Who is the WoL's Equal?

[Aosha]

*After a harrowing battle, the Warrior of Light is finally laid low. It was a lucky blow from an unnamed soldier that finally brought the legend down; hardly the kind of noble death the bards would be like to sing of. Nevertheless, it was the greatest triumph those present had ever known. Lifting aloft that nameless hero, the few Garlean survivors raise a cheer of victory - but it is short-lived...*

Garlean Intelligence officer: Our agents in Rhalgr's Reach have just reported that the Warrior of Light has respawned at the Aetherite Crystal!

*Cheers turn to moans of dismay.*

Garlean Intelligence officer: The Warrior of Light has... equipped a pickaxe? Something about Azurite node spawning? I'm not sure I understand...

*Moans of dismay turn to puzzled looks - but the grim realization remains that the Warrior of Light yet lives, and will be back to try again...*

Ok, you got me to laugh out loud

[Aosha]

I'd say a lot of it is based on circumstances. There are a whole lot of characters who could probably beat the WoL in the right situation, like let's say Yugiri pulling off an assassination. For straight-up 1v1 combat... There are some here and there who could be considered equal or superior, but lose due to, for example, us having allies in job quests.
And then there are of course Godbert and Julyan, who are way above everyone else, and Hildy who I'm convinced is immortal by this point, but they don't really count.

[Balipu]

Equal in what way? We are very good at killing Primals due to the Echo and Hydaelin's blessing, but the Archons could wipe the floor with us. Hell I'm pretty sure even Karasu could kill us one-on-one.

[Critical-Limit]

Until someone else appears...

No one is the WoL's equal in power.

Lore wise the WoL is the only person known in the world who can defeat Primals, Gods, and powerful beings by him or herself.

I think other people could potentially beat primals if being tempering wasn't a thing

[Shai]

This thread speaks a lot about what I find thematically wrong with the (otherwise decent) story of Final Fantasy XIV ARR & onward.

To any of you who played 1.0 think back to 1) The Echo and 2) The Path of the Twelve & The Circle of Knowing as it was represented back then.

The Echo was an unknown. It was an X-Factor. You (the player) didn't really understand how it worked or what it was capable of ultimately doing. This is still true (to an extent) but we use the Echo much, much, much less than we did in 1.0. It's not integrated very well into our personal growth as Warriors of Light. In fact, we mostly see other people using it - or something like it to transform into Primals. All we ever primarily do with it is get "pity-blessed" by Hydaelyn to defeat Primals that are outdated. It's not a very compelling plot device or tool. It was much more interesting in 1.0 and I personally was dying to find out the truth/secrets of the Echo as they were envisioned then. Right now, I could barely care less. Unless I'm about to turn into a Primal to defeat Ultimate Bahamut or something -- the Echo is friggin boring [as it relates to our character who barely ever uses it for anything].

The Path was really that medium by which we would hopefully, one day grow to become Echo Warriors. People who were skilled in its use and understood its significance. The Circle of Knowing characters were [expletive redaction] powerful! Seriously. I started in Limsa and Y'shtola was what I wanted to be. You would see them fight, or protect you from certain death like they were some kind of gods and you would think "Damn. That is what I want to be." It gave you a definitive goal. It showed you what you could be if you could wrap your brain around you powers and break your personal limits. They were impressive and that differentiation in power levels gave you (the player) some idea of where you were going in the world.

Fast forward to ARR (and beyond) and the Scions are pretty much a joke. You are the God-character already, and it's insulting when they send you to fetch cheese. There is no problem in this world that they can solve without your divine intervention. You exist as the pinnacle already and when characters like Zenos show up -- it feels awkward. It's awkward that he's so much more powerful, for no known reason, and it's uncomfortable when you just defeat him like he's any other boss in the game at level 70.

What? No hyperbolic time chamber training? How did I suddenly become more powerful than the God-King Overlord of Everything I was prior to meeting Zenos? Now I have 3 new skills I'm suddenly able to overpower him like he's a child? It's thematically awkward. It's really the biggest and most glaring narrative flaw in the entire game. Your character barely ever "develops" -- you are the Deus Ex Machina of Eorzea. Oh, certain doom is coming? Let's rally the entire world to fight against it! Nvm, jk, WoL is here. He's got this.

