Why do you dislike Garlemald Empire and Ascians?

I really do dislike the ascians, straight down to the fact that they seem intent on trying to resurrect their own god and step on/kill/corrupt anyone that gets in their way or even seems like an obstacle. Maybe they aren't all bad, but the main ones we've met are. I feel somewhat the same about the Garlean Empire but at the same time I feel like had the Warrior of Light actually had a chance to decide I may have sided with Gaius. Going back to one cutscene in the final battle with Gauis before the Ultimate Weapon you're given the opportunity to answer if you believe in Eorzea or not. Unfortunately it doesn't appear to have made any kind of impact what so ever on the story. But what the guy says rings fairly true and I believe Eorzea might have indeed been perhaps a little safer and better had the nations agreed to surrender.

Of course if Doma's rebellion is anything to show for it may have lead to the destruction of the entire realm.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...Obtuse.svg.png

OP I REALLY gotta ask how you went from "people don't dislike Alphinaud" to "why do you all hate the empire and the ascians?" It's a loaded question at best.

Empire is horrible and genocidal. They are out on a conquest and will kill millions to do it. They are oppressive and down right evil, enough that both Domans and Ala Mhigans were driven from their homes. That alternative that was offered that you want to use to defend the empire? It's utter BS. It was pretty much just "don't defend yourselves and we can end this peacefully." That's not an alternative, that's telling people to surrender or you'll kill them. Not benevolent at all.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contrarian

E: Because I guess I should add to the discussion:

1. The Galreans' goal is to kill beastmen and entrap all the Primals to prevent their resummoning. If you've done Final Coil, Garleans want to do to all the Primals/beastmen what the Allagans did to Bahamut/Merecidians, that's why they're so interested in Allagan technology - to continue what they started. They have... suspect intent - it seems like they want to make Aldenard safe from the Primal threat, but their solution is "the final solution", which historically isn't okay.

2. Ascians are the Dark to the Light, they're the counterbalance - chaos, madness, etc. The Ascians are the representation of eternal evil that is necessary to counterbalance good. There's going to eventually be a heavier focus on that, but for now we just know that they want to create chaos to appease Zodiark through any means necessary. They aren't healthy for Hydaelyn, literally - they are the ones that force beastmen to summon their Primals and drain Hydaelyn of her aether. It's no good.

Let's see... the Ascians are literally trying to destroy the world. They are manipulating leaders, beastmen, and powerful people to go to war, continue war, summon primals to for the purpose of murder and destruction, and generally cause death, destruction and chaos... yeah, really good people...

The Empire is known for treating anyone who isn't among the elite as trash and slaves. Nothing more than resources to be exploited. It's the 1%, only the 1% are allowed to kill, steal and exploit anyone below them.

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Originally Posted by Hexceed

Do we really know what ultimately went wrong with the Allagan Empire's methods? Are we 100% confident that Gaius would have failed using similar methods? Or could it be that Gaius was alot more competent than his predecessors and would have succeed where they failed?

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The fall of the Allagan empire was entirely their own fault. At the peak of their power, they grew overconfident, and made a fatal mistake - the construction of Dalamud, and the imprisonment of the Elder Primal Bahamut. Without spoiling too much (the details are laid out quite nicely in one of the cutscenes leading up to the Syrcus Tower, and expanded upon during the Final Coil of Bahamut), their attempt to create an infinite source of energy to power their sprawling empire would end up backfiring horribly, and cause the land itself to swallow the entire nation at the heart of the empire, after which the empire emanating from it quickly collapsed.

The one who could (and did) cause a similar disaster wasn't Gaius, but his rival and former colleague: Nael van Darnus. Where Gaius wanted to conquer Eorzea to quench the primal threat, Nael played with powers he did not understand, and wanted to use Dalamud to reduce the land of Eorzea to a smoldering crater - the Meteor Project. This would eventually result in his enthrallment to Bahamut, and his corruption into Nael deus Darnus, shortly followed by the moon falling and Bahamut once again razing an entire nation to the ground.

