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

[Theodric]

At the end of the day this is also a thread about Endwalker's issues as a whole. Venat comes up often because of how much agency she has in the entire plot. I think that it's pretty bizarre to pretend as if she's being unfairly singled out on that basis alone when the game bent over backwards to tie her - and the player character - to so many different aspects of the story to a such lofty a degree.

Furthermore as can be witnessed throughout the entirety of this thread there are many different reasons outlined as to why Endwalker didn't land for particular individuals. Sometimes there is firm alignment and agreement, at other times there is not. Though understandably this thread is a place for people to express their concerns with the story and they will continue to do as much for as long as it exists.

[Turtledeluxe]

- I don't remember HW that well, but Yotsuyu needed aether crystals, not one person.

- If you don't associate more == morally superior, then why bring it up? I never said more, you did.

- What's comical is that you don't search reddit threads. The game gives you reasons to think Hydaelyn is evil/suspicious and you can find reddit threads about it spanning, probably, the whole game's existence (in years). Maybe you weren't suspicious, idk.

- He requires half of the world just to be summoned and he tempers because he's a summon. We know from the MSQ uncontrollable tempering begets more tempering. Maybe WoL should've told Venat how to deal with tempering. As far as additional sacrifices, they were scheduled to happen so I'm not sure what's confusing about that. "This resulted in a series of sacrifices, first by offering another half of their population to restore Etheirys to habitability, and the plan on harvesting the lives of the new races that would develop on the planet in the future to resurrect those they had sacrificed earlier." Sounds like genocide to me, but again you all aren't actually concerned with genocide so why would you notice? Taking even half the population is outrageous, even if they were willing, because we have no idea if those people even understood what they were signing up for beyond "instant solution".

- Who cares[ if her decision was right? Endwalker is asking everyone to make their own decision about who was right or wrong in the Ascian conflict. There's no "I hate Emet" text button either as far as I know, and characters even dignify him with understanding, despite retaliating with yet more cycles of genocide. Whether I think it's right or you think it's right doesn't matter because Endwalker is not a morality pageant contest furthermore-- by subjecting yourself the tribalism of it all you're missing the whole point that no one was right. It's a trick question.

- What does the quote provided to do with anything? It says to make your own theory and "maybe Venat was working behind the scenes". That's not definitive declaration "Venat was preserving the timeline of events".

- A tangent but have you considered too much interference with the future in the Elpis timeline would mean the WoL never exists and create an inconsistency that doesn't work with this game???

-The Ancients coming up with a solution to Zodiark or the Final Days is conjecture and, imo, not relevant only because I interpret Elidibus's statements to mean the Elpis visit lacked any potential to change the future-- that the Final Days were an inevitable reality. Fate is a very common topic in FF so maybe I'm biased (I play the other games) but I don't think time travel can change fate in a particular timeline. As you've noted, maybe a timeline divergence can happen that results in a different future for that alternate timeline. But that's different from taking the original timeline of the sundering for example and just redoing it with a new future without establishing a deviation. I personally think the Elpis visit created a deviant timeline that spans the range of our visit and conjoined with our present MSQ time (which is the future of the original timeline). In that sense in terms of the present MSQ, there's still a Venat in the past who made the decision to sunder with no future knowledge (and as I've said I also think the walking sequence is depicting this based on the dialogue and the vocal delivery) and there's our new conjoined timeline which puts everyone on the same page and results in a new future. I think that's why Venat mentions a conjunction of time. It was a fanservicey way to have us experience Elpis without breaking the lore (we were literally Azem so a single timeloop paradox doesn't make sense to me). <--- This drives a lot of my takes btw and I understand not everyone sees the events this way.

[Turtledeluxe]

- As far as the other antagonists, they are eventually treated as normal and we kill Hydaelyn almost immediately after unmasking her. I'm not sure what more you want. She's dead-- Durante isn't, Zenos died willingly, and Emet was temporarily psycho at the time so it was unavoidable. You interpret the final scene as comforting to her or something-- I interpreted it as complicated and bittersweet. I loved it. But I guess your perception of it is colored by whether or not you think the sundering occurred with knowledge of the future and accept the time paradox it requires. For me there's always going to be the default Venat who didn't have the future hints. That's why again, I'm not overall concerned with the "what if's" because for me that timeline got cut off and conjoined with ours-- it didn't have a future.

- I'm not sure how many times the game needs to ask you to judge Hydaelyn.

