[Spoiler] About Y'shtola's eyes

[Mr_Fluffems]

Going into ShB, I thought she saw through aether, draining her life but able to see the magic in things. Which seemed confirmed at first when she didn't recognize the WoL since we had absorbed so much light aether. Then she asked Uraianger to describe the night sky to her, further suggested she could not see things that did not contain aether (even though I would think the sky in FF had aether, no?) But then immediately after she asks Urianger to describe the sky to her she's able to tell how old cave paintings are because she can see the kind of paint used? So are we to believe ancient paint has magic in it and the sky and stars do not? Can she see everything or just aether?

[Brightamethyst]

IIRC they specifically mentioned that it was some sort of aether infused paint.

[Anonymoose]

It's also possible that the stars are so dim and distant that they're "whited out" by the ambient aether in the atmosphere.

[Vidu]

Considering that at least all the ink thats used for arcanist books is magic/ather infused, "magic paint" wouldnt be unheard off... so why shouldnt we believe that it was used back in the days those paintings were made?

I could also imagine that the way her vision works now things dont look excatly "pretty" and that shes asking Urianger to describe the night sky not to get an accurate describtion but more one that describe the "atmosphere" and beauty of it, not so much "there are lights in front of a dark background". More about "poetry" and what the night sky means and less about how it actually looks. She might be able to "see" the stars in the sense of seeing their aether, but thats probably not the same as seeing the actual night sky. I recall that scene as kinda wistful - the night sky means so much to the people who now mean a lot to Y'shtola and she isnt able to see it the way they do.

While with the paint and accurate describtion is needed.
The paint is about information, the night sky is about nostalgia and the beauty of it returning.

[Edax]

Going into ShB, I thought she saw through aether, draining her life but able to see the magic in things. Which seemed confirmed at first when she didn't recognize the WoL since we had absorbed so much light aether. Then she asked Uraianger to describe the night sky to her, further suggested she could not see things that did not contain aether (even though I would think the sky in FF had aether, no?) But then immediately after she asks Urianger to describe the sky to her she's able to tell how old cave paintings are because she can see the kind of paint used? So are we to believe ancient paint has magic in it and the sky and stars do not? Can she see everything or just aether?

If Y'shtola can only see aether and the sky had aether, then what difference would she perceive between daylight and nightlight?

[Hezzlocks]

I've heard that the draining her life bit was just an addition to the English translation, and doesn't exist in the Japanese translation, hence why we haven't heard anything more on that.

But it's been absolutely confirmed, for quite some time now, that she used aethersight to see. As an example of what that might look like you could use the Alexander questline, where Cid brought Y'Shtola in to observe the flow of Aether, which she was able to do with her own eyes now confirming her aethersight, but she gives Cid her goggles to take a look, and we get to see what he does. While likely not an accurate depiction of Aethersight, it does give us a sense of what she might be able to see.

Along with the knowledge that everything has its own ambient aether, it's entirely possible that aethersight allows her to see what the exact shape, colour and material of something is, hence her ability to see the murals on the wall, yet not actually be able to see them explicitly. It'd be kind of like being able to see the Matrix code. You can see there is a wall there, you can see it's made of grey stone and you can see there is different coloured pigments on said wall, and your mind's eye can piece all the information together... yet all you are actually *seeing* is the code. By that sense Y'Shtola can see the sky is a night sky full of stars, but can't actually see what that actually looks like.

[Iscah]

As an example of what that might look like you could use the Alexander questline, where Cid brought Y'Shtola in to observe the flow of Aether, which she was able to do with her own eyes now confirming her aethersight, but she gives Cid her goggles to take a look, and we get to see what he does. While likely not an accurate depiction of Aethersight, it does give us a sense of what she might be able to see.

Yes and no, because what Cid sees is the visible aether as an overlay on the real world - whereas Y'shtola may only be seeing the 'overlay'.

Another telling moment is where we first come across Emet's grand illusion. "So we are seeing the same view!" she says (possibly paraphrased), suggesting she can see illusions clearly, but not normal objects. At least that's how I'm understanding it.

(Which raises an interesting question about what our glamoured outfits look like for her...)

[Yuriane]

Another telling moment is where we first come across Emet's grand illusion. "So we are seeing the same view!" she says (possibly paraphrased), suggesting she can see illusions clearly, but not normal objects.

I think that scene actually tells us a lot about aethersight in general. They describe it how we see it, then she says she's seeing the same thing. This gives us two pieces of info.
1 - The illusion is solid aether, aether itself can be molded to shape and colour and mass, this is likely true for primals as well also explaining why many primals only have one major colour given they're comprised of mostly one element of aether.
2 - Aethersight functions simply by only being able to see aether. There's more than likely a range to which that aether can be seen and stronger manifestations of aether are more easily visible. Her being able to see the illusion the same way we do shows that she's unable to see things conventionally which is why it's so significant she has a conventional sight over the illusion. We can also infer from not just this but other instances that her aethersight is like a multicoloured variant of the aetherscopes, as the aetherscopes make no distinction between certain types of aether while she's able to tell each element individually. This is likely the case for the paint.

It's important to remember that aether isn't just vaugely around but everything has aether in it. The land needs aether to grow, develop, and die. A small part of the Eden raids show us it's near impossible to light a fire with no ambient aether present, even through nonmagical means. When something is "aether-infused" it's could be better described as "aether saturated" and thus the aether within is usable. With practice, which Y'shtola has more than enough opportunity to have, one can possibly see such thinly spread aether.

[Hezzlocks]

Yes and no, because what Cid sees is the visible aether as an overlay on the real world - whereas Y'shtola may only be seeing the 'overlay'.

Well, yeah, that's what I meant by "likely not an accurate depiction". It's the closest thing we can get to seeing what Aethersight would look like, but wouldn't be exactly that.

I think that scene actually tells us a lot about aethersight in general. They describe it how we see it, then she says she's seeing the same thing. This gives us two pieces of info.
1 - The illusion is solid aether, aether itself can be molded to shape and colour and mass, this is likely true for primals as well also explaining why many primals only have one major colour given they're comprised of mostly one element of aether.
2 - Aethersight functions simply by only being able to see aether. There's more than likely a range to which that aether can be seen and stronger manifestations of aether are more easily visible. Her being able to see the illusion the same way we do shows that she's unable to see things conventionally which is why it's so significant she has a conventional sight over the illusion. We can also infer from not just this but other instances that her aethersight is like a multicoloured variant of the aetherscopes, as the aetherscopes make no distinction between certain types of aether while she's able to tell each element individually. This is likely the case for the paint.

It's important to remember that aether isn't just vaugely around but everything has aether in it. The land needs aether to grow, develop, and die. A small part of the Eden raids show us it's near impossible to light a fire with no ambient aether present, even through nonmagical means. When something is "aether-infused" it's could be better described as "aether saturated" and thus the aether within is usable. With practice, which Y'shtola has more than enough opportunity to have, one can possibly see such thinly spread aether.

This is how I see it, yes. Everything has ambient aether within it, this much is known, and it's how Y'shtola is able to see while being physically blind. She sees the aether within the object, and judging by the elemental makeup of the aether, alongside the general size and shape of it, she can discern what it is that she's looking at. The city of Amaurot, however, was a colossal illusion made of aether, as such she didn't really need to read the aether to understand what it is, more rather it was... well, kind of like ASCII art.

[Lium]

She actually dies in the next expansion anyway. So it's not that big of a deal.

Just kidding.