The questions I want EW to answer the most: WHY and HOW was the world sundered?

[Vyrerus]

As long as we are talking wild and crazy, some thoughts:

Wild Theory #1: Venat replaced Elidabus; Hydaeyln IS Zodiark, or rather a “reformatted” version.

It took a LOT of aether to create Zodiark and supposedly a smaller amount to create Hydaelyn…
Lahabrea rants that Hydaelyn is a parasite that needs to be removed.
(“Know you the root of this corruption? Hydaelyn! Like a parasite, she must be burned out if the planet is to recover. And naught but the return of the one true god will ensure complete excision.”)
Elidabus was removed from Zodiark, no longer acting as it’s heart.

Wild Theory #2: The Elidabus we killed was not actually Elidabus. Furthermore, I believe the Ancients can’t bring people back was their original intention.
In the same way the Bahamut Primal and Shiva Primal are not actually Bahamut or Shiva, Elidabus as we know him is just a summoned primal; a shade based on what the convocation believed “Elidabus” to be.
I believe anyone they would have brought back would have simply been an idealized shade-version, and not actually the people lost.

But yeaaah that’s just a wild theory. And I’ve been in my cups tonight…

I'm at work, and the post is several hours old, but... *clinks coffee cup to your booze cup* Próst!

I like both of these ideas, as they've flitted through my head as well. Honestly I think my brain is just spun up with excitement that just starts pouring out this sort of stuff because it wants Endwalkies now. Plus, I like guessing at what comes next.

[Iscah]

I shouldn't need to tell you the reputation of JRPGs and killing the seemingly benevolent god at the end.

This is exactly why I don't want Hydaelyn to turn out evil. We've done that plot over and over.

It's far more interesting to do something else with the idea for once.

she forcibly sundered the entire world against the will of the majority of the Ancients. In particular with that last one, it shows a willingness to disregard people's lives for the sake of her mission.

We have no information about her intentions at this point. It could be deliberate or it could be a horrendous accident that happened when she was trying to sunder Zodiark alone but he was too intertwined with the world itself.

lShe compelled Ardbert to stay his blade when he attempted to attack Minfilia. If you would say that wasn't due to tempering, I would say her power to do that would be extremely inconsistent with her stated status of being too weak to lift a finger towards anything.

If we were out in the physical world in that scene and Minfilia was still just a human, then her inability to stop an axe with her bare hands would not be in question.

But at that point, there are other factors in play. We are in the aetherial sea and Minfilia is channeling the power of a powerful aetherial being. And from memory she halts the axe mid-swing – acting on the object directly rather than the mind of the wielder.

5.3+?: Zenos wants to play Planetary Rock'em Sock'em Robots, and he's called dibs on the purple one. (I seriously hope they don't do this.)

This made me laugh out loud.

[Cleretic]

This is exactly why I don't want Hydaelyn to turn out evil. We've done that plot over and over.

It's far more interesting to do something else with the idea for once.

Yeah, at this point I think the only games I can think of that don't eventually lead to you fighting the goodboy light-god are, like... Legend of Zelda games. Maybe some Fire Emblems.

C'mon, contend with Nintendo, let's keep Hydaelyn unambigously good instead of collapsing into cliche.

[Mansion]

Yeah, at this point I think the only games I can think of that don't eventually lead to you fighting the goodboy light-god are, like... Legend of Zelda games. Maybe some Fire Emblems.

C'mon, contend with Nintendo, let's keep Hydaelyn unambigously good instead of collapsing into cliche.

I think what most games have tackled is that "unambiguously good" is impossible. Because "good" isn't the same for everyone. And these Gods have always been favouring what they thought was right, in detriment of the rest.
In FFXIV's case, we already have a bad boy like that, it's Thordan. He was an embodiment of "the good" for most people in Ishgard. And he thought we were the evil one for stopping him.

Hydealyn's case would be similar. The good for humans... right, but tall humans don't have the same aspirations (Garlemald vs Eorzea vs the New World maybe). And is it the same definition for beast-men? I also think she is benevolent in essence, but I wouldn't be surprised if she had to make choices or actions that would be unfair to some people, and that us WoL would question at some point.
That's why the concept of one/greater god in RPGs is always ambivalent I believe.

But there's a lot for Endwalker to cover so I won't think too deep about it. Tempered or not, it doesn't matter so much in the end in my opinion

[Cleretic]

I think what most games have tackled is that "unambiguously good" is impossible. Because "good" isn't the same for everyone. And these Gods have always been favouring what they thought was right, in detriment of the rest.

This is getting into more of a theological discussion, but I do think it's kinda sad if you can't fathom even an entirely fictional concept of a caring god. Of course, just because a god cares, doesn't mean they can save us.

