So, them Allagans... (possible spoilers)

[DarkJester]

Whatever happened to them? I mean, we only have bits and pieces of their fate, right? They were obviously a VERY high tech society, yet they seemed to have completely disappeared before any one in the game even came into existence. How? When?? I heard/read something about a great earthquake that wiped them out... but would it really be that easy? What about the residents of Azys Lla? Where'd they go? Was there a sky earthquake too? How would that even work??

I'd be nice to get a storyline pertaining to this.

[Hinoto-no-Ryuji]

Give the Crystal Tower storyline a go! That really delves into the waning of the Allagan Empire. I'm sure someone here can summarize it for you much better than I ever could, but if you want to hear it for yourself, that's where it is in the game!

[myahele]

There was civil war raging prior to the Calamity that destroyed the Allagan Empire.

Otherwise, it was a lot of factors:

The earthquake sunk the Crystal Tower into the earth and CT at the time was a source of unlimited energy for the Allagans, without it most of their technology would not work. Coupled with the initial mass death of the earth quake, they were left with no (competent) leader since Xande was sealed in the CT.

I'd also imagine that the remaining pure Allagan were hunted and killed. Azys Lla most likely was evacuated since it was sent way up into the sky and the key was left with the Vanu Vanu to guard. Not sure how this could have played out, whether it was the WoL/ rebels that did it to prevent the Empire from using it or it was the Empire itself to do it to safeguard against the rebels.

[Fenral]

Unfortunately, CT was written completely ignorant to the existence of Azys Lla, so certain answers it provided that worked at the time don't really work as well now, or require tremendous leaps to fill gaps in the lore, like myahele's post above. Also, a lot happens that wouldn't have flown at the time if parties concerned were aware of another death fortress still out there somewhere. How many infinite power sources does one need to destroy the world, that Dalamud would need to be built after sealing the Triad?

But I have other bones to pick with that storyline, so ignore me.

[Hinoto-no-Ryuji]

I dunno, I think it all fits together plenty well. Nothing about myahele's post is a huge leap, to me, and CT is absolutely still the most detailed primary source on the fall of Allagan civilization that we have - the bulk of our theorizing will inevitably go back to it as a major source of information. If you wanna learn about the Allagans, it's basically required reading (playing?).

[Frederick22]

Let me put it this way. Imagine we live on civilisation where everything we doing our current day life, is automatic. Even the need of searching a drink would be automatic. All thanks to advanced machines that operate with unlimited energie and doesnt need mantenience. Those machines were made by orther machines, and subsecuent those machines were made made by orthers. Yes long time ago humans would have being being the first automatons, but need of fabricate them and how to operate them or fix them would be long forgotten. Whats the point of teaching or knowing how to fix something that would never breaks and has unlimited energie? Even if some machines breaks, orthers would fix them

The allagans were a culture were they had no back ups, no plan B on case the automatons fail beacuse they thought it was not necesary. That was their doom.
When everything falled, the survivors had no idea how to fix or operate the remaining machines.

[Fenral]

The allagans were a culture were they had no back ups, no plan B on case the automatons fail beacuse they thought it was not necesary. That was their doom.
When everything falled, the survivors had no idea how to fix or operate the remaining machines.

All they could do was to go to truly ludicrous lengths so that one day their perpetually hand-holding society could be reinstated as it was always meant to be. Because that was never an issue, the real problem was Xande and Dalamud.

Or was it?

(Like I said, bone to pick.)

[Frederick22]

All they could do was to go to truly ludicrous lengths so that one day their perpetually hand-holding society could be reinstated as it was always meant to be. Because that was never an issue, the real problem was Xande and Dalamud.

Or was it?

(Like I said, bone to pick.)

Xande and the 4th umbral calamity were big issues to.
But despite this, we know that some allagans survived, but given only a few survive and that all their civilisation was wiped out. Despite someone of the royal famili survive, it was not enought to re construct.

[Fenral]

Of course they were, but Xande was resurrected for very specific, tangible reasons. There's enough evidence to suggest that the ones who survived not only had no idea how to fend for themselves, but no idea what happened to bring them to that point. They were nostalgic for an era they had never experienced firsthand, concerned only with the perpetuation of a failed, flawed legacy. The larger tragedy is that anyone with enough of a head on their shoulders to plan a viable reconstruction effort went down with the Tower, and the ones who survived were... devout, if nothing else.

[Frederick22]

I really what to know more about the 4th umbral and astral era.