Quote Originally Posted by redheadturk View Post
Snip
I definitely don't see the WoL this way at all, especially after we spent the entirety of Shadowbringers trying to prevent the Ascians from effectively doing exactly that - sacrificing everyone we know and love to restore Ancient civilization. Why would they sacrifice one civilization to save another when they've spent so long trying to prevent exactly that?

What is interesting here actually is that what you describe is essentially what G'raha did, but I've seen him decried for it more than once on these forums (not necessarily by you, but in general). He effectively sacrificed a dying world to save a "better" one, where his hero and friends are still alive, and get a second chance. WoL would need to make the same choice to save the Ancients, only they'd be doing it knowing all of their friends are actually still alive and do actually have a chance to be saved, and they'd be trading that for a bunch of people they don't know closely and likely can't fit in with anything close to easily because they're so vastly different in experience, worldview, and abilities. And also OG Azem is still alive back then, too.

WoL knows they used to be Azem, but they are not Azem, and nothing I've seen suggests they remember being Azem to any significant extent. They have no current personal connection to these people other than the encounters they've had with their future selves and the few hours/days/whatever we interacted with them in the past. From their perspective, that's a trade of life for life, and they would be making that choice on behalf of an entire world (and then some, considering all of the shards). Which is... not far off of what Venat is being decried for too. Making the choice to give up on one world for the sake of a maybe brighter future in a different one.

I mean, I'm not gonna be out here singing praises for the story - it's an MMO story, and the bar for those is low, and the bar for a decent time travel story is darn near subterranean. This is definitely one of the better ones I've played, in general, but it definitely still has flaws. But also... sometimes characters make stupid choices based on incomplete or incorrect information or assumptions. There are gaps in the story, but there's also plenty of room for people to just... be irrational and make weird decisions. They are just people after all, Ancient or otherwise.