What's the point with that quite lackluster story in Endwalker?

[SaberMaxwell]

Remember when we were just investigating crystal thefts on Highbridge? Now we're arguing over who's the worse genocider.

Wild.

[Lauront]

I was under the impression according to Shadowbringers and Emet-Selch's explanation is that people weren't killed when the sundering happened, just their souls were split. All the current shards that happened right after had all the remaining people were identical in appearance/intelligence/ect (when he demonstrated on Ryne) but had forgotten about being long lived beings or about their past and whatnot and then they just died due to the normal things like happenings of war, sickness or old age. I don't see how that is "killing everyone."

What Venat did was the same exact thing as what God did when he cast Adam and Eve out of paradise for not learning and heeding His lessons. She tried reasoning with them and making them learn, they refused, so they were cast out of paradise (Unsundered world). Minfilia is akin to what happened to Jesus. God also flooded the entire world in what He deemed to be a greater good for the world. Yet I don't see people ranting about how God is evil for doing that.

I think you need to go re-watch that scene. He's not saying they're identical at all in that scene, and factually, they are not, across a number of different dimensions. Their lifespans alone are cut by a significant factor (nigh immortal to the much shorter sundered lifespans), which would've killed any ancients off at the time. If you don't see how that is "killing everyone", then I guess you won't see how, say, slowly poisoning everyone so as to cut their lifespans down is killing them either, because death doesn't occur right then and there. They did cover the aftermath of the Sundering in the Nier crossover, here. Likewise, the modern races evolved out of the fragmented ancients to adapt to their environments given their newfound frailties, as per the Q&A pre 6.1.

Regarding your second paragraph, there are plenty who do in fact argue that the biblical deity is malevolent, or at the least quite harsh, for that very reason, but Venat is no god - she is an ancient herself. What we were shown of her in that very loosely inspired by the facts, pity me scene is not her trying to 'reason' with her people (to what end? is it a time loop or not? would they be able to wield dynamis or not? what is her end game if they did listen?), but tone-deaf lecturing delivered to a people still grieving apocalyptic levels of destruction of their star, which required the sacrifice of 75% of their number to halt the apocalypse and restore their star to a functional point.

Again, what is the difference? It's okay for God to do it because He's a God? How do we know the Unsundered people aren't considered Gods in this story and she just happens to be one of them? They were creating life with just their wills and magic, just like a divine being would. That sounds pretty Godly to me. We don't know much about the ancients to deem whether or not they were Godly beings or not.

I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy of blaming Venat. If you wanna blame her, anyone who is religious needs to look to their own religious figures and well and question that.

You can direct that argument at any who are religious here, but it's not really on very solid grounds, not least of all because the god in question is, in relation to those he inflicts his decisions on, a higher being, and not just that, but the creator of all existence and life, both of which traits are relevant to its godhood and thus its perceived authority. The ancients may have many transcendent traits compared to humans, but she is one of them, they are still sufficiently human-like for us to be able to empathise with them and they did not see her as a/their god, let alone their creator; the latter two are are things she is emphatically not. So I am unclear on what 'hypocrisy' you're supposedly pointing out, even if someone is religious - which I am not; I thus have little interest in defending the biblical conception of god. Even so, trying to conflate her with the biblical god, a being which is not human at all, is just strange to me.

[Theodric]

Genocide is genocide. It doesn't suddenly become anything but genocide just because its effects are obscured and hidden behind fluffy language.

Let's not forget that in addition to wiping out her people and civilisation she was fully committed to lying about their motives and circumstances as well as attempting to eliminate all memory of their existence. Which, again, is yet another trait of genocide.

[Lauront]

Did you read what your screenshots say or did you stop at the word "appearance"? It even says: "reduced in all respects", which he goes on to list some facets of. We know that they lost their immortality, the full span of Echo powers, the ability to use creation magicks, and more besides.

I certainly agree this should've been depicted in XIV, but it is nevertheless a canonical depiction of what occurred in XIV, authored by the lead writer for SHB and EW, detailing Emet-Selch's story as it introduces him to the crossover.

I believe the "malicious intent" thing is your own reading. Posters here were in fact disputing that malicious intent is required to be a villain. No one is trying to cast her in a purely Manichaean light.

Had the writers not wanted me to blame Venat for all the evils in the world, they should not have given her such a great role in bringing them about - again, consult the pre-6.1 Q&A on this front. And I am sorry but they are not all the same to me. Hermes throwing a cosmic temper tantrum and dooming all life because of his own self-indulgent sadness and discomfort with the concept of death/purpose is very much intentionally evil. Whereas with Venat I can at least agree that her motives were not purely destructive, even if they caused her own people a great harm.

[Kazemon15]

Hermes throwing a cosmic temper tantrum and dooming all life because of his own self-indulgent sadness is very much intentionally evil.

I wouldn't say his sadness was "self-indulgent". Grief is very much a thing that can mess people up. It never goes away, it stays with you for life. Causes you to be irrational. And as we saw from Elpis, most if not almost all ancients do not grieve. For all we know, Hermes was the first ancient to actually feel grief. And when everyone around you dismisses that grief out of hand time and again, it broken him down to his very soul. Yes, I agree what he did wasn't the right thing, but he wasn't in his right mind either.

[Theodric]

I wouldn't say his sadness was "self-indulgent". Grief is very much a thing that can mess people up. It never goes away, it stays with you for life. Causes you to be irrational. And as we saw from Elpis, most if not almost all ancients do not grieve. For all we know, Hermes was the first ancient to actually feel grief. And when everyone around you dismisses that grief out of hand time and again, it broken him down to his very soul. Yes, I agree what he did wasn't the right thing, but he wasn't in his right mind either.

