[Spoiler] Isn't Dark Knight using Akasa ?

Using the earliest word for that energy to limit spoilers in the title, but for the rest of this post I will use the other term: Dynamis

So, we know that Dynamis uses emotions to create effects and that it can be converted into aether. Isn't that exactly what dark knights do ? Using powerful emotions like anger, hate, frustration (all born from the love of what they want to protect) to create somewhat powerful spells ?

In the very first quest, we even learn that overindulging into this process is dangerous and could kill us or worse, that's like a personnal final day getting overwhelmed by our own negative emotions and devoured by them.

Do you think we can dig a bit deeper and draw more parallels ?

Not confirmed, but if there's anything that was akasa/dynamis before Endwalker, it's...

Well, if there's any one thing it's the Totentantz, the 'aetheric corruption' that feeds on the fear and anger in people's hearts in the Dancer questline, which is described in exactly the same terms later used around the Blasphemies. But if there's any two things, it's the Totentantz and Dark Knights.

Oh, I should check out Dancer's questline then.

There's also warriors - who use thier emotions to fuel thier "inner beast" and can be consumed by it and become violent and dangerous to others.

They use their emotions as a driving force. It is not the power source. People seem to forget that we can not directly control and manipulate Dynamis. Think of Dynamis like cases where humans in the real world are capable of amazing bursts of power IE a women lifting a car up to save her baby. It's not something we have control over but comes out when the deck is stacked against you.

Why wouldn't we be able to manipulate it ? We do not have the knowledge of how to, because we never studied it, but they might unknowingly started using it to fuel another aether based magic

In the Ktisis Trust Emet-Selch can be a Dark Knight and Venat can be a Dancer. I maintain that retroactively applying Dynamis to everything is silly.

He uses a greatsword, but as said he has limitless magical abilities etc. I'm not saying using dark magic requires dynamis.
I'm just saying that seems to fit very neatly with the way dark knights channel their emotions to generate more magic than they should

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Originally Posted by Kalaam

Why wouldn't we be able to manipulate it ? We do not have the knowledge of how to, because we never studied it, but they might unknowingly started using it to fuel another aether based magic

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Because that's what everything the game has been telling us. It's only usable in extreme circumstance.

I'd say that a lot of what we do is a combination of Aether and Dynamis. The whole point of us being sundered is that as whole beings of such strong Aether, we drowned out Dynamis. Once sundered, we are better able to manipulate the latter, though it's done unconsciously. Something like the Warrior's Berserk state to me is an example of us combining Aether and Dynamis into a form we can use. Which is why we're so strong-- we're not limited to just one form or the other, but combine the two for something greater.

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Originally Posted by Kalaam

He uses a greatsword, but as said he has limitless magical abilities etc. I'm not saying using dark magic requires dynamis.
I'm just saying that seems to fit very neatly with the way dark knights channel their emotions to generate more magic than they should

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Or it is just the emotional state affecting the way the aether is coming out, since magic can involve manipulating one's own bodily aether, and if your emotions are in an agitated state, that may well suffice to produce darkness...

It might be dynamis. It might not be. None of it requires that it be.

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Originally Posted by Ryaz

I'd say that a lot of what we do is a combination of Aether and Dynamis. The whole point of us being sundered is that as whole beings of such strong Aether, we drowned out Dynamis. Once sundered, we are better able to manipulate the latter, though it's done unconsciously. Something like the Warrior's Berserk state to me is an example of us combining Aether and Dynamis into a form we can use. Which is why we're so strong-- we're not limited to just one form or the other, but combine the two for something greater.

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Right, and to add to this - the fact that it's an unconscious thing isn't to say also that it's not a thing that we tap into regularly, either. Maybe it's not as intentional as manipulating aether in order to cast a spell, or something that we can do so easily. But I'd argue that if dynamis is influenced by strong emotions, if it's something that aids us in our hour of need but not something we can harness directly at will, would not a dark night opening the flood gates to the dark, strong emotions within them and unleashing power that transcends what they'd normally be capable of due to the sheer intensity of their emotions be an example of an extreme circumstance? Would it not be a situation where, while we're not directly able to control dynamis, we're doing something that allows us to be more susceptible to its influence?

I've always wondered "but wait, how exactly are we doing this?" for things like that, so I rather like that dynamis can help fill in those gaps.

Aren't Limit Breaks Dynamis? I thought I read that somewhere.

