Lore Book Preview Spotted on the 14-Hour Broadcast

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cq1ekILVYAAMvoZ.jpg

So～♪

Who's exci～ted?

I want.....

Id be worried about spoilers, but I do want it.

WANT

*opens empty purse as dust blows out and cries*

Ah well, I guess I better start saving for it.. on top of everything else I've been meaning to get but neglected due to money being needed elsewhere (HW artbook, HW OST, 2.55 OST etc)....

That elemental wheel makes me sad it has no real gameplay presence... I get why it wouldn't work in the traditional sense, but I think it could make a great Job mechanic for something like Red Mage... Most Jobs have rotations, might as well make one that adheres to the elemental wheel... Lord knows looking at that wheel hurts my sensibilities with regards to the elements Black Mage and White Mage throw out...

Did they just have some odd pages from it, or did they hold up the actual book? I want a sense of how big this'll be...

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Originally Posted by Nalien

I think it could make a great Job mechanic for something like Red Mage

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Agreed. You know how Ninja spins through mudra? There's no reason a mage couldn't spin through enspells (and not even necessarily off the GCD; it could be part of the main rotation). When you're building up combinations or rotations, it's just mechanics wearing a dress, you know? I've always imagined XIV!RDM as a front-line INT-based jack-of-all-mages and master-of-none that could combine and/or rotate elements to achieve different effects. Mostly DPS, sure, but they could combo up certain debuffs that are worth the lost rotation to manage a longer fight, or to take down a big pull quicker, or sacrifice outgoing DPS entirely for a moment to clutch a buff or heal-assist. I've already written it off as a lost pipe-dream, though.

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Originally Posted by Nalien

Did they just have some odd pages from it, or did they hold up the actual book? I want a sense of how big this'll be...

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Oda-san had some loose sheets and held up what you see there as they were chatting about who everyone was and what recent events were. There's a good chance that the sheets he's holding are 1:1, right? So imagine roughly 300 of those compiled into something that would pass as a "blunt instrument", and scale slightly for what-if sizes.

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Originally Posted by Anonymoose

I've already written it off as a lost pipe-dream, though.

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Pipe-dreams are my specialty! To this day, I'll stick to Musketeer => Scholar; Why else did Merlwyb have a display case with a pistol and book in her office?! Battlefield medic with a pistol for DPS, with Scholar adding a book for Stratagem style buffs! We've had Scholar for years now, but gosh darn it! Musketeer => Scholar was perfect...

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Originally Posted by Anonymoose

Oda-san had some loose sheets and held up what you see there as they were chatting about who everyone was and what recent events were. There's a good chance that the sheets he's holding are 1:1, right? So imagine roughly 300 of those compiled into something that would pass as a "blunt instrument", and scale slightly for what-if sizes.

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Hmm... Something similar to the art books then?

You know... I think I'd prefer something smaller, something closer to a regular book, rather than a text book... Almost certainly not a cost effective way to produce this thing, but damn... Can you imagine having several lore tomes? A book on magic, another on martial arts, another on history, and so on...

Guess I'm going to need to shuffle up my shelf either way... Stone and Steel was a bad enough squeeze...

Shut up and take my money already!

I can haz advanced aetherology? For science?

...well, guess going to visit the boyfriend will have to wait even more <_<

I want it aswell :)

I bet ethys asher grew a nerd boner when he saw that book.

I'm liiiiiviiiiiing for this
Can't wait for it

http://s2.quickmeme.com/img/ac/ac833...c541da8b7f.jpg

Why is ice listed as astral on the wheel?

From what I could read from the lore book in the section Life and Aether

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Within all beings- whether is it man, mammel or even plants?- does aether flow. It is the spark? which grants life to the _____. Conversely? death can be said __ ____ ____ aether has left a corp____? object. From this it is clear to see why many scholars saw? the words "life" and "aether" interchangeably?. It can be assummed that a young man of ____ ____ and body will possess a high concentration of aetherial energy in his? _____, whereas an elder man, or ___ ______ with corruption, will ____. Some scholar have expanded upun this hypothesis saying that the consumption of food serves not only to fill the belly, but to provide the body with aether __ through ____.

