Revelations from the Announcement Showcase

[Theodric]

It's reasonable to assume that many of the Ancients that we saw within Akadaemia Anyder and Amaurot were simply civilians, researchers and non-combatants. I suspect many of them could put up a decent fight if required, though we saw from above just how chaotic the situation happened to be. It's also a reasonable assumption that the second 'Final Days' is not going to be nearly as deadly as the first given that there wouldn't be much left of Eorzea or any of the other major regions if that happened to be the case.

The Ancients saw entire buildings crumble and collapse into dust. Horrific creatures emerge from thin air. Fire rain down upon them from the sky. Most importantly, though, the very fabric of reality began to unravel around them.

[Lauront]

A big part of it is the fact that the sound preceding the monsters manifesting. That subverted their control over their ability to manifest creations. So it's quite reasonable to think that, besides the onset of panic, they were cautioned against directly engaging these beasts, lest they get hit by the phenomenon and add yet more monstrosities. They had devised so-called "guardian forces" - primals by all accounts - to combat it, probably because they're not susceptible to this sound. These monsters were different to beasties which might be trivial to defeat to them, because those can't put their own powers to work against them. They were in essence fighting the products of their own power because of how the Final Days operated, hence why it was so insidious. If we take the ancient shades that Emet summons as representative of the ancients, they could at the very least wield some potent elemental magicks, but the bigger issue was how the phenomenon spread.

My guess is that the Convocation will have had combat specialists in it. At the very least there was Azem but I'm going to speculate some of the others were as well, because they cleared the path to summon Zodiark, and we've seen at least Emet (sorcerer of eld) and Gaia (yes, sundered, but able through Eden to seemingly recreate her ancient self) take on higher forms, as well as references to Lahabrea's brilliant fire creations - bearing in mind the Lahabrea we saw was a shade of his original self. As time went on they probably refined their innate talent in manipulating aether to the more potent forms of spells fuelled by darkness that we now see them use.

Rushing in to kill re-creations of the beasts, that wouldn't spread in the same way when encountering the MC and their party's sundered life forms, isn't quite the same thing.

[Hank_Hotspur]

The impression I got from the society of the Ancients is that they are so unaccustomed to violence in their society that it doesn't even occur to them to fight back. When these monsters started to hurt and kill them, they panicked and fled, even if they might have had the ability to counter them. It's also possible that some tried - and their new creations came out warped and evil, joining the other monsters to turn on their creators, as well... It's notable that modern-day Ascians do not seem to use Creation magic while fighting - at least, not to make creatures. Instead they fight using energy blasts and pools of darkness and stuff. These fighting arts may not have existed back in the days of the Ancients, and may have been developed later.

We, on the other hand, are used to conflict, used to fighting monsters. It's pretty much second nature by now. It's not that surprising that we'd charge in where Ancients fear to tread.

This lines up with Old Sharlayan, a nation of probably the most learned scholars in the world who, when they heard the Garleans were pushing into Eorzea, abandoned their allies and outposts and just went back to their island.

[EdwinLi]

A big part of it is the fact that the sound preceding the monsters manifesting. That subverted their control over their ability to manifest creations. So it's quite reasonable to think that, besides the onset of panic, they were cautioned against directly engaging these beasts, lest they get hit by the phenomenon and add yet more monstrosities. They had devised so-called "guardian forces" - primals by all accounts - to combat it, probably because they're not susceptible to this sound. These monsters were different to beasties which might be trivial to defeat to them, because those can't put their own powers to work against them. They were in essence fighting the products of their own power because of how the Final Days operated, hence why it was so insidious. If we take the ancient shades that Emet summons as representative of the ancients, they could at the very least wield some potent elemental magicks, but the bigger issue was how the phenomenon spread.

My guess is that the Convocation will have had combat specialists in it. At the very least there was Azem but I'm going to speculate some of the others were as well, because they cleared the path to summon Zodiark, and we've seen at least Emet (sorcerer of eld) and Gaia (yes, sundered, but able through Eden to seemingly recreate her ancient self) take on higher forms, as well as references to Lahabrea's brilliant fire creations - bearing in mind the Lahabrea we saw was a shade of his original self. As time went on they probably refined their innate talent in manipulating aether to the more potent forms of spells fuelled by darkness that we now see them use.

Rushing in to kill re-creations of the beasts, that wouldn't spread in the same way when encountering the MC and their party's sundered life forms, isn't quite the same thing.

Considering the original world was probably not free from the dangers of deadly monsters and etc, it is most likely that there is a group that specialized in combat.

However, we have to keep in mind that Amaurot was a very sheltered city having built large walls and magical defenses from any threat from outside the city. Not to mention a long process for people to get themselves approved to be allowed to live within the city of Amaurot as another safety check.

A lot of people who live in Amaurot probably never gotten into a fight for a single day of their life but people who are born and grown up outside of Amaurot may have had fighting experience due to the dangers beyond Amaurot. Something we know was a thing since Azem, who was considered a outsider among Amaurot but appoved to become the newly established 14th seat due to his/her successes outside of Amaurot, had to deal with a lot of dangers outside the city directly and unifying people of different skills to resolve these issues and threats to the people living outside of Amaurot even before the events of the Final Days began.

