Tales from the Dawn #3: "A Question of Life" (Hermes)

[RyuDragnier]

We don’t know what we’re they actually going to sacrifice. I know there’s been a lot of debate whether it’s sapient beings, animals, just life energy in general etc. Devs left it vary vague and considering that they don’t ever mention the third sacrifice as a part of Venat’s reasoning, I can only assume they did not intend it to be people with souls or “kinda forgot” about that plot point since SHB(wouldn’t be surprised tbh).

Either way, I am not claiming that the convocation were paragons of morality. They were desperate people pushed to desperate measures, I’d argue far more desperate than Venat considering they had zero knowledge of what was causing the final days.

I'm still of the mindset they didn't say what the 3rd set of sacrifices were intentionally. Say they were animals, people would state the Ancients were correct and Venat never should have done what she did. State they were sapient life like people, and the Ancients were incorrect and Venat was right to do what she did. Not give an answer...and it leaves the entire area morally grey with neither side looking like the correct party. And I agree, the Convocation and Ancients were incredibly desperate to perform the sacrifices they did.

[SentioftheHoukai]

I mean, the 3.x stuff is kind of a continuity snarl regarding the Zodiark and Hydaelyn backstory since it was clearly written before everything else, it's kind of hard to reconcile with the story as written later, so I just chalk it up to a bit of writing weirdness rather than evidence of Venat being a sinister manipulator behind the scenes (since that clearly isn't the intention of the rest of the story, once they figured out who and what Venat actually was.)

Yeah, remember when Zodiark had HIPS?



The Convocation remembers. He was a life-giver, that one. A mother, a father, and a true LGBT icon. He has no need for gender, have you seen that statue. Damn, was he ever ahead of his time.

Maybe Venat should have done more to actively perserve the culture of her people, but failing to do that is far and away from intentional efforts by genocidal regimes to actively erase the cultures of people they genocided.

Maybe Venat didn't personally cultivate the mythos the Sundered world built up around her, but by all the Gods above and Demons below did she ever benefit from it. She also did nothing at all to dissuade people of the idea that she was NOT in fact a "Supreme Deity" to the people who had a direct literal pipeline to God (a.k.a. Sharlayan and their Aitiascope) and straight up calls herself a "Supreme Deity" when you fight her in her trial. Recall this is the woman who gave herself wings whilst stripping her own people of them wholesale, and took their creation magicks from them and proceeded to give them to anthropomorphic rabbits that made a dungeon with a murder-death machine and never once got told a damn thing about humanity as it is now by the mother they so beloved. It really doesn't sound like Venat is any more responsible with the Creation Magicks that she alone got to keep when everyone else lost them than the other Ancients she killed were.

[Iscah]

I'm still of the mindset they didn't say what the 3rd set of sacrifices were intentionally. Say they were animals, people would state the Ancients were correct and Venat never should have done what she did. State they were sapient life like people, and the Ancients were incorrect and Venat was right to do what she did. Not give an answer...and it leaves the entire area morally grey with neither side looking like the correct party. And I agree, the Convocation and Ancients were incredibly desperate to perform the sacrifices they did.

It feels like they're doing it because they want the story to be deep and controversial and debatable, but if they are doing that artificially by withholding critical information then that just feels unfair.

[Absimiliard]

At this point we can see pretty clearly how irrational people are about the subject. Giving a definitive answer one way or the other would be like lighting up a cigarette two seconds after snorting gunpowder.

[Lauront]

I'm still of the mindset they didn't say what the 3rd set of sacrifices were intentionally. Say they were animals, people would state the Ancients were correct and Venat never should have done what she did. State they were sapient life like people, and the Ancients were incorrect and Venat was right to do what she did. Not give an answer...and it leaves the entire area morally grey with neither side looking like the correct party. And I agree, the Convocation and Ancients were incredibly desperate to perform the sacrifices they did.

