8.0 speculation

[Sudoku]

I don't think dropping the other reflections on Ilsabard is likely since Square Enix seems very reluctant to substantially change old maps. And if we dropped the First onto Ilsabard, that would necessitate some very big changes to the Norvrandt maps.

[17cupsofcoffee]

Between the seeds they've sown about using the First's excess light to fix the Thirteenth (which they made a point of mentioning again in 7.5), and the fact that every single reflection we've seen (now including the Fourth) is elementally out-of-whack, I'm pretty convinced that, at some point, we're going to end up creating some kind of giant, IRL version of the elemental chart Urianger showed us in Shadowbringers.

Though whether that would actually help with our "oh god everything's rejoining by itself" problem, I have no idea.

[StriderShinryu]

Though whether that would actually help with our "oh god everything's rejoining by itself" problem, I have no idea.

My guess is that the planet is basically just trying to seek some level of balance on it's own as opposed to necessarily "needing" to rejoin into one. If we do manage to essentially create that balance ourselves (likely by stabilizing and then balancing the reflections that lean in opposite directions, which is why they keep bringing up the 1st and the 13th) then it seems plausible to me that the planet will no longer need to rejoin itself.

[Cleretic]

My guess is that the planet is basically just trying to seek some level of balance on it's own as opposed to necessarily "needing" to rejoin into one. If we do manage to essentially create that balance ourselves (likely by stabilizing and then balancing the reflections that lean in opposite directions, which is why they keep bringing up the 1st and the 13th) then it seems plausible to me that the planet will no longer need to rejoin itself.

See, my read (and the way I read 17cupsofcoffee's post) is that it's not a need to rejoin or a need for balance, because those two things imply agency that the planet just doesn't have. I think it's essentially weird transdimensional gravity; it's not a need, it's an inevitability.

Which I don't think is necessarily related to elemental imbalance, but I think we'll solve as, like, a tertiary thing behind 'stop the Winterers' and 'stop the Ascians, Again'. I do not believe the Solstice is in any way a pressing thing that we'll actively be moving to solve, primarily because it doesn't end in boss fights; we're gonna spend our time stopping the Winterers one by one, and probably throwing a few Ascians in the woodchipper, and eventually we just sort of incidentally solve the Solstice. My guess is either that one of the Winterers has come up with something we can adapt, or that our crystal-and-key trips somehow themselves set up an apparatus; like a combination Bifrost bridge and load-bearing pillar.

[Cilia]

That is indeed the issue as laid out by Halmarut; the Solstice is nature reasserting itself, and the planet does not have a will unto itself that wants this to happen. "Will of the star" was never a natural thing, and without a an entity fulfilling that role capable of keeping the reflections and Source split apart the Solstice is a natural consequence.

Besides which we do not have enough reflections left to create a proper elemental array; Light and Dark are polarities, not elements, and excluding the Thirteenth (Dark), Source (Balance), and First (Light), there are only four reflections left (Ninth = Lightning, Fourth = Ice, Eighth and Eleventh = ???).

[Zero-ELEC]

That is indeed the issue as laid out by Halmarut; the Solstice is nature reasserting itself, and the planet does not have a will unto itself that wants this to happen. "Will of the star" was never a natural thing, and without a an entity fulfilling that role capable of keeping the reflections and Source split apart the Solstice is a natural consequence.

Besides which we do not have enough reflections left to create a proper elemental array; Light and Dark are polarities, not elements, and excluding the Thirteenth (Dark), Source (Balance), and First (Light), there are only four reflections left (Ninth = Lightning, Fourth = Ice, Eighth and Eleventh = ???).

Well, we do see the Eight and Eleventh. In the "worlds beyond" Queen Eternal shows, it is one full of ice (Fourth), one with earth lose from the ground with gravitational anomalies, and one with raging gales. Those are presumably the Eight and Eleventh.

[Lozza]

See, my read (and the way I read 17cupsofcoffee's post) is that it's not a need to rejoin or a need for balance, because those two things imply agency that the planet just doesn't have. I think it's essentially weird transdimensional gravity; it's not a need, it's an inevitability.

