Ascians

[Zohar_Lahar]

Speaking of Ascian symbols, I like how Igeyohrm's mask has an arrowhead in the middle on top of Shemhazai's glyph.

[treuhavik]

Leviathan's eye! I had completely forgotten about this thread. This stuff is so past it's expiration, I don't know where to begin, but I'm of the mind now that, while interesting, the glyphs hold no significance other than signifying an Ascian's 'combat stance'.

[Daralii]

A'ight, since this has already been revived I'll post this. Yoshida did another interview with Famitsu, of note:

Regarding the main story:
With Nidhogg's roar still being effective, the dragonsong war is not truly over and this will be the focus in the following patches.
In the following patch 3.x series, the reason why Asciens exist and what the WoD trully is will be revealed. 4.0's flow will move towards a different route.(Asciens and Dark existences will still be there as a back bone but it will be an independant story just like heavensward )

https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...sus_interview/

[Kallera]

Come to think of it, we don't really have a reason why ascians are around and doing things. They better have a good reason to elevate them past "card carrying celestial troll."(better get that SE legal team, elidibus!)

[SirPhoebos]

One thing I've been thinking about since completing the MSQ is that in the span of a few months, 3 high-ranked Ascians have been permakilled. There's a lot of this setting's history that has yet to be fleshed out, but based on Elibidus' reaction in the post-credit roll in 2.55 and 3.0, this is at most a remarkably rare occurrence, and perhaps never even happened before (let alone three times).

[Aurelle_Delacroix]

So other than the lesser folk that are basically Ascian pawns we can assume then that there are 9 main Ascians left, 10 if you want to include Edilbus (I probably spelled that wrong). Makes me wonder just how far we'll get in killing them off before they really try and counter attack. At this point simply helping beast tribes unleash primals obviously haven't been all too effective in dispatching us let alone allowing Zodiark to be revived. So, yeah, wonder how long it'll be before however many Ascians are left (whether all 9-10 now or however many there's left in future content) come and simply try and strike us down or just insta-teleport the WoD in front of us to take us out.

[TinyRedLeaf]

Unknown Ascian #2

This Ascian (who I’m naming Loghrif, the Transcendent) taught Tristan Nightflicker, a dark Summoner, to summon Belias-Egi during the Summoner storyline. No name or glyph is seen here, though I’d like to think there’s some connection between the Egi and the keeper of its knowledge. Both Belias from XII and Belias-Egi in XIV use the ability “Painflare”.

I might as well take the opportunity to point out that you've guessed wrong above. The Ascian involved in the summoner storyline is nameless. Or rather, he's known only as the Ascian of the Twelfth Chalice, and he's one of Lahabrea's servants, along with the Ascians of the Twelfth Staff, the Twelfth Sword and the Twelfth Pentacle.

We first met the Twelfth Sword and Twelfth Staff way back in story-mode Haukke Manor, when they openly told the WoL that they were merely there "to take the measure" of his/her strength for Lahabrea.

All four servants would turn up in the Heavensward summoner storyline.

More importantly, during the storyline, Y'mhitra deduced that the black-masked Ascians belonged to a lower-tier of Paragons, and were more vulnerable to destruction than their red-veiled masters.

According to the Scions and their research, the Paragons are effectively immortal. They are said to be aetherial entitities with no physical form of their own, instead possessing mortal host after mortal host in an endless procession down the ages...

But once [the WoL] acquired the Dreadwyrm Trance, the haste with which the Ascian (of the Twelfth Chalice) withdrew did not seem to me the action of a being who harbours no fear of death.

Thus do I pose the question: Could it be that the Twelfth Chalice and his black-masked brethen are not as practiced in the art of possession as their red-veiled masters?

At the time of the battle, our bodies were the only available hosts nearby. Assuming that he also lacks his superiors' facility to flee to the space betwixt worlds, I suspect that our foe's sudden cowardice stemmed from an inability to force his soul into our living vessels.

...if we are able to lure the Twelfth Chalice to a location devoid of potential hosts, then we might succeed in destroying him for good...

Suffice to say that, by the end of the Heavensward summoner quest line, there's another very clear reason for Elidibus to be wary of the WoL's growing power.

[treuhavik]

I might as well take the opportunity to point out that you've guessed wrong above.

Oh man, the number of wrong assumptions I made half a year ago are incalculable, lol. But, hey, I'm glad to see that we were on the right track with the blackmasks!


EDIT: As much as I'd love to dig around for all current Ascian juiciness and get this thread updated...

the past several moons have seen the hill of reports on my desk grow into a veritable mountain.

And sorting out the rest of these version 1.0-1.23 quests will still have me busy for quite some time, unfortunately.

[Viridiana]

I might as well take the opportunity to point out that you've guessed wrong above. The Ascian involved in the summoner storyline is nameless. Or rather, he's known only as the Ascian of the Twelfth Chalice, and he's one of Lahabrea's servants, along with the Ascians of the Twelfth Staff, the Twelfth Sword and the Twelfth Pentacle.

We first met the Twelfth Sword and Twelfth Staff way back in story-mode Haukke Manor, when they openly told the WoL that they were merely there "to take the measure" of his/her strength for Lahabrea.

All four servants would turn up in the Heavensward summoner storyline.

Hmm…Even with the Sword and Staff being Lahabrea's underlings, can we be certain that the Chalice and Pentacle are his as well? I haven't done post-50 SMN story, so I wouldn't know if there's text you haven't quoted that supplies the answer (and xivdb no longer has quest text to check). Basically, I'm assuming that the "Numbered Item" refers to a hierarchy, but does the number determine the leading named Ascian, or does the item? Are the Twelfth X's all Lahabrea's, or are all the Swords and Staves? Or, indeed, only one of the two between Sword and Staff, with the other being a different Ascian lending his underling for a mission?

[SirPhoebos]

So why isn't Lahabrea able to flee when Thordan attacks him?