[Dawntrail] One issue with the lore of Yak T'el

[moshev]

The reason for the conflict between the Xbr'aal and Mamool Ja in Yak T'el is not very sensible. We are told that the two were at war over access to fertile land to grow crops, but that is not something the Mamool Ja should require. Mamool Ja appear to be mostly carnivorous judging by their teeth and their agile hunter physique, i.e. they should not be eating plants, except the occasional taco shell (and it's not like you require taco shells to live). Mamool Ja should be hunters, eating meat from animals they catch, which are abundant in the jungle around Mamook. The Miqo'te U tribe live in much harsher conditions in Forgotten Springs at the edge of Sagolii desert, subsisting on hunting sandworms. Mamool Ja should have it easy in a jungle with abundant prey.

What would make perfect sense on the other hand, is if the conflict was over unspoiled hunting grounds. The soil being contaminated with aether naturally leads to said aether ending up accumulating in the bodies of animals that eat the abundant vegetation. The animals have evolved over thousands of years to tolerate it, but the Mamool Ja, who were only confined to the lowlands a few centuries ago, are suffering deleterious effects from eating them and want access to hunting grounds in the highlands. However, the Xbr'aal are using that land both for growing crops (they are omnivores after all) and hunting, so the highlands cannot sustain both populations at once. With this setup, Koana's solution is almost identical - he would ask his colleagues in Sharlayan to devise a way to prepare meat from the animals in the lowlands in a way that purifies the aether out of it, which would require more advanced technology than what Mamool Ja currently have access to. I think something like this can be easily implemented in the current version of the MSQ without changing the quests at all, except for editing the text. You could even have Koana or one of the Scions speculate that aether poisoning contributed to the mutation enabling two-headed "blessed siblings" to be born, making it even more similar to radiation contamination.

The solution in the current version also doesn't make much sense, because using standard farming practises over a few decades, you can develop strains of plants that tolerate a lot of different climates, and given the dense jungle, obviously plant life can adapt to the particular aether. Life, as they say, finds a way.

I really think that part of the story should be changed somewhat, to something which doesn't sound so illogical in-universe. I am not claiming my idea is the best, but it can be implemented without changing any of the quest design and fits the rest of established lore. In general it makes most sense for the conflict to be over hunting grounds and the resolution to be for a way for the Mamool Ja to safely hunt and eat the animals in the lowlands.

[Cleretic]

Except that the Mamool Ja aren't the only things that have to eat in the Heartlands. Hunting is unfeasible as an entire way of feeding your society after a point, you're gonna need to get agricultural eventually, but either way, they're gonna need to eat other living things. And as Jojo Part 5 explained to us all so well, you have to eat the herbivores, because carnivores taste terrible... so to get reliably-sourced meat, you're going to need reliably-sourced plants.

And they can't cultivate reliably-sourced plants, so we're back at the source problem.

[moshev]

That's flat out wrong. Human societies exist today that survive only on hunting, and we also have examples in FFXIV itself of societies surviving this way. Obviously they will hunt the herbivores, the jungle is chock full of them. It is ridiculous to claim that a small tribe of carnivorous lizards needs agriculture to survive, especially when their jaws are not evolved to chew plants in the first place.

[Denishia]

The Mamool Ja aren't strictly carnivorous though? They say in the MSQ that they eat the bananas, you have an entire role quest-line about juice (and that while the cherimoya fruit is tasty and beneficially healthy for them) and lizards are not strictly carnivorous. And the complaint was for no exportable goods to turn a profit besides the bananas or working as mercenaries.

[MikkoAkure]

I highly doubt the Mamool Ja originated in that dark jungle and didn't leave it for 12,000 years until 80 years ago.

War, famine, changes in climate, etc. move populations in our own world so I don't know why it would be any different there, especially in a setting that has world-altering cataclysms every couple thousand years. Otherwise they would have long since adapted to it and wouldn't be fighting the X'braal to leave. They probably originated elsewhere and ended up stuck there.

It is ridiculous to claim that a small tribe of carnivorous lizards needs agriculture to survive, especially when their jaws are not evolved to chew plants in the first place.

The lore book states they're omnivores and eat a "rich and varied diet" with cornmeal as their staple (retroactively applied to Tuliyollal Mamool Ja). In-game we learn that their primary food was banana in Mamook.

I also used to have a lizard that eats both bugs and vegetables/fruit and then you have iguanas that are completely herbivorous but are still lizards.

[kaynide]

Just to add, even if we just assume jaw structure, there are many examples of carnivorous animals that also eat plant material for various nutritional needs. There are also examples of herbivores eating meat.

Cats eat grass for example. And there’s a video on YouTube of a deer eating a bird, and horses eating chicks. It’s less about what their jaws can do and more about what their body and stomach are designed to hunt and/or process.

Horses typically don’t eat meat because they’re not built to hunt, but they will 100% gobble up a baby chicken and get those sweet sweet calories.

And yes, I know it’s not ideal or necessarily healthy and you certainly wouldn’t want to feed your horses meat, but the facts are you absolutely can have your horse live on certain meat products (see Antarctic horses eating blubber and pemmican)