8.0 speculation

I don't think dropping the other reflections on Ilsabard is likely since Square Enix seems very reluctant to substantially change old maps. And if we dropped the First onto Ilsabard, that would necessitate some very big changes to the Norvrandt maps.

Between the seeds they've sown about using the First's excess light to fix the Thirteenth (which they made a point of mentioning again in 7.5), and the fact that every single reflection we've seen (now including the Fourth) is elementally out-of-whack, I'm pretty convinced that, at some point, we're going to end up creating some kind of giant, IRL version of the elemental chart Urianger showed us in Shadowbringers.

Though whether that would actually help with our "oh god everything's rejoining by itself" problem, I have no idea.

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Originally Posted by 17cupsofcoffee

Though whether that would actually help with our "oh god everything's rejoining by itself" problem, I have no idea.

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My guess is that the planet is basically just trying to seek some level of balance on it's own as opposed to necessarily "needing" to rejoin into one. If we do manage to essentially create that balance ourselves (likely by stabilizing and then balancing the reflections that lean in opposite directions, which is why they keep bringing up the 1st and the 13th) then it seems plausible to me that the planet will no longer need to rejoin itself.

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Originally Posted by StriderShinryu

My guess is that the planet is basically just trying to seek some level of balance on it's own as opposed to necessarily "needing" to rejoin into one. If we do manage to essentially create that balance ourselves (likely by stabilizing and then balancing the reflections that lean in opposite directions, which is why they keep bringing up the 1st and the 13th) then it seems plausible to me that the planet will no longer need to rejoin itself.

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See, my read (and the way I read 17cupsofcoffee's post) is that it's not a need to rejoin or a need for balance, because those two things imply agency that the planet just doesn't have. I think it's essentially weird transdimensional gravity; it's not a need, it's an inevitability.

Which I don't think is necessarily related to elemental imbalance, but I think we'll solve as, like, a tertiary thing behind 'stop the Winterers' and 'stop the Ascians, Again'. I do not believe the Solstice is in any way a pressing thing that we'll actively be moving to solve, primarily because it doesn't end in boss fights; we're gonna spend our time stopping the Winterers one by one, and probably throwing a few Ascians in the woodchipper, and eventually we just sort of incidentally solve the Solstice. My guess is either that one of the Winterers has come up with something we can adapt, or that our crystal-and-key trips somehow themselves set up an apparatus; like a combination Bifrost bridge and load-bearing pillar.

That is indeed the issue as laid out by Halmarut; the Solstice is nature reasserting itself, and the planet does not have a will unto itself that wants this to happen. "Will of the star" was never a natural thing, and without a an entity fulfilling that role capable of keeping the reflections and Source split apart the Solstice is a natural consequence.

Besides which we do not have enough reflections left to create a proper elemental array; Light and Dark are polarities, not elements, and excluding the Thirteenth (Dark), Source (Balance), and First (Light), there are only four reflections left (Ninth = Lightning, Fourth = Ice, Eighth and Eleventh = ???).

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Originally Posted by Cilia

That is indeed the issue as laid out by Halmarut; the Solstice is nature reasserting itself, and the planet does not have a will unto itself that wants this to happen. "Will of the star" was never a natural thing, and without a an entity fulfilling that role capable of keeping the reflections and Source split apart the Solstice is a natural consequence.

Besides which we do not have enough reflections left to create a proper elemental array; Light and Dark are polarities, not elements, and excluding the Thirteenth (Dark), Source (Balance), and First (Light), there are only four reflections left (Ninth = Lightning, Fourth = Ice, Eighth and Eleventh = ???).

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Well, we do see the Eight and Eleventh. In the "worlds beyond" Queen Eternal shows, it is one full of ice (Fourth), one with earth lose from the ground with gravitational anomalies, and one with raging gales. Those are presumably the Eight and Eleventh.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

See, my read (and the way I read 17cupsofcoffee's post) is that it's not a need to rejoin or a need for balance, because those two things imply agency that the planet just doesn't have. I think it's essentially weird transdimensional gravity; it's not a need, it's an inevitability.

Which I don't think is necessarily related to elemental imbalance

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I think you are taking too narrow a read of aetheric imbalance. Aether in the game is a stand-in for energy systems, both actual energy and potential. This has always been something that has tickled me since ARR because they have been so consistent in this. Yes aether has elemental aspects but those are just specialised systems, the same as we have electrical energy, and heat energy, and kinetic energy, and yes gravitational energy. Ceruleum - liquid aether, food - aether that you eat, bodies in FFXIV have aether (energy), are powered by aether (food).

Gravity is a form of energy. Therefore gravity can be reduced to aether in the world of FFXIV. We know that the reflections have elemental imbalance, but they also have aetheric imbalance because right now the Source has what 8(?) times the aether of each of the individual reflections, which in a balanced system is more aether than all the reflections put together. So the Source has 8 times the gravity of the other reflections.

This alone wouldn't be enough if Hydaelyn and Zodiark still existed the barriers being held by Hydaelyn and the aether being animated by Zodiark then the aetheric (gravitational) change wouldn't matter as much because the light barriers would prevent rejoining and the dark would animate the aether such that the reflections were either a) lifted to a higher orbit, or b) had an increase in momentum to sustain the same orbit, thus balancing the aether (gravity) in the system.

