Revelations from Patch 5.5 (Part 1)

**Lauront** · 04-17-2021 01:08 AM

Originally Posted by Lauront

Thanks for that! Looks like I got hit by a dose of the Emissary's amnesia as I forgot that section. Either way, he would make a good proof of concept then. I'd like to compare that to the French one to see if it sheds any light but the 'freshy minted souls' makes me wonder if they came out as ancients or not, or what. It's possible we won't find out until later. It may have some bearing on why her faction had a preference for this.

Hmmm so on that point, the French one is a bit vague as well, referring to "new lives" or "young shoots of life", so it is leaving it rather unclear, but it does leave me wondering if the newer souls were indeed less potent than the ancient ones and in particular, less/not capable of creation magicks - therefore, less capable of replicating their "doom". It would tie it all together then.

Originally Posted by Alleo

I can see your point and maybe you are right but imo Mitron said in the Eden storyline that it was their action on the 13th that brought the imbalance especially on the first shard which is confirmed by her words that you posted. I agree that Ardbert and his friends were used to create more light but if I understand Mitrons words correctly he was the one releasing all the saved up light when he was turned into the first sin eater. Its sound for me like that was probably a lot of the Light that was created by the imbalance (however that is somehow possible) and Ardbert and his friends Light was only the tipping point it needed to bring it further towards a flood.

She says that "Primordial forces will strive to achieve equilibrium" so I guess no matter what the first was always much more turned towards the light. Which begs the question on what will happen with the first in the future? The 13th shard is still in a bad shape....if these strange forces still stive to equilibirium wouldnt they again turn the first towards the light?

I suspect they will strive towards equilibrium so long as the world isn't already flooded, but then again Elidibus busied himself about on the Source to ensure the balance did not tip too much in one or the other direction, so it's not really clear how correct she is on that point; it does probably occur naturally, as with the 6th Umbral Calamity, but once you've gone into Flood territory, the aether becomes too corrupted to re-balance. For their purposes, the world needs to be close to but not at flooding levels, so I imagine it needs more precise fiddling to be achieved. Anyway, I imagine we will hear more about the Blessing in due course, but to me it does seem fairly clear that attunement to the Crystals of Light achieves alignment to it, and therefore allows for those champions to spread it.

Hydealyn had way less people to summon or fuel her. (Maybe even only those original summoners) What if that makes it so that they could resist it? And because she was much weaker she needed the power of sundering to even be able to try at all?

I think what we need to consider here is that it's not so much the summoners being tempered which is relevant here - although I don't doubt they would be (and again, the intention behind both of these primals was not to summon them as gods, but as instruments to achieve specific goals, so similar to Bahamut's summoning that very likely results in a different kind of tempering.) The question is how the sundered life forms stack up to her. Her summoners are gone; either sundered, or part of her. It is the sundered life forms she enlists which we're talking about. Though she may not be a primal on the order of power of Zodiark, she is nonetheless more powerful than almost any other Primal we know of. There is also the fact that they co-existed (whether peacefully, or not) for a time, and I am guessing they may well have shared an auracite before the Sundering. With the caveat that these are paintings by the sundered life forms, driven by memory of the ancient world, the cave paintings from Rak'tika do suggest she emerged all the stronger from the conflict. Once he was weakened and removed, that power would, presumably, remain for her to draw on. It's not too important, though, because even at a base level, she is more than potent enough to temper a sundered life form.

I also wonder if Zodiark or Hydealyn even count as active right now? Other primals always need huge amount of aether that they take from the land to be able to exist. Hydealyn alone should have kinda destroyed the star by now if she really needed aether all the time, the same with Zodiark when he was active. (They only talked about new sacrifices to get old ones back not to keep Zodiark "alive") What if those two simply can exist without hurting the land because the aether that the Ancients used was so massive that they are using this? What if her silence is her simply being so weak because she truly just used up most of the fuel that was given to her at the time of creation and she does not want to take from the world?

He definitely isn't - Fandaniel confirms as much.

Homme à la robe blanche : Notre éventuelle proie est encore endormie, mais une férocité sans pareille bout en elle depuis des millénaires…

= “Our eventual prey is still dormant/asleep, but a ferocity without such an end in it for millennia…”

She is a more open question. We'll find out, I suppose.

