How strong is the Warrior of Light?

[Cleretic]

WoL demonstrates blatantly superhuman ability even by the standards of the setting. They're able to catch a sword the size of an office building and deflect the blow off to the side. In the Monk questline their daily training regimen includes more than ten hours of continuous practice, including fighting forms, calisthenics, and shadow boxing that has the Fist of Rhalgr collapsed in a heap on the ground from exertion. They then proceed to sprint through the craggy Gyr Abanian wilderness and proceed to single-handedly beat the Corpse Brigade into submission and don't even look winded at the end of it all. Widargelt considers them the first of all living monks of the order and they unlocked all fourteen chakra when seven alone is supposed to grant you godly strength compared to a normal man. A sidequest in Garlemald has them move rubble heavy enough to require a team of men to lift to save a girl's mother according to a nearby Maelstrom officer. The end of the Warrior questline has them crowned the greatest practitioner of the warrior art alive, a title they keep even after Dorgono proceeds to knock grown Roegadyn men clear across the Wolves' Den with a single blow. Estinien also considers WoL his superior as a combatant. Estinien is fully capable of acts of enormous destruction like destroying the cannon of Castrum Abania with a single strike or disabling a prototype version of the new series of reverse-engineered Ultima Weapons that nearly brought Eorzea to its knees.

I suppose the disagreements here are that, while you're looking at the WoL being considered the top of their field as 'clearly superhuman' along with a few of the feats of strength in-story, I actually think those things are probably within the theoretical ability of regular people in the setting. That doesn't mean it's easy, but the setting is clearly one of a fairly nuts power scale. Lu Bu ain't a bad comparison, but I'm not looking at it as if there's only one person of that scale.

Estinien might be a bit of a weird example, where his main feats aren't actually combat prowess but more just RAW DESTRUCTION. I'm not sure he needed a lot of combat prowess to smash that cannon.

[Jandor]

I'm not even remotely convinced of this, to be perfectly honest. Seems to me the only thing "beyond" the Ancients is Dynamis, and even that is arguably a stretch. Take Dynamis out of the equation, and Unsundered Souls and Creation Magicks trump those without in nearly every instance. The narrative outlined it as near godlike power for a reason, so as far as pure power levels are concerned it's clear the Unsundered are the superior combatants and win that fight. We won against the Ascians Three because the power of plot demanded we do so. Even Emet-Selch says so, he could have just killed us as we remained blissfully unaware of his presence.

Beyond creating weapons, the Unsundered don't actually seem to use creation magic in combat. Their normal go-to for combat is to create a staff, or sword, or bow, or whatever, and then fight in much the same manner as the sundered do, albeit it with larger reserves of aether.

The fanciest thing we've seen is changing their own form, which has resulted in some pretty tough fights, but not insurmountably so.

[Carin-Eri]

I suppose the disagreements here are that, while you're looking at the WoL being considered the top of their field as 'clearly superhuman' along with a few of the feats of strength in-story, I actually think those things are probably within the theoretical ability of regular people in the setting. That doesn't mean it's easy, but the setting is clearly one of a fairly nuts power scale. Lu Bu ain't a bad comparison, but I'm not looking at it as if there's only one person of that scale.

Estinien might be a bit of a weird example, where his main feats aren't actually combat prowess but more just RAW DESTRUCTION. I'm not sure he needed a lot of combat prowess to smash that cannon.

Agreed. Estinien's tactics tend to be sort of 'limit break'-esq. By that I mean that he generally uses one, overwhelming, move to end things quickly. The already mentioned cannon being one obvious example, and his rescue of Mehvan's baby (assisted by Vrtra) being another. And Endsinger demonstrated how to counter said tactics.

[Necrotica]

WoL is also carrying around the blessing of light and echo. And sporting some insanely powerful weapons and armor. Stripped naked and of those powers one on one against another great fighter they might not be all that powerful.

The WoL has put a lot of time and effort getting legendary artifact weapons and the rest. Now while the MSQ will never mention it outright cause it does not track all that, the artifact quests make it pretty clear your weapon is a God slaying masterpiece.

Even with Zenos they kind of went out of their way to point out he got some magic samurai blade and collected good weapons in general.