Aether is not by any ____ ____. It constantly flows through creation, _____ currents through earth, water, and air which ensure that life is ______ throughout the world. The stoppage of these currents would be ___ ___ the _____ of a limb? cut off from the hearth. Aether is the lifeblood of Hydaelyn, and without it She- and Her children- would perish.

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I've made a huge mistake.

Cannot wait for this. If there is an ingame bonus for getting this, any theories of what it would be? Wind Up Matoya maybe?

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Originally Posted by Fevelle

Why is ice listed as astral on the wheel?

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I suspect it to be an artifact of ambiguity; that is to say that ice isn't astral on the wheel. The hexagram (two overlaid triangles creating a six-pointed star) has a long-held association with elemental theory and alchemy in the real world (one of the few things taken from Western elemental traditions; the cycles and the void and all that are more Eastern traditions).

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...symbol.svg.pngEarth https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...symbol.svg.pngWater https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...symbol.svg.pngAir https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...symbol.svg.pngFire
If you overlay Fire and Earth in opposition, you get a hexagram in which Earth and Air become apparent as well.

Notice also that, even in real world alchemy, Fire and Air point to the heavens, while Earth and Water point to the nether.
All that's missing are the "polar" elements of Lightning and Ice.

Astral is decidedly Wind/Lighting\Fire and Umbral is decidedly Water\Ice/Earth. It looks like, in order to keep the wheel's shape and maintain the hexagram, they colored one cycle black and one cycle white to differentiate them. Notice that the white cycle has two astral elements and the black cycle has two umbral elements. That itself might imply that the CYCLE is aspect-heavy without necessarily implying that ALL OF THE ELEMENTS WITHIN THE CYCLE are, as well.

Remember, Astral and Umbral are in all things.

Still, on my diagrams, the triangles are light gray and dark gray. (Just in case that ambiguity was going to cause a problem.)

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Originally Posted by Anonymoose

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OH, now that I zoomed the image I see! The hexagram has nothing to do with umbral/astral polarity, the upper elements are labeled as Astral while the lower ones are labeled Umbral.

I've been looking forward to this for a long time now.

I was actually thinking of starting a thread asking if any information had surface on it, I am pleasantly surprised. My wallet is downstairs weeping, which I believe is an entirely unrelated matter.

I'm just going to leave this here because I'm too busy reading it to do anything else.

EDITS (AND PTERODACTYL SCREECHING) INCOMING

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Originally Posted by Anonymoose

I'm just going to leave this here because I'm too busy reading it to do anything else.

EDITS (AND PTERODACTYL SCREECHING) INCOMING

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Cant. wait.
Translating/reading this makes me feel like a real scholar >: D

http://i.imgur.com/u4LeQTk.gif

I'm hoping that the lore book will be available for order after the NA fanfest, although I'm afraid that it won't be until after the last of the three fests. Does anyone know if they have given a date for general release?

Even its just a little teaser of the lore book. It already gaves a lot of info and more speculation...

*Squints*

Huh, so belief in Hydaelyn in Eorzea is like belief in Copernican heliocentrism back in the European Renaissance? I.E. they're both borne out by the available evidence but they'll also both earn you a visit from the more zealous sort of Inquisitor?

Also I already said this over on the Reddit thread but I'm both happy and worried that they're keeping it to "things an NPC could reasonably know" vs the Whole Truth. It's a very immersive approach to Lore and I appreciate it a lot but at the same time it's going to lead to a lot of confusion for people who are used to Lore resources being absolutely authoritative.

ETA: "Sheep"? "SHEEP"?! We want none of your strange foreign Othard words here, Ser! Call it a Karkul, as Nophica named it!

Just found another page (japanese) with a preview of the Lorebook. I hope we will soon get a date when avaible in the Onlinestore.

A (very abridged from the looks of it) summary of the Umbral and Astral eras! History of the jobs and equipment! I seriously hope these are available from the online store in the not-so-distant future...

I really, really hope this book will be available in Australia (Square Enix store is for digital purchases only down here).

