I cannot believe how far in advance the story has set itself up. (spoilers of course)

I'm re-watching all the cutscenes having to do with talk of the warriors of darkness. I boggles my mind how far in advance the foreshadowing of this expansion was put in place.

Please sample this clip where the WoD are talking with the Mother Crystal.

https://youtu.be/RtulRvaMv0o?t=5018

What we all thought was some weird story tangent at the end of HW was in fact strong foreshadowing of things to come 2 expansions later. Not just placid, mild foreshadowing, but strong!

I walk to talk about it with someone! reeeeeeeeeeee

Given that the Warriors of Darkness were introduced and then whisked away with all the impactfulness of a wet fart, sometimes it feels like they originally planned for Shadowbringers to come before Stormbringers. If that was originally the plan, it suddenly doesn't seem all that surprising to see that sort of content at the end of HW, since it would've been less long-term foreshadowing, and more direct foreshadowing for stuff coming in mere months. (Also I feel like Lyse's SB gear would've made a lot more sense if she had become a DNC, but I digress...)

With that said, I seem to recall it being stated that the whole Bahamut-inside-Dalamud scenario that they used to destroy 1.0 was originally planned for like... expansion 3 or 4 or something, so yeah they definitely do a lot of planning ahead.

I always believed it was a loose end

This cut scene at the Mother Crystal practically spells out who that Minfillia character is in the ShadowBringers cutscene.

"I will hie me to your world and there take upon myself the Light which riseth even now to drown it, as Darkness once did drown another."

Go back further. The Cutscene with us first talking with Hydaelyn shows other WoLs traveling to the other shards to do her mission. You see another spawn and travel off like a shooting star to another shard.

I don't think they are planning as far ahead as you think they are.

One of the necessary skills of planning serial fiction (and an MMO like FFXIV is serial fiction) is to purposely leave hanging minor plots in a major plot that can then be gone back to and fleshed out. Do it right and it feels like the writers have been planning things out much further in advance then you think they are.

Of course,this can also go the opposite way if it feels too convenient. For me, the writers tied up the story of the 1st Shard and the WoD well enough all the way back in 3.4. I didn't (and still don't) think they need to revisit it. For me, this entire plot seems like an excuse so that the writers can give us a break between an expansion heavily focused on the Garleans (Stormblood) and another expansion heavily focused on the Garleans (6.0). So they decided the end of a finished plot (the 1st Shard and the WoD) wasn't actually the end of that plot and are sending the WoL on a massive cosmology lecture disguised as a side-plot for an expansion.

Now... I hope ShB does have something to do with the plot that started back in 1.0 besides just the greater cosmology, but I don't have my hopes up. If SB's MSQ taught me anything it's that the story team has a major weakness of not making different plots organically mesh with each other and not pacing the MSQ well.

If what Solus has said is true, then Hydaelyn is not the Mother Crystal. The Crystal existed before the sundering. The entity before Zodiark and Hydaelyn is also not the Mother Crystal since the planet also existed before its summoning. While it may or may not have been foreshadowing it's still cool, you could also apply this kind of thing to what Ifrit said in 1.0. Just to grab a quote from the wiki "The true nature and origins of the Echo are unknown, but according to Ifrit, there's a deity who gave the power of Echo to everyone who currently has it, but not even he seems to know who the deity is." He knows who Hydaelyn is, so Hydaelyn didn't give us the Echo, and we've had the Echo before receiving the Blessing of Light. There's lots of stuff we can say is foreshadowing or as stated above just left open so they can come back later to expand upon it.

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Originally Posted by ObsidianFire

Of course,this can also go the opposite way if it feels too convenient. For me, the writers tied up the story of the 1st Shard and the WoD well enough all the way back in 3.4. I didn't (and still don't) think they need to revisit it. For me, this entire plot seems like an excuse so that the writers can give us a break between an expansion heavily focused on the Garleans (Stormblood) and another expansion heavily focused on the Garleans (6.0). So they decided the end of a finished plot (the 1st Shard and the WoD) wasn't actually the end of that plot and are sending the WoL on a massive cosmology lecture disguised as a side-plot for an expansion.

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To me it seems like the opposite. To me it feels like Stormblood was the sidequest and now they are getting back to the plot of Acians trying to bring about a calamity in order to bring all the shards together. We're literally going to the first shard in order to prevent a calamity.

Minfilia, the representative of Hydaelyn and our old friend told us during the WoD plotline that she is going to the First shard to make things right. That doesn't sound like wrapped up story line to me.

They kind of sort of did this with Stormblood, too. Ilberds entire coup in ARR was based around a promise to go liberate Ala Mhigo, and when that fell through that's why he stopped working with Lolorito. Omega also got brought up a couple of times at the end of ARR, and that was when the Doman refugees showed up looking for a place to stay. Too much coinciding at the same time to be a coincidence.

