Revelations from Patch 6.2: Buried Memories

[sidurgu-12]

[HB0]I still hope we get an answer why in Shadowbringers the Ancients told that there was a coming from deep inside the Planet that started the Final Days. We now know that Meteion was at the edge of the Universe. So this Sound can't be her Song of Oblivion. I really hoped Pandemonium would sheed some light on this matter. But it doesnt seem so.[/HB]

Can't seem to get this stupid Spoiler Tag to work.

remove the 0.

[Cleretic]

I still hope we get an answer why in Shadowbringers the Ancients told that there was a coming from deep inside the Planet that started the Final Days. We now know that Meteion was at the edge of the Universe. So this Sound can't be her Song of Oblivion. I really hoped Pandemonium would sheed some light on this matter. But it doesnt seem so.

Realistically you don't need a spoiler tag for this one. Anyone going into a 6.2 thread has already gotten to these points in 5.0 and 6.0.

I'm 99.97% sure that we won't be getting an answer to this because we've already got an answer, and it's that that sound was indeed the Song of the End. Thavnair also heard it but I believe described it more as coming from around them. This suggests that perhaps the Ancients misinterpreted the direction... or possibly that it's an imperfect localization or one that emphasised gravitas or emotional impact over literal fact; that happens, and this wouldn't even be the only time it happened to cause speculation about something that isn't a thing. (Fun fact, the 'Heart of Sabik' is just a chunk of auracite, not an actual heart of anything.)

Personally, I'd say that the main counter-evidence against this being A Thing is the same as what I raised as the main counter-evidence behind the 'Hydaelyn tempered us' theory back when people still had that: if this were a plot hook, then they walked right past every single chance they had to underline it. We first learned about the sound from a background NPC in Fake Amaurot, and yet Emet didn't say anything, almost as if it's not important. The Scions as well as the entire population of Thavnair are privvy to the knowledge of 'this started with a sound', and yet not a single one of them--not the Scions who have every available piece of information, not Thavnairian smart people who would've heard it like Vrtra and Nidhana--ever suggested that the sound was anything worth investigating beyond being the starting point. This is not a game that buries its plot hooks, and is a game that absolutely loves letting its cast full of smart people speculate and theorize; if the sound was important as something beyond 'the thing that signified the start of the End of Days', there are a good half-dozen characters who would've said something before now.

Also, just on a story production standpoint... if a sound were being implemented as a Chekhov's Gun on this level, they would've played the sound. If they knew 'yeah a secret beast is gonna be responsible for this sound', they would've played it for us before now, so that when they introduce the secret beast they could play it again and have us go 'oh damn I know that sound'.

[RyuDragnier]

P.S. the 357 gil is just a reference to how much the new Scion portraits you can buy from an artist after completing the 6.2 Tataru quest with the Redbills resell for. It's not meant to suggest your opinion has low value.[/hb]

That's funny, I'll have to remember that number for later use myself.

I do find it interesting that for all Emet's claims about the Convocation 'not tolerating acts of deception or malice', Lahabrea did murder his wife, split off his memories and concealed them from the rest of the Convocation, and then tried to destroy the evidence when it resurfaced. It's also interesting that the wild genius that Emet remembers Lahabrea as seems to be more akin to how Lahabrea remembers Athena. I wonder if that's a consequence of him picking up the red soulstone.

I think that's a strong hint that

We never actually fought the real Lahabrea back in ARR and HW, we were fighting his Athena infected side.

[Alleo]

im about to break my arm reaching but

what if this means that the twelve predate the ancients in some form?

Honestly I had that thought too.

[Denishia]

the Post 6.2 Shadowed Memories

Once I realized what this was - 4 fiend backstory info-dump - I was delighted at the inclusion of lore that would have severely hampered MSQ pacing. Chuckled at the locations forced to pull double duty as 13th Pre-Void areas and the usage of gear dropped from the WoD raid.

6.2 MSQ Itself

So it's not the Traveler's Ward blessing itself but just the light aether that untransformed the voidsent reaper. I don't think anyone called a Vauthry-like prenatal partial corruption to explain her uniqueness, though I do like that Vauthry exists as our prior example. Zero's pretty tropey but at least she's a different spin on learning friendship and life experiences outside of the narrowness of contractual selfish survival. Once again doing the 'learn about the new people and cultures' that we do in every new zone and new primal summoning group, and I like that the goal isn't just to wipe out the Voidsent but that Restoring the 13th is more about stabilizing it as to improve the lives of its native inhabitants whose current major problem (aside from the underlying deprivation of aether) is another expansionist empire with forced conscription led by a tin tyrant visionary. The only piece missing is that, as far as we know, Golbez wasn't given the captured Azdaja by an Ascian.

