Is 'Hydaelyn' a misnomer based on a misconception?

[Cilia]

Something possibly worth pointing out is, that the alternative you are arguing for, may be worse in effect than the original theory.

You imply, that all political situations a WoL takes place in are Ascian made. That would imply that most of the major issues in the world are caused and solved by larger powers, manipulating the mortal races semi-directly (in the case of Ascians) or indirectly (blessing of light).

Not saying this is incorrect, just that it some ways worse, and possibly still reason enough to hate both sides. Fighting determinism is a common enough theme in jrpgs afterall.

As it pertains to the Garlean Empire, an Ascian proxy? Yes.

As it pertains to Ishgard under Thordan VII's rule? Yes. However, for a brief time afterwards (between the defeat of King Thordan and Nidhogg) we are dealing with a purely man-made crisis, and presumably solve it without Hydaelyn's assistance (hence the need to use Hraesvelgr's Eye to go toe to toe with Nidhogg).

Not all political situations the Warrior of Light deals with are engineered by the Ascians (the Monetarist coup in Ul'dah comes to mind), either.

If not for Hydaelyn's intervention, the Warrior of Light would have perished on a number of occasions - and although an argument can be made for that being a necessity for the sake of the world's survival, it still means that the Warrior of Light's strength is not natural. To say nothing of the fact that he's now an entire soul's worth stronger than everybody else on the Source due to merging with Ardbert. Furthermore, the Echo provides insight and information that would not otherwise be easily discovered/known - which, again, has affected the course of history on a number of occasions.

As such, the course of history is not in the hands of man. It's dictated indirectly - and sometimes directly - by outside forces. Perhaps it will change in the future - though that remains to be seen. As for Hydaelyn, since she isn't actually a deity then the people deserve to know the truth of her nature instead of being led astray. Then they can have the choice to decide if they wish to hold her in high regard or not. Though I suspect that like many other inconvenient truths the masses will be spared from such knowledge 'for their own good'.

Any time Hydaelyn acts it is in response to Ascian machination. There are thousands of years of history where, to the best of our knowledge, she has remained dormant and content to leave the races of man to their own devices. It is only when the Ascians begin acting in earnest that she empowers champions to act against them. The ones really trying to "take the reins of history from the hands of man" are the Ascians; case and point: Hydaelyn does nothing for the entirety of the Sixth Astral Era until an Ascian proxy comes knocking.

Refusing to allow Hydaelyn to act, directly or through a proxy, will lead to the end of man. Not the world, just the races of man. Compromising that principle for a few years once every few millennia is preferable to the alternative, would you not agree?

I agree that people deserve to know the truth about Hydaelyn, but we also need the other side of the story. Regardless of how much free will he had, Emet-Selch's account of how things happened was no doubt colored by his tempering by Zodiark.

[Elladie]

I'm not convinced that you can argue the the WoL's actions in the Steppes are permissible because they are part of the liberation of Doma and therefore a response to Garleans aggression which is a product of Ascian machinations. I mean, I'm okay with what happened in the Steppes, it all worked out okay. But I would be questioning it hard if it had gone wrong, if we'd ended up bringing Garleans aggression down like a thunderbolt on Little Sun and Sadu.

Free will isn't something you can have a bit of. You either have it or you don't. People on the Source and the Shards don't have it because more powerful beings are interfering in those people's choices to manipulate events to match the different agendas of said beings. Hydaelyn is like a mother who says 'yeah, go ahead, do whatever you want. No, stop that, you'll hurt yourself. Don't do that, you're making a mess. No, you can't have that, its bad for you.' Free will means the right to make any choice you want, regardless of outcome, even if it's a bad choice.

Now you can argue that it's better to have Hydaelyn interfering than have Lolorito running the world, but a lot of people dislike the idea of being any kind of divine puppet. And if Hydaelyn is making our decisions for us at any point, then she is taking away our free will. She may say she's doing it for our own good. She may even be right. But you absolutely can't argue that we have free will while she exists.

[Cilia]

I'm not convinced that you can argue the the WoL's actions in the Steppes are permissible because they are part of the liberation of Doma and therefore a response to Garleans aggression which is a product of Ascian machinations. I mean, I'm okay with what happened in the Steppes, it all worked out okay. But I would be questioning it hard if it had gone wrong, if we'd ended up bringing Garleans aggression down like a thunderbolt on Little Sun and Sadu.

Everything comes with a risk. Whether we enlisted the aid of the Xaela tribes (by playing by their rules, then leaving them to their own devices) or not, our very presence on the Steppe drew Garlean attention, and at some point the Empire would have attacked them regardless. (World-spanning Empire, remember?)

Free will isn't something you can have a bit of. You either have it or you don't. People on the Source and the Shards don't have it because more powerful beings are interfering in those people's choices to manipulate events to match the different agendas of said beings. Hydaelyn is like a mother who says 'yeah, go ahead, do whatever you want. No, stop that, you'll hurt yourself. Don't do that, you're making a mess. No, you can't have that, its bad for you.' Free will means the right to make any choice you want, regardless of outcome, even if it's a bad choice.

Now you can argue that it's better to have Hydaelyn interfering than have Lolorito running the world, but a lot of people dislike the idea of being any kind of divine puppet. And if Hydaelyn is making our decisions for us at any point, then she is taking away our free will. She may say she's doing it for our own good. She may even be right. But you absolutely can't argue that we have free will while she exists.

