Are <5.0 main villain> fanboys also supportive of <6.1-6.5 main villain>? *SPOILERS*

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Originally Posted by Theodric

*snip*

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There were so many outs they had to make Venat good or at least morally grey. The Sundering could have been an accident. She could have been trying to lessen her people's power levels and was unaware of the devastation she'd cause. But no, they had her do it on purpose with full knowledge of what would happen. And then, as if that wasn't horrific enough, they tell us she purposely let the Ascians go so that they could go crazy mass murdering her children for 12k years to make her extra special child. So your very creation is built upon a pile of bones. If you didn't impress her so much, worlds full of people wouldn't have died horribly.

They had her pick the darkside option at every single prompt, but were like, she's pretty and wearing white, so she's a Jedi actually.

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Originally Posted by Lady_Silvermoon

There were so many outs they had to make Venat good or at least morally grey. The Sundering could have been an accident. She could have been trying to lessen her people's power levels and was unaware of the devastation she'd cause. But no, they had her do it on purpose with full knowledge of what would happen. And then, as if that wasn't horrific enough, they tell us she purposely let the Ascians go so that they could go crazy mass murdering her children for 12k years to make her extra special child. So your very creation is built upon a pile of bones. If you didn't impress her so much, worlds full of people wouldn't have died horribly.

They had her pick the darkside option at every single prompt, but were like, she's pretty and wearing white, so she's a Jedi actually.

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Yeah, pretty much. In the end it's a situation not unlike what caused a large ripple of disappointment through World of Warcraft's lore community. You have a similar character there who is responsible for horrific acts of attempted genocide and the complete destruction of a beloved city and when the time comes to finally and actually hold her accountable for her actions it's revealed that her evil side was responsible but her good side is back in control now so all is to be forgiven. Sylvanas slinks off to 'atone' ready to someday be brought back out for some cynical fanservice.

At no point did the fans of the characters who Sylvanas murdered in cold blood see any real payoff for it. What's unfortunate is that I encouraged some friends who were playing WoW to come over here because I believed that FFXIV would not make the same mistakes. Instead we end up with a character who not only has even more blood upon her hands for Sylvanas but also one who is actively praised for it and treated as a deity worthy of fond remembrance.

It's the most bizarre storytelling I've seen in some time, though I suppose it remains to be seen if lessons will truly be learned moving forward. I doubt it, personally - if only because the game seems thoroughly intent on catering to venue goers first and foremost these days.

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Originally Posted by Theodric

Yeah, pretty much. In the end it's a situation not unlike what caused a large ripple of disappointment through World of Warcraft's lore community. You have a similar character there who is responsible for horrific acts of attempted genocide and the complete destruction of a beloved city and when the time comes to finally and actually hold her accountable for her actions it's revealed that her evil side was responsible but her good side is back in control now so all is to be forgiven. Sylvanas slinks off to 'atone' ready to someday be brought back out for some cynical fanservice.

At no point did the fans of the characters who Sylvanas murdered in cold blood see any real payoff for it. What's unfortunate is that I encouraged some friends who were playing WoW to come over here because I believed that FFXIV would not make the same mistakes. Instead we end up with a character who not only has even more blood upon her hands for Sylvanas but also one who is actively praised for it and treated as a deity worthy of fond remembrance.

It's the most bizarre storytelling I've seen in some time, though I suppose it remains to be seen if lessons will truly be learned moving forward. I doubt it, personally - if only because the game seems thoroughly intent on catering to venue goers first and foremost these days.

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I would take split personality over what we got. At least if her "bad side" had done it, we wouldn't be arguing about good and necessary genocides.

More on topic, I think that it makes more sense to compare Golbez's character arc to Ardbert. Their initial motivations and approach have a lot of similarities. Where they differ is that Ardbert benefits from the legacy of Shadowbringers, so his largely filler arc in Heavensward gets seen retrospectively as setup for that. I think we'll have to just wait and see what they do with Golbez in the future to make a full judgment on his character. He may end up doing something more heroic in the end.

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Originally Posted by MikkoAkure

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I'm glad that people are picking up on the pattern and starting to look a bit more critically at these types of posts (and are hopefully also starting to recognize the recurring culprit's MO). This is going to recur ad infinitum, given the personality involved. To repeat a statement that I made earlier in the start of this same thread several months ago:

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Originally Posted by Lyth

Two years is a remarkably long time to run a campaign against a fictional character on an online forum.

