*Spoilers* Anyone feel joining Emet would have been better

[Jandor]

The Echo is not necessarily always viewing whatever someone happens to be thinking about. For instance when Fordola Echoes WoL's past she suddenly sees seemingly all of their adventures, and there are times WoL Echoes certain events that are unrelated to either a person or a location. Considering the Ancient's increased control of the Echo, it wouldn't be surprising if they could sift through memories at will.

I guess we were thinking about all of our adventures then, the whole 'peer at memories they're thinking about' info comes directly from Venat.



I'd be inclined to agree that the memories you get sometimes seem very tangential at best, but neither us nor the Ancients seem to be capable of rummaging around in peoples brains at will.

Moreover, Emet does say that they can outright tell whether or not someone is lying. So while the Echo itself could serve to prove the point, it's also an aside.

To be fair, he's hardly going to go around saying the Convocation actually has no idea if someone is lying.

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Telling the Governing body of your world all about the apocalyptic threat it faces would seem like a pretty good idea, and yet Venat very obviously didn't do that. So either she didn't think she could convince them, even with the echo and the lie detector, or she thought that telling them wouldn't pan out, in which case the echo and the lie detector are irrelevant.

[Rulakir]

The important part of that scene is this sentence: "As memories are etched upon the aether of the soul, so too are they etched upon the aether of the world. In this way can history be preserved."

Anyway, I suspect that 5-minute training session with Venat is going to result in the WoL having better control over their Echo in the future. As for why no one scanned the WoL, I can only assume it wasn't possible for whatever reason. Venat in particular seems like she would've jumped at the chance if it were, not only to learn about the future but to view the WoL's exploits for herself.

[RyuDragnier]

The important part of that scene is this sentence: "As memories are etched upon the aether of the soul, so too are they etched upon the aether of the world. In this way can history be preserved."

Anyway, I suspect that 5-minute training session with Venat is going to result in the WoL having better control over their Echo in the future. As for why no one scanned the WoL, I can only assume it wasn't possible for whatever reason. Venat in particular seems like she would've jumped at the chance if it were, not only to learn about the future but to view the WoL's exploits for herself.

Maybe nobody scanned us due to how thin our aether density is? Hythlodaeus and Emet-Selch could just barely make us out as it were at the beginning of Elpis, peering into our soul would probably be incredibly difficult, even for them.

[MikkoAkure]

Maybe nobody scanned us due to how thin our aether density is? Hythlodaeus and Emet-Selch could just barely make us out as it were at the beginning of Elpis, peering into our soul would probably be incredibly difficult, even for them.

I feel like the more likely option is that the writers either didn't think about it or didn't decide to do it than a specific lore reason.

[Jandor]

Anyway, I suspect that 5-minute training session with Venat is going to result in the WoL having better control over their Echo in the future. As for why no one scanned the WoL, I can only assume it wasn't possible for whatever reason. Venat in particular seems like she would've jumped at the chance if it were, not only to learn about the future but to view the WoL's exploits for herself.

She might not have thought about it. If using the echo to peer into peoples memories only gets you something related to whatever they're thinking about at the moment then, cutscenes in a video game aside, it's not really all that useful.

There is also the possibility that the Ancients consider taking a look into peoples heads like that to be pretty rude, sure they might try and bust out the echo brain scanner (to rather mixed results) during a criminal investigation or the like, but taking a peek at someones memories during a bit of friendly conversation might be considered the very epitome of bad manners, maybe even worse than not killing yourself when you quit your job.

[Veloran]

I guess we were thinking about all of our adventures then, the whole 'peer at memories they're thinking about' info comes directly from Venat.

And as we see, the description she gives is provably untrue. WoL has multiple Echo visions that are not at all related to a subject's recollection - For some early examples there's WoL's Echo flashbacks to some of the Scions during the city-state intros which includes multiple scenes some of which are set years apart. Or the instance which prompts Thancred to introduce you to the Scions, where WoL Echoes to listen in on a conversation that the subject was not involved in or privy to whatsoever. For a much later example, numerous Eureka Echo visions feature scenes that have no connection to either the location WoL is at nor anybody they happen to be around. I hardly wish to scour back through every instance of the Echo throughout the game, but even a few examples disprove the notion that it's always either connected to a location or a memory that's in the process of being recalled.

[Jandor]

And as we see, the description she gives is provably untrue. <snip>

I did accept that some of our previous echo visions seem very tangential to what is going on. There does always seem to be at least some personal or geographical link though.

Honestly, given the vagueness with which it links soul, memory, location and the resultant vision of the past, it would seem to be an even less useful investigative tool for the Ancients than I initially thought.

[Veloran]

There does always seem to be at least some personal or geographical link though.

As noted previously, when doing Eureka you frequently get Echo visions of people that aren't around you who are on entirely different continents for the scenes in question. The only connection at play is a relevancy to the mystery you're investigating.

it would seem to be an even less useful investigative tool for the Ancients than I initially thought.

Clearly not, since Venat easily uses it to target a specific point in time that you were interested in. As opposed to any period throughout history that same location had experienced.

Venat's explanation also doesn't at all cover the extended Echo sequences in 1.0, not to mention Echo visions of the future.

[RyuDragnier]

As noted previously, when doing Eureka you frequently get Echo visions of people that aren't around you who are on entirely different continents for the scenes in question. The only connection at play is a relevancy to the mystery you're investigating.

Which can be explained rather easily. Eureka was tossed into the lifestream in an attempt to kill an Ascian. Meaning its aether is mixed with a lot other aether from the lifestream, aether that wouldn't be there originally, which is what made the place such a mess to begin with.

[Veloran]

Which can be explained rather easily. Eureka was tossed into the lifestream in an attempt to kill an Ascian. Meaning its aether is mixed with a lot other aether from the lifestream, aether that wouldn't be there originally, which is what made the place such a mess to begin with.

You're not in the Lifestream at that time though. And you also get visions of other places that are not themselves within the Lifestream. In fact because the explanation Venat gives is memories imprinted onto aether, and the power of the Lifestream is supposed to dissolve material aether and wash away mortal memories (Unless it's an extreme imprint on the soul itself like the Final Days), it shouldn't be possible to get any Echo visions from Val.