Hell, you could say they did it with HW too. Even before Ayemeric showed up, Ishgard, their solitary disposition and their war with the Dragons came up every now and then, and you even got a bit of info about it around level 30 when you go to Coerthas and help out good ol Haurchefant.

I don't know how much of it was setting up future expansions and how much was just developing lore with the possibility of addressing it in an expansion, but by this point we should be keeping adttentive at the seemingly random side plots developing in the post-launch quests. To me, Stormblood is pointing out Garlemald itself as the next expansion following Shadowbringers, and will when this Black Rose gas and all the Solus clones will most prevalently be addressed.

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Originally Posted by IntrovertAnt

To me it seems like the opposite. To me it feels like Stormblood was the sidequest and now they are getting back to the plot of Acians trying to bring about a calamity in order to bring all the shards together. We're literally going to the first shard in order to prevent a calamity.

Minfilia, the representative of Hydaelyn and our old friend told us during the WoD plotline that she is going to the First shard to make things right. That doesn't sound like wrapped up story line to me.

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Agreed. Im not sure why people think the Garleans are the main focus of the core story when that's obviously the Ascians and Zodiark.
They're our Shinra/Galbadia to the main villain Sephiroth/Ultimecia.

Stormblood was formulaic "liberate the town of the month" stuff with a sprinkling of character development, with the only meaningful revelation being that Solus is an Ascian, and that was at the very end.
It was all sidequest.

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Originally Posted by Raldo

Given that the Warriors of Darkness were introduced and then whisked away with all the impactfulness of a wet fart, sometimes it feels like they originally planned for Shadowbringers to come before Stormbringers. If that was originally the plan, it suddenly doesn't seem all that surprising to see that sort of content at the end of HW, since it would've been less long-term foreshadowing, and more direct foreshadowing for stuff coming in mere months. (Also I feel like Lyse's SB gear would've made a lot more sense if she had become a DNC, but I digress...)

With that said, I seem to recall it being stated that the whole Bahamut-inside-Dalamud scenario that they used to destroy 1.0 was originally planned for like... expansion 3 or 4 or something, so yeah they definitely do a lot of planning ahead.

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From what you said at the end, that seems much more likely. They don't make plans for what the next expansion story is going to be the year leading up to launch, they have those plans well in advance.

I don't mean to say they have everything ready already for 6.0, but given that they already know the end of 5.0, it's easy to surmise that they're already working on 5.x story to lead into 6.0, so I completely believe that they foreshadowed this with the WoD in HW, and didn't plan on having Shadowbringers first.

If I recall correctly, he has stated in a previous interview that they plan an expansion ahead at least when making their content. Like while doing developemnt on 3.x patches, they already had ideas on what they were going to use for Stormblood(4.0) as the patches were going to lead to that. Not 100% sure but I believe in regards to story content they plan it ahead by a few patches this way they can make sure that the story content is stream-lined and not left hanging with a few alterations where they need to.

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G: Up to what point have you already decided the future of the storyline? How far forward are you thinking with Stormblood‘s storytelling?

NY: While it’s still very rough at this point, we have kind of mapped it until the last part of 5.0. About the narrative of 4.0, we are already planning for the 4.X patches and especially for their beginning chapters. The plot for 4.1 is coming together as we speak, but there is one point I’m thinking about, and considering that we might change it. Do we still want to move in a straightforward manner and fight the Garlean Empire, or is this an opportunity to consider fighting a more fantastical sort of enemy that threatens the realm… or something like that.

Final Fantasy XIV has received a lot of support from the players, so we’re thinking, what if there is a situation in which the players are fighting a more dynamic enemy? Once we launch Stormblood, and things start to settle down after the first part of the main scenario, I would like to go back with my scenario team and discuss moving forward. Once we decide on the direction, we will go straight on and progress really quickly.

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Old interview prior to StB

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Patch 2.55 introduced a significant plot twist to the final storyline of Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn. How far in advance was the final storyline for Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn planned out and how much of the future storyline has already been written?

First and foremost, thank you very much for enjoying the storyline!

The final storyline of A Realm Reborn was finalized before the release of Patch 2.1 (December 2013). We needed a solid plot from the start so that we could create a story that wouldn’t fall apart. We introduced characters in each patch update every 3.5 months, and created the dialogue to establish these characters and/or build tension and excitement in the story.

Also, Final Fantasy XIV supports Japanese, English, French, German, Chinese (and Korean, in just a short while), with voice overs in many of the cut scenes. In order to accomplish this we need to record in the various languages well ahead of time, which naturally requires that the script be finalized much earlier than that. For Patch 2.55 (“Before the Fall, Part 2”) we recorded the voice overs in between the release of Patch 2.3 and 2.4. (This is about a 6 month lead time). I take my hat off to our script writers, localization team, and sound team.