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Originally Posted by Lady_Silvermoon

I would take split personality over what we got. At least if her "bad side" had done it, we wouldn't be arguing about good and necessary genocides.

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Heh. That's true. I think the biggest problem with the way in which it is all written is that it is practically impossible to discuss many aspects of the story without it tying back to the Ancients in some way. The other problem is that the Scions are inevitably going to encounter some minor, low stakes antagonists in the upcoming expansion and very likely display more of an emotional reaction to their antics over anything displayed towards the horrific cost of Venat's actions.

In many ways, Venat herself deserved better as a character. I think she'd actually be more popular than Emet-Selch had she actually been played straight and called out. They're clearly not above redeeming antagonists with blood upon their hands as they just did as much with Golbez. It's honestly quite baffling that they didn't take such a route and it's even more baffling that certain posters insist that there's some 'conspiracy of hate' against specific characters when the truth is many of us would very much enjoy the character if she was handled with more tact.

It'd be equally eye-roll worthy to me if Emet-Selch was at no point criticised for the cost of the Rejoinings. Consistency is key, really - and the setting spent so long being extremely preachy about its morals that not applying them equally across the board simply came off as a rather jarring sharp turn.

The more that I dwell on it, the more that I think to myself that yes, I do love Durante/Golbez as an antagonist and he gets to join Ilberd, Nidhogg, and Ran’jit as the XIV antagonists I vastly prefer over the popular but personally unappealing ones. (Amon/Fandaniel/Hermes is both *chef’s kiss* and more widely acclaimed.)

I like ‘Evil Buddhist’ aka characters that look to break the wheel of reincarnation by nihilistic despair and ending all life - it’s the Big Bad that I loved in Ishamael. It’s why I was tickled pink with The Endsinger and how she greatly improved the Necron trope. And it’s why one of Golbez’s battle lines makes me giggle and kick up my heels.

A villain trying to save his people by restoring their past (especially when it’s rose-colored and nostalgia plus trauma means that the systemic flaws of said past are ignored) will never gain my sympathy. But a villain trying to save his people by securing them a different future - the difference is subtle and garners more sympathy. Or when the villain is proposing the latter but deep down the anger, spite, and hurt to lash out at their people (Ilberd) in a pyrrhic funerary conflagration (getting back to Fandaniel, Endsinger, that warped Buddhist pov).

Which, yes, means that even if I did see Venat as a villain, by this criteria she’s still leagues ahead in sympathy and interest and charisma than any of the other Ancients or Ascians bar Hermes/Fandaniel.

If you’re wondering, the only Ascian beside Fandaniel I find fun is Nabriles because his VA does a punchable voice so well and there’s a pathetic desperation and eagerness to his actions and motivations that endears me. One of the characterization archetypes that I gravitate towards is a level of pathetic minion trying their best. It’s the element in that Roe mini boss from SB that I can’t remember how to spell their name right now that keeps me from writing that character off completely even though I hate him and he creeps me out. It’s why some of my favorite minor NPCs are Martyn and M’zhet Tia.

And I love Ardbert. He’s one of my favorite XIV characters so the more that Golbez is compared to him the more that I like XIV’s Golbez.

On Golbez himself:

There’s something beautiful in that Durante and his friend Golbez were the two teaming up during the Contramemoria when everyone is fighting alone - and when everyone’s a voidsent still his go-to plan is to find other voidsent in the Four Fiends and coax them to join him, leaning on the vague memories of who they once were and what they held dear. I love the twist that his holding Azdaja prisoner was on her own request and helped her retain her sense of self for millennia in the Void. It added a complex wrinkle to the villain. And most of all - he realizes the errror of his plans and makes amends and is on the long process of atoning and working towards a future without the villainous methods. He doesn’t die unrepentant or soon after his heroic turn but must work for it. And that said work will be off-screen and a long enough time jump will have occurred whenever he rejoins the story that the redemption will be palatable for the audience. A better execution of the plot beat of Gaius/Shadowhunter.

But most of all, that he ends the Void Moon plot line having replaced Golbez with Zero in his Golbez&Durante Duo is hilarious to me due to the extreme physical dissimilarity between Zero and OG Golbez. But that both are now the optimist reaching out for new allies with Durante playing wingman…. There’s something to be said about how both Zero and OG Golbez were both hinted as fellow Azem shards but ultimately dropped/inconclusive that makes this parallel work.

