The Road to 5.0

[ObsidianFire]

Zodiark and Hydaelyn pre-date the Shards (and most likely the life on the Shards/Source). We aren't even really sure if they are tied to Light and Darkness at all, just that Hydaelyn seems to use Light more and the Ascians use Dark more. And we also know that Hydaelyn wants to preserve life while the Ascians really don't care about it.

It's not that much of a stretch to think the Ascians got their stance on things from the divine entity they claim to worship.

[Anonymoose]

I don't see why zodiark would oppose mortal life when he was literally created the same moment man was created

Light and Dark were given form when Man was born, according to Ramuh. Light and Dark once shared an existence in the aetherial sea, long before life. Ramuh's definition of the word "form" is also open to interpretation. If the meaning is specifically corporeal we can rule a LOT out.

Before there was life, in the depths of the aetherial sea, Light and Dark did once dwell as one.

See also the Gerun Oracles, which I would point out were presented to Urianger by Elidibus himself. Or did Elidibus merely mean for Urianger to assume they were true...?

[Kusanagi7]

if we are saying there is atleast 1 death maybe our character?

[Cilia]

Also, I see Darkness as not anti-life but chaotic in nature. The 13th isn't lifeless, it's full of void sent. It seems to me that Light is antithetical to life as a world overrun by light is implied to be barren and lifeless.

Yes and no. Dark is associated more with chaos than a lack of life, but the things in the Void aren't alive in the traditional sense of the word. They don't age and can't die natural deaths as a result of the Void having no aether (energy) or lifestream. Voidsent exist, but they aren't technically alive.

The Light void leaves nothingness in its wake. Not just barren and lifeless land, nothingness.

The point of the two extremes is to illustrate that both are needed in a balance close to what it is now for mortal life to exist as we know it.

[Fenral]

And then The Voice... Once again, my weird voice-recognition habit screamed Joe Dempsie (Arbert) when I saw the trailer, but my JP friends assure me it's Alphinaud's voice actor in JP.

It's nowhere even in the ballpark of Shinnosuke Tachibana (how do I put this, the... texture is wrong?). The only person on the current JP cast who could pull off that vocal pitch and texture is KENN, but I had ruled him out because we have no reason to believe The Voice could belong Urianger, Isse, or Wedge. Well, Urianger maybe, but it would take a hell of an explanation at this point.

[Iscah]

I agree Theodric, they shouldn't go full Martin and kill everyone

[...]

My list of characters that should die or be incapacitated
-Lyse: dead
-Merylweb: dead
- kan-e-senna: incap
-Aymeric: incap
-alisaie: dead
-Shtola: dead
-Hien: incap
-yugiri: dead
-Eldibus: dead
-Doman enclave: everyone dead from black rose
-Varis: incap
-Zenos: my only friend comes back

If any or all of those occur I'll be happy.

So they shouldn't kill everyone, just... the majority of the major supporting characters?

The thought is horrible, but also - building on my earlier post - it feels wrong to go into it with the mindset that we should wipe out so much of the cast just for emotional impact, because what are you left with afterwards? The story needs to go on, and it seems like bad writing to permanently throw out half your cast and replace it with a new set of characters for the next part of the story.

Part of it is the nature of this massively long-term storytelling. Every expansion, every patch story, we have to hit "another climax" with dramatic effect. We can't just keep killing off more central cast members each time that happens, or there'll be nobody left.

I don't want to reach the end of the story and look back to see that so many of the characters I liked along the way are now dead.

[Iscah]

I don't see why zodiark would oppose mortal life when he was literally created the same moment man was created, if Ramuh is to be believed. My guess is that Zodiark is essintally the god of man because man was born with darkness in his heart, again going by what ramuh says.

This is the critical part:

"All blame doth lie within the darkness that resideth in the breast of man. Whence sprung this calamitous seed? In the beginning, no such duality existed. Were light and dark given form when man was born?"

You're missing the critical difference that the game makes between "darkness" and "Darkness".

Zodiark is associated with Darkness.

The "darkness" Ramuh is referring to seems to be, in context, the part of man's nature that drives conflict.

A 'wider' version of the part you quoted:

Thy conflicts have brought naught but anguish and misery unto the forest. All blame doth lie within the darkness that resideth in the breast of man.

Whence sprung this calamitous seed? In the beginning, no such duality existed. Were light and dark given form when man was born?