That's fine but if you concede that we really don't know what was involved, and none of the writing centres her motivation on what was involved so much as what these sacrifices would accomplish (her faction believed they'd lead to their people failing to grow in some sense), how exactly are you determining what was involved to use that term? I actually don't think the default answer would be "they were correct", because EW has never really hinged its entire case on that point in the first place - it has other wobbly foundations it tries to rest it upon. This may surprise you but I don't think these sacrifices were necessarily the best plan - whatever they were, I just don't consider them to be worthy of genociding their entire race, nor were they given the full picture to understand what potential issues there were in pressing down that path. However, it has little to do with what was being sacrificed, because it's not even remotely central to her crew's reasoning, to the extent that they even understood the full picture.

[Brinne]

If we are going to seriously sit down and try to solve, in-universe, "what was the content of the third sacrifice" in a way that goes beyond "lol writers dodging the subject":

It's probably still fundamentally unknowable, and will be for all eternity, because in all likelihood, the actual subjects of the third sacrifice never got the chance to even come into existence.

The plan for the third sacrifice was one that would be cultivated gradually, over the long term and probably multiple generations, as the surviving Ancients slowly nurtured their planet back to life until it was "bursting with vitality." They never got the chance to do this--therefore, it's likely not even they knew what the potential third sacrifice would actually look like, beyond a general source of life energy, because we've seen multiple times the Ancients conceding that how souls manifest, and what is accepted by the star as authentic life, is a realm outside of their control.

The lives that would comprise third sacrifice never had the chance to be born to begin with. They didn't get that far. No one knew in-universe exactly what it was going to be, either, and honestly, the plan was probably to cross the bridge of the finer logistics once they'd come to it. Ultimately, the broad outline of the long-term plan never even had a chance to get rolling because Venat objected on a purely ideological basis from the very beginning.

[EaraGrace]

I'm afraid I recall no such thing occuring for the vast majority of wildlife we personally extinguish in the game, and frankly one example does not a rule make. Forget the trolls for just a moment, if you please. Recall the many and numerous counterexamples in A Realm Reborn, Heavensward, Stormblood, Shadowbringers..... and oh yes, ENDWALKER ITSELF. We don't exactly stop to hold a ceremony for the unfortunate demise of every squirrel, gorilla, opo-opo and pugil that we murder for their raw materials, now do we? In Endwalker it was revealed that literally anything could be bestowed a soul and you couldn't even tell right off the bat, the process was entirely random and decided by the Lifestream which nobody can truly control. Where is all the concern for THEM, since we have since stooped to potentially sapient animals.

Still haven't given me proof of nepotism Senti. But sure how about you prove that the opo opo can speak and well go from there. You want to make the basis for moral consideration be "potential" sapience. Show me an example of beings that have that that didn't aggro to us first.

Gonna be honest here.... This isn't the dunk you think it is. You frankly look no better than Theo with your hyper-aggressive "Why don't you come over here and say it to my FACE!" posts. But since we're on the subject, I do seem to recall either Lurina or Brinne calling some on here out for the same thing. Vagueposting without quoting those making the arguments in order to facilitate an easier time dismantling someone's argument while they may or may not be on the forum to defend their point of view at that particular point in time. Why is it that you never seem to call Lyth, or Cleretic, or Iscah, or Kari out for the manners of behaviour you call us malicious and nefarious Zodiark Trancers out for, I wonder~

God you clearly have nothing but whataboutisms to contribute with.

If we are going to seriously sit down and try to solve, in-universe, "what was the content of the third sacrifice" in a way that goes beyond "lol writers dodging the subject":

It's probably still fundamentally unknowable, and will be for all eternity, because in all likelihood, the actual subjects of the third sacrifice never got the chance to even come into existence.

The plan for the third sacrifice was one that would be cultivated gradually, over the long term and probably multiple generations, as the surviving Ancients slowly nurtured their planet back to life until it was "bursting with vitality." They never got the chance to do this--therefore, it's likely not even they knew what the potential third sacrifice would actually look like, beyond a general source of life energy, because we've seen multiple times the Ancients conceding that how souls manifest, and what is accepted by the star as authentic life, is a realm outside of their control.

I have to again point to the dialogue following our fake Hyth convo.

Y'shtola: What of you, Forename? Was aught worthy of interest said during your efforts to obtain a writ?

