Thread: Revenge of the Weapons (5.2 and Onwards)

Originally Posted by Bright-Flower

It only isn't right now because the emperor was assasinated and the chemical weapon the empire was preparing destroyed and now it's in a civil war, and could just as easily resume once someone consolidates power again. It's not like the empire had a change of heart. Zenos just threw a wrench into the gears, for his own selfish purposes even.

The use of a chemical weapon was to avoid excessive losses among a force that is incapable of using aether. The protagonists can paint it as a 'horrific' approach to warfare but conveniently it does no such thing when it comes to other traumatic methods of death such as blasting people with fireballs, running them through with swords, afflicting opponents with magical diseases or drowning/crushing them with water and debris as we saw with the fall of Doma Castle.

The use of Black Rose was a sound enough move and the real complication lay in the unintended side effects in the form of a Calamity. The weapon was also only used in response to Garlemald itself being invaded and in an alternative universe at that, so...

It's not even necessarily Varis who would opt to use it since apparently that universe still exists based on the Exarch's continued existence.

Either way, the entire plot felt rather contrived and messy. I wouldn't be surprised if it was wrapped up very quickly to justify diving right into Shadowbringers.

Originally Posted by Bright-Flower

'Unintneded side effects?' The calamity was intended. Even Varis is on board with the calamities as shown in the parlay scene with him. He knew about them. The empire was made as a tool to bring about calamities by the ascians, and has been waging wars of conquest to help facilitate them. And while your average garlean doesn't know about acian angle, they're still waging wars of agression all over the world. If Garlemald was invaded in the bad future it would be in retaliation of its constant warmongering, Garlemald is NOT the victim in any such scenario. Even the public reasoning for their war is revealed to be an outright lie in SB's latter patches, one that didn't take all that much thought to punch holes in once the characters thought about it critically.

Garlemald is absolutely the victim. They've been manipulated by Ascian scheming, though putting that aside their people have the inability to manipulate aether and were almost wiped out as a consequence of being driven out of fertile lands and into a bleak, harsh wasteland. It was only the presence of ceruleum that prevented their extinction - and with a nudge, they began to conquer and begin claiming more territory for themselves.

That doesn't excuse everything they've done, though it's hardly a black and white affair - and the only territories they treated with extreme prejudice where those that sought to rebel. In Ala Mhigo's case, its people were happy to try and conquer themselves until they encountered a foe they couldn't beat.

Originally Posted by Lauront

It was just a mess and, IMO, poorly written and rushed. I'm still not a huge fan of the time travel mechanic they used, either.

It's rarely handled well in general and is often just a tool to present 'danger' that amounts to nothing in the end. I've said this before, though the game goes to great lengths to have everything wrap up in a neat little bow of convenience for the protagonists at pretty much every point. A few minor characters are sacrificed now and then but there's rarely any lasting consequences. Meanwhile the antagonists tend to have a more compelling struggle with depth and tough decisions to be made, without the plot device that is the Warrior of Light to solve all their issues for them.

Originally Posted by Melichoir

Their tactics when dealing with conquered territories is actually a pretty age old one and is most likely a tactic that has played out in all places of the world (Including our own City States of Eorzea). It essentially breaks down to this - Citizenry of a conquered nation can fall into two camps broadly: Those that are in league with the conquerors, and those that reject the conquerors. For a conquering nation to ensure stability overtime and bring that territory into the fold (which is what Garlemald is seeking to do), they will have to rout any and all objectors while rewarding and uplifting supporters with the long term goal of replacing the resisting population with the supporting population. Garlemald seemed to be doing this in the case of Ala Mhigo, as well as Doma. People who fell in line behind the empire were rewarded broadly (if not left alone). Objectors to the new Garlemald rule were persecuted and treated terribly. This of course created a schism in Ala Mhigo, as people hated the supporters and saw them as traitors. But as the story points out - those supporters of the Garlemald empire did so because they viewed the mad king as so much god awfully worse and did not see any real leader to take his place. For them, The empire was a good thing and would bring stability to their nation. If it meant giving up a few traditions and practices, that was worth the price.

While I dont think the story does the best job at explaining this, the empire isnt super black and white where theyre nothing but evil slavers to all but the garlemald people. Even the reasoning behind Garlemalds expanse was predicated on (or atleast to the public it was) eradicating a practice which destabilizes the environment. It's literally an argument against WMDs as that is what a primal akin to. In any case, what theyre doing isnt anything new, nor are they an exception. the Garlemald people were victims of this same system, so its no suprise they would use it too. And our own citi states are no innocent actors. Theyre self interested actors. We may disagree with Garlemalds views, but those are ideological. Uldah, Limsa, and Gridania also have sketchy history of doing some pretty inhumane crap. Varis even points this out, and it isnt to much a stretch that Eorzea is defending itself from Garlemald out of self interest and preservation and not so much some greater need for the moral good.

TLDR - Its all a bit sketch. Garlemald is not a great empire, but we the player shouldnt be sitting here and being like "Oh theyre pure evil and were oh so good." The conflict is more about a difference in view point rather than morality.

