Patch 6.5/6.55 speculation based on the art work.

The site for 6.5 has gone live and there isn't much there right now. Mostly due to us only having had the 1st PPL for it. What's interesting to me is that Jullus is part of the artwork. It's nice to see him on there. I just wonder what role he will have to play in the up coming patch. If it will just be him or will Garlemald as a whole have a bigger part. I also wonder why they chose small Varshahn as they haven't shied away from using his more adult form in the artwork before.

Reminder that the 5.5 artwork had several characters that did not appear in 5.5. A group floating-heads shot like this doesn't necessarily mean direct relevance given that context.

I think this is reflective of Zero's journey, because it's only characters that she's connected with: note that Urianger, G'raha, Krile, and Thancred, who she only briefly met and barely exchanged words with, are absent despite being basicall a given to turn up at some point in 6.5/.55 to set up Dawntrail. Instead, we have:

• Estinien, who she's been probably living closest to in this time, as well as training with.
• Varshahn, who's been a big part of her acclimatization to Thavnair and her current journey.
• Y'shtola, who gave Zero her name and provided answers to a great many questions.
• Jullus, who was a strong early help to Zero understanding a less transactional way of dealing with the world.
• Alphinaud and Alisaie, who've been providing clear, working examples of how people can cooperate and aid each other.
• And the Warrior of Light, who just won't leave her alone.

This art is essentially Zero's relationship cloud. The only thing it might be missing is Nidhana, who I think has helped her at least as well as Alphinaud has.

Ït probably because Jullus will be involved in the resolution of whatever (good or bad) that is Zero's fate.

Since it's a bit obvious that Zero isn't coming along in Dawntrail (at least not in the beginning), I'm assuming that if she survives she ends up staying with Jullus in Garlemald.

Edit: Nevermind, the above poster makes a very good point as the artwork being illustrative of Zero's journey.

Posting the art here for a better look for those who want it:

https://img.finalfantasyxiv.com/lds/...IrWZ_dojv0.jpg

And I agree, the characters definitely seem to be there because of their connection to Zero. She's been regaining her humanity the last few story beats, remembering her past and feeling that "flame" burn within her again. And then we see the sun behind her, in a wheat field. And also everyone is smiling at least slightly, except for Zero who is frowning in a determined manner. So it basically says to me she's gonna reap some bad guys while warmed and backed by the power of friendship. lol

And I think smol Vrtra is shown, instead of big or bigger Vrtra, b/c the child form is the one he's been most social with her in. His battle body gets put back into its maintenance pod or w/e the time in between excursions, so when he's been making her feel at home in the city its been as the fun-sized version.


Also, there's kinda of a parallel to the 6.1 art:

https://img.finalfantasyxiv.com/lds/...5RyUKy1ZBY.jpg

Seven figures around the main one, who's walking towards the camera, as light rises behind them. Its probably just for artsy purposes, but still.

One thing I think is neat about that art that I haven't seen talked about much anywhere:

That's a wheat field she's in. As in, the sort of place that a farmer actually would use a scythe for reaping.

Yeah, definitely brings the thought of reaping to mind.

... Though I wouldn't be opposed to Zero picking up BTN at the end of all this, too. lol

A field of wheat or reeds has also been used to symbolize the after life in various religions.

I know this was to be solely speculation based on the key artwork, but this might as well become a general speculation thread. The 6.55 site has gotten more than just the artwork and the interesting thing that has been added is the picture of a party fighting the Dark Elf. Which I'm going to assume has some sort of magnetic part to their fight. As until Edward/Gilbert plays on his end of the twin harp the party can't use metallic weapons as the Dark Elf makes an aura that causes metal to be very heavy. I'm having a hard time thinking of whatever other iconic fights or monsters they haven't already given us either earlier in XIV's lifespan or in 6.0 as the only one that comes to mind is the Giant of Babil. Outside of the rematch with the four fiends. I'm not certain if they're going to do that as I want to say only real Golbez's memoria crystal dropped from Zero. Only two of the four aren't in memoria crystals as well so it'd be odd if they pulled the two that died on the source just to have that fight.

