What lore do you ignore?

[Lady_Silvermoon]

I don't really understand what that has to do with her thanking G'raha for what he did during Shadowbringers, but I'll try to clarify:

I should've maybe clarified that it's not while we meet Venat, but Hydaelyn. When we go to the Aetherial Sea together with the other Scions.

And my reason for why she'd thank him is because he basically saved the world. He did it together with the Sons of Saint Coinach and the Ironworks, of course, but those people weren't there when we met Hydaelyn. In a perfect story all the Scions would've been personally addressed for what they've done for the Star, but I think G'raha has really done the most considering how he travelled through time and space to prevent the 8th Umbral Calamity.

We don't know for sure if Hydaelyn would have "lost" if he hadn't done that, but we do know that she got a lot closer to "winning" by him doing it.

But he was predestined to do it. She set up the First to fall to light so that the WoL would die, so that the alternate timeline would figure out time travel, so that G'raha would come back to save the WoL, so that time travel is now available, so that the WoL can be sent back in time and tell her what she does so that she can do it. Thanking him would be like thanking a domino for falling over when pushed. Plus, I don't think she really cares about individuals. If she did she wouldn't have created seven worlds just to be smashed into the Source, not to mention what she allowed and/or instigated on the First and Thirteen.

So what would she be thanking him for? "Thank you for doing exactly what I set you up to do." If so, should she also thank the Ascians for destroying all the worlds she set them up to destroy right on schedule? Because literally everyone was unknowingly acting on her agenda. The WoL included.

[Iscah]

But he was predestined to do it.

You're blurring two things here: someone having knowledge of the future, and what causes people to act.

If there's some higher-level embodiment of Fate in this story's universe that drives people to act in a certain way, then Venat is as much a puppet as the rest. She is not the controller of fates and doesn't have influence over what other people will do; she's simply relying on the sequence of events in which things will happen as she has been told they will.

And if there is no driving force of fate, then there is only a world shaped moment-by-moment by the decisions of the people living in it, and those people are in control of their own path at the time they are taking it, no matter whether someone from the past has knowledge that they will do it in future, and no matter whether someone in the future knows that it happened in history.

G'raha did not somehow magically decide to save the world because Venat knew he would; he made that decision for himself, and Venat has learned about it as "future history". That is all.

[Lady_Silvermoon]

You're blurring two things here: someone having knowledge of the future, and what causes people to act.

If there's some higher-level embodiment of Fate in this story's universe that drives people to act in a certain way, then Venat is as much a puppet as the rest. She is not the controller of fates and doesn't have influence over what other people will do; she's simply relying on the sequence of events in which things will happen as she has been told they will.

And if there is no driving force of fate, then there is only a world shaped moment-by-moment by the decisions of the people living in it, and those people are in control of their own path at the time they are taking it, no matter whether someone from the past has knowledge that they will do it in future, and no matter whether someone in the future knows that it happened in history.

G'raha did not somehow magically decide to save the world because Venat knew he would; he made that decision for himself, and Venat has learned about it as "future history". That is all.

But without knowledge of "future history" you don't really have the choice to do anything differently. The only person that can choose to act differently is someone who knows what they did before and the results of their actions making Venat the only person with true agency in the FF14 universe. Everyone else is just following a script. We do what we do because it's what we've always done.

ETA: Actually that's not true. The WoL could also choose to act differently and chance the course of events because they also have knowledge of the future.

[Iscah]

But without knowledge of "future history" you don't really have the choice to do anything differently.

There is no need to do things "differently" though – that implies that something is happening a second time. There is only one moment in all of spacetime where G'raha makes his choice, and he chooses it for his own reasons, not because some distant observer is already aware of what he chose to do.

Venat is no mastermind of fates; she simply considers the future that you describe to her and accepts to take her part in it. If anything, she is the one who has lost agency of her own future and can now only play the part that has been told to her.

...or perhaps she did struggle against her dictated fate, and she was able to act differently and split off a timeline that we will never see but the ancients are saved ultimately due to the warning we gave to Venat – but that can't happen without the original timeline still happening as well.

[Lady_Silvermoon]

There is no need to do things "differently" though – that implies that something is happening a second time. There is only one moment in all of spacetime where G'raha makes his choice, and he chooses it for his own reasons, not because some distant observer is already aware of what he chose to do.

Venat is no mastermind of fates; she simply considers the future that you describe to her and accepts to take her part in it. If anything, she is the one who has lost agency of her own future and can now only play the part that has been told to her.

...or perhaps she did struggle against her dictated fate, and she was able to act differently and split off a timeline that we will never see but the ancients are saved ultimately due to the warning we gave to Venat – but that can't happen without the original timeline still happening as well.

G'raha chooses to do it because of every moment that led up to that moment. But the moments he's experiencing are being curated by a god aware of the future. Things are happening again and again because we're in a loop. We go to the past which prompts Venat to sunder the world and set up the Ascians to do the rejoinings, which leads to our creation, so we go back in time and tell her all this which prompts Venat to sunder the world.

