Equilibrium must needs be restored [heavy sppoiler]

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Originally Posted by Balipu

Speaking of the Ascians. We will get to see the old reaper looking ones. It looks like all out war folks, and not with Isgard or the dragons.

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Not only that but, the Way FFXIV goes, ... All I can say is .. Space Pop is going to appear ^^

Thordan VII is a Special case like Barthandelus.

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Originally Posted by Grayve

Presumably, we prove ourselves to Midgardsomr. Having the progenator of the Dragons watching your back would put a huge crimp in the Ascians plans, since Middy likely has lived near as long as them, if not longer. And, you know... fathered Bahamut.

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Really? Midgardsormr fathered Bahamut? I did not know this. Bahamut being a Primal, I thought he owed his existence to the Meracydians and worship and crystals. Like most Primals.

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Originally Posted by blackcitadel9

Really? Midgardsormr fathered Bahamut? I did not know this. Bahamut being a Primal, I thought he owed his existence to the Meracydians and worship and crystals. Like most Primals.

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Bahamut was one of the First Brood. When the Meracydians became desperate they summoned him back from the grave as a primal. Think Shiva but without the whole possession thing.

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Originally Posted by PArcher

Anyone else think the Warring Triad may have something to do with keeping the balance between Light and Dark?

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Probably not as their are 3 triads. Hence the name. They maintain an equilibrium between three sides.

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Originally Posted by Mwynn

Not only that but, the Way FFXIV goes, ... All I can say is .. Space Pop is going to appear ^^

Thordan VII is a Special case like Barthandelus.

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I'm not too far in MSQ, but his knight did....something.

Well it seems I was wrong. My hat off for those who predicted

Ascians. Looks like it was Elidibus.

I personally am more confused why Derplander and Elidibus were on the moon.

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Originally Posted by Zohar_Lahar

I personally am more confused why Derplander and Elidibus were on the moon.

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Good question. There might be something on the moon they want. We know the Ascian hideout is in a different dimension, so Elidibus likely went to the moon in search of something.

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Originally Posted by Balipu

Good question. There might be something on the moon they want. We know the Ascian hideout is in a different dimension, so Elidibus likely went to the moon in search of something.

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If we're going by homages then perhaps there's an ancient group of people sleeping there? *ahem* Lunarians *ahem*

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Originally Posted by myahele

If we're going by homages then perhaps there's an ancient group of people sleeping there? *ahem* Lunarians *ahem*

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Allagan Lunar Colony? Or perhaps some highly-advanced precursor-precursors?

You guys know the legend of the warring triad right?

"Three gods descended from the heavens and fearing one another's power, began to war. The mortals caught among their fighting became espers and were forced to fight as slaves to the gods. The gods realized the chaos their fighting was causing and agreed to seal away their power. They returned the espers' free will and turned themselves to stone with the last words left for the espers being, "Never must we be woken." After the War of the Magi the espers fled the world to a new realm and took the Warring Triad's petrified remains with them. The Triad were placed in a delicate balance of power, and it was said catastrophe would occur if they were moved out of position."

Quote from FFVI story, so if it goes anywhere near it, then it will become something BIG.

I don't know if Hydaelyn is good anymore tbh. After that ending about Light becoming too powerful, balance needing to be restored, and her comments after you regain her blessing, I'm skeptical about anything she says at this point.

"Shine Light on all creation!" sounds like something a primal would say to me.

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Originally Posted by Wizarus

I don't know if Hydaelyn is good anymore tbh. After that ending about Light becoming too powerful, balance needing to be restored, and her comments after you regain her blessing, I'm skeptical about anything she says at this point.

"Shine Light on all creation!" sounds like something a primal would say to me.

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I see your point.

But still...the problem is that this whole non-sense on "equilibrium" is coming from an Ascian; you know, the same guys who are biased for THEIR own god (Zodiark), as well as having committed horrible deeds throughout history (Calamities/"Rejoinings") with no regard for the common man.

