Something doesn't add up regarding the connection between Amdapor and Norvrandt...

[Ouen]

In Live Letter LLIII, this answer was given:

Q17:
In the Eorzea Encyclopedia II it mentions that the statues found within Amdapor were made in the image of transcendent beings from yet another plane. Was this referring to the Sin Eaters from the First?

A17:
In the sense of "if you look back at the Lore book, you notice certain things," we did this intentionally.

Amdapor was founded around year 300 of the Fifth Astral Era, with the War of the Magi culminating in 1510 before the Sixth Umbral Era/Calamity of Water (indeterminate length). This was followed by the Sixth Astral Era, lasting close to sixteen centuries, which led up to the events of Dalamud's fall; the Seventh Umbral Era we're all familiar with.

Taking all this into account, the Ancient City was founded approximately 2,780 years ago (give or take a few with the Sixth Astral Era, the length of which is unclear) if I'm doing the math right. As we learn in Shadowbringers, time flows differently on the First than on the Source. We experience it as being greatly accelerated, with only a few days of comatose scions on the Source aging their spirits several years on the First.

The Flood of Light happened a century ago on the First, which means that with a reference point on the Source, Sin Eaters have only been around for perhaps a few weeks or months, provided the accelerated flow of time remained consistent during this period through the events of Shadowbringers. (Can time flow slower on the first? I don't remember if that was confirmed.)

Yoshi-P's answer along with that line from Encyclopedia Eorzea implies that the Amdapori built their Guardians in the image of Sin Eaters in order to protect themselves from the subjugation of Mhach fifteen hundred years ago. However, it seems as though Sin Eaters have only existed for weeks, let alone for anywhere between 1,500 to 2,800 years Source-time. It stands to reason that the Amdapori were mingling with things that had yet to exist for several tens, or perhaps even hundreds of thousands of years on the First.

Now, as I said, I'm not sure if time on the First can progress slower relative to its passing on the Source, but prior to our arrival, time was flowing at an accelerated rate to what we experience, which caused the scions to age rapidly. As the Exarch beckons us, it slows to a period of "near-equivalence." Given that time was accelerated just before we arrived, it stands to reason that the passage of time during the age since the Flood of Light happened was also accelerated, or at the very least, intuition tells us it's unlikely for the flow of time to have fluctuated so wildly in the span of a mere century that it went from source-days corresponding to first-years, to grinding to a halt with source-millennia being a first-century, all coincidentally in time for us to arrive moments before the Rejoining of the First to the Source.

(continued below)

[Ouen]

There's not much hand-waving in the lore of XIV, with the story having very few, if any, plot holes or inconsistencies that I'm aware of, so I am hesitant to conclude "well, time just conveniently flowed in such a way that Amdapor's founding and the Flood of Light coincided perfectly, then First-time virtually froze for 1,500 years, allowing for the events of the present to happen before the First can be rejoined. EVEN IF we assume this is the case, there's still something very, very strange going on.

Let's assume both events played out just right: Square waves their hands and everything magically happens to line up. At the very moment that Amdapor peers into/visits the first, they happen to find Sin Eaters existing in this minuscule window of time. They say "Wow these things are SICK, let's use them as inspiration," they go home and that's the extent of their inter-dimensional adventures.

If Sin Eaters really are the basis upon which the guardians were built, it indicates one of two possibilities that I can conceive of. Either the Amdapori had some means of traversing the rift between reflections, (possibly even being able to travel up and down the river of time, or at the bare minimum, were possessed of the ability to peer across and see other shards as they are in the present) or the Source was visited by Sin Eaters, which has been erased from the history books.

Both implications are extremely interesting, to say the least... If it's the former, why didn't they take the future Ironworks' technology or something else to ensure their sovereignty or victory in the War of the Magi? Were they searching for something else on the First? If it's the latter outcome, well... the story is about to become much more interesting.

