8.0 speculation

[Turtledeluxe]

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.

Well that leaves us a few likely cases. One is said person left them a very specific outline for the original arc that happened to be good. One is this team has lost their touch. The last is someone had overhwhelming influence on DT who was more concerned with telling their own story than one about our main cast.

Its also not just Shadowbringers. Every xpac including Stormblood saw Scions changing and growing, new alliances being genuinely formed out of naturally occurring events in Eorzea, etc. You cannot sit here and tell me DT was concerned with the cast. It was nearly exclusively about new NPCs. The "division" of Scions was as superficial as the beast tribes. The only single time any Scion contributed something that felt like them was the infamous gondola ride. I wasn't here for Heavensward, I would bet my account people were theorizing about ascians, primals, hydaelyn, the echo, Unukalhai (and by extension many other things), etc. By end of Heavensward we were familiar with Yugiri. We take that all for granted, the massive effort it took to establish myriad plot threads in ARR, some of which were never continued. I see no such effort in DT that would merit it being an origin story for a new arc and in fact, I suspect it will be minimized to cameos. What DT did right is immaterial to me.

And frankly I don't get it at all because even Zero was developed with characters we know, in ways that are consistent with the lore, while DT asked us to believe Ascians somehow overlooked a soul desaturating slaughterhouse with a key that has transdimensional fusion capabilities immediately after an arc about the color of souls and rejoinings. Also Urianger and Thancred would literally never ever team up with Zoraal Ja even before his murderous intent became obvious. They asked us to believe Wuk Lamat, who doesn't even know her own nation well, is better judge of character than Urianger/Thancred. Insane.

[Cilia]

Well that leaves us a few likely cases. One is said person left them a very specific outline for the original arc that happened to be good. One is this team has lost their touch. The last is someone had overhwhelming influence on DT who was more concerned with telling their own story than one about our main cast.

...[W]hile DT asked us to believe Ascians somehow overlooked a soul desaturating slaughterhouse with a key that has transdimensional fusion capabilities immediately after an arc about the color of souls and rejoinings. Also Urianger and Thancred would literally never ever team up with Zoraal Ja even before his murderous intent became obvious. They asked us to believe Wuk Lamat, who doesn't even know her own nation well, is better judge of character than Urianger/Thancred. Insane.

Except they were basically just writing by the seat of their pants until the Shadowbringers / Endwalker duology gave us a coherent resolution to the Ascian plotline (if not one that satisfied all parties). There were interviews during Stormblood where Yoshi-P admitted they did not have the Ascian plot fully mapped out. Everything before that is pretty episodic, even if it seeds plot threads that are eventually cashed in.

Why the Ascians never scooped up the Key is a big question mark, but time differentials may play a part in why they did nothing about Alexandrian society; plus they would have no reason to do so, since it was just a reflection and thus doomed to rejoining sooner or later if their plot ever came to fruition. Is it perfect writing? No, but that's what happens when you don't have a plot mapped out from start to finish.

And you may be misremembering, but Thancred and Urianger threw their lot in with Koana, not Zoraal Ja.

[Cleretic]

Well that leaves us a few likely cases. One is said person left them a very specific outline for the original arc that happened to be good. One is this team has lost their touch. The last is someone had overhwhelming influence on DT who was more concerned with telling their own story than one about our main cast.

No. Stop.

I pointed out the continuity of writers to make it clear to you that your conspiracy theory is objectively and measurably WRONG and you should drop it. There is not some lost and exiled master who is the only person capable of making 'Good FFXIV'; the same people made the entire thing.

You need to accept and reckon with the fact that, rather than some grand conspiracy, writers that you liked made a story that you didn't. Deal with that fact, rather than making up your own.

Why the Ascians never scooped up the Key is a big question mark, but time differentials may play a part in why they did nothing about Alexandrian society; plus they would have no reason to do so, since it was just a reflection and thus doomed to rejoining sooner or later if their plot ever came to fruition. Is it perfect writing? No, but that's what happens when you don't have a plot mapped out from start to finish.

Moving into actual discussion, what we can say at this point is that the Ascians had some level of fingers in the pie of Alexandria. They weren't mentioned for most of that time because it just wasn't really important or necessarily clear to anybody for most of that story; Alexandria and Preservation were the main problem, regardless of how they got there. It was only when Calyx used some straight-up creation magic that the question of the Ascians became relevant, and the Scions jumped on that one real fast, albeit without much of an active pursuit angle. Knowing what we do now, we can reason that Calyx has likely been in contact with Halmarut since before Plan Zodiark fell apart; what exactly that means isn't clear, but the question is more on Halmarut's head than anything.

