Revelations from Patch 5.1

[Puksi]

On Vauthry

Vauthry is a very complicated issue to deal with.

On the one hand, he is fully culpable for the evils he perpetrated.

On the other, it's not entirely his fault because he was raised from birth to believe that anything and everything he does is right and good because he is the one doing it.

Vauthry is innocent in the sense that he is not the architect of the evils he perpetrated, and by Sin Eater standards having been born a Sin Eater he has no sins to be forgiven (all Sin Eaters except Lightwardens being named "Forgiven [Sin]"). Thus, Innocence.

Is it fair to pin all the blame for all of the horrible things that went on in and around Eulmore on Vauthry? No... not all of it, but he is still responsible to some degree.

Ten words is like the forum version of a one-nut mark bill

If not the Titania analogy, the next closest one I can think of: saying he is fully culpable is like blaming Thancred for the massacre at the Waking Sands. I'm not entirely sure why Vauthry should be held to a different standard than every other character who has been corrupted by the sin eaters.

The writers were at least very clear to establish he was mentally unwell and physically corrupted by the Lightwarden wedged directly in his chest (on the heart side, interestingly), from the moment we met him. How could he be expected to have true control when no one else in the same situation -- not even the WoL, at the end, without intervention -- did? We're to forgive the Eulmoran nobility for being "influenced" by him, despite them having free will the entire time before our arrival at Eulmore to fight him -- but completely ignore he was influenced corrupted before he was even born? By a Lightwarden, that no one short of the WoL had a chance of resisting--and the WoL would have destroyed worlds, had they lost control. Would the WoL have been responsible for that, would the destruction have been their informed decision -- or the inability to resist the instincts/will of the Lightwardens?

Lightwardens do not follow the naming conventions of lower Eaters, so I really don't know if that is a sure-fire proof of why "Innocence" was the name.

But, tl;dr: It would really be nice to let it be known who the actual "architects of evil" were. If not Emet-Selch, because explaining Ascians is complicated, then certainly Vauthry's father, rather than elevate that man to "the good old days" of Eulmore. They used a woman like an animal to turn her infant into a monster. To sweep that under the rug is the last thing I'd expect from a "hero". :s

[Rannie]

There is a importance to it and a very big one if they want to keep up a good moral of the workforce.

A place for entertainment is helping people, even if you don't realize it yet, as there will always be a demand for a place that people can go after a nice hard day of work to relax and forget their worries for a moment before returning back to that work.

In a world where the only thing they can focus on now is to rebuild and resolve past issues now, there is little amount of places left that can provide them a place to relax from the memories and physical labor of rebuilding what their world has a left. It is still a depressing world and psychologically to keep their minds from getting too depressed during these times is a place of entertainment.

Keeping the Bee Hive running is important because it is literally the only place left on the First that acts as a place where people can rest from the days of long hard labor and constant depression of how little is left of their world now as they strive to rebuild from what little survived.

Maintaining a good mental Health is very important for the reconstruction of the First because if people can't sustain a good mental health, they are likely to fall into depression and it will become more difficult to rebuild what is left of the First which is why making the Bee Hive more accessable is important because that will be the place where workers go to recover from the mental stress they experience from their hard labor of rebuilding since not everyone can keep up a good mental state through knowing they did a good long days of hard work alone.

I wouldn't say just for moral on it though that will play a part.

I'd also go along the lines of it generating revenue by Tourism. As it is Kai-Shirrs two friends were about to leave because there was no business to be had in there and I'm quite sure that a lot of other people would have too. It's not that bad of an idea either when it comes to it, soon when they get everything going strong they may end up building their own version of Costa Del Sol.

The money they are hoping to make by making the Bee a tourist attraction will help them greatly with imports. They will be able to import food, seeds and other materials that they aren't able to get to bring commerce and stability back to the place.

