Garlemald's situation. (Spoilers 6.55)

[Cleretic]

EDIT: I just thought of a much closer comparison: the political conflict between the Monetarists and Royalists of Ul'dah, at the time of Endwalker. A serious dispute that formed the basis of several important plot points in ARR and Heavensward, but by the time of Endwalker (or even Shadowbringers) it's kind of minor and irrelevant, compared to the Final Days.

An example that I'd point out is the only 'political party' that actually got proper spotlight in Endwalker (and the one I'm most confident is actually a political party): The Bibliothecs, in Sharlayan. Out of all known political groups they're probably the one with the most cohesive known platform, as well as debatably the one we can most quantify in terms of members and influence if we're really clever about political analysis. And their place as basically Astrologian's antagonist gives us a decent window into how they work.

But even though they're around, named and even seen in Endwalker, they don't actually get a whole lot of spotlight. Because ultimately, the level that political parties/movements mostly work on just don't really exist for a story like the one we're playing. Our main area is basically international relations, so we know how each nations' political forces operate there as well as a couple region-specific issues, but everything else just doesn't really matter to us. I'd argue that it never could've; even a theoretical version of 5.0/6.0 that focused much more on Garlemald wouldn't have done much more with them.

I hate that we spend so little of the Garlemald content talking about the incidentally-liberated slaves down in the oil fields, but I also don't think the story ever actually had much scope to talk about them.

[Denishia]

I hate that we spend so little of the Garlemald content talking about the incidentally-liberated slaves down in the oil fields, but I also don't think the story ever actually had much scope to talk about them.

:laughs: I admit I'm particularly bitter about them not only because they're more sympathetic to me, that I'm more interested in the vassal states and former colonies of Garlemald than Garlemald proper (and of Garlemald itself, the culture and history of the Republic Era), but because of where I live, having the fantasy oil/natural gas refinery equivalent be regulated to a single side-quest series about getting the plant back online without more exploration of daily life and health impacts or its influence on political policy was deeply disappointing. Nor did they have any lines during the meeting with Vrtra to outline Garlemald's future. But that comes with living at one end of a port city's Refinery Row where there is more than twenty plants or installations of various sizes and output that I must drive past before reaching downtown. Outsized impact and all that. I'm sure if one of the subplots in Dawntrail is about environmental impacts of cerulean drilling, people will complain about yet another rehash of VII's Shinra. But I hope that if/when they do will also be when the story loops back to pull Jareck and the others of Tapper's Den back into the narrative. A single quest line objective where we ask for their opinions when learning about North Tural probably.

[MikkoAkure]

I'm sure if one of the subplots in Dawntrail is about environmental impacts of cerulean drilling, people will complain about yet another rehash of VII's Shinra. But I hope that if/when they do will also be when the story loops back to pull Jareck and the others of Tapper's Den back into the narrative. A single quest line objective where we ask for their opinions when learning about North Tural probably.

SE has had the chance to make that kind of subplot about ceruleum's possible environmental impact for over a decade because Ul'dah has been drilling for it in their own backyard since 1.0.

It would be awkward if it suddenly becomes a problem when we already have had a zone completely devoted to ceruleum since ARR and seen the derricks since 1.0. It would be nice if they bring that stuff back to ARR zones and give us some Duskwight lore while they're at it since they don't exist at all outside ARR, but after giving us flying there I feel like they might be done.

[Cleretic]

SE has had the chance to make that kind of subplot about ceruleum's possible environmental impact for over a decade because Ul'dah has been drilling for it in their own backyard since 1.0.

It would be awkward if it suddenly becomes a problem when we already have had a zone completely devoted to ceruleum since ARR and seen the derricks since 1.0. It would be nice if they bring that stuff back to ARR zones and give us some Duskwight lore while they're at it since they don't exist at all outside ARR, but after giving us flying there I feel like they might be done.

While I don't think that's what they're doing for exactly the reason you say, I do think you could pitch doing an environmantal impact angle for Shaaloani in a way that wouldn't bring in a 'hey wait a minute' response around the other ceruleum operations.

Specifically, the fact both of the ceruleum drilling operations we've been to are in places that are pretty dead. While there are lively deserts and lively parts of the Thanalan, Northern Thanalan isn't one of them, and Garlemald is pretty famously full of nothing but ice and hatred of all living things. If it turns out that ceruleum drilling blights the soil or something, it would make sense why that only comes up in Shaaloani, a place with light but healthy vegetation, but never before then.

[Heroman3003]

While I don't think that's what they're doing for exactly the reason you say, I do think you could pitch doing an environmantal impact angle for Shaaloani in a way that wouldn't bring in a 'hey wait a minute' response around the other ceruleum operations.

Specifically, the fact both of the ceruleum drilling operations we've been to are in places that are pretty dead. While there are lively deserts and lively parts of the Thanalan, Northern Thanalan isn't one of them, and Garlemald is pretty famously full of nothing but ice and hatred of all living things. If it turns out that ceruleum drilling blights the soil or something, it would make sense why that only comes up in Shaaloani, a place with light but healthy vegetation, but never before then.