The Ascians--or at least Halmarut--do seem to know about the key, what it is and does. However, crucially, the Ascians wouldn't actually have reason to care except as an interim tool. The Ascians can already cross dimensions; they don't need the key to do it, so to them the key's instead a trick to throw at a pawn to further their own plans, like the Heart of Sabik or the treasure of Seal Rock. It would make complete sense that they'd just leave it with Preservation and then later Tural, because it's just not important to them by itself.

[Mansion]

Why the Ascians never scooped up the Key is a big question mark

Do they need it per se ? I always thought they could just... travel between shards with no worries?

Beside, there is still something I can't wrap my head around regarding the key, and maybe the lovely lore nerds can help me here. If the key is just a way to travel between shards and nothing else, and it is made by the ancients, then it must have been made after Venat's decision to split the world into shards, but before it happened. How much time is there in that? And it would be one of Venat's followers, but not Azem as they were not part of this group ? Yet the key seems to react to Azem's stone ? So Azem would have had to know about Venat's plan, and decided to creathe the key before the Sundering ? And there's still the... why would Azem do that ? Why would they think ahead of a way to travel between shards for the future shards of their soul?

That's kind of why I think the key is able to open gateway between shards, but there has to be a main use beyond that. And I also believe that while it is Ancient, it was not made specifically by Azem, but rather that it recognized a strong presence of an Ancient soul in the WoL, which allowed the WoL to use it.

(And is it possibly Halmarut who told Zoral Ja to use the key to go to the Ninth ?)

[Cleretic]

Beside, there is still something I can't wrap my head around regarding the key, and maybe the lovely lore nerds can help me here. If the key is just a way to travel between shards and nothing else, and it is made by the ancients, then it must have been made after Venat's decision to split the world into shards, but before it happened. How much time is there in that? And it would be one of Venat's followers, but not Azem as they were not part of this group ? Yet the key seems to react to Azem's stone ? So Azem would have had to know about Venat's plan, and decided to creathe the key before the Sundering ? And there's still the... why would Azem do that ? Why would they think ahead of a way to travel between shards for the future shards of their soul?

So this is actually the main reason I was against the read that the key was an Ancient creation: there is no good reason for the Ancients to have made something capable of traveling across the shards. They could never have used this, wouldn't have had logical or emotional use for it, and wouldn't even know how to make the damn thing in the first place. Ironically, given the name, they don't really have the ethos to make this decision; the key just isn't something the Ancients would have made according to any information we have on them, so it kinda feels unsatisfying and out of nowhere to me that they did.

And to your Halmarut thought: I don't think Zoraal Ja would've been part of her decisions, for simple reason that I don't think he's that subtle or all that motivated by the Golden City itself. Now, Sereel Ja I could buy, but he's definitely gone off the reservation by the time of the alliance raids, and is completely outside the Winterers' organization now, if he was ever inside them.

[Turtledeluxe]

And you may be misremembering, but Thancred and Urianger threw their lot in with Koana, not Zoraal Ja.

Lmao, I did mix this up. However, I'd still level the same criticism. I think there was maybe one single campfire scene of this group genuinely interacting. Koana isn't written in a way that makes their partnership especially compelling. They don't actually experience much together that helps either side grow in a meaningful way. That's not to say they don't experience anything at all together, it's just not very interesting and there's not much for Urianger or Thancred to contribute or draw from after the fact. And this is my issue with DT. If you're going to have Urianger or Y'shtola in the story, maybe give them an arc where they look after Gulool Ja or something and offer their own unique wisdom to get him through his suffering. If Alphinaud isn't going to be interacting with and advising Wuk Lamat (which he should have done a lot more of given his unique experience in geopolitics), then leave him behind in Radz-at-Han setting up that alliance that happens later. Maybe instead of giving Wuk Lamat more lines than the game's entire history (per character), Alphinaud could have his own entire plot line there that they cut to for intermissions. I don't know, I'm spitballing. DT had a foundation sure, I just think it needed *more things actually happening* between nearly all the characters, all the time,

No. Stop.

This is not an argument. Putting that aside, I framed this as speculation and it's not that serious. It's mostly the same people? Ok fine. They put out a critically inferior work.

And yes I do realize, I'm speaking more to character development, dialogue, the moment to moment of the storytelling. This is more of a lore discussion, which is a separate thing. However, I'd still say DT fails to set the same standard as, ARR. To be fair, maybe this is their intention. I was personally disappointed and felt as though we were left with more of a small mysterybox that points to the singular path the plot is seemingly going (for now) rather than having at least a few different threads that genuinely left me wondering what's in the future. If anything, I am wondering how they could be so carelessly handling their own content with the possible contradictions it is presenting (as I said, I will wait for 7.5 p2 to judge).