The solution then is to balance the aether, of which balancing the elements is one part.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdezmk4SKaI So this youtubers has a few theories about Venat knowing the Solstice.

My speculation, which is subject to change pending 7.5 part II, is the people who wrote the previous xpacs are long gone. By extension, this story will be a letdown unless the current writers are only handling the patches and other writers are handling the xpac. I can't tell if whoever writing it now is completely ignorant of XIV's lore or setting up a massive red herring. I am leaning on the former.

I for one will not contribute to DT quality storytelling for the duration of this game. I recognize many people do not see DT as that bad or see patches as improvement. Yes, the patches are a marginal improvement I would argue is a basic expectation of characters acting like themselves. Looking back at older xpacs is so hard at this point because it just makes you realize the team just wasted two years not setting virtually anything to call back to at the end of this arc. Yes Tural can help us in the future but the original arc was more than that, it was people who are actually part of Eorzean culture and had a real stake in protecting one another. Tural is basically isolationist and only recently became attached to Alexandria, their immediate cooperation feels fake and unearned.

This is because nothing is actually happening in this story (until 7.4). The characters are not experiencing things, like when Thancred met Ryne, to meaningfully recall and solidify as part of the story. Those we did, are Endless or dead. Shale is cool but be honest, she mostly just helped us with a key. Alliances are being formed, but they are generic and impersonal. Am I supposed to feel something about all these beast tribes in DT? Bc I don't. Maybe the arcadion will help us beat Halmarut somehow,and even that feels kinda B tier.

For me Evercold is do or die. If Scions are coming again, can they please get actual arcs where they meaningfully affect the story? Can we leave this reflection and look back on it fondly with people are alive and not small useless children like Gulool Ja who.did nothing the whole story except suffer and cry? I know I am a doomer but man, get it together writers.

There is a reason one of the main things we are talking about is Zero and the First, because barely anything after 6.0 patches is worth theorizing outside the key.

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Originally Posted by Turtledeluxe

My speculation, which is subject to change pending 7.5 part II, is the people who wrote the previous xpacs are long gone.

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All but one person that any of us can name that contributed to writing every previous expansion is still credited in Dawntrail. That one exception was last credited in Heavensward.

You can call any part of the game good or bad if you want, nobody will stop you, but don't make up evidence that goes against concrete facts that we actually have. If you love Shadowbringers so much that you'll declare the game is destroyed by not honoring it, then respect that the exact same people who wrote Shadowbringers did it.


EDIT: Also, the reason we're not speculating on anything from Dawntrail is because the next expansion is very blatantly not taking place in Tural or Alexandria so it's just not relevant. We weren't speculating about Ilsabard for Dawntrail either, because we knew we weren't going to Ilsabard. There is plenty of speculation about the parts of Dawntrail that we do know are coming back--Calyx, and the key--because we know they will be relevant.

Broad-based speculation is also not the only form of love we can convey. I love Dawntrail, and I will talk about it in every single other way, but in the immediate wake of a .5 patch and an expansion reveal, the conversation du jour is not previous stories. We're not talking about Heavensward either, but you're not making a point out of that.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

All but one person that any of us can name that contributed to writing every previous expansion is still credited in Dawntrail. That one exception was last credited in Heavensward.

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Well that leaves us a few likely cases. One is said person left them a very specific outline for the original arc that happened to be good. One is this team has lost their touch. The last is someone had overhwhelming influence on DT who was more concerned with telling their own story than one about our main cast.

Its also not just Shadowbringers. Every xpac including Stormblood saw Scions changing and growing, new alliances being genuinely formed out of naturally occurring events in Eorzea, etc. You cannot sit here and tell me DT was concerned with the cast. It was nearly exclusively about new NPCs. The "division" of Scions was as superficial as the beast tribes. The only single time any Scion contributed something that felt like them was the infamous gondola ride. I wasn't here for Heavensward, I would bet my account people were theorizing about ascians, primals, hydaelyn, the echo, Unukalhai (and by extension many other things), etc. By end of Heavensward we were familiar with Yugiri. We take that all for granted, the massive effort it took to establish myriad plot threads in ARR, some of which were never continued. I see no such effort in DT that would merit it being an origin story for a new arc and in fact, I suspect it will be minimized to cameos. What DT did right is immaterial to me.

And frankly I don't get it at all because even Zero was developed with characters we know, in ways that are consistent with the lore, while DT asked us to believe Ascians somehow overlooked a soul desaturating slaughterhouse with a key that has transdimensional fusion capabilities immediately after an arc about the color of souls and rejoinings. Also Urianger and Thancred would literally never ever team up with Zoraal Ja even before his murderous intent became obvious. They asked us to believe Wuk Lamat, who doesn't even know her own nation well, is better judge of character than Urianger/Thancred. Insane.

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Originally Posted by Turtledeluxe

Well that leaves us a few likely cases. One is said person left them a very specific outline for the original arc that happened to be good. One is this team has lost their touch. The last is someone had overhwhelming influence on DT who was more concerned with telling their own story than one about our main cast.