On your other point, which is something I've also pondered, the best answer I've come across is that it's in auracites (apparently, the Heart of Sabik is referred to as a black auracite.) I need to re-order that album properly at some point, but 5 follows 9. Their lore is such that they could probably limit how much of the Primal's own aspected aether flowed out while also limiting the need to draw on the Lifestream. Even if they had need to draw on its immaterial aether from time to time, it seems that much like the RDM focus, the auracites can amplify its effects. Even if they weaken over time, we know from the Crystal Tower that they're also re-chargeable. Unukalhai mentions they had a "flaw" in that they would bleed Primal energies, but I think that is intentional - Zodiark's darkness would speed up recovery of the planet. It does make them exceptionally poor prisons for a Primal, but if they work as I suspect, they're a very clever device, that can regulate the outflow of Primal energy into the Aetherial Sea while also limiting their need to draw on it for power. They can also be used to emit a message, like we found out Hydaelyn does in 5.2. Ultimately, very good Primal batteries.

On another note, there is Fandaniel. Assuming tempering survives the sundering for the sundered Overlords (there's some indications it does, albeit memory seems to be the most important driver for them as per 5.4 Eden and the memory crystals in 5.3), with:

-a dormant Primal for which there is now a story route for him not to enslave his tempered summoners
-a flawed/weak memory crystal that is not sufficient to awaken the memories of ancient Fandaniel (assuming he is even the original shard of the office-holder), and therefore commit him to the cause of the Ascians
-quite possibly a plan to just use Zodiark's energy to fuel a new Primal, summoned by already-tempered minions

...he can just go on a wild rampage. Zodiark's return could throw a spanner in that if he were to use any tempering to halt Fandaniel, which is an interesting point.

Originally Posted by Jandor

I think that Zodiark and say, Ifrit for example, are both primals in the same way that a space shuttle and a bicycle are both vehicles. They share some basics in common, they're both man-made devices for getting someone from point-A to point-B for example, but beyond that they're not very comparable.

I have to wonder how much of what we have learned from dealing with modern primals will even be applicable to the pair of several millennia old reality warping gods at the heart of the story.

Indeed, and I think that can't be stressed enough. There are general principles that apply to all Primals, but we don't know the full catalog of them, nor do we fully understand them (aka the writers are leaving open sufficient room so as not to be constrained by existing lore on how they implement Zodiark and Hydaelyn and their final arc - recent stuff helped us understand a fair deal more about why their tempering does not appear to enslave in the usual way.)

Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

If Zodiark mostly invokes Astral Will of the Planet and the ancients were full aware of the need for balance, Hydaelyn may have been summoned as the Umbral Will of the Planet to help balance him out. The hopes may have been that instead of one voice making all the decisions, there would be two different voices that could reach compromise much like how the Amaurotine people did through their various verbal debates, leading to a better result. However, something happened that led to the fight between the two, because there's no way both Elidibus and Venat would just seek to fight when both come from the very civilization that sought debate to solve problems.

A plausible interpretation of it could be to do with the aetheric balance of the Underworld/Aetherial Sea. Granted, the very use of auracites might serve to ensure that any outflows from the primal aren't excessive, and thus contain the influence, but at least some must've been intentional, since the dark alignment is linked to a more active polarity of aether and therefore expedited growth. Zodiark wasn't really there to act as a replacement for the Convocation as the star's governing body and even Elidibus's intention was to aid them via mediation, rather than tell them what to do. All the same, I can't help but think that Venat's main concern really was just to prevent him from reviving the ancients, in order for their preferred outcome (ceding the world to the "new life") to take place.

**Kesey** · 04-17-2021 02:40 AM

Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

If Zodiark mostly invokes Astral Will of the Planet and the ancients were full aware of the need for balance, Hydaelyn may have been summoned as the Umbral Will of the Planet to help balance him out. The hopes may have been that instead of one voice making all the decisions, there would be two different voices that could reach compromise much like how the Amaurotine people did through their various verbal debates, leading to a better result. However, something happened that led to the fight between the two, because there's no way both Elidibus and Venat would just seek to fight when both come from the very civilization that sought debate to solve problems.

