story predictions for shadowbringers

[Noitems]

Holy bologne, I completely forgot that they showed this screen.

It really doesn't make any sense! This suggests that half of the xpac is happening at the First, then the content patches we fight Garlemald? Kind of a bummer if it is, because the Empire incursion deserves its own xpac...

It's most likely going to be like Stormblood where the .0 content is our full journey through the first to bring back the dark, but the 5.1-5.4 patches will be our lead in for Garlemald. We didn't get any single thing on for the First in Stormblood until the MSQ end of 5.4 where the scions were called.

Also considering how a recent interview said you have to complete the MSQ to then do your lvl 80 role quest it seems fair to know we're going to have something going on with the Source as they're retelling the events of the Warriors of Darkness.

Also keep in mind we sill haven't even been to Garlemalde yet nor have even visited the New World (which Yoshi-P wants us to explore as well). It would make sense for us to come back to the source to deal with Garlemalde as Shadowbringers brings the Hydelan/Zodiark story to 80% complete.

Also as the Hrothgar/Gunbreakers originate from Islabard the Garlemald tie ins are going to be very big for SHB and be the lead in for 6.0 as wel.

[Jennah]

Taking down Solus - which I guess we're still doing, despite having a friendly chat with him in the E3 trailer? - will, in a very real sense take down the Garlean Empire, as it is now.
The other weird thing from that old presentation was that it listed "Elidibus, an Ascian with the face of Zenos!" as the other major antagonist ... while the live letter said nothing at all about him, showing us Lardass-McEulmore and Discount-Ramuh as the secondary antagonists instead.
Hmm.

[KageTokage]

I'd be surprised if Elidibus didn't figure out where we and Solus went and decided to head to the First for his own reasons as well.

I'm still wondering what Solus is scheming considering that he didn't make a peep about his intentions to Elidibus and left without a word, which seems to suggest it's something he might not agree with.

[Jaywalker]

I predict that Dark Knight jobquest will focus on the idea of Freudian Ego the same way that Fray was Id and Myste was Superego, also mirroring the Warring Triad. Ego in Shadowbringers will have to do with trying to find balance between two conflicting parts of WoL’s personality and negotiating that with reality. Possibly at the end will realize it’s impossible to find true balance.

As another point, no clue if it will happen at any point but I seriously hope we get some Jungian psychology brought in, at least for Dark Knight. Sophia I think indicates that something might be happening but we can go deeper. ;P

[YianKutku]

Watching Mogtalk's episode with Anonymoose and Ethys Asher, I noted the bit when Ethys speculated that maybe Mini-filia was a resident of the First who was a priestess of a Light cult or something, and she willingly gave up her body for Minfilia of the Source to possess while on the First.

And I was thinking that the Japanese name for Mini-filia's role, the "Oracle of Light", was "光の巫女", ie "Miko of Light". And one of the roles of the miko in traditional Shinto is to be a vessel to be possessed by a given kami (voluntarily, or at least as part of their duties).

The more I think about it, the more plausible it sounds. The translation to "Oracle" might also be a reference to the Western traditions of such, who reportedly also go into god-induced trances to give prophecies.

[ErikTheRedXIII]

One thing I haven't seen discussed too much yet, is what we think the beacon to the First will be. My guess is a water-aspected crystal of darkness: Water -> "flow" -> Travel through turbulent space-time (I quoted flow, as I doubt our travel to the shard would have similarities to the spell employed by Y'Shtola). As with the original crystal gathering from ARR, I figure we'll need elementally-aspected crystals of darkness to harness that power for the story, and it could follow that we would gather most of them from defeated Sin Eaters. This would also come with upgrades to our aetherial meeting-space to have chats with the Elder Primals. what thoughts do you all have on this?

[EdwinLi]

Watching Mogtalk's episode with Anonymoose and Ethys Asher, I noted the bit when Ethys speculated that maybe Mini-filia was a resident of the First who was a priestess of a Light cult or something, and she willingly gave up her body for Minfilia of the Source to possess while on the First.

And I was thinking that the Japanese name for Mini-filia's role, the "Oracle of Light", was "光の巫女", ie "Miko of Light". And one of the roles of the miko in traditional Shinto is to be a vessel to be possessed by a given kami (voluntarily, or at least as part of their duties).

