Ability to see the future: Loose plot thread?

[Cassar]

I've heard the theory of Azem having this ability and honestly that would make sense and it would be pretty neat.
What kind of bothers me is the fact the Scions (or anyone, for that matter) could've like asked for Mikoto's aid during the final days or something, her ability would be incredible in times of need, yet no one even thinks about it!

I really hope if they use it, to at least put a "border color" for it. Red for a future that can be changed. Blue for one that cannot be changed. And then throw us curve balls, where we get red and think we can change it...but it didn't change because somebody else needed to do something for it to do so. Or have red around a good event, so we try to prevent it from changing. Future sight can be interesting if done well, but most writers can't really do it well.

Honestly that brings me to my second concern with this future sight thing - If the future she sees truly is a guaranteed future, then that somewhat goes against the multiple timelines aspect of the game's time travel. I mean think about it, if something is guaranteed to happen, and there's nothing you can do to change it even if you try, then that means it's something predestined, which kinda goes against the idea of infinite possible futures and alternate timelines, right?

[Iscah]

Honestly that brings me to my second concern with this future sight thing - If the future she sees truly is a guaranteed future, then that somewhat goes against the multiple timelines aspect of the game's time travel. I mean think about it, if something is guaranteed to happen, and there's nothing you can do to change it even if you try, then that means it's something predestined, which kinda goes against the idea of infinite possible futures and alternate timelines, right?

The thing with FFXIV's time structure is that it isn't just infinite splitting possibilities. The timeline split created in Shadowbringers appears to be an exceptional event, which at least by my own theory on how it works, relies specifically on intervention by a time traveller. The rest of the time, there simply is one flow of time from past to present to future, and just because we haven't experienced it yet doesn't mean that it isn't there waiting to be experienced.

Also, I don't think that's at all the same thing as being predestined. It's more symbiotic: you are free to make your choices, and the future will/would/has turned out according to those choices. If you would have chosen differently, the future would have reflected that in the first place.

[Alleo]

I've heard the theory of Azem having this ability and honestly that would make sense and it would be pretty neat.
What kind of bothers me is the fact the Scions (or anyone, for that matter) could've like asked for Mikoto's aid during the final days or something, her ability would be incredible in times of need, yet no one even thinks about it!

It really depends on other factors: Can Mikoto and other echo users even use it on their own? We for example cant use our echo when we want to. And on top of that we have Mikoto that was like: I keep silent about it because the future should happen as a I see it. And to top it all off, how far away into the future can they see?

That's the other beef I had with it.

The Echo has been firmly established to work by reading the "memory" aether of either souls or the environment, so being able to predict the future is decidedly not something that falls within the scope of what it's previously been shown to be capable of doing and they didn't even bother trying to handwave it by saying it's predicting the flows of aether or some such (Which is how Xenoblade did it).

Well we do have Fordola with the made up echo that is able to have future sights when it was about her attacks. We had to use a device otherwise she just would have known how to stop us because she saw it coming.

I am not against adding to the echo. We have learned with Endwalker that you can see visions in different ways and we know that the echo worked different for people like Minfilia and Kryle too. Yet I am also not a fan of future sight. As in seeing it happening. Having that as being able to predict attacks is okay but Mikotos echo is too much imo.

[KageTokage]

Well we do have Fordola with the made up echo that is able to have future sights when it was about her attacks. We had to use a device otherwise she just would have known how to stop us because she saw it coming.

I am not against adding to the echo. We have learned with Endwalker that you can see visions in different ways and we know that the echo worked different for people like Minfilia and Kryle too. Yet I am also not a fan of future sight. As in seeing it happening. Having that as being able to predict attacks is okay but Mikotos echo is too much imo.

They at least had a simple explanation for why Fordola's ability worked, which was that the incorporeal aether mobilizes before the physical body which provided a very short term precognition in a logical manner.

XIV is very fond of trying to explain how magicks and other supernatural phenomena work at least on a surface level, so them just coming in saying absolute future sight is a thing without any explanation whatsoever about the "how" of it was really awkward.

[Luizgazen]

They at least had a simple explanation for why Fordola's ability worked, which was that the incorporeal aether mobilizes before the physical body which provided a very short term precognition in a logical manner.

XIV is very fond of trying to explain how magicks and other supernatural phenomena work at least on a surface level, so them just coming in saying absolute future sight is a thing without any explanation whatsoever about the "how" of it was really awkward.

That, and Fordola's "precognition" was just that she became able to see cast bars and aoes with the echo just like us

[Alleo]

They at least had a simple explanation for why Fordola's ability worked, which was that the incorporeal aether mobilizes before the physical body which provided a very short term precognition in a logical manner.

XIV is very fond of trying to explain how magicks and other supernatural phenomena work at least on a surface level, so them just coming in saying absolute future sight is a thing without any explanation whatsoever about the "how" of it was really awkward.

That is true. I am not a fan of the bozja storyline (too many moments where we stood around and let things happen) so that is just one part that I was like "really?".