A primal halted the Empire's advance after Ala Mhigo?

[HumsterMKX]

And then there are the goblins and .... while the goblins don't understand why anyone would need a special word for "black market".

Well... you can't really sell lalafell souls, miqo'te pelts oe elezan organs out in the open....

Say....you smoke? Do you practise a healthy balanced diet?

[Melinia]

Hmm. I do not think that is completely true. They were summoned in Othard before the battle in Silvertear lake.

My theory would be that the Allagan collected/captured certain primals' essences, and sealed those away, but unlike all good pokémon trainers, didn't "catch 'em all".

Or what the Allagans did only prevented their summoning in aether-rich Eorzea.

[Alexander_Dragonfang]

And what if that "misterious primal" wasn`t a primal at all?

For now, the only we know about primals is that their summoning requires Aether crystals, industrial ammounts. And then we have Ancient Primals which don`t need this and can manifest their body form anytime they want and for as long they want which forced Allagans to seal em (Odin and Bahamut).

If it was something like King Moogle? And if we are missing steps? If there are more methods of summoning, The Empire raised against the primal threat -That means, they have faced them before reaching Eorzea- Othard also knows about Primals. We can all mostly agree King Moogle IS a primal, just not an "Eorzea Style Summoned" primal.

It could have been even an Elder Primal we don`t know off, Odin seems to be low perfil in comparison with Bahamut omfgwordlsending, Primals also have behavior, they are not all just encarnations of destruction, for example Titan just wants to protect his lands for his children, Ramuh was described as a "pacific" primal when not angered, Ifrit is a warlord, Garuda is a crazyb**ch, Odin is looking for someone to maybe get revenge? They are all too diferent, what we call primal for now is just an aetherite manifestation of a respective element made by a beast tribe. And sorry, but Siren, King Mog, damn, even Gilgamesh itself are all primals. (Gilgamesh imo is an Elder Primal)

[Enkidoh]

Actually, Gilgamesh isn't a Primal - he's just a hapless guy from a whole other universe but was caught in the Void and ended up in various other worlds - Hydaelyn isn't the first world he's visited.

But your idea of the 'Primal' that supposedly stopped Gaius's initial invasion being not a Primal at all but something else might ring true - given the fact the Empire uses the term 'eikon' to refer to any metaphysical being, whether Primal, god or any other aetheric entity, it's entirely possible that it could have even been a reference to Midgardsormr, a very real and living entity that was the guardian of Silvertear Lake, and the term 'Primal' was just a mistranslation. But nothing is known for certainty.

[Anonymoose]

it's entirely possible that <snip> the term 'Primal' was just a mistranslation.

I'm relatively sure they meant primal. It was part of the Version 1.0 flash website, promotional materials, etc. and then they borrowed pieces of it for the ARR website, as well. I feel like somewhere in between someone would have been like, "Wait, primal? That wasn't a primal! Silly typo..." and fixed it. To guess an identity, the main unknown is when exactly it happened. When we had the chance to ask about the lore, any attempts to get clarification on when it happened and who it was have been carefully skirted around to not give any hints to those details. I assumed that meant the answer was going to come someday, but we had to wait for it. Then the issue just kinda disappeared for a while, again, lol.

[HumsterMKX]

........ O.....And sorry, but Siren, King Mog, damn, even Gilgamesh itself are all primals. (Gilgamesh imo is an Elder Primal)

The Primals take the behaviour of the beings that summon them. Titan is summoned due to the Pirates moving inland and broken the treaty, thus the summon is base on Defensive measures. Ifrit and Garuda are summoned due to the endless wars and border disputes. Garuda more insane the Ifrit probably due to the birdpeeps are VERY mad for losing their homes and their flight. Ramuh is mainly peaceful is due to the Sylphs nature or avoidance and non conflict.

King Mob is probably same as Titan, with the wacky touch of the Moggles. Odin is a cursed being, don't think he is summoned.

