Revelations from 4gamer

[Anonymoose]

A new interview with Oda-san has dropped!

There's a lot of cool stuff in here, but two strike me as pretty big.

Thordan (50%) Cleared Up!

I was happy to hold a "jury is out, let's just wait on it" bulwark when it came to Thordan and Ward lore, especially considering Oda-san declined to speak about it yet, at the time.

Early Thordan lore stated that he was summoned last using rites perfected on the Heavens' Ward and that the Ward were selected based on skill because Thordan could always temper them if they got out of line. Later lore stated that Thordan was summoned first and the Ward were "blessed" extension of his primal form. It seemed probable the latter was canon, despite Encyclopaedia Eorzea one using the former explanation for the summoning, as once you kill Thordan, the others just die, too. But that should have made the Ward tempered, not just under the threat of it, right?

It turns out, yes! Thordan VII apparently summoned King Thordan himself and tempered them at their first council meeting, deliberately keeping them "rare" temepred instead of "well-done" tempered. (With the threat being now, I guess, to temper them more, lol.)

Now if they'd just tell me whether Thordan had the Echo... Nabriales seemed to suggest (in some languages) the Echo was required to incarnate summon, which we know isn't True today but was it "true" then? If so, it would sure make sense of the time Elidibus gave a random Sahagin the Echo at the same time Nabriales was creating Shiva, allegedly (but knowing history, perhaps not) the first merging of a deiform spirit and a mortal. That makes 2.1 to 2.5 look like a coherent plan coming together in response to the WOL's unexpected victory. And we see Elidibus with Lahabrea behind the throne in one scene. But whether Thordan had the Echo changes his character. Did he temper himself a la Yotsuyu, or was he truly that self-deluded? Inquiring minds want to know!

The Eye Tattoo

During early ARR, we saw the appearance of a second tattoo that resembled the Sharlayan tat but mirrored and with an eye. I speculated at the time that perhaps it was a combination of the Archon mark and the eye for the Echo, symbolizing the merging of Scions of the Seventh Dawn and the Path of the Twelve to make a "Scion brand."

Two weeks later I joked with Koji at E3, "I'm right, right!?" Did I figure it out!? and he made fun of me (in a nice way, I swear) because, no, I was not, the similarity between the symbols was not intentional. I took this to mean the "Archon" and "Scion" brands were coincidentally similar because...idk, maybe they were both designed by Sharlayan-educated people. Or maybe they were both designed by the same dev. team member. But because of that I never updated the article, I just left it as a half-informative/half-theorywork shite-post with a Zodiark joke at the end.

That left the question of why G'raha (and later Moenbryda) had one, but my guess at the time was that, seeing as G'raha was SUPER into labels and symbols, to the degree that he immediately formed a new club to investigate Crystal Tower, maybe he just decided "sure, I, too, am for Eorzea's salvation" and slapped that on IMMEDIATELY after he recognized that was a thing, while Moenbryda was always close with them and later came to pitch in. They were interfering in history with us for the salvation of Eorzea so it didn't feel weird.

But it also left the huge question of: Why didn't Minfilia have one? (In a place we could see, anyway...)

It looks like as of 2021... it's not the Scion brand at all. It's the "formal" version of the Sharlayan Archon logo, and we've been seeing the informal version the entire time. Some people get both tattooed on them, some don't. (Why they do it in different ink, I have no gods-damned idea. Why a library would have the informal version on the wall, I have no gods-damned idea.)

So now I'm spooked. I've mis-heard things before, I've mis-read things before, they've mis-stated things before, things have been retconned before; I have no idea which this is. Arguably it doesn't matter because G'raha's book here seems to set that one in stone. (Thanks, @Arthaena!) So if this isn't a recent retcon and nobody misspoke in 2015, I want own up to that mistake. I don't like accidentally spurring misinformation.

But give that article a read and support our most benevolent lore master, Banri Oda-san!

[Fenral]

You are forgiven.

Thordan:
I distinctly remember Ysayle's gimmick being that she could maintain her own will while summoning Shiva, thanks to the Echo. What we learned about that summoning from Hraesvelgr, though, was that the being she created was simply her own idea of Shiva, and the soul of the woman herself had nothing to do with it. Supposing you were a religious figurehead dictating the interpretation of holy texts, you could preach your interpretations to the people and use them to accumulate "belief" in such a way that the being you ultimately sought to invoke was aligned exactly to your own ideology. The resulting Thordan would thus be Thordan's idealized Thordan who agreed with him 100%. He'd probably still be tempered without the Echo, but to his own will, at worst going from dogmatic prick to hyper-dogmatic prick, which Lahabrea probably didn't mind.

