Who knew the 6.15 Omega Quests… (Spoilers)

[KageTokage]

The story asks you to abstractly dehumanize a group of humans as unfixably broken people that must be cast aside for the greater good for unalterable, biological reasons.

I understand what they were going for, but it is creepy.

Looking at the kinds of craziness the Garleans devised to overcome their aetherial limitations, the notion that the unfathomably more powerful and knowledgeable Ancients couldn't overcome the dynamis hurdle if they actually knew about it is something that struck me as fundamentally absurd.

Fears of a "death by utopia" felt similarly absurd when they were founded off a single vague statement that one civilization supposedly eliminated sorrow only to drown in apathy...and I feel like that might end up aging even more poorly if we actually get to hear a more detailed account of how that came to be from a recreation of one of the Plenty's denizens in the 6.2 tribal quests

As many have stated before, if you're trying to justify basically destroying the world and mankind as one knows it, you need a really, really solid line of reasoning to make sit well with everyone in the long run.

[Lurina]

Looking at the kinds of craziness the Garleans devised to overcome their aetherial limitations, the notion that the unfathomably more powerful and knowledgeable Ancients couldn't overcome the dynamis hurdle if they actually knew about it is something that struck me as fundamentally absurd.

Fears of a "death by utopia" felt similarly absurd when they were founded off a single vague statement that one civilization supposedly eliminated sorrow only to drown in apathy...and I feel like that might end up aging even more poorly if we actually get to hear a more detailed account of how that came to be from a recreation of one of the Plenty's denizens in the 6.2 tribal quests

As many have stated before, if you're trying to justify basically destroying the world and mankind as one knows it, you need a really, really solid line of reasoning to make sit well with everyone in the long run.

It definitely feels like a contrivance that the problem is completely unsolvable to them - insofar as a single Ancient was the one who made Meteion in the first place - but I guess my point is that it seems silly to get bogged down in "but could the Ancients have stopped her, though?" discourse, when the issue isn't really that the writers failed to justify their scenario in an ironclad enough way, where the text convincingly conveyed that the Ancients would have been completely hopeless against her forever.

The issue, to me, is that they had that goal in the first place. That they chose to write a plot where a culture of millions/billions of people is basically exterminated wholesale, but for this to be presented as absolutely necessary and fine, and in fact a "cool moment" where a rock ballad plays in the background.

I remember saying the thing about needing a "really good reason" for it to sit well myself, but the truth is that I'm not sure there can be a solid reason for something like that, at least not with the way the Ancients had been presented up until that point. Maybe if it has made it clear they were doomed in an immediate sense rather than on the geological timescale it would have taken an Unsundered Zodiark to succumb to the Final Days on his own, it would have been reasonable for the Sundering to happen just to salvage something from the situation... But even then, 'reasonable civilization-level slaughter' is a tough sell when you're talking about human beings. The far easier path would have just been to alter the tone of how it was portrayed to something which embraced the controversy, like they eventually did in the Omega quest.

[Iscah]

Fears of a "death by utopia" felt similarly absurd when they were founded off a single vague statement that one civilization supposedly eliminated sorrow only to drown in apathy...

I think a key thing here is the writer's outlook, because I'm not sure who it is originating from specifically, but the idea of a civilisation becoming too comfortable and grinding to a halt and decline comes up right back in the first lorebook describing the rise and decline of the Allagan empire.

So if this concept is something a core writer holds as a concept to be a natural course of civilisation, then they may not feel a need to foreshadow it heavily when they use it again.

Maybe it's Ishikawa, maybe it's someone else, maybe it's a pervasive idea among the dev/writing team. But the earlier mention of it makes me think it's something they saw as already inherently possible, not a scenario they invented for that one setting alone.

[Lyth]

I find it really odd that anyone would only just now notice the commentary on utopia as it relates to the Amaurotians. It was the central theme of the Eden raid series, so this has been an active theme well before Endwalker.

If you'll recall, Mitron wanted to create a timeless utopia free from suffering in which he could be with Loghrif for all eternity, even if it meant destroying her memories against her will as well as the First in the process. Yoshi-p and the writing team were just being polite in their response. The Convocation already has a proven track record of choosing the Ra-la ending.

In fact, in the lead in to the E11S fight, Mitron reaches into Ryne's memories to try and turn her own hopes and fears against her, giving rise to the the Fatebreaker (which is essentially a combination of Ran'jit and Thancred). He does so with the expectation that it would break you, much like it did the Amaurotians during their Final Days. He is naturally enraged at being proven wrong:

Ascian Prime (Mitron + Loghrif): 'That fragmented souls should triumph over their fears while we succumbed to ours, thereby setting our star on a course to ruin... That inferior beings such as you should succeed while we failed! It defies all logic!'

