Modern Morality vs Game Setting

[KariTheFox]

like letting Yotsuyu live (Heh, until she kicked the bucket anyway).

Eh? The scions assumed she was dead after the attack on Doma castle, until she showed up with amnesia. After she got her memories back and became a primal, we very much did kill her.

Unless you're saying we should have just murdered a defenseless and amnesic woman in cold blood?

[YianKutku]

Eh? The scions assumed she was dead after the attack on Doma castle, until she showed up with amnesia. After she got her memories back and became a primal, we very much did kill her.

Unless you're saying we should have just murdered a defenseless and amnesic woman in cold blood?

Technically we weakened her, and then Asahi shot her. Which one of those contributed more to her death is a little fuzzy.

Compare with Shiva, where we defeated her (twice if you did EX), and she was still healthy enough to run away while scolding us regarding the Dragonsong War. And then there's Thordan, where we defeated him and then he dies in sparklies. So who even knows.

[Stepjam]

To paraphrase: Goody two-shoes save the day. Nothing and nobody gets sacrificed, and only the bad guys get any comeuppance for their stupid decisions no matter how dumb the decisions of the childishly naive heroes were, like letting Yotsuyu live (Heh, until she kicked the bucket anyway).

Good thing "my own ideals and opinions" are exactly the same for each and every one of the egregiously heroic NPCs.

Personally, i freaking WISH they'd torture people for information. You know, that they'd actually were willing to go to any length to achieve their goal, instead of leaving it all to be resolved by the WoL after they fuck up stopping yet another summoning, because their bleeding heart just couldn't take it if they did anything less than heroic.

If you want game of thrones type grey morality, you are gonna need to play another game. The main characters are the type of heroes who don't stoop to such dark measures. So "goody two shoes" yes. Not story needs to have "grey" main characters who commit warcrimes.

[Cleretic]

See, when I saw this thread topic, I thought we were gonna be talking about slavery. You know, the thing that confirmably exists in multiple nations we've visited (I've counted at least four, more if you count 'Garlemald' and 'Garlemald-occupied nations' separately).

Something we have to remember is that the game setting is not 21st century Earth, and does not share its morality. It's very nebulous exactly what level of comparative development the game world is in, since over the course of the game we see nations based on things ranging from 19th century Japan, Crusades-era Vatican City, to a 17th century mythical city, to a mashup of the Roman Empire, Nazi Germany and Cold War Eastern Europe. But all that can really be confirmed is that FFXIV's world hasn't caught up to us. That's just fine for a story, but it does mean that they haven't gotten to modern cultural mores like 'completely outlawing outright slave trading' and 'completely understanding that torture is bad'.

They're getting there, though. Limsa is several centuries ahead of the curve in recognition of the sins of colonialism.

[Lyth]

What does 'modern morality' entail? Perhaps it means temporarily adopting whatever system of morality best suits your argument in the moment. Before we even get to the subject of interrogation, most societies have a moral objection to killing others. How did you level your character and complete the MSQ? Why did you agree to let yourself be used as a tool of war?

There's no point in offering up a moral take that you have no intention nor capability of living up to.

[KariTheFox]

See, when I saw this thread topic, I thought we were gonna be talking about slavery. You know, the thing that confirmably exists in multiple nations we've visited (I've counted at least four, more if you count 'Garlemald' and 'Garlemald-occupied nations' separately).

Slavery is a weird one in the setting because we see it referenced a lot, but rarely see it in practice. Ul'dah seems to practice some kind of debt-based slavery as punishment for crimes, and you can become a gladiatorial slave as a way to pay off you debts too. Limsa regards slavery as illegal and Yellowjackets root it out when they can, but pirates do participate in some kind of black market slave trade (where are the slaves being taken is unclear).

Garlemald seems to have slaves, though it is interesting that the practice appears to be kept away from people in the ordinary core. Provincial Governors appear to employ slaves, but in Garlemald proper the only slaves were tucked away in Cerulea Ingens and put to work there.

[Cleretic]

Slavery is a weird one in the setting because we see it referenced a lot, but rarely see it in practice. Ul'dah seems to practice some kind of debt-based slavery as punishment for crimes, and you can become a gladiatorial slave as a way to pay off you debts too. Limsa regards slavery as illegal and Yellowjackets root it out when they can, but pirates do participate in some kind of black market slave trade (where are the slaves being taken is unclear).

Garlemald seems to have slaves, though it is interesting that the practice appears to be kept away from people in the ordinary core. Provincial Governors appear to employ slaves, but in Garlemald proper the only slaves were tucked away in Cerulea Ingens and put to work there.

There's also evidence of it in Kugane, and most overtly, Yotsuyu was sold into it (after Garlean occupation of Doma, so it's hard to say if that's 'Garlean slavery' or 'Doman slavery'). That last one I see people struggle with every so often, as Hien's reaction to the whole situation... well, it has a lot less anger towards the actual slave-owner than a fair few modern people are comfortable with. To a degree, rightly so, but it's indicative of the people in the story having a markedly different cultural perspective than the people consuming that story.

[Fenral]

It is worth noting that while such things are depicted and maybe brushed aside a little too quickly, FFXIV never devolves into apologia. Yotsuyu's time as a sex slave had very clear and dire repercussions for Doma itself, so even if we're not putting down roots for three books to liberate Meereen, it's not like anyone in-universe is arguing that it's somehow a good or even okay thing. Nobody's turning to the camera and saying, "You don't like it? Tough. That's their culture, you intolerant monster." (That's left for the forums!)

But yeah, come to think of it, A Song of Ice and Fire (and even Game of Thones) had no problem whatsoever injecting modern morality into its medieval setting, so I'm not sure if there's any solid argument that an edgier setting would require setting it aside.

[Beytran70]

Also I'd like to point out that a lot of the time when the Warrior of Light and Co specifically need information from someone, it often just comes to blows anyways and the "good guys" rarely have any qualms about bringing their ungodly power against often regular people over slight misunderstandings. What we should be talking about in another thread is how it seems possible to scale down one's own powers despite using the same abilities. The Warrior of Light can strike with a sword hard enough to pierce a Dragon's hide but also soft enough not to cleave a man in two. That makes some sense on a physical level, but is it really so easy to stop a giant Black Mage fiery inferno from being hot enough to consume a God to just hot enough to hurt a person without turning them to ash?

Just random thoughts I had.

[Fenral]

The Shisui of the Violet Tides quest ends with an acknowledgement that not a single life was lost, so it is safe to assume that, however improbable, not all acts of player-controlled violence (at least from Stormblood on) carry the intent of lethal force.

You may be happy to hear that the palace guards are all slowly beginning to return to their senses. It seems peace has finally been restored to the palace.

You have saved everyone, including Shiosai, from an untimely death. If only the Ruby Princess would open her eyes, Sui–no–Sato will be exactly as it was before.

But if you mean the literal mechanics of how mineuchi is supposed to work with giant deicidal fireballs... I might invoke the MST3k Mantra on that one.