*Spoilers* The Past and After the Endwalker MSQ End

[Lurina]

See the first line of what you quoted from my post.

Oh, I didn't realize what you were referencing.

Well, my point is that they've kinda already thrown out the vision for it that you were hoping for. With that in mind, I don't think it would be bad to throw a bone to the evidently pretty large amount of people who feel dissatisfied with the awkwardness and moral dissonance of the time loop/Venat plot.

[LystAP]

Oh, I didn't realize what you were referencing.

Well, my point is that they've kinda already thrown out the vision for it that you were hoping for. With that in mind, I don't think it would be bad to throw a bone to the evidently pretty large amount of people who feel dissatisfied with the awkwardness and moral dissonance of the time loop/Venat plot.

They could have used a number of other tools to get the point of Elpis across (to make it a distinct place that you can get to only once or twice), but they chose to make a it a full zone that you can travel to. And explicitly in the past. Originally when I saw the teasers, I thought it would just be ruins and we'll interact with more records - perhaps a AI or memory like Emet's shades on the First. That it's a full zone and there are quests that reference traveling to it beyond just for the MSQ already opens the can of worms and dumps them all over the floor.

[EaraGrace]

Because saving people who you can potentially help is the heroic thing to do.

We’ll then we need only two things.

1. We need to rediscover time travel magicks. It’ll take centuries of work, and lots of blood, sweat and tears. You’d also need to an Ancient to help improve and empower the process.

2. You need a massive amount of aether and a way to store it. You can use the crystal tower again, but you’d need to supplement the Aether in some way as even the amount from the Calamity of Earth will be lacking. Might need to summon a primal, one equivalent to the heart of Zodiark.

Then when you get there, you better hope someone with the ability to perceive aether like Emet and Hyth are around, not just anyone can see the weakened form you’ll arrive with. Thereafter it’s up to you. You can try convincing them of what’s about to happen, most won’t believe you without proof and you won’t be at Elpis in time for the proof to reveal itself. You’d also need to avoid being captured and interrogated.

But let’s say you convince them of Meteion. At that point you’re basically opening a black box. Based on Venats judgement many Ancients would fall to despair, Hermes will rebel and fight against you, Zodiarks summoning is likely ruined and you have no Ragnorak or Mothercrystal to get to Ultima Thule.

IF you manage to forestall the Final Days, you’d still be alone to fight against Meteion, no dynamis controlling friends with you. Unless the Ancients try to make them, which may be a hard sell given you’re basically creating a group of empathy beings to send off to hell. They’ll not have the bonds you have with the Scions, nor memories of past trials to give them strength.

But maybe. Just maybe. You’ll do so. And then you’ll likely die as you’ll not have allies to call, or dying Ancient friends that are waiting for your word.

[Cilia]

The tricky thing about time travel is that we already saved the World Unsundered. We went to the past, were not cut off from the relative present by changing stuff, mobilized the Ancients to come up with a solution to the Meteia, and prevented the Sundering! Amaurotine civilization will continue forever! Congratulations, kiddo! You did it! Perfect timeline!

... in the infinitely tessellating pathways of time, one outcome was like that. But that's not a part of this story - the story the director and writer wanted to tell. Sorry kiddo, them's the breaks!

(So far, anyway. You never know.)

[LystAP]

We’ll then we need only two things.

1. We need to rediscover time travel magicks. It’ll take centuries of work, and lots of blood, sweat and tears. You’d also need to an Ancient to help improve and empower the process.

2. You need a massive amount of aether and a way to store it. You can use the crystal tower again, but you’d need to supplement the Aether in some way as even the amount from the Calamity of Earth will be lacking. Might need to summon a primal, one equivalent to the heart of Zodiark.

Then when you get there, you better hope someone with the ability to perceive aether like Emet and Hyth are around, not just anyone can see the weakened form you’ll arrive with. Thereafter it’s up to you. You can try convincing them of what’s about to happen, most won’t believe you without proof and you won’t be at Elpis in time for the proof to reveal itself. You’d also need to avoid being captured and interrogated.

But let’s say you convince them of Meteion. At that point you’re basically opening a black box. Based on Venats judgement many Ancients would fall to despair, Hermes will rebel and fight against you, Zodiarks summoning is likely ruined and you have no Ragnorak or Mothercrystal to get to Ultima Thule.

IF you manage to forestall the Final Days, you’d still be alone to fight against Meteion, no dynamis controlling friends with you. Unless the Ancients try to make them, which may be a hard sell given you’re basically creating a group of empathy beings to send off to hell. They’ll not have the bonds you have with the Scions, nor memories of past trials to give them strength.

But maybe. Just maybe. You’ll do so. And then you’ll likely die as you’ll not have allies to call, or dying Ancient friends that are waiting for your word.