- Being arrogant is not an excuse, it's just the source of many of the problems of that era because they were so high on the hierarchy of needs. It definitely gave Hermes room to ruminate and motivated him to threaten the existence of the universe, for example. A lot of our time in Elpis was meant to explore this idea, because Elpis seems so perfect and being a god seems ideal. Yet it had unanticipated downsides and led to severely irrational decisions in multiple instances, not just with Venat. That's why I'm not particularly concerned with Venat because the messages and themes in Endwalker were not really about her possible motivations after the Elpis visit and whether that was the real history.

[Xirean]

Quick question Turtle. Is the reason you refuse to see it as a true loop because it removes the genesis of the knowledge? You mentioned you prefer the idea that a Venat exists without the future hints. Does that mean you reject the idea that the game you played through could have contained future hints for Venat explicitly because you just think she didn't?

[Nayukhuut]

Don't give me hope that this happens. The moment it does then there no longer exist any reason to prevent the summoning/sundering by going back to Elpis. If they ever actually make multi timelines truly Canon then we better go back and fix that event.

Sadly, if/when we do go there it will prolly be just to back up that Venat was correct and and that the timeline went to rubble without her plan. I like your idea more, but I have seen how the writing has gone these past few patches. Heck, they wouldn't even let the Ancients live on in Ultima Thule, and we saved the rest of the supposedly doomed races there.

[Turtledeluxe]

Quick question Turtle. Is the reason you refuse to see it as a true loop because it removes the genesis of the knowledge? You mentioned you prefer the idea that a Venat exists without the future hints. Does that mean you reject the idea that the game you played through could have contained future hints for Venat explicitly because you just think she didn't?

It isn't really a refusal. It's how I interpreted the scene. To expound, everyone here is saying Venat didn't warn anyone and didn't do anything. Since there is no direct evidence of that (maybe she did and they still failed) I'm assuning this idea is based on the fact that immediately after we leave Elpis, the walk scene happens? It feels far too jarring imo for the writers to seriously be implying Venat knowingly repeated the exact same behavior after WoL leaves. To me it just felt like fanservice. It was just an abstraction bc fans always have always wanted a visual depiction of the sundering.

As far as Venat existing without the future hints, it's hard to explain. My thinking on this is:

- We are in the original timeline (MSQ)
- We time travel in this timeline to the past
- This creates an alternate timeline /deviation because, as I have mentioned, we already existed in Elpis as Azem although we are not shown in the Elpis trip (for this reason)
- Once we return to our timeline, because of a plot Mcguffin, this deviated timeline conjoins to MSQ original timeline

So the past of the MsQ plot is the original past (us as Azem, no future visit) , the present is a conjoined present (hence why we can visit Elpis and have the raids etc). I think this for several reasons

-- Venat in the present MSQ calls out a conjunction twice if I am not mistaken
-- the writers needed a way to have you directly play the cause of the Final Days bc there is NO way to just have it told to you
-- involving you as your own player character causes continuity issues with SHB so they had to wipe Emet and Hythlodeus's memories specifically
-- Venat's memory being kept in tact is needlessly problematic, to everyone's point, and again seemed like fanservice to enhance the emotional impact of the trial
-- As I've mentioned we were Azem...along with Ardbert and Golbez, and whoever is on the remaining reflections
- The writers themselves won't admit it because it's a cluster fuck that barely makes sense, not to withhold mystery

I can go on. There's lots of reasons I have this complicated view that basically boil down to fanservice, gameplay convenience, continuity issues, etc. It doesn't really have to do with saving Venat's character or the genesis of the knowledge.

I genuinely don't think Venat is meant to be saved. I don't even think of her as a protagonist. She's a misguided antagonist, like many of the Ancients. I think she had this idea based on her traveling that she couldn't leave the star because of a romantic idea that her passion for living, endless optimism etc were somehow essential to culture at large. And that ambition/self involvement exploded when she became Hydaelyn. I think given that its a 10 year old game there are lots of quotes you can likely pull that paint her this way or that-- but for EW I feel like they were trying to make her overall motivations/reactions what you see in the sundering sequence (and afterward) and in the trial. Someone who is sort of resigned, did their best to fend off the rejoining, knows they fucked up, and finally accepts that humanity doesn't need her. I don't think she's only crying because it's goodbye, but also because it's the end of her narcissism. It's like someone crying not for the victims but because they got caught in a way. But I also think that's why she's an amazing character, because the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

[Xirean]

-- As I've mentioned we were Azem...along with Ardbert and Golbez, and whoever is on the remaining reflections

Ok I really need you to explain why you keep sticking to the idea that the WoL is not in Elpis but is instead inhabiting Azem. We see the WoL travel to Elpis and appear as a mini ghost who then gets noticed by Hyth and Emit (noting the familiarity of the WoL's soul to that of Azem), enlarged & made solid, given clothes to better blend in despite everyone we talk to being able to instantly recognize as a familiar and specifically not "a person", compared to Meteion in regards to the lacking of aether, repeatedly badjured by Emet to explain who we are and what we are doing, and directly called out by Venat because she recognizes the ward on us.