I also want to say, the reason I am waiting is because it can be done. There are problems with the story they are telling that can be fully resolved, quite easily. However I am not going to write the story for them as many players generously do on this forum. For example, they are clearly aware of some level of contradiction given they're flirting with the Hydaelyn question. I'm not sure if that's because they don't know the answer yet, they don't plan to answer it ever, or because there's a larger plot behind the Solistice that resolves most of the issues I am pondering.

[Mansion]

And to your Halmarut thought: I don't think Zoraal Ja would've been part of her decisions, for simple reason that I don't think he's that subtle or all that motivated by the Golden City itself. Now, Sereel Ja I could buy, but he's definitely gone off the reservation by the time of the alliance raids, and is completely outside the Winterers' organization now, if he was ever inside them.

Then, doesn't it just feel too convenient that Zoraal Ja's plan happened to greatly benefit Calyx's own? Or is it just that the Ninth always knew about this link to the Source, and waited for the perfect moment to use this connexion for their own benefit (which is the Winterer's benefit too)? Maybe this has been explained in the MSQ, I just don't remember it that well.

Otherwise yes, I agree with what you said about Azem, I remember we discussed this when 7.4 came out. That's what led me to think that the key has some other purpose, and it "just happens" to allow to travel between shards too. Or perhaps, while it wasn't made by Azem, it might have been inspired by Azem's power.
That still leaves the motive for the Ancient to create such a key in the air though. Unless it was made by someone opposed to Venat's plan, and hoped they could use it for the Rejoinings (thus an Ascian, although I still have doubts about who knew what Venat was doing)
I imagine most of September's MSQ will focus on the Ethos, how it came to Tural (and how to use it to send our companions to the Fourth too I guess)

[Cleretic]

Then, doesn't it just feel too convenient that Zoraal Ja's plan happened to greatly benefit Calyx's own? Or is it just that the Ninth always knew about this link to the Source, and waited for the perfect moment to use this connexion for their own benefit (which is the Winterer's benefit too)? Maybe this has been explained in the MSQ, I just don't remember it that well.

I wouldn't call that especially contrived as far as dramatic logic goes, no. For as far as the story goes, remember that Tural picks up this baton twenty years ago, and from that point the 'gate to the golden city' is a closely-guarded secret. (Which incidentally makes using it as the 'finish line' of the rite of succession very clever in a way I've never thought about; your goal is to find the truth about the thing you'd have had to learn about as Dawnservant anyway.) However, it's a secret that Sereel Ja knows, because he's the royal seer, so he already knows both where and (roughly) what the key is and what's in the Skydeep Cenote... which happens to play into Preservation's hands, because the entire reason Tural has it is because Robor and Alayla wanted to get the key away from them.

None of this really requires people to be working on any extra levels; it just requires one man with the right access and the wrong ambitions.

[Mansion]

I wouldn't call that especially contrived as far as dramatic logic goes, no. For as far as the story goes, remember that Tural picks up this baton twenty years ago, and from that point the 'gate to the golden city' is a closely-guarded secret. (Which incidentally makes using it as the 'finish line' of the rite of succession very clever in a way I've never thought about; your goal is to find the truth about the thing you'd have had to learn about as Dawnservant anyway.) However, it's a secret that Sereel Ja knows, because he's the royal seer, so he already knows both where and (roughly) what the key is and what's in the Skydeep Cenote... which happens to play into Preservation's hands, because the entire reason Tural has it is because Robor and Alayla wanted to get the key away from them.

None of this really requires people to be working on any extra levels; it just requires one man with the right access and the wrong ambitions.

To be fair, I had forgotten about Robor and Alayla giving the key lol. Thanks, that ties things better in my mind ; Turaal knew about the gate and the key, sort of knew the key could open the gate, and guessed what's beyond the gate could be a source of great power. So Zoraal Ja's plan makes sense on his own (backed by Sereel Ja), and it ties with Preservation's ongoing plan, which ties with the Winterers' plan.

So now what we still dont know is :
- Who made Ethos
- What was Ethos originally made for
- How Ethos precisely works

Now my next brain-knot : Halmarut's knowledge about the Solstice. It would work with the theory that some people outside of Venat's plan knew about the Sundering, but also knew that one scenario would lead to the Solstice, thus the need of a way to travel between shards. Yet, why would the Solstice be different than the 13 rejoinings that the Ascians wanted ? How is she sure about it ?

[Layte_Aeon]

One theory I've heard about Ethos is that its an inversion of Azem's magic. Instead of bringing allies to oneself it draws oneself to others. And the movement between shards is ultimately a result of them technically being parts of the same world.

Incidentally, I love the image Halmarut gives us of the reflections, a bunch of worlds layered on top of each other, with distinct colour tinges.