Also as an aside, I am still dancing for joy that the status of the Azem Shard in the Thirteenth is still ambiguous, as the lore book made clear with the reaper avatar entry. Because the plot does not need it nor cares. Which means that the revolting “WoL gathers all their counterparts on the remaining Shards as a pointless power fantasy” is not a thing that the game is doing. Thank goodness.

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Originally Posted by Denishia

On Golbez himself:

There’s something beautiful in that Durante and his friend Golbez were the two teaming up during the Contramemoria when everyone is fighting alone - and when everyone’s a voidsent still his go-to plan is to find other voidsent in the Four Fiends and coax them to join him, leaning on the vague memories of who they once were and what they held dear. I love the twist that his holding Azdaja prisoner was on her own request and helped her retain her sense of self for millennia in the Void. It added a complex wrinkle to the villain. And most of all - he realizes the errror of his plans and makes amends and is on the long process of atoning and working towards a future without the villainous methods. He doesn’t die unrepentant or soon after his heroic turn but must work for it. And that said work will be off-screen and a long enough time jump will have occurred whenever he rejoins the story that the redemption will be palatable for the audience. A better execution of the plot beat of Gaius/Shadowhunter.

But most of all, that he ends the Void Moon plot line having replaced Golbez with Zero in his Golbez&Durante Duo is hilarious to me due to the extreme physical dissimilarity between Zero and OG Golbez. But that both are now the optimist reaching out for new allies with Durante playing wingman…. There’s something to be said about how both Zero and OG Golbez were both hinted as fellow Azem shards but ultimately dropped/inconclusive that makes this parallel work.

Also as an aside, I am still dancing for joy that the status of the Azem Shard in the Thirteenth is still ambiguous, as the lore book made clear with the reaper avatar entry. Because the plot does not need it nor cares. Which means that the revolting “WoL gathers all their counterparts on the remaining Shards as a pointless power fantasy” is not a thing that the game is doing. Thank goodness.

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You just made me realize that the moral of this story about the importance of teamwork was already known by the antagonist because he was working with others before and after he became the antagonist. It's just that we killed his team. *forehead smack*

And I too and very glad we did not gobble up Zero for a powerup like so many people were hoping we would. I like Zero. I did not want to eat her.

Though you're wrong about their hopes being dashed, for the ones who believe Golbez is our shard, they believe there is a way to get him out of the crystal and since he's in a crystal it won't even be murder to eat him for a powerup. *sobs*

I would argue that Golbez's use of the Four Fiends was not the genuine friendship that Durante had with Golbez, that it had that element of self-servicing backbiting betrayal that characterized the Memoriates (not as bad as how the Unsundered Ascians used and abandoned the Sundered Ascians), but that it's part and parcel of Durante/Voidsent Golbez - he's almost there and it's why his redemption works as a story beat. He wants to free his immortal people from their current world by causing destruction on another, just as he wanted to stop the Flood of Darkness by killing the wrong person, the Watcher instead of Igehyorm. I loved the connection of Zero's flashback to Golbez and Durante's first offer as the lynch pin of their growth- Zero into someone who would not just accept the proffered hand of a new ally but to become that hand herself, and D!Golbez to trust again in the methods and dreams of his old self.

The Memoriate Crystals are sitting there currently unreverseable and static, but I think that it's obvious that those are to be distantly resolved plot point. I don't think the souls inside will be restored, but I have a feeling that when the Thirteenth's Lifestream is restored to functional with the eventual rebalancing of the aetheric balance, those crystals will be broken and the souls inside- the Four (okay, 3) Fiends and Golbez- allowed to be reincarnated. My prediction for the final Void questline involving Zero's crew and Cylva's is something involving those crystals, as Beq Lugg has some familiarity with soul/memory vessels. Gaia's experience with someone trying to erase her current sense of self and memories and her work to restart her own life on her own terms while creating a journal of those memories of a previous lost life as Loghrif force upon her by Mitron means that she'll also have a unique and sympathetic viewpoint to those of the Voidsent like Zero, not just the usefulness of her Darkness-aspected powers.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

I have the same feeling. As I mentioned before: It's an ugly situation, with no objective moral right answer even if you look at every single fact; all you can do is decide where you're comfortable, and try to reckon with what that means. I have my own answer, that I've come to terms with and could explain... but won't, because the only person that answer truly matters to is myself, and because doing so frequently devolves into personal attacks. At least the guy that used to call me slurs has been banned.