[Alleo]

There's not much hand-waving in the lore of XIV, with the story having very few, if any, plot holes or inconsistencies that I'm aware of, so I am hesitant to conclude "well, time just conveniently flowed in such a way that Amdapor's founding and the Flood of Light coincided perfectly, then First-time virtually froze for 1,500 years, allowing for the events of the present to happen before the First can be rejoined. EVEN IF we assume this is the case, there's still something very, very strange going on.

Which would be quite strange indeed because Ardbert and his crew left after they realized what they have created which would then mean that they somehow waited so many years in stasis and then just came to our world and then the return was somehow really fast because the flood has still left one continent open.

(The story does say that different time goes in both direction, so theoretically 1 day on the first could have been x years on the source, but I am not a fan of that time stuff anyways...so much convenience)

[Crushnight]

Storge is believed to be a corrupted Sprite or Fairie and that it feeds on memories.

Thank you ^^

[ObsidianFire]

This is my problem with the "Amdapori statues are based on sin eaters" logic too. The timing just doesn't add up unless the Amdapori could view the future or someone sent a sin eater way back in time.

Also... you can get around the 3k character limit by editing your initial post and adding in the rest of it.

[Ouen]

Oh, that's very helpful Thank you!

[Crushnight]

The best explanation i can come up with without future sight or the time shenanigans between shards is perhaps the Amdapori experimented on themselves or prisoners or beasts on what would happen if you infuse too much light into a being, and watching the slaughter/carnage that would follow, then deside that making golums based on said monstrosities would be great additions to fighting against voidsent/mhach. Also can probably assume Ascian involvement with the war of the magi so could very well get info from them.

[Bright-Flower]

This is my problem with the "Amdapori statues are based on sin eaters" logic too. The timing just doesn't add up unless the Amdapori could view the future or someone sent a sin eater way back in time.

Also... you can get around the 3k character limit by editing your initial post and adding in the rest of it.

Personally I don't think they're based on sin eaters but it is possible that the white magic they used lead to them encountering something similar.

I mean sin eaters take on a ton of forms. Some look look like bears. So those two bosses looking like a couple variants of sin eaters when there are TONS of variants of sin eaters isn't a very concrete connection for me.

[Ouen]

Personally I don't think they're based on sin eaters but it is possible that the white magic they used lead to them encountering something similar.

I'll post the quote that is in my OP again.

Q17:
In the Eorzea Encyclopedia II it mentions that the statues found within Amdapor were made in the image of transcendent beings from yet another plane. Was this referring to the Sin Eaters from the First?

A17:
In the sense of "if you look back at the Lore book, you notice certain things," we did this intentionally.

I'm not using their coincidental appearance to come up with a guess. Yoshida's response is confirmation. If it was not true, he would not have given the answer he did. Here's a rephrasing of the quote that might make it clearer.

"In EE2, we indeed purposefully wrote that Amdapor's guardians 'were made in the image of transcendent beings from another plane,' and we deliberately wanted players to return to the lore book after Shadowbringers and make 'certain' connections."

[Atamis]

I'll post the quote that is in my OP again.



I'm not using their coincidental appearance to come up with a guess. Yoshida's response is confirmation. If it was not true, he would not have given the answer he did. Here's a rephrasing of the quote that might make it clearer.

"In EE2, we indeed purposefully wrote that Amdapor's guardians 'were made in the image of transcendent beings from another plane,' and we deliberately wanted players to return to the lore book after Shadowbringers and make 'certain' connections."

In all fairness, you are interpreting that quote that way (I am also hoping the translation wasn't off)
That quote, to me, says when they wanted to make a light flooded world, they looked back into the lore book and seen ampdapor had loose threads they could build off of. Not that one thing preceded the other, simply they had these wonderful assets and lore connections they could build off of. They purposely used ampdapor as a connection as light based things, not necessarily that the flood happened before or after ampdapor made them chronologically.