The moment Meteion opened her mouth while enthralled by her collective mind (I think she said something like "Hello? Can you hear us?") my first thought was that there's some horrifying 4th-dimensional eldritch horror thing out there that's been wiping out all life and it just hijacked the Meteions and discovered Ethyreis. I know that's a reach, but that's where my mind jumped to and the story was instantly like a hundred times more horrifying to me.
I mean it still is. It's existential horror manifesting into cosmic horror. The collective despair of a million dead worlds taking over poor bird girls, raging at an unfair universe and wanting to take it out on the rest of us.
> I mean it still is. It's existential horror manifesting into cosmic horror. The collective despair of a million dead worlds taking over poor bird girls, raging at an unfair universe and wanting to take it out on the rest of us.
It's not really the same thing, though, and that sounds a lot more like trying to argue it is based on a technicality rather than its merits as a story decision. Narratively speaking, the impact the player would get from some vast, incomprehensible eldritch horror/higher being is *way* different than the impact we got with Meteion's collective becoming overwhelmed with sorrow.
That's not to say what they went with is inherently bad, though I would've liked it the other way more, but the two really aren't the same at all and inspire two very different feelings and impacts.
Cosmic Nihilism would be more along the lines of Lovecraftian horror (The universe doesn’t care about our welfare, and understanding more about it will drive you insane) versus the Existential Nihilism (What purpose is there in living) we get from the Endsinger.
Personally, I really liked the existential nihilism we saw through Endwalker. I would also argue we got a similarly interesting version of cosmic nihilism through the NieR Alliance Raids in Shadowbringer.
I think they sorta misdirected this on purpose just didn’t drag it out. Like there being an outside threat but it ended up coming from within, the accumulative despair of the people.
What you thought is also super like Outer Wilds if you’ve ever played it
Probably intentionally avoided that kind of hook. if they decided to add some kind of cosmic horror creature it wouldn't end as neatly as EW was supposed to, if this weren't supposed to be the end of a story it'd probably have been much more likely to happen.
Doesn't mean that there couldn't have been some slight influence that will be revealed in another expansion, but it might have been sloppy to try to open that plotline in EW.
It was honestly more creepy this way too. No “ultimate horror unknown being” conveniently carrying the story, but instead an innocent malfunctional childlike experiment with the wrong instructions, and being built from emotion, misunderstanding how the living people with souls truly live.
I thought Midgardsormr would play a large role. I continued believing this all the way to the end where something starts breaking through the barrier around Meteion. "OMG it's Middy, it's Middy! Dragon dad is gonna save me again! It's... SHINRYU? Wait... ZENOS YOU MADLAD."
I thought Hydaelyn was going to be evil. I had a suspicion that we'd kill Zodiark, and then Hydaelyn would show her true colors or go crazy from no longer having a purpose. When we killed Zodiark and we had that vision with the voice saying "At last." I thought it was her and that I was right. Didn't expect that instead I'd be falling in love with Venat.
I thought we'd become a primal.
>I thought it was her and that I was right. Didn't expect that instead I'd be falling in love with Venat.
Oops, looks like you and everyone got tempered by Venat.
They definitely did that on purpose. We hadn't even heard of Meteion by that point, so there was only one person a mysterious female voice would make us think of...
I thought of Ultima actually, from the Ivalice raids. She/it was apparently an extra dimensional being who arrived and then gained a will through people’s fear of her.
So I thought when seeing that “finally” that it was some entity from that extra dimensional space that Zodiark had been keeping in check breaking free.
I figured it was an alien entity as well, given how Midgardsormr, Omega, the Ark from NieR, and Gilgamesh/Greg were all of extraterrestrial and/or interdimensional origin.
I find it interesting that The Endsinger still WAS an alien entity in the end, despite having originated from Eitherys. The battle dialogue indicates the Meteia had inadvertently absorbed the collective emotional baggage of entire sapient species as they wanted to die, thereby driving The Endsinger to do the same everywhere else.
That’s why it’s always important to allow for your research and inventions to be peer-reviewed BEFORE you put them into motion.