But now that we know that awakening memories of the Final Days is all it takes to become immune to tempering, it's possible Lahabrea had a Final Days snowglobe or something and left it on Thordan's desk, just in case.

[WhiteArchmage]

Hoooo boy...

Do you have any references or anything that inspires you when writing? Do you read up on literature like the Bible, the classics, or myths?

Oda:
Many things influenced me, too many to narrow down. When writing the main story of “Heavensward”, for example, I looked into how the fantasy series “A Song of Ice and Fire” and the simulation RPG “Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together” were created. The former apparently referenced the Wars of the Roses, and the latter drew upon historical ethnic conflicts like the Yugoslav Wars for its themes. The methodology of how these stories were created helped me write “Heavensward”. I also read through the Bible back when I was still in school, and during my university years, I studied philosophy and ideology, which were my interests at the time. I never thought I would be making games, let alone writing scenarios, but I guess you never know what will come in handy!

So, Tactics Ogre: LUCT already got referenced in HW. I remember the first thread I created in here was specifically about the Valerian gear in Neverreap; but I didn't catch specific plot points that would remind me of TO, which was more based around a sucession war but without an actual heir.

until halfway through the 2nd act

That said, the tribal conflicts in Valeria DO kind of follow the Ishgard/Dravania conflicts, but ofc VERY loosely

For added Funny Points: Final Fantasy Tactics is also based on the War of the Roses; I had to step in once in a Geek page because people were mudslinging about who ripped off whom and I had to, like... "they're based on the same historical event, they BOTH ripped off HISTORY"

That said, now I AM further hoping for an eventual third part of the Ivalice storyline, even if Matsuno is (sadly) out of the picture. Because this dev team has proven time and time again that they get his stories and respect him as a writer.

[Anonymoose]

He'd probably still be tempered without the Echo, but to his own will, at worst going from dogmatic prick to hyper-dogmatic prick, which Lahabrea probably didn't mind.

"He'd be the same either way, so no comment." is the expected answer, yes, lol. Though then I'd like to move my question sideways. If Yotsuyu could have done the same, clap on/clap off primal power suit, ... what really killed Louisoix if not being stuffed with primal power until his face cracked open without the aetherial wellspring-deeping effects of the Echo? You know, just to have the metaphysics on paper, lol.

[Vyrerus]

"He'd be the same either way, so no comment." is the expected answer, yes, lol. Though then I'd like to move my question sideways. If Yotsuyu could have done the same, clap on/clap off primal power suit, ... what really killed Louisoix if not being stuffed with primal power until his face cracked open without the aetherial wellspring-deeping effects of the Echo? You know, just to have the metaphysics on paper, lol.

Uhm, we did!

Once he became enthralled to Bahamut and became the Phoenix, he reconstituted as a thrall. When we fight him as Phoenix in Turn 12, he uses up the entirety of the powers of rebirth as Bahamut demands of him, in order to try and kill us. He couldn't draw aether from the surroundings to prolong the conflict or rebirth, because that's all being directed into Bahamut, and as he was a slave to Bahamut, Bahamut is not sharing his smoothie!

This is also the, I wanna say, second time Primals are shown to do a hierarchy thing? Though she was unsuccessful, 2.0 Garuda had the captured Kobolds and Amal'jaa summon Titan and Ifrit, who she then demanded their aether and power from, believing herself superior. She never got the follow through, because Ultima Weapon, but I don't think she would have had that gambit in place if it wasn't something Primals do... enslave/eat other Primals.

I guess it's important to note that though his face was already cracking from the incredible strain placed upon his mortal figure, which hadn't yet given way to a Primal entity(ala cutscene). It was the ferocity inherent in combating Bahamut that cracked his face. Louisoix did not die when he liquified and dispersed. It was then that his mortal will faded with his dying prayers, and he took on the form of Phoenix (Jean Grey is that you?!). This resulted in resurrection. Bahamut snatched him at this moment.

I think that Yotsuyu's Primal form in Tsukuyomi is messier. She became Tsukuyomi through that relic mirror, and the transformation fed on the aether of the crystals Asahi brought, but it also required that she feel suffering in order for her to keep the deiform entity shell in play. We still don't know exactly how Kami Primal summonings really differ from Eorzean and other Primal summonings, and we actually haven't seen a Far Eastern Primal temper somebody. Of the two that we have seen, they had drastically different summonings. Susano was summoned upon completion of a relic set from completely disembodied Kami at the time, whereas Yotsuyu's required the mirror and her entire persona. There's mention of instructing her in a ritual, I think, but from what was shown, she merely raised the mirror and channeled the aether. Her primal form enhanced all of her clothing and her smoking pipe and gun. She went on during the fight to create two chokutos, which she used as both swords and staves to channel and direct her attacks.

