Do you think after Endwalker there will be time travel?

[Cabalabob]

You need to separate narrative from gameplay imo. Narrative wise do you really think the WoL would be a master of close to 30 different professions/fighting styles? I never have, I suspend my disbelief and chalk it up to 'gameplay'.

Most of our combat knowledge comes from the soul Crystal, we haven’t actually mastered these styles we’re just borrowing the memories of the people who have. The only skills that are our own are the class skills and anything from machinist since we are the one putting our memories into that soul Crystal.

I think where narrative and gameplay get a bit skewed is in enemy “power levels” like we’re supposed to believe that Zenos is stronger than Bahamut? Or that it takes 24 people to beat Acheron but only 4 to beat Zenos?

And the whole fractured soul thing seems very iffy in the first place from both story and gameplay perspectives. Ranjit is only 1/14 of a soul but he’s stronger than all of the scions combined when we rescue minfillia even though anyone from the first should wipe the floor with anyone from a shard. Not to mention we as a fractured being have beaten unsundered beings like lahabrea and that was when we still had the training wheels on.

[Enkidoh]

Most of our combat knowledge comes from the soul Crystal, we haven’t actually mastered these styles we’re just borrowing the memories of the people who have. The only skills that are our own are the class skills and anything from machinist since we are the one putting our memories into that soul Crystal.

Yes and no. The Soul Crystal does act as a skill repository from past practioners of that Discipline that a user can draw skills quickly from, but you're also creating skills yourself as you go along, which are then recorded in the Soul Crystal, via a process similar to attuning to an aetheryte. And MCH and BLU's Soul Crystals you are literally creating everything from scratch then and there, given both Jobs have been made virtually from out of whole cloth unlike other Jobs that are just Disciplines that had been lost, forgotten, were foreign and unknown in Eorzea or made illegal.

MCH is the WoL testing Stephanivien's new theories of aetheromachinestry derived from Garlean magitek that he melded with a few Limsan musketry techniques (from the strictly controlled/forbidden Discipline of Musketeer), while BLU was actually a fake Job (but based on a real one from the New World) peddled by a con artist that we actually made completely functional, much to his relief, given the Limsan authorities were circling.

So the WoL is not just 'drawing on older techniques', they're actually adding new ones they make up themselves, and other NPC practioners of the Jobs are shown doing the same thing, making use of skills and spells we have no access to (and never will). Most of our combat knowledge and skill just comes from plain old determination and a bountiful reserve of personal aether, something the Soul Crystals only enhance and amplify (that the Echo and the Blessing of Light enhance even further).

[Cabalabob]

Yes and no. The Soul Crystal does act as a skill repository from past practioners of that Discipline that a user can draw skills quickly from, but you're also creating skills yourself as you go along, which are then recorded in the Soul Crystal, via a process similar to attuning to an aetheryte. And MCH and BLU's Soul Crystals you are literally creating everything from scratch then and there, given both Jobs have been made virtually from out of whole cloth unlike other Jobs that are just Disciplines that had been lost, forgotten, were foreign and unknown in Eorzea or made illegal.

MCH is the WoL testing Stephanivien's new theories of aetheromachinestry derived from Garlean magitek that he melded with a few Limsan musketry techniques (from the strictly controlled/forbidden Discipline of Musketeer), while BLU was actually a fake Job (but based on a real one from the New World) peddled by a con artist that we actually made completely functional, much to his relief, given the Limsan authorities were circling.

So the WoL is not just 'drawing on older techniques', they're actually adding new ones they make up themselves, and other NPC practioners of the Jobs are shown doing the same thing, making use of skills and spells we have no access to (and never will). Most of our combat knowledge and skill just comes from plain old determination and a bountiful reserve of personal aether, something the Soul Crystals only enhance and amplify (that the Echo and the Blessing of Light enhance even further).

