Primals Unquestionably Bad

[Alberel]

Actually, I'm pretty sure Yoshida has mentioned plans to allow Free Companies to acquire Primals and summon them on the open world / in the large scale PvP zones? Like, only one FC would have access to any given primal per server, and you could only hold onto them for so long before you lost the right and had to fight for it again or something? So, who knows.

It has been a long time since this was mentioned by the devs and given the story now it would make no sense for us to do so. We know the primals cannot be controlled and instead corrupt everything around them to their will... in lore terms the players ever summoning a primal would make them no better than the tempered beast tribes. I'm of a mind to think this feature was scrapped.

[NoloeTazier]

It has been a long time since this was mentioned by the devs and given the story now it would make no sense for us to do so. We know the primals cannot be controlled and instead corrupt everything around them to their will... in lore terms the players ever summoning a primal would make them no better than the tempered beast tribes. I'm of a mind to think this feature was scrapped.

I think this "content" will be scrapped because of the provoking thoughts of "omg people are going to get CLAIM of Ifrit, we can't have that in this with one group getting claim, here comes the competition vs FC bots and RMTs." After all it's not content for "everyone" if a Primal is locked out for a week or 2, the original estimates to how long a FC would control the "card." Also the likeliness of the Primal summons being way too overpowered when it came to the things they are allowed to be in, PvP for example in Duty Finder would pretty much mean the other team would auto-lose if the Primal was indeed as powerful as it should. I really would like for a roaming Primal with claim ala NMs and HNMs, but the current environment and way the game is going it just goes against everything. But yeah I'd rather from a Lore and content standpoint, just scrap it.

[jomoru]

It has been a long time since this was mentioned by the devs and given the story now it would make no sense for us to do so. We know the primals cannot be controlled and instead corrupt everything around them to their will... in lore terms the players ever summoning a primal would make them no better than the tempered beast tribes. I'm of a mind to think this feature was scrapped.

We only have the Ascian method in lore we don't know that they aren't actively giving out something that has downsides they profit from. It is entirely possible there are "safer" ways to summon.

[Pentacus]

We only have the Ascian method in lore we don't know that they aren't actively giving out something that has downsides they profit from. It is entirely possible there are "safer" ways to summon.

we actually know of 7 (maybe 8 or 9, it depends how long the ascians have been messing with things and wether tristan's fusion ability counts) summoning methods:

1. the traditional ascian method we all know and love, the "moar crystals! moar worship!" method (from the story, we know this can work on ANYTHING as long as enough people believe in it, it happened with Moggle Mog twelfth of his name (may the smouldering ash I reduced him to never trouble us again), and almost happened with Rhalgr (I honestly doubt that the ascians would be cartoonishly evil to just try and get some kids killed by straight up lying to them, everything they do furthers their plans in some way))
2. the "advanced" method that gave birth to the EX primals (I've not beaten garuda EX yet, but from what Ive been told, it uses some sort of evil thing rather than crystals)
3. Egi summoning, where the summoner focuses on the essence of the primal and not the primal itself (allagan summoning)
4. Tri-disaster, in the quest text, this was actually specifically referred to as "a different way of summoning", possibly using the egi's aether as a spell rather than a traditional summon (also allagan)
5. the "merge with your egi" ability that tristan posessed (what? if the game counts freaking tri-disaster as a summon, I'm sure as hell going to count merging with your egi)
6. loisoix's summoning (interestingly, he seemed to be doing the same thing as the tri-disaster summoning, but with the power of the gods rather than the egis, and their power manifested as a second dalamund-looking structure, so it's possible that what he was doing was also allagan)
7. garuda's summoning of ifrit and titan (interestingly, no crystals were used, instead it required multiple sacrifices of kobolds and amalja, nor was the summoning done by the beast tribes, it was a primal summoning two others)
9.the ascians method of summoning zodiark, although we don't know exactly what it entails
9. it's possible that the beast tribes and allagan empire had a different way of summoning full primals than the one taught by the ascians, at the very least, we can assume that the allagan empire had a method of summoning full primals without requiring worship in order to train their summoners, either that, or the beast tribes must have been summoning the primals VERY frequently to allow enough research to develop egi summoning (I just realized how badass allagan summoners must have been, they needed to fight multiple primals WITHOUT the echo protecting them)

plus, it's implied that the ascians know more summoning methods, they mention in the garuda EX cutscene that they'll "keep giving the beat tribes more and more powerful ways to call upon their gods" (you know, with some new info we learned in 2.1, specifically that ascians can't be seen by people without the echo unless they specifically WANT to be seen, I wonder if the summoner trainer has the echo? she specifically refers to the paragon/ascian that gave tristan belias-egi... which in itself is also interesting)

(there's also the L'Cie summoning that Lightning did, but that's very much unique to herself and is only "summoning" in terms of "thats what it was in XIII")

[Viridiana]

7. garuda's summoning of ifrit and titan (interestingly, no crystals were used, instead it required multiple sacrifices of kobolds and amalja, nor was the summoning done by the beast tribes, it was a primal summoning two others)

It's my understanding that this is actually the beastmen summoning their primals in their final moments of desperation as they die. At least, that's what the summary text in the journal led me to believe.

