How IS screwed up Echoes' story

At the end of Chapter 4, when Celica confronts Jedah he convinces her that Rigel needs Duma and that she needs to stop Alm. Conrad, the new paladin who's her brother, reveals his identity at this time to stop her from being a fool and going with it. ...She's a fool and goes with it, setting up the Alm VS Celica fight the game teases you with as soon as you boot up a new game. The whole deal was likely done just for the shock value.

Also:
-Rudolf's motivations are apparently left entirely untouched (meaning he still looks like an idiot)
-Berkut is solely obsessed with power and kills his fiance as a sacrifice to Duma in the penultimate chapter, but you're expected to feel sorry for him
-Fernand starts out interesting but quickly degrades and looks like an idiot (his deal is that he quit the Deliverance when Clive appointed Alm as the new leader)
-Conrad doesn't do much of anything but rescue Celica once, join her, and fail to convince her (mentioned above)
-There's a conflict of diablous ex and deus ex machinas after Alm fight's Berkut in Chapter 4-- Nuibaba gave him a mirror that was supposed to take out Alm, but a pendant Celica gave him somehow protects him. It adds nothing whatsoever.

That's all I've found so far.