(6.1 Alliance raid spoilers) Speculation about the Twelve

[SentioftheHoukai]

Honestly? I'm really hoping they truly are gods who either pre-date Ancient civilization, or divinities they didn't know of. Come on, Square! Give me one thing that wasn't engineered by the Conversation or Big V's splinter faction!

[sidurgu-12]

Honestly? I'm really hoping they truly are gods who either pre-date Ancient civilization, or divinities they didn't know of. Come on, Square! Give me one thing that wasn't engineered by the Conversation or Big V's splinter faction!

a big theory right now is saying they come from the twelve wonders but what if the island was made, amongst other things, to study the twelve?

[Raikai]

My theories:

a) They were Venat's rogue group;

b) They existed beforehand and forged a covenant with Venat - this is how she got her sundering powers, which seemed quite a feat. Was Venat that powerful on her own?

[kaynide]

I am of the mind they are familiars that, over many years, became extremely powerful, a la Byakko.

(Copy pasted from other post):

I think the "Gods" are some of the more powerful Ancient familiars that survived the sundering, etc. Basically magical animals that have lived so long they have become somewhat Godlike. I also think the 3.0 series with the 4 lords to be the same or similar thing, also making a future "You need to complete the 4 lords raid series to do the next thing".

As seen with the moon rabbits and Meteion, familiars can be given quite potent levels of power including creation magic. Doesn't seem such a far stretch to me.

To further elaborate, Emet does point out that we should explore and discover many things about the world, including "The true identities of the 12", so they are clearly not what we think they are aka Gods.

And to clarify, I am talking about the specific entities that we meet in the raid. These 12 we will encounter could very well have taken the form of pre-existing individuals or concepts: founding members of Ancient society; a rival "Convocation" of an entirely different city-state of Ancients; early concepts of Gods.

And while I am inclined to think they were created by Venat as a backup plan of sorts, I am beginning to learn towards Azem as the creator.

[MikkoAkure]

And while I am inclined to think they were created by Venat as a backup plan of sorts, I am beginning to learn towards Azem as the creator.

I think I’m leaning more towards something after the time of the Ancients. It would be weird for Azem or Venat to completely make a god named after their Convocation role/themselves to begin with and canon Azem is determined by WoL’s gender while Azeyma is female.

Then there’s Azim, who is male. The disparity makes me think that it was more “legends of a person given life” or “existing legends of gods given power by Hydaelyn or another surviving unsundered”. That would leave room for the stories to lose the original details and gain new ones and make Azeyma and Azim different from the original Azem.

If they were created at the time of the Ancients, or existed previous to that, they would have already recognized us as Azem. If they do and just haven’t told us yet and it’s one of their games or lies or whatever I’ll be disappointed like I already am with nothing at all mentioned about Azeyma=Azem so far.

[Tehmon]

I am of the mind they are familiars that, over many years, became extremely powerful, a la Byakko.

(Copy pasted from other post):



To further elaborate, Emet does point out that we should explore and discover many things about the world, including "The true identities of the 12", so they are clearly not what we think they are aka Gods.

And to clarify, I am talking about the specific entities that we meet in the raid. These 12 we will encounter could very well have taken the form of pre-existing individuals or concepts: founding members of Ancient society; a rival "Convocation" of an entirely different city-state of Ancients; early concepts of Gods.

And while I am inclined to think they were created by Venat as a backup plan of sorts, I am beginning to learn towards Azem as the creator.

I feel like Emet specifically saying '' identity '' alludes to the Twelve having a clearly defined self, and that they are not mere creations, but people that once were. Let's face it, ancients weren't exactly keen on creations having a fully formed identity, they mostly just had a clearly defined purpose. But getting stuck on words feels redundant, especially when we are talking about a translation. So you still might be right.

But had Emet had knowledge of the true identities of the Twelve and how Azem was involved in their creations, I feel like that is a pretty huge detail to gloss over, considering what we knew of Emet's and Azem's past relationship. I feel like Emet knowing that Azem was actively working against him behind the scenes would've elicited a bigger reaction from him. Though admittedly, we don't know the full extent of the Twelve's goals and purpose, but it's safe to say they are very benevolent to the sundered.

I personally think they were part of Venat's backup plans, and their sole purpose was to instill hope to the sundered through faith. But I have yet to come to a conclusion what exactly they are. I don't think they are primals, gods or creations. I think they are first and foremost ancients (whom have transformed, like many ancients seem to be able to do), or some other form of beings from the unsundered world that struck a deal with Venat.

[h-alpha]

Anyways thoughts on the Ktiseos Planisphere?

I see Azyema, Azem, Menphina w/o the smaller moon, Althyk and Rhalgr

There's some slight differences and I'm not familiar with symbolism since Azem symbol is based on alchemical/astrological sun symbol, maybe the others are too?

Oh, wow. This is super interesting, especially considering it came from the Elpis dungeon... I love when they put in little easy-to-miss details like this

None of the other symbols look super familiar to me, not even as alchemical or astrological symbols and none other than the ones you pointed out look particularly similar to the marks of the Twelve, but then again it's a little hard to tell just from a single picture... I kinda want to take a closer look at it in game when I get home later today

Maybe it means nothing but it is interesting that the symbol of the sun is thrown on there with a few of the Twelve...

[Seraphor]

I'm going to side with them being a group of ancients, allied with Venat, likely tied to Elpis in some way, who followed her in summoning Hydaelyn. Like Venat became the heart of Hydaelyn and Eldibus became the heart of Zodiark, these ancient also offered themselves to become The Twelve, to serve as wardens for the sundered world and inspire Hope to guide the sundered people to one day be able to fight against the effects of Dynamis.
But that alone wouldn't be enough to fill a three arc Alliance Raid story, which means they must have some other task to complete as well, to explain why they have opened the heavens to test us.

[Raikai]

I'm going to side with them being a group of ancients, allied with Venat, likely tied to Elpis in some way, who followed her in summoning Hydaelyn. Like Venat became the heart of Hydaelyn and Eldibus became the heart of Zodiark, these ancient also offered themselves to become The Twelve, to serve as wardens for the sundered world and inspire Hope to guide the sundered people to one day be able to fight against the effects of Dynamis.
But that alone wouldn't be enough to fill a three arc Alliance Raid story, which means they must have some other task to complete as well, to explain why they have opened the heavens to test us.

That makes a lot of sense... but on that regard... I think the explanation might lie within one of the remaining Ascians trying to seize power now that Hydaelyn is gone...

[Gemina]

I would very much prefer that they don't have ties to Hydaelyn, Venat, the rogue group, Elpis, the ancients, none of that. They know of Hydealyn, and it can and should end there. No being guardians of the remaining reflections, or anything like that. If that story is done, then let it be done. Besides, if they are/were appointed by Venat, and are ancients, then it raises even more questions such as how they survived the Sundering. We need to understand and remember that Hades, Lahabrea, and Elidibus pulled some serious ex machina s**t to escape it. So much so, that we still don't know how they did. Another question is if they are unsundered ancients, then why them and not also Azem? Of course, the question of them existing before the sundering will need to be answered.

I can appreciate The Twelve much more if they remain intact as the deities we've known them to be all this time. Created from a plane of existence unknown to anyone, and well beyond any mortal's reach. Give them their own story. Please!