8.0 speculation

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Originally Posted by MikkoAkure

Yeah it’s the senate building. The one building that’s unblemished by the war in the part of the Garlemald map we have access to. In the sidequest, a guard charged with protected the royal family said they escaped to there but were all killed and only he and a maid escaped.

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Must have missed or forgot about that one.

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Originally Posted by Pimsan20

Must have missed or forgot about that one.

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Sidequest chain "Stranded at the Station" --> "Mum is the Word."

While there is no hard confirmation, you find a royal guard and chambermaid who fled with the royal family (including Nerva and, presumably, Titus) when they came under attack by Anima's thralls and rogue warmachina; they fled from Senaculum Imperialis to Palatium Novum, but you find no other survivors beyond the royal guard and chambermaid in question. The implication is that they were the only survivors.

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Originally Posted by Cilia

Sidequest chain "Stranded at the Station" --> "Mum is the Word."

While there is no hard confirmation, you find a royal guard and chambermaid who fled with the royal family (including Nerva and, presumably, Titus) when they came under attack by Anima's thralls and rogue warmachina; they fled from Senaculum Imperialis to Palatium Novum, but you find no other survivors beyond the royal guard and chambermaid in question. The implication is that they were the only survivors.

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Then the chance of Titus being alive is very low then.

Which leaves the question of "Why go back to Garlemald?" (other than, heavens forfend, being without the company of Alphinaud and Alisae for more than a patch).

... my guess is that, knowing the dimensional barrier in areas of Garlemald is already weak, we're going to cross over into the "ice" reflection for some reason, and the architecture of wherever it is we first find coincidentally bears similarities to Garlemald's concrete brutalism.

How that factors into the greater picture of 8.0 I still don't know yet other than introducing further dimensional crossings.

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Originally Posted by Cilia

... my guess is that, knowing the dimensional barrier in areas of Garlemald is already weak, we're going to cross over into the "ice" reflection for some reason, and the architecture of wherever it is we first find coincidentally bears similarities to Garlemald's concrete brutalism.

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Oh speaking of an "ice reflection", I know that there was speculation about the digital "worlds beyond" that were shown by Queen Eternal being actual reflections that were suffering their own pseudo-Calamities, ones of earth, wind, and ice. I wonder if that will play in any way.

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Originally Posted by Cilia

Which leaves the question of "Why go back to Garlemald?" (other than, heavens forfend, being without the company of Alphinaud and Alisae for more than a patch).

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This is a much better question to ask, and my reflexive answer--and keeping aware that my usual reflexive answers trend towards the simplest ones--is just that Alphinaud and Alisaie, being that they went back a patch ago, have just been back long enough to see an issue and call us for help. There's also a chance it could even be Thancred and/or Urianger, who left Tural even earlier and we've got no idea where they went.

I think the twins are the stronger answer, especially because they specifically went to Tural to go learn things to then apply to Garlemald; perhaps there's something going on with some echoes to what happened earlier in Dawntrail, so they call us to go 'hey we've got a mid-grade Zoraal Ja situation going on here, might need some help getting on top of this'. Which leads to the notion of an expansion that's largely focused around helping and securing a post-occupation Ilsabard, which is the 8.0 that I think seems the most likely and could be quite interesting, albeit not the one I want (mostly because it's not Meracydia).

Ah, there we go, the Letter from the Producer LIVE official English translation recap thingy came out and confirms that the Clyteum is Garlean, which I feel was only in doubt due to the uncertainty of the translation of what Yoshida said.

Going to change the subject away from garlemald. I’m really curious on what the next alliance raid will be in 8.0. There is a lot we can go through. But personally I think a dragon quest alliance raid based of the first trilogy would be a good pick for it.

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Originally Posted by Pimsan20

Going to change the subject away from garlemald. I’m really curious on what the next alliance raid will be in 8.0. There is a lot we can go through. But personally I think a dragon quest alliance raid based of the first trilogy would be a good pick for it.

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I could really do without another Raid story that you need to have played the origin games to understand the story. FFXI raid is fun but the story is only references right now with an Explanation NPC for those who haven't played it only...


@Topic
Right now I neither think it has something to do with Garlemald (Dungeon is probably more a one time thing with a self contained problem, especially because YoshiP said we would go quickly through the places this patch) nor with the Source much.
The digest of the Live letter mentioned that in contrast to DT the scenario of 7.5 will be "deeply related to the WoL's personal fate" so I think it might either be something with Azem / the key going forward (more a legacy than the real thing) and Shards or something completely left field but way more personal to the player character than DT was.
Maybe we really do get something like an ARR in the way of the story in that we start anew in some way or form, even if somewhere else or there is something that forces us into a "new role".

What we know is that the Winterers or at least Calyx and one Ascian were working on "saving" people from the ninth.
If I had a choice I would actually like our WoL to kinda become a "Pseudo Winterer / Ascian" for that. Not in a "ends justify the means" way like the former but in a "well, can't choose allies for this one".