And if you looked up the etymology of the term 'utopia', you'd know that the word itself is a contradiction in terms, intended as a critique of the concept (literal: 'no place'). Individuality and conflict go hand in hand. I just find it entertaining that some people are using the word unironically in support of the 'superiority' of the Amaurotians when when the literal expression is intended as a condemnation.

[KageTokage]

In fact, in the lead in to the E11S fight, Mitron reaches into Ryne's memories to try and turn her own hopes and fears against her, giving rise to the the Fatebreaker (which is essentially a combination of Ran'jit and Thancred). He does so with the expectation that it would break you, much like it did the Amaurotians during their Final Days. He is naturally enraged at being proven wrong:

Ascian Prime (Mitron + Loghrif): 'That fragmented souls should triumph over their fears while we succumbed to ours, thereby setting our star on a course to ruin... That inferior beings such as you should succeed while we failed! It defies all logic!'

And if you looked up the etymology of the term 'utopia', you'd know that the word itself is a contradiction in terms, intended as a critique of the concept (literal: 'no place'). Individuality and conflict go hand in hand. I just find it entertaining that some people are using the word unironically in support of the 'superiority' of the Amaurotians when when the literal expression is intended as a condemnation.

As with some lines pertaining to the Scions in Endwalker, that quote kind of bugged me because it's framing the sundered as being "better" then the Ancients when the individuals being tested were really not representative of mankind as a whole.

Both sundered and unsundered alike had droves of people who succumbed to the effects of dynamis, yet both also had those who managed to persevere and survive.

[Lyth]

...

Mitron's quote isn't even from Endwalker. It's from the Eden raid series in Shadowbringers, which seems to have faded from memory around here. It's a commentary specifically about the Amaurotian Final Days.

Conflict arises from individuality and diversity. We all have different wants and needs. But diversity also confers a survival advantage. Omega's analysis of the Final Days was that there was no single unique trait that defined all the survivors. But because we don't all think the same way, our individual experiences with it were all different.

That's the central paradox with utopias. It's not that they're decadent and hedonistic; you can have that without an utopia. It's that the elimination of conflict requires you to stifle individuality. That's the common thread that you see in several of the fallen societies we encounter, be it the Ea, the Omicrons, and even the Amaurotians. A single stumbling block affected them universally.

Whether you agree with these themes is a personal choice, of course, but this entire concept has already been explored at length in Shadowbringers, right down to Mitron trying to create a timeless paradise free from suffering at the expense of the world's destruction.

[CrownySuccubus]

Mitron's quote isn't even from Endwalker. It's from the Eden raid series in Shadowbringers, which seems to have faded from memory around here. It's a commentary specifically about the Amaurotian Final Days.

Conflict arises from individuality and diversity. We all have different wants and needs. But diversity also confers a survival advantage. Omega's analysis of the Final Days was that there was no single unique trait that defined all the survivors. But because we don't all think the same way, our individual experiences with it were all different.

That's the central paradox with utopias. It's not that they're decadent and hedonistic; you can have that without an utopia. It's that the elimination of conflict requires you to stifle individuality. That's the common thread that you see in several of the fallen societies we encounter, be it the Ea, the Omicrons, and even the Amaurotians. A single stumbling block affected them universally.

Whether you agree with these themes is a personal choice, of course, but this entire concept has already been explored at length in Shadowbringers, right down to Mitron trying to create a timeless paradise free from suffering at the expense of the world's destruction.

That's kind of the issue. A "paradise" or "utopia" can have two different, paradoxical meanings.

Meaning 1: The best civilization that the specific society is capable of, regardless of any remaining "flaws".

Meaning 2: A truly perfect society, with no flaws.

The problem I have with Endwalker's take on "utopia" is that it argues that both of these things are the same, but that makes no sense, because the latter automatically disqualifies the former. Perfection, or lack of flaws, is inherently a value extrapolated to infinity. It means that no matter what resistance is brought against it, the value of "perfection" cannot be reduced or removed. But the story also argues that perfection itself is flawed, which means we're back to Meaning 1, and Meaning 2 is null. If the infinite value is impossible, then calling it imperfect is irrelevant.

[Lyth]

...

The flaw in your reasoning is that you're assuming the very thing that you've set out to prove. Sure, every one of these civilizations viewed themselves as having attained their own personal standards of perfection prior to their untimely collapse. But every historical empire invariably claims to be the greatest civilization that ever was. Who is to say that any of these are actually 'objectively perfect'? I certainly wouldn't want to live in any of them.

Different people have different values and ideas on what their 'ideal' society would look like. The paradox lies in achieving that consensus. That's why all these 'utopias' attain their 'perfection' at the expense of individuality.