[Tensaihime]

But whether Thordan had the Echo changes his character. Did he temper himself a la Yotsuyu, or was he truly that self-deluded?

My money’s on super-self-deluded, and then tempered anyhow, like Fenral said. The absolute ruler of both church and state, who thought he was going to put down some Ascians after he finished using what they showed him to be the one to end 1000 years of holy war.

[RicaRuin]

I kinda feel bad for parading Demi-Bahamut around Paghlt'an. But hey, my hunch of why Summoners can summon Phoenix was correct!

Also, interesting to read that Garlemald only now develops printing presses, with how advanced their military is, the reverse engineered Allagan stuff - and especially after the Benchmark with the modern highway and the cars.

[Anonymoose]

Uhm, we did!

Ahaha, I know the Warrior of Light ultimately broke the cohesion of his essence and forced it onward to the Lifestream but I mean his normal mortal form. We see his physical frame splitting apart with the power in the CG, and in the voiced scene after he explains that he acquired primal-like power but planned to relinquish it and die before he could become warped into a true primal.

How to view this alongside what happened in other cases is just something I find fun, because this is from the era when the writing team was churning out new ways to summon primals faster than the lore team could invent and reveal consistent rules for how they worked from patch content to patch content. Shinryu actually rhymes quite well with Phoenix, but Ilberd died and then his spirit became the catalyst anyway.

Phoenix was revealed in the same patch series as Nabriales seemed to claim (in some languages) that the Echo was necessary to merge man and god successfully, with Shiva being the first known case of the phenomenon as far as Nabrales was concerned. He was proud he figured it out, and angry we "undid his hard work". So Phoenix actually vibed with that at the time. Louisoix didn't have the Echo, so he was destroyed, or so it seemed to say. But they kept on inventing new primals and new rules, and clearly this is no longer true.

Tsukuyomi seemed designed to help clean up a lot of the oddities preceding her by adding a unique context that tests the rules' boundaries. But some questions remain!

[Fenral]

I slept on it, and was trying to come up with a more eloquent response to that question, but all I could come up with was "Tupsi Did It Again." Loui's intent to self-terminate is rather different from the Shiva and Thordan cases, so it's entirely plausible (to me) that if you summon the primal essence of going out in a blaze of glory, that's probably going to be the end result, sooner or later.

[Vyrerus]

Ahaha, I know the Warrior of Light ultimately broke the cohesion of his essence and forced it onward to the Lifestream but I mean his normal mortal form. We see his physical frame splitting apart with the power in the CG, and in the voiced scene after he explains that he acquired primal-like power but planned to relinquish it and die before he could become warped into a true primal.

How to view this alongside what happened in other cases is just something I find fun, because this is from the era when the writing team was churning out new ways to summon primals faster than the lore team could invent and reveal consistent rules for how they worked from patch content to patch content. Shinryu actually rhymes quite well with Phoenix, but Ilberd died and then his spirit became the catalyst anyway.

Phoenix was revealed in the same patch series as Nabriales seemed to claim (in some languages) that the Echo was necessary to merge man and god successfully, with Shiva being the first known case of the phenomenon as far as Nabrales was concerned. He was proud he figured it out, and angry we "undid his hard work". So Phoenix actually vibed with that at the time. Louisoix didn't have the Echo, so he was destroyed, or so it seemed to say. But they kept on inventing new primals and new rules, and clearly this is no longer true.

Tsukuyomi seemed designed to help clean up a lot of the oddities preceding her by adding a unique context that tests the rules' boundaries. But some questions remain!

Boy howdy, they sure were churning primals out fast.

The one I like to think about, and also have to remind myself exists, is Enkidu.

Like, the chicken wasn't mantling it, right? lmao

But either way, Gilgamesh makes his primal, the primal doesn't enslave him, and shares its aether with him! Granted, it was far smaller summoning born off of one person's will to see his friend again... but like damn, check out the implications on that!

Personally, I think Nabriales and his dialogue are getting more and more marred all the time. The price of having mutton chops, I guess! Of course, he was just another Sundered minion, and perhaps he was a recent acquisition and hadn't been given proper training, getting all his knowledge about how things work OTJ.

As far as Tsukuyomi goes... I want an instanced battle against Lunar Tsukuyomi so we can have that ole Moon Moon meme shoved in our faces (again?).