Bozja: enjoyable lore, a GREAT start...

[HaveAltWillFun]

Hear me out, but the Blades should not have been tempered - or if there were, not transformed (rewrite the lore of Trinity Seeker, the Royal Guard and Trinity Avowed to be ancient Bozjan war machina meant to counter the Allagan war machina - it'd fit, given the ancient Bozjans created the original gunblades).
Except Lovro, him being ambushed and tempered outside of CLL in the field makes sense and plays into a later point.

Because if any tempering succeeded in CLL, there's no reason in-story why Bajsaljien and Marsak should've escaped. Even if Misija knew the plan she still fired up a second round of aether to temper Bajsaljien and Marsak. Which makes sense in-story: remove Bajsaljien and Marsak, the Bozjan Resistance is done, delaying tactic accomplished.

But really, no one needs to be tempered for the Queen to be used as a delaying tactic: the threat of being ambushed and tempered is enough, especially as the WoL can't be everywhere, so it would be logical for the Resistance to be in nigh-on full retreat.

All this could be accomplished by removing the section of the cutscene between the Queen forming her tempering blades and the WoL firing up the anti-tempering barrier, plus rewriting some field notes (using the above point and maybe have the Blades elsewhere working on securing/ motivating people to rebuild in other regions of Bozja).

Now, for the transformations, two points:
If you're using a primal as a delaying tactic, why waste the aether? Everyone else we've seen transformed by a primal - such as those in Sastasha (Hard), Nael, the Heaven's Ward (debatable) and some Imperials - is still recognizably human, and even then, these are people who have usually been around primals for years.
I'll give the rapidly-transformed Imperials a pass because of the sheer number of tempered followers from most loyal imperials and countless members of the beast tribes Anima has plus towers world-wide channeling aether into said primal, so Anima has aether to burn. The Queen doesn't have such a massive following, nor even that many crystals to empower her.

Further, Trinity Avowed and Trinity Seeker are mergers of the Blades, something which no Primal has been shown to be capable of doing. Only those with the Echo/ Resonant and rituals for summoning/ creating primals have shown such ability, at least while the body exists (we've seen that the free aether of the soul is more easily absorbed), but that would involve killing the Blades, which is a waste - especially considering that three people as in-sync as each trio is could easily accomplish what the single entity they become could not.

Not saying remove or change the bosses in DL, either, they don't have to be transformed Blades.

Alright, I've made this long enough, I'm happy to discuss any points that anyone brings up in other posts.

[RyuDragnier]

For the merging of the Blades, I can see precedent for where that's possible. It's known that primals can effectively change the forms of their tempered minions (as seen by the pirate captain in Sastasha HM), so combining them into a new changed form is not out of the question.

Also, it was stated by Matsuno that had he known they planned on curing Tempering, he never would have killed off the Blades like he did. Yoshi-P and the other devs kept that fact close to their chest, and so Matsuno had us save the only Blade left unused, Lovro.

[HaveAltWillFun]

For the merging of the Blades, I can see precedent for where that's possible. It's known that primals can effectively change the forms of their tempered minions (as seen by the pirate captain in Sastasha HM), so combining them into a new changed form is not out of the question.

Also, it was stated by Matsuno that had he known they planned on curing Tempering, he never would have killed off the Blades like he did. Yoshi-P and the other devs kept that fact close to their chest, and so Matsuno had us save the only Blade left unused, Lovro.

Tempered altering form isn't deliberately caused by the Primal, but because they have been overtempered, namely their aetherial aspect has been dangerously pushed towards the element of the Primal in question (i.e. Leviathan's tempered such as the aforementioned Captain Madison, had their aether's elemental alignment over aspected to Water - when this happens the body itself is irrercoverably warped into an abomination).

This is similar to what happened to those unlucky enough to be caught up in elemental Flood, such as the Flood of Darkness that turned the Thirteenth into the Void (and thus birthed the Voidsent), and the Flood of Light that similarly erased most of the First (and mutated those unlucky enough to have been caught in it's wake into Sineaters). It's all to do with aether.

Also, don't forget, a Primal's whole reason for tempering in the first place is to create more devoted followers, thus increasing their power, as a Primal's power comes from faith and worship; making more followers means more worship, more worship means more power, and so it goes in a never ending cycle. This is why Primals were so dangerous.

I don't disagree that the alteration of form can and does happen - we have plenty of evidence for that. However, all indications are that it either takes a significant amount of time or a large overwhelming surge of aether. Given that not a lot of time passes in the Bozja story (months at most, I think), wouldn't it have to be the latter? Otherwise the high priests who conduct the beast tribes' summonings would be exhibiting alterations as well.
And while nothing has been said on this in the lore panels I'm aware of, I would currently conclude the degree of alteration would depend on the extent of aetheric alteration in the tempered.

