Theory on the other 7 calamities

[Shadotterdan]

So, I've been thinking, the previous calamities have all basically been an overabundance of one element of aether. I think that it might stand to reason that the remaining calamities might be a lack of a particular kind of aether. The results would likely be more in line with what happens in the other FF games when the light of the crystals fades.

[Rawrz]

You can't make threads like this. You'll summon the moose and Gilgamesh's chicken. D:

Also when one kind of aether weakens another becomes unrestrained and tips the imbalance to them, which causes something to happen on the opposite side of the wheel. Ill let the woodland creature explain it.

[Enkidoh]

I'm not a chicken I'm a cat!

*mutter mutter* stupid Gilgamesh *mutter mutter*

Ahem...

We actually don't have a lot of information about the causes of earlier Calamities other than the Sixth (and even that one is rather murky at best). So anything I can give is just speculation more than anything. We know that the Sixth Calamity was a flood so therefore there was an aspect imbalance towards water, whose opposite on the elemental wheel is... fire. So we can presume fire aspected aether at that time was weak. But again that is my speculation so take from that what you will (someone else would probably be far more knowledgeable on this subject than I am).

[Anonymoose]

We know that the Sixth Calamity was a flood so therefore there was an aspect imbalance towards water, whose opposite on the elemental wheel is... fire.

Assuming the elemental wheel's polar-opposite relationships actually have any influence on Hydaelyn, where water is weak to lightning and strong against earth. Theoretically, too much earth might beckon the waters ... or too little lightning would allow it to ascend.

I tried to make a "rocking boat" theory of the Calamities like this and could never get it 100% perfect.

I got it to about 95% once, but then the Pudding told me my basis for it was a typo.

[Shadotterdan]

I'm not a chicken I'm a cat!

*mutter mutter* stupid Gilgamesh *mutter mutter*

Ahem...

We actually don't have a lot of information about the causes of earlier Calamities other than the Sixth (and even that one is rather murky at best). So anything I can give is just speculation more than anything. We know that the Sixth Calamity was a flood so therefore there was an aspect imbalance towards water, whose opposite on the elemental wheel is... fire. So we can presume fire aspected aether at that time was weak. But again that is my speculation so take from that what you will (someone else would probably be far more knowledgeable on this subject than I am).

Pretty sure the lore book gave a history of all the calamities including what happened and what was blamed for it, though I don't remember too many other than a giant wind storm, a massive heatwave, a huge earthquake (that one claimed the Allagans) and an ice age. I do know it confirmed that there has so far been one for each element (with Bahamut claiming non-elemental or Astral).

In all of them though, while they each have their own supposed causes, the effects line up with what I imagine an overabundance of one particular element would be. As to my theory on calamity caused by a lack of an element, while some ideas might seem similar to overabundance on the other side, the effects might be a little more esoteric than that. Some examples could be the seas becoming unnavigateable and the earth "rotting", wind dying down, crops failing or worked metal losing it's effectiveness. The lack of an ability to make fire without it just becoming unnaturally cold. Stuff like that.

[YianKutku]

In all of them though, while they each have their own supposed causes, the effects line up with what I imagine an overabundance of one particular element would be.

I'm having some trouble reconciling this with what we know of the Fourth Umbral (Allag's fall) and Seventh Umbral (Bahamut) Calamities, though. The Fourth Umbral Calamity was widely understood to be one of Earth, because the ground gave way under the sheer amount of power channeled from Dalamud to the Crystal Tower. If this is interpreted as an overabundance of Earth aether being directed to Eorzea from Dalamud, then I would wonder why Earth specifically.

This is especially since we know Bahamut was the power source trapped inside Dalamud, and when he broke free and caused the 7UC, it was considered unaspected Astral. (The "unaspected" part I know is canon, while the "Astral" part I'd have to double-check.)

For everything else, though, it's a possible theory. I'm especially curious about the Third Umbral Calamity (Fire, drought, famine), which the lorebook claims was due to the "gods" punishing man's hubris. Which implies the objective existence of gods, separate from Primals.

[Anonymoose]

In the rocking boat theory, I had blamed that on Allagan tech utilizing lightning-aspected aether. Something along the lines of Allag raising lightning so high that it beckoned earth the intervention of earth to ground it. Knowing it was based on an in-game text error made me bristle a bit at the former half being confirmed, lol.

Even as the harnessing of lightning energies gave rise to new recording mediums, techniques were developed that allowed complex arcane geometries to be instantly plotted. Traditional grimoires were replaced by devastatingly efficient and elegant weapons.

Bahamut's Calamity was determined (by fallible scholars, but ones I trust until proven wrong) to be all the elements at once tilted astrally. However, Bahamut was also being used as a transistor to collect the energies of the sun (fire-aspected...?) and channel them into flares that would power the Crystal Tower. The tower could have stored the energy as a different aspect. For example, rotating fire energies counterclockwise one click would land you back on lightning. (Something we were able to do to when breaking down crystal clusters in 1.0 with umbral moraine.) This would explain at least why Crystal Tower is remembered with associations of Byregot and Rhalgr.

[Zohar_Lahar]

The Third Umbral Era is rather curious because it described a solar flare, which would mean something on Hydaelyn affected the sun.

[Shadotterdan]

It may have been that that's what it looked like. I thought it was described more as the sun seeming to get closer.

[koichi88]

I'm fairly certain we do know the cause of the calamity that took out the Allagans. Xande was about to be toppled by rebels so he tried to make good on his contract before he was ready, channeling large amounts of aether from Dalamud to the Crystal Tower faster than it was meant to handle. Somehow this caused a series of massive earthquakes that buried the tower, forced Xande to activate the stasis system and left the empire broken and unable to recover. It has been awhile since I ran the CT storyline though so I could be remembering wrong.