[SenshiDon]

I suppose the disagreements here are that, while you're looking at the WoL being considered the top of their field as 'clearly superhuman' along with a few of the feats of strength in-story, I actually think those things are probably within the theoretical ability of regular people in the setting. That doesn't mean it's easy, but the setting is clearly one of a fairly nuts power scale. Lu Bu ain't a bad comparison, but I'm not looking at it as if there's only one person of that scale.

Estinien might be a bit of a weird example, where his main feats aren't actually combat prowess but more just RAW DESTRUCTION. I'm not sure he needed a lot of combat prowess to smash that cannon.

This is true. Final Fantasy XIV, and the rest of the Final Fantasy series by extension, is pretty nutty, powerscaling-wise. And if not for raw destructive capability (such as Dissidia Shinryu, who was going to destroy the entire FF multiverse, which Y'shtola and Gilgamesh helped to defeat. If Dissidia is canon, this means the WoL scales), the series is full of hax, such as petrification, soul manipulation, time stop, and even death magic.

In retrospect, it was foolish of me to suggest that the WoL can't be outmatched.

[Zero-ELEC]

This is one of the better answers I've gotten! A few things, though.

I think there are a few feats that can be pointed to, such as when we fought Eden Prime. Eden created an alternate reality exactly like Sephiroth's Supernova (which is confirmed to be an alternate reality, not just an illusion. I'm new to the forums and can't figure out how to post scans, otherwise I'd back up this claim), blasted the WoL through the vacuum of space into a galaxy which then exploded in their face... and they were fine. I don't recall them surviving this under any sort of outside help, either. There are a plethora of other examples, but that one immediately comes to mind. And of course, the WoL has become much stronger since then, evidenced when they 1v1'ed Zenos who was empowered by enough of the mother crystal to assume his Shinryu form along with all of its abilities, and I don't think the hopes and prayers of the Scions were empowering the WoL at this point either. With this in mind, I doubt that something as simple as stabbing the WoL is going to stop them.

Fair points! A thing though, Eden Prime's attack is actually based on Eden's "Eternal Breath" attack from Final Fantasy VIII, which is... unclear as how it functions. Eden as Guardian Force has little plot justification and less elaboration. So it's not quite "Supernova", but the point stands. As for 1v1'ing Zenos at the edge of existence, yes they definitely did that in a place that's less place but metaphor and, again, nearly died in the process.

I certainly believe stabbing the WoL in the back while they think they're safe would take them down or at least incapacitate them, the issue is that most of the attacks the WoL tanks or takes on the chin are in combat where they're presumably at their most ready for anything that comes to them. They are strong and resilient, more so than most, but they are still "human", for whatever that means in the world if Final Fantasy XIV. This is all, of course, just from a "feats" perspective, which dismisses the realities of combat, or catching someone unawares, or anything like that.

And again at the end of the day, the WoL will struggle as the plot demands, as long as it helps tell an engaging story.

If I were to make a comparison, WoL would be about the same as Lu Bu is in fiction. An immensely powerful fighter who can turn the tide of a fight almost single-handedly, but still mortal enough to be brought down through strategy, attrition, sheer numbers, or immense amounts of firepower.

WoL demonstrates blatantly superhuman ability even by the standards of the setting. They're able to catch a sword the size of an office building and deflect the blow off to the side. In the Monk questline their daily training regimen includes more than ten hours of continuous practice, including fighting forms, calisthenics, and shadow boxing that has the Fist of Rhalgr collapsed in a heap on the ground from exertion. They then proceed to sprint through the craggy Gyr Abanian wilderness and proceed to single-handedly beat the Corpse Brigade into submission and don't even look winded at the end of it all. Widargelt considers them the first of all living monks of the order and they unlocked all fourteen chakra when seven alone is supposed to grant you godly strength compared to a normal man. A sidequest in Garlemald has them move rubble heavy enough to require a team of men to lift to save a girl's mother according to a nearby Maelstrom officer. The end of the Warrior questline has them crowned the greatest practitioner of the warrior art alive, a title they keep even after Dorgono proceeds to knock grown Roegadyn men clear across the Wolves' Den with a single blow. Estinien also considers WoL his superior as a combatant. Estinien is fully capable of acts of enormous destruction like destroying the cannon of Castrum Abania with a single strike or disabling a prototype version of the new series of reverse-engineered Ultima Weapons that nearly brought Eorzea to its knees.

