say that he's driving this scene.
Take Gorou out, make Kokomi save her men with reinforcements, and you lose all of that. It's still roughly the same, but... you lose so much of that personal touch.
Take Kokomi out, and have Gorou be saved by Kazuha, Bediou and their men (along with some resistance soldiers sent by Kokomi), and you still get quite a lot of emotions, you just miss out on the first wave of relief.
Yes, that still means that you lose out on something, so it isn't like Kokomi's presence is unnecessary there, it's the opposite, she's needed there. But she doesn't drive the scene in the least bit.
And considering that this was her BEST moment, that's saying something. After that, the way they use her character only gets worse and worse.
I think they just set up that scene and story horribly.
Also I thought about how I would've done it, and I came up with something while I was showering. The classic shower stories, lol. I don't claim that it's particularly good, but I do think it's a little better than what they did with Kokomi. If you want to give it a read, it's here, but it's long.
After introducing the MC to Gorou and the resistance, I would've given the MC a mission. Kokomi, the strategist and leader, went away on a mission to resolve the resistance's problems with supply. She should've been back a week ago, but not a message was sent... Gorou can't leave and check, because he needs to hold his ground against the commission until Kokomi returns. So he asks you to go with a small group of soldiers, lead by Teppei, and find Kokomi and her troops.
On your journey there you fight enemies alongside the soldiers. Now, because this is a game and not just a story, there has to be a story-fitting battle too. So I say, make the player fight waves of monsters. Then, cutscene: A larger enemy, a mini boss, shows up and attacks the traveler. While the traveler is occupied, another enemy lunges at them while they're vulnerable - and that's when Teppei uses his delusion to block the attack and kill the monster. Have a moment between the traveler and Teppei - a sort of "I got your back" moment, and then return to the gameplay and the battle against the miniboss. The narrative is that Teppei and the soldiers take care of the small monsters, so that you can focus on the big guy.
Teppei this way ends up being a lot more useful and (imo ) more likeable than by doing archery and fixing fences. It can also trigger his demise - he used his delusion too much, and now the consequences catch up to him. He's becoming weak after the fight, so you take a rest. By the morning, he's old, wrinkly, grey, and dying. You have a short conversation with him - although he's scared and regretful, he urges you to go on and find Kokomi, because it's already over for him, but the others back at the camp still need help, and Kokomi could be in danger too.
So, at the end... You leave him and go on. This way he still dies, you still get a new reason to hate the fatui - probably even more so, because this time around Teppei died a more respectable death.
On you go. You eventually reach Kokomi in some part of the islands - maybe you have to solve some puzzles to get past a few barriers or something, then you reach their camp, where you find Kokomi defending her soldiers. You help her out, and then you find out what happened.
Kokomi's soldiers are on the verge of death because of their delusions, and they're surrounded by monsters, outnumbered. She and a handful of soldiers have been tending to them while simultaneously trying to defend their camp. The barriers were set up by Kokomi to keep monsters out while she figures out a solution.
You find out about the Fatui and the delusions - how Kokomi has been backed into a corner and had no choice but to accept their help, but since she doesn't trust them, she decided to take this opportunity to resolve the resistance's issues and break away from this suspicious third party as soon as possible. She accounted for some kind of price, but not her men dying of old age so quickly - this caught her off-guard, and they became trapped.
Now that the traveler arrived and is willing to help, she makes a bold decision and decides to clear out the monsters with the help of the traveler, so that they can return to the resistance camp. Maybe give her a trial, and have her join the traveler's party as the 5th character to fight some stuff - perhaps Rifthounds, healing is useful with those, and Inazuma is crawling with them anyway.
And after they win, you can still have them meet up with the reinforcements, like Beidou and Kazuha (and imply that this is something Kokomi set up in advance, making her even better at her role), and go save Gorou.
After which you go on like usual, go fight the Shogun, etc. You now also have a reason as to why Kokomi isn't with you; she has a responsibility towards her soldiers, so she's going to tend to them and do whatever she can to get the resistance back into shape. After all, she's a healer, it's natural that she goes back to heal those who need it, and she's the general, she's the one who needs to sort the issue out.
I'm not saying that this is the best fan-version out there, but this solves the both the problem of Kokomi not planning ahead and not doing much: she's actively out there risking her life to try and resolve the resistance's issues, while she also shows that she isn't going to rely on some untrustworthy party to win this war, she'll use them to her advantage and get stronger, then break free. Like a real strategist.
She also shows her competency; she was put into an unexpected and highly disadvantageous situation, but she keeps her men organized enough to set up a camp, defend it and tend to the wounded, while she also works on finding a solution and setting up additional defenses. And as soon as the opportunity arises (aka traveler arrives), she immediately takes it and lunges into action herself, willing to dirty her hands for the sake of the resistance.
Then it gives her a reason to go be somewhere else, if HYV didn't want her to appear for some reason.
There's still a lot that I didn't touch on - her reasons, her plan when it comes to the Shogun, and how she handles everything after the war is over. But I already wrote a shorter novel so I'll just stop here.
I don't know about the best scene in the game. Maybe it's just me, but the battle itself sucks. The setup is boring, the choreography is so basic (stand in lines and charge at eachother) and the supposed climactic rescue lacks any meaningful context. Oh they were losing because they were outnumbered, but now they outnumber the enemy so they will surely win. Mind you, this is supposedly our first introduction to Kokomi being a strategic genius. Yeah, excellent idea - just outnumber your enemy and you are guaranteed to win. Maneuvers, ambushes, use of terrain for your advantage or different types of weapons (maybe an arrow rain to halt shogun army's charge)? Nah, we're too smart for that. Just pick a straightforward fight on a flat terrain and send more troops than your opponent. That's exactly what makes a great strategist.
@@kindlingking You're free to disagree, we all have our opinions and each and every one of them is just as valid as the other one. :) In cutscenes I value the characters' actions, how believable they are in that given situation and how they react to what's happening around them, that's why I talked so much about Gorou in the comment - Gorou makes it good for me, because he reacts really well to his situation. I can't recall a single cutscene that nailed character reactions better than that. And for that reason, it's S-tier in my eyes.
About everything else - well I already talked about all of that in detail in two long comments, so I'll just leave it at saying that, as stated, they messed up Kokomi's writing and debut.
@@user89389 oh no, I'm not disagreeing with you on the character and emotional responses part, I just dislike the battle itself for how plain and unispired it is. Once again Hoyo could've done so much more and they chose the bare minimum instead. It's serviceable, but in the context of what's to come it just feels even more disappointing to me. An entire civil war reduced to an uwu waifu (two of them, arguably), a tearjerker npc and two generals who feel more like accessories. Talk about wasted potential.
@@kindlingking Yes, I fully agree with that part - compared to what it COULD HAVE been, it's.... not good, to say the least. They tend to do that, sadly.
Kokomi being another victim to the waifu personality is very disappointing. But Ei is the most painful one for me, she held the most potential in my eyes. A powerful, flawed antagonist that we even get to fight against, who turns a blind eye to the suffering of her people in order to do what she wants, and swiftly gets rid of anyone standing in her way...
... Reduced into a cute, hot waifu who can't cook and loves dango milk, who didn't do any wrong because it's all the puppet's fault.
It really is sad that the entire Watatsumi cast suffered (and still do after all this time) from bad writting overall, Kokomi "Genius Strategist" part never got really shown and instead they tried to sell us "Inazuma's Jean" in her story quest, and while they had TWO whole patches of Enkanomiya (the patch where they introduced the new area and the patch with the new event surrounding the area) they just never tried to tie her into anything outside of "go explore it for us", while Gorou went from "Military General who cares about his men" to "Bullied by Yae Miko" and "Miss Hina running gag" that quite frankly it got really boring after the 3rd time of "he doesnt know and we wont let traveler tell him", like i'm not kidding when i say from Gorou's debut in 2.3 up until the very last patch of inazuma, there wasn't a SINGLE patch without Miss Hina not being mentioned somewhere, be it in his Hangout, Iodori Festival, Yae Miko's story quest, Liben's event, Itto's drumalong event, heck even Heizou's hangout for whatever reason. It just baffles me how they already have something that they can use to make both of them better and instead both of them get reduced to "joke" characters for no reason whatsoever. (and this really pains me because those 2 are some of my favorites in this game and every time they appear at this point i'm already expecting hoyo to just reuse their same old troupe for the 54th time =/ )
Even today I am still learning to cope with how they handled Gorou ;-;
the way they handled gorou actually made me slowly not like Yae Miko as time went on because of the Miss Hina thing, and how she always wants to touch his ears and tails. The first time I was like "okay, she's just teasing him" but then it got to the point where it feels like she's harassing the poor guy. I've always viewed Yae Miko as a morally grey character, especially on how she puts profit before people, but I always felt like her interactions with Gorou just went too far.