[Kyan]

Gyr Abania could have had beastmen living there, ones that we have yet to meet for all we know.

But if we are counting on the fact that primals were not summonable because of the Silvertear Seal, then let's consider some other clues which are present in game: that Ultima Weapon was excavated from beneath Ala Mhigo, which had the capability to trap and use the power of a primal (or several of them). It should be noted, that Ultima's primal-trapping capabilities are reversible - when we damaged it sufficiently, the primals were released. Dalamud, too, could contain and sustain a primal - it did not need to be summoned - and when that was damaged, it was simply released onto Eorzea. And, if Odin is to be considered as well, he was a primal trapped inside of crystal in the Shroud and was released when that crystal was destroyed.

What made the Garleans dig for Ultima? Just the Ascians? Maybe they encountered some Allag construct in the area, a machination that contained a Primal, they destroyed its confines in research, and it attacked them? Maybe this lead them to understanding some of the Allag weaponry in battling primals, which caused openings for the Ascians to start influencing? Maybe the Ala Mhigans knew of a primal being trapped near their city under a mythos that it was the servant of Rhalgr, and unleashed it from its prison as they desperately escaped their conquered nation?

The Allagan had great knowledge about primals - including Elder primals if the summoner storyline is to judge by. I wouldn't put it past them to have trapped several primals for safe-keeping all over Hydaelyn. Their summoners needed to defeat them at least once to claim them as Egi - there could be places around the world designed especially for this purpose to allow many summoners easy access to the essence of primals.

[myahele]

^
That's a good theory and it makes perfect sense that allagans trapped primals in things (preferably crystals) so that summoners can tap into thier essence, since I highly doubt that they all sought and fought primals.

It'll also make sense since many summons in the final fantasy series were sealed in crystals, items, etc.

If a primal did halt garlean invasion then I'd have to say it would be an Elder Primal. Who knows, if Belias is the Elder Primal of Fire then perhaps theres an Elder Primal of lighting. I still thinkmot was Odin.

[Kyan]

^
That's a good theory

Thanks! I have many! But I think that's the fun of stories in Final Fantasy. They make you guess! And quite often, you are wrong, but in a wonderful way.

For example, Moose things that the Twelve might just be 12 glorified Allags in myth. I think he may be right, but I would extend it further. We see that the Allag not only mastered magic and technology, but they also dabbled in bioengineering (it is believed by some naturalists that some of Eorzea's wildlife were created by the Allag. There is evidence supporting this with some fish and monster information in leves, fishing log, and fates - Allagans may have engineered bolt fish and electric eels, for example. Archeron, and monsters from Bahamut's Coil like Mirror Knights, further expand on their genetic feats.

What if the Twelve are a culminating pinnacle of their work to master primals and create the perfect weapon? What if the Allagan sought to make themselves stronger -or perhaps, immortal- by binding the power of a primal inside a physical person - merging both man and god? Could Odin be that - a combination of man and the essence of a primal? Was he an experiment, gone wrong, and thus sealed away by Urth? Clearly they do not have the same moral compass the people of today have, if we consider the things they have created and experimented on.

The possibilities!

I'd still like to know what happened coming into Ala Mhigo, though.

[Leoheart]

And of course, it should be noted that none of the beast tribes actually couldn't summon until the Paragons (ala, the Ascians) visited each tribe in turn and instructed them on how to do so - the sylphs mentioned the Paragons even visited them and told them how to summon, but that they didn't want to due to the reasons I mentioned above. When the Paragons appeared to each beast tribe is anyone's guess though, but I'm liable to assume it was probably some time around the time a 1.0 player's character first appeared in Eorzea at the start of version 1.0''s storyline (around 1572 6AE I'd imagine) - but no doubt one of the Loremasters will be able to confirm that.

The ascian's were sighted just before ifrit was summoned infact, though in a different form
I'm not sure why they looked like this or why their appearance changed in 2.0, but there you have it~