No matter what though, I think 8.0 will be a pretty big thing for the world and the WoL this time around.

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Originally Posted by Pimsan20

Going to change the subject away from garlemald. I’m really curious on what the next alliance raid will be in 8.0. There is a lot we can go through. But personally I think a dragon quest alliance raid based of the first trilogy would be a good pick for it.

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Unironically, I want a World of Warcraft collab for the 8.0 alliance raid. They experimented with that painterly look in Merchant's Tale, so I think it's only a matter of time. It could be someone's dreams of Azeroth recorded in a magical dream journal.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

... [P]erhaps there's something going on with some echoes to what happened earlier in Dawntrail, so they call us to go 'hey we've got a mid-grade Zoraal Ja situation going on here, might need some help getting on top of this'. Which leads to the notion of an expansion that's largely focused around helping and securing a post-occupation Ilsabard, which is the 8.0 that I think seems the most likely and could be quite interesting, albeit not the one I want (mostly because it's not Meracydia).

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Originally Posted by Zero-ELEC

Ah, there we go, the Letter from the Producer LIVE official English translation recap thingy came out and confirms that the Clyteum is Garlean, which I feel was only in doubt due to the uncertainty of the translation of what Yoshida said.

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Well, that kills that idea. Having said that, I don't think we're doing an Ilsabard expansion; one of the points of Endwalker was seemingly to fill in the gaps of the known world, and thus far issues with former provincial territories have been limited to "help a former Legatus save the territory he once conquered" (e.g. Werlyt). Considering post-6.0 has been nothing but dealing with reflections that serve as adaptations of previous series entries, it would be a strange pivot to make at this point. Not saying that's not happening, but the storyline trend doesn't support it.

I guess we'll figure out why we're going to Garlemald in about a month. Stay tuned, I guess.

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Originally Posted by Pimsan20

Going to change the subject away from garlemald. I’m really curious on what the next alliance raid will be in 8.0. There is a lot we can go through. But personally I think a dragon quest alliance raid based of the first trilogy would be a good pick for it.

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Originally Posted by Voidmage

I could really do without another Raid story that you need to have played the origin games to understand the story. FFXI raid is fun but the story is only references right now with an Explanation NPC for those who haven't played it only...

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We don't have any idea where 8.0 itself is headed yet; there's absolutely no way to know or even really guess what the Alliance raid will be. Trends towards "abridged adaptation of previous entry" (III - Crystal Tower; Tactics / XII - Return to Ivalice; VIII - Eden; XI - Echoes of Vana'diel), with some original content (Shadow of Mhach / Myths of the Realm) and second-party content (YoRHa: Dark Apocalypse). No way to say what things will be, but it's more likely than not not going to be something like Dragon Quest.

The XI raids have little to nothing to do with XI itself; they're basically just a hodgepodge of "Hey, remember these cool fights / characters?" for nostalgic players of that game. Not surprising, given as XI is one of those old-school MMOs that doesn't feature a compulsory, linear, cinematic MSQ. You don't need to understand anything from that game to understand it's plotline; just that Gulool Ja Ja is... pretty much the exact opposite of his XIV incarnation and Sareel Ja wants him to take his alter ego's place to usher in an age of Mamool Ja dominance (with himself as the true ruler behind the scenes, of course).

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Originally Posted by Voidmage

I could really do without another Raid story that you need to have played the origin games to understand the story. FFXI raid is fun but the story is only references right now with an Explanation NPC for those who haven't played it only...

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I actually think the Vana'diel raids are doing very well at that; the whole thing is obviously rooted in FFXI with plenty of references to that, but the actual story isn't; the story is that Sareel Ja accidentally made life while trying to do a holodeck episode of Star Trek where he tries to prove the greatness of some abstract fiction/history, and the people who know this world cannot and will not be theirs are trying to stop him anyway while he tries to prove the new Dawnservants to be unworthy.

This is not a story that needs to be FFXI necessarily, and you don't need to already know who Prishe or Alxaal is to get the gist of the story--hell, nobody knows who Alxaal is right now, including the FFXI fans, I've checked. There is an extra layer to the fact that they did use FFXI, though, and I think it deepens Sareel Ja's story; it gives a specific, understandable context and meaning to his desires. He's a man motivated basically by blind hatred of The New and a need to prove that it's worse than The Old (and the fact that he'd be in a higher status under The Old is probably a factor too); giving him the tools of FFXIV's ancestor is a great way to metatextually reinforce that.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

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You need a whole NPC there to explain those bosses because they are just thrown in references that aren't even mentioned again after that by the other characters.
Ultima and Omega aren't even really brought up again by even us given their importance outside.

I haven't played FFXI and me as well as some others, really don't even know who half of those bosses are or why they are there. Why should I be excited for Card-dude when his existence doesn't even matter in the very same raid he is in?
Prishe as well lives much off of previous knowledge about her and who she actually is (I have read about her) because otherwise she is just a random companion.