During this entire time, Gaius refused to have anything to do with the Meteor Project. This is why he and his division went rogue, when the empire started supporting Nael's genocide over his own solution of subjugation. Having watched Nael's every step with disgust, he wouldn't make the same mistake.

That said, he did indeed make a similar one: accepting help from an Ascian, who ended up playing him for a fool and using him to awaken Ultima. The only reason why Eorzea wasn't burned to the ground a second time was because Hyaedalyn herself stepped in, and outright shielded the blast - taking the brunt of the damage herself. Going by how it reduced an entity as powerful as Hyaedalyn to the state it did, it's actually entirely possible that it'd have wiped out not only the entire land of Eorzea, but possibly even multiple surrounding countries as well, or even destroyed the entirety of the planet itself. It's impossible to say without knowing Hyaedalyn's and Ultima's exact strengths, for starters.

Gaius was no fool, and that particular piece of history would most likely not have repeated itself had he not been stopped. That said, he did make a crucial mistake and almost ended up destroying the very thing he attempted to protect, due to a certain Ascian concealing the truth behind the Ultima Weapon from him. If this was a lapse of judgement on his part, or simply Lahabrea being very good at deceiving people is debatable.

(Warning: Lots of ARR spoilers and a couple of relatively early HW spoilers)

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Originally Posted by Hexceed

Genocide with a cause.

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Not really. They want to murder all the beastmen to prevent the summoning of primals but this is wrong in at least three separate ways.

Firstly: Not all beastmen summon primals. The Brotherhood of Ash, The Nonmind, the Untempered Sylphs, and the Zundu tribe all hate the summoning of primals and other factions of the beast tribes see it as unnecessary or overly aggressive and not for the good of their people. There's also Goblins and Mamool'ja who haven't summoned a primal at all, as far as we know. Only the tempered and the desperate agree with the summonings.

Which brings us to the second issue: Garlean invasion is what caused the greater portion of the Amalj'aa to become tempered and the initial summoning of Ifrit, directly caused the summoning of Ramuh, and indirectly led to the summoning of Leviathan. Ifrit happened during/shortly after the invasion of Ala Mhigo when the Amalj'aa summoned him in defense of themselves. He's cited as one of the reasons the Garlean invasion stopped after taking Ala Mhigo instead of continuing at that time. His summoning also tempered a number of the Amalj'aa and led to the current state of affairs with them. Meanwhile Garlean aggression pushed the Sahagin inland where they got into territory disputes with Limsa and resulted, along with some Ascian interference, in the summoning of Leviathan. And the Garlean presence in the Twelveswood is entirely what caused the Tempered Sylphs to call upon Ramuh for protection.

So the Garlean Empire caused three primals. The Lominsans, on the other hand, managed to cause another primal summoning all on their own--Titan. Titan was summoned because of Lominsans moving into land that had been promised to the Kobolds in a peace treaty with the beastmen tribes. The Kobolds seeing Lominsan invasion of their land and being unable to parley over it (as that Lominsans tend to have a 'kill on sight' thing going with Kobolds and Sahagin) they were left summoning their Primal to retain their lands.

Aggression from outside forces is what has caused most primal summonings. The only exceptions: Vundu and Gnath which seem to have been entirely Ascian meddling with previously mostly peaceful groups, and the Ixal which I'm not clear on why they summoned Garuda.

Which only leaves the third point: The genocide of the beast tribes won't stop primal summonings--anyone can do it. The Ascians nearly convinced the exiled Ala Mhigans to summon Rhalgr against the Garleans and bandits. Louisoux nearly summoned the twelve as primals--holding back on a full summoning only because of what it would do to the Aether of the world. The Moogles summoned Good King Moggle Mog as a primal. Shiva is a primal summoned by human hands. Bahamut was summoned by Dragons. etc. etc.

So basically the Garleans want to murder a bunch of innocent people while causing even more problems with the very thing they're claiming to want to stop.

Ascians: Manipulative, seem biased to their god and if you don't believe him in you perish, have bad motives(to me), and want to kill Hydaelyn whom even *SPOILER* was friends(? Acquaintances?) with.