I don't really understand the backlash against dynamis, but maybe it's the physics analogy, or that even in the fantasy I read with hard magic systems (Brandon Sanderson comes to mind), they don't tie every single magical element to one system or force, even if that's the one that gets the most detail- but having everything in XIV being handwaved as 'aether' was deeply unsatisfying and came across as lackluster undeveloped writing. Having a second named magical force that operates in ways that can be both opposing and complimentary, and isn't a complete handwave mystery but has some room for the writers to flesh it out - and that it is regulated to being weaker except in very specific circumstances- only comes across as a bonus to me. Sure, I understand the fear that everything and every enemy going forward is going to be explained via dynamis instead of aether because here's our new hot plot macguffin - but it's yet to be a factor in the Pandaemonion raids, and it feels like a useful additive retcon instead of subtractive.

It certainly made Omega Raid less cheesy.

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Originally Posted by Denishia

I don't really understand the backlash against dynamis, but maybe it's the physics analogy, or that even in the fantasy I read with hard magic systems (Brandon Sanderson comes to mind), they don't tie every single magical element to one system or force, even if that's the one that gets the most detail- but having everything in XIV being handwaved as 'aether' was deeply unsatisfying and came across as lackluster undeveloped writing. Having a second named magical force that operates in ways that can be both opposing and complimentary, and isn't a complete handwave mystery but has some room for the writers to flesh it out - and that it is regulated to being weaker except in very specific circumstances- only comes across as a bonus to me. Sure, I understand the fear that everything and every enemy going forward is going to be explained via dynamis instead of aether because here's our new hot plot macguffin - but it's yet to be a factor in the Pandaemonion raids, and it feels like a useful additive retcon instead of subtractive.

It certainly made Omega Raid less cheesy.

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When it comes to Lore some people just are very attached to the old ways. Adding something new, even if it IS an additive retcon and can fit into the lore, is still a retcon to them. So, if they've been told for 8 years that everything we do is through aether, then by god, that's it. Nothing else. It breaks their head canon and some people don't adapt to it too well. Trust me, it took me some time to grasp dynamis as well, but the more I thought about it, the more I felt it made sense and could fit very well into the lore and I'm excited to see it explored more in the future. We find new discoveries of how things work every day in real life, so it makes sense that people can find it in a fantasy world as well.

Any long running story is going to have some inconsistencies here and there. FFXIV has kept those to a minimum in my opinion, though some people treat this stuff like WoW levels of retcon. I feel as a society we tend to overanalyze everything these days. People freak out if everything isn't spelled out for them in movies, for example, and expect it all the make perfectly logical sense and can't just enjoy stories for what they are. As a scientifically, logically minded person myself, there are times I get frustrated at the stupidity of certain things I've watched. But I've learned how to turn my brain off during those moments and just enjoy the spectacle.

I've always been amazed and amused at how from the beginning that XIV has worked to explain with in-game lore elements that I was willing to accept as genre or gameplay conventions, elements I was perfectly able to turn my brain off for, be it the Echo to explain wipes in dungeons, the various explanations for Extreme and Savage versions of fights, that at least some of the Duty Finder has canon moments, and now dynamis for some of the 'heroic willpower' like in Omega and at least partially or some of the Limit Breaks.

I think it's worth pointing out that when it comes disciplines like dancing, they are not really being studied extensively by the leading aethorologists of the world. Dancers just say they are manipulating aether through thier dance because that is what they understand "energy" to be. It might be aether, it might be dynamis. I don't think enougn in-universe research has been done on Dark Knights or Dancers to know.

Though I like to imagine some Hannish alchemist writing a paper theorizing that Dancers are using akasa, and it failing peer review because they had no way of proving it at the time.

From the Flame in the Abyss (Lv. 58/Heavensward):
Ahhh, I think I'm beginning to understand this whole “darkness” concept, kupo!
Harnessing the power of your emotions or some such, yes? I'm reminded of an ancient legend about a moogle named Mog─rather simple name, I know, but those were simpler times, kupo! Anyway, Mog had a penchant for dancing, and─

Wait, wait. What does dancing have to do with the dark arts?

Everything, kupo! Everything!
The point is, your master was absolutely right when he told you to “submit to the flame.” You just never figured out what he meant by it.

I think that should answer OP's question.