I love the game, and I love the story, but the character development (of the player's character) is abysmal and unfortunately so since everything else is quite good. Compare it -- for example -- to Alphinaud (or Estinien's) growth throughout post-Ultima ARR & HW. I feel like he's the true main character of this game and we're his super hero buddy who swoops in to save him from primals whenever he's in trouble. He's the one who grows as a character. We just are remarkably amazing for no clearly defined reason other than the ambiguous Echo. It's unfortunate.

[Shai]

I think other people could potentially beat primals if being tempering wasn't a thing

The Company of Heroes defeated Titan and (I believe) Leviathan without use of the Echo.
At least they never mentioned anyone with the Echo being in the Company.
It has always been possible, you just take tremendous losses. It was never clear how they avoided being tempered.

I always assumed they just threw so many bodies at it that it couldn't temper them all - but I just made that up to suit my own personal narrative.
I don't think the game offers any clues how this was achieved.

[Wyssahtyn]

From https://ny.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/commen...rivate_dev_qa/

How strong is the Warrior of light as a human?

Here is the full translation (as it's slightly wrong).

Q：光の戦士の強さは設定的にどれくらいなのか？ゼノスと比べるとどうなのか？70IDでは1対１で戦ったという設定なのか？. Q. How strong is the warrior of light in terms of lore? How is it compared to Zenos? In the L70 dungeon did the WoL fight Zenos one on one?

A：他の3人に助けられながら進み、1対1で奇跡的に勝ったという設定。 光の戦士の強さは超人的というわけではなく、仲間の協力や超える力を駆使しているという設定。 A. Progressing with the help of the other 3 characters, the setting is that the WoL somehow won miraculously again Zenos 1 on 1. The WoL's power is not something personal, but the setting is so that the WoL progresses through the cooperation of their comrades and with the use of the echo.
現在はラウバーンより強いが、レベル50の頃はラウバーンのほうが強かった。 兵と比較すると100人隊長くらい。
Although now, stronger than Raubahn. During the L50 days, Raubahn was stronger. Compared to soldiers, the WoL is about the strength of a centurion (google if you are not sure what this is, I sure didn't). （ベルセルクの）ガッツのほうが強い。 (Berserks) Gutz is stronger.

So technically, Zenos is stronger than the WoL at L70 in terms of raw strength.

[Delily]

A random question popped into my head recently and I'm wonder who is equal to us in power? I know the WoD were formidable and could just about match us blow for blow, but now as level 70 WoL's, who is our new equal? I want to say Zenos, was but as we learned in story, his Echo was just Artificial. Thoughts?

Louisoix, as he was both a highly skilled mage and a capable leader.

Something that is recurring is that the villains of this game believe they only need to take out the WoL. They ignore the fact that we have a legion of adventurers, 4 city-states, and Hydaelyn herself backing us. Sure, Zenos can take us out in a one on one combat. There's no way he can take out the WoL and 23 other skilled warriors.

[Draginhikari]

Frankly, it's just kind of the reality of trying to write an MMO style story in a theme park style game where the player's undefined character is the center of everything that goes on in the game world. You can't really easily have impossible situations play out in a manner that would maim or severely remove the player character out of an event for any real period of time without creating time skips which they seem incredibly hesitate to do and given that MMOs don't really have the 'Game Over' situation where you restart from your last save point doesn't really work and would feel extremely disconnected as a result.

Other games get around this by having your character involved but usually not the one responsible for the end solution to given a problem because XIV heavily pushes the 'You are the hero' method of story telling there's always going to be some issue with doing anything too complicated with the player character without creating other problems. Honestly I think they do the best they can do given the nature of the game's story.

[KalinOrthos]

I would daresay Fordola might be our equal at this point. The only reason we could beat her was because of the inhibiting crystal that Urianger gave us; without, we can't hit her. But we are the WoL and do have a greater innate power than her (without knowing what else Resonance gives Fordola). I think it would ultimately be a stand still if it was a Fordola vs WoL one-on-one situation.