Encyclopedia Eorzea THREE

Heads up to other lore forum goers, pre-orders for EE3 are up on the SE Store:https://sqex.to/Snrq9

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The third volume of the official FINAL FANTASY XIV lore books, written and compiled by the FINAL FANTASY XIV development team! This deluxe hardcover tome comprises records of adventures that transcend the bounds of space and time, from the ancient world to the very stars above.

Offering an astonishing amount of information covering the Shadowbringers and Endwalker expansions, this third volume of Encyclopaedia Eorzea brings readers further into the realms of the global hit video game. Hundreds of richly illustrated, full-color pages present detailed explorations of the events that occurred in Etheirys, Norvrandt, and the sea of stars, as well as comprehensive descriptions of their histories, peoples, lands, and more.

An unending source of knowledge and inspiration to all those who seek truths across and beyond our star.

Includes an exclusive item code for an in-game Wind-up Fourchenault* minion!

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Ahh so they'll probably show it off at Fan Fest as last time we only were shown an empty book.

I'm glad they're finally bringing it out. As soon as I'm able to afford it, I'm definitely going to be buying it to go with my other two.

What are you supposed to do with a Book that says something that is different / changed in the game or becomes completely meaningless because it is changed afterwards?

Then you just accept it as is for what it was at the time of publication.

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Originally Posted by Aneshda

What are you supposed to do with a Book that says something that is different / changed in the game or becomes completely meaningless because it is changed afterwards?

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The books are written from the perspective of scholars in the game. If something happens in 6.5 that cancels something that shows up in the lore book it just means that that thing was understood as X at the time the person wrote it. They have since been proven wrong.

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Originally Posted by Aneshda

What are you supposed to do with a Book that says something that is different / changed in the game or becomes completely meaningless because it is changed afterwards?

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As someone who owns both of the first two, and checks them quite constantly, you'd be surprised how little changes! In fact, a quick check through volume 1's content (released during HW's patches), out of the 303 pages of this book, I count six pages that actually have 'meaningless because of changed' info. One on the Ascians, one on the Warriors of Darkness (neither of which is actually saying outright incorrect info, just outdated to the point where they're not reliable sources on the subject), and four on jobs that mention at least one ability that's been removed in the interim. And none of those pages are completely worthless as a result; everything else about the jobs is accurate, the WoDs are mostly telling the truth aside from names, and the Ascian page has info on a few members that's still both accurate and not elaborated on elsewhere. I'm pretty sure there's no content in volume 2 hit by the same thing, at least at a glance.

Something that's really striking about FFXIV's writing compared to similar media that tells ongoing stories over a long period is that it sticks almost entirely to what I've seen called 'additive retcons'; basically, 'there was more to this part than you first thought' (as opposed to subtractive retcons, or 'nuh-uh, that didn't happen'). Maybe it's because they've largely stuck to a generally stable group of writers working on a singular story. But the end result is that there's no part of its storytelling and lore that you can just tear out and go 'not true anymore'; that's definitely not true of other MMOs like this, and frequently not true of storytelling with similar situations like superhero comics.

Needless to say, I'm very excited about volume three!

We also got our first look at Fourchenault way back in EE1 and nothing about Sharlayan has changed (at least not in any substantial way) as to make the book "meaningless". The Lore team is generally that good with consistency that the times when they do retcon things stand out (looking at you, Echo/Blessing of Light).

Honestly, I'm mostly surprised at how little the Basic Aetherology section has changed with ShB and EW, and what details HAVE changed (namely, it still refers to the planet as Hydaelin) is such a non-issue because it reflects the current understanding at the time and STILL got the basics of the Mothercrysal right (namely, a mass concentration of aether), with the misunderstanding of using Hydaelin to refer to the planet is supported in Her entry Codex entry.

Also, the sum of knowledge expands and changes in real life, I wouldn't expect the Encyclopedia Brittanica from 1920 to hold the same scientific understanding as the one from 2020, and in-game we're living through an Age of Discovery. I'm somewhat hoping EE3 gives us a native name for The New World (if that's indeed where we're going in 7.0) so we don't have the colonizer moniker the rest of the game's lifespan.

Another this with "what if the book contradicts the game" is that if they really do stuff up and have mismatching information, they're more inclined to edit the game to match the book info.

A couple paragraphs in a 300+ page lorebook turning out to be a bit off vs the final in-game product wouldn't be enough for me to care, honestly. lol Besides, this thing is gonna cover Shadowbringers/The First. There's no way I'm not buying it.

It's fun, it's got art, it's on my Christmas list.

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Also, I was looking at the preview and Ryne is listed as "Ryne Waters". That's adorable.

