Nidhogg's Eyes [Spoiler]

When Alphinaud and Warrior of Light went to rip out Nidhogg's Eyes from Estinien's Armor, and Ser Aymeric tells us to toss them into the abyss, am I the only one who thought that was a bad idea? If it was possible, if it was my decision, I would've just destroyed them right then and there. So, when 'The Griffin' appears and certain events unfold, I'm just looking at my screen like, "yup...figured as much"

Practically I think a good portion of the player base was having a whhhhhy did you say that moment. Though it does give Aymeric a my bad moment where he does say he will do his best not to have another moment like that.

Well there was more to it, even though they were tossed into the abyss they did not plan on the warriors of darkness to be watching. hence the plot. If you take the warriors of darkness story line into consideration and how the eyes were reacting there really was no way to destroy the eyes immediately they had to separate them from the host to cut the link.

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Originally Posted by ManuelBravo

Well there was more to it, even though they were tossed into the abyss they did not plan on the warriors of darkness to be watching. hence the plot. If you take the warriors of darkness story line into consideration and how the eyes were reacting there really was no way to destroy the eyes immediately they had to separate them from the host to cut the link.

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Oh I'm not dismissing the need for the eyes for the plot to continue. However, you can also say they [being Alphinaud & WoL] weren't really thinking or could've possibly fathom any one to retrieve them from the Abyss.

The thing is, they had already banished Nidhogg's soul from them, they were basically just eye shaped crystals at that stage filled with enormous quantities of aether. Although Aymeric could hardly have been blamed for thinking that the bottom of the Sea of the Clouds would make them beyond the reach of man, given that no living thing could survive down there, as the player and Alphinaud had spent plenty of time dealing with non-living entities that could easily have been sent down there, it was pretty clear that was not going to be the best place to discard them, so yeah, I rolled my eyes at that scene.

But then, without that the events of Stormblood could not have happened and the Cold War between Eorzea and the Empire would not have turned hot[/url] (and Ala Mhigo and Doma would probably still be under the Garlean jackboot). But I digress....

It was a snap decision, and given the Sea of Clouds is uninhabitable and constantly being battered by wind / water / ice aether, nobody expected them to surface again. It looks really dumb from our perspective, but in-universe it was probably the best idea at the moment. Any in-universe argument against the decision is probably fueled by hindsight bias.

The WoL and Alpnaud do not have an easy time separating the eyes from Estinian. Given what happened to Estinain when the eyes were in close proximity to something living, I can totally see everyone wanting to quickly get the eyes out of range of anyone else that inherited the Dragon Curse (majority of Ishgard). I mean, we know how well leaving them in a vault for a thousand years worked... letting them get battered by the elements in a place no one living can get to isn't any worse of an idea then what they'd been doing with the eyes previously.

I want to give Aymeric the benefit of the doubt and say maybe he assumed that without Estinien's expertise on dragon-killing that they may not be able to completely destroy the eyes properly, and of course Estinien would certainly not have been in a good enough state at that time to deal with them. Therefore the next best option would have been to make sure they were as inaccessible as possible. But without actual confirmation that this is the case, who can say for sure?

While a couple people have touched on it I don't think anyone realizes the gravity of throwing something into the Sea of Clouds. Once the thing it down there it's not just constantly battered by aether, but you've got to imagine just every single second you are down there dozens or Aero spells, Blizzard spells, and Fluid Aura spells are battering you. It's literally a magical hail blizzard and no amount of protection will keep anyone from dying down there. The Warrior's of Darkness could only get at it because they couldn't die, even an Ascian wouldn't be able to get down their cuz the body they're inhabiting would be destroyed.

It's probably just by virtue of how powerful Nidhogg was that the even the eyes survived.

The main problem with the "nothing can survive the Sea of Clouds" explanation is that wasn't clear at the time we chucked the eyes over the bridge. I largely remember that being a retcon/author's saving throw.

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Originally Posted by FJerome

The main problem with the "nothing can survive the Sea of Clouds" explanation is that wasn't clear at the time we chucked the eyes over the bridge. I largely remember that being a retcon/author's saving throw.

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Indeed, in fact reading these comments made me wonder where did that information regarding the Sea of Clouds came from. During that cutscene I also facepalmed at the decission but I also understood the urgency to get them as far from everyone as possible. I didn´t understand why they thought the eyes would be lost forever or why they didn´t send anyone to destroy them afterwards though.

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Originally Posted by Ntol

Indeed, in fact reading these comments made me wonder where did that information regarding the Sea of Clouds came from. During that cutscene I also facepalmed at the decission but I also understood the urgency to get them as far from everyone as possible. I didn´t understand why they thought the eyes would be lost forever or why they didn´t send anyone to destroy them afterwards though.

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It's stated a few times on some of the fish you can catch I think. Along with other side tidbits. I know someone says it in the story but we the players got to see why/how that was a bad idea.

What does the sea of clouds have to do with the eyes? We threw them off the bridge to Ishgard, basically into a really deep ravine; of course the bad guys would get it. We should have tracked them down that night and destroyed them...but the plot bus interfered.

