*Spoilers* Questions about Shadowbringers

[SerLuke]

In the alternate timeline where Black Rose caused the 8th and final Calamity was Zodiark fully rejoined at this point or was that a process that would still take time?

Were the people killed during the Calamity the sacrifice needed to bring back the ancients Emet was talking about or would there still have been additional killings of people left on the Source?

Does this alternate timeline still exist in some sense? (I know we're getting into multi verse theory with this one)

[Ilenya]

I've wondered about whether 8 was the magic number needed for the rejoining. It seems implied, since that was all the elements, but never been stated that I recall. I believe it is, but at the same time the story given makes no mention one way or the other.

I assume the sacrifices made to bring them back would have been made similar to how we've seen Primal summons using crystals. Death isn't the factor here, releasing the aether is.

Too hard to say. Time travel does weird things to story ideas.

[Iscah]

The "eighth and final" claim was from Fanfest (IIRC) rather than within the story, and people simply assumed this meant Zodiark could/would be revived after that. Even then it could be interpreted in other ways, and Shadowbringers makes that interpretation seem very unlikely.

I suspect in the bad timeline the Source may be damaged beyond repair - if Black Rose is still slowly spreading and poisoning / halting aether, civilisation may never recover and life may not survive long-term. The Ascians may have broken their own system and another rejoining is not possible. The eighth Calamity was the last, because they won't be able to set up another.

As for whether the other timeline still exists...? It's somewhat of a philosophical question when we have no way of checking. But if we assume the timeline is stable now, G'raha Tia still exists, therefore the timeline that formed his past *should* still exist.

The way it makes the most sense to me, especially when trying to resolve it against Alexander's "stable time loop" story format, is that this isn't a large-scale "multiple timelines" story where all sorts of things spawn off alternate timelines where things did/didn't happen. Rather, a unique set of circumstances have allowed them to create this one split in the timeline by creating a paradox that can't resolve itself into a single neat timeline. The 'old' timeline has to remain in existence because things from it (G'raha, the tower, information about events that happened there) cannot be erased without also preventing the changes that erased them. So both timelines stay open, though there may not be much of a future for people in the other timeline where it seems the world is dying. they just know that there's also another world out there where - if their plan succeeds - things have gone better.

[Shadygrove]

Tales from the Shadows III seems to indicate the eighth umbral calamity timeline did exist.

Also that it successfully created an alternate timeline that would replace it.

[Iscah]

Tales from the Shadows III seems to indicate the eighth umbral calamity timeline did exist.

Also that it successfully created an alternate timeline that would replace it.

Absolutely - there's no question that it did exist. Despite how the information was initially relayed to us, it's not some vision of a possible future that might come to pass - it's the reality that G'raha Tia was living in prior to his trip through spacetime into the past of the First.

The question is whether it still exists now that it has been replaced.

[Enkidoh]

Oh I have no doubt that the 'Bad future'/original timeline where the 8th Calamity occurred and the Warrior of Light died still exists as a seperate alternate timeline now, as SE themselves have done this very thing back in FFXI in it's Wings of the Goddess and Abyssea expansions (in WotG the big revelation of that storyline was that the player's version of Vana'diel was actually the changed future that was never meant to exist - the prime or 'bad' timeline where the Shadowlord won the Crystal War and the nations of the races of Altana were destroyed was rewritten by the Goddess Altana and entities from that bad present were trying to 'put history back how it was originally was'; and Abyssea's world was an alternate present where the end of the Chains of Promathia expansion went badly, in that the player character died in the final battle and the dark god Promathia absorbed them and their companions into himself, turning himself into Shinryu and tearing Vana'diel to pieces, literally.

Both these scenarios were alternate timelines that exist concurrently with the player's own, despite having diverged wildly from them. In the same way, the 'bad future' of the post Eighth Calamity here in FFXIV still exists as an alternate world, thus the Crystal Tower that ended up in the First, and G'raha Tia with it, is now not 'our' one, it's from an alternate timeline that now exists in parallel to our one.

Of course that means that the crapsack 'World of Ruin' Source where the Crystal Exarch came from still exists and will forever be a dying world that could never be saved is pretty depressing to think about, but that's quantum physics for you.

[Iscah]

In the same way, the 'bad future' of the post Eighth Calamity here in FFXIV still exists as an alternate world, thus the Crystal Tower that ended up in the First, and G'raha Tia, is now not 'our' one, it's from an alternate timeline that now exists in parallel to our one.