...[W]hile DT asked us to believe Ascians somehow overlooked a soul desaturating slaughterhouse with a key that has transdimensional fusion capabilities immediately after an arc about the color of souls and rejoinings. Also Urianger and Thancred would literally never ever team up with Zoraal Ja even before his murderous intent became obvious. They asked us to believe Wuk Lamat, who doesn't even know her own nation well, is better judge of character than Urianger/Thancred. Insane.

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Except they were basically just writing by the seat of their pants until the Shadowbringers / Endwalker duology gave us a coherent resolution to the Ascian plotline (if not one that satisfied all parties). There were interviews during Stormblood where Yoshi-P admitted they did not have the Ascian plot fully mapped out. Everything before that is pretty episodic, even if it seeds plot threads that are eventually cashed in.

Why the Ascians never scooped up the Key is a big question mark, but time differentials may play a part in why they did nothing about Alexandrian society; plus they would have no reason to do so, since it was just a reflection and thus doomed to rejoining sooner or later if their plot ever came to fruition. Is it perfect writing? No, but that's what happens when you don't have a plot mapped out from start to finish.

And you may be misremembering, but Thancred and Urianger threw their lot in with Koana, not Zoraal Ja.

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Originally Posted by Turtledeluxe

Well that leaves us a few likely cases. One is said person left them a very specific outline for the original arc that happened to be good. One is this team has lost their touch. The last is someone had overhwhelming influence on DT who was more concerned with telling their own story than one about our main cast.

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No. Stop.

I pointed out the continuity of writers to make it clear to you that your conspiracy theory is objectively and measurably WRONG and you should drop it. There is not some lost and exiled master who is the only person capable of making 'Good FFXIV'; the same people made the entire thing.

You need to accept and reckon with the fact that, rather than some grand conspiracy, writers that you liked made a story that you didn't. Deal with that fact, rather than making up your own.

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Originally Posted by Cilia

Why the Ascians never scooped up the Key is a big question mark, but time differentials may play a part in why they did nothing about Alexandrian society; plus they would have no reason to do so, since it was just a reflection and thus doomed to rejoining sooner or later if their plot ever came to fruition. Is it perfect writing? No, but that's what happens when you don't have a plot mapped out from start to finish.

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Moving into actual discussion, what we can say at this point is that the Ascians had some level of fingers in the pie of Alexandria. They weren't mentioned for most of that time because it just wasn't really important or necessarily clear to anybody for most of that story; Alexandria and Preservation were the main problem, regardless of how they got there. It was only when Calyx used some straight-up creation magic that the question of the Ascians became relevant, and the Scions jumped on that one real fast, albeit without much of an active pursuit angle. Knowing what we do now, we can reason that Calyx has likely been in contact with Halmarut since before Plan Zodiark fell apart; what exactly that means isn't clear, but the question is more on Halmarut's head than anything.

The Ascians--or at least Halmarut--do seem to know about the key, what it is and does. However, crucially, the Ascians wouldn't actually have reason to care except as an interim tool. The Ascians can already cross dimensions; they don't need the key to do it, so to them the key's instead a trick to throw at a pawn to further their own plans, like the Heart of Sabik or the treasure of Seal Rock. It would make complete sense that they'd just leave it with Preservation and then later Tural, because it's just not important to them by itself.

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Originally Posted by Cilia

Why the Ascians never scooped up the Key is a big question mark

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Do they need it per se ? I always thought they could just... travel between shards with no worries?

Beside, there is still something I can't wrap my head around regarding the key, and maybe the lovely lore nerds can help me here. If the key is just a way to travel between shards and nothing else, and it is made by the ancients, then it must have been made after Venat's decision to split the world into shards, but before it happened. How much time is there in that? And it would be one of Venat's followers, but not Azem as they were not part of this group ? Yet the key seems to react to Azem's stone ? So Azem would have had to know about Venat's plan, and decided to creathe the key before the Sundering ? And there's still the... why would Azem do that ? Why would they think ahead of a way to travel between shards for the future shards of their soul?

That's kind of why I think the key is able to open gateway between shards, but there has to be a main use beyond that. And I also believe that while it is Ancient, it was not made specifically by Azem, but rather that it recognized a strong presence of an Ancient soul in the WoL, which allowed the WoL to use it.

(And is it possibly Halmarut who told Zoral Ja to use the key to go to the Ninth ?)

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Originally Posted by Mansion

Beside, there is still something I can't wrap my head around regarding the key, and maybe the lovely lore nerds can help me here. If the key is just a way to travel between shards and nothing else, and it is made by the ancients, then it must have been made after Venat's decision to split the world into shards, but before it happened. How much time is there in that? And it would be one of Venat's followers, but not Azem as they were not part of this group ? Yet the key seems to react to Azem's stone ? So Azem would have had to know about Venat's plan, and decided to creathe the key before the Sundering ? And there's still the... why would Azem do that ? Why would they think ahead of a way to travel between shards for the future shards of their soul?

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So this is actually the main reason I was against the read that the key was an Ancient creation: there is no good reason for the Ancients to have made something capable of traveling across the shards. They could never have used this, wouldn't have had logical or emotional use for it, and wouldn't even know how to make the damn thing in the first place. Ironically, given the name, they don't really have the ethos to make this decision; the key just isn't something the Ancients would have made according to any information we have on them, so it kinda feels unsatisfying and out of nowhere to me that they did.