That is actually classed as part of the Sea of Clouds - the actual zone of that is one small section of a much wider area and includes the section where Ishgard itself is located, bordering onto Coerthas (it's why the explorable area of it are floating islands, it's quite frankly too dangerous on the actual floor of the 'sea').

Geographically, that doesn't make sense though. If you look from Haurchefants grave site you can clearly see ishgard at ground level on a mountainside, attached to coerthas central highlands. If that's a part of the sea of clouds then it would have to be at the bottom of it already which would make the city in inhabitable...not to mention all of coerthas. For the bottom of the sea of clouds to stretch a finger down to just affect that area under the bridge doesn't make sense either. Ishgard simply isn't high enough in altitude do it to be a part of the sea of clouds.

It's best seen in HW's credits/menu movie. There we see that conceptually anyway, there are lots of floating islands around Ishgard. Ishgard itself looks like it's situated on the summit of one of the highest mountains in Abalathia's Spine (the only mountain that it taller then it is Sonm Al in the far distance) and the rest of the mountain ranges around it are quite a bit lower in elevation. What is higher then Ishgard are other floating islands and they've got a lot of fortifications on them. The area of the Sea of Clouds we can get to in game is considered a back-water outpost where knights who aren't suited for the frontlines are sent to be out of the way. I'm calling this a case of gamplay vs lore representation.

So yeah, I can definetly buy that Ishgard is in the Sea of Clouds and that whatever crazy aether currents that keep the Sky Islands afloat are down rather then up. We've seen aether trump geography plenty of times in FFXIV as it is.

Yeah, almost the entire northern border of CCH is a cliff that drops off into the Sea of Clouds. It's also a level 45 fishing spot though, so at least some organisms can survive there. Unless those creatures are 'above' the bad part - (as presumably are the bridge's foundations).

Makes me wonder what would have happened if the WoL had gotten both eyes, instead of taking one. Would bad stuff had happened to them or would it just be another day?

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Originally Posted by SicariusSeven

Makes me wonder what would have happened if the WoL had gotten both eyes, instead of taking one. Would bad stuff had happened to them or would it just be another day?

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*imagines Nidhogg trying to take over the WoL, getting *****-slapped by Hydelaen.*

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Originally Posted by SicariusSeven

Makes me wonder what would have happened if the WoL had gotten both eyes, instead of taking one. Would bad stuff had happened to them or would it just be another day?

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WoL: *stands there with both eyes*
Everyone else: omg are you okay
WoL: *nods*

Honestly the WoL has walked around with both Nidhogg's eye and Hraesvelgr's eye by this point and has seemingly had no issues, while Estinien clearly had moments where he struggled with just the one. I think Aymeric might've been of the mind that getting the eyes as far away from Estinien as possible at that moment was the best thing to do.

To be honest, I suspect Aymeric panicked. Whenever Aymeric makes a bad decision, terrible things happen...I won't comment on how we ended up at The Vault and lost Haurchefant. I'm glad we were able to save Estinien, though. He more than repaid that debt in Stormblood and I look forward to seeing him be a snarky butthead in the future!

The Warrior of Light is completely immune to the negative influence of Nidhogg's Eyes because the player's character canonically is not a native born Ishgardian, and thus lacks the draconic 'taint' within them that all Ishgardians possess (the traces of Ratatoskr's spirit that was passed on from Thordan and the Knights Twelve at the very founding of Ishgard). To say nothing of the Echo also would provide protection from it's influence as it would be effectively the same as the protection from Primal influence that the Echo also grants us.

Ha I only remember thinking "well I'm sure that's never gonna come back and bite us"

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Originally Posted by Enkidoh

The Warrior of Light is completely immune to the negative influence of Nidhogg's Eyes because the player's character canonically is not a native born Ishgardian, and thus lacks the draconic 'taint' within them that all Ishgardians possess (the traces of Ratatoskr's spirit that was passed on from Thordan and the Knights Twelve at the very founding of Ishgard). To say nothing of the Echo also would provide protection from it's influence as it would be effectively the same as the protection from Primal influence that the Echo also grants us.

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Oh right I totally forgot about that one part. My bad. For some reason my mind just assumed they would corrupt anyone who had them both.

let's not forget how strong our echo is

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Originally Posted by Ntol

Indeed, in fact reading these comments made me wonder where did that information regarding the Sea of Clouds came from. During that cutscene I also facepalmed at the decission but I also understood the urgency to get them as far from everyone as possible. I didn´t understand why they thought the eyes would be lost forever or why they didn´t send anyone to destroy them afterwards though.

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It's mentioned in the MSQ, but not until later - I think when the Eyes turn up again at the leadup to Stormblood? It was a conversation in the East Shroud if I remember correctly, so must have been after Baelsar's Wall.

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Originally Posted by Iscah

It's mentioned in the MSQ, but not until later - I think when the Eyes turn up again at the leadup to Stormblood? It was a conversation in the East Shroud if I remember correctly, so must have been after Baelsar's Wall.

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Indeed it was.

https://i.imgur.com/zYfaGos.jpg

A couple of other NPCs (Alphinaud and Aymeric) also make note of this, which always strikes me as the writers making absolutely sure that people understood that the decision to toss the Eyes off the bridge was done with limited information and time.