What's the point with that quite lackluster story in Endwalker?

[Rulakir]

I see the point I was trying to make was missed.

Final Days: The original extinction level event to which Ishikawa says: "For example, is what Hermes did wrong? Or was it the first step for humanity?"

Sundering: Genocide of the Ancients to which Yoshi-P says: "I think everybody has a lot of different feelings about Venat and we wanted to communicate that Hydaelyn's not a bad guy!"

Rejoinings: I don't know of any quote reframing them in a positive light, so if someone does please let me know.

Additionally, Venat, Hermes, and Emet all get lumped in together as essentially 'Ancients doing Ancient things'. Due to the ludicrous way it's all been handled, you may as well pick which side you most sympathize with or thought had a point. I refuse to accept this nonsense that genocide is okay if Person A or Person B does it, but somehow not if Person C does for arbitrary reasons.

As far as motivations are concerned, I did not find Hermes or Venat relatable. Regardless of what the writers' intent was, the Final Days appeared triggered by Hermes out of spite while the Sundering was Venat's crisis of faith. The rejoinings by comparison were 1) a group effort rather than a singular individual playing God and 2) sought the reversal of a crime against mankind.

You can argue the Sundering was wrong, but at this point it's simply the way the world is now and it's unlikely there's any way it could be reversed without catastrophic consequences...nor is there really any practical reason for doing so at this point as mankind has been irrevocably changed for better and worse and the world becoming whole again isn't going to just magically fix that.

There's still the issue of the shards being tied to the fate of the Source. Even if it's unlikely the game world would be destroyed, that's still a huge liability. Possibly even moreso because the shards exist in pocket dimensions where they're protected from threats the Source is not.

Nothing is truly separate, in fact, I've read theories that if the Source soul of a person dies so do their reflections on the shards. I don't know if that's true, but if it is that's obviously not an ideal situation. I don't think it can be ignored that while Hydaelyn forced everything apart it's still intrinsically linked. This idea that everything is its own island and can just be left alone now isn't how we're shown anything works.

[Theodric]

At the end of the day it's really no different to the infamous 'Burning of Teldrassil' and 'Who has a better story than Bran?' moments in World of Warcraft and Game of Thrones respectively. Both of which ended up being very divisive moments that basically screwed over anyone other than the fans of a very specific character. If anything, I'd consider what happened in Endwalker to be even worse. Mostly on the basis of how tone deaf it ended up being.

I disagree that it's hypocritical for someone to be for the Rejoinings but against Venat's actions. The former has a sympathetic motive and makes logical sense in terms of restoring the status quo and bringing back what was lost. The latter stacked ridiculous plot device atop ridiculous plot device in order to kill a bunch of people for no real reason only to have lies and manipulation cast those same victims as being in the wrong despite...not actually doing anything bad at all.

I'm comfortable enough in my own moral compass that I don't need a video game or the players it attracts to lecture people on the 'correct' opinions to hold. With that said, if a particular video game is going to get preachy then it needs to be consistent.

We sat through a decade of the Scions and City State leaders screeching and drooling all over each other every time they encountered a perceived injustice. Yet whenever it counted most to take a stand and call out one of their own? Silence and token handwaving.

That's what bothers me. Much more than the acts themselves. Endwalker was meant to wrap up many of the story beats that veteran players were eager to see to their conclusion and it couldn't even be bothered pretending not to have contempt for anything that wasn't the same bunch of characters that we've been stuck with for a decade now.

[KageTokage]

Nothing is truly separate, in fact, I've read theories that if the Source soul of a person dies so do their reflections on the shards. I don't know if that's true, but if it is that's obviously not an ideal situation. I don't think it can be ignored that while Hydaelyn forced everything apart it's still intrinsically linked. This idea that everything is its own island and can just be left alone now isn't how we're shown anything works.

It would be pretty dark if people just started dropping dead on the First because their Source counterparts were turning into blasphemies...and again I find myself disappointed by them seemingly trying to sweep that threat under the rug.

I'm praying they actually go somewhere with the mention that stopping the Final Days did not cleanse Etheriys of the corrupt dynamis and that it still ends up posing a major problem in one way or another.

[Xirean]

It would be pretty dark if people just started dropping dead on the First because their Source counterparts were turning into blasphemies...and again I find myself disappointed by them seemingly trying to sweep that threat under the rug.

I'm praying they actually go somewhere with the mention that stopping the Final Days did not cleanse Etheriys of the corrupt dynamis and that it still ends up posing a major problem in one way or another.

If you do all the EW role quests it's mentioned either by Rauban or Forchenault that "the final days are over". Granted this could just be a random opinion from them but it kinda felt like a writer saying "we're done with this now." Either way if they wanted to continue with that storyline or even certain characters storylines (Fordola) it might require making those role quests required content, which wouldn't likely be something people would enjoy. Just my 2 cents.

