When are we supposed to stop fighting?

[KizuyaKatogami]

snip

Fordola killed Conrad though no?Gaius helped with the waking sands infiltration or at least knew of it. They are both still being redeemed. I understand completely what you're saying, but then this gets into the whole aspect of them changing things and rewriting things. If we go based off of what they said previously about Zenos, they said flat out, he is the ultimate evil. Thus, it would not be out of place for him to either severely injure or kill someone close to us to make us angry to fight him. I mean, am i the only one who remembers all that foreshadowing at the final patch of ShB? Where he quite literally says something along the lines of "You will come to me full of rage..." But he never did anything to actually warrant this. It also makes specific scenes lackluster, like yes, the infamous body snatch scene. Nothing came from that apart from seeing the world through the eyes of a garlean, but the overall threat was completely diminished. It screams so much like last minute changes especially if we go back to zenos' line of him wanting us to be angry at him. At this point the game is no different than a slice of life anime that has 0 consequences or stakes for the main heroes, only nameless npc's or antagonists.

But i guess to tie this back into what i was saying before, i dont see how letting the antagonists for once, get their own sort of "win" and be able to be happy in some other timeline we help create would be any worse than the constant plot armor, plot holes, and writing changes they make to keep the protagonists alive.

[Veloran]

What makes Pelennor different is the fact that, from the point that Aragorn recruits the ghosts prior to the battle, the protagonists have a bigger army and the conflict is non-existant. The problem posed is: 'How do we win against a bigger army?' and the solution is 'We actually had a bigger army all along.' The ghosts are free to show up at any point, because there's no constraint attached, and so there is no real conflict. What makes Helm's Deep different is that the critical condition set up before the fight is 'If you hold out for five days, you will win.' The tension comes from whether or not they can hold out for long enough.

You've turned the argument now. Again,

The example that Sanderson gives in the lecture that Valorian linked contrasts Helm's Deep and Pelennor Fields in the Lord of the Rings as a means of illustrating the principle. The same solution is used to resolve both of them (army shows up, we win). The difference is that Helm's Deep has a victory condition placed upfront (survive for five days). This, he argues, is the reason why the former feels satisfying, while the latter feels like Deus Ex Machina.

The arrival of reinforcements at Pelennor was also set up. In the film it's basically the entire C plot. Something being set up does not, in and of itself, make for a satisfying and resonant narrative point.

Before you were arguing that with the Sanderson conception, the set up of the crystal justifies the ending being satisfying, just as the non-set up of reinforcements to Pelennor is what makes the payoff there unsatisfying. However you are now effectively agreeing with me, and are saying that it isn't the presence of a setup alone that makes the payoff good, as the reinforcements were set up in RoTK. It's the particulars of the themes, conflict, and execution that makes for a satisfying ending, setup is one element to this mix.

I think that a main part of the story of Endwalker was to show Hermes and Meteion that their perspectives were flawed. That's why, even Amon at the end of his journey has his doubts, and why you have the option of offering both him and Meteion respectively the opportunity to find an answer together in the future. You're not going to do that if they just killed your friend. Killing off a Scion makes the plot darker and edgier, but it comes at a cost.

Meteion and Hermes killed trillions. Emet and (arguably let's not get into this) Venat killed billions. The game makes a big deal out of people letting go of their resentments, a lot of people were personally wronged by the likes of the dragons or Fordola or Yotsuyu and the message is always that they need to move forward with that. But basically what you're saying here is that if it involves someone the player is actually invested in, that's all null and void. If Emet had actually killed G'raha or Meteion had killed any of the Scions or Zenos had actually killed Y'shtola in Stormblood or anybody in your body in Endwalker, the act of forming a connection despite all that would carry way more weight. Emet only sort of gets this treatment and it still carries pretty hard.

If the player can't be made to suffer personal loss and accept the same messages that countless other characters espouse and are forced to all the time, then it's all utterly hollow.

[_Koneko_]

meteion just killed a failed race of ancients that had failed hermes test of proving their worthiness to live and there is little proof that meteion killed any civilization she actually came across their own failures was most likely amplified by her presence but she did not kill them i'm glad endwalker shined some light on the ancients and proving they was not the utopia society that people think they are they was a highly flawed race that ultimately got erased like they had for so many other failed concepts ironically they died by their very own measurement of what makes one worthy of existence to the very end Emet-Selc and the other 2 failed to proven the ancients worthy of being alive by not respecting all life Emet proved Hermes right in his role as Chief of Elpis Hermes test determined that the ancients was indeed not worhy of life

[KariTheFox]

Other than the obvious, notable example of Meteion sending the final days in the direction of Ethyris, did she actually intentionally kill anyone? I thought the implication that the nature of her existence meant that she broadcasted suicidal despair wherever she or her sisters went without really wanting to or meaning to. It was only after making her report and seeing the barren, despair filled nature of the universe that she (all her sisters) decided to intentionally bring the final days to the ancients.

It's hard to use the right pronouns when talking about Meteion since she's both a person and hivemind conglomerate of (dozens, hundreds?) of birds.

[Veloran]

worthy of being alive by not respecting all life

Hello oxymoron.

Other than the obvious, notable example of Meteion sending the final days in the direction of Ethyris, did she actually intentionally kill anyone?

She has a giant graveyard of souls as her nest and has spent 12,000 years spreading despair throughout the universe.

[Necrotica]

She has a giant graveyard of souls as her nest and has spent 12,000 years spreading despair throughout the universe.

Look at Mr. Ivory Tower.

Let he who is without a giant graveyard of souls cast the first stone.

[KariTheFox]

She has a giant graveyard of souls as her nest and has spent 12,000 years spreading despair throughout the universe.