And to your Halmarut thought: I don't think Zoraal Ja would've been part of her decisions, for simple reason that I don't think he's that subtle or all that motivated by the Golden City itself. Now, Sereel Ja I could buy, but he's definitely gone off the reservation by the time of the alliance raids, and is completely outside the Winterers' organization now, if he was ever inside them.

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Originally Posted by Cilia

And you may be misremembering, but Thancred and Urianger threw their lot in with Koana, not Zoraal Ja.

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Lmao, I did mix this up. However, I'd still level the same criticism. I think there was maybe one single campfire scene of this group genuinely interacting. Koana isn't written in a way that makes their partnership especially compelling. They don't actually experience much together that helps either side grow in a meaningful way. That's not to say they don't experience anything at all together, it's just not very interesting and there's not much for Urianger or Thancred to contribute or draw from after the fact. And this is my issue with DT. If you're going to have Urianger or Y'shtola in the story, maybe give them an arc where they look after Gulool Ja or something and offer their own unique wisdom to get him through his suffering. If Alphinaud isn't going to be interacting with and advising Wuk Lamat (which he should have done a lot more of given his unique experience in geopolitics), then leave him behind in Radz-at-Han setting up that alliance that happens later. Maybe instead of giving Wuk Lamat more lines than the game's entire history (per character), Alphinaud could have his own entire plot line there that they cut to for intermissions. I don't know, I'm spitballing. DT had a foundation sure, I just think it needed *more things actually happening* between nearly all the characters, all the time,

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

No. Stop.

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This is not an argument. Putting that aside, I framed this as speculation and it's not that serious. It's mostly the same people? Ok fine. They put out a critically inferior work.

And yes I do realize, I'm speaking more to character development, dialogue, the moment to moment of the storytelling. This is more of a lore discussion, which is a separate thing. However, I'd still say DT fails to set the same standard as, ARR. To be fair, maybe this is their intention. I was personally disappointed and felt as though we were left with more of a small mysterybox that points to the singular path the plot is seemingly going (for now) rather than having at least a few different threads that genuinely left me wondering what's in the future. If anything, I am wondering how they could be so carelessly handling their own content with the possible contradictions it is presenting (as I said, I will wait for 7.5 p2 to judge).

I also want to say, the reason I am waiting is because it can be done. There are problems with the story they are telling that can be fully resolved, quite easily. However I am not going to write the story for them as many players generously do on this forum. For example, they are clearly aware of some level of contradiction given they're flirting with the Hydaelyn question. I'm not sure if that's because they don't know the answer yet, they don't plan to answer it ever, or because there's a larger plot behind the Solistice that resolves most of the issues I am pondering.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

And to your Halmarut thought: I don't think Zoraal Ja would've been part of her decisions, for simple reason that I don't think he's that subtle or all that motivated by the Golden City itself. Now, Sereel Ja I could buy, but he's definitely gone off the reservation by the time of the alliance raids, and is completely outside the Winterers' organization now, if he was ever inside them.

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Then, doesn't it just feel too convenient that Zoraal Ja's plan happened to greatly benefit Calyx's own? Or is it just that the Ninth always knew about this link to the Source, and waited for the perfect moment to use this connexion for their own benefit (which is the Winterer's benefit too)? Maybe this has been explained in the MSQ, I just don't remember it that well.

Otherwise yes, I agree with what you said about Azem, I remember we discussed this when 7.4 came out. That's what led me to think that the key has some other purpose, and it "just happens" to allow to travel between shards too. Or perhaps, while it wasn't made by Azem, it might have been inspired by Azem's power.
That still leaves the motive for the Ancient to create such a key in the air though. Unless it was made by someone opposed to Venat's plan, and hoped they could use it for the Rejoinings (thus an Ascian, although I still have doubts about who knew what Venat was doing)
I imagine most of September's MSQ will focus on the Ethos, how it came to Tural (and how to use it to send our companions to the Fourth too I guess)

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Originally Posted by Mansion

Then, doesn't it just feel too convenient that Zoraal Ja's plan happened to greatly benefit Calyx's own? Or is it just that the Ninth always knew about this link to the Source, and waited for the perfect moment to use this connexion for their own benefit (which is the Winterer's benefit too)? Maybe this has been explained in the MSQ, I just don't remember it that well.

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I wouldn't call that especially contrived as far as dramatic logic goes, no. For as far as the story goes, remember that Tural picks up this baton twenty years ago, and from that point the 'gate to the golden city' is a closely-guarded secret. (Which incidentally makes using it as the 'finish line' of the rite of succession very clever in a way I've never thought about; your goal is to find the truth about the thing you'd have had to learn about as Dawnservant anyway.) However, it's a secret that Sereel Ja knows, because he's the royal seer, so he already knows both where and (roughly) what the key is and what's in the Skydeep Cenote... which happens to play into Preservation's hands, because the entire reason Tural has it is because Robor and Alayla wanted to get the key away from them.