Part of the resistance to Dynamis comes from the broader Lore forums wanting to flex on the writers in an attempt to demonstrate that they're smarter and more knowledgeable about game lore. Part of it also comes from the fact that Dynamis is coded as emotional and irrational, and those things are scary. What I find fascinating is that most of Azem's current travelling companions have years of formal education under their belt and carry doctorate equivalents, but the idea that there might be something out there that contradicts the fundamental assumption/axiom that underpins all their theories is met with 'Huh, I didn't know about that. Tell me more.' Odd that genuine scientific curiosity is so rare, and that it's so much more common to become emotionally attached to your dogmas.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

What I find fascinating is that most of Azem's current travelling companions have years of formal education under their belt and carry doctorate equivalents, but the idea that there might be something out there that contradicts the fundamental assumption/axiom that underpins all their theories is met with 'Huh, I didn't know about that. Tell me more.' Odd that genuine scientific curiosity is so rare, and that it's so much more common to become emotionally attached to your dogmas.

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I attribute that to how many over the top things they've seen over the course of the game. They've seen body snatching ancient souls, have traversed worlds, learned that their "astral and umbral" polarities were "dark and light" respectively (they believed the opposite), have seen a long lost ancient civilization's city and its downfall, and have in general seen so many things to where they'd be fools not to believe something that may seem outlandish. At this point I wouldn't be surprised if they showed up in the Hildibrand questline and took it all seriously.

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Originally Posted by Denishia

I don't really understand the backlash against dynamis, but maybe it's the physics analogy, or that even in the fantasy I read with hard magic systems (Brandon Sanderson comes to mind),

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A very pertinent lecture.
And more.
And more.

Timestamped for your convenience, though I suggest you watch the whole thing. But basically people are given to dissatisfaction with Dynamis because it is effectively a new magic power invented to solve a problem at the 95% mark of the story. It's not as grounded as aether, which is already like midway on that scale there, but neither does it have much in the way of a sense of mystery because they basically explained how it works - sort of - with the caveat that it can effectively do anything. So it is neither "magic as science" where the reader is impressed by how the writer cleverly solved a problem using well-established rules, but neither is it "magic as wonder" because it's fairly understood and directly viewed to the point of carrying the plot via powerscaling.

So if Endwalker is "the final chapter in the Hydaelyn and Zodiark Saga", Dynamis is the deus ex machina brought out in the last chapter of the book to wrap up all the problems. Hence unsatisfying.

I'm not sure how you can say dynamis "solved problems" when it was quite literally the cause of the final days. If anything it was an antagonistic force that our aether-based characters had to find ways to counteract.

Also, in the context of Endwalker, it was introduced very early on through the Elpis flowers and in Thavnair, and explored more throughout the Elpis questline before being central to the ending. And even prior to Endwalker, there was a looming question of what unknown force caused the Final Days; and then Endwalker goes on to introduce and explain a previously-unknown force that caused the Final Days; seems like decent enough set up and payoff to me.

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Originally Posted by Lucke

Aren't Limit Breaks Dynamis? I thought I read that somewhere.

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Yep, when you use the LB3 in the Endsinger fight she exclaims 'Dynamis?' so it's implied that Dynamis has something to do with it.

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Originally Posted by Veloran

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Dynamis doesn't get introduced in the eleventh hour, in this story, however. The Elpis flower and its associated musical motif shows up in the Level 80 quest 'The Medial Circuit', which is the fifth quest in. The term Akasha shows up for the first time in the Level 81 quest 'The Color of Joy'. You're given plenty of foreshadowing well in advance of any of these things becoming plot relevant. The story also very deliberately makes a point of feeding you lines such as Hermes' "A flower" and Hyth's "Perhaps when our time comes to return to the star, we shall remember the days we had lost,' which are very deliberately delivered in a throwaway fashion initially only for them to come back with a vengeance at the climax (they do cheat a bit by changing the delivery each time). It's amazing how even lyrically that bit of refrain that we've heard in the trailer for months, 'Our song of hope she dances on the wind, higher, oh higher/On wings of hope you rise up in the night' carries a whole other emotional impact when it contextually slams into you during your fight with the Endsinger.

I don't think that a formal discussion of Dynamis was at all necessary for resolution of this story. Even if you willfully ignore the running theme of the indomitable spirit triumphing against all odds that comes up in FFXIV time and again (didn't they literally spell this out for us with Alpha and Omega), this is a recurring theme in the wider Final Fantasy series as well. Many long term fans would have been more surprised if the montage of our friends praying for us didn't show up in the final fight, as part of the obligatory homage to FFIV. (Again, can I reiterate how much powerful storytelling in this game gets conveyed simply through sound? The simple inclusion of the sound of the Scions' gloves tightening makes the moment feel even more clutch.)