This is something that's come up around Judeo-Christian theoology, so I'll borrow a bit from their angle. In the real world, it's generally agreed that if an ultimately good and caring god exists, they cannot be all of 'omnipotent', 'omniscient' and 'omnipresent', because we live in a world where bad things happen. So either said god doesn't have the power to stop those bad things (ergo not omnipotent), doesn't know how to (ergo not omniscient), or doesn't know it's going on (ergo not omnipresent), or possibly some combination of these things. I've also found this is an approach that holds true for understanding extremely strong heroic characters, too, and where they may fail; for example, Superman is effectively omnipotent on the scale of 'stopping Metropolis crime', but can't be everywhere at once and may not know how to solve every problem with his skillset; The Flash can be anywhere he needs to be, but might not know what to do or have the capacity to win when he gets there; Batman knows anything that's ever relevant, but is not necessarily capable of getting to the problem or solving it himself.

So... let's look to Hydaelyn. Fundamentally a caring god on the scale the story is focused on (sure, she hates the Ascians right now, but so should/do we, they're trying to blow up our home and don't really care about who that hurts), so why are we in such strife, which of the omni-s is she not? Well, we can safely say she's omnipresent; she's always aware of the situation. But omnipotent, definitely not; we know for a fact she's actually fairly weak on the grand scale. And omniscient, I'd argue not; while we've never really seen limits to her intelligence, we've also never really pushed it, but she's never exactly concocted intricate plans.

Hydaelyn can be a caring and loving god; there is nothing saying that she is not. But just because she cares, doesn't mean she's always capable of acting on that.

Also, I don't think all those other games came at it from a deep theological perspective, so much as a purely practical and cathartic one: in a medium we largely interact with through violence, any big fancy figure you introduce will inevitably be followed by someone wanting to punch that figure out. So most of them go 'sure, why not' and cue you up to go fight any god they introduce, because a lot of people struggle to settle for less than that. Which I think is ultimately what's at the heart of any 'Hydaelyn is secretly bad' theory; the developers introduced a big giant god, so inevitably people want to LB3 that thing in the face.

(Personally, I don't see the blue rock being an interesting boss fight, so I'll pass. But I'm also a healer main, so I don't exactly get to do the cathartic violence.)

[Veloran]

I don't feel like "cliché" is the right word when it's just a thing established at the start of the story that holds true at the end.

And how many instances are there of "the being we thought was our mother-goddess is actually an artificial construct we may need to destroy – but actually she's still good and does genuinely care about us and want the world to be in a good state"?

Has that happened enough to become cliché?

If you specify something enough, nothing is cliché. I'm not saying she'll do a heel turn to become some cackling evil monster, I'm saying her priorities and ours are obviously prepared to diverge and set us in direct opposition to her, for all the reasons I've previously outlined.

This is getting into more of a theological discussion, but I do think it's kinda sad if you can't fathom even an entirely fictional concept of a caring god. Of course, just because a god cares, doesn't mean they can save us.

Hydaelyn isn't a god. She's a Primal construct invented by fallible "human" beings and by them given her directives and ideals, flawed or biased as they may be. What Venat wants may not be what WoL wants, as was the case 12,000 years ago when this exact same conflict played out and Azem chose not to side with her.

Remember, whatever they're trying to pull here has to top the climax of Shadowbringers. Part of what made the fight against Emet/Hades effective was that it was so deeply personal. You were fighting against an old friend.

I think it's clear any conflict with Hydaelyn would be a personal one. You can tell that just based on this discussion and how people are taken to viewing her.

[Iscah]

I'm saying her priorities and ours are obviously prepared to diverge and set us in direct opposition to her, for all the reasons I've previously outlined.

I'm not seeing the "obviously prepared to diverge" part. We haven't heard from her (at least in real time) in years at this point.

Azem chose not to side with her.

Azem also, even more firmly, refused to side with Zodiark either. Not joining Hydaelyn's faction seems less significant than actively walking out on the Convocation when they planned to summon Zodiark.

Azem simply does not have a clear side in this fight. Maybe they actively opposed both. Maybe they had a third, better option. We don't know yet, but we don't know that they were in conflict with Hydaelyn (or Zodiark) either.

[Lyth]

...

Hydaelyn would be an absurdly poor choice for a final villain. It would be even worse than Necron or Zeromus showing up out of the blue as the embodiment of true evil. If I was the scenario writer for Endwalker, I would be genuinely embarrassed if the biggest climax from ARR to present ends up having less emotional impact than Shadowbringers. Not to say that this isn't possible or even likely, but it seems like a really inferior story concept.