By the way, I asked you earlier for 'my behavior on the forums' that has you so heavily against me; can you elaborate on that? I do like being able to improve on my faults, but that does require knowing what they are in the first place. I made a guess earlier, but I still don't think that's the one you're thinking of.

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I have to assume you and I are either both being ignored or on their block list. That and it feels as though they really don't want to help us see the error of our ways. Or where we might try to clarify things.

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Originally Posted by SannaR

I have to assume you and I are either both being ignored or on their block list. That and it feels as though they really don't want to help us see the error of our ways. Or where we might try to clarify things.

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Yeah, I'm getting the idea that they don't want to see improvement, they want to see an antagonist.

Which itself sort of explains their behavior about the Zodiark-Hydaelyn conflict; a 'no right or wrong answers' question doesn't work in the eyes of someone who needs to see themselves as a good versus a bad. So, their argument revolves not around why their side is right, but why the other side is wrong. And no form of 'wrong' is off the table.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Yeah, I'm getting the idea that they don't want to see improvement, they want to see an antagonist.

Which itself sort of explains their behavior about the Zodiark-Hydaelyn conflict; a 'no right or wrong answers' question doesn't work in the eyes of someone who needs to see themselves as a good versus a bad. So, their argument revolves not around why their side is right, but why the other side is wrong. And no form of 'wrong' is off the table.

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No, it's that Venat does the exact things the that game calls the ascians out for but when Venat does it's fine. It's not needing a right or a wrong it's that Venats as big a monster if not worse than the games villains and the story just shrugs while provinding a sick subtext of if your not the correct forms of life you don't deserve to live.

Edit Also I am getting really tired of these personal attacks where you make up stuff about the people on here posting what you don't like, It's why I don't normal respond to your points directly.

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Originally Posted by jameseoakes

No, it's that Venat does the exact things the that game calls the ascians out for but when Venat does it's fine. It's not needing a right or a wrong it's that Venats as big a monster if not worse than the games villains and the story just shrugs while provinding a sick subtext of if your not the correct forms of life you don't deserve to live.

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So what you're saying is that her actions are identical to the Ascians ('does the exact same things'), but for unstated reasons you consider her worse.

Got it.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

So what you're saying is that her actions are identical to the Ascians ('does the exact same things'), but for unstated reasons you consider her worse.

Got it.

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She outright betrays her own race and personally betrays serveal people who trusted including the outright horror she inflicts on the 3 unsundered ascians by intentionally letting them witness and survive the complete extermination of the race and culture. Oh and then she creates a world of suffering a misery for some frankly vile logic of only through suffering can you know joy which honestly a vile ideology

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Originally Posted by jameseoakes

She outright betrays her own race and personally betrays serveal people who trusted including the outright horror she inflicts on the 3 unsundered ascians by intentionally letting them witness and survive the complete extermination of the race and culture. Oh and then she creates a world of suffering a misery for some frankly vile logic of only through suffering can you know joy which honestly a vile ideology

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So, to quantify, you believe Venat's crimes are:

1. Betrayal,
2. Planet-smashing,
3. Leaving survivors (I'm unclear how this is a crime but I'll run with the concept),
4. Causing suffering and misery.

I'm unclear about why this list of crimes isn't held completely equally by the Ascians. They orchestrate betrayals as part of their M.O., to cause Calamities that destroy planets, that leave at least some amount of the Source alive, and cause immense suffering and misery. In particular I would put Emet-Selch with the Garleans, Elidibus with... basically everyone he's ever manipulated, Fandaniel with the Allagans, and Igeyorhm with the Thirteenth as fitting these basically exactly.

The one thing that I can think causes a difference is that Venat did it to people she would recognize as 'like her', while the Ascians were manipulating something else? I hardly think otherizing is an acceptable or positive element, but if you do, then that still leaves Fandaniel's obliteration of Allag as Amon being equal. Emet-Selch, too, if your view is that he 'went native' at any point with us, Garlemald, or Allag.

I get that you disagree with her, and agree with the Ascians, but I don't think that even by your own logic she's actually worse.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

I get that you disagree with her, and agree with the Ascians, but I don't think that even by your own logic she's actually worse.

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I'm getting really tired of you putting words in my mouth, I don't agree with ascians I just think Venat was worse. I'm also quite confused as to why it maters if Venat hadn't have have sundered the world none of the other crimes would happen and if those crimes and it really messed up how hard the game excuses Venats genocide as hard as the game does.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Yeah, I'm getting the idea that they don't want to see improvement, they want to see an antagonist.

