Thread: The Road to 5.0

Originally Posted by LineageRazor

It's also really vague. Just what IS Darkness? It's supposedly something different from simple "evil" and light is supposedly different from "good". All we really know is that they are forces in conflict - but who is on which side? All three examples we've seen of the "light" side have had humans on the side of Light (even the Warriors of Darkness were Light-aligned before they wound up doing too good a job and dooming their world), but that doesn't necessarily mean that non-humans are on the side of Dark.

It's probably the biggest evidence that I can see that Elidibus might be telling the truth when he implies that cosmology is all out of whack and needs to be "fixed" (even if doing so kills all existing life). It seems that the Ascians HAVE to meddle, because if they don't then worlds are lost to the Light.

If they really wanna say that Light is not good and Darkness is not bad maybe they should have not put the important characters into certain camps. I mean the WoL that fights for the Light does mostly good, the WoD did seemingly defeat too many bad people and on the other side the black Ascians are all 100% evil and some even laugh manically in a scene of destruction. The only one that talks about balance seemingly also does not want to tell us what is necessary to do that and seemingly would have let us be killed by the WoD..which should have tipped the balance quite towards the Dark. So I remain skeptic.

And as Hydaelyn showed, she seemingly is able to take in the Flood of Light if she has enough power and bring balance back to that shard. Why should we even then care about such a Flood? Just let her eat it, if something like that happens. (Or will we get the information that she will somehow blow up if she has too much light? x))

Originally Posted by KageTokage

I fully expect at this point that Ascian meddling is the main reason the empire has acted the way it has.

I fear so too but honestly for once I just want this to be completely on the nation itself and not because some Ascian has said something into their ears..because humans are quite able to create conflict themselves and it would be nice if not every single larger conflict was done by Ascians..

Originally Posted by Alleo

I fear so too but honestly for once I just want this to be completely on the nation itself and not because some Ascian has said something into their ears..because humans are quite able to create conflict themselves and it would be nice if not every single larger conflict was done by Ascians..

I've read the whole topic over the last two days. Disagreed with a lot of things said, but I'm not going to get involved with that.

This point, though, is exactly my concern.

I'm going to feel pretty short changed if the Ascians turn out to have been pulling the strings in Garlemald for the last eighty-ninety years. Are we saying that our principle bads (from the very dawn of 1.0, they have been set up as antagonists), are only that way because Elidibus is playing a giant board game? There is plenty in the lore book to indicate that modern day Garlemald is a result of their history and their clashes with other nations (when they were forced north); how their culture and their outlook developed should be as a result of everything that has happened to them, and how successive governments have governed them. I hope the catalyst for their current imperial form is just what has been outlined so far - the discovery of ceruleum and creation of Magitek - and that these steps merely unlocked a pre-existing strand in their collective psyche; ie, the chance of becoming the present day warmongers was one of several possible outcomes to this combination of history and opportunity.


If that all gets handwaved away as "an Ascian did it", it undoes eight years of story telling, and that is why I approach 5.0 with a little bit of trepidation.

There are so many excellent comments, speculations and decryptions stated in this thread that I'm just going to list mine below in the order in which I've jotted them on my notes. This will be lengthy... but I'm bored and all my meetings today got cancelled, so plenty time on my hands for the rest of the day. Thus, I will punctuate my post below with a few images so as to make reading my banterings much easier on the eyes. Also, if you are reading this thread and got to this page (page 6) then you already know there are spoilers abound and it is assumed that you have finished the MSQ up to patch 4.3.


Full disclosure so I can side-step the morality debate related to the Garleans (since it is indeed somewhat off-topic):
I am a fan of what the Garlean Empire could be... which is one of the core reasons I've always been very interested in their politics, culture and history. There have been a lot of brilliant debates on this thread as to the validity of their actions for global conquest, the morality of their deeds and etc etc etc. However, it must be said that I still do not believe all of them to be mindless territory grabbers... and in all fairness to them, they did have their own era of extreme suffering as well, in the blistering cold, no less. Today, they have an empire that apparently covers everything the cloud touches in that map --- by the way, anyone really notice the mass of clusters floating above the Garlean capital on the map? See image below... somehow I reckon this as well will be a critical location when 5.0 arrives. Reminds me of the Zilart island in FFXI... we used to refer to it as "sky").