If you want to talk about hard vs. soft magic systems, it's worth looking at Amaurot's Creation magic first as an example of soft magic. This is actually the sort of thing that runs the risk of Deus Ex Machina, much more than Dynamis. But much like the Gandalf example included in your link, it really exists just to highlight a difference in power between the Ancients and ourselves. And we'll probably see the counterpoint/flaw to its use get demonstrated in the current raid series, given the identity of the one who was historically in charge of Creation Magic.

It's also worth remembering the zeroth rule: 'Always err on the side of awesome.' It's perfectly fine to have an epiphany at the climax. The highlight of Shadowbringers' climax was the Revan reveal moment: Emet's stunned look just after you rejoin with Arbert and Emet realizes that he's up against Azem. Despite having a predilection for hard magic systems, Sanderson does this all the time with plot twists in his work as well. Characters always break their limitations in the climax. Not because it was preordained in dialogue box 23 from ARR or in book one of the EE vol. 1, but because it's hella cool.

I think people are free to interpret the story and its supposed 'themes' however they so wish. Especially when the game's themes change as often as the wind blows. ARR and HW were prone to gritty realism for the most part, with many lasting consequences all around for both antagonists and protagonists alike. It was from SB and beyond where the tone shifted towards some of the more controversial and predictably stale JRPG tropes.

No story is going to please everybody, though I think it does a lot of people a disservice to dismiss concerns about Dynamis being introduced so hastily at so critical a point. Many of us have invested in and played the likes of WoW. We've been at these crossroads before and seen large swathes of a story retroactively changed to suit the latest whims of what the writers think is 'cool' as well as increasingly contrived methods introduced to empower and keep certain characters alive.

dynamis being misinterperated to be aether is the same as believing the sun is a ball of gas.

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Originally Posted by Theodric

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What is so 'hasty' or 'contrived' about the discussion about Dynamis' in this expansion? Just because a world-building element wasn't formally discussed in ARR doesn't automatically make it a retroactive change. Any serial work is obliged to expand on itself and introduce new information about the world eventually. There are missing parts of the map. Does it matter when these segments are fleshed out by the writers? Is designing the map as you go along cheating? No, it's irrelevant, as long as you don't go back and redraw areas that we've already seen when it's convenient.

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Originally Posted by Denishia

Sure, I understand the fear that everything and every enemy going forward is going to be explained via dynamis instead of aether because here's our new hot plot macguffin - but it's yet to be a factor in the Pandaemonion raids, and it feels like a useful additive retcon instead of subtractive.

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When 7.0 comes out and all the new added skills for all of the jobs have in their tool tips dynamis instead of aether, feel free to say 'I Told You So'.

The point about new zones and areas in the map are a good one; FFXIV is generally very good about revisiting old lore and places instead of abandoning them for the new thing. Like the primals, they will often re-contextualize and add to with additive retcons, but that's in part because this is a MMO.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

What is so 'hasty' or 'contrived' about the discussion about Dynamis' in this expansion? Just because a world-building element wasn't formally discussed in ARR doesn't automatically make it a retroactive change. Any serial work is obliged to expand on itself and introduce new information about the world eventually. There are missing parts of the map. Does it matter when these segments are fleshed out by the writers? Is designing the map as you go along cheating? No, it's irrelevant, as long as you don't go back and redraw areas that we've already seen when it's convenient.

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You're free to believe differently, though Veloran's post covers much of the constructive criticism being put forward. It need not be a controversy - the writers are free to write whatever they so wish, though that doesn't mean that everybody invested in the story needs to like or agree with absolutely everything put in front of them. Nor does it mean that those same individuals dislike absolutely everything that the expansion brought about.

It strikes me as something to agree to disagree on. Personal tastes are just that - personal tastes. The writers may or may not opt to retroactively change how past story elements played out, though WoW did the same thing and it led to more problems than it solved.