1 and 2 are already done. We can teleport to Elpis at a specific point in time - where people acknowledge us as Azem's familiar. There doesn't need to be a complex rationale behind it. Some weird timely wimy thing has us linked to this particular Elpis in space and time. Do recall that the First wasn't always temporally balanced with the Source. The other Scions spent years in the First whereas only a few months have past on the Source when you went back. The rest will depend on SE writing the plot. The quickest way is to just have the Convocation use the Echo on you. The Ancients also have ways to determine if your lying.

Venat judged that many would fall to despair when faced with 'reality', but that's also her own presumption. That's an assumption Vauthy made of people of the First as well, but we've seen how that turned out. In this expansion, Vrtra was convinced (based off his eons of experience) that everyone would hate him, but it didn't turn out that way either. As is noted in the story, Venat as flawed as much as everyone else.

[AlysanneVrannai]

Because saving people who you can potentially help is the heroic thing to do.

You have no idea if there are even people to save to begin with if you truly consider the implications of what we have learned about time travel.

There is no sign that the different timelines exist before we "create them" by splitting the timeline through time travel. To go back to Elpis and avert the calamity could potentially be you creating a whole new reality just to save that reality from a calamity you technically created by splitting the timeline, and you dont even know if you can truly save their timeline or not, or whether they will suffer more in the future.

My earlier post says this is a can of worms you dont want to open for a good reason.

[Rosenstrauch]

You have no idea if there are even people to save to begin with if you truly consider the implications of what we have learned about time travel.

There is no sign that the different timelines exist before we "create them" by splitting the timeline through time travel. To go back to Elpis and avert the calamity could potentially be you creating a whole new reality just to save that reality from a calamity you technically created by splitting the timeline, and you dont even know if you can truly save their timeline or not, or whether they will suffer more in the future.

My earlier post says this is a can of worms you dont want to open for a good reason.

It's a can of worms that has already been opened, scooped out, and used to bait the hooks. See: Shadowbringers.

[AlysanneVrannai]

It's a can of worms that has already been opened, scooped out, and used to bait the hooks. See: Shadowbringers.

Except the circumstances and motivations are completely different.

Going back to Elpis to "save" the ancient world will quite literally change nothing for the reality you are trying to save, you just create another timeline to save while the world you initially wanted to save remains to be doomed in the final days. You just create an entirely new reality to save instead, with no guarantee that you will even be able to keep that new timeline safe. There is NO WAY to save the Ancient World of our timeline, because without their final days we would not exist to save their world from the final days.

Now, if your goal is just to create as much life in the multiverse as possible then sure, go ahead, open the can. But trying to sell it as "saving" people seems kind of disturbing to me. It comes off as creating an entire universe just to fulfill a hero fantasy.

[Rosenstrauch]

Except the circumstances and motivations are completely different.

Going back to Elpis to "save" the ancient world will quite literally change nothing for the reality you are trying to save, you just create another timeline to save while the world you initially wanted to save remains to be doomed in the final days.

Just like G'raha did when he and the people of the Eighth Era sent himself back in time to prevent the Eighth Umbral Calamity, then.

EDIT: I'm just going to cut this short here, and link the short story whose existence I am so very fond of reminding everyone of: https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes.../sidestory_08/

Yes, it's canon. And if you're going to try and apply cynical logic to the idea of traveling back in time to prevent a calamity from wiping out countless lives, then you have to be fair and apply it to Shadowbringers as well, since that concept is the very backbone of Shadowbringers' plot.

[AlysanneVrannai]

Just like G'raha did when he and the people of the Eighth Era sent himself back in time to prevent the Eighth Umbral Calamity, then.

EDIT: I'm just going to cut this short here, and link the short story whose existence I am so very fond of reminding everyone of: https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes.../sidestory_08/

Yes, it's canon. And if you're going to try and apply cynical logic to the idea of traveling back in time to prevent a calamity from wiping out countless lives, then you have to be fair and apply it to Shadowbringers as well, since that concept is the very backbone of Shadowbringers' plot.

Yes, I know. G'rahas world was literally BEYOND saving (until Midgardsormr intervened, which G'raha had no clue would happen), and horrible to live in, so they rather give up on that reality completely to create chance for a better one. A massive gamble, essentially. I have always acknowledged that short story, linking it achieves nothing. Their choice WAS cynical, they completely gave up on their reality in the choice they made. They did NOT know how time travel worked, so they were willing to destroy their reality completely to achieve their goal of a "better future". We KNOW that changing events in Elips will NOT destroy our reality, and we KNOW that this will instead create an entirely new reality instead of "saving" the Elpis we want to save. Thats my entire point, you are essentially doing nothing. You are creating a world just to "save" it. How far do you want to take this? If it in your opinion the "right" choice to create that new reality, why would you ever stop creating those? Its an endless loop of creating worlds just to save them. Hence, the can of worms that should remain unopened.