None of this really requires people to be working on any extra levels; it just requires one man with the right access and the wrong ambitions.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

I wouldn't call that especially contrived as far as dramatic logic goes, no. For as far as the story goes, remember that Tural picks up this baton twenty years ago, and from that point the 'gate to the golden city' is a closely-guarded secret. (Which incidentally makes using it as the 'finish line' of the rite of succession very clever in a way I've never thought about; your goal is to find the truth about the thing you'd have had to learn about as Dawnservant anyway.) However, it's a secret that Sereel Ja knows, because he's the royal seer, so he already knows both where and (roughly) what the key is and what's in the Skydeep Cenote... which happens to play into Preservation's hands, because the entire reason Tural has it is because Robor and Alayla wanted to get the key away from them.

None of this really requires people to be working on any extra levels; it just requires one man with the right access and the wrong ambitions.

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To be fair, I had forgotten about Robor and Alayla giving the key lol. Thanks, that ties things better in my mind ; Turaal knew about the gate and the key, sort of knew the key could open the gate, and guessed what's beyond the gate could be a source of great power. So Zoraal Ja's plan makes sense on his own (backed by Sereel Ja), and it ties with Preservation's ongoing plan, which ties with the Winterers' plan.

So now what we still dont know is :
- Who made Ethos
- What was Ethos originally made for
- How Ethos precisely works

Now my next brain-knot : Halmarut's knowledge about the Solstice. It would work with the theory that some people outside of Venat's plan knew about the Sundering, but also knew that one scenario would lead to the Solstice, thus the need of a way to travel between shards. Yet, why would the Solstice be different than the 13 rejoinings that the Ascians wanted ? How is she sure about it ?

One theory I've heard about Ethos is that its an inversion of Azem's magic. Instead of bringing allies to oneself it draws oneself to others. And the movement between shards is ultimately a result of them technically being parts of the same world.

Incidentally, I love the image Halmarut gives us of the reflections, a bunch of worlds layered on top of each other, with distinct colour tinges.

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Originally Posted by Layte_Aeon

Incidentally, I love the image Halmarut gives us of the reflections, a bunch of worlds layered on top of each other, with distinct colour tinges.

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I love this as well! It's neat given that light is what split the star and held its reflections apart, because it's like a nod to a prism splitting white light into its separate wavelengths or colors.

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Originally Posted by Mansion

So now what we still dont know is :
- Who made Ethos

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Do correct me if I'm wrong, but I was under the impression it was explicitly stated to be a creation of Azem in Days Gone By, Days Yet to Come:

"Oh my, how careless of our Azem."

Thus spoke Hythlodaeus, having ambled into his office at the Bureau of the Architect to find a crystal sitting rather conspicuously on a chair reserved for guests. Slipped from a singularly adventurous pocket, no doubt. He marveled at the way the light played on its facets, like the surface of a tranquil lake, and recalled the first visitor he had received that morning.

In Japanese it's even more blatant with the line:

手のひら大の、澄んだ青色に輝くそれは、朝一番乗りでここを訪れた友人のものに違いない。中に収められているのは本人作の「旅を快適にする道具のイデア、第十四弾」とのことで、その構造について創造物管理局長の立場からアドバイスが欲しいとのことだった。
"In the palm of his hand shimmered with a blue light, a creation of his friend--the first to arrive [in the Bureau of the Architect] that morning. It was an item to make journeying more comfortable*, and they sought out [Hythlodaeus'] advice on the structure."
*Quite literally "the 14th iteration/item" though I'm not sure how to word it naturally in English. It was by no means something Azem perfected immediately, regardless.

(Very rushed translation, please take it with a grain of salt.)

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Originally Posted by Touken_Ranbu

Do correct me if I'm wrong, but I was under the impression it was explicitly stated to be a creation of Azem in Days Gone By, Days Yet to Come:

"Oh my, how careless of our Azem."

Thus spoke Hythlodaeus, having ambled into his office at the Bureau of the Architect to find a crystal sitting rather conspicuously on a chair reserved for guests. Slipped from a singularly adventurous pocket, no doubt. He marveled at the way the light played on its facets, like the surface of a tranquil lake, and recalled the first visitor he had received that morning.

In Japanese it's even more blatant with the line:

手のひら大の、澄んだ青色に輝くそれは、朝一番乗りでここを訪れた友人のものに違いない。中に収められているのは本人作の「旅を快適にする道具のイデア、第十四弾」とのことで、その構造について創造物管理局長の立場からアドバイスが欲しいとのことだった。
"In the palm of his hand shimmered with a blue light, a creation of his friend--the first to arrive [in the Bureau of the Architect] that morning. It was an item to make journeying more comfortable*, and they sought out [Hythlodaeus'] advice on the structure."
*Quite literally "the 14th iteration/item" though I'm not sure how to word it naturally in English. It was by no means something Azem perfected immediately, regardless.

(Very rushed translation, please take it with a grain of salt.)

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That's... basically definitionally not explicit. Azem made things to help with traveling, so yes this theoretically fits within their remit (except, as I've mentioned before, the reflections don't exist to be traveled to in their time), but nothing suggests this crystal--or any of them--were the key. Remember that crystals were just a regular storage mechanism back then, the fact that it was a crystal doesn't mean anything.

...especially because, as you yourself translated, the crystal in that story is blue which the key is clearly not. English's comparison to a 'tranquil lake' is more ambiguous, but also doesn't fit; the key's actually kind of a busy design.

