7.2 MSQ opinions (spoiler obviously)

[Carin-Eri]

I think it was said in the story that he was suffering from an incurable disease from birth and was going to die from it soon enough.

Not related to this reply, but still don't get how we are supposed to be feeling empathy for glorified computer programs. Endless aren't people.

Indeed - which, in the context of the discussion pertaining to him having a 'tragic backstory', takes me back to the comment about how the Endless from Living Memory took appearances based on the happiest moment of their life and how it may be the case that Calyx doesn't have a 'happiest moment in his life'.

[OMGJesuis66]

Because someone might point out the issues with what you're saying?

My guy, hate them all you want, I honestly couldn't care less. But it takes some serious media illiteracy and a determined lack of empathy to not even be able to get why the Ascians might miss or prefer their world, even if you disagree with them.

No, it is because the fact I have a contrary opinion simply because the narrative did not resonated with me, which led to me being unable to suspend the disbelief and be immersed in the story leads to accusations of being a media illiterate sociopath.

It's not that complex. And yes, I understood why they wanted that. Does not mean that for me it is a bad logic, leaning on the absurd and vast cruelty and I wasn't able to relate to it. You can't expect me to have sympathy towards a people which pursue genocide and carry a dismissal of life over their hellbent ideals.

I could not shut off my brain over that major fact despite all the explanation the character brought to why. It is that simple.

You love it, great!
I don't, and that is also great.
And we can both move on.

[Lunaxia]

No, it is because the fact I have a contrary opinion simply because the narrative did not resonated with me [...]

That's a very mild way of putting all the lovely and fair-reasoned things you have to say about them, up to and including their being "bland, twisted, horrifying, ignorant aberrations." And what I said was it's a commonly put forward argument that under any other circumstances would seem sociopathic. If you tried to venture that the Garleans deserved being wiped out and you were happy they were killed off because they were racist and you found them boring in the same way, you'd typically (and rightfully) be criticised, but something in the "Ancients different, therefore bad" perception seems to rile people up in a way that makes it somehow acceptable.

Also, I'm just going off what you said earlier:

It just could not make any sense that he wasn't at the slightest affected by his life experiences, and wanted to pursue only the return of a very bland society, twisted and horrifying, settled in their own ways without noticing the ignorance path they have taken (which was hilarious given they were presented as scholars and always evolving under friendly debate of perspectives), at the cost of billions of lives?

You seem to struggle with why he'd feel that way and reach that conclusion, and I'm saying the reasons are right there staring you in the face if you look for them.

If you don't agree with it, sure, that's cool, but it's a little weird to highlight them as being utterly detestable and unrelatable due to the genocide they committed while feeling sympathetic to Hermes of all people.

[OMGJesuis66]

That's a very mild way of putting all the lovely and fair-reasoned things you have to say about them, up to and including their being "bland, twisted, horrifying, ignorant aberrations." And what I said was it's a commonly put forward argument that under any other circumstances would seem sociopathic. If you tried to venture that the Garleans deserved being wiped out and you were happy they were killed off because they were racist and you found them boring in the same way, you'd typically (and rightfully) be criticised, but something in the "Ancients different, therefore bad" perception seems to rile people up in a way that makes it somehow acceptable.

I stand by what I said. A society where individualism is shunned to the even concept you are not allowed to show your face or dress with different colors because it can provoke envy, while still treating every living being as disposable immaterial resource and desensitized of any possible emotions, living only in acceptance and conformisim is a very unsettling and horrifying society. Did I said at any moment they deserved to be wiped out? No. I just said that it was bizarre in not a good way. If it helps, the same degree of emotions I felt towards Ancients I also feel towards Alexandria. Solution 9 is a very unsettling place.

[OMGJesuis66]

You seem to struggle with why he'd feel that way and reach that conclusion, and I'm saying the reasons are right there staring you in the face if you look for them.

If you don't agree with it, sure, that's cool, but it's a little weird to highlight them as being utterly detestable and unrelatable due to the genocide they committed while feeling sympathetic to Hermes of all people.

No. I don't struggle understanding it. But it doesn't make it any less better. For a society as advanced and intelligent as the Ancients were, their decision making pos-Sunder leads it to be really questionable. While proven they are capable of lift empires, for some reason they have never thought that the best way to honor their dead was to move on. To teach and guide these newfound lives, keep the Ancient culture alive through them, establish bridges between reflections for those new lives and grow them with any other purpose beyond provoke global destruction. Instead their approach was global genocide over recreating scenarios almost as bad as the very own which scarred their souls and have every one of those new lives be turned into monsters or be killed until there's nothing left. I genuine can't relate that this drastic decision is the only one this highly capable people found. And given they have no right to do so, only made things worse.