[JeanneOrnitier]

Even those of us who have played NieR: Automana before have no idea where this raid is going. Yoko Taro loves to throw 3rd Act curve-balls at his audience and right when you think you have a decent idea of what's going on, he'll pull the rug out from under you and hit you in the emotional gut. Simply put, the only thing those of us who have played Yoko Taro's games before are expecting is to be surprised and watch the story turn out not to be what we thought it was.

As much as we know about the different characters in their own games, we know very, very little about them in this game. It's not like the Return to Ivalice Raids where Matsumoto likes giving tons of exposition to the player. Yoko Taro likes to drop players into the thick of things and slowly reveal more of the setting and back-story through datalouges and scraps of left-over information about how the world used to be. So if you're confused about what is going on, that's normal. We all are. And we probably won't know what is actually going on until the last raid either...

It's not so much confusion but more like it feels super out of place in the setting. It feels artificial instead of natural, if you pardon the robot pun. Ivalice worked in the setting, I can believe it exists in FFXIV's world. This doesn't, at least not just with this first raid. We'll see how the next two go.

[ShadowMeowth]

Character law, obey the law ~

I have a theory concerning the setting of the YoRHa raid, but this is Yoko Taro we are talking about. He would not be the mad genius he is if he were easily predictable. His narrative building method consists of planning how stories end, so we will probably be blind until the final raid.

And I keep saying that "Ardbert" is not another shard of us, because does that mean that all our shards have his appearance? That seems nonsensical to me. No, I feel that is what we are led to believe, that he is a Warrior of Light from another shard, but in truth there is more.

As for the white-robed figure seemingly leading Zenos to hunt Zodiark, welp. Unukalhai now says that Elidibus' concern for equilibrium more than once clashes with other Ascians' methods. I wonder if Elidibus considers that for Hydaelyn to be defeated, Zodiark has to go as well. That would certainly be a way to achieve equilibrium.

[RukiaFae]

..............snip............

I don't think it is him but

I don't think it is him but I thought it was Asahi\\'s body. I looked back at the cut scene and now I'm not sure.
https://imgur.com/FY2TMnM

[KarstenS]

Little wall of text.

Well did the MSQ and my thoughts on it:

Still I am not quite happy that Zenos somehow even got some Ascian power..

This was a thing I did just wait for.

Remember our first talk to Elidibus in Patch 2.1? He talked about, if we ever would learn how powerful the echo really is, we would see, that we are not very different to the Ascians.

Mysterious Figures

The Mysterious Figure that appears before Zenos is, by my estimate, [b]not[/i] associated with the Ascians.

My first thought was: maybe the same source as the Oracle of darkness?

So Zenos is now hunting for Zodiarc. And if he consumes him, currently I do expect he will, my idea for the direction is the following:

After this Hydaelyn will sacrifice herself to give the WoL of the Source her power and then everything is heading forward to the final battle between Zodiarc and Hydaelyn, represented by Zenos and the WoL.

From the Fanfests we do know: The Arc of Hydaelyn and Zodiarc will end in 5.x and i think, this could be an possible end.

Somehow they are talking a different language there (which the WoL also cant understand even with the echo)

Not very surprising. As we lerned at the end of the Omega story line, the "natural language understanding" only will work for individuals with a soul.

The visuals are not great. Its an ugly factory with ugly robots. And other than the last fight, none of the music was something I liked, heck the one that played when we traveled through it again really got on my nerves after a bit of time.

Without the knowledge of the game, it is hard to know why it looks and feels like it does. You should definitively give NieR: Automata a try. It has one of the best stories I've played the last decade. After the desaster of Final Fantasy 15, NieR: Automata satisfied me in every way FF15 could not deliver.

[Alleo]

There is a importance to it and a very big one if they want to keep up a good moral of the workforce.

I know that its important to have businesses later but my problem is the time this is done.

This is right after they talked how the biggest problems in Eulmore are safety and something to eat. Of course you also need a place to relax but as we find out right away people cant even afford it.