I don't mind taking from previous titles and forming them into the setting of FFXIV like Crystal tower (even back then when it was basically the only Allagan content) and to a lesser extent Ivalice (which was heavily tied to Garlemald) had been but this raid is much closer to Nier in that regard.
Why not have people in the setting speculate more about Ultima and Omega instead of ignoring their existence?
Why not have the last two bosses of the second raid actually be an overarching thing from the beginning instead of appearing just to get thrown away next?
The whole thing would matter more when we actually saw impact outside like Sareel Ja and his Dawn servant copy confusing the people outside for example or the whole "Copy of another world out of Electrope" impacted the the rest of the world more given it's extreme potential.

I don't want to take away from those who enjoy the story of it but as someone who doesn't know the background of the setting it is extremely disappointing outside of the fights and looks themselves and I know that I am not the only one who thinks that.
Because in the end it will end like Nier. A self contained story without impact.

Whatever the whole thing is off topic anyway and I don't want to discuss about obvious personal taste even from my side because it's a neverending discussion.
Don't want to derail the thread here.
Let's just say that I think they could have done a way better job at integrating Vanadiel and as of right now the whole thing really just feels like "Greatest hits" for someone who hasn't played FFXI.
And because of that I genuinely don't want another crossover in the next raid, even less with something that isn't even FF.

I have no real expectations or demands from a raid series (other than 'please don't all unite together to create another postgame full of Ancient glurge, Endwalker was torturous'), but I do hope that the next alliance raid series doesn't go for an 'excuse for cool boss fights' approach.

I'm not against that being the core structure of a story--this game is very capable of cool boss fights and some of my favorite stories are the ones that do that--but I think that only normal raids are actually well-situated for it. Omega and the Arcadion work because every boss has individual leadup and spectacle, letting all of them stand up on their own, including in difficulty; if Dancing Green is your guy, the one that makes the whole thing worthwhile for you, then he gets all the spotlight he needs and is very capable of being The Fight. An alliance raid series being three instances means that everyone is crammed together without much room for stunting on their own unless they're the final boss, and typically tend to lowball their difficulty to the point where the fights don't feel like good spectacles unless they're the final boss and get a couple cutscenes and a custom fight theme; Myths of the Realm showed that as a serious problem, because god damn, I hope your favorite member of the Twelve wasn't Rhalgr or Althyk, who get relegated to the pushover warmup rounds.

I think Vana'diel is nailing it as well as a 'reference-centric' alliance raid can (which it ultimately is, even if I think its story is an actual story outside of them); difficulty-wise everything's got hands enough that every fight gets to show its stuff, and while most fights don't have much leadup... well, it's all stuff from a pre-WoW MMO, if anything that's sort of in keeping with the themes, a lot of the big famous enemies in FFXI are just sorta there. But at the same time, that also shows the constraints of the medium; if the structure can't give every boss fight the attention it deserves, maybe don't sell an alliance raid on all the cool fights it'll have in it.

Other than that: I mean we should all just recognize that our predictions are all based in references to other games because we don't have any meaningful information that lets us guess anything else. If we're getting a Pandaemonium, Arcadion, or even a Shadows of Mhach, we have no capacity to guess that without even knowing for sure which continent the expansion's on. But hey, Chrono Trigger is just as likely now as it ever has been, that's an evergreen guess, if you're the type to find guessing fun, why not shoot that shot today?

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Originally Posted by Voidmage

You need a whole NPC there to explain those bosses because they are just thrown in references that aren't even mentioned again after that by the other characters. [...] I don't want to take away from those who enjoy the story of it but as someone who doesn't know the background of the setting it is extremely disappointing outside of the fights and looks themselves and I know that I am not the only one who thinks that.
Because in the end it will end like Nier. A self contained story without impact.

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This is my feeling too. A lot of the time it feels like the FFXIV writers think all they need to do to make a crossover engaging and understandable is to bombard the player with basic facts about the setting that are irrelevant to the story, instead of trying to weave interesting ideas from the other story into something naturally coherent.

Whether it's a crossover main-character wandering around going "oh, we have those too but they're kind of different", a talking cat lecturing us about how gameplay seasons work in Monster Hunter, or here making sure we understand that "this is the royal castle, and this is the new adventurers' forest", it's all a pattern of providing the sort of information that does nothing to actually build the plot or setting for us here and now. I'd rather have something that expands FFXIV's setting, and not by infodumping a different game's locations onto it.

It would be interesting to build a list of hanging plot points that could be explored. The G tribe's guarded Allagan ruins pops to mind, so long as they find another visual direction to take it instead of the eternal clashing neon. (And Gelmorra is a fallback answer to everything but I don't think an alliance raid is the right format to explore something interesting there.)