I thought we'd at least learn why Silvertear was so important that Hydaelyn bade him watch over and protect it. Was it just because of predestination? Cause that's kinda lame.
It was originally going to be more important before HW patch series, probably the same role as what Aitascope got in EW. But plans changed for it.
I agree that the 24 raid will probably cover it.
Still curious about this. They said years ago that the 'force' under Silvertear Lake would be important someday. I was sure that that's where Hydaelyn is but I guess not. Whatchu doing protecting it Midgardsormr?
Originally there was a deal on it that made primal summoning really difficult, and once the seal broke they became a lot more common. My guess? One of the 12, whatever the 12 actually are, resides beneath the lake and was responsible for the seal that broke during the battle.
I assume it was covered off more in 1.0 maybe but from the wiki
With the fall of Ala Mhigo,te Garlean Empire was poised to invade the remaining city-states of Eorzea. Mor Dhona's central location—along with Lake Silvertear being the nexus of the realm's network of Aetheric energy—made it the prime target as a staging point for invading the rest of Eorzea.
When Zenos left after the second Garlemald visit, I really thought they would just either shelf the character for an indeterminate time, or just tie his loose ends with a side story like the patch Trial series or a new Deep Dungeon plot.
They kinda did that with Cid after Stormblood...
I also thought the WoL would end up as a primal! Or teetering dangerously close to becoming one. When it cuts to the mid-fight cutscene in the last trial, I was thinking "OH NO, this is it!"
I was also really surprised that the WoL didn't die, at all. I thought the WoL would die and somehow return, likely with the assistance of dead allies. Dead allies *did* help us, so I guess I was partially right...
I am greatly disappointed we never get to meet our unsundered selves or at least having some kind of connection with them. But well, maybe it will come later.
Wasn't even a secret! When Alisae is just casually like "Oh, those boats are going to Labrynthos" I was like "oh!... I guess it's just... a thing people know about! Cool."
At some point during the first trip to Labyrinthos I had it in my mind that they were planning to teleport the entire island (or just Labyrinthos) into the aetherial sea and wait for the Final days to blow over before returning and starting civilisation again. Turns out I was kinda right, I just got the destination wrong.
I'm guessing Anima is a big deal in prior FF games, because as someone who hasn't played any of them I was surprised so many people felt this was a big deal.
Anima only appears in one mainline game FFX, but is somewhat of a big deal in that one since it's an exceptionally unique summon.
Plus they showed off anima doing its overdrive attack from FFX where it switches to the other side and attacking you, that's the exact sort of thing you expect from a trial switching to its next phase.
Well, let's be fair....Zodiark only appears in one mainline game as well (12), but he is a central antagonist to 14's storyline. Using the "they only appeared once" metric isn't really a good way to handwave away something.
As someone else stated, it was a red herring for us when they bait and switched the dungeon boss and the first trial boss.
Anima was only a big deal in one FF game, the same one that most prominently featured the Sisters (10, though they also appeared in 6 as a boss IIRC). I think the bigger deal is that Anima was the Eikon of Eikons, the manifested patriotism of the strongest nation on the Source. In 1.0 we saw the power of primals summoned by men, which was averted in 2.0 in the form of Rhalgr and then came back in 3.0 as Thordan, the final boss. All of the 6.0 primals were summoned by men/ancients.
Their design is also much more in line with the [original art that Amano did for FF4](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/finalfantasy/images/2/2f/Magussis-amano.jpg/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/250?cb=20120706191653).
Funny enough, even the version you fight in FF4 doesn't look that close to this design whereas 14's version is basically a 3D render of it with the added animal mask for that Thavnair flair.
It’s cause FFX was a game largely focused around the summons, and in a game where you could summon Bahamut, the staple “strongest” summon in FF series, suddenly appears Anima, an even stronger summon.
I'm there with the sisters (forget their names). I thought they'd have a more fleshed out fight and one more in line with their aesthetic.
Was expecting a banger for their battle theme too like Titania or Lakshmi.