So I at least would have liked it more if that delivery was more about the general problems of the people and helping them out with our goods, like we did with the princess in Stormblood and then one of the later quests or at the end we could then do something to give the buisness more to do. With these quests now we are only helping out the business and seeing how the Talos and things like that only started it just does not make sense to start there.

Little wall of text.

This was a thing I did just wait for.

Remember our first talk to Elidibus in Patch 2.1? He talked about, if we ever would learn how powerful the echo really is, we would see, that we are not very different to the Ascians.



Not very surprising. As we lerned at the end of the Omega story line, the "natural language understanding" only will work for individuals with a soul.

Without the knowledge of the game, it is hard to know why it looks and feels like it does. You should definitively give NieR: Automata a try. It has one of the best stories I've played the last decade. After the desaster of Final Fantasy 15, NieR: Automata satisfied me in every way FF15 could not deliver.

About your points:

Hm maybe I remember it wrong but wasnt it more like: If we knew what he knew we would be on his side? For me it feels that maybe those with the echo are Amaurotine souls thus he believed that we would join his side if we knew about the tragedy of their race?

The problem with that is, that these robots spoke too and I am not sure if they have a soul (and if Androids in this world have one either) and we are perfectly able to read the text we found there. Text does not have a soul imo.

Maybe Omegas story was more about that echo gives us a chance to understand beings with soul that cant talk normally like Alpha but also works for any language at all as a translator.

I do not plan to play Nier and I really had hoped that the raid would be at least still be deeply enjoyable for those that have never played it. I mean I did not play many other FF games either yet I did enjoy the crystal tower raids. Maybe because they took their time to introduce the characters that are involved with this to us. Of course it can still happen but I am a bit sad how it was barely done at all. Dont need to explain everything but for those of us who dont know about 2P (and imo nobody knows about 2P because she too could be quite different to 2B from Nier) maybe at least make us care about her? She is just there and then stops working for now. It just would be nice if these purely fanservice raids would at least be more than that.

[Yasune]

There is a minimum amount of text before I can post my thoughts.

In the extra F'lhaminn quest, she mentions Warburton died 20 years ago. Shouldn't it be 15 years ago? Did Koji mess up, or did they suddenly jump us ahead five years?

[LineageRazor]

MSQ:

Not a lot in the way of amazing revelations this patch; it felt like filler, albeit necessary filler. Further investigation in how to get the Scions home. Follow up on the situation with Eulmore. Follow up on the situation with the Light-touched at the Inn. Was excited about the concept of a cure for Tempering, but am wary given how they seemed to spin it as being viable only in special cases (like Ga Bu). Would prefer to see a full-on cure - but given how awkward that would make the FATEs that involve Tempered, it probably won't happen. Ignoring paradoxes for storylines that are run out of order is one thing, but for events that happen continuously?

Found the dungeon to be kind of bland and boring. The fire mechanic on the final boss was interesting, even if it killed me a few times before I figured it out. All told, though, I couldn't really drum up any enthusiasm for beating up familiars to get their boss's attention.

Was hoping that the familiar Allisae would summon would be something unique rather than just another Porxie. Nope, it was a Porxie. Would have been happier even if it'd wound up being her clay abomination animated.

Same old Garleans, somehow find the time to commit abominable atrocities even while mired in a civil war. (Well, in fairness, the Ultima Weapon clone was put together well before the civil war. So it's more like, they found the time to DEPLOY abominable atrocities even while mired in a civil war.) Varis seems to be confirmed dead, which is a bit disappointing; I felt he had more to contribute, but nup, we get more Zeno, instead. Yay. Folks considered many possible outcomes for the murder, and several got it right: Varis dead, Gaius and Estinien get the blame, Zenos gets bored and leaves, Garlean Empire now in chaos.

