Idea for a plot point

[Raqrie_Tohka]

In case this hasn't been brought up before ...

When the old Garlean flagship was brought down during the last war, only the flagship was confirmed destroyed. However, a ship of that size and the flagship nonetheless, probably had its own dedicated supply base full of engineers, scientists, logistics people, its own minor army of a garrison, family members of on-duty personnel living on-site as well (as can happen in many foreign bases), and lots of spare parts and supplies at that, which was not confirmed destroyed in battle. In the desperate Garlean retreat, they probably had to cut loose this supply base (more like a minor frontier city) salvaging only what minimal equipment they could carry on foot, and failing to destroy the rest of it, "intentionally" ordering "non-crucial personnel" to remain and maintain the base in case of a counter-offensive, which never quite happened.

Nowadays, it has turned into a mini Garlean frontier city of sorts, which could be the setting for some interesting plot points. Specifically, it could serve as an entry-point to "meeting" the Garlean faction without requiring the plot to be pushed into a full counteroffensive into Garlean territory. The Garlean people, their civics, their cities and architecture, their technology. Many themes can be explored, similar to how themes of class, poverty, politics, resistance, etc. were explored in Ishgard, and was part of what made that expansion's story so good.

I think a setting like this could provide for some interesting plot points if used well, and I hope that between the imagination of me and other players we would be able to come up with some interesting examples or perspectives that will eventually be of help to the devs.

[Raqrie_Tohka]

In case the setting is used as the main stage for a MSQ quest chain or even an expansion, further points could be considered are how during the last war, spies were probably sent by all major powers to infiltrate this base, and but also cut loose after the war as the base was assumed destroyed. Furthermore, opinions and perspectives within the base would be quite diversified considering what happened to them despite being Garleans, and how some of the spies would have become integrated and also influence opinion. Depending on how this is played, it could even potentially come back to threaten internal politics on our side, such as "personal" ties to some of the main city leaders. In any case it could mean some cool stories intrigue-wise. While 'politics' may sound old and boring on paper, in reality it could be used to generate some of the most singular and iconic scenes ever, if treated well.

Another selling point could be the Garlean architecture and technology. The technology could be used to supply a new class or two with background, while the architecture could be used to supply new housing mechanics with background.
- For instance, there hasn't been a true "mech" class in FFXIV yet, but even if a mech class in the traditional sense is unsuitable, there could still be for example a class which "folds" its "technology" like origami, into a support class with unique mechanics and visuals interacting with both the enemy and its allies similar to the Astrologian.
- For housing, an idea I had was underground botanic gardens, similar to Saint Mocianne's Arboretum. The Garleans housed their public civic institutes such as their botanic gardens, deep underground within bomb-proof vaults. It was the pride of a city to have their own well-maintained botanical gardens, as it was a proof of both scientific and civic achievement. The flagship supply base, being a prestigious and large establishment in itself, had its own minor city in form of the family members of many on-duty members living on-site, thus had many "luxuries" including a botanical vault. Long story short, after lots of "plot", we can now grow gardens under our housing, without having to worry about over-detailed trees increasing load times of the whole housing district.

All in all, while it is probably a bit late (for the next expansion which will probably come by summer) to be bringing up an idea like this, I still hope it could be of use for the devs someday, if it has value. FF series lives-or-dies on its story, and a good, memorable setting with lots of potential for unique "perspectives" shouldn't be wasted. (For instance, a "pen-pal" mechanic that allows us to frame quests in a passive tense, allowing for more immersive storytelling and skillful weaving of plot points, with less interference from the modern-day social sphere.)

More details will continually be brought up in following posts by me and other imaginative players regarding this setting.

[ObsidianFire]

The Garlean flagship's "base" as you refer to it, is Ala Mhigo and the various imperial castra in Gyr Abania. The one the readily comes to mind is Castellum Velodyna whose huge tower was originally meant for mooring airships. In addition, the Garleans were said to have built a bunch of manufacturing factories all over Gyr Abania. The flagship itself would probably have been built back in Garlemald where most of the imperial engineers who do design work live.

[Raqrie_Tohka]

Well I would still like to meet those engineers. Send us to Garlemald already!

Edit: I still got questions:
1. If their base was still operational, why didn't they keep sending fleets of airships against us? (though I vaguely remember this answered somewhere before.)
2. When we "liberated" the place, shouldn't we have captured lots of equipment and personnel if it was indeed one of their supply fortresses? Why wasn't there more explicit story/plot on this aspect?
3. I know i will never be as imaginative as the devs, but please consider some of the ideas here, and please make FFXIV focused on story more.