Exploring what effects TFD had on the First should be pretty easy though, if they care to do so. But it also seemed like the only one who knew anything was wrong was Ryne. Actually now that I think about it. Garlemald and Thavnair both don't exist on the First. If the soul shards are truly connected, it would only be a handful of people from some of the role quests, which then begs the question if they currently have a reflection on the First at the time.

[not_ya_wify]

I hate everything about the sundering. The whole concept of split souls bothers me a lot. I'm forever going to wish everyone and everything returns to being whole.

Me too. I think this is the crux of the disagreement in this thread and why some people with the popular mainstream opinion come in here and call people deranged and hypocritical for having the audacity to disagree with them. Which is why I brought up Ashes of Love because it's a fundamental philosophical difference in how you view the souls in FFXIV that determines whether you think one way or another, whether Ascians were justified in rejoining or not, whether the sundered are real people or not.

The popular mainstream people see the sundered as fully formed separate entities from their ancient selves. Therefore they see killing a sundered person as murder and adding previous memories as "overwriting," "brainwashing," "deleting current version."

The dissenters which have accumulated in this thread view the sundered as broken pieces of a whole that was their ancient soul. Therefore, they view the efforts to rejoin those souls as efforts to glue together the broken pieces and fix or heal those souls. They may view adding ancient memories as just that "adding to current memories a more complete picture of the truth and reality." It's not that the current soul gets overwritten but rather, the current soul now has a more holistic view of reality and therefore they may make choices they would not have made if they hadn't had the full view.

This is demonstrated in Gaia having both Mitron's memory of them choosing each other and saving the star for thousands of reincarnations AND having her own memories of drinking tea and eating cookies with Ryne and then going ahead and choosing Ryne over Mitron. (Which I maintain is utterly ridiculous but the writers are pretty adamant about cookies now with teen girl > saving the world with soul mate lover). I think where Mitron may have failed is that he didn't have a memory crystal to give Gaia back her actual memories. He could only try and give her HIS memories which wasn't enough because that could never restore Gaia's sense of self. Which is why he had to resort to deleting her current memories to try and overwrite her broken self with his projection of her real fully formed self.

The way I conceptualize sundering and rejoining is with a porcelain vase. Hydaelyn took the vase and smashed it on the ground. The vase is now broken into 14 shards. To me (or Emet-Selch for that matter) a shard of a vase is not a vase. So, he takes out the glue and glues together half of the vase. In my mind this glued together half vase is more of a vase than a single shard and gluing them back together is a more worthwhile undertaking than leaving the broken porcelain pieces on the ground and declaring that each shard is now a new vase. [Cont.]

[not_ya_wify]

That's why I don't see rejoinings as genocide, because none of the shards cease to exist. They get added to the source where they belong. I also don't view adding Ardbert's soul to mine as erasing Ardbert or overwriting my WoL. I view it as gluing Azem back together. But this Azem will not be the Azem from ancient times. It will also not be the WoL or Ardbert. It will be Azem with the memories and personality traits and senses of self of both the WoL and Ardbert.

That being said, I do think there is one problem with the Ascians' plans and that's not the rejoinings themselves but rather that after rejoining all the shards that are still rejoinable planning to ask Zodiark to give back the souls inside of him by offering up the new souls that were these patchwork souls made up from 13 rejoinings. This to me is genocide.

However, I do view this plan (as well as the pretty violent rejoinings) as an effect of being tempered. What nobody here seems to acknowledge when talking about the ancients changing their cultural values and sacrificing to Zodiark and whatever the Ascians' did after the sundering is that Zodiark did temper everyone who was present when he was summoned. We do know this to be the case because if you speak to Emet-Selch in between quests in the ocular during Shadowbringers, he tells you "yes, Zodiark tempered us." The ancients including Emet-Selch, Lahabrea, and Elidibus and all of the souls roing the moon were not the same people they were during the Elpis time frame. They are all tempered and live to serve Zodiark. Just as I believe the blessing of light is my own tempering forcing me to carry out Hydaelyn's will.

[myahele]

God, I fear what they might do to Estinien, in the future, after looking at what happened to G'raha Tia...

Me too. At worst, he's been a butt of jokes such as how Tataru and Krile threaten him, to how those Alchemist surrounded him and took him. So far he doesn't seem to have any "funny quirk" like the rest of the Scions. Maybe his bad spending? But I don't know if they'll overuse that the same way they do with G'raha's ear twitch or how Urianger can't swim.

[not_ya_wify]

Having said that, I would have worked tirelessly to find an alternate way to do it, but I'm not one who would've accepted the violation the sundering was because 'what's done is done' .

Also, whether or not someone would consent to being rejoined is subjective. I've often thought the Ascians probably could have developed a following similar to WoW's Cult of the Damned.

That is what I'd been wanting after Shadowbringers. Find a way to rejoin souls without rejoining the whole planet and causing calamities like floods and diseases.