To be exact, the bad future (or the part of it that G'raha came back from) will exist parallel to ours in 200 years' time - although the "bad alternate present" has apparently split away by this point.

The joys of time-travel terminology.


Also I'd still regard G'raha Exarch as "our one" because he is the same person we met at the Crystal Tower - there was no split timeline at that point. He knows us, not alternate-universe-us. If we were talking about longer-divided timelines where the split was prior to our first meeting, that would be different.

Both the Exarch and the young G'raha Tia currently sleeping in the tower trace back to being "our G'raha". It's not a different person, it's the same person at two points in their life - although of course after the timeline 'split point' the Exarch is not on the same side of the split that he took "the first time around".

Of course that means that the crapsack 'World of Ruin' Source where the Crystal Exarch came from still exists and will forever be a dying world that could never be saved is pretty depressing to think about, but that's quantum physics for you.

They're not any worse off than they already were, at least - and don't have the guilt of having sacrificed everyone on their world to recreate the timeline. (Not that they'd have the guilt once they ceased to exist, either...)

Maybe the Ironworks can figure out timeline-crossing tech in the next 200 years and then go help them out - after proto-Exarch-G'raha leaves of course, so it doesn't cause another contradiction and split.

(I'm sure this would potentially cause more time issues than it solves, but it could certainly work for that specific situation...)

[Ilenya]

Also I'd still regard G'raha Exarch as "our one" because he is the same person we met at the Crystal Tower - there was no split timeline at that point. He knows us, not alternate-universe-us. If we were talking about longer-divided timelines where the split was prior to our first meeting, that would be different.

Both the Exarch and the young G'raha Tia currently sleeping in the tower trace back to being "our G'raha". It's not a different person, it's the same person at two points in their life - although of course after the timeline 'split point' the Exarch is not on the same side of the split that he took "the first time around".

Thinking about this...I have no idea when the Crystal Tower arc could take place in the story if you have started Shadowbringers, let alone Alexander and Omega. The exarch actually specifically mentions that the WoL and he hadn't met yet in the timeline when talking to Urianger in the Echo scene, but by all accounts the Garleans should have been using the Black Rose a little after your run-in with Elidizenos. Maybe I have the timing off in my head, but it feels like there wouldn't have been much of a chance for you to go side-questing with the war going on and all. You probably only left the front lines in the current timeline because of the Exarch poking you.

[Alleluia]

Thinking about this...I have no idea when the Crystal Tower arc could take place in the story if you have started Shadowbringers, let alone Alexander and Omega. The exarch actually specifically mentions that the WoL and he hadn't met yet in the timeline when talking to Urianger in the Echo scene, but by all accounts the Garleans should have been using the Black Rose a little after your run-in with Elidizenos. Maybe I have the timing off in my head, but it feels like there wouldn't have been much of a chance for you to go side-questing with the war going on and all. You probably only left the front lines in the current timeline because of the Exarch poking you.

If you didn't do the raids yet and Black Rose was about to be launched at you, then you were on the path to an even worse 8th umbral calamity future cus no G'raha, CT, Alex, and Omega. So G'raha really, really did that version of the world a solid. It still works, though, since he's from another timeline anyway. In his timeline, you had done the raids. Its headache-inducing... but it works.

[EdwinLi]

The way I see it there are two possible outcomes being....

1) Building Block timeline - the previous timeline was actually the past and when G'raha Tia went back in time he stopped the old timeline from existing and the new timeline created a new Block to continue the timeline. Think of it like this....



Block A to B is the old timeline and Block C to E is the new timeline. Everything is part of the Block line as one timeline thus it was always intended in the timeline for events of the Black Rose ( along with everything that lead to the time travel) to happen so in a future part of the timeline the events that started Shadowbringer will happen. Thus creating a new Block that still followed majority of the same events up until a specific moments where the new block will cause different events like overriding Saved Data using a New Game+ Data that still count your play time since you began a New game even though New Game+ reset your progress with carried over stuff.


2) Time Remnent timeline - The new timeline is created and completely replaced the old timeline but Old G'raha Tia exists because his influence in the New Timeline is far too vital that it cannot erase him without erasing the New Timeline as well thus he remains in the New Timeline as a Remnent of the Old Timeline due to being a major influence in creating the new timeline.