It's not a question whether you enjoy or dislike story elements. That's an issue of personal taste. If someone wants to claim that Dynamis is a retroactive change, however, the burden of proof is on them to show how it contradicts the established facts. Not that it would be necessarily hard to do now or perhaps in the future; it takes significantly more effort to construct an error-free self-consistent continuity that spans ten years of stories than it is to poke a lore hole in it. But at least put in some work before you come to claim your internet points. It's all too easy to imply and allege fault in the writing from a safe distance without actually committing to it.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

It's not a question whether you enjoy or dislike story elements. That's an issue of personal taste. If someone wants to claim that Dynamis is a retroactive change, however, the burden of proof is on them to show how it contradicts the established facts. Not that it would be necessarily hard to do now or perhaps in the future; it takes significantly more effort to construct an error-free self-consistent continuity that spans ten years of stories than it is to poke a lore hole in it. But at least put in some work before you come to claim your internet points. It's all too easy to imply and allege fault in the writing from a safe distance without actually committing to it.

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People have already put in work and given points on why it is a retroactive change. Just because you don’t agree with it doesn’t make it any less true.What does internet points have to do with it? It just sounds like you’re upset about other peoples takes on the story elements and deus ex machina inserts and trying to throw things around to make them less relevant. Dynamis is just one of the many faults in the writing this expansion.

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Originally Posted by KizuyaKatogami

People have already put in work and given points on why it is a retroactive change. Just because you don’t agree with it doesn’t make it any less true.What does internet points have to do with it? It just sounds like you’re upset about other peoples takes on the story elements and deus ex machina inserts and trying to throw things around to make them less relevant. Dynamis is just one of the many faults in the writing this expansion.

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Except it isn't a fault in writing, and its inclusion does not contradict anything. If anything, it explains a lot in hindsight. What Omega was trying to figure out and replicate in the raids, what saved Nero at the end of CT (remember, his corruption vanished after he swore he would not die there and would live on), how we were able to survive a hit from A12's Holy Judgement (our first canonical use of tank LB3), etc etc.

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Originally Posted by KizuyaKatogami

What does internet points have to do with it?

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Yeah, I always end up with a big grin of disbelief whenever I read that particular phrase. It's a discussion forum for a make believe video game, not an Olympic sport for people to 'win'. When I'm in the mood for a bit of competition, I'd rather do something more productive such as indulge in a friendly race or bout of weight lifting.

I just want to point out this was originally a thread about how dynamis could be intregrated into the story as a concept and how it could maybe be applied to old lore retroactively, for people who are interested in the subject.

And it has quickly devolved into people coming in and saying "actually dynamis is shitty writing and I do not like it". You're free to have that opinion, but it is a shame it has completely overshadowed the original point of the thread.

I'm genuinely interested in seeing how Dynamis is a retroactive change that contradicts established fact. If someone has written a post on this subject and I've missed it, I would love to be directed to it.

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Originally Posted by KariTheFox

I'm not sure how you can say dynamis "solved problems" when it was quite literally the cause of the final days. If anything it was an antagonistic force that our aether-based characters had to find ways to counteract.

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It explained the Final Days and it explained how we stop the Final Days. Narratively that's solving the two biggest problems in the plot with one element.

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Originally Posted by KariTheFox

Also, in the context of Endwalker, it was introduced very early on through the Elpis flowers and in Thavnair, and explored more throughout the Elpis questline before being central to the ending. And even prior to Endwalker, there was a looming question of what unknown force caused the Final Days; and then Endwalker goes on to introduce and explain a previously-unknown force that caused the Final Days; seems like decent enough set up and payoff to me.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

Dynamis doesn't get introduced in the eleventh hour, in this story, however.

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Endwalker is merely the last chapter in a story that's been running since 1.0. In that context it's only insistently hinted at 85% of the way through the plot, then only formally introduced in Elpis at level 87, at like the 95% point. To tie back to what I linked before, even though Sanderson had hinted at the existence of another magic throughout Mistborn, he recognized that introducing it in the final chapters of the book to resolve the climax was faulty writing.

As Theodric pointed out, it's very easy for people to get too comfortable with the idea of retroactive continuity, and allow themselves to fill in the blanks and explain things away that the writers aren't bothering with. This sort of thing can ultimately end up seriously undermining long-running narratives.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

I'm genuinely interested in seeing how Dynamis is a retroactive change that contradicts established fact. If someone has written a post on this subject and I've missed it, I would love to be directed to it.