Alphinaud: A great sacrifice of life in exchange for their brethren's resurrection... And you say all the Ascians' scheming has been leading to this!?

All this time... But if they still mean to enact this plan, then things won't end with the Rejoining...

Y'shtola: ...Aye, I thought we knew their intentions in full: restore the world to its former glory, and, in turn, empower Zodiark to reclaim His throne as the will of the star.
Yet that was merely a step along the way. I hesitate to put it into words, but we have to assume that following the final Rejoining, the Ascians mean to draw on the lives of the Source to make their sacrifice to Zodiark.

Alphinaud: That does seem the most likely scenario. Mayhap those who ally with the Ascians would be spared that fate...

But what value is there in surviving when all our history, all our struggles will be erased? I cannot conscience such an act.

Alisaie: Of course not. And that's to say naught of what Emet-Selch plans for the Exarch's power. Do we stand by and let him threaten our future as well as our past?
We need to find him, Forename. And when we do...

Make your mark. Change the course of history in a way that's felt by those who came before, and those who came after; by everyone you've ever met.

Change things so that even my other self, dying somewhere in that future Calamity will smile and say, “I knew you would win.”

I've seen many quote Alphinauds line, but what of the rest of it? Its clear that the Scions are concluding that the humans on the Source will be sacrificed, based solely on what fake Hyth told us. Concluding that this is an incorrect reading of that conversation, that they were intending to sacrifice anything but human beings, is to say the Scions are also wrong, which is nonsensical writing. So we are left with two choices. Either the writers were telling us the initial sacrifice were intended to be humans, or the writers of ShB and EW lost the plot several years ago.

[KageTokage]

I find it strange that they weren't more specific about that point were it truly the case pre-Sundering; moreso because it would've more strongly pushed Venat's group as being right when the story already leans in that direction to begin with.

It's all the vagueness surrounding basically everything that happens between the end of Elpis and the Sundering the that makes it hard for me to feel completely for/against either faction's course of action, though perhaps that was precisely the writer's intent.

[Absimiliard]

The Scions -- Alphinaud especially -- have a bit of a record of getting things wrong, and what they do as a result of their incorrect conclusions is not always the most helpful thing. Just throwing that out there.

Oh, and uh... unrelatedly to the most immediate topic: Nier Re[in]carnation's sundering lore says hello.

[SentioftheHoukai]

The Scions -- Alphinaud especially -- have a bit of a record of getting things wrong, and what they do as a result of their incorrect conclusions is not always the most helpful thing. Just throwing that out there.

Oh, and uh... unrelatedly to the most immediate topic: Nier Re[in]carnation's sundering lore says hello.

That's non-canon, you utter FOOOOOOOOL~ Filthy cutscene-skipper!

Why? Oh, uh.... I, uh... BECAUSE I SAID SO!

Still haven't given me proof of nepotism Senti. But sure how about you prove that the opo opo can speak and well go from there. You want to make the basis for moral consideration be "potential" sapience. Show me an example of beings that have that that didn't aggro to us first.

Hmmmm.... How many of the Ancients creations can you prove possess souls and sapience? It sure would be nice if you EVER seemed to hold yourself and your arguments to the same standards as you so stringently expect of others.

God you clearly have nothing but whataboutisms to contribute with.

Way I see it, you don't have much better to offer seeing as how your nepotism combatment post is the only point of mine you're making the attempt to fight..... Which is from a different post entirely!

As I mentioned about the Auspices, and you mentioned about the Ancients' creations. When are you gonna address your own whataboutisms, new-old friend? Your continued avoidance of combating my logical points exposes your inability to shoot them down, instead you rely on the admittedly low-hanging fruit I offered so graciously. I never expected that one to be taken seriously, that one was fully admitted low-effort rage bait but when you take into account what it was in response to who can truly blame me? I'm merely using the same "Nobody on these forums bothers to discuss fairly and in good faith, and use nice language all the time! So, neither will I because I'm fed up!" that you yourself have admitted to in the past. I honestly don't see why I ought to put out any more effort than my intellectual opponents are willing to.