*Spoilers* Anyone feel joining Emet would have been better

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Originally Posted by Kordarion

And on the topic of the final days, could the ancients have actually beaten Meteion? The only reason we were able to get to the point we could fight the Endsinger was because of our ability to interact with Dynamis, Thancred's sacrifice made Ultima Thule both a physical place and have a breathable atmosphere, the sacrifices of the other scions in turn were able to manipulate the surrounding Dynamis to give us a path forward. The ancients aren't able to do any of that, by their own admission they are unable to interact with Dynamis and therefore would have faced far more problems than we did in trying to reach Meteion. Then we have to consider the Endsinger's Ultimate Fate ability, where she mentions the use of dynamis in relation to our first LB3 and in the second instance of it where we only survived because of the scions hope filled prayers. Prayers that were probably more dynamis based than aether.

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Who is to say they could not have come up with a way if Venat had given them time and the full information needed to prepare. As it was she left them in the dark. Zodiark was a hail mary pass made in the last hour because they had run out of options and didn't know what was going on. After Elpis she knew the Final Days were coming, knew what the cause was, knew an aethershield would stave it off, and knew they might need dynamis to combat it. She shared none of that during the valuable time they had to prepare before Meteion's attack, and just left her people to suffer.

If she had shared, they might have had time to put a shield up before the attack even started. That on its own would have prevented the destruction of the planet and the first two sacrifices, but more importantly it would have given them time to research dynamis and how to combat it. They could have made constructs, or called for volunteers to weaken their aether so as to take the fight to Meteion. A Meteion that was much weaker than the one we faced.

Still, they would have had a choice, and not have had someone choose for them. What Venat did was no better than the Ascians deciding the Sundered were only fit for sacrifice, or Meteion and Hermes deciding we all need to die because sad,

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Originally Posted by Kordarion

I just re-watched the two Anamnesis Anyder recordings and while the second of the two does seem to hint at Venat's followers being unaware of the consequences of the sundering the first seems to imply that they did know the truth. The diplomatic ancient says that though Zodiark has managed to give the ancients a reprieve he has done nothing to stop the root cause of the issue.

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I'm not convinced that means she told them the truth. To me it reads like they knew the problem had been solved temporarily, but they didn't know what caused it to begin with so they were worried about it coming back to bite them again in the future.

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Originally Posted by Nayukhuut

Who is to say they could not have come up with a way if Venat had given them time and the full information needed to prepare.

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We are unfortunately hampered by not knowing what Venat did in the unknown amount of time between Elpis and the final days. She could have tried to convince more people to stand against the final days but was shrugged of as a man woman. I know if I was an ancient and someone like Venat, who was already shown to act contrary to polite society by not dying when stepping down as Venat, came and told me that the end of the world was imminent and that it was caused by a bird woman at the edge of the universe using a form of energy next to no-one knew of and that we needed to sacrifice ourselves to summon a god capable of saving the planet I would call her crazy and walk off. And even if they did believe her and pre-emptively reinforced the aetheric currents we can't say for certain that they wouldn't just say jobs done we've saved our world back to our normal lives.

The only person who can make those constructs is Hermes, the man who let Meteion go free.

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Originally Posted by Nayukhuut

I'm not convinced that means she told them the truth.

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I'm not convinced she didn't tell them. They knew the convocation was wrong and the final days weren't averted, we know that they knew that something else needed to be done and then of course there was the other part of my statement where I mentioned that Venat tells us she is going to gather a group of individuals to deal with the final days. It's not that difficult to see how those two groups are probably one in the same.

The Ancients have the Echo... she could have literally shown them the truth. As for Hermes, well, he was the only one that had made someone like Meteion *so far*. Given a bunch of motivated and intelligent people, who knows what they could have come up with.

And yeh, Venat put a team together, but that doesn't mean she told them the truth. They might have known it was coming, might have been fighting against the third sacrifice, and still not have known the source. And even if she DID tell them, she certainly didn't tell the greater people or their leaders. She left them to come up with solution blindly while she watched the world burn and held on to information that could have helped.