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Originally Posted by SannaR

The 6.55 site has gotten more than just the artwork and the interesting thing that has been added is the picture of a party fighting the Dark Elf.

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For what it's worth, the Dark Elf doesn't have a reskin in the Lunar Subterrane in FFIV, so we're not looking at them just recreating the enemy encounters like they did in, say, Syrcus Tower.

Cracking out the list of FFIV bosses, here are the ones that we haven't somehow seen in XIV, in alphabetical order. Also excepting the several generic dragons, because it'd take a good couple hours to dissect which ones might've been inspirations for random Heavensward enemies or something.

• Asura (but she's probably not gonna be a dungeon boss)
• Baigan
• The CPU of the Giant of Babil, technically; the spherical Allagan nodes are based on it, but we've never fought one based on its gameplay.
• Dark Bahamut
• The four Elemental Archfiends all at once
• The King and Queen of Eblan
• Lunasaur (actually from the Subterrane)
• Ogopogo (also Lunar Subterrane; it was a Leviathan recolor)
• Plague Horror (Lunar Subterrane boss; recolored Ahriman)

If you want to count enemies from the GBA or 3D versions of the game, then we can also count:

• Death Machine (recolor of a Lunar Subterrane enemy they've never used)
• Flan Master
• Geryon
• Gigas Worm
• Proto-Babil
• Zeromus EG, the Zeromus design from the 'easy mode' American version of IV
• Most Lunar primals

It's fair enough to think that the re-release bosses shouldn't factor in, but I think they should be considered since they're actually where the Lunar primals came from! Well, they were Lunar Eidolons, but you get the idea.

So we do incidentally have exactly three bosses from the Lunar Subterrane we've never seen. I don't think they'll all be used, though; Lunasaur's got a unique take on a bone dragon design we've never seen, but the others don't. My guess is actually that the three bosses will be the Dark Elf, Baigan, and either one or both of a pair of fairly striking non-boss enemies from the final floor of the Lunar Subterrane: Zemus' Breath (or just Breath) and Zemus' Malice/Zemus' Mind (or just Mind). That said, Zeromus EG feels like exactly the kind of pull I'd expect the developers to sneak in somewhere.


Also worth adding: the update also added a picture of the Heaven of Water for, most likely, Thaliak's boss fight! Its architecture I'd say is a combination of Nym and Sharlayan elements, which makes complete sense, and there's also a statue of a tonberry, which is either a really cute touch, or showing that the gods have an awful sense of humor.

...although Nym's patron deity was actually Oschon... hmm.

I didn't include Asura as she's stuck in Fan Fest trial atm. Baigan, CPU and Dark Bahamut (who at least didn't exist in the NA SNES version) IHO weren't fights that stuck in people's heads. Though the Giant of Babil was more of a dungeon than a boss itself. Already mentioned why it would be kind of odd to have the Elemental Fiends rematch and the fight against Edge/Edward's parents would feel kinda strange? Unless we fight against an undead version of Zero's mom or something. But that fight had two ways to end it. Kill them or let them kill themselves. The rest from the original version were skippable bosses and even though they were tough fights you wouldn't find many people mentioning them if you asked them about IV. Zeromus EG might be part of the trial in the 2nd half.

The Heaven of water does look pretty and I swear I got Zanarkand vibes of the city area in the back. Course it could just be the domes and all the water talking. I do wonder how the Heaven of Wind will look like as all we get is giant mountain top that looks over an endless sea ruled by Llymlaen.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Cracking out the list of FFIV bosses, here are the ones that we haven't somehow seen in XIV, in alphabetical order.