Then again, it was Elidibus who said that (and he's the most "approachable" of them all), so there may be some weight in his assessments.

In short, we just don't know enough yet.
For all we know, both Hydaelyn and Zodiark are evil (or worse, they're actually two sides of the same proverbial coin), and we'll end up having to oppose them both further down the line...

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Originally Posted by Exodus-E

For all we know, both Hydaelyn and Zodiark are evil (or worse, they're actually two sides of the same proverbial coin), and we'll end up having to oppose them both further down the line...

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I think you guys are overthinking to much already. There is no evidence, nothing at all ( for now ) that would point that hydaelyn is evil. To much early to make this crasy teories.
For thinks are like this, Hydaelyn is good and cares about life, while Zodiark ( dunno why but im thinking this guy is getting more similar to kefka ) whats to doestroy all.

I don't think either of them are evil, they just have to be kept in equilibrium, just like the Triad

I'm calling shenanigans with "keeping things in the balance" because the Ascians screwed around with man and dragon waaaaaaay before the Warrior of Light was even a thing. There was, as far as I know, no "threat" of light in ancient history.

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Originally Posted by MilesSaintboroguh

I'm calling shenanigans with "keeping things in the balance" because the Ascians screwed around with man and dragon waaaaaaay before the Warrior of Light was even a thing. There was, as far as I know, no "threat" of light in ancient history.

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As far as you know.

Do you got anything to add? Because every time I hear a character crying about balance, it's usually "my side is not winning!"

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Originally Posted by MilesSaintboroguh

There was, as far as I know, no "threat" of light in ancient history.

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Watch through Doga and Unei's Allagan History Lesson again. The Tower's overflowing light was enough to satisfy every want of every common citizen, but the Empire itself went into a serious decline as a direct result. Sounds a whole lot like the light was out of balance there to me, but it's never been brought up again in game since it was first mentioned. Sounds fishy, though, once you consider everything that happened to correct it snowballed into an Umbral Era, because that means Ascians.

Was the Allagans' utopia in fact perfect until Ascians intervened?
Were the Ascians forced to intervene to prevent worse damage from being done?
Or did they merely take advantage of a serious issue the Allagans created on their own?

It's there, but you have to dig deep.

Ok, but what about after the Allagans had fallen? Did something else happen for a long time that "warranted" the need of the Ascians to do what they do before 1.0 came along?

Another thing that bothers me about their obsession with "balance" is they teach people how to summon primals, which sucks up the aether from the world and puts everything in danger. How is that bringing balance back?

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Originally Posted by MilesSaintboroguh

Another thing that bothers me about their obsession with "balance" is they teach people how to summon primals, which sucks up the aether from the world and puts everything in danger. How is that bringing balance back?

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What you should be asking instead, I think, is where is that aether going? If we can one day understand that, I think we can understand the entire conflict.

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Originally Posted by MilesSaintboroguh

Another thing that bothers me about their obsession with "balance" is they teach people how to summon primals, which sucks up the aether from the world and puts everything in danger. How is that bringing balance back?

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Only Lahabrea and Elidibus, the two who were "of this world," have spoken anything of balance thus far. Nabriales specifically stated that Darkness should consume the Light and return all that is to nothingness, a la the Cloud of Darkness. This, however, is (at least on the surface) in direct contrast to what they have in common with the transmigratory Ascians, that they seek to sow chaos so that Zodiark will be reborn.

There's gotta be truth hidden in properly understanding what that even means (including the possibility that it's a smokescreen), otherwise Lahabrea's plan is to stop the unraveling of the laws governing the aetherial and corporeal realms (literally replacing all order with pure chaos) by ... sowing chaos. And now we have Elidibus trying to clean up the mess of Lahabrea's failed papal-primal project by slaying primals to stop the awakening of eikons because there'd be too much destruction. Did they only want a specific type of chaos? A specific amount?