Another thing my sister and I were talking about earlier... Venat's plan not only sacrificed her people without their permission, but it also doomed a good number of her Sundered worlds to death. She knew we were multi times rejoined when she destroyed her world, and she watched as many of the Shards she created (full of life by that point) were sacrificed to get us to the point where she met us. People might argue that she tried to save them, but she knew that we were so many times rejoined. Saving those Shards would have changed history. So if she DIDN'T just watch them burn, why was it okay to try and change history then, but not before you consigned your entire people to forced oblivion the first time?

No, I can't excuse or support Venat's actions. She divided the world and its people against their knowledge and their will. If someone started trying that in the game NOW while telling us that it's for the best because we don't meet up to their standards of what needs to be done/thought and that this is all a plan for the future, we would sure as heck try to stop em... And we would be right to do so. The fact that she's take up that whole mother position with us and constantly calling us her children makes it even worse. As someone who vehemently disavows what she did, constantly hearing "my children" drove me nuts. She destroyed the world, and then interjected herself as a deity figure after getting annoyed at her people for leaning on a deity figure...

I remember during the last bit when she mentioned she was the last of her kind, and all I could think of is that she literally did that to herself, and she gets no sympathy from me. All my sympathy goes to the people who never had a choice.

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Originally Posted by Nayukhuut

The Ancients have the Echo... she could have literally shown them the truth.

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The Echo powers that the Ancients/Ascians have shown seem to limited to possession, teleportation without an aetheryte, and combining forms. Have they or the Ancients ever been shown to have powers of looking into the memories of another? if they had that power, I feel like it would've come up much earlier in Elpis when Emet-Selch initially did not believe our story. We have a soul so he could very easily have called forth that power to call us on our bluff if he had the capability.

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Originally Posted by Nayukhuut

As for Hermes, well, he was the only one that had made someone like Meteion *so far*. Given a bunch of motivated and intelligent people, who knows what they could have come up with.

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There's a lot of assumption involved there. We already know that Fandaniel's understanding was required to allow Zodiark to pause the Final Days. To me it feels like it's too much to base your entire idea on why someone is bad because they didn't get help from a theoretical other person or group of people that we have no idea if they exist. There's also the fact that Emet-Selch also knows everything that's going on and our story and he allows us and Venat to escape Kairos and then says that the Ancients' plan would not have taken them this far at Ultima Thule.

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Originally Posted by Nayukhuut

No, I can't excuse or support Venat's actions. She divided the world and its people against their knowledge and their will. If someone started trying that in the game NOW while telling us that it's for the best because we don't meet up to their standards of what needs to be done/thought and that this is all a plan for the future, we would sure as heck try to stop em... And we would be right to do so. The fact that she's take up that whole mother position with us and constantly calling us her children makes it even worse. As someone who vehemently disavows what she did, constantly hearing "my children" drove me nuts. She destroyed the world, and then interjected herself as a deity figure after getting annoyed at her people for leaning on a deity figure...

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Regarding Venat's actions, she saw them as necessary to stop the Final Days entirely AND necessary to stop the sacrifice of souls that were innocent to the sins of the past to be used to recreate the world of the dead. The summoners of Zodiark were tempered and aetherically unbalanced to the point where they couldn't even spend much time in the light of the First without discomfort. A revived Amaurot would be led by those whose wills are being tugged by a living god and 3/4 of the citizens would be those revived by said god. It would be naive to believe that their society would be the same after that.

Venat's plan may be contentious but as I had said, Emet-Selch himself agreed with it after we summoned him for the last time, and Elidibus as well, since he's the one who sent us to that specific point of time on purpose in order to save our world. By the end of the game, there are no defenders left for the original plan.

Additionally, Hydaelyn doesn't set herself up as a goddess, most people in the world don't even know she as an entity even exists. Outside of independent Echo users and organizations of Echo users like the Path of Twelve (later Scions of the Seventh Dawn) and the Students of Baldesion, that knowledge is limited to some Sharlayans as well as the leaders of Eorzea who themselves were notified by the Path of Twelve, which was a secret organization. Throughout the game, it's shown that the main religion in Eorzea is the Twelve and there's no talk at all about Hydaelyn (other than the name of the planet) outside the Walking Sands/Rising Stones. Individual normal people either pray to individual gods of the Twelve, kami, or their own local deities or spirits.

