The State of the Ascians (Assume Spoilers as of TODAY)

[LineageRazor]

I'm giving her some benefit of doubt, because I don't think she's outright malevolent, but to pretend Zodiark is just some ebul blood good (when the bulk of the sacrifices were voluntary and necessary given the state of the world, and the final stage doesn't even lead Venat to question the benign intentions of the Convocation, implying it was parsable in terms of the ancients' moral code(s)), and she is perfection in crystal form, is just rather uncharitable at this point.

Is anyone in this thread arguing that Zodiark is an ebul blood god? It's been a long, long time since I've seen someone assume Zodiark's evil. For my part, even before Zodiark was revealed to be a Primal, I was of the opinion that we just knew too little about the guy to say one way or another. We knew the ASCIANS were evil - or, at least, performing evil acts, and doing it in Zodiark's name - but it was unclear whether Zodiark sanctioned their activities, or was even aware of what they were doing.

Even after the big reveal, the story has gone out of its way, it seems, to avoid portraying Zodiark's character in any way, shape, or form. We've heard why and how the Convocation summoned him, we've heard what he did, and we've heard the sacrifices the Convocation continued to make to give him power, but we know nothing of Zodiark's agency in all of this. The fact that all of the Convocation were Tempered by him seems to indicate that he has SOME kind of will (since Tempering is basically an unresistable imposition of will), but not all actions taken by the Tempered are necessarily direct commands from their god.

At any rate, one thing to bear in mind about Hydaelyn is that the ONLY concrete evidence we have of wrongdoing or duplicity on her part is the misinformation we got from her regarding her and Zodiark's origins - and that, most likely, was written before the writers had fleshed out the TRUE origin that we now know. It may be hasty to assume that those words were intended as foreshadowing of Hydaelyn's eventual descent into a role as adversary. I honestly wonder if the writers even remember they wrote it (or if they're even the same writers). I believe that Koji Fox once stated that the writers really aren't much interested in keeping track of the lore except in the most broad strokes, and that it's up to him to try to mesh the things they write into the world's lore. What they wrote this time may have simply been too great a stretch for him to overcome.

Writers: Okay, so we've decided that Zo and Hy are Primals, created by the precursors of the Ascians!
Koji: Er, well, Hydaelyn told us she and Zodiark existed at the dawn of time before all else...?
Witers: Shush, we've got an awesome story going. *Writes it anyway.*
Koji: *Gets a biiiig headache.*

[ShadowMeowth]

Is anyone in this thread arguing that Zodiark is an ebul blood god? It's been a long, long time since I've seen someone assume Zodiark's evil. For my part, even before Zodiark was revealed to be a Primal, I was of the opinion that we just knew too little about the guy to say one way or another. We knew the ASCIANS were evil - or, at least, performing evil acts, and doing it in Zodiark's name - but it was unclear whether Zodiark sanctioned their activities, or was even aware of what they were doing.

Even after the big reveal, the story has gone out of its way, it seems, to avoid portraying Zodiark's character in any way, shape, or form. We've heard why and how the Convocation summoned him, we've heard what he did, and we've heard the sacrifices the Convocation continued to make to give him power, but we know nothing of Zodiark's agency in all of this. The fact that all of the Convocation were Tempered by him seems to indicate that he has SOME kind of will (since Tempering is basically an unresistable imposition of will), but not all actions taken by the Tempered are necessarily direct commands from their god.

I always had doubts that Zodiark would be "evil". Besides the too-evident-cliché, I specifically had in mind FFXII's Zodiark, whose bio states that he was the only esper created by the Occuria that did not revolted against them, but because they feared his power, they bound him and kept him eternally in an infant form. All of this has been properly portrayed, Elidibus being a child who volunteered to become His heart included. FFXII's Zodiark is also referred as the Keeper of Precepts, and with enough aether we do know Zodiark can weave the laws of creation anew. And it is curious, the story of the Ivalician espers, because the one who rebelled against the Occuria was Ultima, the Holy-elemental esper, and the one who never took part in anything, perhaps because he was an infant, was Zodiark, the Dark-elemental esper.

