Questionable ethics - Living Memory

[MikkoAkure]

Usually when people die in the FF14 universe, their force ghosts are sitting in the afterlife, they can watch people on the star doing stuff, make commentary, maybe pop in and do us a favor. They can still interact with and impact the world. Emet-Selch and Hyth helped save the universe after they died. That's not possible with the Endless because we shut them down without a second thought. We dissipated the part of them that hangs out in the afterlife and narrates.

Not true.

Normally when people die in the FFXIV universe, they go to the Lifestream where their memory aether is washed off their soul before their soul is reused and born again. They're not watching anything and certainly not interacting with anyone.

You really can't compare the normal process to what happens with Emet-Selch, who spent 12,000 years as a ghost and before that was an Ancient tasked with overseeing the Underworld (Lifestream) itself. After the events of EW MSQ are dealt with, he finally allows his spirit to go back to the Lifestream to go through the normal process. That's not something most people can do and I have no idea where you got the idea that it was possible for more mundane people.

And the argument that we had to because they need something from us that would harm us doesn't work because that's true for any conflict. If we wipe out the Mamool Ja then they can't attack the Xbr'aal for their land anymore. If we wiped out the Garleans then they can't drop moons on people. Wiping out an entire population pretty much solves any conflict with any group. So why do we bother looking for other ways in those situations? We could just wipe them out and declare "we had no choice."

The difference is that the Endless are already dead.

You can't compare civilizations of living, breathing people with a collection of simulacra made from dead peoples' memories. And besides, multiple Endless are OK with their passing, one actively pursues it, another doesn't care either way, and another expresses disgust at the idea of continuing at the cost of living people.

The actual civilization of Alexandria is still there and is thriving. No culture is erased, no living people are wiped out. Just the over-complicated graveyard that no one even knows exists beyond the fact there's a "cloud".

[Lady_Silvermoon]

Not true.

Normally when people die in the FFXIV universe, they go to the Lifestream where their memory aether is washed off their soul before their soul is reused and born again. They're not watching anything and certainly not interacting with anyone.

You really can't compare the normal process to what happens with Emet-Selch, who spent 12,000 years as a ghost and before that was an Ancient tasked with overseeing the Underworld (Lifestream) itself. After the events of EW MSQ are dealt with, he finally allows his spirit to go back to the Lifestream to go through the normal process. That's not something most people can do and I have no idea where you got the idea that it was possible for more mundane people.

We walked down there. We fought old foes. We interacted with Minfilia, Papalymo, Hauchefant, Yasale. They were more faded than the people with more unresolved issues like Asahi, but they were very much down there chillaxing and able to view the living world because Emet-Selch narrates EW and Asahi was big mad about Amon parading around in his body and betraying Zenos. So while yes, they break down in the aetherial sea, they do so slowly. Slowly enough to reconnect with their loved ones before fading away. Or at least it very much seems so from what I've seen. It looks like the souls in the aetherial sea are still self-aware and active. Active enough to both fight us and protect us.

[Arzalis]

You can't compare civilizations of living, breathing people with a collection of simulacra made from dead peoples' memories. And besides, multiple Endless are OK with their passing, one actively pursues it, another doesn't care either way, and another expresses disgust at the idea of continuing at the cost of living people.

Good thing the game already did this with the UT society quests and straight up told us, "Yeah, they have a different existence, but they're still alive and worth treating as such." This is already a solved question in FFXIV. It's just obvious the writer for DT literally didn't know about those quests and came to a completely different conclusion in a far less convincing way.

We talked to a total of three or four people out of what the game tells us is at least thousands. I'm sure the Ascians could've found a couple sundered who would be cool with the rejoining too.

There were just so many better ways to handle the last zone, even if you came to the same ultimate conclusion, and the writer opted to take none of them. They tried to force feed us an answer (which is an issue most of DT has tbh) instead of actually exploring the question.

[AnotherPerson]

Not true.

Normally when people die in the FFXIV universe, they go to the Lifestream where their memory aether is washed off their soul before their soul is reused and born again. They're not watching anything and certainly not interacting with anyone.

You really can't compare the normal process to what happens with Emet-Selch, who spent 12,000 years as a ghost and before that was an Ancient tasked with overseeing the Underworld (Lifestream) itself. After the events of EW MSQ are dealt with, he finally allows his spirit to go back to the Lifestream to go through the normal process. That's not something most people can do and I have no idea where you got the idea that it was possible for more mundane people.

Asahi literally mentions watching Amon puppeteer his body against Zenos and getting mad. Asahi dies in Stormblood. It is later revealed it is Fandaniel who taken over his body.

The only way Asahi knows it is Amon is puppeteering his body and not Fandaniel is if he was able to watch the events unfolding from Shadowbringers to Endwalker the entire time. Same person, but the person who pops up in the Aetherial Sea is Amon. Asahi should not be aware of any of this if he wasn't able to see the events unfolding.

