Increasing aetherial capacity

[Contiguouskittycat]

We've seen several characters improve or augment their own aether. Some by normal means, like Arya who in training as a Red Mage strengthens her aether to become an accomplished mage, even after losing her voidsent blood given magical gifts.

We've also seen this happen by underhanded means such as the resonant procedure and various eugenics experiments in several plotlines.

My question is: Is strengthing one's aether the same as increasing aetherial capacity, and are there any training and/or procedures to improve this to provide accessibility to people born with an aetherial disadvantage?

[KageTokage]

The ability to manipulate aether is described as being strongly tied to the soul, so it's not something that can be easily remedied if you lack an innate affinity for it. Sometimes it's simply a case of not being practiced enough, but it's also mentioned some individuals are straight up not able to use aetherytes due to being too aetherically inept to teleport.

There is still a physical component to it, though, as the Garlean inability to manipulate aether is described as being of such nature and eugenics wouldn't be able to improve aetheric capabilities were it tied strictly to the soul.

I think "aetheric capacity" is in reference to how much aether is actually stored in an individual's body, so even a Garlean could potentially have an extremely high aetheric capacity, but simply be incapable of tapping into it due to their deficiency.

[Cleretic]

The ability to manipulate aether is described as being strongly tied to the soul, so it's not something that can be easily remedied if you lack an innate affinity for it. Sometimes it's simply a case of not being practiced enough, but it's also mentioned some individuals are straight up not able to use aetherytes due to being too aetherically inept to teleport.

There is still a physical component to it, though, as the Garlean inability to manipulate aether is described as being of such nature and eugenics wouldn't be able to improve aetheric capabilities were it tied strictly to the soul.

I think "aetheric capacity" is in reference to how much aether is actually stored in an individual's body, so even a Garlean could potentially have an extremely high aetheric capacity, but simply be incapable of tapping into it due to their deficiency.

Specifically, Garleans apparently have their aetheric manipulation tuned inwards instead of outwards, basically making them an entire race of supersoldiers... which'd be great if every other race on earth wasn't capable of shooting laser beams or augmenting a sword swing so hard that innate strength doesn't matter in the first place.

There is also the possibility of someone of another race just not being physically capable of using aether--this came up in Thamaturge's questline. With him it looks to be more of a problem with aetheric flow, though; the aetheric equivalent of his bloodstream just isn't strong enough, so he just can't manipulate aether.

...and I'm realizing the OP of this thread is the exact same guy who asked basically the same question last thread, and we brought up the exact same things that time, too.

[Enkidoh]

Apparently physical makeup does affect aetherial ability - there was a minor sidequest in Elpis where a researcher noticed the WoL's aetherial 'thinness' (due to being Sundered, although the researcher did not know that was the reason obviously, thinking they were just a flawed familiar) and offered to greatly enhance their aetherial capacity to the equivelant of an Ancient or thereabouts through a potent alchemical concotion (the quest involved getting the ingredients for it).

However, just as the WoL was about to gulp the finished potion down, the researcher stated an unfortunate possible side effect that they hadn't initially considered is that due to the WoL's physical limitations, there was no guarantee that their physical form wouldn't be outright destroyed in the process (akin to popping like an overinflated balloon) - it should go without saying that would naturally be a very bad thing....

Not surprisingly, the WoL quickly decided the payoff just was not worth the risk and (wisely) turned down the offer, returning the brew to the researcher. So from this quest at least it appears aetherial capacity is at least proportional to physical makeup.

[KageTokage]

It does make me question if someone could theoretically "unsunder" themselves by increasing their overall aetheric density in some manner, or if it's simply not possible for anyone achieve a state of "perfection" again without the rejoinings.

The Resonant procedure seemed like it was doing that for the soul, but the physical body would be a limiting factor.

[Vyrerus]

Clearly there was some magical method to increase aetheric density and capacity, though the method was not disclosed to us.

That method being the one Emet-selch used to make us tangible at the start of the events of Elpis.

There's also the Deep Dungeon methods involving the silver boxes and the aetherpool weapons and armor. Whereby equipping those arms and having them resonate with whatever aether is in those boxes lets them increase their power. And said power directly increases the player's power. These also work in the open world to create the same weapon but in overworld stat terms.

So I guess, as has been the case with all aetherial gear since it was first described from Sastasha, you can increase your aetherial capacity by wearing things with high aetherial capacity, and these same things can increase your aptitude should they have a mechanism that does.

[SannaR]

The pink background gear is only enhanced by the user's death. Now how that makes it or really the entire Heavensward relic weapon series for an example works I'm not sure.

[Contiguouskittycat]

Specifically, Garleans apparently have their aetheric manipulation tuned inwards instead of outwards, basically making them an entire race of supersoldiers... which'd be great if every other race on earth wasn't capable of shooting laser beams or augmenting a sword swing so hard that innate strength doesn't matter in the first place.

There is also the possibility of someone of another race just not being physically capable of using aether--this came up in Thamaturge's questline. With him it looks to be more of a problem with aetheric flow, though; the aetheric equivalent of his bloodstream just isn't strong enough, so he just can't manipulate aether.

...and I'm realizing the OP of this thread is the exact same guy who asked basically the same question last thread, and we brought up the exact same things that time, too.

Yes, I have a bit of a hyperfixation right now.

Anyway, in the Thaumaturge questline all that's really stated is that his "aetheric reserves" are so low that attempting to cast a thaumaturgical spell would kill him. They don't mention other types of magic, but that could be for a number of reasons. We do see examples of other characters such as Arya from the Red Mage questline. After she loses the voidsent blood her gift for magic is all gone and she has to start from scratch, at one point she says "My aether feels so weak I doubt I could light a candle." But later she's trained and recovered some of her ability.

Obviously there's been a lot of time between when these two questlines were written, so I guess I'm mostly wondering if there's a possible hope of improvement for people with these aetherial problems. It does seem to be rather important to anyone who wants to do traveling or adventuring.