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Attendant to what I was just referring to, consider Ryu's explanation that A12 was our first canonical use of LB3, and thus explained by a use of Dynamis. But consider then that Dynamis is stated to be suppressed and negated by aether - How, then, did we use Dynamis while inside of a Primal, a being composed entirely of aether? Or, consider the idea that sundered peoples' aetherially thin beings are partly composed of Dynamis. If that is so how does anybody teleport, when that is undertaken by transforming an individual into their composite aether, and whisking them through the (obviously incredibly aetherially dense) aetherial sea? And if there is a massive veil of aetherial energy enshrouding the world coming from Zodiark, then how could anybody ever have been able to use Dynamis prior to his destruction? And of course - If LBs are Dynamis, why can the Ancients in Elpis and Elidibus in SoS use LBs?

To be clear here, with this I'm not intending to state that these questions are definitively plot holes. Only that they are unanswered questions raised by the introduction of Dynamis. The issue is, I'm not confident that any such questions will be answered. Because I've previously seen writers get too carried away with utilizing retroactive continuity to the point that questions continue to be raised only for layers and layers of retcons for the sake of "cool writing" to be added over time without clarification ever coming down the line. I'm very nervous about XIV going down such a path, and Dynamis does the opposite of assuaging such concerns.

Sanderson's first law is not 'Thou shalt not introduce in new world-building lore in the sequels of a serial work.' It's a principle of foreshadowing, in which you plant plot elements well in advance of them becoming plot significant so that the reader/viewer gets an 'aha' moment when you stab them with a plot twist. (Otherwise you'd know the complete ideals of all the Knights Radiant by now and not just be fed them during climactic plot moments, but I digress.)

On the subject of Limit Breaks, there's no clear cut line on what exactly is Aether and what is Dynamis. Emet, for example, uses the line 'Mine is the Aether!' when he uses a Caster Limit Break. Likewise, it's never definitively stated what Elidibus uses to power his Limit Breaks. There is, however, this unresolved bit of dialogue from your showdown with him (Hope's Confluence):

What of it?! I have my mission! I am Elidibus! And it is my duty to steer mankind and the very star upon their true course. This I swore to... to someone. We spoke, and I swore... what? What did I...?

Ah, poor old amnesic Elidibus. I really can't help but wonder if his Warrior of Light, his summoning magicks, and his 'Limit Breaks' all draw inspiration from a certain chance encounter on Elpis, countless years before. I'll laugh if he makes that promise after discovering the cause of the terrible cry from within the earth that set off the Final Days. Perhaps in a place in the depths with lots of Creation magic.

So now let's look at the A12 example that you put out. If Hermes is to be believed, the unsundered Amaurotians were too aetherically dense to perceive, manipulate, or interact with Dynamis in a meaningful way outside a few observations made about entelechies. So how did the Final Days as a Dynamis based phenomenon have any effect on the Ancients? It affected their creation magic. And what is the modern day derivative of creation magic? Primal summoning. Meaning that if Meteion can warp an Ancient's creation magicks on Etheirys from the edge of the universe, then it wouldn't be a stretch for us to unconsciously use Dynamis inside a primal.

Part of the difficulty here is that we don't have the rules, so there probably isn't enough here for you to go off of show a contradiction just yet. Can you utilize Dynamis miles beneath the veil of Zodiark's moving celestial Aether currents? It would seem that way, otherwise the Elpis flower from Sharlayan wouldn't change colour in the present era. Does Dynamis have a mass-like property similar to Aether, or is it completely intangible? What are the Aether thresholds at which you can use/not use Dynamis effectively? If the Garleans are unable to manipulate aether but their Reapers are capable of summoning Voidsent, does that mean that Void magic is based off of Dynamis? Are there any civilizations that are actually based off of utilizing Dynamis (the Amaurotian quest Debate and Discourse, for example, alludes to another civilization co-existing at the same time as the Ancients 'across the pond' that had the capabilities to build a metropolis and a calamity of their own to deal with.) As you can see, this doesn't just have implications for Endwalker, but future storytelling as well.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

Sanderson's first law is not 'Thou shalt not introduce in new world-building lore in the sequels of a serial work.' It's a principle of foreshadowing, in which you plant plot elements well in advance of them becoming plot significant so that the reader/viewer gets an 'aha' moment when you stab them with a plot twist.

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Yes, but as Sanderson says he had already foreshadowed the existence of a secondary magic system in the first book, but still recognized that introducing it at the very end of that book to resolve the plot was erroneous writing. In the context of XIV, this is where I think the "missing expansion" between Shadowbringers and Endwalker, the original 6.0, would have significantly smoothed out the story. Introducing Dynamis there and allowing us to stew and learn more about it for a couple of years would have integrated it much more seamlessly into the narrative before we went into the final chapter.