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Originally Posted by Anonymoose

I'm just going to leave this here because I'm too busy reading it to do anything else.

EDITS (AND PTERODACTYL SCREECHING) INCOMING

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Let me use this thread for something.
Dear Anonymoose, do you know of something (anything) Nym has done during the War of the Magi? I mean, notable fights, creations or even how they tried to defend themselves?

I have read everything I could find about the war and Nymian's actions seemed so... underwhelming.

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Originally Posted by Nestama

I really, really hope this book will be available in Australia (Square Enix store is for digital purchases only down here).

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I hope it makes to Amazon. I live in Brazil so it's kinda hard to get any merch here.

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Originally Posted by Fevelle

Dear Anonymoose, do you know of something (anything) Nym has done during the War of the Magi? I mean, notable fights, creations or even how they tried to defend themselves?

I have read everything I could find about the war and Nymian's actions seemed so... underwhelming.

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Not much in the way of specifics. The war was very long, so the cities of the time constantly forged and broke alliances with one another. The only named battle I remember was the Battle of the Gods' Grip. Nym discovered that Amdapor was going to lay siege to their city and successfully repelled them before they even made camp by ambushing their landing craft on the beach.

If I recall right, Nym wasn't a very impressive city in terms of manpower, size, or technology ... mainly arcanima and strategy. I mean, it wasn't a backwater town or anything, but they were constantly outnumbered and facing laughable odds. That's why there's such a focus on battle tactics (hence the discipline of the Scholar). The Nymian Marines would pair a tactician scholar with the brawn of marauders and use their stratagems to either unravel the enemy's plans before they progressed or collapse their rank and file on the battlefield so that strategy could overcome numbers and strength. If you were to be ... normally whelmed ... sufficiently whelmed ... as whelmed as could be expected ... by anything, it would be that Nym consistently beat the odds and held off much larger, much more powerful forces. Look at what Mhach had to restort to in the end: biological warfare and OZMA.

And by the end of the era it looks like a ton of their power came from soulkin such as golems, anyway.

What survives of those old tactics still exists in modern Lominsan arcanists. There's a stratagem for almost any scenario.

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Originally Posted by Nestama

I really, really hope this book will be available in Australia (Square Enix store is for digital purchases only down here).

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My worries exactly. I'm preparing for the worst. Time to find an American friend you trust and set up an intermediary...

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Originally Posted by Anonymoose

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Thank you very much!

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Originally Posted by Fevelle

Thank you very much!

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Anytime! (Also, I edited a few lines in after I posted. Bad habit.)

I know what's gonna be on my christmas list this year.

Oh wow, if you read the info on the Seedkin "Biloko" it says they are the creatures that worship Sephirot.
Its hard to pick out but near the bottom of thier text you can see the words Worship, Sephirot, The Fiend.

http://gamerescape.com/wp-content/up...6-1024x768.jpg

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Originally Posted by Vejjiegirl

Oh wow, if you read the info on the Seedkin "Biloko" it says they are the creatures that worship Sephirot.
Its hard to pick out but near the bottom of thier text you can see the words Worship, Sephirot, The Fiend.

http://gamerescape.com/wp-content/up...6-1024x768.jpg

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I hate to be the bearer of bad news but...

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Though manlike in appearance, these enigmatic seedkin and composed entirely of vines and [roots?], and appear to lack intelligence beyond the capacity of killing. Some scholars, especially those who concentrate their studes on the Allagan Empire and its campaign in Meracydia, have attempted, unsuccessfully, to draw similarities between the biloko and the southern continent's indigenous arboreal beings most famously known for their worship of Sephirot, the Fiend.

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I wouldn't call it a confirmation, but I read most things when "some scholars suggest" to be direct shoutouts to us lore nerds here, lol (Even if we say this is idle self flattery, there's enough there for it not to be confirmed, imo)
(Like the bit about some scholars believing the Bulb is related to the Treant, but then the book provides evidence carried out by other scholars against, etc)

So nice to see insight into the pre-Allagan times.

Will this be avalible to purchase and when?