Mixed feelings about the Twelve

[Elissar]

Before Endwalker announcement, we speculated a lot about its contents. Exploring the Twelve was one of those speculation. I was really hyped when they showed Myths of the Realm, the raid itself is graphically astonishing, voices actors amazing and the music is original. I would say 8/10 easily. HOWEVER....

In Encyclopaedia Eorzea I, they show that each God has their particular heaven and hell. If you die with honor = Halone's Heaven. If you die like a coward = Halone's Hell. This fact is barely mentioned in-game and i have mixed feelings because: by one side, we could end with a universe similar to World of Warcraft (each "sphere" of existence has a zereth - a internal kingdom that regulates how it works) probably stolen from the Kabbalah's tree of life

By the other side...they (the Twelve) could have more personality and depth. I think they changed or removed this concept (of heaven and hell) when they decided to explore more about Venat and other Ascians. The religion is important for most part of Eorzea...and i feel like as players we are detached from it, unfortunately.


Right now the Twelve feels like the original trilogy of Lord of the Rings: In the books, the Valars were present most of the time helping humans, dwarves and elves. However, in the trilogy, they removed such references (for legal issues) to focus on the main events. Who do you think called the Eagles? Mithrandir/Gandalf with his charming beard? nop, it was Manwë, the father of eagles and air, husband of Varda, the valar of the stars and nocturnal sky.
Look what kind of art they inspire



Imagine if Althyk and Nymeia..no, don't imagine that your silly person!


Why we can pick our entity in character creation? just another cosmetic? we don't even have an unique dialogue

Anyway, it's a beautiful work made by neophytes from CBU3, but i would like to see/feel the touch of a veteran that know how to conduct properly.

[Noumenon]

They are simply making the new developers do all the work since the senior developers are too "stressed" and "busy" and don't have time to work on the game. Probably on some urgent business for SE in the Bahamas playing the new Zelda game

[Elissar]

They are simply making the new developers do all the work since the senior developers are too "stressed" and "busy" and don't have time to work on the game. Probably on some urgent business for SE in the Bahamas playing the new Zelda game

I don't know..but it's weird
i mean, EVERYONE need to choose a god when you create a character
but the raid about them is optional...lol

[Amenara]

Back in the day the god you picked affected your elemental resistance a bit iirc, not that it really mattered. It's all just personal story and a light RPG element if you want to take it there. Otherwise a lot of the god stuff feels like it was retconned to fit the story after it got fleshed out over time.

[Jojoya]

Why we can pick our entity in character creation? just another cosmetic? we don't even have an unique dialogue

The deity you picked used to have a small effect on elemental resistances before those damage types were removed from game play (think that was start of Stormblood?).

For some players who are heavily into role play, the choice still has meaning.

Also regarding the Encyclopedia Eorzeas, they're written to be in the style of Eorzean scholars who may not have the correct facts (leaves room for SE to retcon parts of lore if they feel the need). It's probably better to not lean on the information in them too heavily.

[Striker44]

Back in the day the god you picked affected your elemental resistance a bit iirc, not that it really mattered. It's all just personal story and a light RPG element if you want to take it there. Otherwise a lot of the god stuff feels like it was retconned to fit the story after it got fleshed out over time.

This. I mean, in all seriousness, it's rather unrealistic to expect any series that has had this many installments written over this many years to not have some things get retconned. You get ideas over the course of a decade and don't want to be entirely constrained by whatever you first thought of over ten years ago. I know we sometimes dislike the Warcraft comparisons, but it's a great example here given its similarity as a long-running series (even longer if you count the RTS games). So many things have been retconned in that universe, and some even entirely re-written. I don't necessarily enjoy it, but I really can't be surprised or particularly annoyed when FFXIV has things like the Twelve or the Sundering get gradually "developed" (read: retconned) over time.

[Turtledeluxe]

The Twelve have been severely underwhelming outside their designs. It's ok. You can say it.

[Jojoya]

The Twelve have been severely underwhelming outside their designs. It's ok. You can say it.

Which is okay. They're a remnant of game play that MMORPGs rarely use anymore and so don't need to have a large amount of development time dedicated to them every expansion. Myths of the Realm seems to be added as the chapter to wrap up their existence in the game.

[ReynTime]

Once they removed the mystery veil of the mysticism around the Twelve with the raid series, they turned out to be a bunch of one-dimensional clowns that simp for the player character and/or Venat. It's like they make these characters so the otaku and fujoshi in the fanbase can lust over and feel reassured by their hyper-fixation on the WoL, just like G'raha...

[TheMightyMollusk]

The Twelve weren't all that interesting to me in the first place. Midichlorians of the Realm hasn't helped that much.