Not gonna guess at the identity of Zenos's new helper. I'm hoping it's a new character, because all of the likely known characters I can think of would be lame. Looks like Zenos is well on the path I predicted for him to assume control of Zodiark, something I fully expect him to succeed at completely - no being absorbed by Zodiark instead, or any of that nonsense. Zenos's entire character, such as it is, is built on him accomplishing things assumed to be impossible, likely a deliberate reflection on the Warrior of Light's ability to do the same. He will control Zodiark because he has some kind of innate understanding of how Primals work, and the fact that Zo is an extra buff Primal is completely irrelevant.

I was touched by the Minfilia send-off, though I did feel that F'lhaminn seemed to take the whole thing a bit too stoically.

Neir raid (caution: Neir: Automata spoilers within - seriously DO NOT READ if you're still playing, or plan to play Neir in the future)

I enjoyed the raid; can't say how I'd feel about it if I hadn't played the Neir game, but a lot of what I loved about Neir was here. That said, this part of the raid answered NOTHING about how the robots and setting from Neir wound up on the First. Right now, we don't know if they're relics from this world, or travelers from the Neir universe.

The choose-your-quest bit was interesting; I don't remember which dwarf it was, but I sided with the one who doesn't trust 2P. I don't know anything about her, after all, except that 9S regards her as an enemy, and 9S is a pretty upstanding guy... most of the time. I can't discount the fact that he goes off the deep end in Neir when he witnesses A2 slaying 2B - and even when he learns it was a mercy kill requested by 2B herself, he's unable to let go of his rage. If 2P got on his berserk side, she might be the one in the right, with 9S running in full-on crazy mode. It's also possible that this is not 9S at all, but instead someone wearing a 9S body. The fact that 9S appeared to be "siding" with the Machine Lifeforms is not an indication one way or another. He's able to hack and control them, after all, so they're essentially just tools.

I adored the ability to explore the raid area after the fact, and even more so doing so with a purpose. A lot of the previous raids have had beautiful settings that I never got a good look at, having to press on with the group and all. I've occasionally wanted to check out the cells in Orbonne Monestary, for example. I hope this is a feature that comes up more often. As for the raid itself, my favorite was the GLaDOS-inspired second boss was probably my favorite, though I enjoyed tackling Engles, as well. The first boss... well, I learned I really needed to turn off other peoples' effects for that fight. i could barely see the thing in the cloud of effects, and some of its attacks were telegraphed by its movements.

Puzzled by all the folks saying "knowing Yoko Taro, this and this and this will happen!" I mean - isn't the whole point of Yoko Taro that you CANNOT know Yoko Taro? :P

Pixie Beast Tribes:

Liking the setup so far; I enjoy the concept of a Pixie dream world. Looking forward to what comes of the villain they introduced. Little disappointed they wasted Ezel's name on a Porxie. Not fond of Porxies in general. Not a lot else to say, until I've done more of the quests.

New Collectables NPC:

Not too excited about drumming up business for the Beehive. In response to some others' misgivings, however, I think they're trying to spin it as a place whose workers don't feel shamed or exploited by working there. It's just work. While she has had little impact so far, the presence of one of the dancers in Kai's circle of friends is a way of giving the dancers a voice in the storyline, and unless she starts complaining, I'm going to assume the dancers in general are content with their lot. Totes putting Kai-Shirr in a bunny outfit once I can dress him :3

Hades Ex:

Only attempted this once, so far, but I gotta say that I really like seeing the Ascians of yesteryear make a reappearance with fight mechanics tailored to pay homage to their original battles. A nice touch on expanding the point in the original fight where Hades summons the spirits of the Ancients to help in his fight, this time literally allowing us to fight a few of them!

[ChaoticCrimson]

MSQ

The mysterious figure is quite the turn-up at this stage. Zenos' words hint that they're known to him, but then that may not necessarily mean this is a character we've previously seen before. At least we know now for sure Zenos is going after Zodiark next, likely to try to merge with him. But despite his newfound powers, I'm not entirely sure that even Zenos could overpower Zodiark completely, weakened or not. Hmmm... How interesting would it be if maybe Zodiark was influencing things to allow for Zenos to become a sort of avatar for him in a way Elidibus or the other Ascians could not? Wild speculation, of course, but I wonder...

