Goddess Sophia Lore posted.

[Cilia]

Anyone else getting a serious "Tempering" vibe off of this? Like the only reason that this hugely racially varied society flourished at all is because Sophia MADE them get along?

That's the implication...

[Nalien]

Your explanation has one big flaw, those adds are on the trial of Sophia are elezens and roegardyns. Races of we know perfecly were not part of the allagan empire, that was mostly habited by hyurs.

That seems like a moot point to me... The Allagan Empire spanned the entire globe, even the people of Meracydia would have fallen under their banner by the end... Allagan royalty was certainly Hyurian, but the other races certainly would have existed within the empire... I would imagine the adds in Containment Bay P1T6 are indeed from Meracydia, perhaps even the armor design originated there, all I'm saying is they experimented on them to develop the techniques that they later used on Phlegethon, perhaps even themselves...

Like I said, the idea that studying Sephirot is what resulted in Xandes/etc. having such large size has been floating around for a while... I'm incline to think these adds looking decidedly like Phleg-y supports that to a degree, given we know he was the subject of augmentation (which he certainly never asked for). The alternative implication is that he was a hero of Meracydia, but I find that doubtful...

[Anonymoose]

Anyone else getting a serious "Tempering" vibe off of this? Like the only reason that this hugely racially varied society flourished at all is because Sophia MADE them get along?

It's definitely on the table as far as possibilities go. Notice the phrasing; she "graced the souls of her worshipers" with harmony. Though, unless I'm mistaken / overlooking something, I think there's a small hurdle: how did they all get tempered? Rather, if it's a multicultural religion, how did they get along long enough without her to summon her in the first place? Did she originate with one culture and eventually they tempered the others into it?

But - yes - the phrasing lends itself to a few theories. I'm optimistic that the quest text will narrow the field, but... it doesn't always, does it, lol.

[Frederick22]

That seems like a moot point to me... The Allagan Empire spanned the entire globe, even the people of Meracydia would have fallen under their banner by the end... Allagan royalty was certainly Hyurian, but the other races certainly would have existed within the empire... I would imagine the adds in Containment Bay P1T6 are indeed from Meracydia, perhaps even the armor design originated there, all I'm saying is they experimented on them to develop the techniques that they later used on Phlegethon, perhaps even themselves...´

Like I said, the idea that studying Sephirot is what resulted in Xandes/etc. having such large size has been floating around for a while... I'm incline to think these adds looking decidedly like Phleg-y supports that to a degree, given we know he was the subject of augmentation (which he certainly never asked for). The alternative implication is that he was a hero of Meracydia, but I find that doubtful...

Yea like Myhaele said, probably the allagans copy/pasted the gears of worshippers of Sophia.

It seems that they liked to steal and copy everything from the nations they conquered.

[Griffey]

Anyone else getting a serious "Tempering" vibe off of this? Like the only reason that this hugely racially varied society flourished at all is because Sophia MADE them get along?

Well this would imply that Sophia had been summoned BEFORE their civilisation had got off the ground and NOT in response to Garlean invasion. Which means either the Ascians taught them how to summon a primal and then left them to build cities, or this civilisation had already mastered summoning and brought forth an eikon to lead them.

Oh wait, could this be the distinction between eikon and primal? Are eikons the summoned form of god-like beings that actually existed and primals just the exaggerated concepts of gods? I mean, Garuda must have only existed as long as the Ixal have and we know they are born of Allag so she not some ancient deity, whereas Bahamut -was- a living breathing dragon that died and was summoned back and he is considered an eikon.

The plot thickens!

[Cilia]

Bahamut's never been called an eikon (except by the Garleans, who use that term for all primals). From people who care to distinguish, Bahamut is an Elder Primal.

[Griffey]

That's what I meant, elder primal. My bad

[Fevelle]

Yunalesca is much more a Cloud of Darkness-inpired character than a Godess-inspired one.

[RobinMalvin]

It's definitely on the table as far as possibilities go. Notice the phrasing; she "graced the souls of her worshipers" with harmony. Though, unless I'm mistaken / overlooking something, I think there's a small hurdle: how did they all get tempered? Rather, if it's a multicultural religion, how did they get along long enough without her to summon her in the first place? Did she originate with one culture and eventually they tempered the others into it?

But - yes - the phrasing lends itself to a few theories. I'm optimistic that the quest text will narrow the field, but... it doesn't always, does it, lol.

Well each city-state of Eorzea has their own patron deity and their people are from different races and likely different cultures as well. While each city has their own problems which is inevitable from running a nation, multicultural or no, the people mostly, on surface, get along just fine, without any need to summon avatar of gods to make sure the people play nice.

I believe Sophia's nation was just like any Eorzea city-state, with one patron deity to unify their people under the same banner. Their nation too would've had their problems; they didn't live in a perfect paradise. It was only after Allagan threatened them that they casted their differences away and out of desperation, summoned their deity to combat the Empire.

This makes me wonder, are the Warring Triad the equivalent of Eorzean's the Twelve? Could it be that each nation of Meracydia of old believe in the three gods, but chose to pick one as their own patron? Could it be that without the intervention of Louisoix and his Circle of Knowing and Minfillia's Path of Twelve, the city states of Eorzea would summon their deity, their eikon as well?

Edit: If the Triad really is a pantheon, this is what I imagine their structure would be :
> Sephirot (elements Wind and Earth) governs and distribute Life to all beings. He represents Nature.
>Zufran (elements Fire and Ice) governs Death. He represents Dark.
>Sophia (elements Lightning and Water) is the intermediate between Sephirot and Zufran, balancing Life and Death in the world, making sure the two gods do not fight over dominion. She represents Light.

[tjw]

Eikons...Just gonna make a short post but I feel that the 'concept' or 'theme' of an Eikon is more fundamental or even 'basic', the building blocks of a person's state rather than their own beliefs, although the two could be very correlated. Regardless, here's my list of what I see each eikon, and my speculation for Zurvan:

Sephirot - Life and Biology
Odin - Death and Possession
Sophia - Order and Faith
Zurvan - Chaos and Liberation?

It's also something to note that the current released eikons all have an object that encapsulates their being, and in fact, is inferred that their true body is that object. Sephirot is a tree, Odin is a blade. Scales are already a prominent item seen with Sophia, which could be her object of identification.