[*]Dark Bahamut

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We did get 'Lunar Bahamut' as the final boss of Pagl'than back in 5.5 though, so that sort of counts.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

[*]The King and Queen of Eblan

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Well, to be fair Eblan is the apparent original name of the area where the Garlean capital is located (the area around Camp Broken Glass is called the 'Eblan Rime' on the map, and some of the enemies there also have 'Eblan' in their name). Interestingly Doctor Lugae did appear in the Tower of Babil though, so... maybe they might show up too as Garlean nobility turned into Blasphemies (or else were more fittingly more of Lugae's twisted abominiations?). Or voidsent even.

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Originally Posted by Enkidoh

We did get 'Lunar Bahamut' as the final boss of Pagl'than back in 5.5 though, so that sort of counts.

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Oh, to clarify: Dark Bahamut and Lunar Bahamut are different bosses in FFIV! Yes, it is very silly. Dark Bahamut is a Lunar Subterrane boss in all versions, and you fight it to get Cecil's base-game ultimate weapon. Lunar Bahamut is from the GBA re-release and all versions derived from it, appears in the postgame Lunar Ruins dungeon, and drops that version's ultimate weapon and accessory for Kain.

Incidentally, the Lunar Ruins were a very faint basis for Smileton, since it was also a postgame dungeon where the entrance was found at the face on the moon! Not related to the discussion at all, but I do think it's neat.

And yeah, I'm aware of Eblan being an extant thing in FFXIV's world in a form that means the King and Queen of Eblan fight can't happen as-is; they're still a FFIV boss that FFXIV hasn't done anything with before, which was the point of that list. I think there's a great space for doing something with that boss fight, I think XIV's writers would knock it out of the park if they translated it more conceptually and approached it less as 'this is literally nobility of a place called Eblan' and more as 'these are the parents/loved ones of a party member'.

I don't think it's a place for the Lunar Subterrane dungeon, but I could imagine some amazing writing coming out of adapting that into 'Zero's parents got turned into monsters' or something. It's more solo duty territory.

So we've had the live letter, and I'm sure a thread will crop up about everything from that (I'm a little too preoccupied with audio and video editing to do it myself), I do want to touch on the Lunar Subterrane bosses subject, since it looks like we probably did see all of them, and sure enough, they are all from FFIV! On top of the Dark Elf, I also spotted the Plague Horror (the Ahriman recolor that was an FFIV Subterrane boss), and a fight against all four of the Archfiends at once.

...although curiously, I don't think that last one is actually a boss, because we only see it in cutscene form. What we do see in definite dungeon form, with Trust NPCs, is something entirely different: A fight against the Antlion (which I didn't even include in my FFIV bosses list because I sort of assumed we'd already fought an antlion at this point), in a siege on what I can only assume is the city Golbez and Durande were returning to (which I've been tentatively calling Baron). Which raises a LOT of questions.

Yeah I saw the Antlion. Does this mean Bards will have to constantly be running away? I'm going to need to watch a trailer break down video cause I was mostly just jamin to the Red Wings BGM. It also looks like we get Zeromus EG for the 1st half of the trial with a remix of that fights BGM. I might be getting some hopes up, but when Zero stands up and starts glowing gold it reminds me of the Cecil vs Dad/dark himself scene where a bright light envelopes him and he becomes a Paladin. Now we know she used to use sword and shield in the past, but I don't think she saw herself as a Paladin. More of just a sword and board type fighter.

The Antlion seems to be a part of the new PvP map. So not a dungeon boss. Nvm it might be a solo instance, maybe?

No, the Antlion fight was definitely with Varshahn, Zero and Y'shtola with the castle in the background. The new PvP map is outside Forgotten Springs; that's different.

And I don't think that first phase is Zeromus EG; I think that's regular Zeromus, it's just that our classical image of Zeromus is side-on with a profile shot of its face, while here we were seeing it front-on with the head bowed. It's a little easier to see the resemblance if you compare the DS version.

https://i.imgur.com/1w96lzp.png

https://i.imgur.com/cvKVaZB.png https://i.imgur.com/eYC6xWf.png

Incidentally, I always wondered why they replaced Zeromus' design for the western release, and only now did I notice that oh yeah, that's got, like. Entrails coming out of it, yeah, 90s Nintendo of America wouldn't have loved that.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

and a fight against all four of the Archfiends at once.