Which itself sort of explains their behavior about the Zodiark-Hydaelyn conflict; a 'no right or wrong answers' question doesn't work in the eyes of someone who needs to see themselves as a good versus a bad. So, their argument revolves not around why their side is right, but why the other side is wrong. And no form of 'wrong' is off the table.

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I gues? Though it does explain their you lore forum regulars only want an echo chamber stance. Only to toss out a discord invite that reads as "come to our own echo chamber that totally isn't an echo chamber and even if it were it is better cause we uh have a discoball." (had to use something else other than cookies cause using the same references is lame and pathetic according to some.)

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Originally Posted by jameseoakes

I'm getting really tired of you putting words in my mouth, I don't agree with ascians I just think Venat was worse. I'm also quite confused as to why it maters if Venat hadn't have have sundered the world none of the other crimes would happen and if those crimes and it really messed up how hard the game excuses Venats genocide as hard as the game does.

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Your argument seems to be predicated on the notion that the Sundering 'created a world of suffering and misery'--thereby implying that the world before it wasn't. But even if you take the view that the Ancient world was without suffering (a view that doesn't hold thanks to short stories and Pandaemonium), she wasn't the one that broke that. Meteion did. By the time of the Sundering, three quarters of the population was either sacrificed or dead from the Final Days, the surviving population was divided, some amount of it was tempered, and who knows what other problems had sprung forth in the aftermath; paradise had already burned. And if you do think that the Ancient world had problems, then Venat's crime was... not immediately solving them?

Venat says she 'created a world of suffering' as a condemnation of herself, but it doesn't really hold. Her reasoning is actually something akin to me thinking I'd be a terrible mother because I'd be bringing a child into a world that I don't think will treat it well; I'd feel guilt for the pain that results, but that doesn't make me guilty.

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Originally Posted by Lady_Silvermoon

There were so many outs they had to make Venat good or at least morally grey. The Sundering could have been an accident. She could have been trying to lessen her people's power levels and was unaware of the devastation she'd cause. But no, they had her do it on purpose with full knowledge of what would happen. And then, as if that wasn't horrific enough, they tell us she purposely let the Ascians go so that they could go crazy mass murdering her children for 12k years to make her extra special child. So your very creation is built upon a pile of bones. If you didn't impress her so much, worlds full of people wouldn't have died horribly.

They had her pick the darkside option at every single prompt, but were like, she's pretty and wearing white, so she's a Jedi actually.

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All that you said plus the fact that her back up plan, if all her original plans went sideways, was literally to say screw all the Reflections and save only the people of the Source. If we hadn't gone digging into the why of what was causing the Final Days (because we rightfully thought leaving the Star and letting the Reflections die was stupid), we would have been leaving without ever learning of Meteion too. That means that it only would have been a temporary fix.

I dislike basically everything Venat did in the end. From Sundering the planet, to never telling her people the truth, to setting up gods and a system that makes it so the world HAS to follow the measures she put into place so that it doesn't end up destabilising in its broken state. She was an narcissist that imposed her will on everyone, and she will never sit well with me. Her response to Hermes idiotic plan should have been to tell the Convocation and set Hermes in the jail he belonged in. Not help destroy her people.

I just wish the story would actually call her out on it. I don't expect the future to change or anything, but have the Scions and other people actually maybe condone what she did instead of acting like she's some paragon of love and virtue and not just as bad as half the villains we have fought against. :(

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Venat says she 'created a world of suffering' as a condemnation of herself, but it doesn't really hold. Her reasoning is actually something akin to me thinking I'd be a terrible mother because I'd be bringing a child into a world that I don't think will treat it well; I'd feel guilt for the pain that results, but that doesn't make me guilty.

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It was more akin to killing your neighbor, stealing their organs and Frankensteining a better person with the parts. She didn't take the Ancients anywhere, she ripped them to pieces so that they no longer had the power to improve their material conditions because she believed comfort fostered weakness. And arguing both that she was right to kill them to stop them from improving their situation, but also, their situation sucked, so it's okay to kill them because they already had it bad is a contradiction.

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Originally Posted by Nayukhuut

All that you said plus the fact that her back up plan, if all her original plans went sideways, was literally to say screw all the Reflections and save only the people of the Source. If we hadn't gone digging into the why of what was causing the Final Days (because we rightfully thought leaving the Star and letting the Reflections die was stupid), we would have been leaving without ever learning of Meteion too. That means that it only would have been a temporary fix.

