Archon Theorizing

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Originally Posted by Naria

EDIT: . . . For some reason I'm recalling that there was info from the Dev's about Hydaelyn's year.

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I buy in to the idea that years are 'short', mostly because the years follow a lunar calendar, not a solar one. The world shows minimal effects of 'seasons', so it makes sense that a solar year wouldn't have meaning to them, but that leaves us no idea how long their year is relative to what we think of as a year. It could be remarkably shorter or longer than their rotational period. I think the dev note you're mentioning is the statement that years are made up of twelve lunar months, an Astral and Umbral month of each element. Theorized elsewhere in the Lore forums, though I don't remember where, is the idea that an "Astral" month centers around a full moon and an "Umbral" around a New Moon, which make sense. If that's the case, Hydaelyn's year is made up of six full lunar cycles, broken into Astral and Umbral months.

That said, it makes sense that the races would have different life spans and it's possible all might live longer than humans, but given the rate at which things change and events develop mythologies and knowledge of things is utterly lost, I'd say very few of the races exceed one hundred Hydaelyn years. I think one of the reasons most people are young is that in a world like this, old age isn't the thing most likely to kill you; monsters and war probably are the top killers in Eorzea. And for aging, it could be in part that the changes in appearance over five, or even fifteen years are not hugely dramatic for a lot of people, but I think mostly it a convenience thing from SE's perspective - it both is convenient on the graphics team and is easy from a narrative setting as well. Everyone knows Cid is Cid before even Cid does, because he looks like Cid; narrative simplicity.

Sorry for double-post. Limits on text entry.

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Originally Posted by Phyllo

Oh one more thing, none of them have shown any sign of aging besides Minfilia, Cid just grew a beard that make him look older, F'lhaminn's glasses and clothes are what makes her look older, even tho you see her in echo most of the time in 1.0, there are some scenes during the actual present time where she does not look any older, even tho 15 years separate echo and 1.0 (the only way to make the difference is the color of her boots).

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idk! her hair seems white to me now. in 1.0, she was definitely blonde!

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Originally Posted by faris

idk! her hair seems white to me now. in 1.0, she was definitely blonde!

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Are you talking about Minfilia or F´lhaminn?

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Originally Posted by Phyllo

Are you talking about Minfilia or F´lhaminn?

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F'lhaminn.

Nah she always had silver hair, it's just that her outfit make her look older (and even with that, it's hard to believe she's 31... ^^''')

Waliel>>
Oh yeah Hamon, well he's the prime exemple of them aging, but we have absolutely no idea how old he is :/

The Pugilist guildmaster, Something Whateverfist, is more than old enough to retire, I'd say. I do believe he shares a model with a couple of NPCs.

Hamon HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLYFIST can't retire.

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Originally Posted by gornotck

Hamon HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLYFIST can't retire.

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The quest where you bring him up-to-speed...fantastic. Simply sublime.

I really wonder about the lyrics in both the Praetorium and Ultima battle (phase 2), and Mysteltain has been an amazing contributor over in this thread:

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...g-lyrics/page3

in teasing out the Latin in the Ultima lyrics.

But lately, I've been wondering not just what those voices are saying, but who they are and to whom the ideas in those lyrics are directed. Are the voices exulting a future Archon rule in the Ultima theme?

I'd bet my last gil on two things:

1) the lyrics to both tell us scads of tasty info about both the Garlean Empire and the Archons;

2) that #1 is precisely why the lyrics were not released with the OST like Titan, King Moggle, Garuda, et al lyrics.

We need to break that code!