Next patch I hope to learn more about the Contramemoria War and who were some of the Memorias (Cylva! 'I lost my memoria powers' sounds like weak justification, but ok). And the scene when Zero first woke up thinking she was in an inn room, she sounded different.

Don't know which way I fall on the Zero(mus) theory yet.

Speaking of the unfortunately removed from MSQ but highly relevant characters, Unukalhai teaming up with Ryne and Gaia needs to happen. It'd be very amusing to have this giant story chain involving all these optional content NPCs just continue on in the background.

Liked the use of Eidolons as a layered XIII, IV, and IX reference. I wonder when and where the terms Esper and Aeon will be used.

And Abyssos

Lahabrea isn't winning any father-of-the-year awards, but the twist that his wife was the one that only saw Eric as a disposable extension of herself was good. Not the most breath-taking twist, but I was happy that after two bosses in a row of victimized Female Ancients turned into monsters against their will that Athena was the Big Bad instead of a third noble dead Lucrecia-expy. The patch art made it obvious we were getting a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde soul split.

Like how the MSQ let us affirm that Zenos was not a friend if we so wished (THE BEST), the WoL dialogue choices allowed some leeway in how cautious and hostile or trusting of Past Lahabrea the WoL could be and not have our character brush aside what happened in-game.

Love the music of the first 3 fights, P8's theme was interesting only in the many musical callbacks.

[Tsiron]

6.2 MSQ Itself

Speaking of the unfortunately removed from MSQ but highly relevant characters, Unukalhai teaming up with Ryne and Gaia needs to happen. It'd be very amusing to have this giant story chain involving all these optional content NPCs just continue on in the background.

filling space

His updated dialogue suggests that that's exactly what's going to happen! With regards to Ryne and Gaia, that is. I'd be all for a continuation of the Void Quests, The First ended up having some of my favourite characters despite their not being all that important, in the grand scheme of things

[JeanneOrnitier]

Post-MSQ talk with Cylva and Unukalhai

Both of them say "come back to me if you learn more about restoring the Thirteenth", so I don't think Y'shtola what was talking about in the MSQ scene will be MSQ itself. I think it'll be a sidequest once we beat Golbez that will also require doing their stuff in the First.

Also Cylva says she used to be a memoriate too.

[SannaR]

The stuff with the Redbills is Tataru's own quest line and isn't part of Island Sanctuary. Anyone want to refresh me at least on how Leofard has an Elezen mother and thus an Elezen Grandfather yet isn't Elezen looking? Unless he's like Hilda but took after the father. It's been so long since I did the Void Ark raid series where if he was adopted I must have forgotten that little tidbit as those are the odd factoids my brain tends to remember. Or is it more like how many in the playerbase view Edmont as a surrogate father type for the WoL?

[YianKutku]

The stuff with the Redbills is Tataru's own quest line and isn't part of Island Sanctuary. Anyone want to refresh me at least on how Leofard has an Elezen mother and thus an Elezen Grandfather yet isn't Elezen looking? Unless he's like Hilda but took after the father. It's been so long since I did the Void Ark raid series where if he was adopted I must have forgotten that little tidbit as those are the odd factoids my brain tends to remember. Or is it more like how many in the playerbase view Edmont as a surrogate father type for the WoL?

Yeah, Leofard was an orphan, and was adopted by a "highborn Elezen and childless widow", ie Raimille Roulchardon, the Elezen woman in the portrait. The first lorebook has Leofard's profile (page 202), and if I recall correctly, this was also told to us at basically the end of the Shadows Of Mhach questline, either just after Dun Scaith or maybe a quest after that.

[sidurgu-12]

The stuff with the Redbills is Tataru's own quest line and isn't part of Island Sanctuary. Anyone want to refresh me at least on how Leofard has an Elezen mother and thus an Elezen Grandfather yet isn't Elezen looking? Unless he's like Hilda but took after the father. It's been so long since I did the Void Ark raid series where if he was adopted I must have forgotten that little tidbit as those are the odd factoids my brain tends to remember. Or is it more like how many in the playerbase view Edmont as a surrogate father type for the WoL?

looking at his bio he was adopted into the family by raimille.

edit: yian beat me to it lol. so for additional bit of lore: he still refuses to eat his veggies.