It is also worth noting Doma and Ala Mhigo got the short end of the stick for reasons, whereas other provinces saw life go on as before (and I'd imagine, improve in some cases.) In Doma's case for summoning a Primal, in Ala Mhigo's for its generally bellicose attitude, which meant the Empire would really need to crush any potential flames of revolt early on. Although the writers have made it so that the Empire was being led by its nose to serve the Ascian agenda (which in turn has its own underlying logic, also resolving, IMO, to a conflict in POV, i.e. between immortals and mortals who they view as existing at their world and people's expense), Garlemald is far from uniquely bad or oppressive... and a lot of the lead up in SB to ShB made me think they were perpetrating last minute changes on some characters, like Varis and Elidibus, as well as the Empire's raison d'etre, hence the rather forced writing. Like you said, the city-states have their shadier elements too and more often than not use the WoL to do what they can't really accomplish.

Varis, at least up until that parley, was interested in preserving his people above all else, and it does not seem illogical to me to surmise that he was in a situation where to turn on Emet-Selch or Elidibus would simply mean his death, whilst they ploughed on with their plan, since they could simply possess his body if need be. It's a pretty similar position to that which Thordan was in: he had inherited a conflict that had no easy resolutions, being waged under false pretenses but with stakes which were, nonetheless, very high. Only I think Varis was given the full truth in very recent terms, whereas Thordan was probably aware all along. Makes little difference, either way.

I'm just hoping Garlemald will still be salvaged as a city-state after all is said and done, rather than destroyed outright.

Originally Posted by Melichoir

Their tactics when dealing with conquered territories is actually a pretty age old one and is most likely a tactic that has played out in all places of the world (Including our own City States of Eorzea). It essentially breaks down to this - Citizenry of a conquered nation can fall into two camps broadly: Those that are in league with the conquerors, and those that reject the conquerors. For a conquering nation to ensure stability overtime and bring that territory into the fold (which is what Garlemald is seeking to do), they will have to rout any and all objectors while rewarding and uplifting supporters with the long term goal of replacing the resisting population with the supporting population. Garlemald seemed to be doing this in the case of Ala Mhigo, as well as Doma. People who fell in line behind the empire were rewarded broadly (if not left alone). Objectors to the new Garlemald rule were persecuted and treated terribly. This of course created a schism in Ala Mhigo, as people hated the supporters and saw them as traitors. But as the story points out - those supporters of the Garlemald empire did so because they viewed the mad king as so much god awfully worse and did not see any real leader to take his place. For them, The empire was a good thing and would bring stability to their nation. If it meant giving up a few traditions and practices, that was worth the price.

While I dont think the story does the best job at explaining this, the empire isnt super black and white where theyre nothing but evil slavers to all but the garlemald people. Even the reasoning behind Garlemalds expanse was predicated on (or atleast to the public it was) eradicating a practice which destabilizes the environment. It's literally an argument against WMDs as that is what a primal akin to. In any case, what theyre doing isnt anything new, nor are they an exception. the Garlemald people were victims of this same system, so its no suprise they would use it too. And our own citi states are no innocent actors. Theyre self interested actors. We may disagree with Garlemalds views, but those are ideological. Uldah, Limsa, and Gridania also have sketchy history of doing some pretty inhumane crap. Varis even points this out, and it isnt to much a stretch that Eorzea is defending itself from Garlemald out of self interest and preservation and not so much some greater need for the moral good.

TLDR - Its all a bit sketch. Garlemald is not a great empire, but we the player shouldnt be sitting here and being like "Oh theyre pure evil and were oh so good." The conflict is more about a difference in view point rather than morality.

Except what ever moral high-ground the Empire had went completely out the window when it was revealed their whole ideology was built as a lie - Zenos even lampshaded the Empire's hypocrisy about the Primals outright. It was pretty clear even early on that there was more to the Empire's zealous "kill all Primals" directive when they were antagonizing the beastmen who were summoning, and of course, surprise surprise, it turns out they were founded by the very forces teaching the beastmen to summon in the first place! Accordingly every other strong moral arguement they might have had disappeared into the smoke it was.

You are right though that the Garlean people were victims in a way - Emet set up the Empire as 'Solus' specifically for the sole reason to create a Calamity after all, as that was his MO: find a put-upon, oppressed people, possess some lowly but still well-placed individual close to said government, provide miraculous answers to the nation's problems, and then build up the nation carefully as a powerhouse, then proceed to go forth and conquer their neighbours, hammering them under the jackboot into a mighty yet oppressive empire. Then stoke unrest in said povinces, resulting in resistance and further bloodshed, thus allowing the perfect chaotic situtation to eventually result in a Calamity. He cared nothing for the nations he created and abandoned to their fate, they were just tools to be used in the Ascians' greater plan of allowing Zodiark's rebirth. He did this with Garlemald. He did it with the Allag. He was beginning to do so with Eulmore on the First. And "an assorted half-dozen other nations with Imperial ambitions besides", as he so gleefully admitted to the player and the Scions.

So although there is a lot of Garleans who are not evil warmongers, such as the Populares (who genuiely wish for peace), the Empire itself is still nothing but an Ascian tool that has always been fated to fall, it's creator designed it specifically to be so. Black Rose was specifically designed to further this goal (no surprises that in

the original timeline, it all blew up in the Empire's face when Black Rose wiped the Empire itself out as well!.)

And even SE mentioned it from the very beginning of FFXIV's history, 1.0's backstory blurb that used to be on the FFXIV website and in it's manual outright stated that the Empire was beligerent,for not other reason that they were the designated antagonists. Anyone familar with past FF games should have really expected no different.