I thought about it along those lines too. But there is the problem where Emet claims the convocation was tempered to Zodiark and to further back that up (granted this was based on our pre-5.5 assumptions of tempering) Venat's followers confirm the inability to convince the convocation to listen to their pleas. Seeing as they do come from a society of debate and discussion, it had to be jarring that the convocation refused to hear them, but if the convocation was tempered then rejecting the summoning of Hydaelyn idea isn't so far fetched. But Krile, at the end of this newest patch, has already started the questioning of the true nature of tempering and implies that people with the echo are bound to Hydaelyn's will (which is interesting the idea is said by her, who also has the echo and heard Hydaelyn)--which can, in light of the previous points, justify that Hydaelyn's purpose is balance so the end of days doesn't come to pass.

It will also be interesting to see how the missing event plays out too. As it will most likely involve Azem, who seems to have been missing from the Ancient Zodiark and Hydaelyn struggle, but had to have played a key role in events or Hydaelyn would have never chosen the WOL as her current champion.

**Alleo** · 04-17-2021 11:21 PM

Originally Posted by Kesey

It will also be interesting to see how the missing event plays out too. As it will most likely involve Azem, who seems to have been missing from the Ancient Zodiark and Hydaelyn struggle, but had to have played a key role in events or Hydaelyn would have never chosen the WOL as her current champion.

I really hope that we learn more about Azem. I am too curious on what their final decision was. Maybe we only saw the first meeting and later Azem decided to still help with Hydealyn. Or maybe he/she had a whole other idea how to deal with the sound, maybe even just punch it.

I wonder if the echo is something of Hydealyns doing, I thought she is only able to awake it but not really create it. So basically all those that got the echo are ancient souls that in some cases activate the dormant power. And when it activates people bascially hear Hydealyns voice that she sents out constantly (at least if Elidibus is right). But not everyone that has the echo follows on her path which imo makes no sense if that alone is some kind of tempering. IMO if she really tempers in some way it must be when the person becomes a WoL.

**Lium** · 04-18-2021 04:47 AM

Little late to the party, but here are my thoughts. Sorry if there's any repeated points here.

MSQ

Honestly, the first thing I think about when it comes to the new story update is Estinien mistaking Alisaie for Alphinaud. That was absolutely hilarious. He even patted her on the head. I was dying. Other than that, the rest of the story was just sort of...okay. It was really cool meeting Tiamat again, I'm curious to see what part, if any, she'll have in Endwalker.

And speaking of Endwalker, I hate to say this but if Zenos and Fandaniel are the main antagonists that is going to be very underwhelming. Though I suspect the actual bad guy will be Zodiark himself. After all, Y'shtola asked us when was the last time Hydaelyn spoke to us. She and Krile have been conducting an investigation into this, and now Krile is off to Sharlayan. So I guess that's confirmed we are going there in the next expansion. The obvious answer to the question of who or what is preventing Hydaelyn from contacting us is Zodiark.

There's also a bit of mystery as to what weapon Zenos finally chose.

I also liked seeing Fordola again and her evolution as a character. I ship her and Arenvald. Speaking of the latter, it was quite obvious something bad was going to happen to him with the prominent way he was being shown at the start of the update. I had no idea Alphinaud admired him the same way he admired Estinien. But as soon as that was shown, I was like, "K so Arenvald's dead." And sure enough. He's not dead but close to it, it sounds like. I'm far more interested in Fordola and to see where she goes. A reunion with Zenos is inevitable.

YoRHa
I have thoughts on this that I'll post separately because I keep running into posting errors.

Werlyt

Welp, it happened. Gaius has been redeemed. I was afraid of that. But the writers did it in a good way. He will live on in the name of his children, who all died except Allie. The ending was a nice touch, particularly the moment with Allie and her siblings in that vision or spirit world. FIN at the end reminded me of the way they ended the Omega raids. Not quite as good, though, because I'll always remember Alpha running free and having adventures as the music from the Chocobo game played in the background.

The fight was actually really fun. Jumping from one platform to another and avoiding a ton of AOE was great. But there's a reason I didn't see any BLMs in this fight

. You basically have to keep moving throughout.

So, Werlyt is free now. Gaius and Alfonse slew Valens, and I guess that's fitting. I had no connection to Valens so was glad to see the proper characters bring him to justice. It was also touching to see Gaius end Alfonse's life. So, Werlyt is free now. The Empire's end seems near.