I got really tired about the Miss Hina so fast until I just wanna speedrun whenever they mentioned about it. Like bruh, we have a general being reduced to this everytime he got a chance to appear >>
The best parts of his hangout was learning about how the war affected him since it felt like most of the Inazuma characters were like “Oh the war’s over? Cool ig.” I definitely got more and more disillusioned when the writers instead chose to focus on the most shallow aspects of his character. It seems like we’ve moved on fully from Inazuma but I hope at some point the writers will want to actually do something interesting with its cast rather than… whatever it is they’ve been doing
I'd even go further and expand this to say the rebellion part got bad writing, because Sara got absolutely nothing.
Good points for Kokomi. I was honestly infuriated in this summer event. Both Eula and Kokomi deserved better than this 5th (with 6th on horizon) Klee event. And what especially made me mad is the end of second part, where Eula tells that she will talk to her parents in future. It's literally Hoyo's way of saying "We wanted to give Eula her event, but we don't care about her. Please, wait another 1.5 years when we do her dedicated event, where she has a conflict with her parents".
Eula doesn't sell so it's not worth the investment of Making an Event for a character with poor sales.
I'm sorry, but if you give players 1.5 years to save for a character, chances are that they're gonna get that character while not spending a cent.
@@silverhawkscape2677 Like klee sells? but she gets not 1, not 2 but 3 events to herself meanwhile eula gets throwned in random events. And idk, if eula is so bad maybe make THE ONLY PHISICAL SUPP IN THE GAME THAT SHOULD BE PERFECT FOR HER not shit, or dont let people save primos for over 500 days than be surprised that all the people that would whale for her c6 or weapon or summon for her in general got her for free.
Kokomi acted so weird in the event too, I literally thought she was a hydro copy.
@@akatosh5792Klees banner may not sell, but her personality sure does. Every region has a poster child for events and Klee is the poster child for mondstadt.
Mondstadt = klee and venti
Liyue = Hu Tao and Kazuha
Inazuma = Itto
Sumeru = Cyno
Notice how majority of those characters are extroverted upbeat types (expect kazuha) who are entertaining or are very memeable (kazuha is very memeable). Eula just isn’t as popular or entertaining a character compared to someone like klee. Even while doing the event I skipped majority of her and kokomis lines cause they were all boring, but Klee and kaeyas playful dynamic was entertaining, adorable and hilarious.
Not that this fixes anything, but I feel like a lot of Kokomi's grandeur and hype is intentionally overblown, because there are a lot of details (especially with Summertime Odyssey) that are more consistent than her track record on the battlefield that seem to paint a more honest picture of the brilliant military strategist we all know.
Firstly, Watatsumi is a culture that depends on, and is centered, entirely around her. We're shown in the existence of her secret notes that no one on Watatsumi actually knows how to fight; no military experience, no ranking. They genuinely rely on her directives, cannot think for themselves unless she gives the okay. She DOES say in About Us: Experience that she "spent my younger years traveling between Sangonomiya and the army." I feel like some people see this and assume it's all on Watatsumi, but with everything else we see, this doesn't make sense. It doesn't even make sense for them to have their own army, due to their fealty to the Shogunate. But then the war started and that changed.
I'm noting this, because I feel like it explains two things about Kokomi: why she is obsessed with the military, and why her actual strategy is both lacking yet effective. We're never shown her strategies play out, and most people assume it's because of bad writing, but I feel like I see enough details to justify Kokomi's success.
Firstly, her passion. Kokomi, from a young age, was taken on trips by her mother across Inazuma. Specifically to the army. For one reason or another, this was cultivated to be her calling, to the point where Kokomi even wanted to be an adviser or general as opposed to the leader of Watatsumi. However, her bloodline does not allow that, the will of their god that flows in her veins. I wonder why this was done by her mother? Perhaps she was forward-thinking, not unlike the Hexenzerkel. Who knows - there's much we don't understand about the Sangonomiya clan, still, and they're a magically important family.
But Kokomi doesn't just love the military, she loves reading about it. We're given the impression (told by her) that she reads high-brow heavy reading like Teyvat Art of War, but more often than not, it sounds like Kokomi reads Light Novels, no? From Yae Publishing House, very frequently, which is primarily a distributer of LNs. This always stuck out to me, but Summertime Odyssey emphasized this with Kokomi's panicked cover of her "true" military self, when it was almost blown by that Oceanid. Almost like she was blustering or making up lies to sound impressive off camera, that the Oceanid nearly spoke of and would have subsequently spoiled. This confirms, to me, that Kokomi's knowledge on military tactics largely comes from fiction, and yet, that STILL makes her a more experienced strategist than everyone who looks to her for guidance.
And this is important to note, because it explains why Kokomi somehow manages to succeed in this war, despite being so inexperienced she was willing to accept donations from an anonymous benefactor that ended up sabotaging them. Mind you, though, the Fatui ONLY made this move as Watatsumi continued to hold the stalemate. But why?
Well, as I said, this is noteworthy because of what it reflects about Kokomi's strangely effective strategy. I'd often wondered what it was, yet, nothing ever clicked with me until - of all things - it was Kokomi's KIT that made me realize her strategy! As her Story 2 puts it, this is Kokomi's "unique tactical style: manipulate the larger strategic situation to force the other side to give up, and to win wars with the least amount of cost possible."
So, with all these odds stacked against them, how exactly has Kokomi managed to do this? How does her kit play into it?
Well, just look at her passive: the aptly named Flawless Strategy gives a 25% healing bonus with -100% crit rate. That is to say, to me, this indicates the core of Kokomi's strategy is endurance. She keeps her army healed with her insanely powerful magic, so even though they're all peasants who never held a pike in their lives, they're able to withstand the island-hopping of Sara's army and their superior equipment and training. And that -100 crit rate feels like an intentional part of this, a union between story and gameplay: Kokomi is NOT an expert military strategist, that's all bluster with inferences most well-read people can make, and in fact, her "critical rate (of success)" is actually not that high; they stem the tide, but Kokomi is dealing with an army of children and she herself is someone who gets caught up considering every little possible detail and making directives that are ridiculously thick for everyone. All of this is to say, Kokomi's army isn't successful at winning, but defending. Enduring. Healing, and being able to never give up.
Again, despite everything I said, I don't think this fixes Kokomi's presentation in the game proper. It's painful, and I would love it if all that I said was made even clearer in future content like Summertime Odyssey made it; maybe the day we learn of Kokomi's true destiny.
I think your statements can be true in fact the only succesfull battle that we had saw its happened exactly that at the start the shogunate was mopping the floor with the resistance than kokomi came and started healing everyone bringing also reinforcement and they beat sara and this would explain why kokomi don't want the delusion not only because the fatui are the "bad guys" but also because the delusion would damage her strategy since they are the opposite of endurance and basically cause irreversible damage for a boost of attak power that would be irrelevant at the hand of inexpert people
Finally, someone that understand Kokomi!!! God, it's kind of painful to me to see a criticism without understanding her. I want to see a critic that actually understand her like what you write here.
Fuck
This is amazing
I like it, really good analysis
I agree with a lot of what you said but I want to add that in history Watatsumi did have an army, specifically during their conquest for Yashiori Island.
Back when Orobashi was still alive he was pressured by his own people to push for colonization of Yashiori since they had no form of sustainable resources in Watatsumi due to the soil there being infertile. Orobashi having to go on his mandatory suicide mission anyways, decided to build up a Navy and military for his people. It’s safe to assume that after his death and the end of that first war with Watatsumi and the Shogunate, while the military force was wiped out they still had some form of defense since they still had some valuable resources for trade like Sango Pearls, which are in lore are priceless for trade according to Heizou.
It would explain why there was a military in her time even after the island swore fealty to Ei, probably leftover scraps dedicated to protect themselves since they’re still technically outside of Shogunate jurisdiction. Though what makes me more concerned now is that why did she start a rebellion against the shogunate with such little amounts of resources? Honestly if they pulled moral ambiguity and had her be sponsored by the Fatui since the start then it’d make more sense for her to actively push to start it.
I love her and her lore but the archon quest really just painted her as an incredibly lucky leader rather than an actual strategist that can manipulate situations to her liking. To put it in comparison it’s as if she’s a chess player that remembers all of the opening moves but crumples the moment something completely unorthodox occurs. She really needs a part 2 for her story since I want to see her strategic mind be explored more outside of “look she’s smart yall!!”
