Revelations from Patch 3.56

[LilLemay]

It felt like a star wars a force awakening: han solo situation, papalymo die to save us from the primal that was suppose to be rhaegar and yet we had no funeral, no acknowledging his sacrifice, no mourning, nothing.

Whatta you mean? I got to listen to Yda (lyse) repeat the same ''ARE YOU WATCHING THIS PAPALYMO'' line 37 times over during the solo fight, and honestly I think that's more than enough acknowledging for my taste

[Berethos]

We didn't enforce anything. Reform came about as a natural progression - Thordan was overthrown, and his replacement, who gained power entirely through his own merit, opted for a republic.

Agreed - if there was anything that could be described as being enforced it's peace between Dragon and Man. At no point do we try and change the system of government, instead focusing on bringing to light the truth behind the conflict.

The shift in government is on the shoulders of those like Aymeric.

[Berethos]

If everyone was praying for Rhalgar

My take is that the "prayers" manifested less as specific call to a specific idea of a deity and more toward a being of destructive power to save them/crush their enemies.

Perhaps being combined with Ilberd's suicide in a ritualistic fashion, his own desires (something greater than Bahamut to destroy his enemies) - combined with holding the eyes - was enough to influence the form the creature took.

That said being is now named Shinryu is more a happy accident (in-universe at least) due to Doman legend.

[ReplicaX]

I am with Kallera on this, I don't get it. The only explanation I have is that Shinryu = Rhalgar. which also doesn't make sense because we see a statue of him in Rhalgars Reach, though Shinryu does seem to have lightning attacks.

Hopefully it will addressed in SB. Whether Shinryu is connected to Rhalgar or not. Folks are also forgetting how he received the eyes to begin with. The Warriors of Darkness recovered them and Elidibus gifted them to him. While Yoshi said, we will not see much from the Ascians. There is a past history of them meddling with outcomes regardless.

[Kai_Lee]

You dont need to use trickery or misleading information in order to get players excited for seeing something In Its first appearance in action. The whole shinryu all of a sudden reveal would be no lessen if the followers were all chanting his name instead of rhalgar. I think more players are disappointed with the switch and bait then the expectations but yet to be revealed element.

With heavensward we knew we are going to fight dragons and we did but imagine instead of fighting dragons we get a battle with no dragons and instead it was just a focus on battling the empire. That would be wrong.

[Lambdafish]

My take is that the "prayers" manifested less as specific call to a specific idea of a deity and more toward a being of destructive power to save them/crush their enemies.

Perhaps being combined with Ilberd's suicide in a ritualistic fashion, his own desires (something greater than Bahamut to destroy his enemies) - combined with holding the eyes - was enough to influence the form the creature took.

That said being is now named Shinryu is more a happy accident (in-universe at least) due to Doman legend.

I thought of another theory that could have sparked the identity of the primal. Ilberd was the griffin for... we don't actually know how long, and he was sending out a clear message to the people of Ala Mhigo. Perhaps using this message he planted the idea of a draconic calamity, and using what info we have from the MSQ, the people of Ala Mhigo were praying for Rhalgar, but in their thoughts they were imagining the fires of a draconian calamity (not just bahamut, but also midgardsormr tearing the garleans apart), what this manifested into was a Rhalgar/Draconian calamity that formed Shinryu. This is why it seems that Shinryu uses lightning attacks and seems very mishapen and incomplete as a Dragon.

I don't buy the whole draconic aether from the eye, but I could definately buy influenced prayer from a very clever preacher.

[Ceasaria]

It is possible Shinryu was summoned because some people sacrificed were originated from Doma ?
I ask because I am not sure if Ilberd has recruited doman refugees or not.

[Theodric]

Agreed - if there was anything that could be described as being enforced it's peace between Dragon and Man. At no point do we try and change the system of government, instead focusing on bringing to light the truth behind the conflict.

The shift in government is on the shoulders of those like Aymeric.

The Warrior of Light - and certain Scions - frequently met with Aymeric and other influential Ishgardians during their time operating out of the city itself. It wasn't wrong to go after the Archbishop and his supporters but to pretend as if it wasn't done - at least in part - to bring forth change is simply false. Even after the Archbishop ceased to be the Warrior of Light actively aided Aymeric in assaulting those who remained loyal to his father's cause. If that isn't classified as actively meddling in political matters and ushering in a new government then I don't know what to say.

Aymeric played a part, certainly, but he leaned upon the Scions and Warrior of Light to ensure his success.

Pretty much this.

The same goes with Igeyorhm. The lore book had some neat background on her, on how she is ashamed and seeks redemption by working even harder for her cause - yet in-game she lacks any such presentation. Depth to both sides is something I appreciate in storytelling, not necessarily "grit" and "edginess."
I think it's fair to want both sides to be equally represented, with our side not always being the squeaky clean victor (which 3.4 and the WoD did a lovely job of and I hope to see more of in the future).

Yep. It would have been very interesting to see her past revealed, perhaps through some sort of vision using the Echo. It's a pretty major plot point for her to be responsible for the creation of the Void but most players are unlikely to ever know about it unless they study the lore book intently. Hopefully Stormblood gives us many more scenes with the antagonists to better explain their motivations, thoughts and feelings. When I think back to my favourite Final Fantasy titles - VII, IX and XII - that was something that was very common and ended up being effective.

[Lauront]

It's also nice that Raubahn still has touchy feely sentiments for Ilberd after he unleashed what could've been a genocide, and an uncontrollable, indiscriminate one at that.

Hopefully Stormblood gives us many more scenes with the antagonists to better explain their motivations, thoughts and feelings.

It might. I think it's very hard to now say that the Empire is in any way responsible for breaking the cease fire. The city-states know who wrought the evil that unfolded (and how bad it could have been), and they're choosing to capitalise upon it to free one of their number, a state which has historically been very aggressive to its own neighbours. The only difference between it and Garlemald, at least in this respect as there are ideological differences, is that the latter succeeded. Nonetheless, I suspect Ala Mhigo won't be freed so easily and that Zenos may yet drive our "protagonists" into a wild escape into Doma. At least, I hope something along these lines is ventured. I am hoping for at least something that isn't an entirely Manichaean representation of the conflict between Eorzea and the Empire, with the plot twist from the Warring Triad factored in and built upon. They managed to do this with Elidibus and by extension, Zodiark. I still think they may be building up Zenos as the villain, to distance the Emperor from him and avoid making the Empire irredeemably wicked, whilst being free to do so with Zenos, if they pursue that route... perhaps future internal strife within the Empire may modify its willingness to work with the city-states in suppressing the primal threat.

In spite of the propaganda they feed themselves, the city-states are very weak relative to the Empire. Without the Scions, they'd be finished. Perhaps some, like Ishgard, or outside the Alliance, Sharlayan (old world), could mount a prolonged defence, but not most of them.

[Berethos]

The Warrior of Light - and certain Scions - frequently met with Aymeric and other influential Ishgardians during their time operating out of the city itself. It wasn't wrong to go after the Archbishop and his supporters but to pretend as if it wasn't done - at least in part - to bring forth change is simply false.

The common thread uniting all those the WoL went against? They wanted to keep the bloodshed going.

Again, none of our actions were aimed at changing the government of Ishgard - that was Aymeric's thing. Our goal was to bring peace between Dragon and Man, which did not require changing the government from a Theocracy to a Republic (that is still divided by class/wealth, despite the rosy picture some paint of it at first), and our actions were consistent with that goal.

We were a catalyst that led to the government changing, yes, but to suggest we came to enforce that change (which is your claim) is disingenuous.