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Originally Posted by Mansion

To be fair, I had forgotten about Robor and Alayla giving the key lol. Thanks, that ties things better in my mind ; Turaal knew about the gate and the key, sort of knew the key could open the gate, and guessed what's beyond the gate could be a source of great power. So Zoraal Ja's plan makes sense on his own (backed by Sereel Ja), and it ties with Preservation's ongoing plan, which ties with the Winterers' plan.

So now what we still dont know is :
- Who made Ethos
- What was Ethos originally made for
- How Ethos precisely works

Now my next brain-knot : Halmarut's knowledge about the Solstice. It would work with the theory that some people outside of Venat's plan knew about the Sundering, but also knew that one scenario would lead to the Solstice, thus the need of a way to travel between shards. Yet, why would the Solstice be different than the 13 rejoinings that the Ascians wanted ? How is she sure about it ?

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I find it particularly interesting that the English translation of the Ethos voice uses identical language to Halmarut. This could mean it is Halmarut or someone she is affiliated with. It could also mean the team randomly decided to start using identical phrases in scenes of close proximity.

I am referring to end of 7.4, when Halmarut clearly mentions holding fast and ever onward.

I would be curious to know if the other languages use identical phrasing as such.

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Originally Posted by Touken_Ranbu

Do correct me if I'm wrong, but I was under the impression it was explicitly stated to be a creation of Azem in Days Gone By, Days Yet to Come:

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+1 to Cleretic's note about the color of the crystal in JP, and also Hythlodaeus does in fact later mention:

"Azem left a concept crystal in my office."

Concept Crystals are specifically just those hexagonal crystals in the Watcher's Palace and the Anyders, the ones that look suspiciously like Memoria. While I certainly think this section of the story is designed to get us thinking about Azem leaving things behind for people, either intentionally or otherwise, this combined with the JP description of its colour and facets, as Cleretic pointed out Ethos' busier design, makes it a little more obvious that Ethos is not this specific crystal.

Ethos is all but confirmed to be Azem's short of the 8.0 Narrator showing up in Evercold or 7.56 and physically turning to the camera and saying "Ethos was made by Azem", so yes, that's not really in doubt. But the evidence for it is a little more substantial than just any old mention of a crystal belonging to Azem. Especially because we know all the Ancients were skilled with some form of creation magic and Azem wouldn't really be any exception to that, obviously they would have SOME Concept Crystals.

Instead, look to the Sphene Trial and the blatant Ancient Voice that does not match anyone else's, and its reactions to the Azem Constellation Crystal and Calyx remarking on the Constellation Crystal during Zelenia Recollection, the density of it matching Amaurot's, the design matching Amaurot's, the way it moves Aether across the Rift, the name of the expansion being "Golden Legacy", all of which are far more explicit.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Moving into actual discussion, what we can say at this point is that the Ascians had some level of fingers in the pie of Alexandria.

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I mean... maybe. Halmarut knowing about Ethos doesn't mean the Ascians (as a whole) were necessarily aware of it; Emet-Selch's Ultima Thule monologue suggests he was, but even if that's the case it doesn't mean the Ascians as a group were backing Preservation. As essentially an extension of the Winterers, it's in a very weird place because Robor and Alayla delivered Krile and Ethos to the Source 20 years ago. It seems to be a pet project of Halmarut's or something she decided to look into in the event the "will of the star" position was vacated, which is weird when the Ascians had no reason to believe their plan to fully rejoin Etheirys would fail.

Alexandria does follow the Ascians' MO for rejoining (introduce new, powerful tool people fight over, creating an elemental imbalance) so them having a hand in the Storm Surge makes sense, but Preservation was active before (or at least while) the Storm Surge ruined the Ninth, and it wouldn't make sense for that to be so if they're just a subsidiary of the Winterers (which they seem to be by present accounts) who are apparently acting in accordance with Halmarut's Solstice thesis (which wouldn't be worth worrying about unless the complete rejoining was already kiboshed). It's starting to look a little fuzzy, logically.

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Originally Posted by Turtledeluxe

Lmao, I did mix this up. However, I'd still level the same criticism.

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Your criticism was that Thancred and Urianger were bad judges of character for putting their weight behind Zoraal Ja; they did not, and considering the man they did support (Koana) is a perfectly capable leader and shrewd politician, I really can't agree doing so was an exercise in bad judgment. Was he a bit hasty to try pushing new technology on Tural? Maybe. But despite limited screentime he ultimately turned out to be humble enough to grasp his shortcomings and held down the fort while we went traipsing around Heritage Found, so.

I'm not saying Dawntrail's writing was perfect, just that this exact point has no merit. I agree the writing around the Scions was clunky, but that seems to have been a problem with everyone not named Wuk Lamat (and to a lesser extent Sphene in her triplicate forms).

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Originally Posted by Cilia

Your criticism was that Thancred and Urianger were bad judges of character for putting their weight behind Zoraal Ja; they did not, and considering the man they did support (Koana) is a perfectly capable leader and shrewd politician, I really can't agree doing so was an exercise in bad judgment. Was he a bit hasty to try pushing new technology on Tural? Maybe. But despite limited screentime he ultimately turned out to be humble enough to grasp his shortcomings and held down the fort while we went traipsing around Heritage Found, so.
I'm not saying Dawntrail's writing was perfect, just that this exact point has no merit. I agree the writing around the Scions was clunky, but that seems to have been a problem with everyone not named Wuk Lamat (and to a lesser extent Sphene in her triplicate forms).