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Originally Posted by MikkoAkure

The Echo powers that the Ancients/Ascians have shown seem to limited to possession, teleportation without an aetheryte, and combining forms. Have they or the Ancients ever been shown to have powers of looking into the memories of another? if they had that power, I feel like it would've come up much earlier in Elpis when Emet-Selch initially did not believe our story. We have a soul so he could very easily have called forth that power to call us on our bluff if he had the capability.

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Emet-Selch, while in Elpis, literally mentions the Convocation has a way to tell if a person is lying. Venat also brings us to the floating island where Hermes launched the Meteia and explains that the Echo can be used on a person's memories or the ambient aether where an event occurred.

What you have to keep in mind is that it's not that Emet-Selch doesn't believe us, it's that he doesn't want to believe us. I imagine he would react similarly if Venat came to him with the events that occurred during his mind wipe, which would include an extremely through investigation--even if only to clear the name of a respected Convocation member--just like he denies what we told him...and then goes off to immediately investigate if there's truth to what we're talking about.

Even if Venat did tell the ancients about meteion and the song of oblivion, it seems likely thier plan would not have changed. Hide behind the aether bubble of Zodiark and be protected. But now there's the added wrench of Hermes probably wanting to sabotage the whole thing.

I'm having a hard time understanding why people think Venat telling the Convocation about Meteion and Hermes was a good idea, especially when Hermes now sits on the Convocation as Fandaniel. Hermes already showed his true intentions. And I doubt few would believe Venat's story. Emet-Selch didn't believe it even after he saw everything.

Hermes would actively work against her if she told him everything and would be smart enough to manipulate the Convocation against her. Not saying what she ultimately did was the perfect solution. Far from it. I'm just saying telling everyone would have been infinitely worse.

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Originally Posted by Lium

I'm having a hard time understanding why people think Venat telling the Convocation about Meteion and Hermes was a good idea, especially when Hermes now sits on the Convocation as Fandaniel. Hermes already showed his true intentions. And I doubt few would believe Venat's story. Emet-Selch didn't believe it even after he saw everything.

Hermes would actively work against her if she told him everything and would be smart enough to manipulate the Convocation against her. Not saying what she ultimately did was the perfect solution. Far from it. I'm just saying telling everyone would have been infinitely worse.

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Lets not give Hermes too much credit. He was a... uh smart cookie in some ways, but in the grand scheme of things only one individual, and not even a strong one. One could conceive myriad of ways to leave him out of the testimony towards the Convocation, and even restrain / eliminate him when he outlived his usefulness.

The whole thing about the Convocation not believing Venat is probably moot. The Echo is something established to exist, Emet stated that the Convocation has the ability to detect lies and Venat was (for better or worse) a respected / famous / infamous ex-member of the Convocation. An odball she may have been, but that apparently just comes with the seat of Azem.

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Originally Posted by Lersayil

Lets not give Hermes too much credit. He was a... uh smart cookie in some ways, but in the grand scheme of things only one individual, and not even a strong one. One could conceive myriad of ways to leave him out of the testimony towards the Convocation, and even restrain / eliminate him when he outlived his usefulness.

The whole thing about the Convocation not believing Venat is probably moot. The Echo is something established to exist, Emet stated that the Convocation has the ability to detect lies and Venat was (for better or worse) a respected / famous / infamous ex-member of the Convocation. An oddball she may have been, but that apparently just comes with the seat of Azem.

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The echo can be used to peer at memories etched upon the aether of the soul, but that only gets a look at whatever that person is thinking about.
The echo can also be used to look at memories etched upon the aether of the land, but that only gets you a look at whatever happened at that location.

Both have their drawbacks, you don't get to look at whatever you fancy in either case. I suppose there is also the possibility that beings so well versed in aether might be able to create false etchings upon both, forged memories essentially.

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Originally Posted by Jandor

The echo can be used to peer at memories etched upon the aether of the soul, but that only gets a look at whatever that person is thinking about.

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The Echo is not necessarily always viewing whatever someone happens to be thinking about. For instance when Fordola Echoes WoL's past she suddenly sees seemingly all of their adventures, and there are times WoL Echoes certain events that are unrelated to either a person or a location. Considering the Ancient's increased control of the Echo, it wouldn't be surprising if they could sift through memories at will.

Moreover, Emet does say that they can outright tell whether or not someone is lying. So while the Echo itself could serve to prove the point, it's also an aside.