Is Zodiark evil?

[MPNZ]

No. And, the ascians are dumb, overly edgy, and are a force of self-destruction lost in their personal darkness with little understanding or even attempts to understand the darkness inside of them, which in turn twist ted their bodies and minds just as they did to Solus, Mach, and the 13th shard. And the over aspection of light and dark creates a perpetually lack of fullfillment or the void in theory.

And, the battle between Hydalyn and Zodiark is most likely an internal struggle within itself in a thematic sense

[Floortank]

I'm so disgusted with the story being "good = evil" "void = light" in Final Fantasy games. It is so shallow and boring. Please stop, SE. It was boring with Altana and Promathia, it was boring in Dissidia because Cosmos and Chaos are extremely boring characters, and the only good thing I can say about FFXIV's version of the "equality play" is that the Ascians are factually hurting and using people who don't deserve to be hurt or used, which at least gives the conflict some sense of tension. The navel-gazing path inward to equivalency between "giant space monster good" and "giant space monster bad" ends up making the entire story seem like a farce.

It's okay to have Zodiark be Lavos, Square-Enix. You know, Lavos, right? Maybe one of you working there has heard of him.

[IkaraGreydancer]

I'm so disgusted with the story being "good = evil" "void = light" in Final Fantasy games. It is so shallow and boring. Please stop, SE. It was boring with Altana and Promathia, it was boring in Dissidia because Cosmos and Chaos are extremely boring characters, and the only good thing I can say about FFXIV's version of the "equality play" is that the Ascians are factually hurting and using people who don't deserve to be hurt or used, which at least gives the conflict some sense of tension. The navel-gazing path inward to equivalency between "giant space monster good" and "giant space monster bad" ends up making the entire story seem like a farce.

It's okay to have Zodiark be Lavos, Square-Enix. You know, Lavos, right? Maybe one of you working there has heard of him.

I can only say from the games Ive played but FFX and X-2,FFXII,FFXIII thru LR and FF15 had nothing to do with Light vs dark. Dissidia NT had that initially but that quickly changed. They haven't done the light vs dark thing recently as far as I know.

[Rannie]

Lavos the giant mindless space flea that isnt really evil to begin with? You mean like how we think Zodiark may actually be? Also you want zodiark to eat us?

[Mistyregions]

I look at it this way. Both zodiark and crystal mom are evil. Too much of one and boom no one survives. What I glean from everyone's point of view including the emperor is that if all the shards are rejoined a new world will appear with both bad and good people in balance, some suffer and some don't. That's life. I also like to refute the idea "well killing millions is evil no matter what" and I would like to point out killing them now, gets it's over with and prevents more lives to be lost to the light and dark and the ends justify the means. It's like a trolley cart scenario. Death is inevitable, so I think the best way to go about it is to end it quickly and with certainty.

[Kalise]

I also like to refute the idea "well killing millions is evil no matter what" and I would like to point out killing them now, gets it's over with and prevents more lives to be lost to the light and dark and the ends justify the means. It's like a trolley cart scenario. Death is inevitable, so I think the best way to go about it is to end it quickly and with certainty.

Well...

The thing is...

Dark and Light overabundance isn't a certainty.

It's only thanks to the actions of people (Mostly the Ascians) that major imbalances have formed that lead to these things (With the First also having something to do with not dealing with Primals properly, just killing them doesn't solve the issue it merely removes the symptom)

Which is what Hydaelyn has chosen the WoL to counteract. Instead of letting the Ascians make all the dark they want and rejoin worlds or accidentally cause floods of darkness (Like on the Thirteenth) empower someone who can then go and balance things out so that these buttheads don't mass murder everyone and every world gets to live without being consumed by Light/Dark.

[Rannie]

Honestly, I cant agree with the whole the ends justify the means with that Misty. We unfortunately have no idea what will happen to those millions of souls that die with the rejoining. For what little we do know, it could end up that once that life is dead they're completely gone since the Lifestream that they were used to changed completely then again it may not. Remember for thousands of years these calamities have been happening. I think for that portion of it, it's better to wait and see if we can find out as opposed to jumping the gun and saying hey yeah let all those deaths happen.

[Cilia]

"Evil" is a point of view. From our perspective, Zodiark may or may not be evil; we know next to nothing about Him and have had no personal contact with Him. All we have is secondhand information coming from Hydaelyn (as "The Word of the Mother") and his agents (the Ascians).

Either way, from what we've been told Zodiark's resurrection will mean the end of mortal life as it's known... and the people of Hydaelyn happen to like mortal life as they know it, so that's reason enough to oppose His resurrection.

[Alleo]

Correct me if im wrong but isnt Hydaelyn responsible for the influx of light pretty much screwed up the world we are going to?

Seemingly none of the crystals can keep their element at bay. Hydaelyn was not able to directly influence the first (she needed someone that went for her there) and we know that the void was created because of the mistake of an Ascian and they say that this was not helpful for Zodiark either which kinda hints that he also cant directly influence the realm thus need the Ascians to do that.

In the end the first might have had too much Light anyway which helped tip the balance way faster and since Hydaelyn was not even able to talk to us anymore for a time, because she was weak from protecting us, it makes sense that she could not just simply help them.

I look at it this way. Both zodiark and crystal mom are evil. Too much of one and boom no one survives. What I glean from everyone's point of view including the emperor is that if all the shards are rejoined a new world will appear with both bad and good people in balance, some suffer and some don't. That's life. I also like to refute the idea "well killing millions is evil no matter what" and I would like to point out killing them now, gets it's over with and prevents more lives to be lost to the light and dark and the ends justify the means. It's like a trolley cart scenario. Death is inevitable, so I think the best way to go about it is to end it quickly and with certainty.

The mother crystal has not shown one part of being evil. She has used Minfilia but Minfilia still chose this and it was at a desperate time that only was created thanks to the actions of the Ascians. The emporer has no idea what will happen either. He only got the talk from Elidibus (or maybe Solus) and we cant really trust them. For all that can happen is that life wont exist anymore, and only beings like Ascians exit. Who is to say that a fully powered Hydaelyn could not just sent out fully powered emissaries to all shards and restrain any light that is overpowering them while people can simply live their life? Why would a new world be needed?

[LineageRazor]

Death is inevitable, so I think the best way to go about it is to end it quickly and with certainty.

Assuming by "death" you mean the destruction of the Source and the Shards, it inevitable, though? We have only the Ascians' word that the current situation is untenable, and they certainly are biased in their opinions. It could be the case that the Source and the Shards are a completely viable state of existence, just not the state of existence that the Ascians WANT.

As near as we can tell, ALL CASES of light/dark imbalance have arisen due to Ascian influence. As much as they claim to want to preserve the balance, both Floods involved Ascian activity. If the world is spiraling toward doom, it's because the Ascians are causing it, not because it's inevitable.

The Ascians want to return the world to its original state, and there's no guarantee that a "unified race" will arise as a result, no matter what Varis believes. It is in their interests to convince all concerned that the only way to save the world is to destroy it, and murder billions in the process. It's a tough sell, and I ain't buying it.