I feel like I'm missing something huge, at the start of Shadowbringers

Hi. I've recently began playing through Shadowbringers after being gone from the game for 1.5 years or so, and I'm finding myself increasingly frustrated by the lore so far. I'm hoping y'all can help me resolve what I see as issues, because I have to think that I'm off-base with my perceptions, I'm just unsure exactly how.

The idea of Light and Dark being opposing forces that need balance is great. I liked the WoD storyline back in Heavensward, and I was ready to see some more explanation about what Light and Dark actually are, but it didn't come, and it left a lot of concerning holes by the time of ShB starting. The problem is that those holes aren't patched yet by the time of me already committing to bring balance to the First by fighting back the Light. I'm committing to a conflict that, as of yet in the story, still doesn't make any sense.

The holes I'm talking about boil down to this: The conflict between Light and Dark on the Source prior to ShB hasn't felt cosmic or abstract at all, it has just felt like heroes vs villains, over and over. Us tipping the balance towards Light involved putting down Primals, and just going around doing generic hero things repeatedly. The big conflict capstone in ARR was us stopping the Ultima Weapon and Lahabrea from causing mass death and destruction. That set the tone completely for what Light vs Dark means. After that, us tipping the balance continued in a similar direction. Over and over.

This doesn't mean that Light is Good and Darkness is Evil. Far from it. But, it means that, generally, actions that can be perceived as good or heroic are those that push the balance towards Light. And the opposite: the Ascians repeatedly try to push towards Darkness by causing disasters, death, and destruction. So, the methods open to either side for pushing the balance have been implied to be limited to this, thus far.

It feels like the writing up to ShB doesn't support the main conflict we just jumped into, for this reason. We want to fight back against the Light. But, the only method we have been shown to do that is by nuking the world or forcing Primals to show up and start causing problems.

And I'm okay with that? There hasn't been a good explanation of why Light and Dark work the way they do yet, or alternative methods of tipping the balance. So, at this point in the story, I'm signing up to replicate Ascian methods of mustache-twirling villainy, based only on what I know up to this point.

I get that the Light vs Dark conflict is supposed to be more abstract, and that it's not as simple as Good vs Evil. But, I don't feel like that has been reinforced well up until this point, so it feels contradictory to the events of the previous expansions.

Edit: I summarized it below well, I think: It's like the game is saying "Darkness isn't evil. It's just a massive coincidence that the servants of Darkness keep doing evil things."

Everything until now, particularly in the 2.0 story is very much just told from our point of view where the information we have is very black and white. We are followers of Hydalen who is light and good and we're fighting the ascians who are followers of Zodiark who is dark and evil. It's not until Shadowbringers that we learn of the nuances behind that one-sided view although there's hints of it before then.

I.e. it's not completely new info that is contradictory, it's information we didn't know about that expands our worldview.

It's more order vs chaos than good vs evil. Too much light is just as bad as too much dark. There needs to be a balance or everything collapses (as seen on the First and the Thirteenth.)

From the way I understand it, it is a fight between Order (Light) and Chaos (Dark). Usually, we are seen to represent Order. This time, the Lightwardens et al. represent Order. We are chaos.

I don't know if that answers your question at all, but I hope it helps. :)

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Originally Posted by Brightamethyst

It's more order vs chaos than good vs evil. Too much light is just as bad as too much dark. There needs to be a balance or everything collapses (as seen on the First and the Thirteenth.)

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I get that it's trying to come across that way, but it just doesn't, to me.

It's like the game is saying "Darkness isn't evil. It's just a massive coincidence that the servants of Darkness keep doing evil things."

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Originally Posted by dragonseth07

It's like the game is saying "Darkness isn't evil. It's just a massive coincidence that the servants of Darkness keep doing evil things."

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That's part of what ShB is trying to explain. That the Ascians (the unsundered at least) more chaotic good than pure evil. They honestly feel that their plan is correct, and if they have to be the villains in order to make it happen, so be it.

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Originally Posted by Brightamethyst

That's part of what ShB is trying to explain. That the Ascians (the unsundered at least) more chaotic good than pure evil. They honestly feel that their plan is correct, and if they have to be the villains in order to make it happen, so be it.

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But, it also undermines it at every turn. Everywhere I look, the game is trying to reinforce the idea that Light is Good, from ARR all the way up to Shadowbringers.

Even when the Light is made out to be literally monstrous, we get enemy names like "Forgiven Cowardice", with the citizens of the world calling themselves Sinners.

It's not even subtle about it. It makes the break away from that comparison feel forced.

Edit: It also puts us in a very unsatisfying position, thinking about the future, because again, all we've been shown to this point were Ascian methods. Like I have to say, "Sorry, I have to let Ultima go off and kill all these people, or the world will die because I'm too good at being heroic."

