Ebon Lights in Abyssea

[Gwynplaine]

So ever since this update lets us to see our Abyssea lights objectively, it's become apparent that it's not really obvious what the heck Ebon light does. Anyone have any insights into this? Ideas range from some type of Treasure Hunter, to an exp/cruor bonus of some kind. What the heck is it for?

[Kavik]

I have always heard that ebon is an enhancement of the other lights, but i have a new description of it since we've been able to see our lights. I now believe it to be a combination of the other lights, which makes sense because on the color spectrum black is technically ALL the colors and white is an absence of them. If you get say ruby/pearl/azure lights, your ebon goes up by 1-3. I guess that doesn't really answer the question very well or at all, i've never had anyone say definitively what they've seen it doing though.

[Arcon]

[..] on the color spectrum black is technically ALL the colors and white is an absence of them.

Depends which color model you use, the additive color model, which represents lights mixing, proposes exactly the opposite. Just to point it out.

[Monkeynutz]

actually, relating to light (as opposed to say, paint) white is the combination of every color and black is the absence of color/light. No idea what it does, though even on nights when my LS does nothing but fight NMs it's not like we ever accrue a very large amount of ebon light. If it works like the other lights, which seem to have almost tiered effects at ~64, 128, and 255, then it would seem capping ruby and opening a ton of ebon chests might be the only way to find out what it's doing. Of course even then it might be difficult. Might be helpful to isolate it as much as possible (ie. attempt to only have ruby and ebon light). I've heard some people speculate that it affects what's in chests, though that seems rather hopeless as you'd want more ebon light to make chests more worthwhile, but at any given time you might want any of the possible chests that could drop (sometimes I just want items, sometimes KIs, sometimes exp, sometimes TEs, etc.). Hopefully someone makes a solid attempt at figuring this out, though given that the most direct path to large ebon numbers requires lots of ruby light I wonder if people would bother with it even if it turns out to be great (people almost never try to get gold or silver lights even in exp parties because ruby light is needed).

[RAIST]

Tried to watch lights the other night while soloing Glen Crabs for skillups. After 5 Ebon chests, none of the other light counts had been modified (were still on the same multiples as the first mobs I killed with Azure/Pearl/Ruby/Amber). Then again, it was only to 15 and may not do anything until you hit second tier. Wonder if it is some sort of a mod to your actual light count (like a MAB tweak) when calculating what spawns.

[Shadotter]

That's what I'm thinking, that it's a modifier to all the lights instead of just adding to their own totals.

[Glamdring]

since noone has been able to definitively tack a single effect in Aby on Ebon light the "enhances all" remains the most viable theory.

The other theory is "black lights look amazing when your stoned, let's throw the stoners a bone", but that doesn't really sound like the SE developers style... although they did invent goldfish scooping so I could be wrong

[darkvision]

a group from my LS was fell cleaving the other night and we had every lights capped including ebon had no effect on exp or cruor or what chests where dropping, just seems to do nothing, also ebon increases by 1 for weakest ebon and caps at 200

[Raksha]

http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Developer_Q&A:_Abyssea
Am I the only person who remembers this interview?

[Charismatic]

Sure seemed that way, not that I could say I remembered it myself... this is actually my first time seeing it.

[Dew]

It buffs all the lights, but doesn't add to them. Just grants extra bonus to the lights.