Which I don't think is necessarily related to elemental imbalance

I think you are taking too narrow a read of aetheric imbalance. Aether in the game is a stand-in for energy systems, both actual energy and potential. This has always been something that has tickled me since ARR because they have been so consistent in this. Yes aether has elemental aspects but those are just specialised systems, the same as we have electrical energy, and heat energy, and kinetic energy, and yes gravitational energy. Ceruleum - liquid aether, food - aether that you eat, bodies in FFXIV have aether (energy), are powered by aether (food).

Gravity is a form of energy. Therefore gravity can be reduced to aether in the world of FFXIV. We know that the reflections have elemental imbalance, but they also have aetheric imbalance because right now the Source has what 8(?) times the aether of each of the individual reflections, which in a balanced system is more aether than all the reflections put together. So the Source has 8 times the gravity of the other reflections.

This alone wouldn't be enough if Hydaelyn and Zodiark still existed the barriers being held by Hydaelyn and the aether being animated by Zodiark then the aetheric (gravitational) change wouldn't matter as much because the light barriers would prevent rejoining and the dark would animate the aether such that the reflections were either a) lifted to a higher orbit, or b) had an increase in momentum to sustain the same orbit, thus balancing the aether (gravity) in the system.

The solution then is to balance the aether, of which balancing the elements is one part.

[Pimsan20]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdezmk4SKaI So this youtubers has a few theories about Venat knowing the Solstice.

[Turtledeluxe]

My speculation, which is subject to change pending 7.5 part II, is the people who wrote the previous xpacs are long gone. By extension, this story will be a letdown unless the current writers are only handling the patches and other writers are handling the xpac. I can't tell if whoever writing it now is completely ignorant of XIV's lore or setting up a massive red herring. I am leaning on the former.

I for one will not contribute to DT quality storytelling for the duration of this game. I recognize many people do not see DT as that bad or see patches as improvement. Yes, the patches are a marginal improvement I would argue is a basic expectation of characters acting like themselves. Looking back at older xpacs is so hard at this point because it just makes you realize the team just wasted two years not setting virtually anything to call back to at the end of this arc. Yes Tural can help us in the future but the original arc was more than that, it was people who are actually part of Eorzean culture and had a real stake in protecting one another. Tural is basically isolationist and only recently became attached to Alexandria, their immediate cooperation feels fake and unearned.

This is because nothing is actually happening in this story (until 7.4). The characters are not experiencing things, like when Thancred met Ryne, to meaningfully recall and solidify as part of the story. Those we did, are Endless or dead. Shale is cool but be honest, she mostly just helped us with a key. Alliances are being formed, but they are generic and impersonal. Am I supposed to feel something about all these beast tribes in DT? Bc I don't. Maybe the arcadion will help us beat Halmarut somehow,and even that feels kinda B tier.

For me Evercold is do or die. If Scions are coming again, can they please get actual arcs where they meaningfully affect the story? Can we leave this reflection and look back on it fondly with people are alive and not small useless children like Gulool Ja who.did nothing the whole story except suffer and cry? I know I am a doomer but man, get it together writers.

There is a reason one of the main things we are talking about is Zero and the First, because barely anything after 6.0 patches is worth theorizing outside the key.

[Cleretic]

My speculation, which is subject to change pending 7.5 part II, is the people who wrote the previous xpacs are long gone.

All but one person that any of us can name that contributed to writing every previous expansion is still credited in Dawntrail. That one exception was last credited in Heavensward.

You can call any part of the game good or bad if you want, nobody will stop you, but don't make up evidence that goes against concrete facts that we actually have. If you love Shadowbringers so much that you'll declare the game is destroyed by not honoring it, then respect that the exact same people who wrote Shadowbringers did it.


EDIT: Also, the reason we're not speculating on anything from Dawntrail is because the next expansion is very blatantly not taking place in Tural or Alexandria so it's just not relevant. We weren't speculating about Ilsabard for Dawntrail either, because we knew we weren't going to Ilsabard. There is plenty of speculation about the parts of Dawntrail that we do know are coming back--Calyx, and the key--because we know they will be relevant.

Broad-based speculation is also not the only form of love we can convey. I love Dawntrail, and I will talk about it in every single other way, but in the immediate wake of a .5 patch and an expansion reveal, the conversation du jour is not previous stories. We're not talking about Heavensward either, but you're not making a point out of that.