I'm not trying to say WoL is unstoppable or invincible or whatever, but they're very clearly exemplary among mortals and only a handful of characters can take WoL in a single fight that they're completely and utterly devoted to winning. That said, even WoL is wise enough to fear the wrath of an angry Manderville. Godbert and Julyan are clearly above every other character in the setting without question.

The comparison to the Romantic Lü Bu is apt here, even from a storytelling perspective. Good post.

[Cleretic]

This is true. Final Fantasy XIV, and the rest of the Final Fantasy series by extension, is pretty nutty, powerscaling-wise. And if not for raw destructive capability (such as Dissidia Shinryu, who was going to destroy the entire FF multiverse, which Y'shtola and Gilgamesh helped to defeat. If Dissidia is canon, this means the WoL scales), the series is full of hax, such as petrification, soul manipulation, time stop, and even death magic.

In retrospect, it was foolish of me to suggest that the WoL can't be outmatched.

A comparison I like cracking out to explain the Garleans' struggle is 'they're a nation full of Captains America, in a world where every other nation is the X-Men', and that carries over fairly well here. It's absolutely valid to ask how strong an individual person in that world is, but you kinda need to take into account that the baseline 'average human strength' is rather different from what we in the real world would assume.

[Lord_Umbra]

Well we're as strong or weak as plot needs us to be but if we did go by kill count the WoL probably has most impressive kill of all FF counting super bosses: Shinryu, Ultima, Ultima "Dun Scath", Ultima "Azy Lla", Warring Triad, Ruby/Diamond etc Weapons, Knighs+Thordan "solo'd", Yiazmet"2 hour boss now a 10ish minute fight, Ozma & Proto Ozma, Kefka, Midgarsormer, Bahamut/Lunar, Ex Death, Omega twice M/F form, Literal gods of our realm in Aglaia, Zodiark/Hydaelyn, Four Lords, Eden..... I could go on & on but it'd be along f list. We're a beast & if game would allowed us to be a beast always we'd probably gib every normal soldier that fights us with a single strike though being One Punch WoL probably wouldn't make for a good story.

[Carin-Eri]

I actually enjoyed the few times that the story presented us with the idea that the WoL wasn't the 'strongest out there'.

Best example being our first defeat Vs Zenos - though I didn't particular enjoy how quickly we moved on from said defeat.

I mean, by that point in the game we were already something of a godslayer who'd saved Eorzea several times. And that suddenly disappears when Zenos shows up, kicks our ass almost effortlessly, mocks us and then swans off. Canonically, this is probably the first time the WoL actually loses a one-on-one fight and it should've been a huge deal for them - but it wasn't treated as such (beyond a bit of sulking). And the Scions present at the time, whilst admittedly preoccupied with Y'Waifu and her injuries, didn't question the implications of a single Garlean being able to hand the WoL an instaloss either, and the story seems to approach it all with a "you have to wait until you get strong enough to defeat him" mindset.

Zenos's overwhelming power at that time should have been an excuse to examine the character of the WoL but the writers didn't do so, which is a pity.

[indigo_imp]

I mean, by that point in the game we were already something of a godslayer who'd saved Eorzea several times. And that suddenly disappears when Zenos shows up, kicks our ass almost effortlessly, mocks us and then swans off. Canonically, this is probably the first time the WoL actually loses a one-on-one fight and it should've been a huge deal for them - but it wasn't treated as such (beyond a bit of sulking).

That fight, and the scenes before/after it, had a big impact on me. It really established Zenos as a threat and made me concerned about any time we'd have to face him again. I was worried about how he would react to the other events that happened, particularly in Doma.

Having the player character feel so weak isn't something I really expected out of an MMO or an RPG. I do think it should've been made to be a bigger moment, it felt a bit odd confronting him towards the end of Stormblood since I didn't feel that much stronger. At first I didn't enjoy the experience of being beaten like that, but it did add a good amount of tension to the expansion.