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Originally Posted by WhiteArchmage

We also got our first look at Fourchenault way back in EE1 and nothing about Sharlayan has changed (at least not in any substantial way) as to make the book "meaningless". The Lore team is generally that good with consistency that the times when they do retcon things stand out (looking at you, Echo/Blessing of Light).

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Even the Echo/Blessing was more of a localization thing than the original writing; in the Japanese script Midgardsormr's big post-Keeper of the Lake scene distinguishes between them off-handedly (and crucially, alludes to both of them being a form of protection), and in English that part was obfuscated to the point of basically not being there because of that scene being written extremely differently. That caused a uniquely weird situation where in Japanese, that distinguishing is a stated but dormant fact that got built on much later, similar to something like the Creeping Death, while in English they just sorta didn't get the chance to correct the record until it was too late.

Yes, it's still about as annoying, but it's also way weirder than just 'retcon'. (I'd also say it's a credit to the writers that even the worst of these only reach the level of 'annoying'.)

And similar to Sharlayan, the EE1's info on Ala Mhigo and Garlemald is only 'inaccurate' because it can't reflect the events of the story written afterwards, it's all pretty the money for what we'd go on to see in Stormblood and Endwalker respectively. And similar to Fourchenault, EE1 had a portrait of Solus Galvus that was used as the basis for his appearance in the Bozja storyline. It also has a table of every Garlean title except 'viator' (which was made up on the spot so fair enough), which you can find mirrored on the internet these days, but it came from there, and describes a lot of titles that we would only see in the game afterwards, like 'bas', 'goe' and 'nan'.

We know the original 1.x story was supposed to end at Silvertear Lake and most concepts in the story would tie into the "force" there (which was never revealed and might no longer even exist in the world-setting). There have been a lot of clues over the years that support the hypothesis that the Echo either was either uprooted from its original explanation without a plan for how to explain it in the new setting, or never had an explanation at the start at all. You can see several retrofits to the concept over time, so there was probably never any hope that whatever Eorzeans theorized it to be as of EE1 would be remain totally accurate.

In 1.x, the Echo was primarily a plot device - a contrived psychic power to explore history and it just happened to protect you from primals. It was implied that you were blessed by something and therefore couldn't be blessed by something else. This split into the Echo + the blessing in 2.00, when they revealed Hydaelyn and added the "collect the Crystals of Light" concept (theory: they wanted to exploit the nostalgia). Lahabrea originally alludes to it in not-EN Toto-Rak. (Why EN skipped Lahabrea's "James Bond Villain Overexplains Himself" Monologue, I was never quite sure on that.) Endwalker splits it again by separating the Echo from the primal protection, which feels like a very late-game development.

In my humble opinion, it actually looks like there are two layers of blessing. We see other characters refer to receiving the blessing as if it represents divine intervention through the crystal(s) not unlike we saw in the Praetorium. However, Lahabrea and Midgardsormr also highlight something I like to call "the champion factor", something unique to you that marks you as Hydaelyn's chosen. Unlike those gifted with a single crystal, somehow the crystals are drawn to the Warrior of Light. The set wants to be complete. And while other characters can exhaust their crystals, we see the Warrior of Light restore exhausted crystals alight twice (Midgardsormr's attempt to sever the connection to Hydaelyn and when one was "sacrificed" alongisde those of the Warriors of Darkness to bring them into Urianger's trap).

So where we are today is the Echo, the blessing of Light through the Crystals, the champion factor, and the Traveler's Ward primal protection.

Some of it is still a little inconsistent / murky, so I'd expect Eorzean scholars' understanding to keep on shifting, lol.

Yes, what I meant was more that for most of the game we treated the Echo as the power that protected us from Primal Influence until Endwalker suddenly said "Hey, it's great how the Blessing of Light protects from Tempering, huh? Yeah, that good old Blessing of Light that does that thing that we repeatedly said the Echo did." Reinforced when Venat tells us "Huh, you have my Traveler's Ward on you, which protects you against aetherial influences. It is extra special because we all have the Echo here..."

So we kinda have to ignore or headcanon away a whole plot point from Stormblood about the Echo (or rather, the Resonance) giving protection from Tempering to Fordola and Zenos. Which one can headcanon away as "They had the Echo copied from Krile, who canonically has the Blessing, so maybe the Resonance also copied the Blessing and Zenos was full of <kupo!> when he said his theory about the Echo and Will and Tempering." And Arenvald also has the BoL for good measure even though it's never mentioned. In fact, it was in Heavensward when we heard that not everyone with the Echo has the BoL (way earlier, actually, since it was a huge reveal that Iceheart had both plus a crystal of light). And it got kiiiiind of an excuse when 5.3 states that the Echo is a literal awakened memory and Hydaelin has an answering machine message on loop and possibly gives the BoL to anyone that hears it on the off-chance of getting the WoL.