Anyway, those are my thoughts. Looking forward to going back through this thread and reading everyone else's.

**Lium** · 04-18-2021 04:50 AM

YoRHa

So in the end, I was still thoroughly confused about, well, everything. I might have to re-watch the cutscenes in an inn room because I'm sure I missed a lot. But Anogg suddenly showing back up and then disappearing again to "close the portal" was confusing. I got that the machines entered the First to destroy it but why? And the last time I saw Anogg she was coming out of a sphere speaking gibberish. I thought that meant the real Anogg died in the cave-in, and who we've been seeing this whole time was an android. But I guess that wasn't the case? I'm so confused.

I liked the final boss fight. The red girl whatever her name was. I liked the aesthetics and the music. I died a lot because it was my first time, but honestly, I don't raid for progression or gear or anything. I raid only once for the story. So I honestly doubt I'll ever stop foot into the Neir raids again. At least not with this character, my main. I'm not really interested in the 2B hairstyle because it wouldn't look right on my Highlander. And I was lucky enough to get her outfit the first time I ran it whenever that tier was released. So, I'm done with YoRHa. It was a cool world but I just wasn't emotionally invested in any of it. 2B and 9S couldn't care less about the WoL and I was fine with that. 2B left a nice parting message for us but that was about it. Felt kind of tacked on. Compared to previous Alliance raids, like Ivalice and Mhachi, this felt a bit disconnected from the rest of the FFXIV world, both literally and figuratively, and really has no impact on the story. The dwarves were endearing, but ultimately forgettable.

10 characters

**RyuDragnier** · 04-18-2021 06:57 AM

Originally Posted by Lium

YoRHa

So in the end, I was still thoroughly confused about, well, everything. I might have to re-watch the cutscenes in an inn room because I'm sure I missed a lot. But Anogg suddenly showing back up and then disappearing again to "close the portal" was confusing. I got that the machines entered the First to destroy it but why? And the last time I saw Anogg she was coming out of a sphere speaking gibberish. I thought that meant the real Anogg died in the cave-in, and who we've been seeing this whole time was an android. But I guess that wasn't the case? I'm so confused.

I liked the final boss fight. The red girl whatever her name was. I liked the aesthetics and the music. I died a lot because it was my first time, but honestly, I don't raid for progression or gear or anything. I raid only once for the story. So I honestly doubt I'll ever stop foot into the Neir raids again. At least not with this character, my main. I'm not really interested in the 2B hairstyle because it wouldn't look right on my Highlander. And I was lucky enough to get her outfit the first time I ran it whenever that tier was released. So, I'm done with YoRHa. It was a cool world but I just wasn't emotionally invested in any of it. 2B and 9S couldn't care less about the WoL and I was fine with that. 2B left a nice parting message for us but that was about it. Felt kind of tacked on. Compared to previous Alliance raids, like Ivalice and Mhachi, this felt a bit disconnected from the rest of the FFXIV world, both literally and figuratively, and really has no impact on the story. The dwarves were endearing, but ultimately forgettable.

10 characters

You may wish to do the weekly quests after completing that, because if Yoko Taro has any real MO, it's that

he doesn't give you all the info the first playthrough, and tends to leave things to slowly trickle in through other endings to his games. Considering this weekly quest afterwards feels more than a little bizarre, I won't be surprised if it leads to us having to redo the raids in order to get a different/better ending to the whole storyline while explaining things. First playthrough also tends to leave a bunch of unknown language of the enemies, only for the second playthrough on to actually tell you what is being said. He did this in both Nier and Nier: Automata. He also tends to make the last ending require a sacrifice of some kind on the player's part, one that isn't easy to make by any player's standards.

**Naria** · 04-18-2021 09:30 AM

There have been a lot of fun easter eggs this patch--ironically not the easter egg fate--but Rowena at the Skyrise Celebration is my fav so far.

**KizuyaKatogami** · 04-18-2021 11:52 AM

Originally Posted by Lium

Little late to the party, but here are my thoughts. Sorry if there's any repeated points here.

MSQ

Honestly, the first thing I think about when it comes to the new story update is Estinien mistaking Alisaie for Alphinaud. That was absolutely hilarious. He even patted her on the head. I was dying. Other than that, the rest of the story was just sort of...okay. It was really cool meeting Tiamat again, I'm curious to see what part, if any, she'll have in Endwalker.