[Pentacus]

It's my understanding that this is actually the beastmen summoning their primals in their final moments of desperation as they die. At least, that's what the summary text in the journal led me to believe.

it's still interesting since I'm fairly certain that they didn't have a few piles of earth and fire crystals with them at the time (considering that they were tied up and all), meaning that whilst the worship and desperation were there, the crystals weren't.

plus, from the cutscene, it definitely gives the impression that it's garuda doing the summoning, she hits them with a whirlwind like when she tries to temper the player, the beastmen cry out to their primals to save them, the beastmen turn into yellow and red sparkles which fly up to create the summoning circles, then ifrit and titan are there.

it certainly doesn't seem like the beastmen were intending to summon ifrit or titan that way, the fact that they were begging their primals to save them means that they didn't expect to die during the summoning, else the "oh titan save us!" would be a little pointless.

there's also the point that the beastmen were garuda's PRISONERS, if they had summoned their primals, they would likely have been our allies temporarily since everyone there except the ixal wanted garuda dead (hell, the reason they needed saving was because garuda was killing them)

[Viridiana]

it's still interesting since I'm fairly certain that they didn't have a few piles of earth and fire crystals with them at the time (considering that they were tied up and all), meaning that whilst the worship and desperation were there, the crystals weren't.

plus, from the cutscene, it definitely gives the impression that it's garuda doing the summoning, she hits them with a whirlwind like when she tries to temper the player, the beastmen cry out to their primals to save them, the beastmen turn into yellow and red sparkles which fly up to create the summoning circles, then ifrit and titan are there.

it certainly doesn't seem like the beastmen were intending to summon ifrit or titan that way, the fact that they were begging their primals to save them means that they didn't expect to die during the summoning, else the "oh titan save us!" would be a little pointless.

there's also the point that the beastmen were garuda's PRISONERS, if they had summoned their primals, they would likely have been our allies temporarily since everyone there except the ixal wanted garuda dead (hell, the reason they needed saving was because garuda was killing them)

The crystal thing is weird, yes, but the rest is all explainable. First, the tempering whirlwind and the whirlwind she uses there are different. The tempering one is blue in color, much like Ifrit's blue flames. The ones she uses on the prisoners is the same as the one she blocks Alphinaud and Cid with. Beastmen crying out to their gods for salvation is a perfectly natural reaction to facing imminent death. As to the primals allying with us against Garuda, I believe she expected to have to fight them. Unless she really thought they'd surrender their aether to her willingly. . .

[Enkidoh]

A few things to clarify here:

7. garuda's summoning of ifrit and titan (interestingly, no crystals were used, instead it required multiple sacrifices of kobolds and amalja, nor was the summoning done by the beast tribes, it was a primal summoning two others)

Watching the scene in question and looking at screenshots, it's apparent that Garuda herself wasn't the one who summoned Ifrit and Titan in that scene - she merely tortured the amalj'aa and kobold prisoners to the point they pleaded to their respective primals to save them.

From what I could gather, this was only possible because the Howling Eye was practically saturated in aether - it was an aetheric cyclone in a sense (I mean, unlike the other Primals, Garuda herself still continuously remained corporeal even after being defeated by the player and having her crystal forcibly torn out of her by the player's Echo) so thus all that aether could make it very easy for any Primal to appear in the right circumstances, which Garuda seized on by pushing the Ixal's beastmen prisoners over the edge - it was only when Gaius showed up, shot dead all her Ixal followers and Ultima Weapon absorbed her and the other two Primals did she disappear. So yeah, this was not a special way of summoning - merely the 'normal' way of summoning a Primal done out of desperation.

CNJ and WHM are the big exceptions, the whole point of the CNJ questline is to cement the fact that they use their own aether like THMs, but rather than regaining aether through meditation, nature gives them their aether back, if a CNJ uses too much aether without accepting more from nature, they overexert themselves and die, however, the amount of aether that they are allowed is purely at the discretion of the elementals, if you are using too much aether, they'll probably just refuse to give you any more until you stop being so wasteful (amusingly, that's probably put sylphie in the elementals good books, considering that she tried to stop using magic at all fearing that she's hurting the elementals by using ANY magic).

in the past, when there was no regulation for WHMs, EVERYONE was using full on white magic with no regard for what would happen, both WHMs and BLMs were taking aether directly from the lifestream and the sheer amount of magic used in the war of the magi brought about an umbral era. now, BLMs all use the THM's methods of restoring aether, whilst lorewise, WHMs are strictly regulated (canonically, you are the only non-padjal WHM, and you are one of the few remaining BLMs), CNJ are WHMs regulated by the elementals, rather than just ripping magic from the lifestream, whilst WHMs are free of such restrictions on the use of their magic, hence only the padjal, the ones that the elementals specifically choose, are allowed to become WHMs (and yourself, by virtue of being A-Towa's heir, and even then, one of the two padjal was fairly worried about the prospect)

Actually, that's not entirely correct - you've clearly mistaken Sylphie's unique healing ability with Conjury as a whole in the CNJ quest line. Conjury has been constantly mentioned both in 1.0 and ARR, and out of universe (in other words, on the FFXIV website), as borrowing the aether from the environment in order to then weave it into spells. To do so a CNJ has to open their minds to the elementals in nature - someone who is closed minded however cannot conjure - this was actually Slyphie's dilemma at first - she refused to open her mind to nature and instead preferred to go around healing people using what could be best described as the traditional White Magic ability 'Sacrifice', like her mother before her. E-Sumi-Yan actually mentions early on how useless at actual conjury she really is - that she cannot conjure so much as "a single whiff of air or pebble."

Eventually though, through the player's influence she realizes the power of nature and is revealed to have a particular talent for hearing the elementals with particular clarity, a 'hearer' as they're called. Hence she eventually lets go of this stubbornness, focuses on nature around her and finally can conjure effectively. White Magic is technically therefore a separate school of magic whose inner workings are not elaborated on,although it does seem to go hand in hand with Conjury, given the padjal are the only ones who remain with the knowledge to use White Magic (they use it in specific rites as hearers).