What The Queen does is a more radical alteration than any transformation we've seen thus far: the Blades aren't even remotely recognizable and their souls are merged.
This sort of alteration has only been seen with an elemental Flood, yes, but not by a primal. It seems to be a whole different magnitude.

Also, RyuDragnier, you have a point about how Matsuno handled it, but SE has gone back and corrected dialogue and cutscenes that were problematic when it can to lore or story (the ending cutscene after the Vault is a more recent example).

[Enkidoh]

Tempered altering form isn't deliberately caused by the Primal, but because they have been overtempered, namely their aetherial aspect has been dangerously pushed towards the element of the Primal in question (i.e. Leviathan's tempered such as the aforementioned Captain Madison, had their aether's elemental alignment over aspected to Water - when this happens the body itself is irrercoverably warped into an abomination).

This is similar to what happened to those unlucky enough to be caught up in elemental Flood, such as the Flood of Darkness that turned the Thirteenth into the Void (and thus birthed the Voidsent), and the Flood of Light that similarly erased most of the First (and mutated those unlucky enough to have been caught in it's wake into Sineaters). It's all to do with aether.

Also, don't forget, a Primal's whole reason for tempering in the first place is to create more devoted followers, thus increasing their power, as a Primal's power comes from faith and worship; making more followers means more worship, more worship means more power, and so it goes in a never ending cycle. This is why Primals were so dangerous.

[RyuDragnier]

Something to keep in mind about the Blade itself, it was made by the Allagan Empire with Auracite, and basically corrupts the desires of the user. As we've seen with Auracite from Ivalice and Bozja, it can completely warp the user and the aether in the area. Fusing of souls isn't out of the ballpark considering how little we actually know of how Auracite itself functions. Hell, all we know is that it came from Ultima, we don't know it's original world of origin.

[HaveAltWillFun]

I concede that's possible - hypothetically, it's equally as valid to say auracite could fuse souls as not, and rituals to summon primals can achieve the same (and individuals with the Echo/ Resonant).

But it takes aether to fuel the process - regardless of the power The Queen might gain from such alteration and fusing, it is using the aether stored within the Blade/ focus to do so, aether which is limited in its supply. And that was my main point: is there sufficient aether in that single shard of auracite to do so, considering that it was apparently low enough on aether the IVth dared not take any offensive actions despite catching the Resistance on the back foot? Low enough on aether where it was left powerless by the end of the story?

[Cleretic]

The transformed Blades in Delubrum Reginae are the most understated horror in the game, it's earnestly fantastic. That moment of 'oh god, OH GOD' when it really dawns on you just what you're dealing with is something that the game usually doesn't touch.

I'd also point out that Misija isn't exactly the world's most rational actor. She's got a completely understandable and even agreeable central motive--if you read through the field notes for extra info, she's absolutely right, the IVth Legion were providing better chances and living conditions to the lower classes. But she's also spiteful, vindictive and hateful, and her stunt with the Queen is just as much about hurting those who've wronged her as it is about bringing what she sees as a better Bozja. It's no surprise she falls in with the Garleans; like them when Solus gave them the ability to fight back, she took one look at the power that Save the Queen offered her and realized that she could take revenge.

Yes, I wouldn't be surprised at all to find out that those transformations were ultimately a bit of a waste of Save the Queen's aetheric reserves. It wouldn't even be the only self-defeating thing she does in that one instance: if you read the Queen's Guard entry, you'll find out that one of them probably would've been a staunch ally of Misija, but wasn't given the time of day to show it. (Specifically it's the Queen's Warrior, the axe-wielder.) But Misija is not smart, even if she's surprisingly cunning; she's an imperfect actor making mistakes, and one of those mistakes is being wasteful.


Also, on a more metatextual level: Delubrum Reginae came in the exact same patch cycle as Matoya's Relict and the curing of the tempered kobolds. There was now a confirmed and functional cure for tempering, albeit one with the limitation of there being a point where they're too far gone. Suddenly, Bozja's problem of 'the blades are tempered' feels like a lot less of a problem, because it's now completely fixable. Therefore, if that problem is to remain a problem, then it needs to escalate to the point where it's not fixable. And that limitation on the tempering cure provides one: if there's physical changes, then the cure can't help. The horrible transformations in Delubrum Reginae were likely written in because of that: if the Blades were still human, you could just say 'well it's fine we can fix that', but if they're like THAT, there's nothing you can do but stop them and mourn them.