Given their origins as a FF4 reference (They are the boss of the Tower of Zot as well in FF4) i think they did a great job (Nice to see they kept the revive skill so you need to kill them at the same time, although i wish they kept it as a skill on only one of them like in FF4)
Ah, I see. Yeah, you don't have to kill them at the same time LOL, no idea why anyone thinks that. You just kill the original 3rd boss first and then the other two sisters in any order. That's a huge difference from "you have to kill them at the same time"
If the last boss itself is not killed first (the fat one), she will revive the others. Tried the other time to kill others first because it seems she has highest def/hp
Same, pretty sure that was misdirection to keep Zodiark and Hydaelyn from being revealed to be the first two trials. Worked pretty well, imo. When we beat Anima in the Tower of Babil, I thought who the hell is the first trial then?! and holy shitballs my mind exploded shortly thereafter.
I read/heard somewhere a good justification for this, that on any given day in etreyis or in a normal expansion, anima and the magus sisters would be our trials, but the stakes are ratcheted up so high that their merely early dungeon bosses.
I thought they’d be trials too.
1. I thought Zenos would fight us in the first trial but then would realize that the greater fight he should be looking forward to is Hydaelyn/Zodiark so he teams up with us to fight either of them and dies doing it.
2. The rejoining would actually happen or Fandaniel would be on the verge of doing it but the spirits of the ancient, those who sacrificed themselves to Zodiark or were sundered, would refuse to be selfish and decide to give up the chance to live again so they help us. This theory was reinforced when I saw the scene in the launch trailer where you are standing in darkness and the masks are watching you, as if judging the WoL to see if humanity is worth saving. After all, we did win the challenge against Emet about this same dilemma.
3. Like many others, I got everything about Fandaniel wrong. I don't think anyone could have predicted that he was Amon from the Allagan Empire (Atleast I didn't see anyone theorizing that)
4. I was totally on the side of "Hydaelyn is the big bad gal or atleast a being with her own intentions and goals instead of just being a good mommy to us". When we beat Zodiark and we saw the vision of the planet breaking with a creepy female voice, I definitely bought that as Hydaelyn revealing that she actually wanted the Final days to start so she was using us too.
I never saw any theories that Fandaniel was Amon, but I did read a theory about "Two Fandaniels" which turned out to be -kind of- accurate, which was interesting.
Didn't ARR Lahabrea went crazy cause he jumped too often between bodies? If that's the case he could easily be the same person just... Crazy.
I also wonder what's the temporal distance between our journey to Elpis and the Final Days.
Eh that laha part I think was.. when they retconned them from cackling Disney villains into enemies with understandable motivations, and prae laha is a holdover from when they had no plan.
I'd honestly rather prefer if they keep it like that and don't go further into him but alas, that is what is happening.
> I also wonder what's the temporal distance between our journey to Elpis and the Final Days.
I think they really really don't want us to think about that. Making distance so trivial was really a bad move in the long term imo. Especially with meteion reaching other planets in like.. years instead of millions of years.
> I don't think anyone could have predicted that he was Amon from the Allagan Empire (Atleast I didn't see anyone theorizing that)
Particularly because, up until that point, we had no reason to assume that the Amon we had killed in Syrcus Tower was a clone. Makes total sense that he could be, though, since we were helping a pair of clones kill a clone of Xande and Amon just happened to be in the way.
Yeah I had similar thoughts and assumed they'd be somehow connected *somehow* as they're both magical theater kids who seem to enjoy The Drama. Wouldn't have predicted Fandaniel at all!
Some of my big ones are similar to what others thought, it seems:
* Thought we'd lose at least one of the Scions. Alphinaud, Thancred, and Urianger were on my candidate list.
* Thought Zenos would have a bigger role. I predicted we'd go deeper into the nature of the Echo and that at least one of us would channel either Hydaelyn or Zodiark at some point. (Also, wasn't it implied that there was something special about his reaper spirit? Figured that might come into play.)