Please help me understand what part of any of that allows for the non inclusion of literal time travel but also taking the place of any character besides the WoL and not Azem who is notably talked about as not being there by Venat, Hyth, and Emet.

[Turtledeluxe]

Ok I really need you to explain why you keep sticking to the idea that the WoL is not in Elpis but is instead inhabiting Azem. We see the WoL travel to Elpis and appear as a mini ghost who then gets noticed by Hyth and Emit (noting the familiarity of the WoL's soul to that of Azem), enlarged & made solid, given clothes to better blend in despite everyone we talk to being able to instantly recognize as a familiar and specifically not "a person", compared to Meteion in regards to the lacking of aether, repeatedly badjured by Emet to explain who we are and what we are doing, and directly called out by Venat because she recognizes the ward on us.

Please help me understand what part of any of that allows for the non inclusion of literal time travel but also taking the place of any character besides the WoL and not Azem who is notably talked about as not being there by Venat, Hyth, and Emet.

We are a reincarnation of Azem. That's why our soul is familiar. I'm confused as to why you are confused. The only thing I said that's controversial is Golbez is also a reincarnation because it's not exactly confirmed, but it's imo it's heavily implied as he's a paragon of virtue who goes unidentified for no reason and has their voice hidden. The fact Ardbert and WoL are literally Azem is well established.

I suppose you could argue we were Azem at some other time, but I don't buy that. I think the reason Hythlodeus mentions it and the reason they specifically denote Azem isn't around is because Azem is the unsundered version of all their shards in the reflections. In other words it would have been weird because they're us...seems like a pointless way to muddy the moment.

"With Ardbert speaking through the Warrior, Emet-Selch momentarily saw an Amaurotine who was an old friend of his in the Warrior's place. In truth the Warrior, and thus Ardbert as well, was a reincarnation of Azem, the fourteenth member of the Convocation of Fourteen from the ancient Amaurot."

This is from the wiki btw. My point being I was not aware it was controversial. The reason it is thinner btw is bc..you know..the sundering. You know we aren't a familiar and don't just happen to feel familiar to Azem lol.

And if you disagree and think the various hints in SHB and post SHB don't confirm it. Why exactly is Azem kept such a secret with the arc officially over? You know it, I know it. We were Azem. I never said it meant we can't time travel. I said it necessitates that the time travel create a deviation

Tbh I'm unsure why anyone would want to believe the literal WoL existed in Elpis. It's terrible writing. Just regard the Elpis visit timeline as a limited alternate fanservice thing that gets tacked onto MSQ for effect and honestly EW is great. I'm quite serious in that I really think all the Elpis stuff was really just an excuse so we could play it and meet the Ancients as our character. That's why I don't understand why people are so heated about it.

[Xirean]

Sir do you not remember the words you type and what they mean?

I played the game where it's casually hinted at multiple times that we were Azem. It's not possible the WoL existed in Elpis-- they're a sundered being.

Do you understand that the WoL was very literally in Elpis or not? Bad writing or not aside, do you understand that the WoL canonically existed in Elpis for the duration of the Elpis MSQ as a direct result of actual canonical time travel?

You keep saying these random things and going off on tangents about them. Kindly please stop doing that.

[Turtledeluxe]

Sir do you not remember the words you type and what they mean?


Do you understand that the WoL was very literally in Elpis or not? Bad writing or not aside, do you understand that the WoL canonically existed in Elpis for the duration of the Elpis MSQ as a direct result of actual canonical time travel?

You keep saying these random things and going off on tangents about them. Kindly please stop doing that.

Yes, I've said repeatedly that we time travel to Elpis. But my point is that, it doesn't make us part of the actual history. You can think that, I don't think that for all the reasons I've cited.

And I think every time someone "recognizes us" what they're reacting to is Azem. In the same way Hythlodeus does.

I guess I used the wrong wording. I meant we didn't exist in the past of Elpis as WoL, but rather Azem. As in the past PRE VISIT. The months, weeks, days, hours, seconds prior. We were Azem. We were likely Azem when we visited. That probably sounds confusing but I don't know how else to explain it. I'm referring to the time period. When we visit, the unsundered Azem wandering around but not shown, is actually us. We are there as well as WoL, so it's like we exist twice in the same space.

That's why Hythlodeus jumps on us for being a thinner Azem. Because we are.