Colours and Symbolism

[Elladie]

Just redone the short quest series at the church in eastern Thanalan which has some information about death and grave rites. The church belongs to the order of Thal (so, yeah, some tie-in with the thaumaturges) and they all wear cream coloured robes (not black like the Nald'thal folks wear). Not much on ceremonies; there's a lot of dead given the number of refugees in the area, and most people just seem to be abandoned where they drop(especially if they have no family). I found myself hauling at least 4 different corpses around. But the folks at the church are very kindly; they had me gathering Nymeia lilies in the hope the sweet scent would bring the lonely dead some peace. What mourners there were dressed in every day clothes, but they were all poor folks. Wealthy Ul'dahn merchants probably have elaborate funerals; can't recall if we saw Nielesfresne's ( or whatever his name was ) in 1.0

[TinyRedLeaf]

I don't believe there is sufficient evidence to suggest that specific colours are associated with funerals. As for the Order of Nald'Thal, as mentioned already, the thaumaturges are supposed to be ones in charge of Ul'dah's funeral matters, but their role as "undertakers" and funeral specialists has been very much downplayed since 2.0.

I vaguely recall some mention, though, of why thaumaturges specialise in fire, ice and lightning magic: Ice to preserve a body; lightning to cleanse it of impurities; fire to cremate it. Of course, I could well be mis-remembering this, as it seems abundantly clear that the dead are usually buried, rather than cremated.

To be sure, I've always disliked the inconsistent way the story handles the "decomposition" of the dead. Some bodies literally go *poof* into a burst of light and aether; others dissolve instantly in a puff of purplish, evil-looking miasma; and sometimes, just sometimes, actual bodies get left behind. There never seems to be any logic as to why some bodies go *poof*, and some get left behind. I chalk it up to gameplay-story segregation.

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Anyway, to go back to the original topic of the thread, I think it hardly needs to be pointed out that red is the colour of Stormblood. And the symbolism shouldn't be hard to figure out either — it's broadly the same as in the real-world.

Red is the colour of blood, and the colour of war and revolution. "In crimson it began, and in crimson it ended. And then... and then we were free."

Red is the colour of fraternity, hence its association with the Resistance, especially with Lyse, the Lady in Red.

Red or, more accurately, a shade of red closer to salmon pink, is the colour of Ala Mhigo, the physical country, a land of "crimson mountains, a sea of clouds, and a mighty fortress".


What's interesting is the juxtaposition of Stormblood's red with the blue theme that's less obviously associated with Heavensward, as in the prophecy: "Look ye where the sun doth rise, see crimson embers, dark'ning skies/ Look ye where the sun doth fall, see azure lost amidst the squall".

Blue was, in my opinion, the predominant colour of Heavensward, although its use wasn't as in-your-face as red was in Stormblood. Blue is the colour of the sky, the predominant image of 3.x as the expansion most associated with flight and flying.

Then there's also the revelation that the WoL's aether signature is blue.

And lastly, blue is sometimes the colour of melancholy — "feeling blue" — and that's quite clearly the tone that the writers were striving for with the Dragonsong War, in contrast with Stormblood, which as all about active, robust attempts to fight an openly known evil.

[RickiFake02]

Then there's also the revelation that the WoL's aether signature is blue.
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I'm curious where this comes from? I don't recall this being shown anywhere to be honest.

[YianKutku]

I'm curious where this comes from? I don't recall this being shown anywhere to be honest.

ALC 50-60 questline. Specifically, the final quest.

Dialogue screenshots below; nothing too interesting, just straightforward stuff.

EDIT: If it matters, this is aether as seen via a special substance called "spectrolium". The ALC guildmaster Severian is the one who invented it (just prior to that cutscene, incidentally), and he states that it shows the colour of a given person's aether signature.

Apparently it's basically something like Luminol for aether.

[wereotter]

I'm curious where this comes from? I don't recall this being shown anywhere to be honest.

Also, Stormblood trailer when he's sparring with Lyse.

[zuzu-bq]

Spells make your character glow in the element color it is aspected to. Even non damage spells follow this small world rule, probably for fluff.

[ObsidianFire]

^To go with that, the PC WoL is always show to have a water-aspected Crystal of Light in cutscenes. For comparison's sake, Ysayle has an ice-aspected one and the Warriors of Darkness' Crystals of Light are every elemental color except water's. The PC WoL's crystal completes their set.

[SkorchBlackstar]

I'm also a little confused, since DRK uses more than just black. Blue flames, purple flames, scarlet and red flames, the red glyphs, and blue lightning. I don't exactly know what to aspect it to, but I'm not knocking it in the least, since it's my favorite tanking class. Probably is just a fluff and flashy thing, but it is a little confusing if Dark Knight is all "darkness used for good deeds" trying to show light colors with the dark, or it's just more flashy fluff to make AOE cones on the ground harder to see.