On Venat's Role in the Story

[vormela]

Did we figure out what that blueprint we retrieved for her was for?


VENAT:
My apologies, but before we move along, a colleague has tasked me with a matter which I'd rather not leave unresolved.
It involves finding a certain concept-engraved crystal...and the quick-fingered oreias which made off with it.
...
Agreeing to help locate that missing crystal was a minor distraction...which now promises to become a major revelation! How strange and wonderful it is the way one thing leads to another. Wouldn't you agree?
...
Thank you again for your timely help. Now then, 'tis time I returned this stolen property.
If you would go on ahead to my accommodation, I will join you as soon as I have attended to that task.

[QT_Melon]

I would actually say Venat's decision in this timeline worked out in the end and our main story. Though given the other timeline that's hanging about - leaves questions as to it being the only possible solution if that. Due to allowing another branching timeline - this whole topic is now the conundrum.

[Veloran]

I often take extended breaks from the forum, is there some reason a bunch of posts in this thread appear to have been deleted?

[Vyrerus]

I often take extended breaks from the forum, is there some reason a bunch of posts in this thread appear to have been deleted?

I think some sort of fight happened? I think someone got a 10 day ban or something? Not sure, wasn't online or here when it happened.

[HappyHubris]

Not much to add here except to say that Big H is characterized as a benevolent saint but comes across as having no regard for life with any thought:
-By sundering in excess (Zodiark is imprisoned after 7 rejoinings, after all), she created endless death in frail beings by age, illness, war, murder, etc.
-She's ready to let the sundered shards succumb to the end days while only saving a few arks of lives from Source. That's a LOT more death than allowing ancient created critters to be sacrificed to Zodiark.
-She refuses to tell her civilization about the coming End Days, despite them being best able to stop Meteion with notice. Instead she sends the entire world into great fear and suffering due to meeting a weak being from the future who was pretty cool.
-She refuses to tell her Oracle or WoL about how ether thinning would lead to the end times or work with her rabbits on countermeasures.

She would be far more sympathetic if she was reacting and stumbling through events after a mind wipe instead of making deliberate choices.

[Rulakir]

I just wanted to add, regarding Venat acknowledging her actions, that the game doesn't treat her as a monster. The player is not given any dialog choices towards her that are negative, the NPCs justify her actions, and the cutscenes are emotional in a positive way. She comments in Anyder about "suffering the eternal condemnation of our brethren", but the sundering wiped everyone's memories. Aside from the unsundered, there wasn't anyone who knew or cared about what she did and even Emet forgives her in his own way. There is no one who hates her and by the end of it none who considers her choices to even be questionable.

Edit: Point being, the narrative at no point supports what she did as even being morally grey. Venat/Hydaelyn is overwhelmingly presented as being right and good.

[tokinokanatae]

I feel as though, personally, almost all of my issues could have been resolved pretty easily: have the Sundering be acknowledged as a mistake (borne of passion, borne of anger, borne of sorrow, any one of the three is fine) and have Hydaelyn apologize for doing it. Not an “I made the best decision at the time, sorry if that hurt you but I HAD to do it” but a full on taking responsibility for her actions apology.

The issue isn’t so much what she did, but why she did it and how the narrative reacts to it.

[Lyth]

...

That's quite an interesting observation. It's worth mentioning as well that the concept crystal that we retrieve for her is the same color as another mysterious crystal that we've only just recently encountered. Chekhov's crystal if you will. I wouldn't be surprised if this time loop is more elaborate than we presently realize.

[pinkbubblegum]

Yeah... I agree with a lot of your points OP... The biggest shock to me while playing through MSQ was finding out that Venat never had her memories wiped, and chose to keep the cause and potential outcome of The Final Days a secret (shared only with those select Hydaelyn-faction Ancients she thought worthy iirc ;;; ) The justification used was she couldn't consult The Fourteen about this because that would mean telling Hermes the truth, making him a risk-- but to keep both Hades and Hythlodaeus also in the dark, the two characters who accepted our time travel story with no problems, was something that made this feel as though Venat chose to unnecessarily burden herself with this choice;; (But this is also, I think, a problem born from Emet and by extension, Hythlodaeus being fan favorites thanks to ShB writing, so they ended up getting such big roles in EW's Elpis bit)

In the end Venat, who the MSQ wanted to paint as someone who believed nothing was impossible, chose to believe that her people could not survive the great filter due to them being too weak of will, and so the sundering had to happen. And when Hades, at the end of MSQ even says that he doesn't believe the Ancients could have gotten this far as they were, it felt like the true "If god says it can't be so, then I guess that's how it is..." moment for me

To the credit of the game though, there are points that touch on Venat's choices leading to immense suffering, which I appreciate. The Elpis culmination cutscene with the sundering and her seeing all the people suffering of poverty, disease, etc from her choice and this knowledge burdening her, with WoL being her tether to keep moving forward. During the cutscene after the trial portion of the game she also says this to Y'shtola when Y'shtola is doing her exposition

Hydaelyn: It is as thou sayest. 'Twas the trial to which I subjected mankind, and it hath led to untold bloodshed and suffering. There was no kindness nor justice in the tragedy I wrought.

