Let's play a game: Save the Ancients!

[Cleretic]

No, I obviously meant leave it for the Convocation [primarily Emet and Elidibus] to find after we're gone detailing what happened in Ktisis,I can't understand how you didn't get that.

I took it to mean 'a message in the bottle to the Scions' because it was the only thing that made sense with your logic, even if it was still a flawed and bad idea. You used 'them', and it was ambiguous, so I jumped to what I thought was the rational conclusion. I'm sorry that I assumed you made a better argument than you did.

A message in a bottle to the Convocation is so much worse in such fundamental ways that I'm not sure you understand how anything works. Because the timeline split wouldn't be 'Nabriales looked at a crystal', that's not the thing that changed: it would be 'the WoL put a memory crystal in the mail'. By making and leaving the crystal, you would by nature be stranding yourself.

And not only that, you would be stranding yourself in an effort that makes the problem worse. There's a reason Venat doesn't tell them.

[SannaR]

I took it to mean 'a message in the bottle to the Scions' because it was the only thing that made sense with your logic, even if it was still a flawed and bad idea. You used 'them', and it was ambiguous, so I jumped to what I thought was the rational conclusion. I'm sorry that I assumed you made a better argument than you did.

A message in a bottle to the Convocation is so much worse in such fundamental ways that I'm not sure you understand how anything works. Because the timeline split wouldn't be 'Nabriales looked at a crystal', that's not the thing that changed: it would be 'the WoL put a memory crystal in the mail'. By making and leaving the crystal, you would by nature be stranding yourself.

And not only that, you would be stranding yourself in an effort that makes the problem worse. There's a reason Venat doesn't tell them.

Not sure how I understood redheadturk but anyway I think he means to somehow chuck it into the Aetherial Sea while time magics are on it? Though I do think he suggested at one point to make one around the time we're finishing up with Pandeamonium. You know make a memory crystal and "accidentally" drop it as you say goodbye to Elidibus and Lahabrea while the WoL is still in the past. Have the WoL fringe ignorance if either of them notice we dropped something. We know the briefing about Pandeamonium happens some time before the Final Days so they would be able to be slightly warned ahead of time. Not that I like Lahabrea, but if he is able to kill his wife and keep it a secret from the rest of the Convocation I'm sure he'd be able to use some tact if he saw/heard what was on the crystal. Elidibus also probably would know how to be smart about what's on the memory crystal.

[Cleretic]

Not sure how I understood redheadturk but anyway I think he means to somehow chuck it into the Aetherial Sea while time magics are on it? Though I do think he suggested at one point to make one around the time we're finishing up with Pandeamonium. You know make a memory crystal and "accidentally" drop it as you say goodbye to Elidibus and Lahabrea while the WoL is still in the past. Have the WoL fringe ignorance if either of them notice we dropped something. We know the briefing about Pandeamonium happens some time before the Final Days so they would be able to be slightly warned ahead of time. Not that I like Lahabrea, but if he is able to kill his wife and keep it a secret from the rest of the Convocation I'm sure he'd be able to use some tact if he saw/heard what was on the crystal. Elidibus also probably would know how to be smart about what's on the memory crystal.

That's still dumb, still gonna strand them, it's just leaving Wuk Lamat in the lurch rather than an entire planet. Also possibly Zero, Vrtra, Azdaja, the entire Thirteenth and probably the Twelve, depending on how you sequence your 6.x. And I'm not even gonna touch 'just use time magic to do the thing from the present', because I'm not even sure that's physically possible for anyone in the game world.

FFXIV's time travel mechanics just don't allow for this approach to work while still going back to the present day to participate in the actual game. And that's even putting aside that I don't actually expect it to work; I don't think you can butterfly effect your way to a good end for the Ancients if you're starting after the Meteia have launched, even if I do think Lahabrea might be the best Convocation member to tell. Venat is neither evil, or stupid; in fact, she's better-equipped than any of us to solve that problem, and still couldn't.

I feel like, if you're introducing the actual stakes of FFXIV time travel to this hypothetical (as opposed to a vague detached god-view of it, which I took the original point of the thread to be), you'd better have a perfect way to stop it. And it has become abundantly clear that nobody does.