If Zodiark returns and Hydaelyn is burned out, what balance is gained that isn't also immediately lost?

Urianger said that balance is always sort of present, even if it hangs in the balance of a swinging pendulum...

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Originally Posted by Fenral

is where is that aether going?

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From the primals? Do we have any reason to believe that it's going anywhere aside from being torn from the land and then returned to it?

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Originally Posted by Fenral

Watch through Doga and Unei's Allagan History Lesson again. The Tower's overflowing light was enough to satisfy every want of every common citizen, but the Empire itself went into a serious decline as a direct result. Sounds a whole lot like the light was out of balance there to me, but it's never been brought up again in game since it was first mentioned. Sounds fishy, though, once you consider everything that happened to correct it snowballed into an Umbral Era, because that means Ascians.

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The Allagan became lazy and docile because they had technology to do everything for them, including fight their wars(see: Fractal) When their leaders went corrupt, no one noticed and no one did anything until it was too late.

No one could do anything for themselves.

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Originally Posted by Anonymoose

From the primals? Do we have any reason to believe that it's going anywhere aside from being torn from the land and then returned to it?

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We do. Remember the readings we were taking before we stumbled across poor Wilred? I'm disinclined to believe that dropping aether levels are entirely unrelated to the Ascians' plot. There could be some sort of entropy involved in dissipating primals, but it's hard to know one way or the other right now.

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Originally Posted by Fenral

We do. Remember the readings we were taking before we stumbled across poor Wilred? I'm disinclined to believe that dropping aether levels are entirely unrelated to the Ascians' plot. There could be some sort of entropy involved in dissipating primals, but it's hard to know one way or the other right now.

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Personally, I don't think there's much more to it. The summoning and sustenance of primals eats up aether, but any in reserve that was not spent is returned to the land upon the primal's defeat. So any spent aether is gone, but whatever was ready to sustain it is still there or returned.

It's sort of like filling up a gas tank, driving a bit, and then siphoning out what's left. The overall level is lower, but there is some left.

Aether levels have just dropped significantly due to the massive number of primals that were summoned during 2.x (which makes me shudder to think how much aether Bismarck used up, given he was around from when we first go into the Sea of Clouds at 50 to his canon defeat at 57 / 58).

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Originally Posted by Nadirah

The Allagan became lazy and docile because they had technology to do everything for them, including fight their wars(see: Fractal) When their leaders went corrupt, no one noticed and no one did anything until it was too late.

No one could do anything for themselves.

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Exactly. Which is the precise why behind their wish to Salina to ensure that the tower might be restored: it did everything for them and they couldn't imagine life without it. Even after its power was turned against them, they refused to acknowledge its role in setting up their downfall, placing all the blame on Xande instead. Though their magi like Doga and Unei were aware of the effect it had, they had died trying to stop him and as a result weren't around to offer counsel after the fall.

Unless I missed something, we're ignoring the lessons of history and bullying ahead with our "no, light is always good" mentality heedless of the consequences; paving the way for a new "flood of light" to occur sometime in the future if our present course continues unaltered.

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Originally Posted by Fenral

We do. Remember the readings we were taking before we stumbled across poor Wilred? I'm disinclined to believe that dropping aether levels are entirely unrelated to the Ascians' plot. There could be some sort of entropy involved in dissipating primals, but it's hard to know one way or the other right now.

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Considering that they were in the Black Shroud at the time, I've (for now) just been assuming that it's connected to the Odin storyline, where O-App-Pesi theorized that Zantetsuken reforged its own wielder by consuming ambient aether over an extended time. I think Odin's more important than we've been led to believe; even the 3.00 story invoked the Dark Divinity when talking about the true eikons. The drop in ambient aether seems (to me) more likely to be related to eikons than primals, now that we know the difference. On one hand, that quest did specifically say they were studying the impact of primal summonings on the aetherial balance. On the other, they clearly didn't know anything about the difference between primals and eikons until this patch, anyway. I'm unsure whether the observation supports anything they were looking for or whether they found it incidentally. It might have been the Calamity itself that siphoned Eorzea's aether somewhere else ("Yet even as it enervates, the Ardor empowers our master.")