Whatever the case, becoming the Heart of an elder primal such as Hydaelyn and Zodiark might be the same principle as what Ysayle, Zenos and Yotsuyu did. Zenos says that with full control of the Echo, one can bend a primal to their will, and he demonstrates with Shinryu. Of course, Hydaelyn and Zodiark are way more powerful, but I would say that with Elidibus as His core, Zodiark would have hardly any bad intention. Venat... well, we do not know much about her. She is a complicated character in FFXII and I suspect it will be the same here, but if Hydaelyn's command is "banish the darkness", I have to wonder if that will not put Her at odds with us, fully acknowledged Warrior of Darkness by Elidibus-Heart-of-Zodiark himself.

[Iscah]

She is a primal implanted into the star without the benefit of the people who created it to oversee it and that is all she is. We have yet to understand how she impacts the Aetherial Sea and if that impact is adverse or not - the fact that the 80 AST quest points to it being saturated with light, much like the First, means it probably is not without consequence.

I'm not seeing anything in Leveva's dialogue that indicates she's talking about light as in the aether being Light-aspected, but simply as an analogy of what drawing aether from stars vs the planet is like. It's the difference between gathering tiny amounts of aether/light from each of those distant sources vs the intensity of a single source incredibly close.

[Lauront]

From Exarch's presentation I concluded that the Source was already flooded with light from the First and rejoining was imminent. Even though we prevented the rejoining as of yet we did nothing to restore the dark/light balance on the Source so it makes perfect sense that Aetherial sea would still be saturated with Light. This also makes Black Rose still very very dangerous.
So far nothing has come of the msq quest where we assisted the scientist while he was measuring aether levels in South Shroud (apart from poor Wilred's fate). My belief is that aether level was not actually low, but instead aether was slowed down by light which had already flooded from the First.

It can also be interpreted that way but so does the notion that the Primal serving as the will of the star has an effect on its aether. After all, I am fairly sure the choice of darkness for Zodiark was deliberate, and not just because Lahabrea liked purple - it would be intended to influence the aether of the world. If so, it'd be peculiar indeed if her aspect did not do the same.

Is anyone in this thread arguing that Zodiark is an ebul blood god? It's been a long, long time since I've seen someone assume Zodiark's evil. For my part, even before Zodiark was revealed to be a Primal, I was of the opinion that we just knew too little about the guy to say one way or another. We knew the ASCIANS were evil - or, at least, performing evil acts, and doing it in Zodiark's name - but it was unclear whether Zodiark sanctioned their activities, or was even aware of what they were doing.

I am not referring specifically to this thread but only to an argument I have seen crop up several times on other sites, including Reddit, as well as various Discord servers. So although you may not have seen it in recent times, I certainly have.

Regarding their acts being 'evil', I take it as a matter of perspective. The unsundered are higher life forms. They see the present life forms as having weak, worn down souls attached to them that resemble nothing they were once familiar with. They have shorter life spans and, as per dialogue by Elidibus/Lahabrea, they grow weaker even as the world is rejoined (and they refer to this as them playing Hydaelyn's game in the JP dialogue.) We have yet to see how this jives with the understanding that the Rejoinings reinforce the world, but it may all fit it in together. For the sundered Ascians you could chalk it up to them understanding that the world has suffered what they consider to be a grievous harm, that they see as their duty to rectify.

I really don't see the vantage point of the unsundered as any different to how we humans view 'lesser' animals, or how the characters in the setting view the same, or various monsters etc. Emet even refers to them as malformed. Does it put them at odds with the sundered life forms? Yes. Mostly because their vision is mutually exclusive with the world remaining sundered.

Even after the big reveal, the story has gone out of its way, it seems, to avoid portraying Zodiark's character in any way, shape, or form. We've heard why and how the Convocation summoned him, we've heard what he did, and we've heard the sacrifices the Convocation continued to make to give him power, but we know nothing of Zodiark's agency in all of this. The fact that all of the Convocation were Tempered by him seems to indicate that he has SOME kind of will (since Tempering is basically an unresistable imposition of will), but not all actions taken by the Tempered are necessarily direct commands from their god.