[ZavosEsperian]

That's still dumb, still gonna strand them, it's just leaving Wuk Lamat in the lurch rather than an entire planet. Also possibly Zero, Vrtra, Azdaja, the entire Thirteenth and probably the Twelve, depending on how you sequence your 6.x. And I'm not even gonna touch 'just use time magic to do the thing from the present', because I'm not even sure that's physically possible for anyone in the game world.

FFXIV's time travel mechanics just don't allow for this approach to work while still going back to the present day to participate in the actual game. And that's even putting aside that I don't actually expect it to work; I don't think you can butterfly effect your way to a good end for the Ancients if you're starting after the Meteia have launched, even if I do think Lahabrea might be the best Convocation member to tell. Venat is neither evil, or stupid; in fact, she's better-equipped than any of us to solve that problem, and still couldn't.

I am surprised you are this negative towards any ideas like this and to justify it you bring up the butterfly effect of all things. The butterfly effect implies determinism which is entirely incongruent with the Final Fantasy franchise as a whole at the narrative level, where defying fate (opposite of what determinism stands for as determinism states things are bound to happen regardless of what happens, which isn't very Final Fantasy) tends to be an ever-present theme in most, if not all, Final Fantasy titles. It begs this question: Why are you playing a game/game series where determinism is one of the least supported concepts in its themes, and is usually torn to shreds by the end of the game?

Understand I do not mean this in any negative capacity. It is just an observation that I want an answer to. Whether you indulge me is up to you, we haven't exactly been the most cordial with each other recently.

[Cleretic]

I am surprised you are this negative towards any ideas like this and to justify it you bring up the butterfly effect of all things. The butterfly effect implies determinism which is entirely incongruent with the Final Fantasy franchise as a whole at the narrative level, where defying fate (opposite of what determinism stands for as determinism states things are bound to happen regardless of what happens, which isn't very Final Fantasy) tends to be an ever-present theme in most, if not all, Final Fantasy titles. It begs this question: Why are you playing a game/game series where determinism is one of the least supported concepts in its themes, and is usually torn to shreds by the end of the game?

Understand I do not mean this in any negative capacity. It is just an observation that I want an answer to. Whether you indulge me is up to you, we haven't exactly been the most cordial with each other recently.

Would you prefer I say 'domino effect'? Because the point I was making was that in the context of stopping the Ancients from falling apart, you can't do a direct problem-solve if you're starting after the Metia have left; there is no means to do so. This is even true for Venat, who had a wealth of social resources available to her and knowledge of the society she's gonna use them in. It's even more true for the WoL, who in this context is a weak idiot with no friends. (That last part's a big problem, because the WoL's ostensible greatest strength is having a lot of those.) This is even a thing you yourself agree on, because your own plan still starts before that point.

If you want to save the Ancients, but only start with the WoL themselves after Ktisis (or Pandaemonium, which doesn't meaningfully change anything here), either physically present or not, you'd better have an insanely elaborate plan that can be weaved out of literally nothing, because that's what you've got. In my eyes, the butterfly effect is its best hope, the notion that the WoL can beat their proverbial wings and cause exactly the one storm you need. And frankly, that sounds like a terrible plan.

I'm negative towards ideas that are bad. And readheadturk's idea was so bad, and so poorly-articulated, that we wound up with three different interpretations of it that are all fundamentally terrible.

If you want me to be positive towards an idea, make it a good idea. It's quite simple.

[redheadturk]

I'm negative towards ideas that are bad. And readheadturk's idea was so bad, and so poorly-articulated, that we wound up with three different interpretations of it that are all fundamentally terrible.

If you want me to be positive towards an idea, make it a good idea. It's quite simple.

Except they are not. The point is that given the information early enough [yes, even post Meteion dispatching] as long as it is before the Final Days themselves begin, they can Create Zodiark using ambient aether instead of actual sacrifices, giving themselves thousands of years to figure out how to deal with the angry twitter bird.

[Cleretic]

Except they are not. The point is that given the information early enough [yes, even post Meteion dispatching] as long as it is before the Final Days themselves begin, they can Create Zodiark using ambient aether instead of actual sacrifices, giving themselves thousands of years to figure out how to deal with the angry twitter bird.

...what? You've never put forward this 'make Zodiark using ambient aether' idea, nor has anybody else. You're gonna need to explain it, and how it is not going to somehow kill the planet by draining it of all its everything. And presumably, why the leading minds of Etheirys never came up with it if it's a perfect, no-downsides solution.