And speaking of Endwalker, I hate to say this but if Zenos and Fandaniel are the main antagonists that is going to be very underwhelming. Though I suspect the actual bad guy will be Zodiark himself. After all, Y'shtola asked us when was the last time Hydaelyn spoke to us. She and Krile have been conducting an investigation into this, and now Krile is off to Sharlayan. So I guess that's confirmed we are going there in the next expansion. The obvious answer to the question of who or what is preventing Hydaelyn from contacting us is Zodiark.

There's also a bit of mystery as to what weapon Zenos finally chose.

I also liked seeing Fordola again and her evolution as a character. I ship her and Arenvald. Speaking of the latter, it was quite obvious something bad was going to happen to him with the prominent way he was being shown at the start of the update. I had no idea Alphinaud admired him the same way he admired Estinien. But as soon as that was shown, I was like, "K so Arenvald's dead." And sure enough. He's not dead but close to it, it sounds like. I'm far more interested in Fordola and to see where she goes. A reunion with Zenos is inevitable.

Anyway, those are my thoughts. Looking forward to going back through this thread and reading everyone else's.

Ten characters

In regards to Zodiark, i don’t think it’s obvious or even hinting to him having anything to do with Hydaelyn tbh. For one, Fandaniel says he’s dormant. That conversation seemed to be going moreso toward, what has Hydaelyn been doing this entire time if she hasn’t been speaking to us yet she’s on auto-pilot with hear,feel,think. I also don’t see Zodiark as the bad guy of 6.0 either though considering Yoshi even said there’s is no bad regarding him.

**Kesey** · 04-18-2021 03:02 PM

Originally Posted by Alleo

I really hope that we learn more about Azem. I am too curious on what their final decision was. Maybe we only saw the first meeting and later Azem decided to still help with Hydealyn. Or maybe he/she had a whole other idea how to deal with the sound, maybe even just punch it.

I wonder if the echo is something of Hydealyns doing, I thought she is only able to awake it but not really create it. So basically all those that got the echo are ancient souls that in some cases activate the dormant power. And when it activates people bascially hear Hydealyns voice that she sents out constantly (at least if Elidibus is right). But not everyone that has the echo follows on her path which imo makes no sense if that alone is some kind of tempering. IMO if she really tempers in some way it must be when the person becomes a WoL.

I think the decision Azem made will still be the same, but the current moment will serve as a second chance to redo it correctly or stop the end days from repeating again. Maybe Azem always intended to side with Hydaelyn and Venat's people but was trapped for unknown reason probably researching The Sound. Or maybe Azem was a victim of the Sound until Hydaelyn fixed it. This can be played a few ways because we clearly know some event is missing from time Hydaelyn is summoned to when she decides to sunder Zodiark as the pictures in Rak'tika have gone on to show.

**Alleo** · 04-18-2021 05:49 PM

Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

You may wish to do the weekly quests after completing that, because if Yoko Taro has any real MO, it's that

he doesn't give you all the info the first playthrough, and tends to leave things to slowly trickle in through other endings to his games. Considering this weekly quest afterwards feels more than a little bizarre, I won't be surprised if it leads to us having to redo the raids in order to get a different/better ending to the whole storyline while explaining things. First playthrough also tends to leave a bunch of unknown language of the enemies, only for the second playthrough on to actually tell you what is being said. He did this in both Nier and Nier: Automata. He also tends to make the last ending require a sacrifice of some kind on the player's part, one that isn't easy to make by any player's standards.

About Nier raid

Maybe he did that in his games but he is only a guest in this one and imo we should have gottenat least a mostly whole story line when running it the first time. Right now we have nothing at all. If you had not played his other games you wont really know or imo care about the Nier characters and I really doubt that they will go out of the way to include redoing the whole raids but with a twist. (Which would mean a whole lot of new cutscenes for all of them + all the missing information) Of course I dont know how long these weekly quests will go until they are finished but I doubt that most players will even try to do them. At most (imo) we will get another cutscene at the end where we will meet the brother again and maybe find a way to save his sister or conclude it in another way.

Also what realistically could the player even sacrifice if we would get such another ending? The other dwarf?

Thread: Revelations from Patch 5.5 (Part 1)

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