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Originally Posted by dragonseth07

It also puts us in a very unsatisfying position, thinking about the future, because again, all we've been shown to this point were Ascian methods. Like I have to say, "Sorry, I have to let Ultima go off and kill all these people, or the world will die because I'm too good at being heroic."

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The Ascians have been trying to explain it to us for years but we just scoffed and called them crazy until we saw it for ourselves. Waaaaaaaaaaaaay back in 2.0 Lahabrea straight up told us a lot of these things during his monologue in the Praetorium. We just didn't believe him or understand the implications until years later.

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Originally Posted by Brightamethyst

The Ascians have been trying to explain it to us for years but we just scoffed and called them crazy until we saw it for ourselves. Waaaaaaaaaaaaay back in 2.0 Lahabrea straight up told us a lot of these things during his monologue in the Praetorium. We just didn't believe him or understand the implications until years later.

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I remember the monologue, and I remember thinking that his portrayal sounds like a terrible way to go about the whole light-dark balance angle, because it made the dichotomy sound too close to good and evil in that moment. It comes off like you need to burn down an orphanage every time you save a group of peasants, and that impression is only reinforced by later content. I know that Light and Dark aren't Good and Evil, but I swear to God that SE doesn't seem to know that.

They keep trying to drive home the balance angle, which I appreciate the potential for, but they also just keep portraying Darkness as cartoonishly evil the whole time, which makes the whole thing seem nonsensical. As if I need to stop doing side-quests, lest I make one too many people happy and cause the End of Days.

Shadowbringers does reframe the conflict to a degree, from "good / evil" to "chaos / order." This is made explicit through a cutscene about a third of the way through the MSQ, where Urianger explains what Light and Dark actually are beyond vague terms. This is hinted at more than a little bit early on (without spoiling too much), as Eulmore has a twisted sort of order under Vauthry's rule (and Eulmore remains an antagonistic faction until the twilight of 5.0's MSQ).

That said even this framing comes across as odd to me, given Stormblood similarly had us acting as agents of chaos and change in the cruel and brutal order Garlemald was enforcing on Doma and Ala Mhigo. Hell, we've been agents of positive change damn near everywhere we go... but I digress.

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Originally Posted by dragonseth07

Edit: It also puts us in a very unsatisfying position, thinking about the future, because again, all we've been shown to this point were Ascian methods. Like I have to say, "Sorry, I have to let Ultima go off and kill all these people, or the world will die because I'm too good at being heroic."

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This was a running concern we (or at least I) had in the lead-up to Shadowbringers given the history of what "bringing darkness" meant in the hands of the Ascians.

You said you're only at the start of the game, so you probably haven't reached the point of actually starting to diminish the Light yet. Rest assured that you will not be embracing the powers of darkness or committing acts of cruelty to do so.

Honestly it's prettymuch false advertising that makes you expect something much edgier than what you get. To my relief, personally, but it's still at odds with what actually happens.

I agree that the whole Light/Dark conflict isn't much explained until ShB, except for the occasional "Dark is evil !" here and there.

However, if you ever played other FF games, this is a recurring theme, which is usually explained like "Light and Dark are opposed, but we need both of them or sh*t gets real in a hurry"

I don't want to get too spoiler-y, OP, because it seems clear that you haven't completed ShB's story yet. I will say, though, a few things. First of all, there are more ways to push the balance from a side to an other side than letting Ascians do stuff without stopping them or fighting civilians until the world gets dark again. After all, fighting Forgiven creatures is more or less like punching Light in the face...

Then, consider this : most of the time someone brings up the topic of Light and Dark, it's from the vantage point of someone who is on the Light side of things. Most of your friends may believe that Light is good; some of them may want to make you believe that. ShB will bring quite a lot of light(pun intended) on that subject. In my opinion, you should do the MSQ and then come back if you have questions.

As Yoshi-P usually says : Please look forward to it !

Light and Dark are just what they are, one stabilizes elements and one energizes them, but there is no inherent morality there.

If anything I got the impression that the story was taking a bit of a gentle jab at mankind assigning morality to primordial forces.

One issue is we don't know where you are in the MSQ just yet so it's hard to gauge just how much info you have on the subject. But things do get explained in their usual "confusing" way, lol. But as people have said the conflict gets refrained as order and chaos instead of light and darkness. It's also important to realize that we learn that the terms vary depending on who you ask. But that might fall into spoiler territory if you aren't far enough in the story.

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Originally Posted by dragonseth07

Even when the Light is made out to be literally monstrous, we get enemy names like "Forgiven Cowardice", with the citizens of the world calling themselves Sinners.