[Mortex]

There was no chance to question or try. Sphene was going to commit genocide from the moment we met her. When finally did find out the plan, she just goes full throttle with it giving us no chance to reason with her. Sphene is %100 to blame for the memories of her people getting wiped out. She put us in that position and left no way out.

Let’s be honest here we as the main character get told from sphene “yeah I want these souls so I let the king start the war” into we help you save your people and then we let sphene casually stroll in and take the shardfusion mcguffin straight from the middle of all scions. Like good lord are we so absolutely useless.

[Mortex]

THE MENTAL GYMNASTICS, OMFG.

The Sundered is now the same as the Endless. Wow. That's baffling.
Absolutely baffling. People then want to blame the writers because of their rationalizations, which make absolutely no sense. Mmk.

Swear to god, SE mistake with the FFXIV storyline was making the WoL be Azem and this whole debacle about the Ancients, it backfired so hard to the point of people genuine believe the Ancients are right and they just fully embrace all the twisted logic from them in order to uphold arguments to future story points. Yeesh.

I mean they aren’t fully 100 % sundered but if you go by how they react and act. They feel, think, hear, love and have the memories when they were alive. Effectively they do live on burrowed stolen human soul energy but they are still capable of emotions and even find long lost family member, friends or even lovers and partners (or your own child after you gave it into the care of a random person from the other side of a portal) lost from before death and maybe even unfair situations like a deadly illness in the childhood ripping apart people that love each other.

The line between uncaring machine gif and actual human emotions is pretty narrow in this case.

And I can understand both sides in this debate because even the writers do try to play both sites.

[OMGJesuis66]

I mean they aren’t fully 100 % sundered but if you go by how they react and act. They feel, think, hear, love and have the memories when they were alive. Effectively they do live on burrowed stolen human soul energy but they are still capable of emotions and even find long lost family member, friends or even lovers and partners (or your own child after you gave it into the care of a random person from the other side of a portal) lost from before death and maybe even unfair situations like a deadly illness in the childhood ripping apart people that love each other.

The line between uncaring machine gif and actual human emotions is pretty narrow in this case.

And I can understand both sides in this debate because even the writers do try to play both sites.

Yes. Ghosts with 'unfinished business'.
They are not people, they were people. Therefore, they are not Sundered. At best, if they lived in our world, they would be considered an Ashkin.
Like many ghosts we see in the world and kill without hesitation.
That's the whole point, they are not alive, it isn't a moral debate about 'what is alive and what isn't', it is almost set in stone that none of those people are alive.
We are just assisting them to have a peaceful passing, that's all. Not, murdering them, as many try to claim.

[MikkoAkure]

The only way Asahi knows it is Amon is puppeteering his body and not Fandaniel is if he was able to watch the events unfolding from Shadowbringers to Endwalker the entire time.

Can’t believe I have to explain myself, but if you’re dead and you’re able to watch events play out or even interact with things, you’re a ghost. You’re not in the Lifestream. There’s plenty of examples in the game already.

If you’re in the Lifestream, your soul is in the process of being washed away but it’s explained there that those with strong wills can maintain their sense of self for a time. But considering the whole point is to wash the soul for reuse, I highly doubt there’s an “afterlife tv” where they can watch things and there’s no concrete evidence of such.

Considering Asahi is extremely intact unlike his Garlean compatriots we encounter who EE3 describes as soul fragments, Asahi probably was haunting Fandaniel the whole time and chased him into the Lifestream and that’s how I understood it at the time as well. Emet-Selch himself only actually went to the Lifestream to take a soul cleanse at the very end of EW and we know he’s been hovering around.

[AnotherPerson]

Can’t believe I have to explain myself, but if you’re dead and you’re able to watch events play out or even interact with things, you’re a ghost. You’re not in the Lifestream. There’s plenty of examples in the game already.

If you’re in the Lifestream, your soul is in the process of being washed away but it’s explained there that those with strong wills can maintain their sense of self for a time. But considering the whole point is to wash the soul for reuse, I highly doubt there’s an “afterlife tv” where they can watch things and there’s no concrete evidence of such.

Considering Asahi is extremely intact unlike his Garlean compatriots we encounter who EE3 describes as soul fragments, Asahi probably was haunting Fandaniel the whole time and chased him into the Lifestream and that’s how I understood it at the time as well. Emet-Selch himself only actually went to the Lifestream to take a soul cleanse at the very end of EW and we know he’s been hovering around.

... That's not how souls work.

You do realize the "ghosts" you are referring to are wraiths - effectively souls that can manipulate the surrounding aether to generate a body for themselves. Those who neither have the Echo or have a technique/art applied on them will have their souls directly sent to the Aetherial Sea. Souls don't randomly hang out in the living world. There has to be specific conditions for them to stay in the living world - all of which Asahi does not fulfill. Ascians are beings who have the Echo - and thus can manifest themselves even just as a soul in the living world. Asahi is not an Ascian. He does not have the ability to remain conscious as a soul in the living world.

[4clubbedace]

gasp, head Character ai think lesser character AIs are real out of grief.

Theyre chat gpt chatbots, dont feel bad