@@browserjunior4707 The "why" of Kokomi's desire to fight is alluded to collectively in her Quotes and Stories. As the current living "will" of Orobaxi, and the upholder of Watatsumi's pact with Narukami, peace between the two island peoples would be maintained so long as their autonomy was protected and respected by the shogunate.
Iirc, mind you.
And so, Kokomi felt compelled to fight because the Vision Hunt Decree did just that. Combine that with her healing power making a stalemate in perpetuity possible, and their not being stomped was a safe bet to make I'd say.
I've been saying for a while that Kokomi is the result of Hoyoverse trying to write a character who's smarter than themselves. She's _supposed_ to be a prodigy in military strategy, but no one at Hoyoverse actually knew the things she was supposed to know, so they couldn't show her knowing those things.
Hoyoverse has definitely gotten better at writing intelligent characters, but there's also the matter of Kokomi's intelligence being highly specialized in a specific field that isn't very common to think or hear about.
yeah, most people won't understand much of the field of knowledge Kokomi specialize in, mainly because its mostly not applicable in daily life and the modern world. Yet its so complicated, that if you try to explain it, it can get way too convoluted. Kokomi skillset lies in analyzing terrain and troop movement, then predicts and choose the best path to take. She is good in preparing logistics as well. She is not the "i come up with something unique nobody thought before" kind of genius, but one that is more of a prediction analyst and making early preparations. The reason she won battles, is because her predictions were spot on and she prepared the necessary counters, not because her tactics were out of this world.
True but this could have been solved if they spent the money and hired a history consultant who specializes in past war events and knew everything about what famous strategists did at the time
@@vis1975 Honestly, they could have done that. They can afford that too. Why didn't they do that? All those history buffs for Yun Jin's accuracy but not one for Kokomi? DAMN
@@aureliaavalon genshin has their priorities all over the place, lmfao
Kokomi is a character that is so defined by what she does and not what she cares about, and I think those should be complimentary, but I think if they wanted to make her better they should’ve made her more thematically relevant and not specifically more intelligent, because I don’t care about how smart she is, I care about why she should matter.
I definitely agree, in Sumeru they really improved the character writing, with more show and less tell. I also liked how they left mysteries, like after seeing Alhaitham steal the forbidden knowledge capsule, I wasn't sure if he'd end up being an enemy until the end of the archon quest. So far Fontaine has been interesting too. Hopefully they can keep it up!
"Sumeru" and "less tell" don't go well together. It's the one region where characters would never shut up.
@@ligeiasiren4290well we were also shown quite a lot so that compensates for my poor index finger and my keyboard's poor space bar
Hell people theorized Al was the Archon for a bit to the point it's a MEME that he's the real archon if Sumeru
Yeah with Neuvilette out there's like nothing more to kokomi now. She's always going to be the strategist that was executed badly. There's no more out for her story anymore
LMAO I remember after finishing the Inazuma archon quest I didn't really process that the entire Inazuma arc was over because I legit thought there was gonna be more to show like what will happen to the resistance, Kokomi suddenly not important anymore, etc. After a great cliffhanger in Act 1, with Kokomi finally showing up, I was skipping most of the Teppei stuff just to get to the characters I wanted to care about only to realize I finished the entire story quest. Without going online to read what others thought, I remember feeling empty after completing the entire story but I wasn't sure if I missed something important since I did skip a lot. So I wasn't sure if my criticisms were justified because I may have set up unrealistic expectations myself. Glad to hear many people felt the same way about this storyquest. I remember the community crying over Teppei's death and I never understood it because to me he is a basic npc and I cared about other npcs more (Hanachirusato and so on). Kokomi, the smartest general, doesn't realize her troops are using delusions and killing themselves. GTFO of here lmaooo. If they want to write character flaws for Kokomi, that requires you to have a character arc. Teppei getting more screentime than Kokomi and Gorou in the story quest is infuriating and I can not understand why parts of the fandom cry over that npc
Dont forget that they spend like half an hour building Teppei , A RANDOM ASS NPC THAT HAD MORE DEATHFLAGS ON HIM THAN EVERY OTHER CHARACTER COMBINED WHOS WHOLE PURPOSE WAS TO DIE TO SHOW THAT THE FATUI ARE EVIL LIKE WE DIDNT KNOW THAT, while kokomi gets 5 mins.
@@akatosh5792not even showing how «bad» the Fatui are but the reason for the duel with La Signora (the char with a good potential yet HoYo developed her so grotesque - «I'm bad because I'm a villain»). And the worst thing is that HoYo puts Scara and later Lynnette & Lyney as playable characters and the ones with whom we communicate so much screentime (Tartaglia's included). Such a contradiction. And the reason for such contradiction is a flat scenario. Life is much deeper than B&W separation. Even villains should have their reasons, opinions and aims in a good story. Yet to show such depth one definitely should be on George Martin's level. It's too high for a gacha game.
N.B. IMHO, I see progress with each region and Archon's Arc. By this moment Fontaine's plot is almost flawless. And even in side stories such as of the Narzissenkreuz Ordo and Mary-Ann's. Only Enkanomiya's story, The Chasm's story and Act I of Nahida's Archon quest have such a well-written plot. It's a great leap ahead.
i mean, scara, lyney+lynette (and freminet) and childe at least make sense to join us somewhat - all signora has left for herself after becoming living flame in the ice (thanks to delusion), is being bitter and salty over 1 death. @@abehaibane
conclusions for the inazuma arc was basically told through inazuma story quests (kokomi's, kazuha's, and ei's mainly). they were used to fill in the gaps.
@@goodietwoshoes7238 obviously i know that. Would have been better if they didn't boxed themselves in a 3 act structure and expand into more arcs in the ARCHON quest like Sumeru
Kokomi's introduction was AMAZING, which is why her downfall hit so hard.
What's sad is that Alhaitham was unironically an amazing strategist/planner in Sumeru... if Kokomi had gotten that writing, GEEZ.
The fact that they show Kokomi as a "genius" in an event by having her win TCG is just a joke too... I mean TCG in general is a joke, but still. TCG requires absolutely 0 skill, it's literally just luck, based on the dice rolls you get. What's even funnier is they PROVE this by having you fight Itto using his awful deck, and he uses a "meta" deck, and your winning is entirely reliant on getting good RNG on the rolls. What a joke.
i remember losing to itto while his last character card was at only 2hp. i didnt even try to play again
@@karkador I won on my second run thanks to good dice rolls that let me actually attack
I won with his deck the first time. So had good luck.
I lost to Itto. He was on his last card. With 1 hp.
It just shows Hoyo has improved their writing
That ending cutscene for Inazuma Act II was amazing, Kokomi's introduction set high expectations on her character considering she's the grand strategist of The Resistance. Even though they were fighting a losing battle, it would've been great to see what she was capable of. It's a shame that the delusion plotline obviously shoved her character into the ground, not to mention the lack of Gorou, Kazuha, and even Beidou.
Edit: oh yea, she never even meet the Raiden Shogun either. So many missed opportunities with the Inazuma Archon Quest 🥲
It kind of shows when my favorite kokomi moment is from the genuius invocation TCG, her talk (after? Before? The duel) where she explains how the relations between the islands/peoples is still bad and that her participating helps. Her using the fact that you can not see watatsume from the capital as a physical / visual way to show fit so well in showing how she is smart and even in explaining.
Anywho, i think the poor gorou display in active story moments only hurts not only his character but kokomi as well. As much as i think the whole yae miko teasing him / miss Hina bit is funny its basically the only angle they exppores, and it makes him look stupid. We hear about his great advice even see him give it but the hard angle on the teasing makes it fall to the wayside. And as the second in command general, him looking stupid makes kokomi also look stupid. Because if this is the great general how great is the leader actually... :/
As somone who enjoys gorou it pains me time and time again when the fans continuously rake him through the mud and have him way off character.
Note yourself never make the charther very dumb for the sake of a stupid plot device with an npc
11:43 hilariously in the recent GAA Kokomi just didn’t even feel like a character… like the entire time I suspected she was also some sort of construct. But no apparently nothing is going on????
Help 😭 I mean you are not wrong
recent GAA felt like it was Kaeya and the girls honestly. Kaeya is my main so I enjoyed it, but I was honestly hoping for *something* to happen more with Kokomi and Eula. Collei kinda just seemed there for the fun of it though, so I didn't mind the limited role she played.
why tf she was even there lol she did nothing
HELPP you're right.. why was she even there 😭 😭
yeah I’m confused why they even added her 😭
I've noticed that most female Genshin characters have progressively become more and more 'submissive and meek' anime girl stereotypes ever since the intro of Inazuma. Even Ei who was introduced as this cold and ruthless goddess of war throughout the history of Teyvat now just appears in the occasional event as a nice dessert-loving mommy character. Dehya and Candace came close as in the lore they are both strong self-sufficient women leaders but you never get to see that part of them past their introductions.