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It's explained during the Main Scenario that self-referring as "Sinners" was due to a misunderstanding at the start of the Flood of Light. A not-insignificant number of people believed that the Lightwardens and the Sin Eaters were holy hosts from the heavens called down to punish the wicked. When it became clear that they were here to punish EVERYONE, the name still stuck, but with an ironic twist to it: the people now used the name as a badge of resistance. They would RESIST Heaven's judgement, and fight against the holy hosts (if holy hosts they even were). They continued to refer to the creatures by the names they'd already given them, and why not? Everyone by that point knew what a "Forgiven Cowardice" was, so there was little point in confusing the issue by naming it something else.

As for the light vs darkness angle, here's a VERY spoilery explanation that basically gives away the whole plot of Shadowbringers. Read at your own risk!

As others in the thread have mentioned, "Light vs Dark" is really "Order vs Chaos" rather than "Good vs Evil". Light represents stability (as a positive spin) and stagnancy (for negative). Darkness represents change (positive) and destruction (negative). Zodiark, the god of the Ascians, is actually an enormously powerful Primal that they summoned out of desperation when their world was literally ending. Enormous change was needed to bring things under control, and so Zodiark is pretty much the epitome of Darkness.

It worked, but was a problematic solution because Zodiark needed a tremendous amount of energy, but for the initial summoning and also to provide him the power he needed to get the job done. Three quarters of the world's population were sacrificed (voluntarily - it was such a utopian society that folks en masse were willing to give up their lives for the sakes of those who would carry on after), and the world was healed and began to flourish with new life. The folks that had summoned Zodiark, though, were not satisfied, and decided to sacrifice this new life to Zodiark in order to resurrect the sacrificed people.

Not everyone agreed with this plan. There were a signficiant number of dissenting individuals who believed that enough blood had been shed, that the world now belonged to the new life. Further, they believed that bringing back the sacrificed would set the stage for the disaster that Zodiark had prevented to resurface again. For the first time in living memory for the members of that utopian society, no amount of debate was enough to reach an agreement, and the dissenters eventually summoned their OWN primal, one much weaker than Zodiark but with a particular power capable of overcoming him: Hydaelyn, who had the power to divide. She divided Zodiark (and the entire world, and all but three of the Ascians) into fourteen pieces, rendering him weak enough to seal away.

Hydaelyn's goal now is to preserve order and stability on the divided world, and to prevent Zodiark from resurfacing. She hasn't been doing the best job - the Ascians decided that the best course of action was to put the world back together again, and they've succeeded seven times so far. Each Calamity merges one of the sundered worlds (the Shards) back into the original world (the Source, where we live), at the cost of extinguishing every life on that planet. The Ascians see this as a mercy - mortals live pitiful, short lives, and are weak in magic, mind, and body. Compared to the Ancients, they barely even qualify as ALIVE. Obviously, as members of this weak, pitful collection of mortals, we disagree, and see the wanton slaughter as monstrous.

So we, representatives of Light, order, and stability, are in conflict with the Ascians, representatives of Darkness, change, and destruction. The Ascians are doing what they see as best for the world, for their lost people, and for quality of life in general. We are doing what we see as best for all the worlds and the people living on them now.

The Ascians DO seem as though they enjoy their role a bit too much, it's true - but there are bits and pieces here and there that hint that they've come a bit unhinged over the millenia, frustrated with the slow progress, the resistance they face, and above all the general AWFULNESS of the mortal beings that now consider themselves to be rulers of the world the Ascians' people once claimed.

The original Warriors of Light were not called that when they were still around, at least according to every head of the local Adventurer's guild in-game. They were called that because, when people tried to remember their faces, all they could recall is the light surrounding them.

There is a moment with a certain member of the clergy where this is driven home both visually and verbally.

Thordan VII: "Who ... what are you?"

We are called the Warrior of Light for that reason alone, in memory of those who went before, not because we're disciples of Hydaelyn.

Good and evil are not defined as Black or White in our world. We consider the Ascians as evil by their actions, not by their choice in robes. Evil, as we understand it, tends to favor Black for some reason, except when they wear White, or Rich Person's Clothing, or Poor Person's Clothing, or ...

What occurs in Shadowbringers is not a role-reversal. Up doesn't become down, inside doesn't become outside. Our understanding of the nature of our Reality changes, and we get to assess the true intentions of the Ascians -- which I personally consider to be Evil, although they stopped wearing Black.

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Originally Posted by Brightamethyst

That's part of what ShB is trying to explain. That the Ascians (the unsundered at least) more chaotic good than pure evil. They honestly feel that their plan is correct, and if they have to be the villains in order to make it happen, so be it.

