What is Foul?

Has Foul been explained in EE2 or elsewhere?

From my own observation, Foul might be this game's version of the Unholy spell that has appeared in several other Final Fantasy games.

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Originally Posted by Myvar

From my own observation, Foul might be this game's version of the Unholy spell that has appeared in several other Final Fantasy games.

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Maybe, maybe not. Scylla in the Crystal Tower uses Unholy, but I don't remember if there are other bosses who use it.

I think of 'Fair is foul and foul is fair' - the witches in Macbeth.

Probably absolutely nothing to do with the FF reference, as it's really just a fancy literary paradox, but it does have Black Magic and spell casting associations.

Foul looks sort of like Level ? Shadowflare from FF Tactics.

Outside of that, I can't help but think that it might be the "Ancient Magick" of the Dark school of spells.

I.e.

Aero > Aerora > Aeroga > Aeroja > Tornado

Blizzard > Blizzara > Blizzaga > Blizzaja > Freeze

Dark > Darkra > Darkga > (Darkja >) Foul

Fire > Fira > Firaga > Firaja > Flare

Stone > Stonera > Stonega > Stoneja > Earthquake (Sometimes it appears as Quake > Quakra > Quaga)

Thunder > Thundara > Thundaga > Thundaja > Burst

Water > Watera > Waterga > Waterja > Flood

I don't recall we've seen anything beyond Darkga in any FF game, so it might be that FFXIV is establishing Foul as the ancient magic for the line. Maybe we'll also see a Darkja spell at some point (Well... It'd be Dark IV in the English localization for the game :rolleyes:)

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Originally Posted by Kalise

Foul looks sort of like Level ? Shadowflare from FF Tactics.

Outside of that, I can't help but think that it might be the "Ancient Magick" of the Dark school of spells.

I.e.

Aero > Aerora > Aeroga > Aeroja > Tornado

Blizzard > Blizzara > Blizzaga > Blizzaja > Freeze

Dark > Darkra > Darkga > (Darkja >) Foul

Fire > Fira > Firaga > Firaja > Flare

Stone > Stonera > Stonega > Stoneja > Earthquake (Sometimes it appears as Quake > Quakra > Quaga)

Thunder > Thundara > Thundaga > Thundaja > Burst

Water > Watera > Waterga > Waterja > Flood

I don't recall we've seen anything beyond Darkga in any FF game, so it might be that FFXIV is establishing Foul as the ancient magic for the line. Maybe we'll also see a Darkja spell at some point (Well... It'd be Dark IV in the English localization for the game :rolleyes:)

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i don't think we would get a dark upgrade without having lower level dark spells

Someone asked this on Reddit, and I tried to dive into the lore but came up with nothing. I did find that the kana used to spell it in the original Japanese is just the English word "foul" (ファウル or "fauru") which was no help at all.

Normally if a spell is the same in the original but has different names in English translations, you can figure that out that way, but the only spell I can find that uses that word in any FF game is Foul Waters ("fauru wota"), a blue mage spell that does water damage and helps resist silence in FFXI. In French, the term used for it is Infect, which suggests "unclean" or "diseased" or "toxic."

The person who asked the question on Reddit joked that the Black Mage was probably just swearing at someone, using the effect of foul language. I don't think they were serious, but since it operates under the effect of Polyglot (speaking many languages or literally "many tongues") that's honestly as good a theory as any.

My own guess is that's Bio/Virus, but they had used both names already for things in the game. Black Mages have always had access to poison, and at later levels they attacked with disease. In Final Fantasy III, IV, V, and VI it takes the form of giant bacteria or viruses attacking the target. I am thinking that since they'd used the name already, they came up with a new name for Black Mage's traditional "hit them with a poison/disease" attack.

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Originally Posted by Kalise

I don't recall we've seen anything beyond Darkga in any FF game, so it might be that FFXIV is establishing Foul as the ancient magic for the line. Maybe we'll also see a Darkja spell at some point (Well... It'd be Dark IV in the English localization for the game :rolleyes:)

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Im fairly sure that Zodiarc uses a Darkja spell when you fight him in FF 12. Dont think the players had access to the equivalent(outside of summoning said Zodiarc).

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Originally Posted by Kalise

Foul looks sort of like Level ? Shadowflare from FF Tactics.

Outside of that, I can't help but think that it might be the "Ancient Magick" of the Dark school of spells.

I.e.

Aero > Aerora > Aeroga > Aeroja > Tornado

Blizzard > Blizzara > Blizzaga > Blizzaja > Freeze

Dark > Darkra > Darkga > (Darkja >) Foul

Fire > Fira > Firaga > Firaja > Flare

Stone > Stonera > Stonega > Stoneja > Earthquake (Sometimes it appears as Quake > Quakra > Quaga)

Thunder > Thundara > Thundaga > Thundaja > Burst

Water > Watera > Waterga > Waterja > Flood

I don't recall we've seen anything beyond Darkga in any FF game, so it might be that FFXIV is establishing Foul as the ancient magic for the line. Maybe we'll also see a Darkja spell at some point (Well... It'd be Dark IV in the English localization for the game :rolleyes:)

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Dark IV already exists in game (Can't remember what casts it but its on Garland Tools so its in game) so it could be the next step, but dark isn't a BLM spell in xiv, so I'm not sure it would be that. I think its makes most sense as an holy antithesis (both being exploding orbs of light/ dark respectively) and is a XIV exclusive concept.

