Let's play a game: Save the Ancients!

[Cleretic]

So like you know how a tank of water works? Like you our water into it and it gradually fills up right?

Zodiark was a very big bottle of Water that the Ancients needed to fill very quickly. Ergo sacrifices instant water instant filled tank.

In theory you could fill up that tank at a slower pace and still end up with the same result. I know you have a habit of arguing in bad faith but that's a pretty straight forward idea.

I'm not 'bad faith arguing', and in jumping in with that right away you're clearly showing that you're not really coming into this in good faith yourself; you just want to come in with a cheap gotcha. But I can tell you why this is, at best, a bad idea:

'Consumption of ambient aether' has been an actual raised crisis point for primals three different times: Ramuh, Alexander, and Eureka. On top of that, overconsumption of the land's aether was the cause of the Sixth Umbral Calamity, the flood that ended the War of the Magi. Draining the world dry like that causes a complete wasteland like we saw from The Burn, itself a non-primal instance of overconsumption of ambient aether, from when the Allagans launched Azys Lla. So far from being a completley harmless thing you could do, a primal is capable of rendering the land a barren wasteland just by being summoned. We even have some general indications of how much aether that takes; the Students of Baldesion theorized that Eureka could've drained the entire planet by just recreating the Mothercrystal--and as deeply-connected Sharlayans we can reason that they probably had accurate measurements of how big the Mothercrystal is. But perhaps even more damning: Alexander was capable of being a Calamity-level threat just by consuming the aether needed to walk. So no, I don't think Zodiark could be made by doing that without causing just irreversible harm.

But your argument is that if we just do that slowly it'll be fine. That they just siphon off tiny little bits of aether until they have all they need. Honestly, in this context I'm not sure that works; first of all it seems to presume that there's a constant supply of aether coming to the star somehow, maybe like how Earth gets energy from the sun, but I'm not entirely confident that's how it works. In fact, my counterargument would be The Burn: if there were a constant supply of aether enough to replace a Zodiark's worth of ambient aether, I think the Burn would show signs of recovery, and it doesn't.

But even putting aside the plausibility of the plan itself, there's another problem: you seem to be naturally assuming that they have a lot of time. And honestly, I don't think they have that much: the only indications of time having passed is that Fandaniel was now in the seat, and that later on Venat had recruited twelve friends. There's no indication of aging, natural death, or of changing life circumstances; the descriptions of the Twelve's predecessors sounded like people who knew each other as a snapshot, not over a long period or perhaps even that well. Menphina was young, you'd expect an over-time description would mention her growth. I've always gotten the idea that they had about a year or so. Not nearly enough time for them to have initiated and compelted a public works project so slow that it needs to be outpaced by natural regrowth.


EDIT: Had another part to this, but I was thrown off by ambiguous terms; Iscah's got the better explanation on this one.

[redheadturk]

...what? You've never put forward this 'make Zodiark using ambient aether' idea, nor has anybody else. You're gonna need to explain it, and how it is not going to somehow kill the planet by draining it of all its everything. And presumably, why the leading minds of Etheirys never came up with it if it's a perfect, no-downsides solution.

Maybe because those consequences existed more in the Source/Shards where there was far less aether to spare? The Unsundered World had exponentially more aether between the aether pools of the Ancients themselves, [which remember, shield created prior to the Final Days reaching Amaurot means having significantly more of them around. ] and the well of aether of the world itself. No where near the concern of say. . .a Primal on the Source. Also, because they #1 did not know what they were dealing with until crap was too late [Because, ya know, they got lied to by the person you seem to have a thing for.] and #2 by the time they did know all the aether they had left to work with was themselves. You also seem to forget Zodiark provided a shield that last 12k years even ssundered and unmantled and likely would have protected Eitherys for many thousands of years more if we hadn't been forced to put Zodiark down

Where I draw criticism in the "Message is a Bottle" route is that there isnt a scenario where someone finds that message whilst the WoL isnt it Elpis. Like even as of the current patch the WoL can still actively travel back and forth to Elpis however any effect on the future only happens when the WoL is present (The Athena Saga has many examples of this).

Once the congruence has happened, there is really no worry of us getting stuck even if we do happen to be there running fates/cleaning up the monster prison/etc when it happens.

[Iscah]

Because for example Asphodelus didn't appear in the Sundered World until the WoL defeated Hephaistos even though time logic says it should've been there.

We didn't change the timeline and make Pandæmonium appear in the aetherial sea as if it had always been there; Athena deliberately made it appear there at that point by ripping a chunk out of Azys Lla, reshaping it into a copy of Pandæmonium and teleporting it into the place where it appeared.