The only people with enough knowledge of what's going on to break the loop are Venat and the WoL and while the WoL has chosen inaction, Venat has chosen to do everything in her power to maintain the loop. G'raha will always make the same choices because he's unaware of the loop. The only people capable of making different choices are those aware of the loop and that's Venat and the WoL.

Sure the WoL telling Themis and therefore the convocation about Meteion and Venat's plans to sunder the world *might* cause our timeline to end, which was a risk the people of G'raha's future were willing to take and commended for doing so. To plant seeds they'd never see grow. And both Shadowbringers and 6.5 taught me it's wrong to doom a world to save your own. Unless it's the Ancient world, I guess. Then it just can't be helped or changed or nothing. Just gotta accept the eradication of every man, woman and child without even clearing your throat and throwing a "by the way..." out there in an effort to help them.

Traversing space and time when it comes to saving the WoL, but pimp shrugs when it comes to saving the Ancients.

[Cleretic]

Venat is no mastermind of fates; she simply considers the future that you describe to her and accepts to take her part in it. If anything, she is the one who has lost agency of her own future and can now only play the part that has been told to her.

...or perhaps she did struggle against her dictated fate, and she was able to act differently and split off a timeline that we will never see but the ancients are saved ultimately due to the warning we gave to Venat – but that can't happen without the original timeline still happening as well.

My read is that she actually didn't do either of these. She doesn't accept her place in The Time Loop; the scene right after Ktisis basically has her saying that she'll look for other options if at all possible. It just seems like those options weren't really viable. ANd yet, we know she was pursuing them even before the Sundering, because of the Anamnesis Anyder discussion.

But even when we have completed the time loop, we know she's not sticking to it: remember that when we meet her in the Aetherial Sea, we learn that her plan is several layers more complicated, reliant on both events that happened afterwards that couldn't have been part of what we told her (specifically, tagging Meteion) and multiple factors we didn't even know were on the table after we left her alone (for example, the Ragnarok).

If she were simply following her assigned role with no agency, everyone would've been screwed: it was her rejecting that 'future history' being told to her and deciding to be more clever that anyone had a chance of survival anyway.

All this assumption about the time loop is predicated on the assumption that our intel was a perfect blueprint anyway, and the entirety of our eventual success was predicated on the fact it had massive holes: even assuming we were as exhaustive as possible, we had a very limited perspective, and gave her a history with a good ten thousand years of '???'. If your information on the time loop that you're allegedly in is so limited, how can you be sure that any deviation you even try to make wasn't just an unrealized part of the loop? Why can't you just try some stuff?

We explained Hydaelyn's Plan B to her, and then found out about the Plan A much later. How do we know we haven't been surrounded by the failed remnants of Plans C through W this whole time?

[Theodric]

We also know - as per the lore clarification Q&A released shortly after Endwalker - that Venat deliberately spared Emet-Selch and banked on him surviving as part of her plan. The Ascians were very much controlled opposition for Venat and she had prior knowledge as to what they would do in order to restore their loved ones.

Therefore, she is at least indirectly responsible for all of the blood upon their hands as well as the Ascians themselves being directly responsible.

If she was making a genuine effort to save the Ancients then she would never have withheld key information relating to the true cause behind the Final Days and she certainly would not have resorted to actively sabotaging their efforts to come up with solutions on their own.

Indeed, with every new scrap of information that is revealed it seems more and more likely that she always intended to resort to the Sundering and her feigned concerns towards the Ancients were simply a convenient excuse to get them out of the way through a cruel act of genocide complete with racial replacement and eugenics for good measure.

Unfortunately for the writers, not everybody falls for the 'bRAvE lItTlE SpArK' act because not everybody even self inserts into the story in the first place and even in cases where they do, their priority isn't necessarily seeking to imagine themselves working to please 'cRyStAl MoMmY'.

Which, I believe is a key point behind the disagreement. Some of us are discussing the story from the perspective in relation to how everything fits together and impacts the various characters and societies. Others are just flinging their hands up and automatically siding with the game's point of view characters and throwing anything and everything at the wall in order to come up with an excuse as to why the Ancients 'needed' to be wiped out. Sometimes as something to be cheered on, other times as a 'grim necessity'. Failing that, you then have certain posters who will fully imagine the Rejoinings as an act of genocide but pretend as if they don't see the equivalent, through the Sundering, as being the same thing. Convenient, that!

The funny - and rather sad - thing is that if Venat were actually properly criticised and held accountable for her actions then she'd be a lot more popular amongst those who take issue with her. Instead by having all her brutality hand waved and dismissed it just led to many an eye roll instead.

The game is exceedingly preachy at times and a lot of people stomached that on the basis of hoping for some consistency. Instead we get a story that ends up trying to pretend as if the character responsible for a horrific act of genocide 'tried her best' even as she sabotaged, lied to and betrayed her own people.

It doesn't work like that, I'm afraid. Still, with any luck the story will handle its characters with more dignity across the board moving forward. It certainly seems to be eager to embrace something of lesser stakes as of the upcoming expansion.

[Cleretic]

If she was making a genuine effort to save the Ancients then she would never have withheld key information relating to the true cause behind the Final Days and she certainly would not have resorted to actively sabotaging their efforts to come up with solutions on their own.

No.

