Echo and Blessing of light, post endwalker retcon

[Theozilla]

The big problem I have with the retcon is that it breaks one of two things because of how it completely fails to address the Resonant.

Remember that all three Resonant explicitly used it to protect from tempering; Zenos to throttle down and consume Shinryu's will, Fordola to protect Ala Mhigo from Lakshmi and then later as part of a number of anti-primal expeditions, and Misija specifically to emulate Ysayle when controlling Queen Gunnhildr. Fordola and her Resonance are also actually a very prominent part of the healer role quests, which should have been prime position to do a bit of off-handed explanation, and yet, nothing.

Also remember that you don't just inherently get the Blessing; the WoL themselves got it after besting some voidsent (at least, it was voidsent for an Ul'Dah and Limsa start, I'm not aware if it was voidsent for Gridania too), which wasn't exactly a tough challenge for us, but we also know that it's not necessarily that easy. Remember that we have a sample size of six thanks to the Shadowbringers role quests, we know how all of Ardbert's team got theirs and it wasn't exactly a picnic for any of them.

I think we're owed an explanation rather than just being left to our own speculation, because these two facts together create a problem when we don't have one. This means that one of two things breaks:
A: The Resonance is no longer what it's been reported as by every single in-game source, which then calls everything all three of them have done into question,
or B: All three of the Resonant have the Blessing, which wouldn't be that weird to hear about Fordola, but then raises the question of 'oh god did Hydaelyn give Zenos and Misija the Blessing basically for free'. Everyone else had to work kinda hard for theirs, so how did Zenos The Worst Garlean get it, and how did Misija given there was basically no time between her getting the Resonance and using it on Gunnhildr?

It can be explained/reconciled in that both the Echo/Resonant and the Blessing of Light provide protection from tempering, just in different ways. With the Echo/Resonant providing protection based on how Zenos describes it, being an amplification of an individual's will power and such, while the Blessing of Light is a more comprehensive magicked protection/immunity.


Also you have to remember how 5.2 clarified that every non-Ascian and non-artificial Echo/Resonant user has the Blessing of Light granted to them as soon as they awaken the Echo.

What the WoL and Ardebrt and his companions had to earn was a Crystal of Light which further empowers the Blessing of Light. But individuals can still have the Blessing of Light without having a Crystal of Light (and that would be by default be the most common form of the Blessing of Light).

So yeah the redundancy of the Echo and Blessing of Light's overlapping protections can make things a little wonky, but they aren't unreconcilable.