Yes we’re adapting the fighting style but we’re building it on a foundation that we don’t actually know. This becomes abundantly clear if you unequip your soul Crystal. You can see that, for example, as a gladiator all we know is our 1-2-3 combo, total eclipse, fight or flight, shield bash, shield lob, iron will, sentinel and circle of scorn. These are the only skills that we properly know, everything else comes from the soul Crystal and without it you simply can’t do them anymore, even skills that realistically there’s no reason you shouldn’t be able to as a gladiator, like goring blade.

Again this could be taken as the lines between narrative and gameplay becoming skewed since they simply abandoned classes as an idea so they don’t update the base classes anymore. But it does make sense from a lore perspective since as lanadra says, it’s hard to imagine we mastered all these fighting styles, it makes more sense that we’re using the soul crystals to cheat.

It’s also interesting to think that the soul Crystal is actually hurting our growth, since we’re no longer developing our own skills and instead are becoming dependant on this lump of rock. If we were to ever lose it or have it taken from us we’d have nothing. Kind of like what they did with midgarsormr locking away our blessing of light.

[Iscah]

It’s also interesting to think that the soul Crystal is actually hurting our growth, since we’re no longer developing our own skills and instead are becoming dependant on this lump of rock. If we were to ever lose it or have it taken from us we’d have nothing. Kind of like what they did with midgarsormr locking away our blessing of light.

If you chalk it up to gameplay and story segregation though, and assume that we're learning the skills for good really, I can see it working more like the skill system from FF9: skills originate from equipment, so you equip a thing and can suddenly use a new ability, take it off and lose it again - but as you use it, you eventually learn it permanently.

In the case of soul stones, you'd then continue using it to engrave all your new techniques into it as well.

[Lanadra]

Again this could be taken as the lines between narrative and gameplay becoming skewed since they simply abandoned classes as an idea so they don’t update the base classes anymore. But it does make sense from a lore perspective since as lanadra says, it’s hard to imagine we mastered all these fighting styles, it makes more sense that we’re using the soul crystals to cheat.

My point was more that I treat 'the WoL is a star at literally all forms of combat and crafting/gathering' as gameplay while from a narrative point thinking that the WoL most likely mastered three, maybe four of those things in total. Like.. I dunno, Gladiator/Paladin, Machinist, Dragoon and Samurai. That is typically how I think when looking at my WoL from a narrative perspective, exceptional at a few things that share a general skill similarity (like melee) and machinist as an outlier while treating the rest as 'gameplay', making them exceedingly powerful especially with the workaholic attitude the WoL is often believed to have.. yet still within the realm of reason.

Hearkening back to your point about the Soul Crystals though, I don't believe it's as simple as 'we don't learn anything ourselves, we just cheat by using the knowledge of those who held it before us as a crutch'. It's worth remembering that with a lot of the jobs you only even get the Soul Crystal because it resonates with you, because you're 'special'. Perfect example is White Mage, the Padjali siblings make it exceedingly clear how unusual and actually forbidden it is for anyone not Padjali to wield the forbidden White Magics.. yet A-Towa-Cant himself chooses the WoL to inherit his crystal and become a White Mage.. presumably because the WoL has the affinity and drive to learn the arts and put them to good use. So quite clearly a certain skillset and ability to actually learn the arts is a requisite to being able to actually use a Soul Crystal.

It's often been described to us that yes, the knowledge recorded in the Soul Crystal helps us on our way and is likely why we are able to pick things up surprisingly quickly rather than go through the process most of the NPCs would have to.. namely, a long arduous learning path.. like Jannequinard learning Sharlayan Astrology.. but I don't think that we never learn anything ourselves and just 'cheat' as you put it. I won't deny that it does seem clear that any job does seem to always require the Soul Crystal be with you.. and this does not seem to go for just the WoL either. In the Astrologian quest.. the first one, Mace tosses his crystal towards you before he's taken, and his grand daughter despairs at how he now has literally no means with which to defend himself with.