Thread: 8.0 speculation

The only thing that I can say immediately after watching the trailer is that the theory that Azem created the key is looking very strong right now. It looks like we, the WoL, built a very unique looking portal by using the key + the Azem crystal.

This would fit because Azem probably knew of Venat's plans and created the key as a way to allow future Azem shards to continue adventuring across shards. However, they will have to explain how the other Ascians never used the key for their ends. Still a lot to learn but yeah, I'm subscribing to the Azem theory for now.

Originally Posted by Cassar

The only thing that I can say immediately after watching the trailer is that the theory that Azem created the key is looking very strong right now. It looks like we, the WoL, built a very unique looking portal by using the key + the Azem crystal.

This would fit because Azem probably knew of Venat's plans and created the key as a way to allow future Azem shards to continue adventuring across shards. However, they will have to explain how the other Ascians never used the key for their ends. Still a lot to learn but yeah, I'm subscribing to the Azem theory for now.

I think they made the key for something like the withering. In hope that in the future the future them can face the withering.

I'm calling it.

Azem knew "we" were going to solve the Apocalypse and the Meteion problem, and passed the last of their own time prepare for the "after" calamity that Halmarut is talking about, that Azem also predicted.

The key being the "key" of salvation for the Source and all the Shards one way or another.

It also make the WoL as Azem main soul inheritor and "title" holder the main character of the overall story once again, something many asked for with Dawntrail and that Yoshi-P teased when earring those critics about Dawntrail that Dawntrail was kind of a "pause" for the WoL.

Originally Posted by Zackneifein

I'm calling it.

Azem knew "we" were going to solve the Apocalypse and the Meteion problem, and passed the last of their own time prepare for the "after" calamity that Halmarut is talking about, that Azem also predicted.

The key being the "key" of salvation for the Source and all the Shards one way or another.

It also make the WoL as Azem main soul inheritor and "title" holder the main character of the overall story once again, something many asked for with Dawntrail and that Yoshi-P teased when earring those critics about Dawntrail that Dawntrail was kind of a "pause" for the WoL.

I don't know if Azem would know that their reincarnation would ended the final days and knew about the withering. It feel more like he had other plans for the key. But for what, we have no idea.

Azem knew we would come back to help Elidibus. I mean it's almost certain that they had either knowledge of the future, be it prediction or any other time shenanigan.

We also know that, from their character, there is no way they would have accepted the Apocalypse if they knew there was a way to stop it and I refuse to accept they just did nothing and waited for the end.

I'm convinced the big reveal of 8.0 or maybe later is that they knew it all and prepared for the Withering as everyone else thought they just gave up or simply disappeared.

Originally Posted by Zackneifein

We also know that, from their character, there is no way they would have accepted the Apocalypse if they knew there was a way to stop it and I refuse to accept they just did nothing and waited for the end.

On that i agree. It's possible that they must have told Venat about his plan and gave her an backup of sort in case if his plan go away. I mean let's be honest, this is Venat we're talking about, there is no way she wouldn't know about the withering if she died. SHe must have left something behind that could be related to the key we have.

Despite what we've seen in the trailer, I'm still skeptical about The Key's ties to Azem. Like we still have the 8.0 teaser trailer to either corroborate or contradict the 7.5 trailer. And there's still part 2 which we won't be able to play until after EU Fan Fest. I don't think we'll be able to untangle facts from clever editing until we actually play the story patches.

Originally Posted by Zackneifein

I'm calling it.

Azem knew "we" were going to solve the Apocalypse and the Meteion problem, and passed the last of their own time prepare for the "after" calamity that Halmarut is talking about, that Azem also predicted.

The key being the "key" of salvation for the Source and all the Shards one way or another.

I apologize for how harshly this is going to come off, but this would be the worst, weakest, most narratively destructive explanation for the key, and I want nothing more from this plot thread than for this to be wrong.

The Ancients have no use for the key as we understand it; the reflections did not exist at the same time as them. For any of them to have made the key, it would have to be for literally no purpose of their own; there is no 'why' to that explanation, no compelling personal motivation, no personal investment for them--and, therefore, us. Any other civilization we've ever heard of in this game making the key would be more compelling, because at least they'd have a reason to want to make it themselves. It is a 'nothing' storyline... that somehow gets even worse if Azem made it.

Because for Azem to make the key, to assert that their future sight was so elaborate and so perfect as to have them know they should make this tool that is literally worthless in their time and of absurdly specific and likely precise purpose and mechanism... would mean that Azem is, effectively, omniscient and omnipotent. At that point, either Azem knows and is capable of everything, or that the limits of their knowledge and abilities are so extreme as to be meaningless.

And if that's the case... where does this end? If Azem had enough knowledge of events twelve thousand years into the future as to see the need to make the key, and to then do it themselves, what else could, did, or didn't Azem do about anything and everything else? If they saw the need to make the key to prepare for events after Endwalker, why didn't they do anything for the events of Endwalker? Or did they, and it turns out the entire game up until this point has just been Azem futzing around and setting up twelve thousand year butterfly effects?

I apologize for giving you both barrels on this, because this is not a 'you' problem and I've seen plenty of people bring up this idea... but OH MY GOD is it such a bad idea and I'm a little tired of seeing people raise what is, very plausibly, the worst idea for where this game could go that I have ever heard. Like, if this was true? I give up, there is no more story, because the entire game is just Azem setting up dominoes for Azem to knock over.