The more I think about it, the more plausible it sounds. The translation to "Oracle" might also be a reference to the Western traditions of such, who reportedly also go into god-induced trances to give prophecies.

It is not much of a surprise that Source Minfilia would choose her First Doppelganger as a host body. Despite having completely different lives with the only similarity being their appearance and voice, First Minfilia is most likely the most easy host to maintain a certain amount of will over due to being genetically indistinguishable with the only thing separating them is their different life experiences and personality. First Minfilia chosen to be the Miko/Oracle is due to how similar her appearance is to Source Minfilia which is no a surprise since it is common in stories for characters of similar appearances to the image of their Gods or Chosens of their Gods to be picked as the Miko/Oracle by the population.

I suspect this will be a important plot to cover over time in 5.0 through 5.X since I believe at some point Source Minfilia will have less influence over First Minfilia so First Minfilia can start to develop into her own individual character rather remain a host for Source Minfilia to control. Though expect a bit of emotional conflict from characters such as F'lhaminn since there is possibility that First Minfilia may begin to live with the Scions in the Source after 5.0 plot due to story reasons. Not to mention some internal conflict from First Minfilia as well since part of the plot may involve her own personal feelings of this role of Miko/Oracle being placed on her.

[Iscah]

Watching Mogtalk's episode with Anonymoose and Ethys Asher, I noted the bit when Ethys speculated that maybe Mini-filia was a resident of the First who was a priestess of a Light cult or something, and she willingly gave up her body for Minfilia of the Source to possess while on the First.

And I was thinking that the Japanese name for Mini-filia's role, the "Oracle of Light", was "光の巫女", ie "Miko of Light". And one of the roles of the miko in traditional Shinto is to be a vessel to be possessed by a given kami (voluntarily, or at least as part of their duties).

The more I think about it, the more plausible it sounds. The translation to "Oracle" might also be a reference to the Western traditions of such, who reportedly also go into god-induced trances to give prophecies.

An alternate, simpler take on her title is that "our" Minfilia has already become a god-possessed oracle as the Word of the Mother.

Regardless of exactly what's going on, "Mini" certainly appears to be under Hydaelyn's influence in the same way.

[EdwinLi]

An alternate, simpler take on her title is that "our" Minfilia has already become a god-possessed oracle as the Word of the Mother.

Regardless of exactly what's going on, "Mini" certainly appears to be under Hydaelyn's influence in the same way.

I suspect it will be a Psychic link thing where First Minfilia will be in control 90% of the time and only time the Mother/Source Minfilia is in control is during moments when she needs to speak through First Minfilia.

The Glowing Blue Eyes are most likely to show that they have a Psychic link with each other so Mother/Source Minfilia can see what is happening through First Minfilia since as the Miko/Oracle of the Mother Crystal/Source Minfilia, her role is to act as their representative in the First and personal means of communication to other people who do not have Echoes.

[ObsidianFire]

If it turns out that Mini-fillia is the one place where they ditch the "it's been 12k years since the Shards split from the Source so there's no good reason for there to be alternate versions of other characters on other Shards" idea, I will be very disappointed.

Alternate versions of major characters in this setting make no sense. If the writers have to stoop to giving another shard a version of Minfillia to have Source!Minfilia be involved with the plot again, I will think they are very lazy writers indeed. And this is in an expansion that has been dripping with contrivances since it was introduced. The last thing this expansion needs is just another "it just so happens that x happened".

I would much rather have Mini-fillia not be anyone from the 1st Shard. Having her come about due to Source!Minfillia messing around with the 1st Shard and letting her human side be born again or something makes far more sense.

If there was one thing Stormblood taught me about the FFXIV story team, it's that their lore is usually well thought out (so long as Youshida isn't to heavily involved; see Eureka for that). However, their implementation of how the lore is shown to the player through the story has been very lackluster. In particular, Stormblood had a badly paced Expansion MSQ (4.0) and Transition MSQ (4.5). Having to contrive circumstances that Minfillia is involved in the 5.0 MSQ just makes it feel like we are headed into more badly paced MSQ again.