Revelations from Patch 6.4: The Dark Throne

[Denishia]

I will say about

Garlemald, that it always leaves a sour taste in my mouth. The people in charge seem to always be ultra-nationalists and for a moment I was sure that the twist was that they were hoarding the resources meant for the common people, instead of just worrying about their cultural identity. A piece of me was going "are you worried that we'd steal all your warmachina and resources and re-traumatize your people because that's what YOU'D do in this position?"

Like Quintus and irl politicians of that like, the majority of it is projection, so it's very realistic. XIV could be a lot worse in how it tackles imperialism and colonialism, which is why my frustrations exist instead of not engaging.

Also, I've seen other people saying about Pandae and... I disagree. Also because I'm one of six people who was still interested in the Heart of Sabik:

I don't think we were meant to see Athena as a "victim" of the auracite. The narrative even goes out of its way to say that even if it drove her desires to the extreme, they were still HERS, and it was still HER in there. And I love that they went back to explain it since it was one of those "We'll throw this at the wall and say how important this is and now we kinda forgot all about it among all these others plot points we also threw at the wall." things from the 2.x era. The fact that it also ties with my favorite side-story is a bonus.

re: Athena

that they didn't go into a full co-op and blame everything on some parasitic entity from Sabik meteorite -and that for a second I thought they would- was delightfully refreshing. I was terrified they would, because XIV does have a habit of "feel sorry for Mr. War Crimes" and it's rare for a mother in fiction to stay evil. And while I wasn't in the six that cared about the Heart of Sabik, Ultima from Ivalice was a dangling plot thread that felt it wasn't at all integrated into the world-building, weirdly ignored, so I was already happy when the third dialogue option mentioned it and then p12 centered on it.

I'm still thankful and relieved that the cause of the Final Days wasn't a Lavos or Jenova type outside malevolent evil but instead Meteion was an eventual product of one of the fundamental flaws in the home society returning home. So if the Heart of Sabik is this side stories' threat that returns for a trial series or raid's final threat in 7.0 or 8.0, the trope would please instead of annoy me. As long as the main MSQ plot doesn't hang on the extraterrestrial threat I like it.

[Tehmon]

Just a few thoughts.

MSQ

At the end of Aitascope, Asahi drags Amon into the void with him (somehow, I'm still not sure how that happened lmao). The whole post-patch has been about the void. Are you telling me they are not going to make an appearance? I think people would love to beat the shit out of Asahi, perhaps as a dungeon boss.

Unless I'm misremembering, Y'shtola implied that we'll be gathering light (or whatever) in the First so we can deal with Zeromus. Are we going to be guzzling some light juice again and spewing it at the boss? I'm not sure if I'm confident it'll work again. Either way, now that the First is back on the table, I am confident that by the end of 6.5 a way to travel to the First will be open. Will Cylva and Unukalhai finally get something to do though? The answer is no.

Panda Raid

I didn't think the Heart of Sabik stuff really dampened Athena's evil. Lahabrea made it very clear that Athena's true colors were shown, and it wasn't just the auracite that made her that way. In the end, her reasoning wasn't far off from Hermes' either, and he certainly didn't need auracite to go absolutely nuts. It's clearly evident that all ancients are capable of horrendous feats if they are pushed to that point or see that it is just for the sake of the star.

The ending cutscene of Themis in the aetherial sea puzzles me. What exactly was he talking about regarding the course of the star or whatnot? And the light, was that supposed to be a rebirth or him letting go of his senses and going to slumber so to speak? If he got reborn immediately, that was pretty fast honestly.. it took Gaia/Loghrif like a hundred years to be reborn. Guess there's no official '' waiting in line '' for rebirths and instead it's just random.

[Lunaxia]

I want to clarify, since my post keeps being touched on here; I am aware Lahabrea highlighted that Athena's madness was not entirely the fault of auracite. However, I do still resent the necessity of its implication on her behaviour overall regardless, because there's no doubt it would have pushed her further to some degree even if her baseline was already fairly wild, and there's such a scarcity of compelling female villains who are permitted to be as unapologetically power hungry and remorseless as their male counterparts as it is (to say nothing of mothers), it was pretty disappointing to see they felt it necessary to apply it here of all places.

I don't begrudge the fans who wanted to hear about Sabik, either - it just felt very clumsy and deliberate and at the cost of the narrative rather than an organic tie-in, and again, I think it would have worked better elsewhere.

There's been a running theme for a while now of focusing more on fanservice than on the story, and it gets very wearying.

[Cleretic]

Tataru aka Werlyt sequel:

Knew we'd get back in the Gundam, though surprised we didn't fully repeat the Sapphire Instant Role-Play fight as that would have been a big draw to everyone clamoring for it during Werlyt. Getting Nero officially involved also fixed another missed opportunity. End reward item was meh, though nice to include the portraitist again. (Slides him some gil to finally get the Ysayle portrait we're years overdue for)

And as someone who never watched any of the Gundam series, even I knew vaguely about masked Char clones (whoever Char is? Charismatic red rival ace villain henchman I think?). Body-double route itself of just using the preexisting Garlean(Allag) cloning technique I guess was to fit the exact Gundam reference.

If you want a Gundam fan's explanation of this one:

Char Aznable is basically Gundam's Darth Vader; masked ace pilot with a mysterious and important past, that becomes a big defining part of the conflict despite not being a leader, basically as contrast to the also-ace-pilot hero. Nero being brought in for this story is fitting, because he himself is a bit of a Char riff in his aesthetic, overall personality, and contrast with Cid.