In the end, I can respect the views that they have destroyed lives and upset the social balance of millions of lives on the planet (for instance, I'm still hoping the Devs will continue the questline for Drest so I can help him get back home)... but there are always two sides to a coin, three if we go by the words of the great Terry Pratchett (the edge is the third side). More on this another time but for now... lets just blame it all on Ascian meddling and get back on the main topic.



First off Elidibus and his part on the path to 5.0 MSQ:
He now continues to strike me as being even more sinister than initially imagined. He keeps humming this tune about working towards the salvation of this star (or "dimension") and our part in establishing a vision for a wholesome balance across the Final Fantasy "universe". However, he doesn't really furnish us with clear concrete evidence of what we need to do to achieve this so called "salvation".

What really, really, really worries me is the thought that this chap might actually be "developing" the WoL to become the corporeal vessel for Zordiark. Think about it... Hydaelyn and Zordiark are apparent mirrors of each other, the shadow that accurately reflects the light. Now, remember how Minifilia was able "ascend" to become "one" with Hydaelyn? The specifics are a little more complicated than that but the core matter remains that Milifinia arguably "transcended" to become a part of Hydaelyn. Is this what that creepy punk Elidibus is planning for us?



Not to mention, in the last cutscene for 4.3, Varis reminds him that the eikons cannot be tolerated but he slyly assures the Emperor that it was necessary during that battle with Tsuyu... but wait, didn't Lahabrea consistently babble on and on that the eikons were not to be tolerated under any circumstances? And yet, the Empire had her as an ace up their sleeve all this time.

Interesting.

In addition, his manipulations and "mentorship" with Unukalhai gives me a lot of pause for thought because the more I research his history with the kid, the more I'm convinced he's just using him. Thankfully, I firmly believe the kid is nothing like him and has seemingly now begun to further his own agenda that will likely help the WoL in the future. Nonetheless, lets still keep a weary eye on him... there was a time (when his face was initially revealed), that I even speculated him to be young Solus from the future-past-whatever under the guidance of Elidibus ---dunno, must've been the hair colour. Eventually, we hear his story and how wrong i was... but yeah, I still believe this young man still has his part to play.



That said, Elidibus has obviously been tinkering in world politics for far longer than we imagine... I personally suspect he may have even had involvements with the rise and eventual demise of the Allagan Empire and then quietly relegated himself to the sidelines for eons until now. He has likely upped his participation a whole notch once the Seventh Astral began for mysterious reasons... and my gut feeling tells me he had a lot of dealings with Solus in the past.



Emperor Solus and the far reaching effects of his empire on the path to 5.0 MSQ
This is one Garlean character I have been eagerly awaiting to delve into. Young, brilliant, charismatic 24 year old military genius becomes a Legatus and nobody bats an eyelid? How did he do it when he only joined the military at age sixteen? Sure, he had the distinguished lineage, the necessary family name and intellect but how did he get his hands on Magitek technology in the first place? There has to be a lot more to their extremely rapid technological advancement than just having Cid's father Midas at his side. Solus must have been one heck of a guy, with a heck of team around him, and a heck of Cerulean resources at his disposal... and I will say it again, were Team Solus made up of some Allagans? Ascians? Or someone else?

Either way, he had some serious help from them, and there was something very life-changing that he saw at the Burn which wholly convinced him to declare war on eikons with such vigour. I want to know that story because somehow it ties into why Shadowhunter elected to make that place his apparent base of operations (a brilliant tactical location to hide since it's apparently devoid of any aether or life). This information will also be key on our journey to Garlemald and why he favoured Gaius and Nael so much in the past. Yes, yes, yes, Nael was the son of one of the founding fathers and Gaius always distinguished himself with his keen loyalty (killing nine aspirants and all that)...