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I never considered the evacuation plan as anything she was serious about given she knows the actual source of the problem and that there is nowhere for people to escape to given the entire universe is being destroyed. Like maybe she did it because she wanted to give people hope, or maybe she did it cause we told her she did and she wanted to maintain the timeline, but given no one even bothered to tell the Loporrits what size we were, I can't take the evacuation plan seriously. She just needed an excuse so we'd fight her in her assisted suicide, so she didn't have to look the people in the eye whose families she murdered and civilization she destroyed after they gave their lives to protect those things. Imagine being one of those people who sacrificed yourself to protect the star only to find out moments later Venat murdered your family and used their parts to make her familiars. I'm just saying, we know for a fact combat is possible in the aetherial sea. I get why she destroyed her soul instead of facing those people.

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Originally Posted by Nayukhuut

I just wish the story would actually call her out on it.

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I do not disagree with this. I do not have any issues with Venat in the position she is if there was a counterbalance outside of the Ascians, mainly because the Ascians are a biased party to this topic. To me, I believe a counterbalance, potentially from a scion member, would be something I would find acceptable. There are many issues in terms of how Venat is portrayed and admittedly this is but one example. Other examples come from a lack of clarity of events pertaining to the period between our departure from Elpis up to the sundering along with the intentional open-ended interpretation of time travel the writers placed into the story, as they have by omission stated this was done intentionally via Live Letter.

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Originally Posted by Lady_Silvermoon

I never considered the evacuation plan as anything she was serious about given she knows the actual source of the problem and that there is nowhere for people to escape to given the entire universe is being destroyed. Like maybe she did it because she wanted to give people hope, or maybe she did it cause we told her she did and she wanted to maintain the timeline, but given no one even bothered to tell the Loporrits what size we were, I can't take the evacuation plan seriously. She just needed an excuse so we'd fight her in her assisted suicide, so she didn't have to look the people in the eye whose families she murdered and civilization she destroyed after they gave their lives to protect those things. Imagine being one of those people who sacrificed yourself to protect the star only to find out moments later Venat murdered your family and used their parts to make her familiars. I'm just saying, we know for a fact combat is possible in the aetherial sea. I get why she destroyed her soul instead of facing those people.

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Fair enough. You make good points. It did feel a bit contrived, and the moon bunnies really are quite awful.

As for your point about the Aetherial Sea. Yup. If I was imprisoned for millennia after trying to save my home and saw Venat there after finding out what she had done, I would definitely want to have words.

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Originally Posted by Nayukhuut

Fair enough. You make good points. It did feel a bit contrived, and the moon bunnies really are quite awful.

As for your point about the Aetherial Sea. Yup. If I was imprisoned for millennia after trying to save my home and saw Venat there after finding out what she had done, I would definitely want to have words.

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Now I'm just picturing a bunch of people in robes and masks having the Office Space printer scene reaction and I can't stop laughing.

https://youtu.be/N9wsjroVlu8?si=hn4lvRdUxvL8CXB4

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Originally Posted by Lady_Silvermoon

Now I'm just picturing a bunch of people in robes and masks having the Office Space printer scene reaction and I can't stop laughing.

https://youtu.be/N9wsjroVlu8?si=hn4lvRdUxvL8CXB4

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Haha, oh my goodness. If only. Heh, the Ancients as a species seemed to be pretty non violent, but if I suppose if an exception were to be made it would be for the one that literally destroyed your civilisation.

Edit: Though on my end, a proper debate to make her see just how much harm she ended up doing would be wonderful too.

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Originally Posted by Nayukhuut

Haha, oh my goodness. If only. Heh, the Ancients as a species seemed to be pretty non violent, but if I suppose if an exception were to be made it would be for the one that literally destroyed your civilisation.

Edit: Though on my end, a proper debate to make her see just how much harm she ended up doing would be wonderful too.

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They seem just as capable of violence as we are. They just didn't have need of it most of the time given the ability to meet all their material needs with magic. But let somebody wipe out my entire species right after I sacrificed myself to save it. I don't care if I spent 8000 years as a librarian, I'm lifting that robe and getting a couple good kicks in.

I'd pull an Asahi and drag her straight to the bottom. "Come on, Venat. Let's go see how strong famine and typhoid make you."