The side quests in Elpis reveal that Hermes was far from the only Ancient to experience grief. I get the impression a lot of people are simply projecting their own experiences onto Hermes when to me he's one of the most laughable attempts at showcasing mental health issues and something as complex as depression and despair in a video game to date.

[Sarkany]

The side quests in Elpis reveal that Hermes was far from the only Ancient to experience grief. I get the impression a lot of people are simply projecting their own experiences onto Hermes when to me he's one of the most laughable attempts at showcasing mental health issues and something as complex as depression and despair in a video game to date.

Well, if people are finding him relatable, I think that would tend to indicate they got something right. Everyone's experience of depression is different. (I do think I recognized a lot of the absolutely wild depression-philosophy he was getting into in Ktisis Hyperboreia - I recognize that it's completely nuts, but it felt very similar to some of the rabbit holes I've gone into.) He does seem to be the only person who reacts as strongly as he does to the "necessity" of putting down animals that aren't meeting their performance metrics. Other people were experiencing grief, but was anyone else driven to the same level of despair over insufficiently successful animals? I don't think so. Emet has the whole monologue about how the Sundered are so worthless compared to him that our deaths are morally meaningless, and we can talk and express feelings - I really don't see any of the Ancients feeling more strongly than that about literal animals.

[Cach]

The side quests in Elpis reveal that Hermes was far from the only Ancient to experience grief. I get the impression a lot of people are simply projecting their own experiences onto Hermes when to me he's one of the most laughable attempts at showcasing mental health issues and something as complex as depression and despair in a video game to date.

All things "final enemy" related felt rushed specially for a multi-expansion plot.
But to be fair, the moment time travel was introduced again I pretty much checked out and couldn't help being snarky at every single revelation.

[Lauront]

I wouldn't say his sadness was "self-indulgent". Grief is very much a thing that can mess people up. It never goes away, it stays with you for life.

I would say it is. He didn't realise many of his own fellow researchers shared his sentiments, implying he scarcely ever spoke to them to understand how they thought. It is not purely grief which animates him, but his inability to cope with the concept of life, terminating in death, which he cannot make sense of; he struggles to conceive of a purpose in this context. Moreover, it does not absolve him of condemning all existence to death, which he knew he was by allowing Endsinger to form her "nest" and shower everything in her path with her song of despair, including the creations he supposedly valued. He is willing to torment mankind both unsundered and sundered for his 'answer', still isn't satisfied in the process of getting it (as Amon) and still thinks mankind, both sundered and unsundered, is unworthy of living. His decisions are not purely in the heat of the moment, but calculated. To me this is all exceedingly self-indulgent and very much driven by spite.

And as we saw from Elpis, most if not almost all ancients do not grieve.

You should replay those scenes, too. We are shown, emphatically, that they even possessed funeral rites for their living creations which were killed accidently. Where do you derive this notion from that they did not grieve, let alone to the tune of "most"? There is also a separate quest, dealing with a mentor and her mentee, making her peace with the decision of her mentor to pass on and be reborn. Nevermind Pandaemonium and Eric.

For all we know, Hermes was the first ancient to actually feel grief. And when everyone around you dismisses that grief out of hand time and again, it broken him down to his very soul. Yes, I agree what he did wasn't the right thing, but he wasn't in his right mind either.

Yeah, no, he wasn't the first. And not only that, but his fellow researchers indulged his requests. Perhaps a bit too much. He clearly wasn't in his right mind but not because only he felt emotions...

[Kazemon15]

I would say it is. He didn't realise many of his own fellow researchers shared his sentiments, implying he scarcely ever spoke to them to understand how they thought. It is not purely grief which animates him, but his inability to cope with the concept of life, ended by death, which he cannot make sense of; he struggles to conceive of a purpose in this context. Moreover, it does not absolve him of condemning all existence to death, which he knew he was by allowing Endsinger to form her "nest" and shower everything in her path with her song of despair, including the creations he supposedly valued. He is willing to torment mankind both unsundered and sundered for his 'answer', still isn't satisfied in the process of getting it (as Amon) and still thinks mankind, both sundered and unsundered, is unworthy of living. His decisions are not purely in the heat of the moment, but calculated. To me this is all exceedingly self-indulgent and very much driven by spite.



You should replay those scenes, too. We are shown, emphatically, that they even possessed funeral rites for their living creations which were killed accidently. Where do you derive this notion from that they did not grieve, let alone to the tune of "most"? There is also a separate quest, dealing with a mentor and her mentee, making her peace with the decision of her mentor to pass on and be reborn.



Yeah, no, he wasn't the first. And not only that, but his fellow researchers indulged his requests. He clearly wasn't in his right mind but not because only he felt emotions...

I'm currently in the process of replaying the entire game from 2.0. I have not gotten to replay Endwalker yet but I will take a closer look once I get to this part.

I don't care about you agreeing with me, but you do take things at face value, otherwise you wouldn't be so determined to die on that hill of Emet showing us a literal depiction of the sundering instead of a abbreviated version that is easier to digest.

And you would not insist that Ancients don't grieve - Erichthonius would like to have a word with you about that. Or the ones who asked us about better funeral rites.

Yeah, you automatically know everything about me from the few posts I mentioned. I don't care what you say either in that case, and I will not reply to you anymore for being extremely rude and attacking me for having a different viewpoint.