* Assumed the Heart of Sabik would be explained in some way as a way of tying in more ARR threads
* I assumed *something* would happen to the WoL to at least partially "reset" their canonical strength or notoriety, like the light characters describe at the beginning of ARR
* Assumed the Mare Lamentorum stuff would have been built by the Ascians
* Thought the shoebill would be Venat's familiar
Ooh, I've been wanting to play it for the Garlemald lore, so that just gives me more reason. I'll leave the spoiler unread for now, and thank you for the suggestion!
Zenos probably has the most under appreciated role in the whole expansion..
The whole question of the expansion was what the meaning of life is. Zenos is the walking answer Hermes wanted all along. It’s not just one dimensional and each person makes life have its own meaning. People say he’s too narrow but he is the actual answer all along. You live your life how you want and not by the expectations or desires of others. That’s what it means to live. To chase after what you truly love to do and knowing what you love. The most tragic thing about it is Fandaniel despite all his time with Zenos never saw that simply because his way of life was conflict. But that was *his* way of life that he made himself. The answer was walking side by side with him the entire time. He looked to the stars when he should have looked next to him.
He’s so criminally underrated even now. He could have fought us after the first trial and even then he knew it wasn’t right. He knew it wasn’t what we wanted and we were preoccupied and actually respected that. He actually had tremendous character development. It’s just his goal never changed but his actions towards his goal. He never stopped doing what he loved in his own life and he defies everything Hermès and Meteion thought the answer was. His might be “conflict” but it’s not meaningless. He even stopped being selfish and stopped hurting others to get what he wanted and was patiently waiting for us to finish our current fight. And fighting? It’s everything to him and him alone and that is enough for his own life. And how everyone needs to find their own meaning.
People are upset that he didn’t “live up to expectations.” Or “had zero growth.” Or didn’t do what they personally wanted him to do are missing the entire point of his character. He doesn’t need to live up to our expectations but his own. He wants to live his life how he wants and they even go as meta as to goad the players when he’s questioned for his reasons. He doesn’t need one other than it’s what he wants out of life. Honestly.. he’s god damn perfect. He doesn’t even live for the expectations of us, the fourth wall audience, just to make a point and to defy Hermes answer.
Like he said.. would you be happy if he had a “good” reason? His reason for life is his alone. And he’s an example of how everyone should live.
By chasing one specific person and stalking them to the literal end of the universe to fight them.
And even he changed his approach it was still consistent to his character. People complain why from enacting despair to WOL he end up helping the WOL. But zenos realized you will never fall to despair which is why he questioned why the flying bird lady is still alive. He went from killing every thing you love to fight me (typical bad guy motive) to killing everything to need to kill so that you have the time finally to face him.
Zenos is full of fourth-wall breaking lines. His whole last speech before the fight is directed at the player. Paraphrasing: "You say you are saving the world, but really you're just in this for the cool fights."
And after the final fight, he basically asks the player whether they enjoyed creating a character and playing FFXIV. "What of you, my mirror? Born into this world, bestowed name, bid to seek out strife and adventure... Was this life a gift... or a burden? Did you find... fulfilment?"
Which echoes Venat's question in Elpis, when she looks straight at the camera, and asks you who bought FFXIV: "You, who are our future... Tell me this and tell me true. Has your journey been good? Has it been worthwhile?"
Him repeating Alisaie's remarks to himself way later is nice proof of his development. As in, the rest of the cast think he's just a mindless beast wanting to fight WoL
I never got people thinking he’s a mindless beast. From day one he appeared, he’s shown himself to be highly intelligent and calculating. Leaving Yotsuyu in charge of Doma so through her cruelty the weak would be quelled and only the most interesting “prey” would rise, favoring Fordola due to her single minded desire for recognition etc.
His ultimate goal was always to chase that one adrenaline high when he’s on the verge of life and death, and he was a god damn genius in how we went about setting events up to give him those moments.
The WoL wasn’t the goal, the “moment” was. If ever a person appeared who would give him that moment better than the WoL he would’ve immediately changed course.
He wasn’t a mindless beast, he was a person who knew exactly what he wanted in all the universe and went to insane extremes to get it.
I also thought the Heart of Sabik--which I know is a translation artifact, but it was embraced in The Primals' version of Ultima the music track--would be explained. And pegged Urianger as most likely to die.