Garleans: Mistreat their own, easily corrupted by outside sources (aided from the Ascians), want to conquer all until just the Garleans existed (Seemed you had to join, or be stomped.), and had the wrong way of going about protecting the people(see Allagan Empire).

You wrote it like the npcs are really doing nothing for the whole story and when there are actually few they have done to their sake and yours.. merylweb went into sahagin territory when they were about to summon leviathan, or even the operation archon which the alliance tried to hold off garlean from that castrum asdf all across the eorzea.. We, as the warriors of light has echo, which is being considered so holy unimaginable power that could exceed anyone.. So those losers need a hero like us to sacrifice ourself for their deeds, from the fiercest battles in eorzea history to finding a missing child went into dangerous aetheric zone.. As much as they are count as errants, the good deeds for the betters.. A true hero doesnt need all the luxury in the world supposedly, because they arent supposed to aim for them as reward.. That's pretty much what's there to the lore of being good and bad..

And believe it or not, the npcs have all the brains to decide things to progress, while we cant even speak nor make decisions for own cause because we are depicted as silence stupid muscle men who need brains to tell us what to do..

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Originally Posted by Aana

The empire as a whole is still very much by their own effort, and, as far as we know through 3.0 has no real horse in the race between light, dark, primals, super beings. They are simply exploiting ancient tech so they can stand against these godlike powers themselves as the allagans did.

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Hate to be that guy but who was the very-much-backed-by-the-Emperor Legatus of the VIIth legion that got himself temperred by an Elder Primal inside an ancient satelite? Two of the Empire's big shots have been, in effect, pawns of a higher power.

I actually like the Garlemald Empire... I'd rather work for them. lol

Originally Posted by Roda View Post
They've killed people I like.
And Garlemald likes genocide too much.

I love this one. So, liking genocide a little is o.k? :D

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Originally Posted by Elim

I actually like the Garlemald Empire... I'd rather work for them. lol

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I thought I was the only one!

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Originally Posted by Krylo

the Ixal which I'm not clear on why they summoned Garuda.

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The Ixal are a strange bunch. They summoned Garuda because of promises they would regain their long lost power of flight. Where they heard these whispers is up for speculation, but I'll wager the Ascians had a hand in their aggression.

Instead, Garuda just makes increasing demands every time she is summoned and they never get any closer to getting their wings.

I don't feel like discussing this because OP is too focused on only this one viewpoint they like and bends everything else to fit her view...but I also can't keep silent on this topic either xD

So about Garlemald:
1. My own reason to dislike them:
Easy - because they want to kill me for something I obtained against my own will.
This dates back to 1.0 story, but basically, lots of people in Eorzea were fine with Garlemald invading, especially Ul'dah's leaders. The only reason we started teaming up with Minfilia and built that semi-useless organisation with the Scions was because Garlemald wanted to kill not just every beastmen in existence (which didn't bother humans all too much, tbh) but everyone able to communicate with them (a trait the WoL obtained through the Echo). Unless you are seriously suicidal, you'd dislike being killed, so yeah.

2.

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Corruptions in militant forces exists everywhere the way I see it, some are more readily visible than others. For all we know, similar things might be happening in the underworld of all three nations.

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Really? You compare slight corruption and bad things happening in the CRIMINAL UNDERWORLD in one country with something that is OPENLY practiced and accepted and the NORM in another country? Yes of course the Eorzean city states are not free of murder, slavery and corruption. But the difference is - it is looked down upon. It's considered a BAD thing, something authorities are trying to get rid of. That's not the case for the colonies of Garlemald - the people there are lawfully treated as nothing more than livestock and brainwashed from early childhood to accept that as the norm and are brutally killed should they rebel against that system. The mere thought of comparing that to some lawlessness in the Eorzean underworld baffles me...