...although curiously, I don't think that last one is actually a boss, because we only see it in cutscene form.

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Yeah, there's Y'shtola using a barrier, so it's defnitely a cutscene. I'd say we may fight them in a solo duty, though.

i am so disinterested with the current plot, i was so psyched for the void but its just turned in to such a low energy soap opera, plus tho i liked her at first, zero is really starting to bore me. none of this feels like it matters, im so sik of this hole "lets sit around a table and talk about feelings" thing, i want to adventure, i dont care if zero tried a crab rangoon and wanted for more, let me kill a pack of demon banditos trying to steal mana maracas or something...

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

No, the Antlion fight was definitely with Varshahn, Zero and Y'shtola with the castle in the background. The new PvP map is outside Forgotten Springs; that's different.

And I don't think that first phase is Zeromus EG; I think that's regular Zeromus, it's just that our classical image of Zeromus is side-on with a profile shot of its face, while here we were seeing it front-on with the head bowed. It's a little easier to see the resemblance if you compare the DS version.

https://i.imgur.com/1w96lzp.png

https://i.imgur.com/cvKVaZB.png https://i.imgur.com/eYC6xWf.png

Incidentally, I always wondered why they replaced Zeromus' design for the western release, and only now did I notice that oh yeah, that's got, like. Entrails coming out of it, yeah, 90s Nintendo of America wouldn't have loved that.

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Are we sure we're talking about the OG NA release? Cause the picture on the right is the one I remember from when I was a kid. And I think Raikai might be correct that the Baron part might be a solo instance. Or this dungeon takes us on a trip. As we've seen all three Lunar Subterranean bosses with the Plague Horror, Dark Elf and the Fiends redux which have to be memories since two died on the source.

I know people's prayers change the 12, but Llymlean and Nymeia feel as though they're the wrong element. I'm sure Llymlean started out as just the one you prayed to for favorable wind and over time she became someone who controls the seas. As even though she is one of the gods aligned with Air what we see of her fight in the trailer that's a lot of water. With Nymeia on the other hand outside of water getting used by some for divination her look let alone most of her attacks aren't tied to water. Or at least not to me. I wonder if the unknown 4th boss will be all 12 combined into one or if we get to fight some form of the Watcher?

I do wonder where the cut off point is between 6.5 and 6.55 is for the story. Obviously the Krile scene most likely is 6.55 as it would be strange if that scene played out in the 1st part.

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Originally Posted by SannaR

Are we sure we're talking about the OG NA release? Cause the picture on the right is the one I remember from when I was a kid.

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Okay, on looking this up, we definitely aren't, but not in ways we expected! We're falling victim to a pretty commonplace misconception, that FFIV Easy Type (which Zeromus EG's design is from) was just the North American version of IV repackaged for Japan. It wasn't; it has a lot of the NA difficulty nerfs, but also a few more changes for the sake of appealing to younger audiences. That last part is likely why the Zeromus EG design happened in the first place; as I noticed, the original Zeromus design has some real body horror going on, so they probably replaced it so as not to scare the kids.

This Zeromus is just the FFIV Zeromus, no Easy Type elements at all. It's kinda hard to tell right now how much of that original design body horror it retains, though; the stream quality dulls a lot of the detail it may or may not have.

And I genuinely don't think that the Fiends fight is an actual boss fight; not only did they show an awful lot of cutscene for that, more than any boss intro reasonably would, they only showed cutscenes. Including combat shots, too; Raikai noted Y'shtola throwing up a barrier which she only does in cutscenes, but Zero's got a lot of action going on too. My guess, that's what the Scions are doing while we're fighting Zeromus.