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On the subject of Limit Breaks, there's no clear cut line on what exactly is Aether and what is Dynamis. Emet, for example, uses the line 'Mine is the Aether!' when he uses a Caster Limit Break. Likewise, it's never definitively stated what Elidibus uses to power his Limit Breaks.

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As you point you, we lack the rules about any of this, and so are left with nothing but headcanon to fill the blanks. For example, all player Limit Breaks are observed as aetherical by the characters in-universe through the EE, which would suggest that, if LBs are indeed partly Dynamis, that both aether and Dynamis are combining to produce the effect. Which runs in contradiction to the notion that they are incompatible.

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So how did the Final Days as a Dynamis based phenomenon have any effect on the Ancients? It affected their creation magic. And what is the modern day derivative of creation magic? Primal summoning. Meaning that if Meteion can warp an Ancient's creation magicks on Etheirys from the edge of the universe, then it wouldn't be a stretch for us to unconsciously use Dynamis inside a primal.

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As above, there is no explanation. We don't know how the Ancient's magicks were warped, only that concepts were seemingly siphoned from their minds and made real by creation magics taken from their control. We have no idea how Dynamis could be capable of this. And with the issue of the Primals, there's also the fact that they are formed partially through faith and prayer - Something that, now, we could easily conceptualize as Dynamis. But if so, that raises the question of how Hydaelyn and Zodiark could even exist, given the Ancients evident inability to manipulate Dynamis.

While I am interested in the ways Dynamis could factor into the story in the future, at the moment I have my doubts as to the question of whether or not they'll get around to explaining some of the oddities surrounding it, such as what is and is not Dynamis on a basic level. To do so in-game we might need to return to ARR-levels of exposition dumps. Otherwise we'll be left awaiting a potential new EE in the future.

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Originally Posted by Denishia

The point about new zones and areas in the map are a good one; FFXIV is generally very good about revisiting old lore and places instead of abandoning them for the new thing. Like the primals, they will often re-contextualize and add to with additive retcons, but that's in part because this is a MMO.

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Spoken like someone who definitely wasn't super invested in Gelmorra or Silvertear Lake. They do drop interesting setting hooks sometimes, it's just that it's more often 'quietly file a side thing back into nonexistence' rather than 'yeah this big thing is no longer a thing anymore'.

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Originally Posted by KariTheFox

I just want to point out this was originally a thread about how dynamis could be intregrated into the story as a concept and how it could maybe be applied to old lore retroactively, for people who are interested in the subject.

And it has quickly devolved into people coming in and saying "actually dynamis is shitty writing and I do not like it". You're free to have that opinion, but it is a shame it has completely overshadowed the original point of the thread.

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Honestly, the lore subforum's had a lot of that going on lately, a few people consistently stomping into discussion about any part of the story they don't like, going 'IT BAD' and derailing the entire discussion. I'm getting rather tired of it, because I really am ready for a good talk about what was actually laid out.

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Originally Posted by Veloran

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The Mistborn analogy doesn't apply well here. The central problem is 'main villain is immortal, nobody can defeat him.' When the resolution to that conflict is 'The protagonist was secretly more powerful than she realized', then there never was a conflict to begin with. It doesn't really matter when you introduce that fact. Deus Ex Machina eliminates the central conflict by sidestepping it. Sanderson's point about having a 'victory condition' is important. He contrasts Helm's Deep and Pelennor Fields in that the solution to both problems is similar (big army shows up, we win), but one has a foreshadowed victory condition (survive for five days) and the other does not. Without that victory condition, there is no dramatic tension, because you can just win at any point that you feel like. You can, however, distract the audience from that condition, which is why its to your advantage to introduce the rules of the game earlier rather than later.

None of this really applies to Dynamis. I think if you want to see a better example of this principle, look at Ultima Thule. As you progress through the area, you're given some bits of information on how it works:
- Meteion can unmake people at will.
- Emotions govern the land, allowing a soul to stand up in defiance of Meteion even if she unmakes them. She has to break their spirit to win.
- You can use Azem's magic to summon your friends souls back at any point, but that resets your way forward. (this effectively sets the terms for the victory condition and hints at the solution - your 'friends' are more than the people that you're travelling with)
- When people return to the star, they regain the memories that they've lost.

