i mean, tbf, i kinda don't blame them all for disliking drayton XD; i'm especially empathetic to lacey's frustrations with him, as weaponized incompetence is the worst, especially from men. ://

lmao, i was so MAD when i first started playing teal mask, and we were forced to go on the exchange trip with 3 randos, and not my squad??? the AUDACITY!! XP (but srsly tho....they didn't have to be major characters in the dlc's story!! they coulda just had small bit parts!! i truly do remain convinced that the dlc would've been so elevated if we could've had them along for the ride, rather than the 3 non-entities who don't even get names ffs XDD (like, instead of that one kid who got partnered with carmine who always had her yelling at them, and that she was forcing to play messenger between you, could you imagine if that had been, like, nemona instead? or maybe have that one be penny, and the 2 randos from your academy that got paired together could've been arven and nemona, bickering in the corner? WE COULD'VE HAD IT ALLLL--)) ever since the trailers revealed the existence of the special coaches, i'd been holding out hope for the Squad to be included in that, and when cyrano first introduces it to you and says that you can invite "any other strong trainers" too, i was like, yesss!!! this must mean my babies!!! and upon looking at the number of slots, it seemed to me that there was enough room for them alongside the gym leaders, paldea league, and teachers, so i went to bulbapedia, which does list nemona, penny, and arven as special coaches, so i got so excited...only to read that, as of now, there was no way to unlock them (whereas the teachers and etc had listed conditions for unlocking), and i was DEVASTATED and like, wtf do you meannnn?????? i found out about the epilogue later on, and like...on the one hand, i'm glad for more content with my Squad, but on the other hand, i'm just kinda like....why in the heck is it being released separate from the dlc?? that confuses me. and like....making me wait until jan 11th is so mean ;;; XP (well, at least for nemona and arven....we did get a tiny bit of penny content along with the team star storyline in indigo disk, so i suppose the dlc did give us at least a crumb XD and also there was the Encounter with the professor, which i guess you could see as arven adjacent, tho i cannot Speak of it, due to my incadescent Rage at said professor XP)

but yeah....we truly were Robbed of the beloved polycule Squad content that we deserve ;;;; and truly....why create the best group dynamic we've ever had in the games, only to give us so little content for them in the dlc??? like, i think back to swsh's dlc, and how hop got to show up during the story of IoA at least, and....ngl, i'm a little bitter about it. XP altho, i do have to give credit where it's due, and i must say that i vastly prefer the special coaches (and the league club room in general) over, like, the galarian star tournament, as it's a far better goldmine for character interactions, which is the kind of content that i value the most (as while gameplay is obvs important, i'm primarily playing games for the story above all else), and i def think sv's dlc was a huge step up overall in comparison to swsh's (but then, for me, sv beats out swsh all around in every way you could possibly compare them, so i suppose it's not that surprising XP to be clear, i don't hate swsh, but a lot of things about it were kinda...underwhelming, for me).