As a Faruzan fan, is it fair for me to say she's an outlier when it comes to "submissive and meek"? Grandma is very much argumentative haha (≡^∇^≡)
@@Ansyteavery true very true indeed
yeah, as i noted somewhere else - genshin knows when not to use "meek and submissive" personality type to drive the character, and when they do - the character personality-wise comes out VERY well. most male characters and some of the female ones are like that (male ones because they dont husbando-ify them as much as they do with female characters, and even if they do - they dont do it in such a way as female ones are done, like... thoma) @@Ansytea
Personally I disagree with the second statement. Ei was not presented as cold and ruthless throughout the history of teyvat if this history also includes the opinions of people close to her. Was she a soldier and still seese herself as one? Yes but that's not all she is. She was a god living through an a war (Archon war) so she saw it fit to focus on nothing but training to protect her people and the ones closest to her. That does not mean she didn't have any hobbies outside of training. Her own story even tells a tale of how she occasionally played Karuta with Saiguu, Makoto, Chiyo, and Sasayuri despite being a busy samurai. She even bothered her friends so much for a rematch in Karuta just so she could beat them and get Saiguu's victory pastries and did the classic victory fist pump when she won.
My point is that she's always has these traits and just because she went through an intense grieving period doesn't mean she's lost said traits. Choosing to view her so one dimensionally for either side (candy loving mommy or only cold and ruthless) is weird in my opinion.
the thing is - her personality might exist, but the game and her story barely touch upon it, instead being like "tee hee, lets not remember that my actions led to death of many of my people and instead talk about me not knowing what a kamera is", etc. like, its one thing if it was just players rendering her to such (like how wanderer is sometimes rendered into "little emo meow-meow") - but its the game itself that basically renders her into that kind of blob. even zhongli, with all his "big brain" idea of letting his people in danger (no thanks to mister international) had him a plan to still save them if harm actually to come their way, and practically speaking the 3 other archons are just written... way better than her. for now, the only other annoying archon so far is Furina, but at least in her case its just her personality being... not very pleasing, but it exists and isnt hidden behind fluff as of now @@RomBeams8840
I feel like the writers just legitimately have no idea what to do with Kokomi. Like yeah Inazuma Act 3 hurt her but it hurt basically everyone who appeared in it. But the difference is most of the other characters (Ei, Miko, even Gorou in his hangout) have improved since then with much better story arcs. Meanwhile Kokomi is still just... kind of there, and most of her character traits (including her supposed intelligence) are informed rather than shown.
The recent GAA solidified this more than anything. Kokomi literally is just there to be there. She had nothing to add or contribute, aside from very generic advice and having Paimon go "Wow, Kokomi is so smart!" in response. She was just a waste of time.
Her popularity is carried by her design and meta relevance. But her actual writing is easily the weakest of the playable characters right now overall.
Kokomi makes me so sad i love her but pls hoyo use her full potential in the story! This happens to alot of characters i really like unfortunately 😭
Tbh I love Kokomi being a nice person who has issues, but I would’ve really liked if she was just so much blunter, and a little irritated. Because there’s so many things going on of course she’d end up being a little strained. I just would’ve liked a character to not show their struggles with just.. being so “I need help..I’m overworked ..” like Jean or something not saying that it’s a bad thing but we already have so many characters who get burnt out, just somebody actually getting angry and watching them overtime get more and more angry, and then actually walking away to calm down so she doesn’t explode on somebody would’ve just been so different for once at the time. And I would’ve like to see that.
But it’s also just- kind of a bunch of pet peeves I have..
I liked Jean because in the Archon quest, she looked so cool and responsible.
And then they made her into a doormat and I lost my interest and respect for her character.
I'm ok with her being this burnt out, overworked person.
But she's overworking herself for the stupidest reason.
It kinda makes her look stupid.
Also, people say she's one of the nicest characters in the game.
Yet, she can't keep her temper when it comes to Klee.
(a child who doesn't know better)
Jean also doesn't explain to Klee, why fish bombing is bad and why she has to be put in solitary confinement.
I think your idea is great. A more blunt and irritated kokomi because she's overworked and stress.
@@NaturalParadox Yeah, Jean needs to work on delegating jobs for others to do instead of doing all the work she obviously can't handle herself. It does lead to cute moments where Lisa forces her to have tea with her or Kaeya picking up for her. But then her character stopped growing. This is the reason I didn't like Keqing at first too, Ganyu too I guess. Overworking is not a cute personality nor is it one. Maybe this is why I love Alhaitham's character. He is smart, for sure, but he showed us how he works smarter, not harder.
@@floofthedoof I actually like Keqing and I'm indifferent towards Ganyu.
(Yeah, I agree. Being overworked is NOT a cute personality. Also, they glossed over the fact that being overworked can cause health problems.)
I liked Keqing because she kinda hated the gods at first. Like, she doesn't want her hard work to be thought of as blessings from the gods.
I liked that she's a skeptic.
I don't remember much about Ganyu, I think she feels out of place, she's one of the few adepti that lives near people. Also, she's trying hard not to gain weight.
She dislikes Keqing at first because she's a skeptic.
Jean's personality is overshadowed by her overworking tendencies. People kind of forget the other parts of her personality.
(I don't blame you if you forget, Hoyo always makes the characters talk about how overworked she is.)
That she feels responsible for the safety of her people, because she's a knight, it's her duty.
Jean was taught and raised to be a knight.
But honestly, like Diluc, I wish she would find her own purpose, instead of doing what she's told.
@@NaturalParadox yeah, she’s super conflicting at all times. Sometimes it feels like she’s just being added stuff to for the sake of it. And her personality sometimes just feels like a reskin..
The generations of potential beef between the watatsumi people and the narukami people was such a ripe area for development.
How cool would it have been if Kokomi’s genius was just her writing really rebellious newsletters to rile up all the people affected by the vision hunt decree and you’d get to see more and more people migrate to watasumi just to learn more about this mysterious author and then bam it’s a cute anime girl
19:00 yee yee!! I don't think Ayato is that really "badly written", because he really did fit the role of someone who "works in the shadows" well. If Hoyo placed Ayato as a major part of the AQ and have him in scenes where he openly supports the resistance and then forcibly sells us that he's some guy who you'll never expect to be behind the ambush in his story quest- I feel like it would've been another Kokomi situation. I think showing that in his trailer alone is great enough. Especially since **he is meant to show loyalty to the shogun.** Unlike Ayaka who's the youngest sibling and can tell the traveler she's willing to betray the shogun for them in the voicelines, Ayato's restricted by his position as clan head so ¯\_(ツ'')_/¯
I'm a full blown Ayato main so maybe that's biased. But I'm not without some criticisms, I wish that they focused on his role as the leader of the Shuumatsuban. I think what he's doing is nearly not so different from what Arlechinno's doing. He's adopting orphans and making them into his own private soldiers iirc and that "oh it's a lore you'll only piece out in his friendship lvl stories, sayu's existence, and voiceless quests that can be a bit time-gated (Shuumatsuban Operations)" thing me wish so much that his story quest was more about that side of him ಥ_ಥ But I guess making him look like an honorable noble in the traveler's eyes by doing all the Chisato work is also a very Ayato-esque move to gain their trust lmao
🤝🤝 definitely
He had his own restrictions, which is why he had to work in secret and execute anyone who got in the way; especially the fatui
It's been a while since I played or even really thought about the Inazuma storyline, but if I recall correctly, what kept Ayato from directly interfering was that he was performing obedience to the shogun the whole time.
Unlike Kokomi, who was in open rebellion, or Yae Miko, who was kind of free to do her own thing regardless, Ayato had to act like a dutiful retainer until the battle reached a tipping point, hence why his sister had to do most of the secret support of the rebellion.
We also have to remember that Ayato was still working with Yae Miko. The turning point was when they both noticed that Ei took notice of the Traveler during the ceremony. The main problem, is that nobody could talk directly to Ei, only the puppet. So they both worked together to use the rebels to "recreate" the same conditions to get Ei's attention. Which is why the rebel forces got so close.