I am absolutely not convinced that the "Ardbert" we see in the stinger's stinger is our Ardbert. I will say that his appearance, whoever he really is, caught me off guard. Whatever's going on here, I also have strong suspicions that Elidibus is involved. Curious how he didn't make an appearance this patch...

Back to Garlemald, I have to wonder if Varis actually approved the research into Arch Ultima or whether it was a secret Ascian agenda he wasn't aware of. Or perhaps he did disapprove and was aware, but couldn't act against the Ascians. Varis is gone now, so it's kind of moot anyway I suppose. Either way, I suspect the Ascians had a hand in it, given that only they could have provided the requisite data and resources after what happened to the XIVth Legion. It wouldn't surprise me if the Heart of Sabik was indeed involved in this process, and perhaps that was what Gaius sought but it was possibly relocated prior to his infiltration of Garlemald. At any rate, Estinien confirmed that Zenos was apparently able to completely remove Black Rose from the equation (as far as he's aware for now, at least). As a side note, Estinien's LB was pretty rad imo.

Aside from that, the story mostly turned out about as I expected. The Scions on the First work with the Exarch to find a way back to the Source, and we go to Kholusia to help with Eulmore's fallout after Vauthry. The dungeon was quirky and fun for the most part, and the dialogue bits throughout it if you bring the twins as trusts were funny. I've already taken a liking to Beq Lugg as well. It was nice to revisit the storyline with the light-afflicted in Amh Araeng. I liked the little shoutout to Angelo from FFVIII too. Interesting that this may lead to a way to break the conditioning placed on the tempered back on the Source, I hadn't thought of that before but then we didn't really know anything about this soulcrafting until just recently. I do worry about the implications of using Allagan science as a font for the Scions to get back though. The auracite was shady enough as it was for an idea.

Kholusia was a nice little bit of development if nothing else. The Chais are kind of adorable together lol. Dulia was precious as ever, and it does seem like Chai is starting to come into his own a bit. He understands he's not experienced enough in certain fields to handle all the responsibilities of being mayor, and makes it clear he can't do everything on his own. Despite that, he also doesn't want to delegate all the work to someone else without rolling up his sleeves and working himself. Still, there could be a chance for conflict in the future between those who were once in differing social classes during Vauthry's reign, but for now it appears the people are willing to come together to rebuild and survive.

Post MSQ (Mor Dhona):

I thought it was nice of them to devote a side quest devoted to F'lhaminn so she could have a chance to properly find peace with Minfillia's loss and move on. It was a pretty touching bit of story they could have easily just made into a passing bit of NPC dialogue and nothing else, but I'm glad they mad the effort to do it with a full quest instead.

Nier Raid:

Chaotic as it was in certain mechanics, I actually really like the raid itself. We didn't get all that much story about the androids and the machines themselves yet, and the factory itself is still somewhat of a mystery. I do have yet to read over the collection archives from the exploration, so those will probably reveal more things. I do expect there's going to be a significant amount more supporting lore come patch 5.3 when the next alliance raid comes out. After all, there's plenty of questions to be answered. There's the mystery of 2P herself, and her exact relation to 2B. Also, what were all those 2B units doing in that one room, and was it 9S that destroyed them? It seems like the Nines we see here is from post-ending-B in Nier Automata, very probably post-ending-C/D/E, or maybe it's just a version from a totally different timeline altogether. I suppose we'll find out soon enough. I also believe we're bound to run into A2 or a proxy of her along the way, though whether we'll have to fight with or against her is anyone's guess. I'd also love for Devola and Popola to make cameos in the future. I would be absolutely surprised if we don't see Emil down the line, granted he's not an android but still. Anyway, I did like that we could explore the raid dungeon after clearing it and really appreciate all the details and such, though I wish we could use mounts in there to make things go a bit more quickly. That's all I've got for now, I think