In terms of future storylines, we’ve already determined a general outline of the next expansion pack (Version 4.0) after Heavensward. Of course, the details may potentially change, and depending on our players’ reactions, there is always a possibility for adjustments, too!

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An even older interview. XD

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Originally Posted by QT_Melon

Go back further. The Cutscene with us first talking with Hydaelyn shows other WoLs traveling to the other shards to do her mission. You see another spawn and travel off like a shooting star to another shard.

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Is that who they were supposed to be? That makes a lot of sense. I always thought they were other adventurers, but that made me question why if that were so they'd be talking to Hydaelyn.

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Originally Posted by IntrovertAnt

To me it seems like the opposite. To me it feels like Stormblood was the sidequest and now they are getting back to the plot of Acians trying to bring about a calamity in order to bring all the shards together. We're literally going to the first shard in order to prevent a calamity.

Minfilia, the representative of Hydaelyn and our old friend told us during the WoD plotline that she is going to the First shard to make things right. That doesn't sound like wrapped up story line to me.

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I honestly felt this way about Stormblood too, since the Ascians were almost completely absent from it.

Sure ascians were absent from 4.0, but the Empire is also a major antagonist. In retrospect the two are also intricately linked though we didn't know that in 4.0. It also resolved major story arcs with ala mhigo and doma. So I wouldn't really call 4.0 a side quest or filler.

5.0 I wouldn't either. The idea of going to a parallel world COULD fall into that trap but it seems they're linking it enough to the main story to not be an issue.

They've already stated that this trip will, in a sense, bring us full circle. One step closer to finalizing plot points that were around since the 1.0 story.

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Originally Posted by disturbedcobra

They've already stated that this trip will, in a sense, bring us full circle. One step closer to finalizing plot points that were around since the 1.0 story.

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I think 80% is the figure they used. ARR, HW, SB, SHB...I'm guessing that means the expansion after SHB will bring an end to the Ascian/Empire/Zodiark arc, and the game wil transition towards something else, not unlike WoW starting to work towards the void lords now that Sargeras is defeated.

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Originally Posted by Raldo

Given that the Warriors of Darkness were introduced and then whisked away with all the impactfulness of a wet fart, sometimes it feels like they originally planned for Shadowbringers to come before Stormbringers. If that was originally the plan, it suddenly doesn't seem all that surprising to see that sort of content at the end of HW, since it would've been less long-term foreshadowing, and more direct foreshadowing for stuff coming in mere months. (Also I feel like Lyse's SB gear would've made a lot more sense if she had become a DNC, but I digress...)

With that said, I seem to recall it being stated that the whole Bahamut-inside-Dalamud scenario that they used to destroy 1.0 was originally planned for like... expansion 3 or 4 or something, so yeah they definitely do a lot of planning ahead.

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Stormbringers? Is this the Mandella effect expansion.

Doma's crisis was set up in the 2x series.

Sharlayan's main city has been set up since awhile ago.

Thavnair is a thing.

Bukyo is a thing.

They do a lot of setting up. Just wait. We will see all these places and many more someday.

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Originally Posted by DamianFatale

Stormbringers? Is this the Mandella effect expansion.

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What do you mean? It's always been Stormbringers.





;)

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Originally Posted by DamianFatale

Doma's crisis was set up in the 2x series.

Sharlayan's main city has been set up since awhile ago.

Thavnair is a thing.

Bukyo is a thing.

They do a lot of setting up. Just wait. We will see all these places and many more someday.

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And the New World

And Meracydia

And the Moon

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Originally Posted by DamianFatale

Thavnair is a thing.

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Soon please YoshiP xoxo

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Originally Posted by MrThinker

And the New World

And Meracydia

And the Moon

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Oh I do so hope that if we ever do go to the moon it'll be because of something like this

https://youtu.be/3yMy7JuGpJM

I'll just gently point at the lost city of amdapor (hard), and the rather similar art style, and how this is just another reflection of the great war of the mages.

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Originally Posted by Starblessed

If what Solus has said is true, then Hydaelyn is not the Mother Crystal. The Crystal existed before the sundering. The entity before Zodiark and Hydaelyn is also not the Mother Crystal since the planet also existed before its summoning. While it may or may not have been foreshadowing it's still cool, you could also apply this kind of thing to what Ifrit said in 1.0. Just to grab a quote from the wiki "The true nature and origins of the Echo are unknown, but according to Ifrit, there's a deity who gave the power of Echo to everyone who currently has it, but not even he seems to know who the deity is." He knows who Hydaelyn is, so Hydaelyn didn't give us the Echo, and we've had the Echo before receiving the Blessing of Light. There's lots of stuff we can say is foreshadowing or as stated above just left open so they can come back later to expand upon it.