We have no way to guess what the Normal/Savage or Alliance raid series will be, since we have no idea what 8.0 is even going to be about, much less where it is; and the raid(s) are not necessarily connected to the main story narratively or thematically. On the contrary, it's a very rare event they do so. The only thing we can do is make educated guesses; and that suggests one or the other is very likely to be a loose, abridged adaptation of a previous franchise entry, while the other may be original content or (less likely) a second-party reference / loose adaptation. They are being very (I would say unusually) tight-lipped about where things are headed; I'm sure we'll get information once 7.5(.5) lands and FanFests kick off, but as of right now it's impossible to guess much of anything about what's coming in 8.0 - setting, plot, jobs, raids - and all we have to go on is the trends since post-6.0 which suggest it's some combination of a reflection that's fallen to some kind of elemental ruin that's also home to a fallen / dying civilization patterned on a previous franchise entry.

Even that's not guaranteed if they decide to pivot after Dawntrail's lukewarm reception. It's all just a big ??? right now.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

I have no real expectations or demands from a raid series (other than 'please don't all unite together to create another postgame full of Ancient glurge, Endwalker was torturous'), but I do hope that the next alliance raid series doesn't go for an 'excuse for cool boss fights' approach.

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I would counter that to an outside observer without deep franchise exposure pretty much the entirety of the Omega raids are just excuses for cool fights with references that will go whizzing over their heads; the brief introductions provided by Nero do not adequately explain who it is you're fighting, and you have no real reason to care because they're just recreations of Omega's. The Arcadion, despite mostly following this structure, makes them real characters and even explains who they are to varying degrees (sometimes in side content) which is why it landed, in my opinion, better than Omega despite lacking anything in the way of legacy fanservice the way so much of this game relies on, especially the rest of Dawntrail.

I would also argue that Pandaemonium is not "Ancient glurge;" on the contrary, aside from being a II fanservice vehicle it was there to show us that the Ancients / Amaurotine civilization was not as amazingly perfect as Emet-Selch tried to portray it during Shadowbringers (if Endwalker did not drive the point hard enough yet). When your antagonist is based on Emperor Mateus and lacks anything resembling redeeming qualities, I'm pretty sure we left the realm of glurge behind (outside of interactions with Themis and to a lesser extent Erichthonios; we never get past "colleague" with Lahabrea, before or after reintegration).

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Originally Posted by Cilia

The Arcadion, despite mostly following this structure, makes them real characters and even explains who they are to varying degrees (sometimes in side content) which is why it landed, in my opinion, better than Omega despite lacking anything in the way of legacy fanservice the way so much of this game relies on, especially the rest of Dawntrail.

I would also argue that Pandaemonium is not "Ancient glurge;" on the contrary, aside from being a II fanservice vehicle it was there to show us that the Ancients / Amaurotine civilization was not as amazingly perfect as Emet-Selch tried to portray it during Shadowbringers (if Endwalker did not drive the point hard enough yet). When your antagonist is based on Emperor Mateus and lacks anything resembling redeeming qualities, I'm pretty sure we left the realm of glurge behind (outside of interactions with Themis and to a lesser extent Erichthonios; we never get past "colleague" with Lahabrea, before or after reintegration).

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Omega's unashamedly an excuse for cool boss fights (and some asset reuse, Exdeath and Kefka are just lifted right from Dissidia NT), but I think it holds mostly because the boss fights are actually cool. Even putting the references aside, Exdeath and Kefka are spectacles that get the point of their characters across very well, the interim bosses all get a fair amount of good spice to them that the source material could never quite manage, and the Omega fights are both great. I won't deny the Arcadion does it better, but Omega's a solid first attempt, especially on what I've always suspected was a low budget.

But crucially, they get there through a level of spectacle, leadup and difficulty that normal raids have the capacity for, that alliance raids don't. And I do think difficulty is an underrated component of video game storytelling; the fact the Myths of the Realm raids were pushovers actually did hurt their story, this doesn't feel like 'fighting ancient gods' at all!

And Pandaemonium I legitimately look at as worse now than I did when it was coming out, because the only way I was going to accept that level of full-force, earnest Ancient and Ascian fanservice is if they were never coming back, that this was a final farewell... and then goddamn Halmarut turned up in less than one expansion and confirmed for me that, no, we're never getting away from that nonsense. Even then, it probably would've kept standing of Myths of the Realm wasn't also Ancient fanservice at the end.

Also Pandaemonium isn't really 'II fanservice', it barely pays lipservice to II's Pandaemonium and is more just using the name and barely remembering the aesthetic. It's as much 'II fanservice' as Bismarck was 'VI fanservice'. It's not a good or bad thing, I'm just saying we should judge the spade for its qualities at being a spade.

Just watch the lore video about the horns and tablets that can gather fast amount of aether. While almost all of the horns and Tablets are gone, (although we have no idea if Tupsimati survived.) We have still have one Tablet left and that is currently in the depth of the ocean. It makes me wonder if we're going to see the horns and tablets again in the next expansion. I mean it would be fitting if Winterer want to survive the withering and they needed the tablets and horns to do it.

