Au Ra physiology and other lore.

[myahele]

@Dynza

In 2.4 we meet Yugiri in Coerthas (looking for the spies/conspiritors) where she says that line.

[LystAP]

I wonder how are they going to fit in the Au Ra into the starting storyline, at least in terms of leveling. It's also going to be pretty awkward doing the Coerthas missions as one, given how similar they look to the foes that Ishgard is obsessed with purging.

[Dynza]

Regardless of whether or not Au Ra are a new creation or something pulled from the existing lore and made playable, the au ra take some interesting cues from earlier and existing art, or perhaps vice versa.









We know that the Legatus' and his commanders' designs were inspired and based on the Judges of FF12 and the Ivalice Alliance. The horn designs of the legatus and his team are quite unusual and seemingly inspired the horn designs of the au ra PCs. One of the unique elements behind these horn and helmet designs, though, seem to suggest that there's some bit of lore behind them. Though, to that end I'm not entirely sure what it is, but it seems to tie into some old Allagan tech and bears curious similarities to the Ultima Weapon


Note that the Ultima Weapon bears horn designs similar to the female au ra PC and Yugiri.

One thing is certain though, all the legatus helms bear the Garlean third-eye design on them. Even Nael's and Rhitatyn's. So the whole design of the armors perhaps isn't entirely based on some foreign race or opponent they once encountered, but maybe the horns are partially based on some dragons the empire encountered or fought on Ilsabard or elsewhere. There are at least five dragons whose locations we aren't sure of.

In turn, the designs of the legatus helms could also influence that of the au ra horn designs, or vice versa (depending on how the story goes). We don't have an exact date of when the Garleans conquered Othard (do they even have complete control the continent? Lore strongly implies it), but had they controlled most or nearly all of it, could the Garleans have encountered the au ra there, fought them and/or conquered them and designed their helmets based on their appearances? Is the facial work on some of the helmets a design inspiration of Garlean pure-bloods or that of the au ra or that of dragons? They seem to pull from many different inspirations and build them from there. So what those inspirations are - in-game - is what I'm curious about.

In the real world, many of the horn designs we see on helms are based on real-life animals and the imaginations of the people and cultures living in the areas where such creatures roam. Including historic helms like this:


Or this:


Horns were used for a variety of things, including tableware, ceremonial, combat, fashion and other such uses. In-game crafters use horns for crafting a variety of items, and the horns found on armor, dragons and the legatus' armor. Au ra have horns instead of ears (or so it appears) and likewise appear to have different designs that players can choose for their character. In terms of lore, whether or not the horns of the legatus' helmet designs are based on those of dragons, au ra people, or some other animal is up in the air, for the most part. Still, with many of the horn designs found so far on the Garlean armor and of dragons, I tend to wonder if - lore wise - the au ra were at least partially responsible for the horn designs. And outside of the lore, I wonder if the leaders of the XIVth had at least partially influenced the design. I'm sure we'll find out sooner or later.


Note: Originally I wanted to talk more about the designs of the horns as a way to indicate gender between the species of different dragons and their relation to the au ra horn designs. This did not turn out well as the horn designs on dragons are pretty consistent across all the ones we've seen. Some dravanians even lack horns making it even harder to get any evidence for study. As such I'm putting the rest of this speculation on hold until later. If/when information shows up for more horns, I will beginning writing more up. But as it stands right now, I don't think the au ra bear much relation at all to the dravanian dragons

[Kaiser-Ace]

Well, if Neal and Gauis' words are true, than the Garlens are the Descendants of the Allagan. And the Allegan conquered and enslaved most if not all of myracidia. So it would make sense that a lot of Garlen armors would have a stylistic draconian appearance. And I still stand firm that the Au Ra are completely independent of both Myracidian and Dravanian influences. The Dravanians have always been native to Eorzia and the Myracidians were a draconic race on the Southern Continent. Oethard is to the East of Eorzia so it suggest to me that The Au Ra have absolutely nothing to do with the Dravanians or Myracidians.

Seems to me like with their close ties to Doma that the Au Ra may be the origin of the shinobi arts and through them and the Domans combined efforts they've been able to stay in relative isolation until very recently.

[Belhi]

The Garleans are decendents of Allagan? That would be curious, particularly since the Allagan seemed to have a talent for Magic and Garleans are genetically incapable of manipulating Aether without mechanical help.

Still the horns on Garlean armour could have various inspirations. Draconic would be an obvious one. However outside the helmet, I haven't seen a lot of Dragon stylisation in Garlean design.

[myahele]

The Garlean emperor is filled with dragon iconography. I guess that's just Garlean heraldry, maybe they've had that even before magitek discovery? I know ala mhigo has the griffin. Ishgard has the horses. Gridanian the twin adders, etc.



Since allagans like genetic experimentation, would it be fatfetched if the au ra are a result of mixing dragon and man dna?

[treuhavik]

I guess that's just Garlean heraldry

It's certainly possible that, since dragons were the first race(?), the Garleans simply adopted the imagery to project their sense of superiority over the other races of men. I mean, they do seem to give off a sort-of Aryan vibe.

I still can't share in the idea that the Au Ra are the result of any kind of experimentation or cross-species breeding however. No, the race was more probably either an off-shoot of the Othardian(?) dragon evolution or it's apex...or completely unrelated.


Regardless, the defeat of the Garleans by dragons at The Battle of Silvertear Skies is still plenty ironic.

[Belhi]

One of the Triple Triad cards from the other thread says that Dragons go through a long 'evolution' during their lifetimes that alters their mental and physical properties and results in very diverse results, making it difficult to create set tactics to use against the dragons. I could see the Au Ra being from a group of dragons who, living with humans for thousands of years, slowly evolved to take on more human like characteristics. If we take, say, all the bosses of Stone Vigil HM to be different dragons then we can see that the level of variety can be huge.

[Ordoric]

I dont know if anyone has braught up the point of Eorza is a mear Continent not an entire world thare are portions we have not yet seen. there might be an area where there is a dragon/hyur hybrid unknown to dravania or meryicidia too empires on a Continent

[Dynza]

PAX SE Booth has costumes of the Au Ra starting gear up for display. Somewhat more interesting is the wigs.

Hard to tell, but they may have subtly revealed another set of hairstyles for the Au Ra.