When you hear about 'Char Clones' in Gundam fandom, it's not actually referring to clones, but rather that Gundam stories have a tendency to introduce characters that fit the same role (because why neglect what works) and put their own spin on it. Zechs Merquise in Gundam Wing was probably the first to so clearly try to recapture that magic, 00 has Graham Aker, Iron Blooded Orphans has McGillis Fareed, and even right now Witch from Mercury is doing an unusual spin with Prospera Mercury.

...that said, there is one 'Char Clone' that is a damn near literal Char clone, and that's Full Frontal from Unicorn. The fake Valens is very clearly combining elements of Full Frontal (who's also a person heavily altered to become a double of Char, trying to galvanize remnants of a fallen fascist empire) with elements of the original Char Aznable, particularly in Gundam The Origin (where he attends military academy under a false identity, wearing shades because his eye color gives away that he's not who he's claiming to be). And honestly, I think it fits for who Valens is--who ironically isn't much of a Char himself. This absolutely reads like a plan he would've been all-in on.

[Yuella]

If you talk to Claudien after finishing the raids, the first option gives you a cutscene that provides more information about that thing.

[Garnix]

Just finished all quests except the island sanctuary

MSQ:
Not much to say honestly.
What happened with Azdaja was quite predictable.
So was the arrival of Zeromus.
And obviously, Zero is not becoming Zeromus and that was a red herring since the beginning. Or maybe they will merge later on.
They really want to remind us about Zenos during each patch. I am really starting to think he will make his come back somehow.

Also....a bit surprised to see the hints that both Thancred and Urianger are invited for the 7.0 launch party. I was expecting one or two of them to not tag along anymore due to the fact they had so much character development already.


Panda:
With it being advertised as the Lahabrea raid, I expected two things out of Panda when starting it back in 6.0:
- some closure on the Heart of Sabik
- an explanation regarding how Themis, Hephaistos and Hades were the only 3 survivors of the sundering

I went out of it expecting a new storyline to emerge to continue on the Heart of Sabik's extraterrestrial origins.
And I still do not know how the guys survived.
And, unlike Hades, nothing was yet retconned to explain why they do not remember us.


Tataru:
Cute. Forgetable, but cute.


Overall:
Still not sure where we are heading next...
Meracydia is still an option I guess (Especially if we bring back Azdaja and with Tiamat being...somewhere...)
But now I also would be a bit surprised if we are not heading back around Dalmasca in 7.X.
Between the revelations of the Heart of Sabik, and Erenville insisting on going back to his hometown (and knowing that the Viera Rava clan originates from the Golmore Jungle).
So, wouldn't really be surprised if they just decide to remove all those clouds from the world map and explore those parts before really moving on. (places like, Lea Monde, Corvos, and the rest of Ilsabard)
Or they could just make Zeromus win and make us travel back through time again to find a way to beat him.

[KageTokage]

an explanation regarding how Themis, Hephaistos and Hades were the only 3 survivors of the sundering

There's been two references to such, though one was in a live letter Q/A, and the other was in the Emet-Selch story that featured as a cross-over event in the Nier mobile game.

The former suggested that Venat might've purposefully let the unsundered escape due to knowing of their involvement in the causal loop which is...yeah.

The latter just states that Emet-Selch and company "barely survived" by mustering all of their strength to resist the effects of the Sundering.

[Iscah]

The former suggested that Venat might've purposefully let the unsundered escape due to knowing of their involvement in the causal loop which is...yeah.

That very much had the ring of "made up on the spot without fully considering the implications because we didn't previously think about it for some reason".

[Brinne]

The implication of deliberately allowing Emet to escape was written into the game script, though, which Yoshi-P also pointed out in his answer. Not that that makes things any better or not ill thought-out, of course. Even when it was being written into the game, I'm sure they were operating from a perspective of "wouldn't it be cool if all the pieces fell into place and everything Came Full Circle as part of the Grand Plan?" without thinking of the further implications.

[Iscah]

Well this has been quite a ride.

MSQ

I know there was some discussion *somewhere* previously that Zodiark's shard in the Thirteenth might not be able to dissipate due to the lack of Lifestream, but that was in conjunction with the idea that Golbez would have absorbed it. Wasn't expecting it to be a separate threat.

We should theoretically be able to beat one shard of Zodiark after we managed to beat the semi-assembled one, but maybe you could assume he's much more powered up here due to the overbalance of Darkness?

This chapter feels unbalanced overall. Was all ready to leap into the void, but no, we're stuck getting permission from multiple parties... which is a good and necessary thing, but it leaves me wondering whether the story might have been better presented with a chapter in a non-major patch to get some of this talking side out of the way? Though I suppose in the long run people are going to be working through it all consecutively anyway.

The dungeon boss battle was fun. Nice to be getting some interesting arena designs this patch. (It also made me realise that Exdeath's tree form seems to be borrowing the kraken model.)

I think I had more to say, but it's all gone out of my head since yesterday.

Pandaemonium

Tell us you're doing a sequel without telling us you're doing a sequel.

Leaving Claudien with the One Ring his precious the Heart of Sabik has to be the worst choice we've made since we tossed Nidhogg's eyes off the bridge, and we can't even excuse it as a hasty decision in the moment.

Lahabrea's final speech to us in Pandaemonium seemed odd, like he already knew everything that would happen between us, which he shouldn't and didn't.

And Themis's farewell felt incomplete. He was supposedly created from "Elidibus's soul" found in the aetherial sea, so has to be in his post-Endwalker state to have ended up there, but only seems to have the knowledge level of his earlier Pandaemonium-era self besides a few vague notions of what he even describes as his future.