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Your argument seems to be predicated on the notion that the Sundering 'created a world of suffering and misery'--thereby implying that the world before it wasn't. But even if you take the view that the Ancient world was without suffering (a view that doesn't hold thanks to short stories and Pandaemonium), she wasn't the one that broke that. Meteion did. By the time of the Sundering, three quarters of the population was either sacrificed or dead from the Final Days, the surviving population was divided, some amount of it was tempered, and who knows what other problems had sprung forth in the aftermath; paradise had already burned. And if you do think that the Ancient world had problems, then Venat's crime was... not immediately solving them?

Venat says she 'created a world of suffering' as a condemnation of herself, but it doesn't really hold. Her reasoning is actually something akin to me thinking I'd be a terrible mother because I'd be bringing a child into a world that I don't think will treat it well; I'd feel guilt for the pain that results, but that doesn't make me guilty.

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My point point with the world of suffering was that Venat actively creates a scarcity world to actively force strife and suffering on the population. That's the the whole ponit of the sundering to make a species that has to endure short hard lives where misfortunate means death (remember the children in Ishgard freezing to death)

Also with respect to Venats actions I just don't know what you are trying to get at, I mean jumping to genocide as your solution to any problem is monstrous in the extreme, I don't get how you can hate characters like Emet the way you do and then be fine saying things like genocide are solutions to problems. This is my problem with Venat, it's not so much what she does, it's how the game bends over backward to say outright one of the most heinous things possible is acceptable if you other the victims enough

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Originally Posted by jameseoakes

My point point with the world of suffering was that Venat actively creates a scarcity world to actively force strife and suffering on the population. That's the the whole ponit of the sundering to make a species that has to endure short hard lives where misfortunate means death (remember the children in Ishgard freezing to death)

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According to the game and written directly into the new lore book, the purpose of the Sundering isn't suffering for its own sake, it's to remove creation magicks and to turn everyone into entelechies who can face against Endsinger who was going to kill the entire universe.

It would be one thing if Venat sundered the Ancient world at the height of its power, but at the time the whole thing went down the world had already ended. Most of the Ancients were already dead or turned to Zodiark soup and until Zodiark's second act, the planet was a barren lifeless husk. Zodiark couldn't bring back all the people who died during the Final Days either. Ancient society and culture would've had to have been rebuilt by the survivors anyway and a "numerous" movement of Ancients rejected the Convocation and Zodiark and decided that they couldn't move on like this. Venat didn't make this decision by herself.

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Originally Posted by MikkoAkure

According to the game and written directly into the new lore book, the purpose of the Sundering isn't suffering for its own sake, it's to remove creation magicks and to turn everyone into entelechies who can face against Endsinger who was going to kill the entire universe.

It would be one thing if Venat sundered the Ancient world at the height of its power, but at the time the whole thing went down the world had already ended. Most of the Ancients were already dead or turned to Zodiark soup and until Zodiark's second act, the planet was a barren lifeless husk. Zodiark couldn't bring back all the people who died during the Final Days either. Ancient society and culture would've had to have been rebuilt by the survivors anyway and a "numerous" movement of Ancients rejected the Convocation and Zodiark and decided that they couldn't move on like this. Venat didn't make this decision by herself.

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Sorry exterminating an entire race to replace them with something else is never justified, Eugenics is one of the greatest evil humanity has come with and this games story goes full apologist for it. Also I don't expect the anicents to go back to how they were before the trauma of the scale of the end of days makes that unlikely but Venat robbing them of that chance was an act of evil

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Originally Posted by jameseoakes

Sorry exterminating an entire race to replace them with something else is never justified, Eugenics is one of the greatest evil humanity has come with and this games story goes full apologist for it. Also I don't expect the anicents to go back to how they were before the trauma of the scale of the end of days makes that unlikely but Venat robbing them of that chance was an act of evil

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Again, this was a decision agreed upon by a large enough group of Ancients that everything stopped and Elidibus had to come out of Zodiark to try to negotiate. It wasn't just Venat unilaterally changing everyone by force. The anti-Zodiark crowd were aware of and supported sundering as the only way to prevent a second coming of the Final Days and the game hasn't presented to us an alternative to stopping Endsinger since only those who can interact with dynamis can.

It was either the end of the Ancients or the end of everyone else in the universe including the Ancients. They might have come up with something else later on but we don't know that and they didn't know that. They went with the only plan that they knew had at least a small chance because you don't gamble all life on something like that.