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Originally Posted by Cilia

I would counter that to an outside observer without deep franchise exposure pretty much the entirety of the Omega raids are just excuses for cool fights with references that will go whizzing over their heads; the brief introductions provided by Nero do not adequately explain who it is you're fighting, and you have no real reason to care because they're just recreations of Omega's.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Omega's unashamedly an excuse for cool boss fights (and some asset reuse, Exdeath and Kefka are just lifted right from Dissidia NT), but I think it holds mostly because the boss fights are actually cool. [...] But crucially, they get there through a level of spectacle, leadup and difficulty that normal raids have the capacity for, that alliance raids don't.

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Omega works for me, I think, exactly because the fights (while being cool) don't actually matter that much, so the writers don't spend time trying to explain the backstory and there's no need to dwell on it. Get in, do a cool fight, get out again and on with the actual and very FFXIV-centric story - and consequently those final few fights against Omega really do matter, because they fit into the story I am actually playing, rather than referencing something that only got properly built up in another game.

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Originally Posted by Cilia

About Arcadion

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Arcadion imo is what Omega tried to be.
I really like it in that it is it's own thing, knows what it wants to be and doesn't try to be more for a "feeling" thing.
It also is unique enough to not be a blatant copy from another game.
It also basically did correct what 7.0 did wrong, namely introducing new characters with their own quirks and story while not encroaching on the player characters turf (at least in my opinion).

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Originally Posted by Pimsan20

Just watch the lore video about the horns and tablets that can gather fast amount of aether. While almost all of the horns and Tablets are gone, (although we have no idea if Tupsimati survived.) We have still have one Tablet left and that is currently in the depth of the ocean. It makes me wonder if we're going to see the horns and tablets again in the next expansion. I mean it would be fitting if Winterer want to survive the withering and they needed the tablets and horns to do it.

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Tupsimati is gone as far as I remember or at least broken after sealing Shinryu.
Granted we don't know if fixing it is actually possible.
Honestly, using it would actually be a good idea because using old stuff that people forgot about is one of the biggest strengths of the writers here in my opinion.

I think in the end it's a bit too early to speculate too much.
YoshiP said before 7.4 that we would get more information for 8.0 with 7.5.
We only know that:
The Winterers will probably play a part,
At least 7.5 (and probably 8.0 to some extent) will involve the WoL (Digest),
That we have a Key for inter dimensional travel,
Some kind of calamity without the will of the star is taking place (7.4 end).

We don't even know if the Withering is only a Shard thing or if it also affects the source in some way.
Three Shards we have seen and all of them were in some kind of almost rejoining. I honestly wonder if all Shards are actually at the brink of collapse because of Ascian parallel working.

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Originally Posted by Voidmage

I think in the end it's a bit too early to speculate too much.
YoshiP said before 7.4 that we would get more information for 8.0 with 7.5.
We only know that:
The Winterers will probably play a part,
At least 7.5 (and probably 8.0 to some extent) will involve the WoL (Digest),
That we have a Key for inter dimensional travel,
Some kind of calamity without the will of the star is taking place (7.4 end).

We don't even know if the Withering is only a Shard thing or if it also affects the source in some way.
Three Shards we have seen and all of them were in some kind of almost rejoining. I honestly wonder if all Shards are actually at the brink of collapse because of Ascian parallel working.

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That is fair, but i made this post so that we can exchanged ideas and theory we have for 8.0.

I still think our biggest lead for 8.0 is from whatever information we get about The Key from Preservation, and it's going to point us towards somewhere on The Source. The Key had to have had a 'life' prior to being used by the Millala so I think part of 8.0's story will involve tracing back the history of The Key. Another thing to not is we don't know if the Warrior of Light knows that what seems to be the Azem symbol appeared on The Key. This might be something only we as players know about.

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Originally Posted by Pimsan20

That is fair, but i made this post so that we can exchanged ideas and theory we have for 8.0.

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Ah, don't misunderstand me.
I am not saying that speculation is wrong or impossible, it's fun nonetheless.

I'm simply saying that 7.5 will probably be the earliest to actually have grounded / realistic ideas.

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Originally Posted by mallleable

I still think our biggest lead for 8.0 is from whatever information we get about The Key from Preservation, and it's going to point us towards somewhere on The Source. The Key had to have had a 'life' prior to being used by the Millala so I think part of 8.0's story will involve tracing back the history of The Key. Another thing to not is we don't know if the Warrior of Light knows that what seems to be the Azem symbol appeared on The Key. This might be something only we as players know about.

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Agreed, the history of it is definitely important.
What I also think though is that its entire purpose is a question right now and will probably be a major thing somewhere.
For all we know, the interdimensional power might not be it's original purpose actually and is maybe just a side effect.

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Originally Posted by Voidmage

Ah, don't misunderstand me.
I am not saying that speculation is wrong or impossible, it's fun nonetheless.

I'm simply saying that 7.5 will probably be the earliest to actually have grounded / realistic ideas.

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And i do look forward in the next month.

I can expect many people will be unsatisfied with it because that's the forums favorite thing to do lol.
I just hope we get a fun reunion for Runar and Yshtola, Ryne and Thancred, more story involving unukulhai, sylva, zero and durante.

it would be nice to get an explanation for nybleth obdelord and ultima from tactics getting isekaied into ff14.