About the Ascians:
So far I don't exactly dislike them.
But, like several others said already, one of the few things we reliably know about them is that they are responsible for draining the planet of aether aka lifeforce. If the planet dies, we all die, so obviously I'd try to stop them.
If they have a good reason for doing it other then "Muhaha, we will be soo powerful when our Master Z****** awakes!", they sure haven't bothered trying to convince people why their plan would be a good idea to follow...

Garleans: Warmongering Technophiles that like to steal technology they don't understand and use it to opress other countries, giving them the virdict of "Submit and be conscripted and used as cannon fodder and your lands sucked dry to fuel our never-ending thirst for expansion, or we'll take your land anyways and kill you all, preferably slowly, painfully and with torture to try to make you submit."

The garleans are quite liteterally the scum of the earth when it comes to FFXIV, they would rather utterly destroy entire races of creatures due to their (While reasonable) fear of the primals, instead of finding out why they are being summoned in the first place (News flash Garleans, your tactics are why primals are being summoned more, Good job there). Garleans are basically the nazi's of this world, anyone else is lesser and either needs to be exterminated or subjugated under their rule (Hell, many of them believe this so much that defecting from their massacres across the globe basically gets you labeled as a traitor to be put to death, not to mention we have a prime example of what happens when the Garleans get ahold of a country, just look at the dolmen, they were taken over and abused, and tried to break away during the war of succession, which lead to the garleans just deciding to litearlly obliterate an entire civillization because they didn't want to be ruled under an iron boot.

The ascians are no different than the Garleans, except the fact they are the ones constantly inciting these sorts of things, giving these primal summoning powers to anyone they can, just to weaken hydalin and promote their god, which of course is the one 'True" god, which is probably just a primal controling them like puppets, whom just happens to basically be the embodiment of all that is evil and chaos, and apparently we are all suppose to just bow down and let them do what they want. (Fat chance)

Both of these groups are literally the most basic of "We are evil because we are evil bastards" There is no "Hidden Agenda" for either side, their intentions, beliefs, and the way they plan to make good on those intentions are all laid completely out in the open, there is no surprises except for how much more evil and deranged can we possibly look.

There are some "Villans" that I can understand people not wholely hating, but the Garleans and Ascians are not part of that catagory, they are litearlly killers / evil / dominators simply to do just that, they have no other motive, and no other reason than to just be the "Bad guys"

Genocide is not cool, ever, except mabye in the ascians case.

Garlemald: they're warmonger
Ascians: they kill my Moenbryda

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Originally Posted by Lemuria

The Ixal are a strange bunch. They summoned Garuda because of promises they would regain their long lost power of flight. Where they heard these whispers is up for speculation, but I'll wager the Ascians had a hand in their aggression.

Instead, Garuda just makes increasing demands every time she is summoned and they never get any closer to getting their wings.

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Yeah I remember that from Ixali quests, I just couldn't remember if that's why they worship her or why they summoned her. Most beast tribes only summon their primals if shit is going down and they need the help.

the main reason i see is we are manipulated/told to dislike/hate them

me personally i quite like them and i don't think they are evil at all.

to me an evil person does something that they know is wrong, both the ascians and the empire believe what they are doing is the right thing to do.

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Originally Posted by Krylo

Garlemald: Genocide.

Ascians: They literally exist to kill Hydaelyn. Shouldn't need to ask this, but I think you did mention you skipped a lot of cutscenes.

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Not so much with the Ascians. They exist to restore Zodiark and have already tried 7 times and failed. They don't so much want to kill the planet rather than restore it to its natural state before what can be assumed is the first astral Era. Hydaelyn the Crystal is trying to prevent that.

Garlemald's Goal is the same as both the Scion's and Hydaelyn's Goal. Stop the Primals from being brought forth to stop the damage being caused. Both are calling for Genocide. The Garleans with the Beast Tribes and any territory that becomes too rebellious. And Hydalyn with the Ascians as well as any creature from the void, well anyone that disagrees with her in general. Kill all the Dark things which makes Dark Knight rather interesting as you take on that Job while you are void of her blessing.

I wonder often what Hydaelyn's motives actually are. I guess that makes me a prime target for Ascian Influence. Whelp come and get me Elidibus.