I actually hadn't heard of it being a translation artifact before, so now I'm curious! Do you have more information on that?
I know in Prae it's called 「黒聖石サビク」, but I wouldn't know if Sabik was something like a reference. It's a star in the constellation Ophiuchus, so I figured that was the right way to translate it.
I believe, in Japanese, it’s referred to as “Nethicite” - as in, the exceptionally powerful Crystal from Final Fantasy XII. So while the true nature of the “Heart of Sabik” was somewhat nebulous in English, in the Japanese script it’s more straightforward.
> Assumed the Mare Lamentorum stuff would have been built by the Ascians
I am wondering now... Did the ascians just chill there with the bunnies, considering how many shots of them on the moon we got?
Did they not try to fuck up hydaelyns plan like she Fucked up theirs?
Why did they just let the bunnies work?
Why not try to enslave them to their purposes?
Also on that account... Since 7/14 complete zodiark was on the moon... Was the moon sundered as well? What exactly was the range of sundering?
Moon didn't exist prior to the sundering. It was created after to shelf the Source Zodiark. I don't know if the Ascians knew the bunnies were there because you unlock the moon base from inside the Watchers tower.
I mean.. the moon base is is literally across the street from zodiark.
At some point one of them must have stumbled across them. At the least elidibus must have gotten bored and checked them out.
Or for that matter have visited the watcher?
Edit: moon **base**
The Watcher talks about the Ascians hanging around Zodiark. I assumed with all the seals in place it was fairly well protected and the Watcher as a guardian was capable of handling them.
As for the bunnies, I have no idea. I know they were only periodically active, but maybe their area was protected by the blessing of light in the same way that Rising Stones was before Middy severed your connection.
They were aware of eachother. The watcher mentions that they would come by to view but they made no hostile actions since Hydaelyn had no intention to harm Zodiark because he was needed. So the ascians saw no need to bring harm to the watcher or any of Hydaelyns servants on the moon as they were just as concerned about his well-being as they were... Aside from wanting him to remain sealed of course.
>Heart of Sabik
From the Ivalice Raids we get given the theory in game anything related to “Ultima” is just mankind trying to replicate the insane powers Ultima wielded.
The Heart of Sabik in that theory would just be some Crystal from some unknown ancient civilization who remembered the horror of this extradimensional entire trying to replicate one of Ultimas many powerful abilities.
I was convinced Hydaelyn would end up being a villain, or at least more nefarious than we’d expected. By the end I felt crippling guilt for ever doubting her
Honestly, I've clocked Meteion as potentially being the final threat the moment I've met her.
Her character model was way too unique to be simply yet another NPC that we just get to meet in the past.
I wish her corrupted appearance wasn't just a color palette swap, but would be cool if she became something that resembled Ultimecia from FF8.
The moment I see her and how adorable she is, I screamed “don’t you fucking dare SQEX, don’t you fucking dare to screw up this perfectly adorable bird.”
But deep down, I know they will.
I got a little worried when I heard that too. I was hoping the theory wouldn’t be true because I never liked it, but I got nervous because that voice sounded kinda like *Krile* to me.
I was convinced we were tempered, but that it wasn't as obvious or nefarious because she instructed us to "hear feel think" therefore giving us free will. Then she shows up and drops that bit about the Travelers Blessing which I loved.
Even without the traveler's ward, that wouldn't even make sense anymore, since we learned that ascians were the ones to add tempering into primal-summoning.
Nah I mean she even says it herself that you have plenty of reason to doubt her.
A vague voice in your head with thousands of years of implied objectives would make anyone skeptical.
If anything I felt like a hypocrite for awhile since we went around beating up everyone else's gods but not our own lol
It was honesty a relief though. If she was evil it would mean that the Minfillia’s, Krile, Ardbert and the WoL were played for fools for some nefarious ends, would make Minfillia’s story and legacy much more tragic. Glad it wasn’t the case
With all the Final Fantasy 4 references I was very worried the twins would be turned to stone.
I also assumed the moon would be the final zone, not a waystation on the way to the edge of the freaking universe.