She didn't kill the dragons, she didn't kill the Ea, she didn't kill the omicrons or any of the societies in the Dead Ends. She either found them all already dead, or they committed societal suicide shortly after communicating with her. But it doesn't appear that she went out of her way to cause harm to any of them.

It was only after that - when she intentionally broadcasts that suicidal despair back to Ethyris that she's acting with any intent ( though you can argue she's following her original mission parameters. Hermes asked her to find out what people in the greater universe live for, and she broadcasts suicidal despair back as the answer because the rest of the universe as far as we know is dead.)

[KizuyaKatogami]

meteion just killed a failed race of ancients that had failed hermes test of proving their worthiness to live and there is little proof that meteion killed any civilization she actually came across their own failures was most likely amplified by her presence but she did not kill them i'm glad endwalker shined some light on the ancients and proving they was not the utopia society that people think they are they was a highly flawed race that ultimately got erased like they had for so many other failed concepts ironically they died by their very own measurement of what makes one worthy of existence to the very end Emet-Selc and the other 2 failed to proven the ancients worthy of being alive by not respecting all life Emet proved Hermes right in his role as Chief of Elpis Hermes test determined that the ancients was indeed not worhy of life

Except the whole "test" is a sham. How are you going to test someone but not give them, for all intents and purposes, a study guide. However, even despite not knowing wtf was going on, they did live. They summoned Zodiark. What killed them was Venat's sundering. That has nothing to do with Hermes' "test." If youre going to say the ancients deserved to be erased for erasing concepts, you had better be saying the sundered and wol need to be erased since we create our own concepts only to kill them immediately afterward in Eden.

[_Koneko_]

Uhm that was the fair part of the test if they had known about the test they would have artificially altered their society to reflect the test by not knowing they continued along on their self destructive path Emet had every chance to prove Hermes wrong but for 12,000 he clung to a dead end civilization and refused to alter his views so by the goals listed by Hermes, Emet-Selc and the ancients failed to prove them self worthy of existence and was rightfully wiped out the test was never winnable by the ancients because their society never allowed for the kind of thinking that hermes was testing them for they lacked Empathy so why would they respect all life

the ancients by their very nature was a failed concept as meteion proved by other similiar civilizations that all perished heck the final civilization in dead ends seem to be the goal the ancients was trying to reach and look what happen to them

[EaraGrace]

Hydaelyn is venerated practically whenever she was referenced earlier in the game, Minfilia explicitly prayed to her and the Zodiac Braves clearly revered her as well. Moreover she directly communicated with the sundered all the time in the form of her visions and calls to those with the Echo. And need I remind you when she interceded to save WoL or Krile's lives? I'd say that's providing her self-described "supreme goddess" powers to stop hardship and loss.

All to counter explicitly the plans of the Ascians. And if such widespread worship was present we would see Her everywhere. Need I remind who the Eorzeans prayed to during the Fall of Dalamud?

You don't have to sunder the world to sunder Zodiark. The world wasn't just sundered as a consequence of sundering him, she did so intentionally.

That’s actually not what the evidence points too. While the Sundering did have positive benefits for the fight against Meteion and yes played into the decision, dialogue and other sources make clear it wasn’t the biggest reason.

Hydaelyn Triple Triad Card: This ancient primal was created under the leadership of Venat to curb the towering might of Zodiark. Summoned with a lesser sacrifice of souls, Hydaelyn chose to unleash a blow which sundered not only Zodiark but the star itself, a desperate act which allowed Her to imprison His shattered essence upon the moon. In appearance, She closely resembles Venat, who gave herself to serve as the primal's heart.

Zodiark was conceived as the very will of the star, unlike Hydaelyn who claimed the mantle post sundering and was actually summoned with the intention of keeping him in check.



And thus when you sunder Zodiark, you sunder the world.



In Her own words.

We have no idea if the sundering ability was specifically made by Venat, or if she made use of an existing concept. Regardless WoL literally tells her what she'll do, the point is she doesn't actually know the circumstances of what happened, if the world survived due to something WoL simply didn't know about. It was a complete hail mary - IE bad strategy.

We do know that it was an ability unique to Hydaelyn and never seen before Her.

From the French version.

[14:00] Emet-Selch : Des attaques qui, en plus de toucher l'enveloppe matérielle de l'adversaire, tranchaient jusqu'à son essence même... C'était du jamais vu.
= “Attacks that, in addition to touching the material envelope (body) of the opponent, cut to its very essence… It was never seen before.”

Having developed enervation, and believing the world doomed if Zodiark not imprisoned, the risk seemed well worth it. After all, if not her and her followers who else would act?

He's weaker when we fight him. His laws are aetherical in nature and the currents protecting the world naturally would have lost 13/14ths density along with everything else. There is every reason to seriously doubt the efficacy of his shield after he's sundered.

This is ultimately speculation though. Exactly what impact the Sundering had on the shield is unknown to us. The Ascians certainly didn’t seem to think they were on the clock now were they?

It's the position of extreme ecological activists that the world is doomed if the human population isn't reduced and the exploitation of the environment isn't stopped. Is it justified - Not to mention productive, intelligent strategy - to bomb cities to stop people from living their self-centered, self-destructive lifestyles?

If you wish to know my moral system it’d be easier to just ask. More to the point the analogy is wrong. Bombing innocent people would not be justified as they aren’t the ones largely polluting the planet, they are innocent and thus it would be nothing but terrorism, an abhorrent act. Bombing oil pipelines, denying organizations the chance to cut forests or mine the Earth, active armed resistance against major fossil fuel companies, I’ll just say I have no opinion so I don’t get banned.