"Time Skip" for 4.5 or 5.0?

[EdwinLi]

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Don't forget the 2nd key part of the teaser trailer is to change the past which means WoL is expected to have some ability to influence and change events of the past in 5.0 to prevent the Calamity we see in the teaser trailer which most likely may be the Echo evolving or gaining that ability.

We know the echo powers is given by Hydaelyn for the power over Soul but what will happen if the Echo has the power of both Hydaelyn for the power of Soul and Zodiark for the power of Time.

[MistakeNot]

I really, really hope their won't be any kind of actual time travel introduced.

Visions of the past, or of a possible future is one thing.
Actually being able to change the past, or having alternativ timelines is another thing. Those tend to really mess with continuity and generally cause a mess.

[Mansion]

I think we will have a big fight "for the light" in 4.5, and it will screw things really bad, then MSQ will get us understand that "WoL into WoD" thingy. 4.55 will show us where and how to go, and that's it.
As Anonymoose said, the trailer is designed to foreshadow things but also blurr some paths. Maybe we will just go somewhere, have our Echo show the "future of Flood of light" and we'll just switch to darjy edgy to balance things up to avoid that.

Time warps are a mess to grasp in fiction, and in the context of a MMORPG like FFXIV with little time bubbles here and there, it would be a pain to finetune the overall world to that new concept.

[KageTokage]

If we function under the assumption that the voice talking in both 4.4 and the trailer is Arbert, it feels to me like it's more plausible that the first shard effectively is the future of the source due to being extremely similar, which would make simply preventing what happened there from happening again "rewriting history". I'd kind of rather they just stick to having a multiverse instead of throwing time-wimey stuff into the mix as well.

I'm also thinking we might end up becoming the Warrior of Darkness simply due to needing to fight back the excess light and the beings born of it at the first shard as part of a plan that will spare both it and the source from destruction, with the mystery girl likely being a key player judging from her seeming presence on the collector's boxart.

[Alleo]

My guess is, that we will get forced into a future or a vision of it where we have to fight through the new dungeon. At the end we might meet that child and might make the decision to switch towards the WoD. Then we get sent back and 4.5 ends. In 5.0 we will try to stop the future from happening and maybe towards the end we will meet the child again.

I dont believe that we are truly dealing with a time skip (only for that mission to change us to WoD maybe) otherwise they would have to change the models for Alisaie and Alphinaud and if a huge battle really took place they would have to change the map of Eorzea too. Seeing how we stopped the air force of Garlemald to reach Doma on the normal route I cant believe that we are suddenly in a full war in 4.5 thus my view that this is only a vision of what could happen.

Don't forget the 2nd key part of the teaser trailer is to change the past which means WoL is expected to have some ability to influence and change events of the past in 5.0 to prevent the Calamity we see in the teaser trailer which most likely may be the Echo evolving or gaining that ability.

We know the echo powers is given by Hydaelyn for the power over Soul but what will happen if the Echo has the power of both Hydaelyn for the power of Soul and Zodiark for the power of Time.

The trailer could also just simply mean that we see a possible future and rewrite this one by changing our way in our present. Because if the WoL suddenly has the power to truly change the past and thus the future why would he not go back more in time and stop certain characters from dieing? What would be the limit to this? Also how would they show that ingame? Its still a MMO and unlike WoW which changes the map for everyone thus taking away stories, FF14 has always kept the way to see the story from its very beginning. How much would they have to create in terms of maps? I mean you have the future one, the changed one and the old one.

[Fenral]

One of the other things mentioned alongside those so-far-reliable leaks is that the Crystal Tower would be involved, and (if I'm remembering correctly) finding a portal there. In any case that would tie in with the ending of that questline where Nero throws away his magitek compass - and then it seems to have found a signal as he walks away.

...you don't suppose we might be hearing from G'raha Tia??? Could that add up? The voice would suit him, he may well be waiting years for us, and he's essentially the last of the Allagans now... plus hints of further plot involving Princess Salina.

Small chance, of course, especially since it's an optional quest and they don't like crossing those into MSQ. But we did see a brief flash of G'raha during one of the Omega cutscenes. Or at least I did. No idea if they'd make it a variable cutscene depending on whether you'd completed the other raids or not.

Wait, the leaks are saying what now? *ears perk up*

I've already written at exhaustive length, and to the annoyance of a great many people, about why G'raha can't be kept too separate from the Allagan lore going forward, but you appear to be on the same page already, so...

It is literally impossible for the Crystal Tower to be involved in the MSQ without bringing in G'raha Tia. That would be like fighting Nidhogg without Estinien, but worse because when last we left it, he was already in there. There would be no accounting for it.


However, the more likely progression of events will be that the WoL will end up in a situation where all/most of their allies are gone, and with nobody able to save us, G'raha will come to our aid (this would be massive FFIII fanservice, given he was modeled after the FF series' first "fake" heroic sacrifice, Desch, including copying his famous "this is my destiny" line). Afterwards, Krile could facilitate an alternate introduction, perhaps even crediting him with her inexplicable knowledge of Allagan tech, and then the tower could be conveniently (re)visited regardless of the player's prior completion, with just a little bit of head scratching along the same lines as DRG 30-50 or the Binding Coil. This could even happen in 4.5, given Y'shtola was about to do the thing with Allagan tech that we've been trying to stop everyone else from doing since 1.0.

All that said, the voice is probably not G'raha (though he was on my shortlist before the teaser). While I grant that the casting would be more than good, the pronoun doesn't add up ("watashi" vs "ore"). However, the pronoun was actually the only part that didn't resemble G'raha's speech patterns in Japanese, so it would be too obvious a tell, especially for the JP playerbase that already expects him to return. Maybe it'll change in a later version. Hrm...

[ScootPatoot]

Personally, I'm of the mind that it won't be a look into time travel, per se, and we'll explore The First in order to bring balance and stability to both of our worlds. Maybe time passes differently in other worlds, and the Warriors of Darkness and Minfilia will have been there for a while waiting on us. What if the child in the trailer IS Minfilia, born into that world to help save it?

It's been such a short time since the last Calamity in our world, so maybe the reason all these souls are being called now isn't to prevent a calamity that begins in our world, but one that will affect both us and The First if it comes to pass. Maybe we'll be able to travel between both with the Scions on one plane of existence and the armies on the other and in accomplishing our goal, will bring down the misguided in charge of Garlemald.

[Chewy2nd]

I wonder if a new 'Warrior of Light' does arrive on scene, and usurps our title, but is actual an agent of Zodiark? So we must turn to the darkness to quell the twisted light they're bringing to the world.

[ObsidianFire]

It's worth mentioning that the Japanese title of the 4.5 MSQ dungeon (the one that is in the trailer) roughly translates to "Border Region" and that in the art for it, we see what looks to be Garlean magitek mixed in with more mundane weapons. So until 4.5 actually hits, I'm going with the idea that it's somewhere on Hydaelyn near the Garlean border and we run into someone there...

I don't know who the voice is. I don't there there's any good way to say who it is until 4.5. I did think it interesting that it seems the voice isn't describing waiting for a specific person ("our" WoL), but someone playing the role of the WoL ("a" WoL). Given how long Ascians and prophecies have been around, that makes me think time-travel isn't the only way for what the voice is saying to be true.

[Chewy2nd]

I'm reckoning it's on the Gyr Abania/Garlean Empire border.