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I directly mentioned believability while also noting that they would not partner with Zoraal Ja. My presupposition could be true since they did not, in fact, choose him. As for Koana its not insane, its just still unbelievable. I remember them getting the letter and listening to their interactions and I didn't buy it. Yes, their relationship to Koana is innocuous, tepid, unoffensive, whatever you want to call it. But its so much of those things that its like, anyone could have been his allies and the result would be mostly the same.

Like when Urianger hangs out with Lopporits or, to use DT, when Y'Shtola teams up with Shale, that's quintessentially their characters. There wasn't enough inherent relevance or enough dialogue to show me this team up was necessary or even uniquely useful to either party.

For example, maybe this resonates with Thancred because he had a tough dad with high expectations. Let them share anything other than being good natured and wanting to help others. That's like. Almost everyone in this game.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

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Originally Posted by Prometeo

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Thank you for taking the time to clarify! I would've continued on thinking that Azem 100% created it with the linked story being conclusive evidence...
My memory of Dawntrail lore is faulty, it seems.

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Originally Posted by Turtledeluxe

I directly mentioned believability while also noting that they would not partner with Zoraal Ja. My presupposition could be true since they did not, in fact, choose him. As for Koana its not insane, its just still unbelievable. I remember them getting the letter and listening to their interactions and I didn't buy it. Yes, their relationship to Koana is innocuous, tepid, unoffensive, whatever you want to call it. But its so much of those things that its like, anyone could have been his allies and the result would be mostly the same.

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Koana actually makes complete sense for Thancred and Urianger to support, not just because he very directly called for Sharlayan help, but because he is, at the outset of the rite of succession, the best option. He's educated, he's got a shrewd political mind, he's allied with a known nation that mostly don't hate, and he's got a plan for his home country; when the other options are two different flavors of budding dictators and a woman that nobody yet takes seriously, he's a great pick not just for the future of Tural as a nation, but for avoiding the massive war that Zoraal Ja was explicitly going to start, and that Bakool Ja Ja was probably gonna do eventually too.

The problems with Koana as a leader instead spring up across the rite, and are a great example of what a campaign for leadership (which the rite of succession basically is) actually does bring out; that Koana's vision for his country isn't actually what his country needs, he's just importing what's worked elsewhere without having done any work to check if it's functional or even wanted in Tural. Koana's journey is one of learning that his homeland isn't the primitive backwater that he thought it was, and that while some people are receptive, rampant modernization both isn't always welcome or what's needed. He's sort of a harmless (and fixable) version of Zoraal Ja and Bakool Ja Ja: he's turning up assuming he already has the answer to every problem, but learns over time that you really need to hear what the question is before giving your answer.

Thancred and Urianger don't get journeys, because they're there to prop up and progress Koana's story, as well as to broadly legitimize him as a 'good guy'; if he didn't have the support of people we know to be allies, he would look like the most Seto Kaiba-ass secondary antagonist around. But Thancred and Urianger also don't need one; Thancred got Shadowbringers and Urianger got Shadowbringers and Endwalker. Not everyone needs an arc all the time, and trying to give everyone an arc is just a recipe for a bloated, aimless mess. (EDIT: And I'd argue does cause problems later on, with the overlapping expertises and arcs of Y'shtola and G'raha meaning neither of them get to do anything.)

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Thancred and Urianger don't get journeys, because they're there to prop up and progress Koana's story, as well as to broadly legitimize him as a 'good guy'; if he didn't have the support of people we know to be allies, he would look like the most Seto Kaiba-ass secondary antagonist around. But Thancred and Urianger also don't need one; Thancred got Shadowbringers and Urianger got Shadowbringers and Endwalker. Not everyone needs an arc all the time, and trying to give everyone an arc is just a recipe for a bloated, aimless mess. (EDIT: And I'd argue does cause problems later on, with the overlapping expertises and arcs of Y'shtola and G'raha meaning neither of them get to do anything.)

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I agree with the idea that Scions can't all uniformly have a dramatic arc like say, Thancred and Ryne, every xpac. I would argue they don't. I disagree for example Thancred had a strong role in Endwalker, I felt he was mostly there for flavor. Lopporits also are more like a semi arc, a vibe check that makes "complete sense" for Urianger's character. Just making the qualifications "Are you Sharlayan adjacent", "Are you good natured" makes this association shallow at best and contrived at worst. I'm arguing they needed maybe two or three more campfire scenes and just other scenes in general. Like maybe instead of having Bakool Ja Ja setting Valigarmanda loose off screen, he somehow tricks their party into doing it. I want to see them deliberating over and experiencing the Alexandria attacks, more than I did. And so on and so forth. I think the fact this did not happen is not due to it being Koana's story or the necessary pace to tell DT's story, I think they just don't have any real strong reason for those Scions to be there, it just barely made sense and they wanted them for the advertising of the xpac.

