Thread: Revelations from Patch 5.3

Originally Posted by Alleo

I think the biggest thing about immortality (or very long age because seemingly the concept of death is known to the Ancients) is how a few of them are not able to let go. Nidhogg and his vengeance, Tiamat and her sorrow, the Ascians and their wish to bring them back instead of accepting their passing and honoring it. It feels that a lot more immortals have problems with moving on. Of course its also understandable because they have such a long life spawn and losing someone there is horrible because you know that there are many more years to be believed without them. So I also got the feeling that being immortal is really only great if you dont lose anyone dear to you.

About flight height and mountains. Well it really depends when they landed here. Yes flying might have been much more restricted and the amount of people living there sparse after the flood of light. But who knows how long its already there? And if it fell down from the sky then someone should have noticed and investigated it. I just have a big issue believing that something like that was hidden for who knows how long. (And did nobody ever climb these mountains and see it then?)

That's always been kind of the thing, we as humans can only understand the world in terms of the fact that everyone eventually dies, due this fact, our minds cannot really process the idea of eternity or even an extension far beyond our mortal lives. Even if someone were able to extend their life to a thousand years without being able to extend the lives of those, we care about what would that mean? Is that something our minds can remain Sane under or it is a fate worse than death? How long could we live before we completely forgot who we were in the first place or the people that were in our lives. What happens when we stop remembering?

Nidhogg played an example of this, for him a 1000 years was the same as yesterday, his rage can't ever really be satisfied so he takes it out on Ishgard over and over again, even though the ones responsible for the crime have long since dead because he cannot see those lines because his scale of time is so far detached that it becomes almost impossible for him to reconcile the fact that most of Ishgard doesn't even understand why the dragons are attacking them. Even once the truth has been revealed and Ishgard attempts to take some responsibility for what happened it's not enough because there will never be a period of time long enough for him to accept what happened and moved on. The Ascians have a similar problem with basically endless sorrow and sense of failure about a duty that almost lost all meaning the more time has gone by so they attempt to restore that meaning by trying to force the world back to the way it was before. The harsh thing is, can the world ever truly be how it was were the Ascians to succeed? I'd guess the answer is likely no, but there is no way for them to reconcile that.

Finishing this thread took longer than finishing the MSQ!

The thing I don't get for Emet-Selch or Elidibus is why they didn't just wait for the Warrior of Light to die of natural causes? Once Lahabrea died, wouldn't they think, "Oh, there's some danger in engaging wit this WoL? For Elidibus, it's an even more important question when he became last of the Unsundered. Especially if only the Unsundered can raise up Sundered Ascians! And surely a century means nothing when you've been waiting for 12,000 years. Hydaelyn continues to weaken as the ages pass (if we can believe Master Matoya). So why not wait a little bit? Sure, these plans will be ruined, but with eternity, there will always be a chance to set up new ones.

Originally Posted by Kiniun

Finishing this thread took longer than finishing the MSQ!

The thing I don't get for Emet-Selch or Elidibus is why they didn't just wait for the Warrior of Light to die of natural causes? Once Lahabrea died, wouldn't they think, "Oh, there's some danger in engaging wit this WoL? For Elidibus, it's an even more important question when he became last of the Unsundered. Especially if only the Unsundered can raise up Sundered Ascians! And surely a century means nothing when you've been waiting for 12,000 years. Hydaelyn continues to weaken as the ages pass (if we can believe Master Matoya). So why not wait a little bit? Sure, these plans will be ruined, but with eternity, there will always be a chance to set up new ones.

I believe the issue belies in set up to make these things happen. If you scrub the plans just because the WOL shows up you've wasted hundreds if not thousands of years of preparations. Ascian impatience is definitely born of loneliness for having what they once had and the friends that needed to be sacrificed to make it right.

Finally, I believe clues show that every moment of history where the balance is thrown off has a hero (most likely our reincarnated aether). We saw the paintings in Rak'tika. The world has needed to be saved 3 times. The last one that was crossed out we can assume was Ardbert and his friends, the canceling needed because the brought the flood of light. But the first is assumed to be during the time of the Ancients/Ascians and second would have transpired during the time of the Ronkans. Each of these moments had us around. Furthermore, I would like to assume Ronka and the Allagans are equivalents for the First and Source. So most likely all the Ascian plans are potentially in chaos by us or people similar to us.

Originally Posted by Kiniun

Finishing this thread took longer than finishing the MSQ!

The thing I don't get for Emet-Selch or Elidibus is why they didn't just wait for the Warrior of Light to die of natural causes? Once Lahabrea died, wouldn't they think, "Oh, there's some danger in engaging wit this WoL? For Elidibus, it's an even more important question when he became last of the Unsundered. Especially if only the Unsundered can raise up Sundered Ascians! And surely a century means nothing when you've been waiting for 12,000 years. Hydaelyn continues to weaken as the ages pass (if we can believe Master Matoya). So why not wait a little bit? Sure, these plans will be ruined, but with eternity, there will always be a chance to set up new ones.

So, if you look at the timeline of things, you'll see that they never really *had* time to stop and wait for the WoL to die naturally (except Elidibus). Consider this: The flood of light on the first, an essential part of their plan for the 8th calamity, had already begun by the time we reached the endgame of Heavensward (which was around the time Lahabrea died). That plan was already long in motion before we ever showed a hint of being as much of a dire threat as we are. During stormblood, the ascians were not much of a focal point, as we were busy dealing with our mission to liberate Doma and Ala Migho. Now, you might say "They could have halted the plan on the first when Lahabrea died," but here's the thing: *We* were not the ones who killed lahabrea. They pinned the blame for Lahabrea's demise on his own foolishness, not on us. So, even up all the way through stormblood, we weren't considered that much of a threat to them. The only reason why Elidizenos even approached us to defeat us at ghmlyt dark was because he believed we threatened the balance on the source, not because he thought we were an existential threat to the ascians and their plans.

It wasn't until we directly intervened on the first and murdered Emet-Selch that it became clear how much of a threat we posed to the ascians. Elidibus could have put a stop to everything right then and there and waited us out, but he wasn't in his right mind at that point anymore. He was desperate and scared, and angry. It wasn't *just* about bringing Zodiark back at that point - he wanted "justice" for emet-selch and lahabrea. And ultimately he failed to accomplish that when we got our Azem stone.

MSQ thoughts on Elidibus as a character:

Was he a child when he joined the Convocation and/or became Zodiark's heart?

He's our size at the end of the trial, which is child-size for an Amaurotine. And the word choice in his final speech sounds childlike in its earnestness to me.

And the flashbacks where the other convocation members are talking to him, before the final days it seemed, about how his dedication to duty is bordering on obsession and basically telling him to take it easier... It painted the picture of a kid attempting to live up to a legacy and trying too hard. Also, in this flashback, I think our pov is a bit on the short side physically.

I just get the feeling he might have been a child prodigy, elevated to Elidbus' seat at a young age. And then the apocalypse happened.

And I'm just imagining this kid taking on the responsibility of becoming the heart of Zodiark so he can save everyone, promising them all that he'll never forget his duty, and now I'm sadder.

Originally Posted by Rokke

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As for Gaius

One of the red masks he has looks an awful lot like a cat's head, which would interestingly enough likely belong to Fandaniel as Leo's rep.

This is a good catch. Maybe a future plot point will be us showing Gaius how to really kill an Ascian? And since F-train has taken the slot of major villain it would be easy to tie together in the future.