The main villain is probably going to be another Amaurotian who sowed the seeds of discord and broke up the band. One who genuinely hates Azem to the bottom of their soul and their 'cheerfully refreshing' grape-loving free-thinking tendencies. One who can't stand the fact that the likes of Emet and Elidy were willing to let them get away with perpetually bending the rules. That way, when you complete your last rejoining in full, pull out your Ascian mask, announce your true name and the fact that you're out of bubblegum, it'll actually mean something. And then, when they're at your mercy, then you'll hunt the dark god that broke them, be it Jenova or Lavos or whatever.

[Mansion]

This is getting into more of a theological discussion, but I do think it's kinda sad if you can't fathom even an entirely fictional concept of a caring god. Of course, just because a god cares, doesn't mean they can save us.

That's not about me being unable to imagine this concept, that's more about everything that won't let it easily apply. Because the concept of god-entities in intrically linked within the people, and that's unstable ground enough to make pretty much any notion ambivalent.
I'm not saying you are wrong to think your way, and I wouldn't care that much if your theory appeared to be true. I was just jumping in about the tradition of (J)RPGs that have "studied" a similar question for 30 to 40 years now. And I do personally think a "flawed" god is much more interesting in a writing point of view, but that doesn't mean we have to end them (with the power of friendship) .
For me the main flaw of Hydealyn is how little she has let us known about the big scope of things, so much that we had to get most of the info from the baddies (which then questions the reliability of this info). Or her being so inefficient to fight the Ascians / rejoinings. Or that we have endless arguments on the forums to discuss the possibility of the WoL being tempered or not, about the Blessing of Light and so on. But all of this could be explained in Endwalker so I don't mind so much. I do think the writers think ahead, but not so much that any detail is already set in stone in their minds so that everything makes sense from the beginning, that's a storyline that has being going on for 10+ years now.

Now for my personal theory: I think the chunk of the Endwalker build up will be defeating a Zodiark infused Zenos, Fandaniel, and the origin of the Final Days. I believe Hydealyn would have had enough opportunities to show her dark side by the time we got here, so for me she is a benevolent god in principle. And I guess that if we defeat all that Ascian-Zodiark opposition, her existence will have reached its purpose and she will kind of retreat. I also think the Hydealyn becomes corrupted by whatever and we have to smack her back to her senses is a possible plot.

[Veloran]

There's also something to remember about the whole situation from Azem's presumed angle: since their last known presence, the Convocation have shifted into becoming planet-destroying genocidal monsters on an unfathomable scale, while Hydaelyn's been spending all that time trying to get them to knock it off. I think it's folly to assume that Azem wouldn't be realigning their expectations over the years, and if they had a say I think it's perfectly reasonable for them to look at Hydaelyn and go 'you know what, I didn't much like you, but the other guys went crazy, we need to get them to stop before anything else'.

For all intents and purposes, the Ascians are already done for. Sure there are still a few sundered hangers-on, but basically the "before anything else" has already come and gone. Additionally, Hydaelyn herself is a Primal that destroyed the planet, so...

This is exactly why I don't want Hydaelyn to turn out evil. We've done that plot over and over.

It's far more interesting to do something else with the idea for once.

Even if we want to say that "the JRPG party must destroy the god that was seemingly on their side throughout the story" has turned into a cliché, the opposite is also still a cliché.

We have no information about her intentions at this point. It could be deliberate or it could be a horrendous accident that happened when she was trying to sunder Zodiark alone but he was too intertwined with the world itself.

She was formatted with the ability to sunder things in that extremely specific way, not to mention the ability to set up a dimensional barrier between the worlds preventing them from rejoining. I don't believe for a moment that it was simply an accident, it was by design and the original sundered world was the state of being Venat planned for.

Yeah, at this point I think the only games I can think of that don't eventually lead to you fighting the goodboy light-god are, like... Legend of Zelda games. Maybe some Fire Emblems.

C'mon, contend with Nintendo, let's keep Hydaelyn unambigously good instead of collapsing into cliche.

As I said, Hydaelyn staying in that position is already a cliché of it's own. And frankly, one which doesn't address all the issues with her that have been building in the story for years. At this point going the route of "she was just misunderstood and actually is unambiguously good and helps you out to the very end" would simply be subverting a subversion for the sake of being meta-subversive. It simply reverts us to the state of play we had way back in 2.0. Again, I fail to see what this would actually add to the narrative, not to mention the story of Endwalker specifically.

Are we really supposed to believe that Endwalker will just be Stormblood 2.0 with few, if any, twists and moral dilemmas along the way? We just go to the moon to kill Zodiark, and chase down Zenos and Fandanny before killing the former with Hydaelyn's blessing? That at the end of the Hydaelyn/Zodiark saga that's spanned five expansions we just end up viewing both of them practically the same way we did at the end of ARR?