[ZavosEsperian]

Would you prefer I say 'domino effect'? Because the point I was making was that in the context of stopping the Ancients from falling apart, you can't do a direct problem-solve if you're starting after the Metia have left; there is no means to do so. This is even true for Venat, who had a wealth of social resources available to her and knowledge of the society she's going to use them in. It's even more true for the WoL, who in this context is a weak idiot with no friends. (That last part's a big problem, because the WoL's ostensible greatest strength is having a lot of those.) This is even a thing you yourself agree on, because your own plan still starts before that point.

Me espousing a possible solution that happens to take place before the events of Elpis is more of a convenience than me agreeing it is the only way. Within the realm of fiction and headcanons, you can devise a solution really at any given point inside of the timeline prior to the Sundering. I chose prior to those events to maximize potential survivors and to minimize the amount of extra baggage the WoL would require to effectively deal with the problems faced after the events where Hermes orders the Metia to destroy the Universe. Nothing is impossible and defying fate is something Final Fantasy is all about, but also minimizing the number of McGuffins and Deus Exes is also something required to make the story more believable.

If you want to save the Ancients, but only start with the WoL themselves after Ktisis (or Pandaemonium, which doesn't meaningfully change anything here), either physically present or not, you'd better have an insanely elaborate plan that can be weaved out of literally nothing, because that's what you've got. In my eyes, the butterfly effect is its best hope, the notion that the WoL can beat their proverbial wings and cause exactly the one storm you need. And frankly, that sounds like a terrible plan.

Venat's plan also hinges on putting all her chips onto the WoL. All events post Elpis would be out of Venat's ability to predict due to the WoL not knowing what would happen upon returning to the present, thus unable to communicate this. As such, the following things would be unknown to her:

-The ability for the Sharlayan's and the Loporrits to construct a ship that is capable of FTL travel and is able to reach the absolute furthest point away from Etheirys in the Universe, aka Ultima Thule (note: She directed the Sharlayans to build such a vessel and it is possible she knew about what it had to be able to do since she had a Meteion tracker, however this is not explained and thus the former statement is allowed to remain.)

-The WoL being able to overcome the Endsinger inside of its own domain, which was not suitable for life and required the sacrifice of multiple Scions to reach Meteion. (note: She did enhance the Azem Crystal, but whether it would be enough would be something she would not know.)

-Zenos being pivotal to her plan's success without knowledge aforethought of him needing to be present in the final battle.

-Any and all events occurring outside of what the WoL would know she would have to direct in a way to get to all the events the WoL is describing as events as part of the MSQ (all non-essential quests outside of the MSQ can be ignored since this will differ from WoL to WoL).

-The timeline G'raha Tia was in had to play out exactly the way that it did, and her influence there would be extremely limited if any at all.

This does not include the issues surrounding the paradoxical nature of the Sundering, as there is no indication of whose idea the Sundering was. It cannot be any incarnation of the WoL in a timeline system that does not have alternate universes, as their existence hinges on the Sundering being a thing so there would never be a sundering ever unless the idea originated beyond them. In a system where Alternate Universes are allowed and time travelling spawns alternate universes, only the initial timeline and potentially the second one would be affected since the idea still has to come from somewhere, but the existence of the WoL inside of the past can be explained away a bit more simply from a logical perspective.

Yet despite all these things, the plot still works out in Venat's favor. Defying fate, defying destiny, and defying reality are all hallmarks of a Final Fantasy game. Boiling down everything into something that plays out like dominos or even a butterfly effect is effectively useless here, as the game plays out in a realm of fiction. Yet, you would likely rule out such a plot from being viable years ago with the logic you are running with for my ideas.

It is clear you are applying deterministic thinking to a game franchise that largely goes against this notion in favor of overcoming impossible odds, such as saving the Ancients from themselves. The WoL saving the Ancients from what appears to be a predestined fate from our current perspective would make for a Final Fantasy franchise styled plot as the WoL goes up against a seemingly impossible outcome, only to defy it to save those who came before, and whose sacrifices now result in their initial goal: their salvation.

So once again, I pose to you this question again: Why are you playing a game/game series where determinism is one of the least supported concepts in its themes, and is usually torn to shreds by the end of the game?

As always, when I ask these questions, it is not meant to be taken as an offense. It is me making an observation I would like to have an answer to. And while you are not obligated to answer the question, it would help me be able to potentially come up with something to your liking.