That depends on how you take tempering. Is it intended to imprint the Primal's will on the summoners? Is it more of creating an energy network that allows it to expand its domain, as per the dialogue here? It's certainly not uniform in erasing the will of the tempered and beyond ensuring a motive to see to the Primal's revival should it be banished, what we know if its characteristics is limited. He certainly has some will and persona, as Elidibus speaks of him in the third person, but I think it's fair to say neither faction regarded tempering as much of an issue. Her summoners certainly thought little of it given that they were just about to summon a Primal themselves. They also don't bring it up in terms of the Convocation's motivations being clouded by it.

At any rate, one thing to bear in mind about Hydaelyn is that the ONLY concrete evidence we have of wrongdoing or duplicity on her part is the misinformation we got from her regarding her and Zodiark's origins - and that, most likely, was written before the writers had fleshed out the TRUE origin that we now know. It may be hasty to assume that those words were intended as foreshadowing of Hydaelyn's eventual descent into a role as adversary. I honestly wonder if the writers even remember they wrote it (or if they're even the same writers). I believe that Koji Fox once stated that the writers really aren't much interested in keeping track of the lore except in the most broad strokes, and that it's up to him to try to mesh the things they write into the world's lore. What they wrote this time may have simply been too great a stretch for him to overcome.

Like I said, the out they may well give her is that she, as the Primal, is unaware of it. That's fine and logical. Where it is more questionable is in terms of Venat's role. Although the use of the name is not a guarantee that they will reprise the role her namesake played, it is, all the same, an interesting choice.

I always had doubts that Zodiark would be "evil". Besides the too-evident-cliché, I specifically had in mind FFXII's Zodiark, whose bio states that he was the only esper created by the Occuria that did not revolted against them, but because they feared his power, they bound him and kept him eternally in an infant form. All of this has been properly portrayed, Elidibus being a child who volunteered to become His heart included. FFXII's Zodiark is also referred as the Keeper of Precepts, and with enough aether we do know Zodiark can weave the laws of creation anew. And it is curious, the story of the Ivalician espers, because the one who rebelled against the Occuria was Ultima, the Holy-elemental esper, and the one who never took part in anything, perhaps because he was an infant, was Zodiark, the Dark-elemental esper.

Whatever the case, becoming the Heart of an elder primal such as Hydaelyn and Zodiark might be the same principle as what Ysayle, Zenos and Yotsuyu did. Zenos says that with full control of the Echo, one can bend a primal to their will, and he demonstrates with Shinryu. Of course, Hydaelyn and Zodiark are way more powerful, but I would say that with Elidibus as His core, Zodiark would have hardly any bad intention. Venat... well, we do not know much about her. She is a complicated character in FFXII and I suspect it will be the same here, but if Hydaelyn's command is "banish the darkness", I have to wonder if that will not put Her at odds with us, fully acknowledged Warrior of Darkness by Elidibus-Heart-of-Zodiark himself.

Complicated is to put it mildly. Although some may construe its intentions as benign, the consequences of removing the influence of the Occuria were nothing short of disastrous, resulting in the vanishing of magic from the world, and the non-human races vanishing. Does it sound a little like accidentally (?) splitting the world into 14 and thus weakening it? I suspect both her facet of ensuring memories of the ancient world did not survive, and her impetus to banish the darkness, might be factors here. I am awaiting to see how they will handle Venat, Fandaniel and Zenos.

I'm not seeing anything in Leveva's dialogue that indicates she's talking about light as in the aether being Light-aspected, but simply as an analogy of what drawing aether from stars vs the planet is like. It's the difference between gathering tiny amounts of aether/light from each of those distant sources vs the intensity of a single source incredibly close.

I mean it's there. What you're really saying is you're choosing to interpret it some other way. That is fine. I think it is a little more than just an analogy in this case, given the vivid description, and it makes perfect logical sense given that she is ensconced in the Aetherial Sea and aspected towards light. Not to mention that if her crystal is an auracite, they don't exactly contain the energy in them.

In fact, it has been speculated that darkness was chosen as the energy for Zodiark given its propensity towards activity (=faster regeneration of the world.) If so, the question would arise how is it that he would affect the world thus, through his aether, and not she?

[Kesey]

Complicated is to put it mildly. Although some may construe its intentions as benign, the consequences of removing the influence of the Occuria were nothing short of disastrous, resulting in the vanishing of magic from the world, and the non-human races vanishing. Does it sound a little like accidentally (?) splitting the world into 14 and thus weakening it? I suspect both her facet of ensuring memories of the ancient world did not survive, and her impetus to banish the darkness, might be factors here. I am awaiting to see how they will handle Venat, Fandaniel and Zenos.