But in the end it's a plot point that I'll raise an eyebrow and wag my finger at, not something that leaves me clamoring for CBU3 to take a scalpel to earlier scenes for consistency's sake.

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Originally Posted by WhiteArchmage

Yes, what I meant was more that for most of the game we treated the Echo as the power that protected us from Primal Influence until Endwalker suddenly said "Hey, it's great how the Blessing of Light protects from Tempering, huh? Yeah, that good old Blessing of Light that does that thing that we repeatedly said the Echo did." Reinforced when Venat tells us "Huh, you have my Traveler's Ward on you, which protects you against aetherial influences. It is extra special because we all have the Echo here..."

[paragraph cut for space]

But in the end it's a plot point that I'll raise an eyebrow and wag my finger at, not something that leaves me clamoring for CBU3 to take a scalpel to earlier scenes for consistency's sake.

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And again, this isn't necessarily a retcon and more just 'the English script missed a fact that wouldn't be important until it was way too late to correct it'. As I understand it, part of Midgardsormr's thing after the Keeper of the Lake in Japanese was him turning up the 'stern dad' angle and going 'she's spoiling you, you've already got a perfectly good Echo and she just goes and gives you a Blessing on top of it', basically saying off-handedly that both are protection so you should be fine with only one. That was a plot point that took nearly seven years before it came back up out of goddamn nowhere, so they didn't really have room to pre-emptively correct the record on it in the same way they were able to use Werlyt to solve a similar situation with the Heart of Sabik. I'd expect the EE3 will give them a spot to say it in clear text; if I were being really analytical I'd say that maybe they could've fit this into the EW healer role quest, since that includes Fordola and therefore forces the Resonance front-and-center, but even there I feel like it'd be completely out of left field and feel too conspicuous.

Which if anything makes for an even stupider situation than it just being a retcon, but it still looked like one to us and would've looked like one no matter how they resolved that, so the difference is basically just academic. But it's honestly testament to how tight a ship they run that this is the worst we've got; I don't even play WoW and I know this is peanuts compared to some of what they've had given to them.

They do create an interesting conversation that limit breaks are aether, not dynamis, and never have been. As far as I can tell, there's never been anything that contradicts aether limit breaks. Calling on a reserve of strength in moments of crisis might be dynamis-driven, but it doesn't mean the technique itself is dynamis.

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Originally Posted by BaroLlyonesse

They do create an interesting conversation that limit breaks are aether, not dynamis, and never have been. As far as I can tell, there's never been anything that contradicts aether limit breaks. Calling on a reserve of strength in moments of crisis might be dynamis-driven, but it doesn't mean the technique itself is dynamis.

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Yep, this is exactly right, and some of us have been saying it since Endwalker launched: the only limit break that is confirmably dynamis is the tank LB3 against the Endsinger, and even then, that's because basically that entire fight is running on dynamis. Inversely, there are multiple LBs that could be in no way dynamis, like the Ktisis Duty Support's LBs, or Machinist's Satellite Laser, and most LBs are provided an explanation in EE1 and 2 that give full credit to a different phenomena. (Interestingly, I think most of them read as tying to the ambient aether of battlefields that's described in Monk's storyline.)

The idea that all LBs are dynamis was basically entirely fueled by 'wouldn't it be cool if', and rejected all evidence to the contrary.

Well, not even that one is necessarily based on Dynamis. She just says "Dynamis?" or (from my understanding) in JP "Is this Dynamis?". Which doesn't mean that the LB was Dynamis itself, only that your will to survive was driven by it. She could be surprised that your will to survive is so powerful that you channeled obscene aether, or that she literally cannot comprehend aether anymore and picked /something/ she understood. It's just as likely.

It's just like in the other example people tend to point toward with the fight with Ultima/Lahabrea, where Hydaelyn is all "I can't protect you anymore." The WoL going "aw crap I'm on my own, better Gohan this stuff up hardcore" doesn't mean Dynamis was used, only that the emotion triggered an aetheral connection.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Something that's really striking about FFXIV's writing compared to similar media that tells ongoing stories over a long period is that it sticks almost entirely to what I've seen called 'additive retcons'; basically, 'there was more to this part than you first thought' (as opposed to subtractive retcons, or 'nuh-uh, that didn't happen'). Maybe it's because they've largely stuck to a generally stable group of writers working on a singular story. But the end result is that there's no part of its storytelling and lore that you can just tear out and go 'not true anymore'; that's definitely not true of other MMOs like this, and frequently not true of storytelling with similar situations like superhero comics.

Needless to say, I'm very excited about volume three!

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Was just thinking this last time I compared my ffxiv book to my wow lore compendium, which has vast swathes of retconning. Yoshi p really focused on getting all their notes right from the start and hard focusing on them, keeping the story consistent and not just ignoring past lore on a whim