It would explain much. Not least why strife and sorrow follow ever in thy wake. Thou canst not deny the urgings of thine own nature.

[Iscah]

FFXIV has historically been really bad about following through on character deaths (Ul'dah was the same with or without Nanamo, nothing happened in Camp Dragonhead with Haurchefant gone, the heretics simply stopped existing after Ysayle's death, and so on)

I actually thought they handled Haurchefant's death really well in regards to the impact on characters at Dragonhead.

Nothing visibly changes, but talk to people and you can see the impact it's had. Not every single NPC gets new dialogue, but a lot of core ones do. Yaelle and Corientaux in the main hall, Medguistl and Ninne in the northwest building, Aurelle and Theobalin on the ramparts, Francel and his assistant Stephannot at Skyfire Locks, and even Laniaitte if you detour to Camp Cloudtop. (And of course Artoirel and Emmanellain in Ishgard - once they eventually reappear after being absent for some time.)

(Note that the script formatting puts both their initial dialogue and post-Vault dialogue under the same heading, presumably because it changes mid-quest rather than at the beginning. Also Corientaux's dialogue - the "what do you do here?" tourist information - doesn't show up because it's arranged in menus rather than normal talk.)

Speak to them immediately after, and they're in shock, struggling to believe it. (Corentiaux can't even get through his usual script. He gets a sentence or two into it and cuts off saying he just can't.)

After completing Heavensward and again post-Dragonsong, their dialogue changes as they begin to come to terms with it.

Francel stands out in particular - as well as his comments when you talk to him, which are rather lovely, you can also encounter him up at Haurchefant's grave near the Steel Vigil. That was a really potent moment for me, actually - I went to find the place as soon as Heavensward's credits were over, and could see someone walking up ahead as I approached, and then I realised who it was.
I know at some level it's all just pixels on a screen, but having gone there expecting to be alone and to find him there... it was beautiful.

I hope to see his story arc continue through further installments of the game - whether he can become actively involved in the plot again, or they just continue updating dialogue like this. I think it would be interesting to see him interact with Emmanellain too - I can see them not liking each other much in the past, but now things are changing, Emmanellain is going through his own story arc of maturing, and also presumably they'd be working together to some degree.

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As for Nanamo, I think people underestimate the significance of those events to her, just because nothing outwardly changed. But it's a turning point for her, where she realises the consequences of her naively reckless actions, and begins a shift towards being a true and competent ruler. (It's worthwhile reading her side story For Coin and Country.)

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And there are definitely mentions of the heretics after Ysayle's death. Remember that we returned from slaying Nidhogg (the first time) just as a band of heretics had broken into the city, and Ysayle intervenes and orders them to withdraw. Nidhogg is dead and the Dragonsong War is ended. (See journal entry here.) I'm not sure if we hear from her again between then and Azys Lla, but that's the primary reason that they have withdrawn.

They're also mentioned a couple of times in terms of reconciling with the Ishgardians during the Dragonsong arc.

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Oh, and some random could-be-important-later trivia I found while getting links... Matoya's talk dialogue from the end of Dragonsong mentions that Alphinaud had been going through her books researching how to "untangle entwined sources of aether" - at the time it must have been for rescuing Estinien from Nidhogg, but who knows where that sort of arcane knowledge might come in handy for a future plot point...?

[Mansion]

Even if we already discussed that idea, the fact that this Ghymlit thingy looks like the core of the battle, I believe it gets more and more probable we'll get casualties somehow. It's free material to build drama in MSQ so people "look forward" to any resolution in the next patch / expansion.

So hold to your dear ones!

[Fenral]

snip

You've sort of unintentionally proved my point, though. People are sad about it, and much dialogue is updated to reflect how sad people are, but nothing actually happens. Part of that is due to death generally only impacting characters with nothing staked on their survival. To contrast with A Song of Ice and Fire, people die and create power vacuums, factions split, complicated revenge plots spiral out of control, and five volumes in people are still figuring out just how much Ned Stark meant to Westeros. I'm not saying we need that kind of body count, just that individual life can and should be shown to have value beyond making people sad when it ends.


By that evaluation, Stormblood has actually been better about this. In spite of the occasional "fake out", there is definite fallout to both Yotsuyu's survival and her true death (and Asahi's), not to mention the amazing meat suit we basically gift-wrapped for Elidibus. Which is of course not to say that I dislike the addition of little moments like meeting Francel out by Haurchefant's grave, just that those should be the icing, not the cake itself.