The Ancients weren't killed and replaced either, we are them. They are our direct ancestors, not some separate people.

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Originally Posted by MikkoAkure

Again, this was a decision agreed upon by a large enough group of Ancients that everything stopped and Elidibus had to come out of Zodiark to try to negotiate. It wasn't just Venat unilaterally changing everyone by force. The anti-Zodiark crowd were aware of and supported sundering as the only way to prevent a second coming of the Final Days and the game hasn't presented to us an alternative to stopping Endsinger since only those who can interact with dynamis can.

It was either the end of the Ancients or the end of everyone else in the universe including the Ancients. They might have come up with something else later on but we don't know that and they didn't know that. They went with the only plan that they knew had at least a small chance because you don't gamble all life on something like that.

The Ancients weren't killed and replaced either, we are them. They are our direct ancestors, not some separate people.

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Sorry but forcibly remaking into a different for of life is eugenics and genocide. The fact that Venat then creates gods (and makes her self the world supreme deity) to force the peoples she makes to act how she decided they should be actively destroying the culture and people who lived before (creation magic be an intrinsic part of who they are). Honestly the whole murdering whole races and cultures to be replaces with people some fanatics decided are the only solution to a problem (as it really doesn't seem the Venat told them anything about the true end of days) is a vile plot point to pivot a games story on, it's a evil plot.

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Originally Posted by MikkoAkure

The Ancients weren't killed and replaced either, we are them. They are our direct ancestors, not some separate people.

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Uh, no. They were very much a separate people. Our player characters are the cut up fragments of the original Ancients that evolved into entirely separate species from the original ancients, so yeah, they were killed and replaced.

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Originally Posted by MikkoAkure

According to the game and written directly into the new lore book, the purpose of the Sundering isn't suffering for its own sake, it's to remove creation magicks and to turn everyone into entelechies who can face against Endsinger who was going to kill the entire universe.

It would be one thing if Venat sundered the Ancient world at the height of its power, but at the time the whole thing went down the world had already ended. Most of the Ancients were already dead or turned to Zodiark soup and until Zodiark's second act, the planet was a barren lifeless husk. Zodiark couldn't bring back all the people who died during the Final Days either. Ancient society and culture would've had to have been rebuilt by the survivors anyway and a "numerous" movement of Ancients rejected the Convocation and Zodiark and decided that they couldn't move on like this. Venat didn't make this decision by herself.

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When we face Meteion we're at 9/14ths. If she divided the world to make us able to interact with dynamis, why not inform everyone of the threat and propose that solution? Not only would you have a world full of super wizards attempting to solve the actual problem. Given they only need a 1/2 reduction of themselves to control dynamis, they could have consensually reduced themselves to two parts which would have maintained far more of what they were than what she did. And it would have been done with a world of geniuses working together rather than a psycho and her 12 simps murdering everyone.

And if you want to argue that they wouldn't have done that...75% of their population gave up their lives to save their world. If there had been a way for them to make a sacrifice where no one had to die, if only they'd known about the problem, nothing about them suggests they wouldn't push through, because they were actually incredibly strong regardless of what Genocydalyn said about them.

Stop blaming the Zodiark summoning because she let that happen as she needed it both as an excuse to get her simps to sac themselves for her and to protect the planet for 12k years after she murdered everyone.

Imagine what would have happened if they listened to her and didn't summon Zodiark given she never informed them what the actual problem was or given them forewarning so they could prepare a defense ahead of time. They would have become entirely extinct. Obviously, that wasn't her goal, so she didn't really want them not to summon Zodiark. She just opposed it to create the strife needed to weaken her people so she could murder them all.

If at any point the Ancients pimp shrugged and did what Venat wanted them to do, all life in the universe would end, so clearly that wasn't her real goal. She set them up to be slaughtered.

ETA: I don't believe being able to control dynamis would be enough. I think that given the solution, people who overcame each type of despair Meteion had experienced would be needed. Like purposefully exposing someone to a disease so that they create antibodies. But had Venat informed people of the problem, and the likely solution, a portion of them could have volunteered to be sundered and run through her torture simulator to learn the lessons needed to save the universe. But instead of telling people and working with them, she took it upon herself to kill them, bury their culture and history and make herself a supreme deity. As my character said to Emet-Selch in my headcanon, "any plan that requires murdering babies in their crib is a bad plan."