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you doubt solus have told us everything....
- by example, what was the cause of the apocalypse? we know that a sound did come out and people did loose control of them power.... but they have never touch on the reason of this sound?
- same some shadow in the city have let us understand that 14 people was part of the council, but in this time one of them did leave the council. while waiting for the pass to the capitol the shadow did let us know that maybe we are the descendant of the 14 the councile member....
- he say that some have come out and create hyadelin for counter zordarck since they didn't stop to sacrifice people to him. acting like if hyadelin was the bad one... but i think Hyadelin was created for counter the power the ascien did begin to use (the one that allows to turn life into aether)

technically Hyadelin is the mother crystal, the one that did split the world into 14 part, probably for stop the use of the power the human was abusing.

but a point disturb me greatly... with the power the ascien (old human) was having how they wasn't able to create weapon for fight against the trouble? if them power out of control was really behind creating this hellish situation, they why it wasn't possible to create something for protect themself against the sound and it effect?

here a food for your though.... what if actually the whole situation was created by someone else... what if ascien by overusing them power did lure something else into them world that did lead to that?

all in all, we have only have the word of solus.... can we really believe everything he have said? can we believe that soo much time didn't affect his memory?

i still think that something else did spread the light, maybe a primal born from the prayer of the aurora religion that was strangely spreading, it said that at the start only elven was following, then hume did follow, but the stranger part is them enemy the drahn and galdalfen did decide to switch religion... another point, Solus did told us that light was diminishing him... then how they did create this whole situation by just killing one person with the help of the hero of the first shard...

i feel we haven't seen the whole story yet... far too much loose end remain...

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technically Hyadelin is the mother crystal

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We're in a situation now where we won't know whether she really is a Primal or whether it was all smokescreens and misdirection from a chaos-spreading Ascian until Square deem it necessary to flesh out that story-thread. If there's a hint of truth behind Emet's lessons, murals, the finale, or anything of that kind, then calling Hyde the mother-crystal won't be accurate in the slightest. We don't know the full story of what really befell them back then but (assuming the majority is true) we've been given a decent template to work with (that can be fleshed out whenever Square desire to push the story a certain way).

As for the WoD's - I understand how divided people are about them but I really enjoyed that mini-story when they were introduced, thus I thoroughly enjoyed getting some more on that score in Shadowbringers. They were set up back then as a blatantly obvious mirror for our own WoL and friends, which is why it resonates with some people. The simple concept of people just like you who are forced/goaded/tricked into doing something different than you would, for a goal that good/evil as a matter of perspective, but ultimately unjustifiable from any morally sound perspective on our side. It is not that much different to the ShB climax either, or the Emet-Road-Trip where he's attempting to point out that it's all a matter of perspective. Funny how he baulks at the 'we are the same' trope from Alphinaud whilst simultaneously demanding to know why we keep struggling... Well, the same reason he was struggling, or reliving his old days, or trying so desperately to rejoin everyone - to bring back / fight for / protect what they were/are/had. Whether someone is a hero or villain for doing whatever they deem necessary to achieve that will often be moulded by history or individual perspective.

The WoD's weren't evil - but they did do very evil things under misguidance, desperation and ignorance - and as was confirmed by the finale, Arbert was indeed a sort of splinter of the WoL. I don't think many will argue if you call Ascian's evil, though with a blind eye and a few things kept hidden under a rug you could half-convince people they were somewhat heroic in their own tragic way.

Do bear in mind the cloning tech. I highly doubt we're genuinely an Ascian down just yet. Could all have been just another mindbending scheme.

no, we did kill lahabrea and emeth mostly because what we did destroy is them soul, not them body.

with them capacity to creation magic we can expect the part about zordiarch and hyadelin to be a sort of primal to be true. the question about if hyadelin is the mother crystal is.... simple.... from the old world perspective she is not. from our perspective, hyadelin did create the world and his shard, she is litterally the one that did create it.

the point is how far can we trust the info we did get.... i doubt the part about how the apocalypse did happend and the creation of the two spirit is false.... the question is more do like emeth have said zordiarch is a spirit that really try to help.... from what i have get, it's a primal that is quite glutton in terms of aether consumption, in the dungeon of akademia it was said that the new method for create aether was really powerfull and they did use half them population for summon him.... and another time half of them population for save them world. if they had continue more and more people will have die....

what did lead to the creation of hyadelin because the power the ascian was using is corrupt, yes they was able to create a spirit for stop them destruction, but this spirit was slowly destroying them. the question is more about viewpoint at this point.