However, after Endwalker we could just avoid all of that. Avoid all the moral gray areas, all the genocide, all the suffering, the question of whether rejoining souls is good or bad by simply preventing all of that from happening in the first place. Here's what I would do if my character wasn't tempered by Hydaelyn and I could do whatever the fuck I want:

Step 1: Ignore Venat when she says not to help or tell Emet-Selch what happened.
Step 2: Travel to Sharlayan and ask G'raha where exactly in the Crystal Tower he left all the documentation on time travel.
Step 3: Travel to the first and find the time travel documents.
Step 4: Make copies.
Step 5: Travel to Elpis and ask for directions to Amaurot.
Step 6: Travel to Amaurot and request an audience with Emet-Selch because it concerns the survival of the star.
Step 7 Optional quest fluff: Get denied an audience because "who are you? Emet-Selch doesn't have time to talk to children."
Step 8 optional quest fluff: Wait for Emet-Selch to finish work and stalk him home or instead go to the bureau of the architect and request an audience with Hythlodaeus to put in a good word for you to talk with Emet-Selch.
Step 9: Ask Emet-Selch to use the Echo to look into your memories and see what happened in Elpis.
Step 10: See Emet-Selch despair.
Step 11: Tell Emet-Selch, "no worries, I got you babe. Here are documents that detail how to travel back in time. Just set up a time portal like Elidibus did in my time and get Hermes some professional help in a mental hospital preferably with rubber walls and some mechanism to prevent him from using creation Magicks before he can create all the Meteion sisters."
Step 12: Emet-Selch rewards you with sweet love making.

No Meteion, no final days, no other planets succumbing to the end singer, no sacrifice, no zodiark, no Hydaelyn, no sundering, no rejoining, no choosing between one life over the other. Just good old saving the world with things that are already established to be possible in canon.

[Xirean]

There's a few things being ignored in that analogy. A vase has a purpose. It was crafted with the explicit intention to fulfill that purpose. This is rather similar to the wildlife that the Convocation creates. They often refer to themselves as caretakers of the star. They are very used to making things with a purpose and judging how well those things fulfill that purpose. The big disconnect here is that the sundered do not fall into this category. The exist as a result of the convocation but aside from Venat, there was no decision to create those people. Venat didn't even make them, she broke existing people into other, generally less capable, people. Those people do not then take up the mantel of caretaker of the star. They have little way of doing so. They are simply people trying to live their lives. The Ascians who were outright robbed of their people and way of life are completely justified in their anger and resentment of this act. But they continue to do the one thing they have always done. Judge those beings who exist and determine that they do not fulfill the Ascian intended purpose of caretaker of the star. They have no right to do this.

IRL people discuss the morality of eating animals. I've seen this brought up in this and other threads as an appropriate analogy to the sundered and unsundered. The problem though is that it simply is not sufficient. The sundered are not cattle, they are not monkeys or dolphins of which we have the ability to measure intelligence from, but lack larger means to communicate with. It's impressive that we can teach an ape sign language but it pales in comparison to the situation with the sundered and unsundered. The two can have a full on philosophical conversation about the ethics of the situation. There is no way to say that the sundered are not intelligent life with hopes, dreams, and values. The fact of the matter is that the Ascians we have met all display a lack of concern for the sundered's culture. Alphinaud said it best "We define our worth! Not the circumstances of our creation!" Ryne also states in the Eden questline "You won't even give us a chance to make something for ourselves."

It's not so simple a situation as broken pieces of a vase. Those shards may not be able to create life on the scale that their predecessors can, but they can do some pretty incredible things. They are also physically capable of manipulating dynamis directly. Something the Ancients simply cannot do.

[Rulakir]

That being said, I do think there is one problem with the Ascians' plans and that's not the rejoinings themselves but rather that after rejoining all the shards that are still rejoinable planning to ask Zodiark to give back the souls inside of him by offering up the new souls that were these patchwork souls made up from 13 rejoinings. This to me is genocide.

I don't believe that was their plan since it's one line that's inconsistent with all other information. During the lift cutscene Emet tells the WoL that should we survive the remaining calamities we will become their equal, a complete existence in a complete world. Later, in one of the 5.x patches, Alisaie comments on having memories of her Ancient self at the edge of her mind upon seeing the star showers, but can't fully remember likely due to being sundered. Even without the context of EW (where we learn souls sacrificed to Zodiark are indefinitely trapped within), the implication seems to be that the sundered when returned to being whole would also have their memories/identities restored. It makes Emet's statement counterproductive. However, I have no doubt they intended to sacrifice non-Ancient lives to Zodiark as that was the original plan for the 3rd sacrifice.

As far as rejoinings, they're still an extinction event for the shard. I can't deny that. The question is more which should take precedence, the "fleeting" life of a mortal or the eternal soul of a nigh immortal Ancient? The issue being if you favor the former then the crime of the sundering is endless. As much as I would like to see Etheirys restored, like I said, I would've tried to find a gentler way to do it.