Is anyone else dying to get to Garlemald?

[YianKutku]

I was wondering where the rest of your post went in the Gaius thread, Kyran. Good to know it still exists, and you just moved it to another thread.

3) Oh hell let us just deal with the devil himself: Varis zos Galvus realizes he made a mistake working with Elidibus. Or better yet the arrangement between the two goes to hell and the Empire faces possible annihilation unless the situation is contained. So he turns to his enemies, the Scions of the Seventh Dawn and the WoL and asks for their help.

I'm not too sure about this. We already did something quite similar with Thordan, although Thordan was planning to betray the Ascians almost from the start.

And Thordan did succeed in betraying the Ascians. He destroyed Lahabrea, who certainly did not expect it. That we end up stomping Thordan and his knights anyway is another matter entirely, which does not negate his success.

It's possible that Varis, being Garlean, cannot manipulate aether, and as such cannot create a big Sword of Light to dispatch Ascians like what we or Thordan did. And anyone who can manipulate aether would probably come from a conquered territory, and may not be loyal enough to kill Ascians on Varis's orders.

Which may be one reason for all the experiments.

[Kyran-Varlsen]

I'm not too sure about this. We already did something quite similar with Thordan, although Thordan was planning to betray the Ascians almost from the start.

And Thordan did succeed in betraying the Ascians. He destroyed Lahabrea, who certainly did not expect it. That we end up stomping Thordan and his knights anyway is another matter entirely, which does not negate his success.

Thordan got the upper hand. In my scenario, it is the other way around - the man who conjectured the alliance needs our help to stop the Ascians and Elidibus (who may or may not be an Ascian in the normal sense). Loyalty is not the issue so much as knowledge and experience. Thordan was able to wipe Lahabrae from existence with a massive amount of energy. But only the Scions devised a method by which a mortal might destroy an Ascian. The Empire, despite it's vaunted strength, may be unable to bring such power to bear fast enough.

Basically Varis may be able to handle the problem but it would require throwing so much manpower and energy into it that it would be less trouble to bring in the "experts." We already have experience making a truce with bastards in this story, in the form of Lord Lolorito. This would be on a larger scale.

Also, sorry for throwing my threads around like that. I just figured here was better.

[Enkidoh]

Thordan was able to wipe Lahabrae from existence with a massive amount of energy. But only the Scions devised a method by which a mortal might destroy an Ascian.

This isn't actually correct -

Thordan destroyed Lahabrea not by a massive amount of energy, but by using Ascalon to reduce Lahabrea to his aetherial form which he then simply consumed him, turning him into a tasty aetheric snack. Thordan and the Heavensward had become the Primal Knights of the Round by that stage, and Primals require a source of aether to keep themselves anchored in the corporeal realm, consuming any aether they can find. Thordan himself even says this outright immediately after consuming Lahabrea.

This was hinted way back in 2.2's storyline where the same fate befell the Sahagin Elder whom Elidibus had supposedly granted 'mastery of the Echo' to - the Elder had become a being of pure aether, and Leviathan consumed him as aether accordingly, destroying him.

As Knights of the Round Thordan and his knights planned to consume the rest of the Ascians, the Dravanian Horde and other Primals alike as 'God-King', except his plan however had one fatal weakness - he was up against that meddling adventurer who had made a career for themself taking down Primals like he had become (namely, the player ). Needless to say, he folded so easily.

As for how Varis and Garlemald will use their newfound synthetic-Echo power... it's hard to say. But one thing is clear is that it will not lead us into an alliance with them - Garlemald is still our enemy, they are still allied with the Ascians, and in true FF style, it's likely once we get to Garlemald's capital itself, finally taking out the Empire's ruling regime will then reveal the real string pullers all along, the real big bad, which is almost guaranteed to be the Ascians and their evil moon deity Zodiark.

But we'll find out either way.