She explains this, directly, after Ktisis.

Forename, listen to me. Our duty now is not to denounce Hermes for his misguided determination, or to convince Emet-Selch and Hythlodaeus that they have been deceived.

No, we must instead ensure that the experiences Hermes sought to expunge are preserved.

What remains in our memories alone will be our weapon against the Final Days.

You must fight this battle in your age, and I in mine...
Come, let us walk together once more. I will see you to the doors of Propylaion.

[...]

With Meteion free to pursue her designs, 'tis only a matter of time until the Final Days are upon us.

We must be ready. From fortifying our defenses to securing our escape, there is much to be done.

In spite of this, we cannot allow the report that set this calamity in motion to become common knowledge. Were the masses to learn the fates of the other stars, I fear the situation would spiral out of our control.

I must carefully consider who can be trusted, and bring them into the fold.

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.

Regardless of how we proceed, if we are to permanently avert the Final Days, we must be equal to Hermes's challenge. We must prove that mankind is worthy to exist.

And this hinges, I think, on how we confront the all-consuming despair that accompanies a senseless and seemingly inevitable end.

Bewildered and divided, we would perish like the peoples of those celestial ruins.

We could not hope to survive the Final Days, much less take the battle to Meteion at her nest.

We must find a way to defeat despair. To unite and prepare as many as possible for the struggle ahead.

Heavy will weigh the burden of guiding this legion of souls...

Yet I have faith in mankind's potential. As long as he believes in himself, there is naught he cannot achieve. So I will not give up on him. On us.

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.

Far from 'sabotaging' any effort to deal with the Final Days, she specifically went out of her way to get out of their way.

[Iscah]

Things are happening again and again because we're in a loop. We go to the past which prompts Venat to sunder the world and set up the Ascians to do the rejoinings, which leads to our creation, so we go back in time and tell her all this which prompts Venat to sunder the world.

The only people with enough knowledge of what's going on to break the loop are Venat and the WoL and while the WoL has chosen inaction, Venat has chosen to do everything in her power to maintain the loop.

The term "time loop" is a simplification. It's more like a series of interlocking time-travel-related events that make some people's path from "past" to "future" rather more squiggly than it is under normal circumstances, but that doesn't mean that the people are stuck in a loop or living through the same events multiple times.

Venat is not seeking to maintain some trapping loop indefinitely, but to ensure that in this one sequence of events, things play out as you told her they would and will lead back to your existence and your seeking her help in Elpis. Once the world has reached that point, the history she knows is over and everything else is up to you.

What are you thinking a time loop would even look like? Do you think Venat is somehow stopping time from progressing beyond the point where we travel back to Elpis? Why would she do that? Her end goal is saving all of humanity (which, whether we agree or not, she sees as continuous with her own ancient race), and the route to do so is equipping you with the knowledge that you need and then trusting in you to defeat Meteion.

Additionally, the WoL does not "choose inaction" in Elpis but has no choice but inaction. This is a vision of the past and they need to learn what happens in this timeline's past. There is nothing to be prevented, because it already happened, and even Elidibus warns you of this before you enter the portal - that you cannot change the tragic outcome, only observe it. Our time to act is in the present, not the past.

[Lady_Silvermoon]

No.

She explains this, directly, after Ktisis.



Far from 'sabotaging' any effort to deal with the Final Days, she specifically went out of her way to get out of their way.

She says this as she's shuffling off the one person with knowledge of the future and thus the ability to alter events back to their own time. Then she proceeds to not make a single verifiable attempt to change the future and several known acts to ensure things went down the way you told her.

Her words at face value make you think she's preparing to fight Meteion, but when you look at her actions you realize her words were just to placate the WoL and get them out of the way so she could go do her genocide without her pesky little champion warning anyone else. This is the 40th half-truth she's thrown our way. Just like all the other half-truths she's told us on our journey.

We even offer to stay and help. Wonder why she didn't accept...

*snip*

By time loop, I mean she enacts what is required to ensure she becomes a god and the reigning beings on the planet and their environment are shaped by her hand. You know, what Athena wanted to do, but somehow good for some reason when Venat does it. You can assure me til the cows come home that parallel timelines exist when it's time to save the WoL but we're locked in a loop, helpless to save the Ancients all you want, but I'm gonna need an explanation as to why that would be true. And let's say it is, no matter what we do or try Venat exterminates her people. Then why aren't we screaming from the rafters mommy goddess is about to kill the lot of them since nothing we do can change the past anyway? It's because we could change the past, but we are actively choosing to keep our mouth shut cause we need Azem dead for parts.

And given we've already observed G'raha change the future without ending his existence, the fact we're not even trying is unforgivable. G'raha knew there was a chance he'd wipe himself from existence, but he tried anyway, because it was the right thing to do. But in Endwalker I guess the right thing to do is to hang out with a child that idolizes you and do literally nothing to attempt to stop him from a fate worse than death.

ETA: It just hit me that had we kept our mouths shut in the first place we wouldn't have given mommy goddess the necessary steps to eradicate her people. So we open our mouths to cause genocide, but we're suddenly able to keep our mouths shut when it comes to preventing it? How convenient...