[ObsidianFire]

Well I would still like to meet those engineers.

Ironically, we've met a lot of them already. We've certainly met the most influential engineers Garlemald has. Cid and Nero came up with a lot of the airship and reaper technology when they were both at the Magitek Academy together. It's entirely possible that the flagship and all other Garlean military airships we see were designed by them. However, Cid defected after one of his father's experiments killed him. Nero was part of the Legion that went (and largely stayed) AWoL. Neither of them have a lot of reason (or desire) to go back to working for Garlemald. That would also go to a sizable portion of the Ironworks engineers. Many of them are originally from Garlemald and wanted out of Garlemald so they could decide what they wanted to work on instead of the government picking for them.

1. If their base was still operational, why didn't they keep sending fleets of airships against us? (though I vaguely remember this answered somewhere before.)

Apparently, the Battle of Silvertear Skies did... something. Whatever that that something was it stopped the XIVth Legion in it's tracks and prevented them from going into Eorzea for the next fifteen odd years. What that "something" is, we don't know. We do know it has something to do with Silvertear Lake though. That said, the only reason why we know any of that is because of Koji telling us that's why the XIVth Legion didn't resume invading Eorzea until Nael was handed the Metor project.

2. When we "liberated" the place, shouldn't we have captured lots of equipment and personnel if it was indeed one of their supply fortresses? Why wasn't there more explicit story/plot on this aspect?

You see this happening in 4.1 when the Resistance members are going over the place Aulus was doing his research on the Resonant. You also see it in the very first MSQ quest of StB when you go to Castrum Orines, a Castrum the Alliance has occupied. Other examples would be Castellum Velodyna when it's and Castrum Abania and even Ala Mhigo itself.

3. I know i will never be as imaginative as the devs, but please consider some of the ideas here, and please make FFXIV focused on story more.

For an MMO, FFXIV is very heavily story focused. In fact, many of the people who play FFXIV only for the gameplay complain about a story being involved in everything. If you haven't already, I highly suggest getting the lore books. Those have tones of story in them, a lot of which has never and probably will never make it into the game because of the limits inherent in a game's medium as opposed to a book's.

[Cilia]

Just... ehh... elucidating a few points.

Neither [Cid nor Nero] have a lot of reason (or desire) to go back to working for Garlemald.

What led to Cid's defection, specifically, was the incident at Bozja. Aside from it claiming the life of his father (who could be considered semi-tempered by Bahamut at that point, or at least so obsessed with Meteor he may as well have been) it was Solus' willingness to continue the experiments and weaponize Meteor despite the risks it posed that led to his defection. His conscience simply couldn't abide what Solus wanted to do, and he's remained an expatriate due to disgust for the Empire's imperialism and brutality (another factor leading to his defection was the conquest of Ala Mhigo which, while quick, was supposedly incredibly brutal).

Nero can't go back to Garlemald even if he wants - since he was part of the XIVth which went rogue, he's wanted for desertion and that's apparently punishable by death. He joined the military only for the opportunity to get up close and personal with Allagan tech since engineers only got the scraps the military didn't want. (Despite his outward disdain for the Eorzeans' simpler lifestyles, he seems happier as an itinerant engineer in the region.)

Apparently, the Battle of Silvertear Skies did... something. Whatever that that something was it stopped the XIVth Legion in it's tracks and prevented them from going into Eorzea for the next fifteen odd years. What that "something" is, we don't know. We do know it has something to do with Silvertear Lake though. That said, the only reason why we know any of that is because of Koji telling us that's why the XIVth Legion didn't resume invading Eorzea until Nael was handed the Metor project.

The point of invading Silvertear was to gain control of the aether in the region. Midgardsormr threw a gigantic monkey wrench into those plans; not only did he halt the attack, his death made it possible to summon eikons in the first place (no records of summons exist prior to this event). Nobody's really sure what kept the Garleans holed up in Ala Mhigo for 15 years, but it's plausible Gaius was simply being shrewd and not attacking to prevent those summons. He refused to march on Eorzea again until he had a way to permanently deal with eikons, having the foresight to recognize that attacking would simply cause the same summons he wanted to prevent. (Meteor being the nuclear option would make them a nonissue in the end.)

[Enkidoh]

What 'flagship' do you mean? The Agrius? We already got a dungeon dealing with that (the Keeper of the Lake), which showed Garlean technicians from Castrum Centri had set up camp inside it to salvage material and components from it (as the XIVth Legion had actually gone rogue and were cut off from the Empire itself, thus were having to make do with salvaging whatever material they could as they no longer had a direct supply line from Garlemald itself).