[Cleretic]

Maybe because those consequences existed more in the Source/Shards where there was far less aether to spare? The Unsundered World had exponentially more aether between the aether pools of the Ancients themselves, [which remember, shield created prior to the Final Days reaching Amaurot means having significantly more of them around. ] and the well of aether of the world itself. No where near the concern of say. . .a Primal on the Source. Also, because they #1 did not know what they were dealing with until crap was too late [Because, ya know, they got lied to by the person you seem to have a thing for.] and #2 by the time they did know all the aether they had left to work with was themselves. You also seem to forget Zodiark provided a shield that last 12k years even ssundered and unmantled and likely would have protected Eitherys for many thousands of years more if we hadn't been forced to put Zodiark down

I'm sorry, but none of these arguments really explain why the Ancient world just... didn't do, or ever bring up, the approach that had no downside whatsoever.

If this theory was plausible but just not on the table for time constraints from not knowing, then one of Elidibus, Emet-Selch or Lahabrea would've been mad when they posthumously learned they weren't given the info. They were not; Emet directly agreed that Venat made the right call, and Lahabrea just knows he'd do the same thing all over again. (Elidibus avoids the subject, probably because Lahabrea already talked about it.)

But there's that Venat element again: Venat has this information. If there was enough time and resources to make a Zodiark out of dirt, she and her crew would've known; that's especially thanks to the existence of Thaliak's predecessor, the head of Akadaemia and general Knower of Things. We all know Lahabrea can keep a secret and is willing to do shadowy stuff for what's right, so you could get him secretly on-side for the construction, and you can probably get Fandaniel on side as long as you avoid the M word; in fact, I'd even argue that if this were viable, it'd be a really good outlet for him.

So the fact that she didn't do it, and that none of the post-death Ascians begrudged her for that, suggests that 'Zodiark out of ambient aether' doesn't work. Perhaps it wasn't possible in the time they had; perhaps it wasn't possible at all; or perhaps, a society that was deeply invested in enriching their planet didn't want to lop off a chunk of it until they were a couple mass sacrifices in and their priorities shifted.


Honestly, I think your problem on this--I find it a little ironic that I'm saying this to you--is that you need to give the Ancients more credit. The Ancients were flawed, and their fall was tied to that fact, but 'stupidity' wasn't one of their flaws. They're a society that can think their way around so many problems, and both sides of the eventual conflict had their best and brightest focused on it. Do you really think that, if there was a better solution, they wouldn't have found and tried it? Most of those best and brightest had thousands of immortal years to stare at the aftermath of the problem; don't you think that, if there was a better way that was this supposedly easy and effective, they'd be cursing fate for not giving them the chance to try?

[redheadturk]

Venat intentionally didn't tell them for one reason: She was idealogically driven. She wanted to fix what wasn't broken until Hermes got a hair up his arse in the first place. So even if she had known such was possible, she wouldn't have told them anyway because she believed they needed to change when really, they didn't.

[Cleretic]

Venat intentionally didn't tell them for one reason: She was idealogically driven. She wanted to fix what wasn't broken until Hermes got a hair up his arse in the first place. So even if she had known such was possible, she wouldn't have told them anyway because she believed they needed to change when really, they didn't.

Riiiiiiiiight. And Thaliak? Menphina, Azeyma? The Watcher? All those bright sparks, in highly respected positions in Ancient society, were they also 'ideologically driven', or were they somehow too dim to ask questions, but not so dim as to work on Venat's solution? Your image of your beloved Ancient society is one that can apparently get swayed pretty hard by what you seem to think is an ideologue with nothing but selfish delusions of power.

You really don't think the Ancients are better than that as a people?

EDIT: And this still doesn't explain why the unsundered weren't mad at her after learning the truth. Surely, if Venat were a selfish shallow ideologue, Emet would've been so mat at her for ruining the perfect future the Ancients could've had without her, instead of begrudgingly respecting that she made the right calls. Or is your image of Emet also too dim to realize, even if given perfect hindsight?

[KrasieArk]

I'm not 'bad faith arguing', and in jumping in with that right away you're clearly showing that you're not really coming into this in good faith yourself; you just want to come in with a cheap gotcha. But I can tell you why this is, at best, a bad idea:
.

When it comes to the topic of the Ancients you absolutely are. However are we just going to ignore that all your examples happen in a Sundered World (AKA a Shard of 7/13ths) and in the Unsundered world we are playing by a different set of rules? Ancients don't have the restrictions in Aether like the Sundered.

In our timeline after the initial Final days killed a good portion of the Star and the Ancient people. Following that with an ever smaller population pool they managed to get more uses out of Zodiark with just their sacrifices alone no Ambient Aether required. So unless my math ain't mathing anymore I don't see why they wouldn't have an issue taking Aether from a much larger population of Ancients without requiring their bodies and souls. Call it an Aether Blood drive and take a small bit from the Star symbolism and what not.

Also your doing it again in response to Redheadturk. Bad faith arguments Tsk tsk

Once the congruence has happened, there is really no worry of us getting stuck even if we do happen to be there running fates/cleaning up the monster prison/etc when it happens.

