After finishing the Rivenspire quest, I really wanted to like him. But time and time again, he proves himself to be just smart enough to get a lot of innocent people hurt, and just arrogant and pho-mysterious enough to sound like an immature but gifted teenager. Gwendis has so much potential to be a fun character, but the forced teacher-student romance, which is creepy in its own way, really detracts from the whole experience. Am I missing something?

Edit:

Seeing a lot of solid comments, and I want to say I absolutely will be playing through the dlc. I find a lot of the story writing in this game to be pretty good, even great depending on the zone.

That said, there hasn’t been much discussion about Verandis’ actions or personality. I don’t think he’s necessarily a “bad” guy, but he seems to think of himself as the humble father of his house, when in reality he makes rookie mistakes one after the other his whole life which dearly costs everyone he claims to care about. He reminds me of Dutch van der Linde in the way he tries to plan and scheme, but throw tantrums when his own shortcomings cost the group. He’s intelligent, but lacks wisdom, while surrounding himself with people who can’t see his deep personality flaws because he’s “saved” them. And maybe he has saved them, after all he’s done some great things. But he’s too reckless to not hold him accountable. So far as I’ve played anyway. Thoughts?