Hermes I related over the precise sentiment I am describing here, his inability of being complacent over the society around him and seeing it as the cruel nature it is. The best hypocritical line in Endwalker was when Emet argue with Hermes about him not having the right of decide who lives and die, when Elpis is a whole place dedicated to that sole purpose. Of course, Hermes actions afterwards and his whole pursuit is not something I can relate upon, but what I like about the character was that he threw on people's faces the entire flaw and hypocrisy over a society many gloss over, because he simply saw those and didn't brushed aside.

So, no. It's not weird. You are the one trying to paint some very bad notion on me just because I dont agree with you. I haven't said the Ancient deserved the Final Days either. And while that was tragic, you won't be seeing me shed tears over what the remaining did after that. It's just inexcusable.

[Lunaxia]

I stand by what I said.

It's interesting you view them that way. And I won't argue with you, because that's your point of view and you're entitled to it, and I doubt it would achieve anything even if I did, but it gives some insight behind the vitriol, at least. Given how much you have against them and your feelings about Hermes I'm hard-pressed to believe otherwise, but I'll take your word on it.

No. I don't struggle understanding it...

I mean, you've kind of tip-toed near the answer yourself: the Ancients were inherently a highly intelligent and extremely logical society and dealt with matters accordingly, and they were ignorant, in a sense, or rather living in ignorance - of pain, sorrow, trauma, loss. The Final Days were a violent and all-consuming introduction to concepts that we mortals still struggle with even as we come into contact with them on a daily basis, and their struggles thereafter were a reflection of the underlying message that permeates theirs and the Ascians' storyline; that for all of our differences, they are more similar to us than they either aware of or care to admit, and aren't immune to the effects of grief and despair - no one is, and especially not on such an immense level. It's easy to say what the right thing to do is and what they ought to have done, but you can never predict how grief will affect you or how you deal with it, regardless of how wise or learned you are. And they didn't just lose their loved ones, they lost everything one could conceivably lose, and were left isolated, alone and immortal in a world that to their mind was a poor facsimile of their own and how it always had and should have been. Add in the sense of responsibility and guilt they would have felt as both the leaders and last remaining survivors of their people, and it becomes even more difficult to rationalise effectively.

I don't offer this as necessarily a way of changing your mind, but simply another side of the coin as you've explained yours. It doesn't mean justifying or agreeing with them in any way even looking at it from this angle, but I do think it's fair to say they were stuck between a rock and a hard place in most respects, regardless of how you feel about them.

As for Hermes, I mean, again, I struggle with the idea of praising a character for highlighting the "cruelty" of the Ancients when it's apparent his problems were less about his empathy for living beings and more about his own inner turmoil, and led him to things that were far crueller and more deliberate than anything they might have done. The Ancients acted with the best of intentions and out of ignorance, but he wilfully chose death and destruction and almost condemned life as we know it to doom out of his own frustration with the world. Any point he might have had in the beginning kind of flies out the window with that. And that line was absolutely meant to be ironic and a parallel to ShB, the "hypocrisy" was fully intended.

[Sunhwapark]

I just played through both 7.1 and 7.2 today, 7.2 was better than 7.1 at least. I find it hilariously tragic that Krile is supposedly a main character, but I certainly feel as though I've seen and heard more from Shale.
I liked spheneception, I thought it was funny, particularly the parts where she is arguing with her simulant. She has a nice english VA too.
Don't really care about calyx, just screams edgy and tired loner wielding a wacom stylus and an ipad.

I'm not deeply invested in the story or anything as of late so I don't have any deep or meaningful analysis to consider...

[OMGJesuis66]

(snip)

The biggest crux of such society that renders me to not see them as believable is that, given what I spoke, there's no dissent between them. People are naturally unique beings, each individual having different tastes, emotions, preferences, aspirations, etc. To suppress such matters while highlighting duty, it should have created frustration. Internal turmoil. Rebellion against norms. Instead, there was nothing of it.

And in the same prospect, this is what I find the perspective of other side of the coin not believable. Faced with such adversity, how come there was not discordance within the Ascians in their methodology? Not a single individual was capable to think that perhaps their ways were wrong? That they could rebuild in this new place, their lost utopia instead of pursue something that even if successful in the rejoining, would never be the same? None of them truly realized the futility of the act? None of them, upon realizing they are not so different than these "false lives" felt like they should be preserved instead? Even upon such loss, they had time. And with the 13th being their first attempt and a vast failure, there should be a moment to reevaluate the efforts, instead, they just doubled down to refine them.