Incidentally, there's an interesting part where there's uncertainty about how the tempering cure actually works regarding that 'point of no return', and it's something where the DR bosses cover all bases anyway, which is quite clever. It's not clear if the tempering cure just doesn't work at all on transformed people, or if it works but doesn't fix the body. If it's the latter, we could've theoretically helped the Queen's Guard, although they would probably beg for death afterward; however, even if we could do that, Trinity Seeker and Trinity Avowed would still be an unfixable mess.

[HaveAltWillFun]

I agree Misija is spiteful and hateful - which is why it makes no sense that she didn't temper Bajsaljien and Marsak right away, which wrecks the consistency in-story.

However, after CLL, she's supervised by Lyon at least - plus she's back in a military setting. Neither of those are conducive to her being able to act out her revenge fantasies, especially since the IVth is starved for resources.

[Cleretic]

I agree Misija is spiteful and hateful - which is why it makes no sense that she didn't temper Bajsaljien and Marsak right away, which wrecks the consistency in-story.

She tried. We stopped her. Also, her first angle was more of a poetic justice thing; temper Gunnhildr's Blades to make them what she feels they're meant to be, which is 'servants of Gunnhildr'. Bajsaljen and Marsak were priority two (possibly also because they aren't as capable in combat), and yes, it probably would've been smarter to just swing at them first, but again: she's not smart. (Also while I'm not about to check the cutscene, I'm pretty sure B&M were behind the Blades, so there's a few people in the way.)

Lyon is technically her commander, but remember that Lyon is also not a perfect rational actor. He clearly keeps Misija on a loose leash and thinks she can handle herself, and is also clearly someone who thinks what Misija's pulling is, in short, cool as hell--he does not disapprove, even if he recognizes it's shady. He wouldn't have told her not to do that because he thought that it was a good idea, he recognizes fear tactics and that she's pretty capable; really, his only mistake was thinking she'd win. But even then, he's also someone who believes in acceptable losses; if Misija falls while achieving something, even if that thing is just buying time for the Dalriada to turn up, then that itself is acceptable.

Ironically, it feels like your disagreement about Misija turning the Blades into perfect robots is because you want different characters to be different kinds of perfect robot. A lot of what you're saying is... well, correct, they are doing things that make no logical sense and making mistakes that they could've easily just not made. that's the point; they're not perfect, they're not geniuses, they made mistakes.

[HaveAltWillFun]

Nitpick: their bodies are merged but their souls seem to be separate and switching around which one of them is in control.

Ah, I misinterpreted that or mis-remembered someone saying they were merged into one soul.

She tried. We stopped her. Also, her first angle was more of a poetic justice thing; temper Gunnhildr's Blades to make them what she feels they're meant to be, which is 'servants of Gunnhildr'. Bajsaljen and Marsak were priority two (possibly also because they aren't as capable in combat), and yes, it probably would've been smarter to just swing at them first, but again: she's not smart. (Also while I'm not about to check the cutscene, I'm pretty sure B&M were behind the Blades, so there's a few people in the way.)

Lyon is technically her commander, but remember that Lyon is also not a perfect rational actor... he recognizes fear tactics and that she's pretty capable; really, his only mistake was thinking she'd win...

Ironically, it feels like your disagreement about Misija turning the Blades into perfect robots is because you want different characters to be different kinds of perfect robot. A lot of what you're saying is... well, correct, they are doing things that make no logical sense and making mistakes that they could've easily just not made. that's the point; they're not perfect, they're not geniuses, they made mistakes.

Bajsaljen and Marsak are part of the Blades - they're wielding the reforged weapons, they're the commanders of the unit.
As for the positioning - the same point could be raised for the Blades themselves: they're in a staggered formation, so some of them are behind the others - Bajsaljen and Marsak are no more protected from The Queen than about half the Blades are, from what I can tell (also, the tempering blades are guided, they don't fly in straight lines).
I did have to check the cutscene, because you raised a good point that I couldn't recall precisely, Cleretic.

As for rational actors and perfect robots... as we have seen, both in-game and in lore Garlean soldiers obey orders from superiors even if they don't want to (Julles being a recent example). That is how the Empire tends to employ their troops, as robots. But even so, considering Noah's plans for Bajsaljen to take up his cause, Misija's attempt to or success at tempering him because of her prettiness and spite would be an enormous mistake and would fit because she wouldn't necessarily care about how capable Bajsaljen and Marsak are in combat. The use of fear tactics can be better employed by having the Blades themselves do the attacking, not unknown abominations - which Lyon would probably recognize, rational or no, because it's one of the oldest military tactics around. I don't expect geniuses, but consistency of character is important.