Tales From the Shadows Updated (SPOILERS ABOUND)

[Alleluia]

3.
Early on the exarch forbade anyone spending the night in the tower because it could vanish. Now elibus and emet were defeated and the exarch was turned into a crystal but the scion did not go back to eorzea nor did the tower and why is that?? The only logically conclusion one can derive is the future has not changed and i am certain all will be made aware of it in probably 5.4 or 5.5 not entirely sure. I suppose there could be multiple timelines but I'd rather not think about the 8th umbral era timeline cause it is depressing even with middy awakening . There is no going back to 7th astral era state in that timeline.

The logical conclusion is that the future that led to that tower ending up in Norvrandt didn't change, yes. And that's right, it didn't. It still exists. But we're not on that pathway anymore. Our future has diverted to another path.

An example:
You're floating down a river. You turn around and throw a shrapnel bomb really far behind you. It explodes and creates a new channel in the river, the bomb's fragments floating down this new channel you made. The bomb is still from your boat and you still threw it, so the shrapnel bomb does not disappear. But what's left of it is now physically present and persistent in the new channel of water that was created. Water continues to flow down both river channels.

The Tower is the bomb.


As for the 8th umbral timeline being depressing... I mean, yes. However, I think they have some hope. I mean, yeah you have Midgardsomr, but also, Black Rose likely didn't effect the world beyond the three great continents. Calamities are always localized and strongest in Eorzea (prolly b/c the veil btwn worlds is thinnest there or something). Its why the water calamity didn't drown the world, for example. So, Black Rose was really bad and we know it was released in Ala Mhigo, effecting both Aldenard and Othard. We can assume it probably effected parts of Ilsabrd, too, since that connects Othard with Aldenard. Probably also effected the surrounding seas cus there's aether in the water, too.

But its effects had to dilute at some point, or else there'd have been no living on the continents at all for the prior 200 years. And I doubt it crossed the oceans and hit either the new world or the southern continent very hard, if at all. So, there's hope that they can live in those new lands, or possibly figure out a way to start seeding the aether back in from the fringes and rebuild.

[Yuella]

Let's start shall we


5
I give the the zenos factor. It is said that zenos destroyed all of black rose because he does not want anything to get in the way of his hunt( also probably why he killed varis). The thing is it safe to assume that he would have also destroyed black rose in the future timeline as well which kinda leaves me to believe black rose may not be responsible for the 8th umbral calamity either so either the exarch lied or se created a plothole.

Maybe Zenos didn't know about Black Rose in the original timeline

[Vyrerus]

In the original timeline since we never get body snatched we kill Zenos's body at Ghimlyt Dark when we fight Elidibus within it, rather than passing out and getting saved by Estinien. That's likely what removes all doubt about the deployment of Black Rose. Would be cool to get a Tales from the Shadows about that.

[Rannie]

@ Grimr They were already starting to USE black rose (even if it was in testing but they were wiping out settlements quickly with it) at the end of stormblood even before we fought Elidibus as Zenos and how would G'raha Tia be lying when it was confirmed by Omega as OMG in A World Forsake

The Garleans have deployed a powerful new weapon on the Eorzean front. We tried to contact our comrades at Rhalgr’s Reach, but received no reply.”

Despite lacking several essential details, the message was entirely accurate. The reason the sender had been unable to communicate with said comrades was simple: they had been annihilated by Black Rose, a poisonous gas developed by the Garleans. This ingenious weapon halts the flow of aether within organic beings, causing near immediate cessation of respiratory functions. Being highly potent and capable of rapid dispersal across a wide area, the majority of settlements in nearby Ala Mhigo were almost entirely depopulated in the aftermath. Contemporary reports state that the damage extended far beyond Alliance-held regions such as the Black Shroud and Thanalan to several imperial territories, resulting in significant loss of life.

https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes.../sidestory_03/

Btw Vyrerus that tales does kinda go into it and beyond but not exactly

[Vyrerus]

They were already starting to USE black rose (even if it was in testing but they were wiping out settlements quickly with it) at the end of stormblood even before we fought Elidibus as Zenos and how would G'raha Tia be lying when it was confirmed by Omega as OMG in A World Forsake



https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes.../sidestory_03/

No, that takes place after, because we still had Gaius running around with Alphinaud destroying Black Rose production facilities. Not sure why you mention G'raha Tia. I don't really hang on his lines, and I'm yet to get back to Shadowbringers on my current replay.