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Okay, on looking this up, we definitely aren't, but not in ways we expected! We're falling victim to a pretty commonplace misconception, that FFIV Easy Type (which Zeromus EG's design is from) was just the North American version of IV repackaged for Japan. It wasn't; it has a lot of the NA difficulty nerfs, but also a few more changes for the sake of appealing to younger audiences. That last part is likely why the Zeromus EG design happened in the first place; as I noticed, the original Zeromus design has some real body horror going on, so they probably replaced it so as not to scare the kids.

This Zeromus is just the FFIV Zeromus, no Easy Type elements at all. It's kinda hard to tell right now how much of that original design body horror it retains, though; the stream quality dulls a lot of the detail it may or may not have.

And I genuinely don't think that the Fiends fight is an actual boss fight; not only did they show an awful lot of cutscene for that, more than any boss intro reasonably would, they only showed cutscenes. Including combat shots, too; Raikai noted Y'shtola throwing up a barrier which she only does in cutscenes, but Zero's got a lot of action going on too. My guess, that's what the Scions are doing while we're fighting Zeromus.

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Presumably Zero Vs Golbez is a cutscene too. Either that or we have to play AS her again. Which I hope isn't the case!

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

Okay, on looking this up, we definitely aren't, but not in ways we expected! We're falling victim to a pretty commonplace misconception, that FFIV Easy Type (which Zeromus EG's design is from) was just the North American version of IV repackaged for Japan. It wasn't; it has a lot of the NA difficulty nerfs, but also a few more changes for the sake of appealing to younger audiences. That last part is likely why the Zeromus EG design happened in the first place; as I noticed, the original Zeromus design has some real body horror going on, so they probably replaced it so as not to scare the kids.

This Zeromus is just the FFIV Zeromus, no Easy Type elements at all. It's kinda hard to tell right now how much of that original design body horror it retains, though; the stream quality dulls a lot of the detail it may or may not have.

And I genuinely don't think that the Fiends fight is an actual boss fight; not only did they show an awful lot of cutscene for that, more than any boss intro reasonably would, they only showed cutscenes. Including combat shots, too; Raikai noted Y'shtola throwing up a barrier which she only does in cutscenes, but Zero's got a lot of action going on too. My guess, that's what the Scions are doing while we're fighting Zeromus.

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Well I say solo as the part right before the Antlion fight we have "Golbez" and two other npcs with the WoL. Where for the Antlion fight we have Zero, Y'shtola and tall Varshahn. Both happen in the same area. Oh and I wasn't wrong with that the antlion shows up in pvp. It's one of the three things that can show up in the swirly sand suck spot. I just know a few jp people in the chat were saying EG Zeromus when I watched the PLL at an appropriate time of day and not at 2am. You could be right about the others fighting them while we're busy with something or someone else. Kind of like when we ran after Regula in Azys La.

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Originally Posted by Carin-Eri

Presumably Zero Vs Golbez is a cutscene too. Either that or we have to play AS her again. Which I hope isn't the case!

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One of those "you play someone else" sequence. We did not have one for a while and I did not miss it.

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Originally Posted by CNitsah

One of those "you play someone else" sequence. We did not have one for a while and I did not miss it.

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Ironically, I think the last one they pushed on us was 6.3's "An Unforeseen Bargain", where we played as Zero. Which is why I don't want to do so again.

And I don't miss them either!

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Originally Posted by Cleretic

And I genuinely don't think that the Fiends fight is an actual boss fight; not only did they show an awful lot of cutscene for that, more than any boss intro reasonably would, they only showed cutscenes. Including combat shots, too; Raikai noted Y'shtola throwing up a barrier which she only does in cutscenes, but Zero's got a lot of action going on too. My guess, that's what the Scions are doing while we're fighting Zeromus.

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You're probably right, but I'll be a little disappointed if that's the case. Mostly because I think a 'refight the Four Fiends all at once' sounds pretty fun.

Also, I personally enjoy the roleplay instances where we get to play as someone else. To some extent I agree that Zero again (given she was the most recent one) would be a bit odd, though.

I'm calling Plague Horror and Dark Elf as Lunar Subterrane dungeon bosses, maybe Geryon as the final boss?