Then allow me to elaborate and please correct me if I'm veering into the realm of Head cannon. In the case of Graha Tia being unable to return to the Alternate 8UC timeline I've always been lead to believe he became stranded because of the appearance of The CT in the First. This event so dramatic fundamentally changed the course of history that it brought us to our current time line.

My logic here is if lets say the WoL leaves some Hypothetical form of irrefutable proof that fundamentally changes the history of that world wouldn't they be stuck the same way as Graha?

[redheadturk]

EDIT: And this still doesn't explain why the unsundered weren't mad at her after learning the truth. Surely, if Venat were a selfish shallow ideologue, Emet would've been so mat at her for ruining the perfect future the Ancients could've had without her, instead of begrudgingly respecting that she made the right calls. Or is your image of Emet also too dim to realize, even if given perfect hindsight?

Because the writers took both of the remaining Unsundered utterly out of character so Yoshi P could prop up his waifu because he could not deal with her looking bad. In a real life situation not tainted by dev fiat they would have been furious.

When it comes to the topic of the Ancients you absolutely are. However are we just going to ignore that all your examples happen in a Sundered World (AKA a Shard of 7/13ths) and in the Unsundered world we are playing by a different set of rules? Ancients don't have the restrictions in Aether like the Sundered.

In our timeline after the initial Final days killed a good portion of the Star and the Ancient people. Following that with an ever smaller population pool they managed to get more uses out of Zodiark with just their sacrifices alone no Ambient Aether required. So unless my math ain't mathing anymore I don't see why they wouldn't have an issue taking Aether from a much larger population of Ancients without requiring their bodies and souls. Call it an Aether Blood drive and take a small bit from the Star symbolism and what not.

Also your doing it again in response to Redheadturk. Bad faith arguments Tsk tsk



Then allow me to elaborate and please correct me if I'm veering into the realm of Head cannon. In the case of Graha Tia being unable to return to the Alternate 8UC timeline I've always been lead to believe he became stranded because of the appearance of The CT in the First. This event so dramatic fundamentally changed the course of history that it brought us to our current time line.

My logic here is if lets say the WoL leaves some Hypothetical form of irrefutable proof that fundamentally changes the history of that world wouldn't they be stuck the same way as Graha?

Not if they are already back in their own time. Can't strand what's not there, and the congruence deals with the hypothetical spanner in the works nicely because we would only be traveling back for fates/etc along our own timeline, not the altered one. As to G'raha, big difference there [and why he got stranded] is the measures he had to take to correct the timeline dealt with much more than just information. He had to be there with his team for 100 years and tie himself to the tower to effect the necessary change. All we have to do is leave some info behind before we go back to our own time.

[KrasieArk]

We didn't change the timeline and make Pandæmonium appear in the aetherial sea as if it had always been there; Athena deliberately made it appear there at that point by ripping a chunk out of Azys Lla, reshaping it into a copy of Pandæmonium and teleporting it into the place where it appeared.

Ah gotcha Its been a while so I probably memory holed this Thank you for the clarification.

[Xeronia]

Riiiiiiiiight. And Thaliak? Menphina, Azeyma? The Watcher? All those bright sparks, in highly respected positions in Ancient society, were they also 'ideologically driven', or were they somehow too dim to ask questions, but not so dim as to work on Venat's solution? Your image of your beloved Ancient society is one that can apparently get swayed pretty hard by what you seem to think is an ideologue with nothing but selfish delusions of power.

You really don't think the Ancients are better than that as a people?

EDIT: And this still doesn't explain why the unsundered weren't mad at her after learning the truth. Surely, if Venat were a selfish shallow ideologue, Emet would've been so mat at her for ruining the perfect future the Ancients could've had without her, instead of begrudgingly respecting that she made the right calls. Or is your image of Emet also too dim to realize, even if given perfect hindsight?

I had to look for the quest as I was almost certain The Watcher stated none of them knew her intentions and sure enough he did in the level 84 quest Heart of the Matter(https://ffxiv.gamerescape.com/wiki/L..._of_the_Matter):

The Watcher:
That flower... How came it into your possession?
How very like Her.
Guided by its light, you may come to know Her true intentions. Intentions which remain a mystery even to us.
In our time, we called it "Elpis"... You would do well to remember the name.

That to me implies none of her followers knew the truth. Apologies I have been lurking in this topic for quite some time and wanted to just note this.

Edit: If you can provide anything to counter this I will gladly take it but it has been my impression she never told her followers the truth of the matter.

Edit again: I knew I saw this elsewhere, the short story A Friendship of Record also backs she didn't tell them the truth.

"Unable to find the words, the archivist retreated into ritual. He held out a crystal—as he had countless times before—upon which was stored the last chapter of cosmological wisdom Venat had sought. Though she had spoken of its importance, he suspected she withheld the entire truth. Of her glimpse into the future, she had offered precious little."