Thus I would submit the advice that just as we do not need major arcs constantly, we also do not need every Scion in every xpac all the time. Maybe Koana should have partnered with one of the Pelu Pelu who is a friend of their family, or something, and they could have used that to give us a more personal insight into Tural. Or is it that there isn't enough "story" there to do that. And that's exactly my point, it comes across as very uninspired.

This is also, btw, how you solve the "Scions divided" problem, by having characters actually do stuff that creates stakes between them personally. What we got was "we are competitors simply by nature of it being a competition but I would be fine if I or the other one won" and vice versa which is a flat contest.

I dont see why we had any interest or stake in the succession of a foreign continent of baby sacrificing savages that cant even grow their own food.
Especially to the point of fighting each other over it after everything the scions have been through together. Im glad that proposed plot point of opposing scions ended up forgotten about.

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Originally Posted by Wildheaven182

I dont see why we had any interest or stake in the succession of a foreign continent of baby sacrificing savages that cant even grow their own food.
Especially to the point of fighting each other over it after everything the scions have been through together. Im glad that proposed plot point of opposing scions ended up forgotten about.

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Fully agree. In my view, it should have been framed as a friendly competition. The team was going for an anime beach episode but they forgot to maybe watch some anime beach episodes and understand how a low stakes story can still play on characters' established traits and personalities to make the tournament feel fun. The team was trying to have it all. Beach episode, anime tournament, tons of worldbuilding, family issues, all before we get to the other 50%. That's nearly impossible to do well. It was doomed from the start.

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Originally Posted by Wildheaven182

I dont see why we had any interest or stake in the succession of a foreign continent of baby sacrificing savages that cant even grow their own food.
Especially to the point of fighting each other over it after everything the scions have been through together. Im glad that proposed plot point of opposing scions ended up forgotten about.

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The idea of the scions having a serious schism and seriously fighting one another was never really on the table. But the idea of friendly competition, with different scions having their reasons for backing different candidates, could have led to some fun interactions before they eventually inevitably reconcile and unite again.

Remember that most of the scions also have scholarly backgrounds. They could have had actual interesting discussions on the subject. Instead of the nothing burger we ended up with. It made me want to pull my hair out when the Twins went to the New World ostensibly to learn things to help Garlemald, only for nothing of interesting to happen with that idea all expansion, and then to end with them coming back to Jules to say 'understanding people is good. :D'

Instead we just get Thancred slightly inconveniencing us in the first dungeon and then nothing else, which was kind of dull. Why bother to tease that story thread at all if it wasn't going to lead to anything?

It reminds me of the whole 'become what you must. Become the warrior of darkness' thing. Obviously the WOL was never going to become a villain but it ended up meaning nothing except a change in terminology and it was actually the blessing of light in the first place that allowed us to fill that role. People are going to be disapointed when a potentially interesting story angle is brought up but then not explored in an interesting way.

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Originally Posted by Wildheaven182

I dont see why we had any interest or stake in the succession of a foreign continent of baby sacrificing savages that cant even grow their own food.
Especially to the point of fighting each other over it after everything the scions have been through together. Im glad that proposed plot point of opposing scions ended up forgotten about.

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...okay that is a CONCERNINGLY bad read of Dawntrail to the point where I'm not sure it's worth refuting, I don't think this is possibly a comment made in good faith. But, here we go.

The reason we (and Thancred and Urianger) turned up is literally because we were asked, but all of the characters involved are broadly humanitarian; they want the best for everyone, and 'everyone' includes the people of this nation that they've never been to.

That nation is not 'baby sacrificing savages' oh my god how did you even GET here. Tural is certainly less technologically advanced than the Eorzean average, but that does not make them lesser people, and certainly not 'savages'; in fact, there's a solid case that Eorzea is more savage than Tural, because Tural's different races are all really friendly to each other, and nobody in Tural has been performing human sacrifices in recent history. Tural's pretty great, they just haven't figured out, like... ocean-faring boats.

The exception is Mamook, but Mamook also are not 'baby sacrificing savages', and aren't really indicative of anything greater. Mamook's just a conservative town that doesn't know how to solve their own problems, and have an old-fashioned outlook doing them more harm than good; they aren't 'sacrificing babies', they have an outlook causing a REALLY haunting infant mortality rate. Not only would basing your entire read on Tural on this reading of Mamook be like me basing my opinion of the entire U.S. on the worst possible reading of Tennessee, Mamook are also just also people who deserve help. They're just a warmer, blue version of Garlemald, and we're also helping Garlemald.


I've also over time just stopped caring about people bringing up that 'the Scions didn't really have conflict' side of things, because... frankly, that was one slide of fanfest hype. It was clearly marketing copy, and I care little about it in Dawntrail in the same way that I care little about the 'become what you must' hinting for Shadowbringers. And I think given context it actually makes more sense that they didn't clash, because the clash between Wuk Lamat and Koana was always pretty tepid and good-natured; both sides agree that Zoraal Ja really had to be stopped, and beyond that the clash is clearly between two figures with mutual respect but different outlooks. It makes complete sense that the Scions never really clashed outside of some good-natured slowdown tactics in Ihuykatumu; there's no ire or animosity here. They're basically just playing for two different teams. Would've been kinda neat to have a 'Thancred and Urianger' boss fight in the middle of that dungeon, but I don't think we needed that, and anything more might've actually detracted from the real focus.