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Originally Posted by Dererk

OP has never seen an Ascians true form I take it.

On the topic of Garmald sure lets join up with them why not. Its not like a guy lost his sister and mother because they decided to jump off a cliff rather die than go back to a Garlein occupied Al ma Higo right? And its sure not like Nero killed that guy who said he came from Al ma Higo.

And its not like the entire nation of Doma was destroyed by trying to take back their nation and its not like the whole place was destroyed to make an example. Right?

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No, The entire nation was not destroyed only the cities towns and villages that were in rebellion. This was stated during the Ninja Job Quest.

Hate both the Empire and Ascians because they look more cool than Warrior of the Light.

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Originally Posted by Causality

Not so much with the Ascians. They exist to restore Zodiark and have already tried 7 times and failed. They don't so much want to kill the planet rather than restore it to its natural state before what can be assumed is the first astral Era. Hydaelyn the Crystal is trying to prevent that.

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Hydaelyn the planet and the crystal seem to share a lot of aspects, and what the Ascians are doing is very much killing the planet. The constant summoning of primals is destroying the Aether and is, by lore, killing the planet itself. Leaving it barren and lifeless. That's the real reason the scions care about primal summoning, even when the primals are relatively benign like Ramuh and Good King Moggle Mog. And why Ramuh unsummons himself after testing the WoL. His very existence is a drain on and danger to the planet.

Further, their stated method of bringing back Zodiark is causing war, strife, chaos, and pain. So, you know. There's really no way to look at the ascians and go 'oh yeah, those are good guys'.

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Garlemald's Goal is the same as both the Scion's and Hydaelyn's Goal. Stop the Primals from being brought forth to stop the damage being caused. Both are calling for Genocide. The Garleans with the Beast Tribes and any territory that becomes too rebellious. And Hydalyn with the Ascians as well as any creature from the void, well anyone that disagrees with her in general. Kill all the Dark things which makes Dark Knight rather interesting as you take on that Job while you are void of her blessing.

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Neither Hydaelyn nor any of the people who have spoken with/worked for her have called for genocide on the void or the Ascians. The Ascians and the void have always been the aggressors, but even then there's never a quest to, say, go to Outer La Noscea and kill every single grenade because they are of the void and must not be suffered to exist on Eorzea. Nor Ahrimans or any other voidborn. Lesser/unintelligent voidborn who simply roam around doing their thing are basically treated as any other dangerous animal or predator. Avoid it, leave it alone, kill it if it gets a taste for people. The more intelligent ones do shit like attempt to devour Eorzea and kill everyone/thing on it, so, you know, that's an issue regardless of who/what they are.

Even the quest line about figuring out how to kill Ascians was coached entirely in self-defense, and the method was only used on an Ascian who was murdering people in our home.

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Originally Posted by reillyblair

to me an evil person does something that they know is wrong, both the ascians and the empire believe what they are doing is the right thing to do.

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Well, I guess in your world there's no such thing as evil. That's nice to know.

Subjugation is fine.
Murder is fine.
Genocide is fine.
Destroying the world is fine.

As long as you don't think you're in the wrong, everything is fine.

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Originally Posted by reillyblair

to me an evil person does something that they know is wrong, both the ascians and the empire believe what they are doing is the right thing to do.

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Oh come on, Hitler also thought what he did was right and totally legitimate!
Do you want to argue now that he was a good person? :confused:

That's just not how good/evil works.
Nobody ever thinks what they are doing is wrong. Something is 'evil' because it ignores the horrible consequences for others, not because the one doing it thinks "Haha, I'm gonna do something evil now!"

(Yes, I know there is something called chaotic evil, basically evil just to be evil, but even if you look at these villains closely, you'll notice how they try to find legitimations for their doings, even if it is just something like "Hurting others is fun and I deserve to have fun.")

I like the Garleans, actually. :3

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Originally Posted by Kahnom

Empire and Ascians...they look more cool than Warrior of the Light.

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Exactly. They look awesome. I want all their armor. >_<