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Originally Posted by Cilia

The summoning and sustenance of primals eats up aether, but any in reserve that was not spent is returned to the land upon the primal's defeat. So any spent aether is gone, but whatever was ready to sustain it is still there or returned.

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This is also possible, though I've been thinking of aether as raw energy; not created or destroyed but changing forms. To use Garuda as an example, if a chunk of the Land's aether were trapped in wind crystals, and then those crystals were consolidated into her form, and and then she expended some of it using her attacks, I just assumed it was no different than releasing the power of the crystals into, say, a synthesis. Energy converts forms, wind shows up, aether is freed and returns to the land.

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Originally Posted by Anonymoose

Energy converts forms, wind shows up, aether is freed and returns to the land.

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Now you've got me brushing up on thermodynamics.

Scientifically speaking (yeah, yeah, I know, it's magic), the tiniest amount of energy is always lost in conversion. "Entropy" is both the term for that loss, and also describes the increase of disorder (get it? chaos) in the system caused by that conversion. So the repeated summoning and dispersing of primals is increasing systemic entropy.

Since Eorzea is not an isolated system, the increase of entropy in Eorzea is decreasing the entropy of the environment. It could be going the rest of the world, leading to equalized aetheric levels across the whole of Hydaelin, or it could be going to Zodiark. The former would enable us to take our aether-powered l33t d33ps to other continents in future expansions. The latter is probably really bad.

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Originally Posted by Fenral

So the repeated summoning and dispersing of primals is increasing systemic entropy.

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I'm much more comfortable with this polished version of the concept. The idea of aether vanishing bothered me; if anything, some would just escape between two forms (crystals and Garuda), which doesn't explain how it disappears from the aetherial system at large. Focusing on entropy as disorder makes more sense to me, especially considering the Land-to-Aetherial Realm system isn't very concrete.

So, I think you're right: We can reasonably ask (if it's not simply being quietly consumed) "Where could it be going?"

Eikons or Zodiark seem to be the most likely scenarios from my present point of view.

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Originally Posted by Fenral

Since Eorzea is not an isolated system, the increase of entropy in Eorzea is decreasing the entropy of the environment. It could be going the rest of the world, leading to equalized aetheric levels across the whole of Hydaelin, or it could be going to Zodiark.

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In addition, it could simply be returning to the aetherial realm at large. Minfilia's PowerPoint pointed out that a slain primal's essence returns to the land and the excess aether runs off to the aetherial world. Though, that seems too simple, lol.

Unless we come full circle back to the Dark Crystal, in the aetherial realm, being Zodiark...

/facedesk

This is the section of future-prediction that I'm bad at, lol.

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Unless we come full circle back to the Dark Crystal, in the aetherial realm, being Zodiark...

/facedesk

This is the section of future-prediction that I'm bad at, lol.

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Try not to think about it *too* much. I'm still reeling from the headache that is trying to make sense of the Elder Scrolls canon, lore, and metaphysics.

PS: don't go there if you value your sanity.

Maybe we all need to rest our brains for a while until the next patch?

I'm going to propose a theory.

One plot point, "The Rejoining," and the name Krile implies something to me: Sometime in the past the world was divided into two parts, a la FFV, in order to seal something dangerous away (Chaos maybe?).

This likely ties into the "True Power" of the Echo demonstrated with Ascian Prime.

The world is split, the Ascians seek to restore the split world, and the Elder Primals/Eikons are from before the world was split.

I posted theory to that effect a little before Heavensward, and nothing so far seems to contradict the idea. In FF5, it was the Void sealed between worlds, but FF14's Void seems to be of the FF3 variety. It could be Zodiark, if Zod's a being and not a giant crystal, but if it's not...