Yeah definitely, the other commissions and even the fatui were monitoring his every move very closely
As much as i love kokomi i have to agree to the video
I really think that basicaly Al Haytham and Nahida is an ,,updated version" of Kokomi, they saw what went wrong with her writing, and did it better and now did'nt care to go back and fix Koko-fishy. It's sad, becouse (as soo many other characters in the game) she had so much potential. And i really think that, the base for the Akasha system problem was Kokomi's micro management habit. Like...it's basicaly the same thing, when a 3rd party telling you what's the right thing and what not for so long, people will be helpless when they face a problem that they had to solve themselfs. It was the same with Kokomi's plan book (idk what it's called, i just try to find words from my language), than with the Akasha. I heard people saying ,,Sumeru was not THAT good". Like...YES, it was and still is. Not perfect, i don't say that. But it was a really action-filled and well written version.
So tldr, i think Hoyo tried to fix the problems they made with Inazuma, and just dropped the ,,fix bomb" right onto Sumeru XD
Actually I always feel like some Sumeru character is a direct upgrade from Inazuma character. Almost feel like writer's redemption arc some sort lol.
Nilou as upgraded Yoimiya. Both are wholesome and good with their own thing, play a role in early part of the story but miss the action since they can't fight. Unlike Yoi that completely forgotten, Nilou is back and play quite a big role during final act.
Al-haitham as upgraded kokomi. Literally show you what it means to be a genius strategist and not just character that being called a genius strategist.
Cyno as upgraded Gorou/Sara. Actually show what a general or military trained people should look when work also how strong he is physically. Not just a bit scene of they commanding their soldier.
Scara as upgraded Signora. Like, actual backstory and motivation shown in the main story and not locked behind artifacts. Also a valid reason to fight traveler and not just a 'you're annoying so let's fight to the death' excuse.
It's kind of funny but even npc like Dunyarzad feels like the better executed Teppei lol. I mean, we know her motivation, problem, and what kind of life she's been through during our time with her. Then problem appeared, traveler tried to save her but in the end failed her, feel angry and depressed before finally motivated again for her sake. Even though she can be considered as plot device like Teppei, the execution is just way smoother and she didn't even have to actually die for at the top of that lol. It looks like a big slap for Teppei's story where he was just rambling nonsense one sidedly, constantly reappearing to show his changed hair color, then proceed to die so traveler has reason to go alone and not bring her entire team because angry mode. Only for all of it to not relevant anymore a few minutes later, lol.
@@thitharaudiya8033 and thats exactly the reason why, despite Fontaine is here, I still love Sumeru. Every bit of it. Well, I dont lie, I like Fontaine but Sumeru still have a special place in my heart ^ ^
And people like Tectone actually think the Inazuma story had no issues...
tectone (and several other male genshin cc's that actually, ironically, left genshin) always been a clown, lol.
I like to believe that he said that so he can bait people to comment and boost his video.
I dare say that Inazuma is the weakest archon quest. Had an amazing start, slow and sluggish middle and a terrible anticlimactic end.
Pretty sure Tec disliked Raiden's first story quest.
@LittleSparklingStars He did, but he also reviewed someone criticizing inazuma's writing and was pretty heated about it in that video.
I mean why you gotta bring him up? Though I do agree he has some bizzare tastes. He probably thinks its the best because of the long break he had from genshin. Each to their own no need for tectone hate in a lore video
I never liked Kokomi, but yeah, Hoyo did her dirty. The dragon theory was an interesting one in my opinion, but there is way too much conclusive evidence pointing towards Neuvillette being the dragon‘s reincarnation that I don’t want to believe Kokomi is anymore.
I'm just keeping in mind that the hydro sovereign was reincarnated as human. Which leads big arrows to kokomi oooor neuvillette is the dragon that will reincarnate into kokomi.
it was all only a bunch of theories. she's most likely just a descendant of the vishaps. i doubt they meant for her to be the dragon in the first place cause it was already stated way before that the reincarnation would be human (pure blood and not of vishap blood) and it's been hinted a lot that kokomi is likely to be related to vishaps - her eyes, her hair ornaments, etc. that thing about the reincarnation using a cane too (albeit can be a metaphor, it's moreso used as a hint for neuvillette now)
The prophecy said that the dragon would be reincarnated in a form of a human, not that it would be exclusively reborn as a human being though.@@Icantfeelyousugah
@@Icantfeelyousugah I'm pretty sure the prophecy in enkanomiya says the dragon of water will be born in a human form, not born as a human, and neuvillette use hydro without a vision, and if you play the AQ there's a big hint towards him being the dragon
@@goodietwoshoes7238those ornaments in her hair are actually her horns!
what's more i dont like about her is how they made military her whole personality like if you listen to her voicelines its as if she makes almost everything about her to be related to military stuff. kokomi what's your hobby? reading military strategy books cause im a military general. what's ur fav food? something thats convenient during war situation cause im a military general. even when you bring her to your teapot she cant stop going on about how she cant help but think of strategic military points around the teapot and whatnot, and that she requests to have her own room so that she can open maps and read her strategy books in peace, cause, you know, she's a military general. its like her writers are desperate to tell you that she is indeed a genius military general by screaming about it at you about it every 5 seconds
Her story quest was barely memorable but i remember that its all about keeping her awake and she talks more about the military and how overworked she, is barely exploring the character itself like Diona’s hangout event had more character explenation than her
Kokomi is part of a character archetype that I really dislike, and that is something that I call the "super planning genius", it's the same that Yae Miko and Ayato also have where when a character is shown you know the writers made it so they planned for this to happen or are actively making a plan as we speak with them but compared to the other two Kokomi is the weakest of them in her intelligent persona because she almost always says something that is "smart" but is unnecessary is telling us this "intelligent" conclusion she came to because it's usually just explanation of how something works but never actually advances what we are doing. I think the time that shows this the best was the recent event we had with her explains how I feel the best, she's just kinda there Apparently ahead of us and whenever something comes us she tells us something explaining whatever is happening but making no progress and generally not fitting in compared to the rest of the cast feeling like she's with us because they needed someone to explain stuff to us. And I do think the event was her at her worst but she still went through it, it didn't not happen we still sat through it learning nothing from her while being told she was super smart who can make a plan in any situation.
Classic case of aggrandization + "tell, don't show". Recently this has gotten better, for example in the Sumeru archon quest or Kaeya hangout you get to *see* someone be smart before its explained to you how they were being smart, even if the traveler knows already. It leaves far more of an impression.
funny how the one character that hoyoverse did go back and reexplore the character(and very good execution at that) and put them in an archon quest again after 3 years is the Mr. Worldwide, Childe and the other characters should honestly get the same treatment too like Kokomi, Cyno, Diluc(mostly about his conflicts to the Fatui), Albedo etc.
I think the problem with Genshin is that they have too many characters, and still need to introduce new characters. So many characters will has limited screen time.
i think heidzo's hangout shows more kokomi's genius strategy than her entire quest. like she didn't have much choice but allow contraband just for her people to get products
I think all rebelion attempts started while knowing they can't win, but the rebellion is not about winning. Its all about people so oppressed that they'd rather die fighting than continue living under the oppression. Its not an operation you plan to win, its just something people do out of despair, its more like suicide. Kokomi taking the leadership was their blessing, because if she didn't do that, they'd just died one way or the other, fighting or being executed, all of them.
ohh interesting take! i didn't really think of it from this POV.
A more tactical take would be that Kokomi was fighting for a favourable surrender.
Like, the Shogun sending soldiers instead of immediately nuking the rebellion indicated that she’d prefer occupation over destruction.
And while defeating the Shogun was out of the question, convincing her that concessions was a better way to get what she wanted than force is a more realistic goal.
It’s also something that actually happened in Chinese history. Strategist Zhuge Liang became famous not for winning against an invasion, but for holding off the invaders until they agreed to accept a surrender that was basically a favourable merger
I can't remember if it was an event or her story quest. The one where she meets with Yae Miko to discuss the merger of Watatsumi island into Inazuma again. That's exactly what that was their favorable surrender. Normally they'd all probably be executed for treason regardless of how it turned out, but because of that event they got to keep their Freedom, independence, Lives and Military as evidence of their loyalty to bettering the nation.
Still even that one was pretty poorly written, but it makes the most sense that, that is what it was supposed to be. It helps that Yae didn't go there with bad intentions either. xD
@@YuyuHakureiAgreed, and that is what explains why all of Watatsumi basically worships Kokomi seemingly out of nowhere. In reality, this admiration has really deep reason, albeit poorly explained by the game's narrative.
@@YuyuHakurei it would make sense- in polish history people uprised many times knowing they are going to die, but wanted to show that they wont be defeated and their beliefs are still strong. Many died and took many years but even after Poland was erased from maps their beliefs made it come back after 100 years. Sometimes its not about winning.