All the pieces are on the table beforehand. The main conflict is an ideological one. Stand up to Meteion, and show her your will to live. If you wanted to discuss whether this setup works or not using the above framework, it would be relevant. Is it contrived? Anything can be if you choose to be critical enough. That's really up to individual interpretation. Maybe you liked it, maybe you didn't. I thought it was clever.

But as for the explanation of Dynamis that we get? I don't think that it has any impact on dramatic tension outside of pure symbolism. It's a world-building element. It's not the MacGuffin that solves the conflict. If you're going to blame anything, it should be Azem's soulstone.

When you have limited information to go on, you have to be careful not to infer more than you actually can. Aether interferes with Dynamis somehow. Does that mean that the two are incompatible? Meteion is still made up of Aether, even if it is a little thin, so they're not 'incompatible' per say. Is it that Dynamis transmits less effectively through Aether? Or is a better analogy to compare Electromagnatism and the Strong interaction, where the dominant effect depends on something like scale, causing one to 'drown out' the other? Can you use the two together, by say creating a box of Aether and opening it to stuff it full of Dynamis so that it can't escape? Break in case of emergency. What if the Flame in the Abyss refers to an interplay between Aether and Dynamis?

I don't think that Limit Breaks need to universally be one thing. In times of emotional duress, people can surpass their limitations. Perhaps some of these cases involve just Aether. Perhaps some involve just Dynamis. Perhaps they involve both. What we do know is that there are a lot of jobs out there that draw on forces that are not entirely aetherical in nature. Wrath, Darkside, and so on. Perhaps these have something to do with Dynamis. Perhaps there are other forces out there that we're not aware of. Either way, it adds a bit of nuance to our understanding of these things. Emotions are powerful in this universe.

I'm sure that we'll learn more as we go. For one, there is a lot about Void Magic and the Voidsent that we still yet don't know, and this is probably the one thing that I'm the most curious about. I wouldn't be surprised if we get a referential tie in here somewhere, especially given that Diabolos was the creator of Dynamis in FFXI. Second, as powerful as Amaurot was, it was isolationist, and it sounds like their contemporaries from 'across the pond' were quite technologically advanced as well. I doubt it was the center of the universe that its denizens made it out to be. I wouldn't be surprised if there was an 'Esthar City' lurking out there in the 'wastelands' of Meracydia or even in the New World. If Dynamis exists, there are surely people out there who have mastered its use, and yet others who would find our current powers to be underwhelming. There should always be room for growth, learning, and the promise of a journey to that next horizon.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

But as for the explanation of Dynamis that we get? I don't think that it has any impact on dramatic tension outside of pure symbolism. It's a world-building element. It's not the MacGuffin that solves the conflict. If you're going to blame anything, it should be Azem's soulstone.

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Even Azem's soulstone didn't quite resolve the conflict with Meteion. It allowed the scions and the WoL to move into a position where we could confront the Endsinger directly. But immediately after that, the scions were all blown away into space, and the WoL was forced to use the teleportation device to get them all to safety.

After that point, there were two central conflicts to be solved. The first was the physical confrontation with the Endsinger. The second was the matter of reaching Meteion on an emotional level.

The first was solved by Zenos showing up in a manner that kind of was a deus-ex-machina, but in a good way in my opinion. He literally breaks into the scene and gives the WoL the means to fight the Endsinger directly, but doesn't actually resolve the conflict directly. And this where FFXIV's nature as video game differentiates it from other forms of literature, you're allowed to solve violent conflict by directly asking the player to do it through gameplay.

And even the fight itself has a narrative. After the Endsinger seemingly destroys you, the prayers and hopes of the scions reach you, and gives you the strength to finally defeat the Endsinger (represented by the enormous potency buffs you get after that.) And that mirrors both the prayer scene of the scions in the very first cutscene of ARR, and reinforces the themes of Ultima Thule that state that even if your friends aren't physically with you, their hopes and prayers can propel you forward.

As for the second, emotional conflict. That was resolved by showing compassion and kindness to Meteion directly, and sharing with her both your pain and your hopes. Sure, kind of simple, but sometimes the answer to despair is to just reach out and give someone comfort.

The point being that neither dynamis, nor Azem's soulstone actually ever resolved the conflict. They were just there to help move the WoL to be in a position where they could solve the conflict themselves.