On Themis [6.4 SPOILER]

[jameseoakes]

We saw her agonize over who to bring into the fold, terrified that alienating Hermes from the convocation or allowing him to find out that his own "unbiased test" had become compromised would lead to the entire society finding out the results of Meteion's survey and not only undermine her mission to save them, but create conditions that destroyed the Warrior of Light's one chance to defeat Meteion (which was itself set in motion by her future self)

Where do we see this, we don't see anything of Venat trying to mitigate the end of days we just seem to get her wilfully withholding information so they have to suffer the full horrors of the end of days and allowing the insane monster that caused this to enter high office. The game seems to show very little on her effort to evert the End of Days

[Anonymoose]

We saw Venat tell the Warrior of Light she wouldn't take their story for granted and would try to change the fate of the ancients, only to fail. We saw her agonize over who to bring into the fold, terrified that alienating Hermes from the convocation or allowing him to find out that his own "unbiased test" had become compromised would lead to the entire society finding out the results of Meteion's survey and not only undermine her mission to save them, but create conditions that would destroy even the Warrior of Light's one chance to defeat Meteion (which was itself set in motion by her future self)

Where do we see this, we don't see anything of Venat trying to mitigate the end of days we just seem to get her wilfully withholding information so they have to suffer the full horrors of the end of days and allowing the insane monster that caused this to enter high office. The game seems to show very little on her effort to evert the End of Day

I'm not even paraphrasing, to be honest, I'm directly quoting in-game text. It just goes by quickly and people who want to ignore it...do. It's all from the same speech, directly after the memory wipe.

She says, "You may find your world to be very different. Or perhaps the erasure of our friends' memories has sown the seeds of a conjunction between us. We cannot know until the moment is at hand. So shall I strive to do my best, taking naught for granted as I walk my path." If you read the different languages, she specifies in some that the WoL's story of what will come to pass is one of the things she will take as not-guaranteed in her attempt to change things.

She says, "Ordinarily, I wouldn't hesitate to call upon the Fourteen. However, it was the desire for a fair determination that drove Hermes to attempt to erase our memories; were he made aware of his actions, there is no telling whether he would remain a friend or become a foe. Alternately, we might try to alienate him from the Convocation. Yet in doing so, we would deprive ourselves of a brilliant mind who would be invaluable in the crises to come. Quite the dilemma... Which is why I must work independently of the Convocation." Again, reading the different languages highlights different specifics in each, with her saying that the results of Meteion's survey led one man to make this mess, so the whole society knowing will almost surely cause the situation to spin out of anyone and everyone's ability to influence and play right into Meteion's hands. And, moreover, since he has experience with dynamis and (whether he ever discovers it or not) the problem is dynamis, he may be of value to the altered course if she can alter it. And he is uniquely qualified to be Fandaniel in the first place, so it might be worse to rob the Convocation of a competent Fandaniel in the other respects he is qualified for.

Is that all convoluted writing that probably exists just to justify having an arc of the story take place in Elpis hanging out with the ancients at all? Probably.

Do we blow by her justifications very quickly? For sure.

But is it "not trying to mitigate the end of days" and "willfully withholding information so they suffer the full horrors of the end of days"? I would disagree with you there.

Addendum: In retrospect, given the convoluted nature of the whole arc, my personal question would probably be "Why didn't she lie more?" Why didn't she give some information, withhold some, and do everything she could to prevent them from finding out the whole situation, hoping they got everything they needed to create a better outcome, but none of the stuff that would risk it going out of control? She did that to the Warrior of Light for the whole game. (Granted, Hydaelyn couldn't have told you anything SE didn't t know.) But maybe that's a lot harder to do when you're up against the combined intellectual and investigative might of the Convocation of Fourteen. Even if she were to encourage them to use the Echo to prove some of her claims, it would also reveal the things she's afraid would undermine not only her efforts to change her people's course, buy ALSO the one known future where Meteion's defeat is possible.

[Cleretic]

But maybe that's a lot harder to do when you're up against the combined intellectual and investigative might of the Convocation of Fourteen. Even if she were to encourage them to use the Echo to prove some of her claims, it would also reveal the things she's afraid would undermine not only her efforts to change her people's course, buy ALSO the one known future where Meteion's defeat is possible.

Yeah, this is exactly it. A lot of the story around Venat, including the question of 'why didn't she lie to them', is answered by the Convocation (and Ancients as a whole, really) having really, really good tools for fact-checking each other. Post-sundering, both she and the Ascians can and do lie to us pretty readily (mostly through lies of omission), because our tools to verify them are pretty poor, but the Ancients have both really reliable recording devices and a very refined Echo that lets them sniff out this stuff pretty well. So Venat's only option at first is basically silence and secrecy; she can't risk the public at large hearing the truth and having a freakout, and she can't tell anything to the Convocation because Hermes needs to remain both in his seat and in a healthy state of mind.

Going by the Anamnesis scene, those fell away over time, either out of desperation or knowledge that's no longer a relevant concern. But that's why her plan is how it is from the jump.