Well, big part of Garlean lore was that the land was already like that when they first arrived and had to survive off of it, and discovery of ceruleum and magitek is what basically turned things around. So it's definitely not ceruleum that's at fault for Garlemald's barren nature

[Jade_Tyrant]

Well, big part of Garlean lore was that the land was already like that when they first arrived and had to survive off of it, and discovery of ceruleum and magitek is what basically turned things around. So it's definitely not ceruleum that's at fault for Garlemald's barren nature

I think the point was moreso that "ceruleum blights the soil" would be a non-issue in Garlemald because it's already barren, rather than it being the cause of it - and that being part of the reason for why it didn't come up previously.

[Denishia]

Look, I've had to deal with too many "If you live downstream of This Point, you need to Boil all your Water until we tell you not to" in the years that I have next to the twenty plus refineries that coupled with the fact that over and over again XIV has shown the body-and-mind warping effects of too much aspected aether concentrated in one locale or person, that the ceruleum drilling is sitting there like leaded gasoline waiting for a subplot to center around it. Even if it's just overcautious fears and debates.

[Cleretic]

I think the point was moreso that "ceruleum blights the soil" would be a non-issue in Garlemald because it's already barren, rather than it being the cause of it - and that being part of the reason for why it didn't come up previously.

Yeah, this is what I meant. There's not much ecosystem to destroy in either of those places, so if that's a side-effect of ceruleum drilling, it makes sense why it wouldn't come up.

Look, I've had to deal with too many "If you live downstream of This Point, you need to Boil all your Water until we tell you not to" in the years that I have next to the twenty plus refineries that coupled with the fact that over and over again XIV has shown the body-and-mind warping effects of too much aspected aether concentrated in one locale or person, that the ceruleum drilling is sitting there like leaded gasoline waiting for a subplot to center around it. Even if it's just overcautious fears and debates.

That said, I actually didn't think of 'downstream effects' on places close to the drilling operations that aren't the sites themselves. That also makes some amount of sense for not coming up in the places we've been, but I feel like if one were so inclined to write it, there'd be some potential in an area near Garlemald specifically. Northern Thanalan still seems a bit too remote and empty of imperiled things, but being that Garlemald's operation was on a lake there actually would be a 'downstream'.

[Cilia]

On point: the nation Wuk Lamat's brother wants to conquer hasn't been clarified, and the story is framed as him wanting to go after Aldenard / Ilsabard in general. The offscreen war with Garlemald during Shadowbringers and the Telophori / Final Days conflict that followed no doubt drained the military strength of all nations involved, which would make them easy pickings for anyone looking to invade (supposing their own nation wasn't hit by the Song of Oblivion).

Reprisals by former vassal states against Garlemald are a concern, but said former vassal states are probably more concerned with rebuilding at the moment; either way I don't expect it'll come into play until a later date (7.4+), if at all.

Well, big part of Garlean lore was that the land was already like that when they first arrived and had to survive off of it, and discovery of ceruleum and magitek is what basically turned things around.

To clarify: Garlemald has used ceruleum as heating fuel for centuries since its founding after the Corvosi pushed them out of Locus Amoenus / Corvos (the Lore Book(s) have an exact date, I think, but I don't have them). Solus (Emet-Selch) only introduced them to magitek ~60 years ago. Whatever process they use to refine it has very likely changed since, but it's been used for a long, long time.

Garlemald's barrenness is entirely a consequence of its frigid climate.

[Denishia]

The drilling side effects would be different (again, personal regional experience is all the offshore drilling and that brand of environmental disaster especially when the other cornerstone economy is the shrimping fleet and other commercial fishing activity that isn't too happy when one of those oil rigs has a little accident.) And it is something about the world-building that vaguely pegs to me that the writers are Japanese where the mining for coal and oil is and was historically minuscule and the social conscience of power plants and energy production/environmental sign effects are dominated by nuclear power plants.

The impact is a bit different going through a region that has the miles of scarring from strip mining where you can see the slices of mountains missing like you do in the Northwestern area of the Great Plains or the depressed former coal mining regions that are so familiar a setting and trope to English-speaking writers thanks to either Appalachia or Northern England/Wales - and funnily enough I felt that zone that resonated with that particular feeling was Kholusia and Twine and not Northern Thanalan or Garlemald. Probably because the Eorzean setting is, if anything, at the start of the Industrial Revolution rather than post.

Two regions that Tural is drawing for inspiration are obviously the Amazon in Brazil and the Lower Great Plains into the Southwest of the US/Mexico - both regions where extensive detrimental environmental impact due to commercial resource gathering on massive scales have shaped and are shaping the landscape and cultures. And we see that real world inspiration in the wooden ceruleum drilling rigs in Shaalonai. But a driving factor in those dynamics was colonization and imperialism. Which I will find interesting to see if and how such topics are brought up and explored in Dawntrail, which as far as we know doesn't have that as the major internal factor. (Unless that's part of why the Not-Incas fell and tied to the mystery of Solution Nine).

But! Former Garlean provinces in Ilsabard were colonized and would be ripe for stories of "that flat straight brown mountain top/cliff didn't look like that fifty years ago for an obvious reason" and "yeah the Garleans and their tech brought economic prosperity - for a select few and mostly themselves and now that the industry as collapsed we're left with the poisoned remains and the mine that still on-fire". The curiosity for me is on how they frame the central political conflicts of Dawntrail and Tural on tradition versus progress with regards to environmental preservation and exploitation, because it won't be a straight copy of the Americas. And if a later expansion will go back to Ilsabard and the former conquered territories - or if the game never does so because Stormblood and the Bozjan/Werlyt portions of Shadowbringers have thoroughly exhausted the well of stories dealing with the effects of empire.