At the very least, I suspect Krile (and maybe even Galuf) will show up in the current patch cycle, and give us some solid answers on what's up with the Students of Baldesion. My guess will be that it happens in the same patch we finally track down Minfilia.

(Responding to way back with the initial question) This theory may have been posited before but...what if the warrior of darkness is a primal?

I mean, an important distinction in Heavensward is that the primal does not need to be related to their base concept. (The Vanu Vanu Bismark not matching the scriptures, Shiva being based on Ysayle's ideal of Shiva instead of the person) All it takes is faith, aether, and an image of a being to create a primal.

Now, to the citizens of the city states, we're heroes, living legends, "The beacon of hope", etc.

But what are we to, say, the beast tribes? We, who aided their heretics, who slaughtered their people, and murdered their god, often in front of them. However justified we were, to them, aren't we destroyers, monsters? What if the warrior of darkness is a primal based on the image our enemies have of us?

I am curious as to why Ascien Summoning method is so bad.

We've seen it's technically possible to bring back the dead (or disintegrated) from the lifestream

A Towa Cant, ALC quest line and to a lesser extent Y'shtola

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Originally Posted by myahele

I am curious as to why Ascien Summoning method is so bad.

We've seen it's technically possible to bring back the dead (or disintegrated) from the lifestream

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It doesn't though. It creates a "shade" of that being, a memory or idea made manifest, that hungers for whatever it was summoned for. Bahamut, for example, was but a twisted memory that thirsted for vengeance for his brood, and seethed with rage after being bound inside Dalamud. Shiva was but Iceheart's idea of who the Saint was, not Shiva herself.

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Originally Posted by myahele

I am curious as to why Ascien Summoning method is so bad.

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It's bad because summoning, not just the Ascian method but all methods save those of a Summoner, drain the world of its aether. Ifrit consumes the Fire aether and the other main five their specified element's aether. Any one of them can throw the natural order of the world out of balance, and that's what makes summoning so bad.

Summoners aren't guilty of this because they manifest part of their own soul in the image of one of the primals they have defeated, so they don't drain the aether of the environment.

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Originally Posted by Advon

(Responding to way back with the initial question) This theory may have been posited before but...what if the warrior of darkness is a primal?


Now, to the citizens of the city states, we're heroes, living legends, "The beacon of hope", etc.

But what are we to, say, the beast tribes? We, who aided their heretics, who slaughtered their people, and murdered their god, often in front of them. However justified we were, to them, aren't we destroyers, monsters? What if the warrior of darkness is a primal based on the image our enemies have of us?

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An intriguing concept. Just one question: Why would the best tribes summon us if we are so bad. Or do they pray that we would show up so they could kill us personally? If so, how much crystals do they use?

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Originally Posted by Balipu

An intriguing concept. Just one question: Why would the best tribes summon us if we are so bad. Or do they pray that we would show up so they could kill us personally? If so, how much crystals do they use?

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Well why do the Amal'jaa summon Ifrit, their spirit of fiery death? Why do the Vanu Vanu summon Bismarck, the spirit of sky islands sinking into the sea of clouds and being eradicated? The beast tribes summon spirits of their own doom all the time, I don't see how the Warrior of Darkness would be any different, if it was a primal.

I dont think the warrior of light is like destroying the balance. Edibudus just said that the WoL is geeting so strong that he is aproaching the power of the gods, that the lines of dark and light will become bigger and that will be a disaster to "THEIR PLANS", their not that we are destroying an important balance or something. We are just geeting too strong that we have become a real danger to ascians plans.

What if, the light destroyed the balance and you without knowing are keeping the unbalance, and eldibus is just trying to restore it like he once said "if you knew the truth you would help us" not saying all ascians want balance i mean lahabrea was all butthurt with you and nabriales was insane as for the chick which i forgot her name i think she just loves chaos.