...However, I have mentioned a while back on these forums, there had to have been something much more as to why those two were called the Raven and the Wolf. Perhaps it's just me but I keep getting the sense that Solus is like Odin (see image below, I think I posted this a while back)



Which brings me to...

Gaius and his part to play on our path to 5.0:
I cannot stress enough how excited I am about this guy's re-appearance. He will serve as our focal point for our Echo abilities to view a LOT about the past histories of the Empire, Solus' rise to power, the other Legati, the real agenda of the Ascians, the Frumentarii and so much more. Ohhhh one more thing... now that we know what he looks like, Nero's resemblance to him is... compelling... unless, maybe, I took this artwork I found (a while back) too much to heart-- the artist had made Gaius a blondie like Nero.



Here's one other mystery I really want to know about Gaius... is there something unusual he knows about the Twelve and the Ascians? Does he see the WoL, the WoD and other Echo users as unfortunate proxies in their "war"? As such, is he planning to give Man back the power to dictate their own actions within this universe (similar to how Vayne Solidor carried out his plans in FFXII?). Back then he kept emphasizing the notion of the strong ruler, and saying to the WoL some lines along the themes of:

Only a man of power can rightly steer civilization
Why do you grovel at the Twelve's feet?
Such power as yours befits a ruler!

Does he still think like that? Will patch 4.4 or the journey to 5.0 expatiate on his new ideals? Plus, I seriously want to know how epic he was in his younger years and how he came to establish himself as Solus' favourite... afterall, he was so held in high esteem by the Emperor that he was given his own brand spanking new legion, the XIVth. In ancient Rome, one had to be a member of the Senate, or from a super influential wealthy family to attain the rank of Legatus; so either Gaius was related to Solus (I'm still hoping for that)... or he had performed such incredible feats for King and country. But more on that another time.

More importantly, I keep sensing that it is through Gaius and his recent (assassinations?) of a few Ascians that we will get to finally understand what the Heart of Sabik really means. When we first fought Gaius and Lahabrea at the Praetorium in 2.0, the Ascian mentions it as being so powerful that even the ancient Allagans didn't decode all its secrets. This still intrigues me...where is the Heart of Sabik now? It stands to reason that it if is even a fraction as powerful as Lahabrea says it is, then it did NOT get destroyed when we defeated Ultima.

So is it in Gaius hands now? Does it have anything to do with abilities to transcend?



Aulus and the ramifications of his work on the path to 5.0 MSQ:

Yes, the mad scientist is apparently dead but this talk of "transcendence" had me remembering our battle with him: anyone remember when he would do the "soul extraction" ability during the fight and we had to stagger back to our bodies? Yeah... I'm still wondering about that and I know we haven't seen the last of this move. Plus, Zenos coins it perfectly when he repeatedly asks us during our battle with him (I particularly like the specific intonation in his voice when he says it)

Have you the strength?
The power to transcend!

Which then brings us to these lines extracted from The Wandering Mistrel's poem during this Rising event...

Upon your breast a crimson crest
Shine Light down from on high
O hero of rebirth transcending

These three lines got me thinking that the WoL will face a mortal wound to the chest, will be "revived" (possibly by Hydaelyn or Garlean Technology?) and then transcend into a stronger being... almost divine like?

Page 15 of my much beloved Encyclopedia Eorzea Volume One establishes that the Echo grants the power to transcend Words, Time and Worlds. The third type of transcendence, "Worlds", is what I think we will really delve into as we begin our path to 5.0... and the Ascians will either be terrified of our ability to use it or will try to use it against us to further their weird ambitions. In the end, I also want to believe this ability will also grant us the avenue to go back in time to the Allagan Empire (to fix things?)... yeah, that could be the foundations of the 6.0 expansion.

Yes indeed... much of this will be fascinating to see unfold.