Also, there already was a Garlean base set up in Mor Dhona after the Battle of Silvertear Skies, it was called Castrum Novus and was the base of the VIIth Legion (Nael van Darnus's legion). The VIIth were all but wiped out completely in the Battle of Carteneau, with any survivors becoming absorbed into the XIVth after the Calamity, which took over Castrum Novus and rebuilt it into Castrum Centri. Part of ARR's story takes the player to Castrum Centri to rescue Minfilia, Papalymo, Tataru and Urianger from captivity, although it's not a dungeon but just a solo-instanced fight. Centri is also blockaded by Gridanian troops during Operation Archon (to prevent them reinforcing Castrum Meridanium in Northern Thanalan).

As for Garlean tech finding it's way to Eorzea, we already have the Garlond Ironworks led by Cid (they're the ones who have developed such concepts used in gameplay as the Ironworks gear and the Falcon mount, so your concept idea of Garlean engineers setting up shop and selling stuff to Eorzeans simply would not fit I'm afraid (apparently we are getting a gunblade class in Shadowbringers though so it remains to be seen how that will be introduced lore wise).

We probably will end up in Garlemald eventually, so don't give up hope! I just think at the moment at least, the story seems to be more setting up the player's fall to the dark side as a priority rather than taking us into Garlemald itself unfortunately.

[KageTokage]

I assume that once the conflict with the Garleans is over, we're likely going to have to be the middle-man to make sure that peace remains between them and the other nations, since transitional periods tend to be rough, particularly when it comes to formerly oppressive empires.

[ObsidianFire]

Heh... Koji got asked again why Gaius stopped invading after the Battle of Silvertear Skies at the last fan-fest. This is what he had to say about it...

GE: Speaking of stuff we talked about before that may have fallen through the cracks… Do you have any updates on the so-called mysterious primal? There was the idea that right after Gaius took Ala Mhigo, he was going to keep going, but a primal halted his advance. It could have happened in ’57; could have happened in ’62.

Koji: That was related to the whole, “What lies deep beneath Silvertear!?” Yes, something stopped his advance. And then there was the trailer beam, tons of primals shooting out. And then there was the seal. What is it sealing? What was going on in there? A lot of this is where the 1.0 story was supposed to go, and there’s a lore reason for that.

When the Calamity happened, it caused a lot of changes to Hydaelyn. Whether that was enough to seal off something that was already sealed, but the seal was getting weak, or… That I don’t know. There could be something like that. The hint was that Gaius was stopped for a reason, and that it was a powerful force. There’s a presence. It wasn’t just Midgardsormr there, it was more of a force, and I can’t say anything more, for now.

So... Gaius didn't just stop invading Eorzea for fifteen years because he didn't want Primals not to be summoned. Something was preventing him from doing so. What that might be? *shrug*

This was the interview: https://gamerescape.com/2018/12/01/f...with-koji-fox/

[Raqrie_Tohka]

Thanks for the answers, they were welcomed and gave me new insight but I still feel we are talking apples and oranges here... although I was probably influenced by storytelling practice from other video games and my own imagination focus, so I guess I won't make much sense without specific description.

In short, the core idea of it was to be able to provide a proper Garlean city encounter without having to invade the empire itself, not to mention the difficulties we will encounter if we tried to do storytelling in a city where we are explicitly the invaders. So the "scientists, engineers, their families on-site, and spies" was supposed to be a rather ideal compromise. We have met lots of Garleans as was pointed out, but we have yet to properly see their cities and their civics.

Besides the civics, the next most important thing (at least in my mind) was to provide a breath of fresh air on the story, either by using pass-tense storytelling of a "mundane" but no less touching story, or by creating a good story arc that is not constantly overshadowed by stuff like eikons, world-saver-all-star-party, etc. aka. focusing more on a "standard" FF type story that does not involve living deus-ex-plot-devices every other turn. It's difficult to describe a more "standard" serious story without giving examples but I'm not sure what I imagined would be looked liberally upon, so I'm not quite ready to share it yet.

Another important thing would be to provide a few key features like underground gardens, Garlean classes and technology on the game and whatever help they could be for the base game, but this is actually not one of my key concerns despite probably a high priority thing to consider in actual production (what features to introduce into the game etc.) I just want a good story. There's plenty of story sure, and none of it is bad per se, but it's just hard to describe the "good" kind of story, and FF story I have in mind.