"How Hoyoverse ruined Kokomi's/Scara's/Kazuha's writing"
Answer: "Make Ei do nothing wrong."
also I want to mention: don't you guys think that it's stupid that Beidou, Kazuha and Gorou all fight mostly with their weapons and not elements? It's just stupid for me! Kazuha could make a big wind area like his ult and Beidou could Electro-charge enemies or something like that... I don't understand why Hoyo is so lazy when it comes to cutscenes and why are they always forget that characters have elements?! That one scene where MC fights with eremites and doesn't even use his Anemo powers is still beyond me! 😭
At least in the fontaine mecha cutscene elements are used in battle though the cutscene is short
Guess you have not seen the cutscenes of Sumeru and Fontaine archon quest?
It’s funny bc any actual war in Teyvat would be won by whoever has the most vision holders on their side. That could’ve been something brought up in the Inazuma story to give Raiden’s faction some credibility
@@raidenmakoto7168 Or perhaps used to persuade Raiden that taking away visions from people who could use them would weaken her nation against enemy forces. I would have liked to see the Fatui (or some enemy faction) actually try to seize power from Inazuma using that plan.
@@petersong974 They're improving sure, but ONLY A TINY BIT. Most times they pretend that Traveller cannot continuously use all their elements simultaneously hit after hit without exhaustion like they did in Liyue (at this point, i expected a quest where they learn how best to utilize their multi-elements in fights) and that characters besides Traveller can quite literally use their Visions with the same Ult animations they have in cutscenes. So far i believe i have seen Traveller fainting in crucial moments more than Traveller kicking ass as the strongest person in the room.
OMG THE GOAT IS BACK
I WAS JUST ABOUT TO COMMENT THIS
I sometimes think about that one comic where she was at some point cruel saying to Sara "the ocean is infinite" referring to no matter how many people Tenryo sends, they will all in the end drown in the sea and i would actually loved seeing this type of character but ig mihoyo cant risk it especially when people cant even stand yae because she is slightly mean
agreed. If you look at how idols irl deal with this problem, it becomes all too clear why characters remain safe.
IKR , making the game toddler friendly isn't doing it any favors (and I said toddler because kids, or more like TEENAGERS , the target audience of the game, can handle dark themes like that with no problems) , sometimes I wish they did more mature things in the game and not just really tame stuff all around
It never hit me that Kokomi didnt have a plan for the Shogun.
Holy crap, the likely outcome if the resistance came to the Shogun's doorstep was that they just get cut down like flies by the puppet.
"Her kit had a redemption with the release of Dendro"
No, she was never bad.
But I do agree her writing could have been better than just a mere plot device for the archon quest then afterwards she's just kinda... there.
I pulled for her the first time and that part had me like "What?" also. Her kit was never bad but others didn't want another "healer" now she's seen good because of her hydro application and healing but she was always like that for me, since i originally used her in permafrost teams.
tbh, a lot of characters became good with the release of dendro
I really like your idea in the last part! Her quest could even be about the impact of having to make these tough decisions, it’s common for the guilt that comes with that sort of thing to be soul-crushing after all
the redemption arc of Kokomi's kit start with the introducton of clam set and the wolfs in the abyss
lmao the hydro dragon theory gone down the drain
Gorou's hangout was more memorable than Kokomi's story quest
lol it's one of the only hangouts I did and I can still vividly remember it for some reason, Miko teasing the poor fox boy was soo fun XD
Kokomi story quest is basically trying to keep a fish awake 💀
I find it hilarious, to say the least, that a dancer who received Hydro Vision had more relevance in the main story of her region than a strategic leader of a rebellion against a god. Hoyoverse really knew how to use the characters well in Sumeru, Nilou's scenes are important, significant and very exciting, the scene of her undoing Samsara with a bossa nova and all magical ambiance, or the scene of her risking being arrested without knowing if the plan It would work, just by trusting your teammates were AMAZING, unfortunately we didn't have the same with Kokomi.
Same with ayato man... He was supposedly to be the one pulling the strings, kinda like a mastermind but hoyoverse flopped him so bad 😭😭😭
Poor inazuma characters...
Kokomi reminds me of Fu Xuan from Honkai Star Rail, but her military strategy and and leadership is way more competent and explored.
Her leadership was passed by Jing Yuan in an impossible position as she's not fit for the role. Throughout the story, she manages to lead the cloud knights to a victorious result but at the cost of their lives being strucked by the mara and actually captures Kafka at the end, rather than the story telling us she's a military genius instead of showing us because she's trying to pursue the sanctus medicus leader being the main culprit behind her cloud knight's infection she cares about leading to protect Xianzhou under Jing Yuan's command.
Kokomi on the otherhand, we never got to explore why she was a leader in a flawed position in the first place, only for her so called "military genius" get downplayed by her overwork waifu trope and being absent at Act 3 of Inazuma like a goldfish brained leader she is.
While Fu Xuan is still active and flawed as a leader near the end of Act 3 in the Xianzhou luofu quest, finally overcoming the sanctus medicus priestress with the help of trailblazer.
Oh yeah, forgot to mention that having Ayato send a half-dozen nameless nobodies against the Shogun makes him look really dumb too, and he's another supposed "smart" character. Like what are they going to do against a woman so powerful she can literally cleave continents in half? Truly a "hydrogen bomb vs handful of coughing babies" moment.
yo miss me mr fanboy?
No, that was Ayato working with Yae Miko. They both were trying to "recreate" a moment for the Traveler to enter Ei's world. Those nameless nobodies were all pawns for that goal which made them both look Big brain.
gonna put my own two cents on this, he probably sent them to help the traveler rather than to defeat the shogun. he most likely already knows the traveler's going to tenshukaku since yae sent them there, and yae also probably told him her own plans on sending the traveler to plane of euthymia. they scheme together a lot (like in the youkai event), so i wouldnt put it pass them to plan out the whole last act too.
though this could all just be me filling in the gaps with my personal interpretation lmao
@@rinmaIa i also agree, given how we see the relationships or their roles in running the nation, its highly likely that they did both plan that out.
@@sebastiancastro3524 Who are you? Also it's not Mr.
Hoyo has a pretty big problem with “telling and not showing” where they straight up directly characterize a character to our faces (through paimon especially) instead of actually SHOWING us what they can do. It’s definitely gotten better with Sumer and Fontaine, but then there’s still paimon who is a flying “direct characterization” machine. With Kokomi, they keep telling us she’s a strategic genius but we never REALLY get to see her go all out and show us what she can do. Gorou…as much as I love him, he’s an errand boy at best. Again they repeat the fact that he’s a very young general and only show him “leading” an army once or twice. Their handling of watatsumi and enkanomiya in general was pretty lackluster which is upsetting because they have my favorite settings and lore.
I loved the idea of her being like low key evil by showing her drowning the shogun’s army and also using the deaths of the war to power the eldritch resurrection of Orobashi to fight the Shogun. Genshin isn’t really that kind of game though so I see why they didn’t do it.
They got the chance to do it with enkanomiya, but as we know... thats so sad to see that she's locked behind the shy waifu for the traveler its disapointing
hi fren,
i've been a launch genshin player but recently gotten the lore bug and found your channel in the process of binging lore videos. i've been lurking for a hot minute, and one day when i was discussing kokomi's characterization with a friend i was immediately reminded of this video. Linked it to my friend and they practically agreed with all of the points you made. I did the rounds again and all your analysis have held up really well, maybe even better than some of the bigger lore/story channels imho. You really deserve more subs, and i hope you will get ALL the subs in due time. Just wanted to drop in and say i'm really looking forward to hear your take on fontaine and future story!
The fact that Gorou also suffered because of this poor writing is what bugs me.
They both could have been their own interesting and developed characters, but instead we got 1 which is just a walking stereotype designed to be likable (and mind you, there are already like THREE other characters that fit this role of being "always overworked, tired, with a great sense of responsibility"(them being Jean, Keqin, and kinda Noelle)).
And the other one is just an addition to Kokomi. A great general of the Watatsumi Island. And that's his entire personality. All of his lines are about how everything he does is related to his "duties" and so on. It honestly feels like he doesn't even have a personality and that's just so disappointing because I really like him overall. All of his event entries so far have been for like 5 minutes of screen time and they weren't really informative in terms of expanding his character imo.
I just found your channel like yesterday so it’s crazy you uploaded on my fave design is so funny to me
that first fan theory did not age well
I was right about to point that out.
Man what wouldn't I give to have "the ocean goes deep" line as canon.
I’m SO GLAD someone else is talking about Koko. I did a whole project for school about how mishandled and sexist her writing is 🥲🥲 I love her sm but she really is a whole mess
How is it sexist?