I have a theory after cosmic exploration's latest planet oizys. The gravitional anomaly showcased over the world is eerily similar to meteor in ff7 after the rocket hit
https://img.finalfantasyxiv.com/t/0d...png?1770105686 https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/fi...teor_FFVII.jpg

This combined with ruins of a previous civilization could give merit to us getting an ff14 original version of JENOVA as an antagonist. She wasn't the "meteor" spawned via black materia BUT she is an alien who travels in a meteor to parasitize planets. This is evident in JENOVA SYNTHESIS's form and the fact it was HER impact that created the northen crater. The gray drained of life aesthetic of oizys could be a result of JENOVA successfully consuming the planets aether/lifestream.
https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/fi...HESISFFVII.png https://jegged.com/img/Games/Final-F...-Highwind.webp

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Originally Posted by Reginald_Cain

I have a theory after cosmic exploration's latest planet oizys. The gravitional anomaly showcased over the world is eerily similar to meteor in ff7 after the rocket hit

This combined with ruins of a previous civilization could give merit to us getting an ff14 original version of JENOVA as an antagonist. She wasn't the "meteor" spawned via black materia BUT she is an alien who travels in a meteor to parasitize planets. This is evident in JENOVA SYNTHESIS's form and the fact it was HER impact that created the northen crater. The gray drained of life aesthetic of oizys could be a result of JENOVA successfully consuming the planets aether/lifestream.

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That is not the case. The gravitational anomalies in Oizys were caused by the civilisation Namingway has named "Voyagers", who used their advanced gravitational magics to launch themselves into space on a route to another star, leaving the anomalies behind. It has nothing to do with any creature like Jenova.

Oizys, also, is not "drained of life", it's the most alive star we've visited so far. While Phaenna was colourful, it was so due to silicon deposits—it is basically made of glass. Pretty, yes, but mostly devoid of life, barring some silicon based pseudo-flora. Oizys has both flora and fauna, surviving despite the gravitational anomalies.

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Originally Posted by Zero-ELEC

Oizys, also, is not "drained of life", it's the most alive star we've visited so far. While Phaenna was colourful, it was so due to silicon deposits—it is basically made of glass. Pretty, yes, but mostly devoid of life, barring some silicon based pseudo-flora. Oizys has both flora and fauna, surviving despite the gravitational anomalies.

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This is a classic stereotype about deserts (and a vaguely offensive one; I know it's rarely ever intended this way, but people live in deserts, they're fine). Because we can't see that much trees, grass and birds people just assume they're 'dead', when the reality is far from the truth. Oizys sure ain't doing well, but it's more because it's being torn to pieces gravitationally--which last I checked wasn't a thing FF7's Meteor did. The planet itself is teeming with life, you can tell just from doing any fishing missions; I dunno what a Psuedoshark is, but it's definitely alive.

Also, you need to frame speculation around Oizys around the fact that it's crafting and gathering content. Oizys cannot build up to, like, a raid, and it's extremely unclear if the developers would be willing to let it be the leadin to any future content anyway; they've previously let crafting and gathering content be an epilogue of sorts, but I suspect they might see crafters and gatherers as separate enough their material can't be used as setup. More likely, it's going to lead into more crafting and gathering content

...which I happen to notice that none of Reginald's Oizys speculation involves, despite us knowing what's going to follow Oizys, which is the planet full of verdant life covering a departed civilization Which... y'know, seems like a more relevant element, directly connected to the story they're actually telling.

I'm not up on the finer points of Oizys (it's still in progress over here on Bismarck) but what that giant aether-ball immediately reminds me of is the similar one at the heart of Elysion – the proto-aetherial sea of a forming star.

I saw a link to the other video but haven't watched it yet. I have my own thoughts in that area too.

Other than the FSH targets there's no fauna on Oizys, but it has thriving plant life adapted to the arid climate and gravitational irregularities. There may not be sentient life, but it's not "dead."

As it stands I can't make a fair judgment on Phaenna. It's true the whole planet is silicon-based (including the apparent flora) but it's probably intended to be the designers' imagining of what silicon-based life would be like. I think these things are alive (there are also fish adapted to the molten silicon "water"), they're just not living things in the traditional carbon-based way we recognize, and like Oizys there's no sentients among them.

Auxesia will have even more plant life than the other three sections combined so far. We may not encounter the Voyagers or their descendants, or any sentient life for that matter, but the cosmos are far from dead. As an environmental scientist, I am loving this.

As for Jenova... it's an interesting idea, though Ultima has already supplanted her role to a large degree and we've had tons of VII homage already, even if the plotline it takes center stage in isn't playable any more.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Cilia

Other than the FSH targets there's no fauna on Oizys, but it has thriving plant life adapted to the arid climate and gravitational irregularities. There may not be sentient life, but it's not "dead."

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I'd have to find a way to review the stellar exploration materials, but I believe Botanist sees a few bugs, too.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

I'd have to find a way to review the stellar exploration materials, but I believe Botanist sees a few bugs, too.