I'm glad you mentioned this. Particularly about Venat. Since he was the heart of Hydaelyn does that mean he exists like Elidibus and could have been someone in the story who was always on our side?

If I take a stab at it, I'd say it was Louisiox. This would pass his legacy to the twins and explain the knowledge he used at the battle of Carteneau (these events may have played out differently, but I never played 1.0). This would also explain the sending us from Carteneau to the beginning of ARR from the Coils cutscene.

[Veloran]

Like, FFX is a comparable example of God is evil, and it belabors the point throughout the entire game, in demonstrating how Yevon has perpetuated a broken system upon the world that traps all its people in a spiral of death. FFXIV hasn't done anywhere near that groundwork, and Hydaelyn's actions have been infinitely more benevolent.

I don't know, I think XIV has been laying that groundwork for years. Just listen to Answers or Dragonsong, look at the main conflicts of the game, it's all about a circle of conflict and mistakes that's been repeating for thousands of years, and Hydaelyn's summoning and subsequent sundering of the world is a very large part of that.

[ShadowMeowth]

Complicated is to put it mildly. Although some may construe its intentions as benign, the consequences of removing the influence of the Occuria were nothing short of disastrous, resulting in the vanishing of magic from the world, and the non-human races vanishing. Does it sound a little like accidentally (?) splitting the world into 14 and thus weakening it? I suspect both her facet of ensuring memories of the ancient world did not survive, and her impetus to banish the darkness, might be factors here. I am awaiting to see how they will handle Venat, Fandaniel and Zenos.

It /does/ sound quite a bit to what happened to the world of Ivalice, aye. Regarding Hydaelyn / Venat and Zenos and Fandaniel, I see here a pattern that reminds me a lot of FFXII. Venat supported and aided Vayne Solidor, heir to the Archadian Empire, to achieve her goal of removing Occurian influence, which led to a bloody conquest on Vayne's part. Vayne was aided as well by rather eccentric and dramatic Doctor Cid, who had his own reasons to support Vayne's crusade, namely For Science™. Balthier even calls him out in the Pharos of Ridorana about wanting to become a god himself. Now, of course comparing Vayne to Zenos in terms of motivations would be an insult to Vayne, but there is the fact that Zenos was largely inspired by him, not to mention he was legatus of the XIIth Legion. Fandaniel could work as an evil(er) version of Doctor Cid, starting from the point of "shaking the shackles off". Both Zenos and Fandaniel wear white now and after the First shenanigans you shall excuse me but I have reasons to be wary of white. So, would that mean they will earn / force Venat / Hydaelyn's support? Since, you know, they apparently are targeting Zodiark.

It can also be interpreted that way but so does the notion that the Primal serving as the will of the star has an effect on its aether. After all, I am fairly sure the choice of darkness for Zodiark was deliberate, and not just because Lahabrea liked purple - it would be intended to influence the aether of the world. If so, it'd be peculiar indeed if her aspect did not do the same.

I am sorry but the Lahabrea-liking-purple bit reminded me of this thing and now I cannot stop snickering.



Made even funnier when you realize Lahabrea's memory crystal was "sky blue" and the violet one was Emet-Selch's.

[ObsidianFire]

The thing is... Hydaelyn really doesn't fit the "goddess" trope at all when it comes to the "Killing God" trope. Especially when it comes to a formal worship. Usually with a "Killing God" story, there's an entire major religion that gets shown to be false and part of the story is about how the world has to learn to function with the knowledge that the religion was based on lies. Which... no one really "believes" in Hydalyn in that way. In FFXIV, there is no major religion that worships Hydaelyn; we instead see lots of different religions that worship different kinds of beings in different ways. Hydalyn not being a "real" god? No one would care; most people don't know she exists in the first place. There is no "Religion of Yu Yevon" that relies on her existence to keep order in society.

For that matter, Hydaelyn isn't interested in the day-to-day running of the world. How people think of her does not matter to her. What matters is keeping the supernatural beings who are trying to manipulate history in check. In fact... the worst I can say about Hydaelyn is that she might be too passive in how she handles the Ascians. But like... that's a way better side to err on than being too involved.

