Wait a minute...is this a plot-hole (Austerities of Wind and Main Scenario-related)?

[lololink]

Err It could be possbile to summon a primal alone and not dying, it would just be super weak because so few aether was used.

[Kaiser-Ace]

Err It could be possible to summon a primal alone and not dying, it would just be super weak because so few aether was used.

Um, thats what an egi is in a nut shell.

[lololink]

Um, thats what an egi is in a nut shell.

Not really, an Egi doesn't have the soul of the Primal, if we could just summon Primals as Egi there couldn't be two of the same egi and beastmen wouldn't be able to summon them again since they are already summoned by the player.

[WyrahFhurrst]

Not really, an Egi doesn't have the soul of the Primal, if we could just summon Primals as Egi there couldn't be two of the same egi and beastmen wouldn't be able to summon them again since they are already summoned by the player.

Well, it does have the soul of the primal. The soul of the primal kind of brushes on you when you kill it and you take that little bit that clung to you, pump some more aether into it, and you control it in this new form known as an Egi.

The Crystal is a Conduit FOR the Aether, Louisoux didn't use either the allagain or ascian methods, he used the symbols of the twelve as the focusing conduites for mass prayer. How ever him turning into Phoenix was not the original idea it was a last resort back up plan that he literally came up with on the spot.

The definition of conduit does not imply Crystals are anything but what they are. We've used them as Conduite BECAUSE they are crystallized Aether. Thus making them a perfect conduit for focusing the unharnessed aethir of various sources.

You don't need a conduit for aether. You are doing the focusing and controlling. Louisoix did use the conventional summoning method of gathering a whole bunch of aether and a whole lot of prayer to make a joint primal of the twelve. The aether came from the large number of people fighting and adding to the ambient aether in the Field of Carteneau, and the prayer at the various stones of the twelve. The crystals don't channel aether, they are condensed aether by themselves, that's why they're consumed by primals who want to gain power, because while a Primal ambiently consumes the ambient aether of their element (or unaspected aether in a the case of Bahamut, Odin, Good King Moogle Mog, and presumable Ravana), a crystal (being condensed aether) is much more potent than just sitting around sucking up whatever's floating around. That's the reason why we put down Primals in the first place, because they consume ambient aether which upsets the balance.

[lololink]

Well, it does have the soul of the primal. The soul of the primal kind of brushes on you when you kill it and you take that little bit that clung to you, pump some more aether into it, and you control it in this new form known as an Egi.

It's not their soul, it's their aether, when you kill a primal the soul go backs to the aetherial plane while the aether goes back to the earth and all living being, that aether is, like most aether, aspected, aether can change it's "frequency" it can be fire, earth, wind etc... When you defeat a primal you receive some of their aspected aether, it has the "frequency" or "DNA" of the Primal, that's why you can summon egis of them, but you don't trap the soul of the Primal. Egis aren't primal, they are soulless.

[Alberel]

Not really, an Egi doesn't have the soul of the Primal, if we could just summon Primals as Egi there couldn't be two of the same egi and beastmen wouldn't be able to summon them again since they are already summoned by the player.

We don't actually have conclusive proof that a primal cannot be summoned multiple times at once... If we take the whole concept of King Moggle Mog for example, since he is just a myth made manifest through belief there had to be some point that he was simply created from nothing. There was no 'soul' in the aetherial stream to summon. To be honest we don't even know if the primals have persistent souls and memories between summonings. If Garuda were summoned by a group of Ixal, and then another group of Ixal tried to summon Garuda in a different location, unaware that others had summoned her, there is nothing in the lore so far to suggest they would be unable to do so.

The reason we can control the egis is because we only draw on a small amount of the primal's aether. It is the concentration of aether that gives the primal its personality as evidenced by the fact that garuda was noted to become more and more sadistically destructive each time she was summoned with more crystals. By summoning an egi with a far smaller amount of aether we stop their personality from becoming strong enough to escape our control. This is why we have to defeat the egi the first time we summon it, so as to learn how to dominate it and bend it to our will. The fact it turns on us that first time is proof enough that even the egis do have some degree of awareness.

There is no sudden point at which a primal switches from egi to full primal. It's more of a sliding scale. The more aether is used to summon it the more distinct an appearance it takes on and the stronger its will and personality. This is why the egis look like they're made from crystal; because they are just condensed elemental aether like aspected elemental crystals but there isn't enough of that aether to take on a complex form. A summoner would not be able to summon a full primal because a single summoner would not be able to control it; it would turn on them straight away assuming they had enough aether on hand to summon one that strong. The egi is the limit of what we can control at present because the mind of the egi is just barely weak enough for us to dominate.

[lololink]

We don't actually have conclusive proof that a primal cannot be summoned multiple times at once... If we take the whole concept of King Moggle Mog for example, since he is just a myth made manifest through belief there had to be some point that he was simply created from nothing. There was no 'soul' in the aetherial stream to summon. To be honest we don't even know if the primals have persistent souls and memories between summonings. If Garuda were summoned by a group of Ixal, and then another group of Ixal tried to summon Garuda in a different location, unaware that others had summoned her, there is nothing in the lore so far to suggest they would be unable to do so.

Ultima Weapon traps the primals and prevents them from being summoned again.

Same goes for the seal from mor dhona and Dalamud trapping Bahamut, all Allagan techs were aimed so that primals couldn't be summoned again.

[Alberel]

Ultima Weapon traps the primals and prevents them from being summoned again.

Same goes for the seal from mor dhona and Dalamud trapping Bahamut, all Allagan techs were aimed so that primals couldn't be summoned again.

Ultima Weapon simply consumed the primal that was summoned. We weren't expressly told that the Ixal, Amal'jaa and Kobolds were unable to summon again during that time. If that were the case then we would not have been able to summon the egis prior to Ultima Weapon's destruction either as they draw on the very same aether the primals are constructed from.

The seal in Silvertear Lake was something else entirely as it prevented summoning as a whole, including primals like King Moggle Mog who had never been summoned before. One of the persistent theories is that the seal simply sealed off enough ambient aether that there was not enough to actually summon anything. The original 1.0 cinematic showed the primals escaping the lake, yes, but a lot of 1.0 content was retconned and the introduction of primals like Moggle Mog and Shiva threw a wrench in the works there as neither of them had ever been summoned prior to our encounters with them so they were not sealed in that lake. The whole 'myth made manifest' thing makes it incredibly unlikely Silvertear Lake actually held the primals themselves but rather just a catalyst needed to create and summon them.

[WyrahFhurrst]

Ultima Weapon traps the primals and prevents them from being summoned again.

Same goes for the seal from mor dhona and Dalamud trapping Bahamut, all Allagan techs were aimed so that primals couldn't be summoned again.

I agree on the Allagan technology parts. That was the idea behind Dalamud, so that the trapped Bahamut couldn't be summoned again (because he was already manifest and trapped), so I can only presume that, that is proof of a Primal's ability to only be manifested in one location at any given time. As for the continuous mention of a "seal" on Lake Silvertear, I don't actually know where that's coming from. As far as I know the lake is spoken of as the font of aether for Eorzea and the explosion we see is a large amount of aether washing over the realm.

[axemtitanium]

Ultima Weapon traps the primals and prevents them from being summoned again.

Just wanted to clarify, the Ultima Weapon does NOT prevent primals from being summoned again after eating it. Alphinaud explicitly states that the reason the beast tribes don't summon primals while the Ultima Weapon is still operational is because they're AFRAID that the primals they summon would just get eaten immediately (i.e. a waste of crystals).