I do not condone Hermes actions after he heard Meteion report. There was indeed his inner turmoil, but his turmoil came from the isolation. Why no one else felt like he did? Was he the wrong one, or the others were wrong? There was no one to talk, for no one would understand. Why did he felt guilt and sorrow over creatures denied the chance to live, grow and prove themselves, when others didn't and discarded them on whims to completely erasure? And ultimately, the hope that perhaps there was something different out there. Someone he could reach, talk and understand him. The expression of the Ancient cruelty over other lives but their own, acted in ignorance but still in cold-hearted cruelty due sheer indifference, is indeed a personal whim of mine in the whole concept, that deepened my appreciation.

As I said, I cringed when I was given the robes at the cost of the butterfly. To see that a character there expressed the same level of issues and concerns, was a surprise, given how since Shadowbringers such concerns existed. Things were not perfect. And it was good that they brought that over as the major hubris of their society, as a narrative point.

[Kozh]

You would be surprised how much of the anti-Ancient sentiment comes from simply "I don't like them because I think they're boring and weird", as if it isn't a ridiculous rationale that would seem borderline sociopathic if applied to any other group in the game as a reason for deserving to die. There's not much point in trying to reason against it.

Oh it won't surprise me. I was there when we have our little forum pvp back in Endwalker XD

And this is why you don't share opinions about not enjoying something people fangirl about with this community!

Reducing someone to just "fangirl" definitely helps your argument, sure /s

I stand by what I said. A society where individualism is shunned to the even concept you are not allowed to show your face or dress with different colors because it can provoke envy, while still treating every living being as disposable immaterial resource and desensitized of any possible emotions, living only in acceptance and conformisim is a very unsettling and horrifying society.

Here's the thing though, it might seem that way at the surface, but the Ancients culture are very much different from the sundered. They don't hide their individualism for funsies, they do it to lessen conflicts as each of them are born with enough power to cause great harm. I mean, just look at Hermes. Another thing, and one that people tend to gloss over, while they discourage displaying individualism through physical appearance, they promote expression of individualism through things they DO. Hobby, jobs, their purpose on life; that sort of things.

Basically it's a world where you appearance doesn't matter, and what matters is what you do. It's pretty logical as well since if you remember it, the Ancients are capable of perceiving a soul. They're a race who's so attuned with the planet (lifestream) and aether.

As for treating "every living being" as disposable immaterial resource, this is simply untrue. Elpis is a research facility where some of their test subject aren't even "alive" yet (as in, haven't been granted soul by the planet). If anything, they show more responsibility and mercy towards the animals/monster compared to how human scientists act. I find it amusing that people seem to be so offended by hythlodaeus turning a couple of butterflies into clothing, while being okay with the sundered (and us) killing animals for designer brands (a luxury rather than necessities) and sport.

We barely know anything about the Ancient society as a whole since we only meet way less than 1% of their population, with the 2 places we've been seen are a fake capital city full of government officials and a research facility, yet the game basically told us that it's okay for them to get wiped out because they're bad and scary. Mind you, this is a game that used to try to make us understand and see from other's perspective, like how ARR showed us that the beast tribes aren't evil, or how in HW we were given a perspective from Nidhogg's side (while not excusing his action at the same time).

Or in SB where the game doesn't force us to cast judgment on the culture of the Azim steepe Au ra clans, which can range from (morally) questionable to downright criminal (if we use our standard)

This is also what I mean on my other comments that ever since EW, ff14 does this thing where they tried so hard to justify the story ThEMe they created a group of NPC to be preached at by the heroes (who's somehow always right, morally). In EW it's less noticeable because, for better or worse, the Ancients have been featured in ShB where the story didn't try to judge them (that much). Meanwhile the Alexandrian in DT is very obviously a caricature of dystopian society.

[OMGJesuis66]

(snip)

That why I pointed duty. They are assigned duties which they do, until they complete it and then give themselves to be killed and return to the star. This adds to the disposable and lack of expression part, the last one being even more ambiguous as we do not see expression of individualism in their society in proper ways.

Elpis will remain a vast debate about morality. "They do not have souls" and yet they act, have joy, fear, anger, and every single other trait of a living being. We cannot claim that they did not had souls, that's not deeply approached in Elpis and comes from unreliable narrator sources. On that note, if entites in Elpis do not have souls, even Meteion doesn't have a soul and I think none could say she wasn't alive in all senses that compose someone alive.

Hunting quests like that always bothered me, tho. I never did the Nesingway Quests in World of Warcraft for that very own reason. But, that's just me.