I can't profess to know exactly how things went differently with all of the Scions still in play, but the things that still hold true are that Varis and Emet-selch were directly overseeing the final production facility and speeding up production. We can assume Gaius/Alphinaud didn't get that far, but even with that production sped up, it didn't get deployed by the time we fought Elidizenos.

But honestly, the happenings between Thancred getting soul snatched and Black Rose being deployed are one big ? cause things had to have progressed far differently with the Scions still in play.

[Rannie]

Sorry didn't quote who I was saying all that first part towards that too which was addressed Grimr. I apologize for that... got a bit lazy since I'm on my cell phone and copying, cutting and pasting is annoying.

Basically yeah that happened after but Grimr was saying that it was probably a plot hole and Black Rose didn't cause the 8th Umbral Calamity. Which it did due to the tales from the shadow I linked. I just bseem to bloody well suck at explaining things at times. I only mentioned your name Vyrerus due to saying it would be neat for a tales about what happened so I was just saying to you that that one did... kinda but most likely not in the exact depth of detail you were wanting.

They were still starting to use it however its how Gaius and Alphinaud knew it was back in production. Remember that camping ground/ settlement those two came to with the dead people in it? Also Gaius mentioned for every plant they would destroy several more would crop up.

The things that would have most likely played out different than what we the players witness would have been Thancred going to Garlemald to discredit Elidibus in Zeno's body, Urianger and Y'shtola would most likely have been trying to study the cause of the issue with the Aether that they were noticing, Alphinaud would have still been with Gaius and running around with him failing to destroy black rose places and Alisaie would be still with us helping fight the empire

Ill fix that part of my post ^_^

[Vyrerus]

I wanna know the specifics soooo bad haha

[Rannie]

Alas we will never know now... just like we will never know exactly how many licks it takes to get to the tootsie roll center of a tootsie roll pop... i don't trust Mr Owl nor any machines for that answer

[SannaR]

Going back to the Elidibus story and what we learned from how our past self was like makes me think that the only real response to Runar and friends is the um... kupo? One as the most Azem type answer and makes Emet's response even funnier. I've been watching someone go through 5.0 for the 1st time so everything with Emet and how he behaves specially with what we now know has made him even more of a delight than he already was.

My understanding of the original timeline aka the bad timeline is that somehow we win and beat Elidibus for good assumingly. Meaning the only Ascians left would have been Emet and Fandanial as it seems he got raised at some point before Zenos killed Varis. We then push Gramald back to its door when boom they unleash a light boosted black rose. Emet having done his job goes back to sleep or not as I doubt he'd allow someone that crazy to run around all willy nilly like that unsupervised. Specially with how he felt about Lahabreaha behaving as he did. We and the scions bite it and the rest we know partly how it played out.

I do think the Southern continent and the New World would have been spared as it seemed it only effected the continent Eorzea is apart of. I don't think Emet would have started working on another that is if it didn't allow for Zodiark to break from his prison as they made it seem like they'd only need an 8th calamity to cause that to happen. At least not so soon after this last one.

[Alleo]

I am not sure that we can assume that we somehow beat Elidibus. Killing the person they are using at the moment does not kill the Ascians. We would have needed white auricite and a huge light source to kill him after that and even though it might be possible since the scions were not taken at that time (since that only happens because of the time changes) I really doubt it.

I guess we simply beat Zenos thus the alliance is not at a stalemate and tries to fight back. This started the use of black rose and had us dieing. I doubt that they would have waited until we got to Garlemalds doors, especially since the plan of the alliance was to defend themselves not to conquer.

We do not know how far it spread but I have a hard time believing that it only was around Eorzea. If that was the only continent suffering then people could have just moved to other lands. The short story and the parts we got ingame suggest to me that it spread quite a bit otherwise why would it still be so hard living on this world 200 years after? If only Eorzea was affected people could have moved on. But I guess it will be open to speculation.