@@flayawag4334 she falls into that tragic “overworked waifu” archetype that otsuucurry mentioned before! Hoyoverse tends to undermine their powerful female characters by making them a sort of “damsel in distress” type situation where the traveller needs to save them from overworking themselves. It’s unfortunate because like otsuu said, Koko has potential. It’s just that she was written in a way that makes it seem like she can’t fend for herself. Really what makes it seem sexist is the fact that this is a pattern with Hoyoverse’s female characters (Ganyu, Keqing, Jean, etc.)
I agree with that, and generally all the women in Inazuma are reduced to the status of "Waifu", even with the character design. @@Tk-qm8ud
"damsel in distress" by itself isnt really sexist, but i agree that they heavily overuse it.@@Tk-qm8ud
@@Tk-qm8ud Thank you! It's the most annoying "personality" in the game. It's not cute, it's overused, it's hurtful, it's shallow and it doesn't have any character growth aside from "come with me to get some rest from your work before you get back to a whole lot of imaginary work that'll drive you to exhaustion but don't worry it's cute how overworked you are"
I was waiting for her to be some epic priestess-warrior based on her in the trailer, but what I got was overworked waifu no. 4
I'm sad about what happened to kokomi, but I'm glad hoyo has learned how to write better. you can see it in all of their games. all 4 of the global ones.
What i hated about kokomi story quests on top of the points u mentioned is that it felt like to make kokomi seem like the brightest person in the room they had to make Sara look dumb and pretend like she made a mistake and didnt discipline or monitor her army properly for her to miss the fatui connection right under her nose
there was an enkanomiya event...IT WOULD HAD BEEN A PERFECT TIME TO EXPLAIN ...but here we aaare
The main problem of Genshin is the same thing that makes it "popular": It is a GACHA game masquerading as an JRPG. All the worldbuilding is there, but since the game's story and events' main purpose is to serve as banners' advertisement first and foremost most of the potential ends wasted.
That's why they introduce many new characters each nation, but then fail to either give them all meaningful time in the spotlight to develop them, or give proper reason for their absence. ( Ayato being one of of the worse offenders. ) They have a business schedule and products to sell.
And, of course, they can't have the characters stray too far from their stereotypes either to risk their "desirability". And it is specially bad for female characters, because they can't be too competent lest they lose the "waifu" appeal.
I feel like this is an unpopular opinion, but the character who was written even worse in the Inazuma archon quest was Teppei.
For a character that was supposed to die and make Traveler mad enough to go after the Fatui, his writing was shit.
I was honestly irritated by his character and disliked him, and it really doesn't help that we knew next to nothing about him that gets us attached to him (like why was he in the war? Does he know someone who lost a vision? What does he gain from this? What's his backstory? Would he have any regrets if he died?)
There was so much space for development, but all we got was his annoying habit of exaggerating all the action, and the fact that he wants to be stronger.
He wants to be stronger. This could be a set up for a backstory with him and someone he cares for - possibly a vision holder - becoming separated during the war, and the fact that they're possibly dead, hence why he's fighting against the Shogunates and why he wants to go up through the ranks (+ accepting the delusion), because the more power he has, the more he can contribute to ending the war (possibly end it faster) and he can finding them again, even if they are dead, and that could be why his death was so upsetting to the Traveler.
He's a friend who fell victim to the Fatui's plot, in a war he wouldn't have been in otherwise, and the only reason he was a victim of that plot was for someone he loved. Even more angst is if we meet someone who lost their vision and hints towards looking for someone they loved in the resistance (but was barred entry because of security issues), and that's why we went to see him. However, seeing his state, traveler instead asks if he's okay, and he dies before we could confirm. and we have to go back to tell the person Teppei died. Post shogunate defeat reveals that yes, the person we met was the one that got separated from Teppei.
Honestly I wish the resistance member we befriended was Nathan instead, and we get hints of the fact that he might be betraying the resistance, but we never followed through with investigating him, and that's why Traveler was so mad about the Fatui. (Or I should say, mad at themself).
If the traveler investigated based on their concerns, they would have found out about the Fatui plot sooner, and maybe the resistance wouldn't have lost so many good people (flashback to some interactions with other NPCs maybe).
Teppei could just incidentally being the last soldier we saw and the one that died, which motivates traveler to go after the Fatui, because while it might be too late to save those soldiers, Traveler could still go and stop the plot now, and maybe save more lives.
I WAS JUST ABOUT TO REWATCH YOUR VIDEOS THEN YOU POSTED OMG UR AMAZING 😭😭😭😭😭🤯💖💖💖
I've noticed some of the same problems and have been wondering if it's a translation issue. Is Kokomi called an equivalent of a strategy _genius_ in the original Chinese? Because she really does come off as a strategy _nerd_ at best. Then again, that may just be a limitation of the writers. IMHO, the quality in writing dipped quite a bit in general around the time that second part of Inazuma quest came out.
Kokomi was a missed opportunity in regards to writing, we got an actual stategist character in Alhaitham, and a morally grey character in Lyney and Lynette which (I would've liked Kokomi to be).
I do kinda like her character in itself though, but she kinda feels like a mary sue that isn't a mary sue.... I don't know how to explain it.
I would like to see you do a video on Signora if you can since she’s my favorite character and personally I feel like she got done dirty as well, also I agree Kokomi got done so bad and she had so much potential
Like the other harbinger mainly
Chide,Scaramouche and Dottore had more depth and charther than her, whose her lore is locked behind artificial
Glad i am not the only one who felt Kokomi's writing is terrible. I told my brother and he didnt believe me. Hoyo kept selling her as a genius WAR strategist. We saw no war related strategy used. To me, getting back up only is not enough of a war strategy to be considered a genius cos any military leader could do it. Heck, even Sara can do it. I was looking forward to her using her own home turf topology and geography to make a battle plan that is sound and works. It would be really cool that she won the war with the little amount of people she has with a brilliant strategy. Drives home even more about the genius war strategist. But nope, we get no explanation whatsoever just backup and now is our moment then war won. To me TCG is just a tie to Yu-Gi-Oh. We all know that real smart startegy people play chess. Then her story quest, although i was not expecting anything good, i did not expect it to be that bad. Whats with the plus one energy minus one energy. This only works when they were actually successful in showing that Kokomi is smart in the archon quest. I know they were gg for some gap moe but gap moe can't work if there is no visible gap to begin with. Also writing a textbook thick possibility on what to do if negotiations with sara goes south is dumb. The smart people are the ones who grasp the main concepts abd writes the textbook to be thinner and thinner. Paimon struggling with said textbook while war btwn sara n Kokomi also break out again just goes to show how inefficient it is. Real strategist would know their goals and convince the other party they are negotiating with that their own goals are the correct option to take. Real smart negotiator pulls the wool pver your eyes n make u do their bidding. They have a battle plan and makes sure it succeed, can change said plan on the fly should they deem fit. I have given up on hoyo giving kokomi the brilliant smart brained war strategist and negotiator a redemption arc.
She is the first female character from genshin that i love the design and doesn't look revealing even when clothed, only to be butchered like this... (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻
Hot take: to me, Nahida's writing about how shes a god of wisdom doesnt show. I was expecting her to be this other worldy high being kind of smart with kindness and compassion. IQ, EQ, you name it she have it. Its fine if she cannot fight physically but she should not lose any brain fights whatsoever. She should have the brain power to win a psychological battle with 6 sages combined. For her to lose to Azar and Dottore, it only gives me the princess peach vibes. Can't do anything, waits to be saved. Even green tea n white lotuses are better than her. Also, for her to act rashly to save those cute tinies living in apep is just... Unbelievably irrational. She cute, must protect, but doesnt pass my wisdom vibe checklist.
Me cracking my knuckles preparing to rewrite kokomi because she was my first squish (aka a platonic crush)
At the beginning it felt like there was a option for a plot thread where Kokomi could have been using the traveler for her own ends. which was the reason she promoted them to the captain of swordfish II. Its fairly common to do things like that to flatter people when you intend to later influence them. If they had gone that route I could see the title of her being a good strategist fitting, also it would have been very thematic with Ayaka pulling the traveler into a conflict they weren't interested in participating in.
What I wanted of Kokomi during the war? Actual WAR tactics. Imagine:
Kokomi: "Okay Traveler, here's the plan. You're going to lead Swordfish II and lure the Shogun's army to this island so I can drown all of them with a tsunami."
Traveler: "What?! But Kokomi thousands of people will die instantly."
Kokomi: "That's the point. Traveler, I dunno if you've noticed, but this is WAR. There is no mercy when your people's lives are on the line and we're so outnumbered."