Except at no point has Hydaelyn compelled anyone to do anything. She lends us power, but that's because she agrees with what we're doing anyway. The Ascians manipulate events to cause Rejoinings / Calamities, we set out to counter them, and Hydaelyn lends us that little extra bit we need to accomplish it due to the disparity in power between us.

This may play into Hydaelyn's agenda, but given said agenda is nothing but beneficial to us, and Hydaelyn is totally fine with a hands-off approach unless Ascians are interfering, how can one argue that she's smothering? She isn't. She hasn't been portrayed that way, at all, at any point. Her only agenda, as has been presented, is to prevent the races of man from becoming Zodiark's food. Not to dictate their histories or strip them of free will. (We know Hydaelyn doesn't compel anyone to do anything, because her chosen Warriors of Light on the First turned against her in a desperate bid to save their world.)

Hydaelyn's only "agenda," her raison d'etre, is allowing the races of man to live their own lives, rather than as livestock to fuel the Ancients' wish-granting machine (a.k.a. Zodiark). What is objectionable about that?

[Lersayil]

...Except at no point has Hydaelyn compelled anyone to do anything. She lends us power, but that's because she agrees with what we're doing anyway. The Ascians manipulate events to cause Rejoinings / Calamities, we set out to counter them, and Hydaelyn lends us that little extra bit we need to accomplish it due to the disparity in power between us.

This may play into Hydaelyn's agenda, but given said agenda is nothing but beneficial to us...

This may be the other way around. She may be handing out power to people that she knows would follow her agenda. She may not manipulate the individual, but she is manipulating the history of millions by distribution of power. For better or worse, many would take issue with such things.

Not sure if it will ever come to pass in story, but its interesting to think about a scenario, where Hydaelyns best interests are not in our best interest. Wonder how that would play out.

As for the Steppes... in hindsight "it worked", but the morals are questionable either way. Unless the xaela specifically told us to do it this way? I honestly cant remember much about that dialogue. Was it them who suggested to force the issue via the tournament? If so, then sure, conscript away!

[Lauront]

I suppose we'll see. There's much we don't know about tempering - it does make sense that it could be used to ensure misuse of Creation magicks did not take place, but at the same time it also makes sense as an unforeseen, unintended side-effect which the Primal may or may not exploit, depending on its nature.

The one thing that would strike me as odd if it were built into Zodiark to temper by design, in order to prevent Creation magick misuse, is why the Convocation would temper itself in the process, too, when such concerns would be unlikely to apply to them and they were the summoners. Maybe it's the only way they could build in such a feature and make use of it e.g. through the final stage of sacrifice, so they accepted the risk, but at the same time it does seem consistent with the whole thing taking them by surprise or being an acceptable price for saving the world if they did suspect it could happen.

[purgatori]

They are, for the most part, very dedicated to allowing the player to choose their own narrative for their characters, and out-and-out saying "Oh, everything you've done has been because your soul has been enslaved by Hydaelyn" would stand pretty starkly against that!

Since when? There are no meaningful choices available to the WoL in the MSQ.

[Lauront]

Since when? There are no meaningful choices available to the WoL in the MSQ.

They even have some dialogue options to poke fun at it in some of the quests.

[Theodric]

The situation with the Xaela is especially interesting when you consider that one of the biggest criticisms of Garlemald, as an Empire, is its forced conscription. Of course, the Garleans were actually under the impression that their cause was righteous and that the Primal threat needed to be resolved at any cost. We now know that it was a ploy by the Ascians, though in the case of the Warrior of Light and Scions they have no such excuse to hide behind. They actively participated in the manipulation of a proud race and set them about defending Doma, risking their lives in the process and refusing to give them the agency to decide for themselves.

My main concern is that it serves only to make the Xaela feel more like a useful tool to the Domans and with their traditions exploited in the manner in which they were the Warrior of Light is undeservedly a major figure in their hierarchy. I'd strongly prefer to avoid that sort of thing in the future, since not everything needs to revolve around the Warrior of Light and/or their allies.

It's why I find Hingashi so refreshing, I suppose - it's a neutral nation that isn't swayed one way or another by the politics of foreign organisations. I enjoyed the opportunity to explore cities with a stance of neutrality back in WoW, too, when I played that - in no small part due to faction war feeling very contrived to the point where it stifled many of the playable races.

[Tlamila]

Not only Hydaelin is not compelling us to do anything, her blessing was taken from us way back in ARR, so she literally has no influence over the WoL anymore.

[Lauront]

Zodiark was more of a reset button than a wish-granting machine, as well as a safeguard presumably against whatever caused the Sound. You can call that reset a "wish", and there is the question of what his nature is and how tempering affected them, but there is nothing to suggest for the time being that there was any intention to sacrifice to him on an on-going basis to get something out of him, beyond the final point of bringing back their fallen through the sacrifice of this "new life".

Not only Hydaelin is not compelling us to do anything, her blessing was taken from us way back in ARR, so she literally has no influence over the WoL anymore.

It was also restored near the end of the 3.0 MSQ... and that is assuming that it would be the source of any influence, as opposed to something else, like the Echo.