There's also the fact that... the writers of FFXIV love foreshadowing. And when it comes to "foreshadowing", Hydalyn has just about nothing. Mainly because she got blasted by Ultima in 2.0 and hasn't had any energy to even talk to us. All of our meetings with her or the Word of the Mother have been on some kind of time-crunch because Hydaelyn is so weak, she can barely talk to us at all. And when she has managed to talk to us, it's about the really important stuff; like why Zoidark and her were fighting and why Zoidark is an enemy. Or sending Minfillia to save the 1st Shard from destruction in a last-ditch measure. We've never had the luxury of time to really sit down with her and have a long drawn out conversation ever.

Which also means... She could very well have known the truth and knew she couldn't talk to us for a long time... and so just told us the really important stuff about Zodiark and the Ascians we needed to know at that moment. For all we know, she was planning to tell us what actually happened later and has simply never had the chance to because the 1st Shard needed to be dealt with which meant Minfilia had to go. And the only reason Hydaelyn could talk to us after 2.0 in the first place was because Minfilia was there to give her more energy. With Minfillia gone for good... who knows how we'll be able to talk to her again? We could actually never get the chance with Hydaelyn being as weak as she is...

[Cilia]

I'm just going to put it in the plainest terms I can, and not say anything elsewhere for the time being:

Hydaelyn has not been set up in a Demiurge / Yaladabaoth / Shin Megami Tensei YHVH role. She lends the PC and others power to accomplish goals they have in common; namely stopping the Ascians' genocidal / omnicidal plans, something most people would agree is a completely reasonable thing to do. Her duplicitous context doesn't make a difference, and she hasn't been shown to compel service. She acts only in opposition to the Ascians, doesn't compel service, has to act through mortals by granting them power and hoping her read on them is right, and doesn't take that power away should her read be wrong.

Shadowbringers does make her shady insofar as some of her earlier exposition turned out to be lies (retcons probably), but it also defines her raison d'etre as a primal, and that needs to be taken into account when discussing what she does and why. She exists solely to bind Zodiark and in so doing prevent the Ascians from feeding mortals to him to resurrect the long-dead Ancients. That's it. That is the only reason she does anything. Everything she does is geared toward that singular purpose.

Now, is it possible they'll have Hydaelyn go the Demiurge route? Sure, it's possible - but there's no evidence suggesting that's the direction things are headed. It's equally possible that once all the Ascians are dead, being bereft of worshipers Zodiark will truly die and Hydaelyn will either fade away due to her purpose having been fulfilled or just... hang out in the aetherial sea, I guess? (Sounds much more likely to me.) Point is we can throw out possibilities all day; without evidence to back anything up it's little more than baseless speculation.

Why did Hydaelyn lie, beyond the Doylist answer of retcons? I don't know, but given she's shown herself to be magnanimous toward the races of man (and indeed, the sentiment behind her summoning was that they should be more than livestock to feed Zodiark) I'm not wont to ascribe ill intent towards her. If they do go the Demiurge route with Hydaelyn I will have no problem killing her, but it's not something I see in the cards right now.

[ShadowMeowth]

To me, whatever argument about Hydaelyn's alleged benevolence does not change the fact that She is a primal. Zodiark is too and He has not be shown to be malevolent (to be fair, we do not know hardly anything from Zodiark and the will / command He was given of "hope / salvation / deliverance" is definitely not an evil one). If Zodiark is gone, Hydaelyn must disappear as well. There is already an imbalance between Light and Dark in the Source that the Ascians have been talking about ever since 2.0 and this is with Zodiark still having a (sundered) presence. If He is gone, the only major force in existence would be Light. And that would be bad. The First was the best example.

In short: in the end, the circumstances and details are relevant, but the outcome should, in my opinion, be the same. They both should disappear. Their very existence begets conflict. Primals are a blight upon the star, no matter the form they take. We are the eikon-slayer. As Azem we opposed both of their summonings and at the time our past self fled from the conflict. I feel like their arc should end, in their current incarnation, right the wrong of the Ancients: causing the first (civil) war that signaled the start of many, many tragedies.