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Check Garland Tools – look at the patches database and you can see items added in each patch and sub-patch.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Iscah

Check Garland Tools – look at the patches database and you can see items added in each patch and sub-patch.

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Checking Gamerescape on that (which has a generally more readable way to check these things) says Botanist doesn't harvest any bugs on Oizys, but it does harvest tentacles. Which... raises some questions that I don't think I'm gonna get answers to.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Checking Gamerescape on that (which has a generally more readable way to check these things) says Botanist doesn't harvest any bugs on Oizys, but it does harvest tentacles. Which... raises some questions that I don't think I'm gonna get answers to.

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It's probably referring to the tentacle-like vines that feature on many of Oizys' flora (e.g. the kiting poulps, colloquially known as "those floating ball thingies").

More pointedly there are giant pitcher plants (or what appear to be such) around the Foregone Oasis, which raises the question of what these things eat. Despite growing in hexagonal shapes the cactoids are also flowering plants, suggesting the presence of fauna that act as pollinators.

I will not be surprised if some how Gaia become involved as a main character in 8.0 since Square Enix manage to develop Gaia into a Time Mage for Dissidia Duellum and develop some of her Hammer attack animations. Not to mention give her a bit more as a individual character (with more as Dissidia Duellum main story updates over time). This can open up the chance for Time Mage as a 8.0 Job as well.

Gaia trailer for Dissidia Duellum
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BRJj9G1x2xA

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Originally Posted by EdwinLi

I will not be surprised if some how Gaia become involved as a main character in 8.0 since Square Enix manage to develop Gaia into a Time Mage for Dissidia Duellum and develop some of her Hammer attack animations. Not to mention give her a bit more as a individual character (with more as Dissidia Duellum main story updates over time). This can open up the chance for Time Mage as a 8.0 Job as well.

Gaia trailer for Dissidia Duellum
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BRJj9G1x2xA

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I'm not inclined to believe a spinoff featuring Gaia is any hint as to this game's plotline.

If you go look in Garland Tools and/or Gamer Escape though, there is a certain minion and certain mount that have been datamined that may or may not be Fan Fest rewards and may or may not hint at the direction things are headed. I will refrain from posting these things both because I want to keep the surprises for people and to avoid maybe getting banned; but even these things do not properly clarify much of anything, and they may be red (heh) herrings unrelated to the plot or maybe even Crystalline Conflict feelies.

I'm not surprised if that is the direction they're going, and just a little disappointed if it is.

Duellum has some buck-wild picks in general, between Iroha for XI, Krile for V and Balthier for XII. I don't think it shows anything but the developers wanting to get diverse with their roster and making deep cut picks that allow for the cast to be things other than 'Here's Another Sword Boy'. Gaia's packing a hammer and time magic, she's great for that! (Being a desperate attempt to reuse that canned Kingdom Hearts game's assets might've helped too; they might've already had some hammer or time magic assets ready to go and were shopping for a user.)

Which, incidentally, is probably why previous crossover games picked Y'shtola; she's a woman, non-human and primarily a spellcaster, which is a great splash of variety in a lineup of FF protags.

EDIT: Also, within the context of FFXIV itself, Gaia's not turning up in any non-optional MSQ context because it'd require them to make Eden mandatory, and that is a TERRIBLE idea.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Cilia

If you go look in Garland Tools and/or Gamer Escape though, there is a certain minion and certain mount that have been datamined that may or may not be Fan Fest rewards and may or may not hint at the direction things are headed. I will refrain from posting these things both because I want to keep the surprises for people and to avoid maybe getting banned; but even these things do not properly clarify much of anything, and they may be red (heh) herrings unrelated to the plot or maybe even Crystalline Conflict feelies.

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Also, while I don't like double-posting, it's probably good to let you know that the mount that you're most likely thinking of literally just got officially revealed to be an item shop thing completely unrelated to FanFest or 8.0.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Cilia

I'm not inclined to believe a spinoff featuring Gaia is any hint as to this game's plotline.

If you go look in Garland Tools and/or Gamer Escape though, there is a certain minion and certain mount that have been datamined that may or may not be Fan Fest rewards and may or may not hint at the direction things are headed. I will refrain from posting these things both because I want to keep the surprises for people and to avoid maybe getting banned; but even these things do not properly clarify much of anything, and they may be red (heh) herrings unrelated to the plot or maybe even Crystalline Conflict feelies.

I'm not surprised if that is the direction they're going, and just a little disappointed if it is.

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It is not about what 8.0 main story maybe about directly but that they have assets for her being built up now to be used in FF14 beyond just her role in Eden for whatever they may have planned in any expansion main story. If she becomes a main character for any expansion, 8.0, 9.0, and etc, they now can use her for party role as well being a Time Mage Job.

This can also lead to introducing Time Mage Job later for a future expansion or 8.0 if they want to.