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That's not what ShB was trying to say given the nature of what it is the Ascians serve. They are pure evil who think they are good. ShB shows us why they came to feel that way.

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Originally Posted by thegreatonemal

They are pure evil who think they are good.

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The Asicnas aren't deluded. It's all a matter of perspective.

We see them as evil because modern human morality says genocide = bad. The Ascians see themselves as right because from their perspective none of this is real. Killing people means nothing because the world isn't really real and reviving Zodiark will put everything back to the way it should be. We of course don't want the world to end and millions of people to die, but that doesn't make the Ascian's viewpoint inherently wrong.

Did you ever play FFTA? Same thing. Marche just wants to end the dream and get home, but to the people of Ivalice he looked like a supervillain trying to unmake the universe. It's all perspective.

Spoilering for Ascian information

They don't feel what they're doing is acceptable because none of it is "real," they just place no value on lives lesser than them beyond as livestock. While it's not clear whether or not they intended to genocide the lesser races to restore their fallen brethren, the Ascians certainly have no qualms doing so now after the world has been fully rejoined. (That they were willing to do so at all paints a less than positive picture regardless.) Mortality renders us feeble, both in body and mind, and gives us less time to live - thus they don't see us as deserving of the gift of life due to the vices and folly that come with that shorter lifespan.

Most of the Ascians are mortals raised up via memory transferrence from crystals. Of the three unsundered, only Emet-Selch still resembled his Ancient self - Lahabrea lost himself in his passions, while Elidibus stopped using his memory crystal to hold onto his identity and gave himself over to the programming that came with his existence as a primal. While the Ancients were longer lived than contemporary races, they weren't immortal, and it's rather unlikely they were intended to live for the 12,500 years the unsundered did. As for the sundered... I expect a clash between personality and memory is part of Fandaniel's deal, but we'll see.

Personally I clock the Ascians in as Chaotic Neutral, albeit using evil methods. They want what's best for their people, but don't care what happens to anyone else. At the same time I'm not sure how much they actually believe the "you're not really alive by my standards, so killing you isn't murder" shtick Emet uses to justify what he does - such a convoluted explanation sounds more like he's trying to convince himself, meaning he knows what he's doing is wrong, but he tells himself there's nothing wrong with it so he's not crushed by guilt. Maybe.

5.3 Spoilers.

It is also worth noting that Azem, the original incarnation of the PS, was a neutral figure, not siding with the Convocation's Zodiark plan, but also not working with Venat's faction either.

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Originally Posted by Brightamethyst

The Asicnas aren't deluded. It's all a matter of perspective.

We see them as evil because modern human morality says genocide = bad. The Ascians see themselves as right because from their perspective none of this is real. Killing people means nothing because the world isn't really real and reviving Zodiark will put everything back to the way it should be. We of course don't want the world to end and millions of people to die, but that doesn't make the Ascian's viewpoint inherently wrong.

Did you ever play FFTA? Same thing. Marche just wants to end the dream and get home, but to the people of Ivalice he looked like a supervillain trying to unmake the universe. It's all perspective.

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The problem with the Ascians is that whether or not they believe they have the right to genocide the people they don't think are "real", they still don't have to be such massive jerks about it.

Their methods maximize suffering for no apparent reason, other than their own personal amusement. They're even jerks to their fellow Ascians.

It's mostly due to the nature of FFXIV being an ongoing story that they're making up as they go. I imagine that the methods they employ are usually flagrantly destructive toward life because the story tells us that the aether in souls burns brightest at death, and I expect that would act as a catalyst for the reactions they're setting off on the Source to cause the aetherial draw-in.

I don't remember the details, nor where it's at in the story, but the 13th shard is The Void, and it was their first attempt at a Rejoining. The way I remember it is, they didn't prep or cause a Source side calamity, merely opting to drown the 13th in Darkness. Whoopsie doopsie they have to cause a big bang on The Source too.

In Shadowbringers they basically start giving us information that we've only ever had the cliff notes for even at their most explained back in 3.5. The lead-in for Shadowbringers is basically the narrative equivalent of click-bait. The goals of neither side change, merely the tools they're using to see those goals to fruition. Namely, Light and Darkness. The idea of Shadowbringers is to make you ask a question very similar to what you phrase in the OP. What is the true nature of Light and Dark? It's very much a running theme that tendencies or stereotypes are assigned by people, because that's human(or catboi) nature. It also goes on to show why the default settings for good are generally Light and the default settings for evil are generally Dark. You can still be a player on the board for either side, in spite of changing your settings.

So just keep swimming upstream. You'll get more info as you go, and it may satisfy you. If it doesn't, come back and start some more discussion!