Of course the other seats, except for Emet-Selch, never really liked Azem's constant actions of not following their standard procedures of waiting for the paperwork and getting the paperwork approved before people are allowed to act.

[EaraGrace]

The impression I got from the society of the Ancients is that they are so unaccustomed to violence in their society that it doesn't even occur to them to fight back.

This doesn’t really jive with the short story we got focusing on Elidibus and Emet Selch, where it’s mentioned pretty casually that Azem was gonna use Ifrita to absorb the aether of a volcano and then fight it (literally described as being sent off to battle). I think like all societies the Ancients had varying degrees of proficiency and this undoubtedly led many to be unable to resist the beings that were summoned. Add in the fact that they are literal manifestations of their worst nightmares, ones that got worse and worse and worse throughout the Final Days, any society would be overwhelmed no matter how militarily powerful they are.

[Hank_Hotspur]

This doesn’t really jive with the short story we got focusing on Elidibus and Emet Selch, where it’s mentioned pretty casually that Azem was gonna use Ifrita to absorb the aether of a volcano and then fight it (literally described as being sent off to battle). I think like all societies the Ancients had varying degrees of proficiency and this undoubtedly led many to be unable to resist the beings that were summoned. Add in the fact that they are literal manifestations of their worst nightmares, ones that got worse and worse and worse throughout the Final Days, any society would be overwhelmed no matter how militarily powerful they are.

I think this highlights how different Azem was from the Convocation, who was also said to disregard assistance from Convocation members and instead formed his own merry band to right wrongs of the world.

[Zohar_Lahar]

The alternative explanation is that the Voidsent are beings corrupted by darkness. We see this process replicated in the tank role quests. We also know the beasts of Terminus were the product of creation magicks and the dread fears of the Amaurotines, after the sound triggered the loss of control over their powers. The DNC quests also have a similar phenomenon where anxiety yields creatures of nightmarish aspect, but in this case something emanating from the earth (in which the Underworld aka the Aetherial Sea is to be found) in the form of a sound preceded the phenomenon and then led to loss of control over their powers. My guess is darkness has a lot to do with an active state of aether, and any heightened emotional state may be more prone to yielding it (also suggested in the DRK lore I believe), thus the form is more the same end product but from a different process, created from uncontrolled creation magicks impelled by dread. The 13th only became that way after Igeyorhm rushed a calamity there without the Source being in a "receiving" mode at the time, when the Ascians were still figuring out the whole process. So I do think there's a connection but specifically in the process (overload of darkness) that yields such "demonic" forms.

It wasn't just creation magicks going haywire; "The sound distorts all living things within earshot". Not unlike what the Flood of Darkness and Flood of Light has demonstrated.

Theoretically it's possible, but given several Sin Eaters were also reskinned voidsent enemies, I'm not putting stock in the idea.

If we operate under the assumption Emet-Selch was telling the truth about what happened to the Thirteenth, and in good faith that he never lies...

How would that contradict what Emet-Selch said about the Thirteenth shard? His Amaurot recreation made it impossible not see a connection between the Final Days and the Flood of Darkness/Light.

[Iscah]

How would that contradict what Emet-Selch said about the Thirteenth shard? His Amaurot recreation made it impossible not see a connection between the Final Days and the Flood of Darkness/Light.

Does it? I never once thought of those - it's an entirely different phenomenon. This isn't an overflow of light or darkness, it's something else happening while the balance is, if not stable, then not something Emet thought worth bringing up.

And the "distorts all within earshot" thing is a bit odd but unless it was actually distorting people in ways that Emet didn't bother to portray with his recreations, I took it to mean the distortion would directly be the loss of magic control. It can't be warping everyone that hears it into monsters, or there'd be nobody left to explain that they heard a sound at all.

[Cilia]

Something I've not seen mentioned much is Anima.

X players will remember that she is not just another aeon (summon) - she is effectively the intended Final Aeon of Seymour, the secondary antagonist of the game, with Final Aeons being made by sacrificing someone very close to their intended summoners; in Anima's case it was Seymour's mother.

I can't help but wonder if Anima will end up being more than just a boss fight for the sake of having a boss fight, like a lot of mid-game trials (I assume she's going to be one of the two in Endwalker).

How would that contradict what Emet-Selch said about the Thirteenth shard? His Amaurot recreation made it impossible not see a connection between the Final Days and the Flood of Darkness/Light.

Flood(s) of Light / Darkness are created by severe aetherial imbalances leaning toward Light or Dark, respectively. What happened to Amaurot was not that.

[KageTokage]

I'm kind of expecting Anima to be a Terminus beast rather a conventional primal.

That is, something born from the fear and dread that's bound to be stirred up among the populace as the world unravels.

Though I'm particularly curious as to how those creatures are coming into being with no potent creation magicks to unintentionally spawn them.