As for why Gaia can become a Main Character to the new Shard story arc we are in now, it is most likely her role as a surviving Ascian and how the antagonist's current plans will affect the Source and all Shards. We already know the surviving Ascians basically just decided to join the new Antagonists though we do not know how many did and how many did not choose to join him (or her). We are maybe going to explore a split between Ascians between those who side with the new antagonists and those who have always been just happy with their life they have. The Zodiark Arc (aka our first story arc that ended with Endwalker) was always focused only on Ascians who wanted the original world back but never focus on the Ascians who accept the current world and are happy with their current life or Ascians who are against the plan to restore the old world because they never agree with it.

This will obviously lead to us exploring all the surviving Shards since the current patch Main story set this up. It will be interesting to see and meet Ascians who rejected joining the Restore the original world Plan and those who are doing what they can to restore their now damaged Shard world. Not to mention visit shards that are not badly affected since their elemental alignment were not messed up.

As for the Winterer's plans, well we will just have to wait and see since he or she manage to recruit surviving Ascains to whatever the plan is.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Duellum has some buck-wild picks in general, between Iroha for XI, Krile for V and Balthier for XII. I don't think it shows anything but the developers wanting to get diverse with their roster and making deep cut picks that allow for the cast to be things other than 'Here's Another Sword Boy'. Gaia's packing a hammer and time magic, she's great for that! (Being a desperate attempt to reuse that canned Kingdom Hearts game's assets might've helped too; they might've already had some hammer or time magic assets ready to go and were shopping for a user.)

Which, incidentally, is probably why previous crossover games picked Y'shtola; she's a woman, non-human and primarily a spellcaster, which is a great splash of variety in a lineup of FF protags.

EDIT: Also, within the context of FFXIV itself, Gaia's not turning up in any non-optional MSQ context because it'd require them to make Eden mandatory, and that is a TERRIBLE idea.

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That did not stop them from making Crystal Tower manditory.

Players may not like it but if Gaia does become more important to a point she becomes a Main character for future expansions, Eden may become manditory like Crystal Tower UNLESS they make adjustments to the story where players will not need to play through Eden raid.

They can just add a system to provide a quick rundown of what happened in Eden Raid and default the the Expansion story to always assume our character did the Eden Raid. So doing Eden raid will just be going through the full story about what happened in Eden Raid recap but they already got all the important details from the Recap system from the beginning of the X.0 expansion storyline.

However, they can always keep it to current system and adjust the story to being IF players did Eden Raid or not like they did with Shadowbringer before they did the whole "Crystal Tower is now mandatory due to patch Main story plot reasons".

Quote:

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Originally Posted by EdwinLi

This can also lead to introducing Time Mage Job later for a future expansion or 8.0 if they want to.

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Yoshi-P already said that we’re not getting Time Mage.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Naoki Yoshida

The Time Mage is known for using time-related abilities such as haste to speed up the party or to stop time. All of the abilities related to the Time Mage were designed to be fun to play using active time battles. However, in an MMORPG, we can’t stop time, and another aspect is that it would overpower the job. What would be the point of a Time Mage that couldn’t manipulate time?

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by MikkoAkure

Yoshi-P already said that we’re not getting Time Mage.

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I'm not talking about a literal debuff and buff job that Yoshi-p was talking about back then.

Yes, Yoshi-P said no Time Mage job as in the version that actively use buff and debuff to control turn actions in Turn base combat. However, gameplay can be changed to be more visual themed and action combat theme with attacks animations rather than the turn base combat theme.

Gaia, gameplay wise, in Dissidia Duellum is basically a Time Mage DPS Job with slow debuff (which can be changed in FF14 into something else for the Job mechanic). For FF14 style of gameplay it gives a obvious way to make a Time Mage Job for FF14 even though gameplay wise it is different from the Turn Base combat system version of Time Mage. Attack animation wise, her Time Magic is basically Nuke damage based with her attacks focus on shattering time and delayed Nuke damage with Time.

It is a rather interesting way to make Time Magic theme magic work for more action based game like FF14 (which resolves the issue Yoshi-P had for not wanting to add Time Mage back then being he did not believe there was a way to create a Time Mage Job that works for a light action combat theme style game FF14 had as a MMORPG) because the focus is on Delay Damage for Big damage and Shattering Time to cause damage. Mechanic wise, it can work through Delay DPS mechanic like the Machinist time bomb. Each attack hit (while performing their own separate damage) adds on to a Time Magic Bomb mechanic that will explode at a certain point, once it reach a certain stack number, or player choose to activate it early.


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Now Time Mage job talk aside...

the Fanfest has FF7 theme stuff for FF14 with the Red XIII minion and new Bike mount. Why do I feel as if the next expansion Shard location maybe FF7 themed?

IF the next Shard ends up FF7 themed then probably should expect a Zack/Cloud job but question will be if it ends up a Tank Job for more Zack theme with Price of Freedom being our LB3 or Damage Immune skill/Damage reduction mechanic OR DPS Job for more Cloud theme so Omnislash is our LB3 or Ultimate DPS skill mechanic.