Mamool Ja's Broken English

[Denishia]

Minfilia specifically sends us to parley with the sylphs because of our Echo.

Minfilia: In short, it is essential that we approach the sylphs in as diplomatic a manner as possible. Words and actions can be misconstrued. The only sure way to communicate our intentions is the Echo.

The universal translator aspect of the Echo hasn't been stressed often, but it was central to that level 20 MSQ questline.

[Cleretic]

Sounds more like you've just invented something to be mad about, and are now getting mad that you can't convince other people it exists.

I'll be mad if we get there and they are inexplicably the only ones talking in simple English. But until then you're literally getting angry at nothing.

[SannaR]

I mean the main reason why people east of Tural speak the language of the Hyur is due to it being the easiest to use via business means. Or at least that's the reasoning for the source. The last time I remember the echo being a translator is back during the Omega raids. When we needed Midgardsormr to tell us what Alpha says. Obviously there are Hyurs over in Tural and something similar could have happened language wise. I put it down to the possibility that the Mamool Ja might not be capable of saying some words in common. Or they could be running into the whole "Oh crap there isn't a Hyur word for ____". Course those over in Eorzea might just speak in broken common due to wanting to seem like they're just dumb mercenaries. I also blame it on XI. I'm just glad that XIV's Quiqirns aren't asking me if I have any shiny clink clink so far.

[Eisi]

Sounds more like you've just invented something to be mad about, and are now getting mad that you can't convince other people it exists.

I'll be mad if we get there and they are inexplicably the only ones talking in simple English. But until then you're literally getting angry at nothing.

That doesn't even make any sense. But let's bet!

[Cleretic]

That doesn't even make any sense. But let's bet!

People told you several completely reasonable explanations for why the Mamool Ja we're going to meet in Dawntrail might either speak perfectly fluent English, or have an alternative speaking style that makes sense for the context in which we're meeting them.

You proceeded to baselessly reject every single one of them to instead say 'nah they're gonna do the bad thing I've said they're gonna do', with absolutely no evidence indicating this, since we haven't heard a word from a single Mamool Ja in Tural. (That we know of; the voice at the end of the trailer is still unidentified.)

You are literally inventing a problem to get angry at. I don't know how you can't make sense of that.

[MercuryD]

Interesting Mamool Ja lore from Gubal (Hard):

It is widely known that the Mamool Ja boast one of the most impressive indigenous societies to be found in the New World. It would be a mistake, however, to view the Mamool Ja as a single, uniform people. A careful analysis of documents brought back by explorers reveals that the Mamool Ja are more accurately described as a federation or alliance of numerous distantly related tribes, each with distinguishing physical characteristics: the brown-scaled Hoobigo with their distinctively long combs, the large-eyed, blue-scaled Boonewa, and the mottled Doppro. It is further said that although Mamool Ja rarely marry outside their own tribes, such unions do occur on the occasion of certain religious observances, and are known to produce two-headed offspring that are hailed as “blessed siblings” and groomed to be warlords from a young age. Indeed, the Autarch, ruler of all Mamool Ja kind, is known to be one of them...


So I guess it's entirely possible that the Mamool Ja we've encountered so far are not from Eastern Tural or might be part of the tribes that really thoroughly learn the common tongue (or they are just having a hard time learning it, personally)

[Cleretic]

Interesting Mamool Ja lore from Gubal (Hard):

It is widely known that the Mamool Ja boast one of the most impressive indigenous societies to be found in the New World. It would be a mistake, however, to view the Mamool Ja as a single, uniform people. A careful analysis of documents brought back by explorers reveals that the Mamool Ja are more accurately described as a federation or alliance of numerous distantly related tribes, each with distinguishing physical characteristics: the brown-scaled Hoobigo with their distinctively long combs, the large-eyed, blue-scaled Boonewa, and the mottled Doppro. It is further said that although Mamool Ja rarely marry outside their own tribes, such unions do occur on the occasion of certain religious observances, and are known to produce two-headed offspring that are hailed as “blessed siblings” and groomed to be warlords from a young age. Indeed, the Autarch, ruler of all Mamool Ja kind, is known to be one of them...


So I guess it's entirely possible that the Mamool Ja we've encountered so far are not from Eastern Tural or might be part of the tribes that really thoroughly learn the common tongue (or they are just having a hard time learning it, personally)

Indeed, the Blue Mage NPCs are actually from either a different tribe or a sub-tribe, the Latool Ja. And maybe because of their nature as regular NPCs that get... y'know, cutscenes and dialog, they're noticeably better with the language than the Mamool Ja we see from ARR FATES and dungeons that are rarely allowed full sentences just by the nature of the content they're in. Notably, the one Hyur we meet from the Whalaqee tribe does speak in proper English, so it seems like it's more that the hiccup is on the Latool Ja's end rather than just a product of the actual regional gap.

I'd generally describe the Latool Ja as having solid 'ESL speaker'-level grasp of the language; they're perfectly understandable, but they get grammar wrong in consistent ways that imply they don't quite have all the rules down. I've met and worked with plenty of people who have about that grasp of English, and while the Latool Ja don't sound exactly like any I've met, the spirit is definitely there. If I weren't really tired right now I'd go through their dialog to try to pin down the actual grammatical structure, because it does seem like there is an actual logic to it, and you can probably intuit a bit of the Latool Ja's language structure by what they're getting wrong.

[Iscah]

Indeed, the Blue Mage NPCs are actually from either a different tribe or a sub-tribe, the Latool Ja.

You've got your lore wires crossed somewhere. The two individuals are Latool Ja and Gaheel Ja, and they are from the Boonewa tribe.

As for the three tribe descriptions given in the Wanderer's Palace - "the brown-scaled Hoobigo with their distinctively long combs, the large-eyed, blue-scaled Boonewa, and the mottled Doppro" - the first two of those are just describing the two types of Mamool Ja model that have been wandering the Bronze Lake area since the beginning of the game. Effectively just physical fighter and mage, and then the two-headed final boss has one head resembling each of those tribes and is holding a sword and staff in the corresponding hands.

The third tribe doesn't seem to be around so obviously, although having gone through the dungeon, I think first boss Frumious Koheel Ja might be one. It's hard to get a good look but he's blue and seems to lack the chameleon-eyes of the Boonewa model.

[Cleretic]

You've got your lore wires crossed somewhere. The two individuals are Latool Ja and Gaheel Ja, and they are from the Boonewa tribe.

Fair enough! My bad, and in my defense, I'm sick and at that point was running at like, 85% tops.

Still, Latool Ja and Gaheel Ja show that the Mamool Ja aren't really consigned to the borderline caveman-speech we see in ARR. That tells me that the absolute floor of what we're gonna see from them in Dawntrail is 'fairly eloquent but not scoring 100% on grammar'.