Y'shtola (who is honestly my favorite Scion because only she ever calls out these things) also says something to the effect of "Far be it from me to dispute Hydaelyn's own words (about her actions causing untold suffering, as I understood it) but let us instead view it as proof of her belief in humanity's potential" when talking to her after the trial.

Still, I do feel that there is a very big dissonance with what the game wants us to feel about Hydaelyn and the magnitude of death her choice introduced. I personally... attribute the 7? 8? dead planets to her even if she didn't directly have a hand in it. In hindsight, the Ascians plan for their rejoining would not have had to happen without the shards.

If Hydaelyn was never summoned, and the Ancients got to keep their planet coated in Zodiark's aether ozone, the sacrificed total given the resurrections would've been 1/2 of creation (and given that these god beings can just remake them since... I feel there is very little difference between creation magic and whatever is happening with the Aetherial Sea's recycling of souls and aether) it feels far less of a loss vs the death of the rejoined planets.
But again, it really boils down to justification for the sundering, because it's what allows the Source and all the shards to exist.

[Cleretic]

I just wanted to add, regarding Venat acknowledging her actions, that the game doesn't treat her as a monster. The player is not given any dialog choices towards her that are negative, the NPCs justify her actions, and the cutscenes are emotional in a positive way. She comments in Anyder about "suffering the eternal condemnation of our brethren", but the sundering wiped everyone's memories. Aside from the unsundered, there wasn't anyone who knew or cared about what she did and even Emet forgives her in his own way. There is no one who hates her and by the end of it none who considers her choices to even be questionable.

Edit: Point being, the narrative at no point supports what she did as even being morally grey. Venat/Hydaelyn is overwhelmingly presented as being right and good.

As I've mentioned before at some point (I forget if it was in this thread or not), while her act was morally questionable, it's so long ago that litigating the issue is more of an academic one that holds no literal weight than one with any form of justice attached. We live in the world she made, and we cannot undo that; beyond anything else, we have to live with that.

You also have to remember that the sides of this debate were equally presented, just not simultaneously. Shadowbringers put forward all the evidence there is for why what she did was wrong (which you probably know, because you've been using those arguments); Endwalker, in response, put forward all the evidence for why she was right. Similarly, there actually were lines we could have given to speak against her; they were just placed before Endwalker made its case, in Shadowbringers, its patches, and very early Endwalker.

The characters who are still alive took the positions they did, but remember that Emet-Selch and Elidibus were willing to die in argument against it. There was an opposing side, and even when he was briefly revived with full knowledge of the situation, Emet-Selch never morally capitulated; he admitted her plan worked, he never admitted she was in the right to do it.

I feel as though, personally, almost all of my issues could have been resolved pretty easily: have the Sundering be acknowledged as a mistake (borne of passion, borne of anger, borne of sorrow, any one of the three is fine) and have Hydaelyn apologize for doing it. Not an “I made the best decision at the time, sorry if that hurt you but I HAD to do it” but a full on taking responsibility for her actions apology.

The issue isn’t so much what she did, but why she did it and how the narrative reacts to it.

And see, here you're making a bit of a slip-up; again, whether she was morally right to do so or not is left as an open question (although again, more an academic one than one that can be acted on). So what you're asking for won't happen, because Venat always believed, even if what she did was reprehensible, that it was for the best. It's rather important that she doesn't think she made a mistake, she just wishes it didn't come to that. She wishes she didn't have to cause us such suffering, but she doesn't think she was ultimately wrong to.

Just like how Emet-Selch will not admit she had a moral victory, Venat will not admit she had a moral failure. It's complicated, and you're not going to get an on-high answer for which side is correct. And that's okay; it is not a failing of the story that it left a question unanswered.

EDIT: I will admit, at times it was laid on a tad thick that she had altruistic reasons for what she did. But I don't think that's a mistake so much as an unfortunate requirement of where the story was. It's real damn hard to give a good reason for 'I smashed the planet and took the powers of godhood from man', and yet that's the challenge they took up. That means making your argument as loudly and clearly as possible, and knowing that anything less will cause it to falter.