I haven't watched the whole video yet so please forgive me if this is something you already addressed but I've been saying for years now that the fatal flaw of Kokomi is that she is an expert strategist written by people who don't know what actual expert strategizing looks like. An actual expert strategist is someone who can react to newly introduced variables in real time and adapt their strategy to fit their new circumstances; NOT someone who meticulously writes down every possible scenario regarding literally anything ever, like some freaking Laplace's demon.
i agree with this.
Just clarifying a common misconception about Orobashi: we have no evidence he was a Sovereign or even related to Vishaps. In fact, he was leading the experiments on them in the laboratory in Enkanomiya which if was a dragon... doesn't really make sense. He was definitely under the control of Celestia since that's why he was punished for reading Before Sun and Moon. But! Kokomi is definitely supposed to be his spiritual reincarnation which is meaningful as leader of the descendants of his people. Neuvelette is definitely the human-form reincarnation of the Hydro sovereign since all the lore fits him to a T
I think people forget that in her story quest she kinda talked about being overwhelmed that everyone is depending on her and that she only really gets her ideas from books that she reads. Kokomi looks to be in her late teens or max early 20’s. It’s pretty hard for someone of that age to have an idea to beat a god and lead a resistance. Everyone saw her as a genius when in reality she read war books and got lucky. She was never a genius, it’s just her people thinking she was.
I find it hard to believe that she's a military genius after she read just a couple of books from Yae's book store. That could actually have been some decent character development, where she's struck with the reality that she's actually a dumb dumb.
Also, as someone who is a bit of a nerd when it comes to military history... Kokomi is, in fact, a dumb dumb. All of her plans rely on the assumption that her enemy is stupid and not doing their best to kill you at the same time. Believe me, if what she calls strategy was put into practice irl, she would lose 9 times out of 10.
As another comment pointed out, this may be because Hoyo tried to write a character they didn't know how to. I know a lot about this kind of stuff and can quote many different figures from history who would make Kokomi look like an absolute idiot, but it's such a niche topic that not many even think about it. I honestly can't blame the writers for failing to depict warfare accurately. Whole damn subject is a rabbit hole.
finally someone said this.
genshin keeps doing this with characters and it makes me sad :(
cyno especially... they really messed up
I don't like her playstyle, I hate her visual design and animations, HOWEVER I still think she was handle really poorly. Part of it, might be cuz Miojo (Hoyoverse) is too cowardly to create real conflict between playable characters, so Raiden for example, couldn't be shown as a really ruthless dictactor
That happens when genshin is created in the Chinese dictatorship. Rather, it is said that the CCP got involved with the Inazuma story and that the original writers resigned.
Is so funny to me how the game tries so hard to tell the player that Kokomi is this 300 IQ character but every time she is on screen she is just.... meh.
19:31 if i were to hazzard a guess, its because 1. mihoyo at the time really wanted to keep Ayato's character design a secret until his chara banner, so ppl will feel the fomo and pull from him when he is revealed nearer to his release date. 2. They dont want Ayato to steal the spotlight of the other characters present
I feel like hoyoverse tried to make kokomi a “relatable” character while also being a leader of an army, and they failed on that.
It's frustatin how the game gives us charaters with such interesting backstories or future possibilities but you just know they will never be relevant. Like Kokomi, Sara, or how Albedo's current story is lock in events. But my main nitpicking is Collei, who I really hoped would be seen more in the main quest. Specially because it was hinted some type of connection or interaction between her and Dottore could happen.
I firmly believe that at the end of Inazuma they finally hired some actually good writers and that's why we see such an upgrade in storytelling not only in archon legends but even in hangouts. Unfortunately, Inazuma was already unsalvageable by that point, as well as Kokomi.
Some of the honkai impact 3rd team was invited to help write for inazuma, ie kazari's quest so there's a chance they helped out with parts of the inazuma script that hadn't been completed yet as well
This is a really good video! I agree with basically every point you have on how Kokomi was butchered by the story and deserved better. When listening to how you think it should’ve gone I kept thinking of this one fanfiction called “The Art of Love and War” that does basically everything you said should’ve been done with her writing. Funny how the fans can do better than a whole writing team.
I was absent for many of the Inazuma events. Also behind on the archon quest and kinda rushed through them to get ready for Sumeru. I liked Enkanomiya a lot, but it had such an empty feeling because it was only traveler helping nps. Kokomi should have been there too, since she has the deepest connection to it. I liked the Chasm because Dainsleff was accompanying us.
Great analysis. I think the issue with Koko is that she is supposed to be like Zhuge Liang, the genius strategist from the 3 kingdoms, who was the sleeping dragon and the reason behind koko constellation. The issue is that Kokomi needed a Redcliff moment, a point in which she showed her military genius. She would also benefit from having a Liu Bei, a person she served as strategist and called the shots. Kokomo is both Liu BEi and Zhuge Liang in her own story, and falls flat in both roles, which is a shame because as you said she had a ton of potential to be explored.
The whole Inazuma archon quest was disappointing. It had a lot of potential but fell short. by a lot. Ayaka semi-manipulated us into helping her. Ayato wasn't even shown but I guess he was a more behind the scenes guy. Hell even Sara i would argue had better screentime than her. Itto and Kuki got their vision taken away and not a lot was given about that. Not to even mention Heizou and how he could have added more to how the Tenyrou Commission was handling the decree. He literally didn't show up until 2.8 almost a year after the main story finished. Heizou and Kokomi could have interacted and battlled wits.
Anyway this isn't about him. Kokomi was misunderstood, from her kit to her lore. The whole thing with Wastasimi's god and Enonomiya is pretty much forgotten by the entire community. The only time she was actually shown using her big military brain was during freaking TCG. (side note her va had her voice more high pitched but i guess that was the director's fault) And the 3.8 summer event, she was just there. I don't even recall why but something about a lost artifact. She was also there to pass on a gag about how rollercoasters make people sick.
Missed potential for lots of lore. But hey, fanfics exist so if anyone wants to see them more fleshed out then try to find them on ao3 or smth idk.
When Beidou showed up I thought Ningguang/Liyue is behind the resistance or at least made a deal with Kokomi, wouldn't that be cool? And I forgot when and where but Hoyo hinted Yae Miko hold secret talks with Venti. Is this Genshin or is this Game of Thrones, idk!
Excuse me what? It was explicitly stated in the story that Ayato is a neutral party. If you remember Sayu helping us in the Archon quest to save the fake vision dude - that's his agent, she's from Shuumatsuban - Ayato's unit. He is unable to act directly due to his position, so he tries to improve the situation in the realm he's the best in - politics. He was also hyped up in the story to be this mysterious mastermind behind the curtains, that's why there were Ayato fans since Inazuma release - waayy before we even got to put a face to his name, but unlike Kokomi he did live up to the hype. I guess it's easy to miss if you didn't care about him from the beginning.
tbf - most of the male characters, ayato included, seem to live up to what they are supposed to get and usually have better built stories than female characters... mostly cuz the game doesnt try to husbando-bait them as much as they waifu-bait female characters, at least from what i've noticed
I hate how they did "Im A sTrAtEgIsT" her ENTIRE personality. I get it with Klee or Xiangling, but Kokomi seems like grown up woman and ALSO she is a priestess, who pushed into the war thst she didn't want to be part of. And I don't actually see her preistess part in story quests AND in her voicelines AND in voicelines of other characters. All she say is that "I'm a strategist" "that's a good strategy" :It's strategicaly anefficient" "strategy is not so simple" "ah and also I'm a little bit intorvert" "did I mention that I'm a good strategist?"
it's feels almost insulting that character that played such big role in Inazuma story was flated out to be JUST the strategist. To such point that her obvios victory against Yae in card duel felt much less deserved.
And that also sad that with Kokomi the Priestess being The brains of an army, Gorou the General was nothing to do but to be a dog comic relief. Like HOW did you get your general status? I thought that he will be as strict and experienced as Sara, almost mirroring her. BUT NO, antipode of Sara is Kokomi, and general of an army is a silly puppy who scared of a sly kitsune lady
I agree with your argument but the charter combat wise is good
a proper Kokmi can deal 10k/atack (i cont in the meduza) damage per attack, while healing the team and 26k damage in every 5 second from clamp set while she is indestructible (she literagy tank the Mangokenki in tower 12, and wracks Asdaha)
yeap the show-don't-tell principle is really not that difficult to practise; cannot understand why story writers keep falling back to tired exposition again and again.
honestly, the resistance felt a LOT more like a slightly larger guerilla than an actual military
"redemption arc with Dendro" Kokomi is already amazing on non-dendro teams that need hydro.