Sylphs on the First?

[JeanneOrnitier]

It's also possible that there were never sylphs there at all. It's not like we know anything about sylphic history. They may post-date the Sundering.

The Encyclopedia's entry on sylphs says even their own creation myth says other races existed before them, in contrast to how most creation myths say a race was the first to come into being. So that may mean they're post-Sundering.

[Gula]

I guess I figured they’d be fine because the other Eorzean counterparts were. Just seems kind of odd.

Shards aren't like countries, planets or even galaxies. They're not even in the same dimension, to an extent. Consider the following! If someone spat on you on the First, that same person didn't spit on you on the Source.

[Morningstar1337]

I mean they're technically alternate timelines, but the point of divergence was so far off that the ripples and butterflies resulted in them being very unlike the Source. Which I suppose tends to happen to alt-histories over a very long period.

[Draginhikari]

It's hard to say, the actual placement of the various races is placed somewhat difference in the First compared to the source just because of the difference in the history.

Like the Auri variation in the First were more common in the area that reflected Coerthas compared to the Source where they are primarily Migrants from Othard and Hingashi specifically.

Even the Beast Tribe quests spoke of the Namazu in the Rak'tika where there is no canon appearance of the Namazu in Eorzea. The Shards were only the same up to the point of the Sundering after that history could play out on the shards in their own way. This means any of the missing beast tribes or non-playable races such as the Garleans never came to be, went extinct for some reason, or disappeared due to the flood.

[MirronTulaxia]

Shards aren't like countries, planets or even galaxies. They're not even in the same dimension, to an extent. Consider the following! If someone spat on you on the First, that same person didn't spit on you on the Source.

I'm not sure that really follows because it is rather literally the same planet. Just copied and then different timelines (and Ascian meddling). That's why the ruins of the original cities are there after all.

And the point of "things are different" would have a bit more weight if all of the Spoken races on the Source and most of the Eorzean Beast Tribes weren't around. That they are really makes it lose impact. As is it seems just kind of arbitrary.

[Brightamethyst]

I'm not sure that really follows because it is rather literally the same planet.

Right, but the Sundering wasn't THAT long ago. 10,000 years is long enough for empires to rise and fall and for technology to diverge and such, but not long enough for biology to drastically change. It's not weird at all that most intelligent races (barring artificially created or enhanced ones) are older than that.