Black Mage had the spell "Scourge" in FF1, which was an instant kill poison elemental spell. Maybe this is harkening back to this.

I think Flare makes more sense as the anti-Holy - both learned at Lv50, and paired up as RDM's Verflare/Verholy finisher spells.

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Originally Posted by MorbolvampireQueen6

i don't think we would get a dark upgrade without having lower level dark spells

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Sure we could. Holy isn't an upgrade of any particular unaspected damaging spell. Holy is very similar to Foul.

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Originally Posted by Iscah

I think Flare makes more sense as the anti-Holy - both learned at Lv50, and paired up as RDM's Verflare/Verholy finisher spells.

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Flare is learned at level 50, Holy is learned at level 45. According to the Lore book, Verholy and Verflare don't share THAT much in common with the original spells other than being namesakes.

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Flare: Shanttoto the matriarch of black magic, derived this spell in her reckless pursuit of ultimate destructive power. Combining one's own mana with ambient aether, the caster triggers an explosion of monumental force.

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Holy:This incandescent blast of purifying energies was devised by the white mages of Amdapor to combat the voidsent servants of Mhachi sorcerers. The battlefields of the War of the Magi were often illuminated by spell's distinctive explosions

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Verflare: Its name is a portmanteau of "vermillion" and "flare". This incantation seeks to rival the destructive power of the black mage spell that shares the latter's denomination. Rather than drawing on ambient aether to cause a single, massive explosion, Verflare overlaps a number of smaller arcane eruptions.

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Verholy: An adaption of the forbidden white mage spell "Holy", this purifying blast was conceived as a means to banish the lingering voidsent, which were summoned during the War of the Magi

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So Flare combines the user's mana with ambient aether to make a gigantic explosion. Holy is a purifying blast of light energy to wipe out low level voidsent. Verflare uses a chain of small microexplosions instead of using ambient aether to make a localized magical burst. Verholy is a singular blast of "holy". It's more concentrated and the description says it was used to pick off individual voidsent survivors after the war, as opposed to the WHM version which was probably used against hoards/armies.

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Originally Posted by Floortank

Sure we could. Holy isn't an upgrade of any particular unaspected damaging spell. Holy is very similar to Foul.

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To be fair, White Mages technically can cast "Banish" and "Dia" but the player cannot. These were spells that used to be in 1.0, but were removed around 1.2. There are several White Mage-type mobs (Light Sprites/Holy Sprites/Amdapori statues etc) that still cast these spells, and it's likely that Holy is to Banish what Flare is to Fire. It's possible the original Amdapori White Mages specialized in pure White Magic. The player White Mage is technically is a hybrid of Conjurer/White Mage, since White Magic is a lost art, the core of our skills is based on Conjury (elemental magic), hence why we have Stone/Aero/Water instead of pure light magic like Amdapor white mages did with Banish spells.

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Originally Posted by Jonnycbad

To be fair, White Mages technically can cast "Banish" and "Dia" but the player cannot. These were spells that used to be in 1.0, but were removed around 1.2. There are several White Mage-type mobs (Light Sprites/Holy Sprites/Amdapori statues etc) that still cast these spells, and it's likely that Holy is to Banish what Flare is to Fire.

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The one thing that throws a spanner in the works of this idea, is that Holyra, Holyga and Holyja exist in the series.

Which is different from the other "Ancient Magicks" which didn't have that sort of upgrade system, and the closest example is Bahamut having Gigaflare and Tetraflare which share the "Flare" name (Though, were neither Fire damage nor shared any other similarities with the Flare spell in the game)

So while Banish > Banishra > Banishga > (Banishja >) Holy would make some level of sense as other elemental types, it doesn't suggest that with the fact that upgrades to Holy exist within the series.

Much like how Foul could be the capstone spell for the Dark line instead of the Dark version of Holy (Unholy Darkness, Dark Holy or Mega White depending on which iteration of the game you look at... Rabanastre raid uses Unholy Darkness, Tactics called it Unholy Darkness or Dark Holy and Mystic Quest called it Mega White)

Meaning that there's a possibility that both Banish and Holy could actually both have a unique capstone spell to be the powerful alternate named "Ancient" spell. (I have to put Ancient in quotation marks because technically, everything we learn as SCH is ancient because it's learned from the Nymian scholars through Lily/Surito. As is everything we learn as BLM most of which is learned through the book of Nald'thal. As is everything we learn as SMN which is learned through ancient Allagan texts/Prin.)

Especially if you also look at the description you provided regarding Holy. If Holy was to be for dealing with the lower ranking voidsent servants... You'd think the Adampori would have a much more powerful spell for nuking the higher ranking voidsent that would likely be employed during the war. Possibly something like Nova?

There's also the issue that in the case of White Mage, a lot of the higher level White Magics are probably illegal for even us or the Pajali to use because they are what led to the land being drained of aether. Black Mages doesn't really care all that much about that and so they just go ham with crazy powerful magic use. The Elementals are a natural check on the White Mage job and we know there are certain things White Mages were capable of doing that the Elementals don't want to be discovered.