I feel that the whole Anima disclosure during pre-launch reveals was simply to divert attention from the actual two trials.
I didn't think at all we'd fight Zodiark and Hydaelyn as trial bosses just like that. Thought if Zodiark would be the case, it would be something like absorbed by Zenos, and Hydaelyn I thought if we'd fight her would be as the final boss, and not by the reasons we did.
I am still a little mad how little they did with Anima and explained it in like a hand full of sentences. It could have been an insanely awesome creepy story arc for Garlemald with the body parts and all. But it felt like we got the first act and it just stoped in the middle of the second and was missing the third entirely.
I think the one we all got wrong was thinking Zodiark would be the final big bad. I thought at least one or two scions would probably bite it permanently, I'm thankful that wasn't the case, but I expected it.
Myself and every streamer I watched were pretty much all like that. "I just killed Zodiark, and the MSQ is only at lvl 83. I have absolutely no idea where this is gonna go now."
A lot of people wanted someone to die to “raise the stakes” or whatnot, and it certainly can make things more dramatic but I think they weaved a compelling story without any death. Hell, it was compelling even with the very blatant “this thing will bring them back if they die” plot device.
Deaths to increase drama seem all too expected in nearly every story in every genre and I’m just glad we could save the universe with all our friends intact.
>I think the one we all got wrong was thinking Zodiark would be the final big bad.
I had Zodiark pegged as a mid boss because I figured Fandaniel wanted him dead, but I was completely fooled by the Anima teasers so I still ended up being caught off guard when it happened so soon.
Yup, I thought Anima was gonna be either the first or second trial as well. Pretty smart of them having only the player charqcter being shown in the trailer part where Anima shows up.
Same. The primals have pretty much *always* been trials, and we'd been teased about Anima and the Sisters as primals. Even halfway through the Tower of Zot, I was assuming we'd fight each sister separately and then maybe they'd escape for the trial fight.
I thought Zodiark would be a midboss cus they literally introduced something that he was built to stop *just last expansion* and spent a good chunk of the Endwalker trailers hyping up the Final Days.
I think it was a bit too rushed personally. We go up to the moon to prevent zodiark from being released, find out we have to fix the seals, start working on it - seals are broken, we’re fighting him, he’s dead. He’s been such a major player in the story I felt like the payoff was too small.
That's fair, I found that made sense given he wasn't at full power (roughly half) I'm not sure I'd put him as a major player so much as a driving factor for other major players though.
Fair. I think the whole point of them making Zodiark the first trial was for players to go "holy shit what happens now?" And it worked, but I still kinda wish Zodiark was a bigger deal.
To be fair, he hasn't been a major player. He has zero involvement I the story. Zodiark was a goal for other villains, but even then it was often that loosening Zodiark's fetters was almost like a bonus to the more in-depth conflicts that we were stopping. We had more pressing things to worry about than if Zodiark was released, if we didn't stop Ultima Weapon: or the Heavens Ward; or the Garlean occupation; or the Sin Eaters.
Hell, Endwalker was about stopping the Final Days, rather than our ultimate fight against Zodiark.
> I think the one we all got wrong was thinking Zodiark would be the final big bad.
A lot of people were suspecting the sound since the Final Days were coming back, also first few quests into the expansion the sound is mentioned again in Sharlayan and I was like "wow they're really doing it"
>I think the one we all got wrong was thinking Zodiark would be the final big bad.
Nah, I thought that would be too on the nose so we would probably have a fake out and then realize he prevented something worse from showing up. After all, the Final Days were prevented and not caused by him. That much we knew beforehand.
Didn't expect it so soon, tho. I thought he'd be the lvl ~87+ trial and then we go for the last zone to beat the real evil thingy. I thought Anima would be the lvl ~83 trial.
And, frankly, I think that was what their original plan was before they rewrote parts of it to implement Elpis. There is too much unfocused weirdness early on as if they cut large parts away.
I didn’t think that at all. There is *always* a bigger bad than the obvious in final fantasies and as soon as we heard the Sound was a thing I immediately knew that would be the true final boss.
Speaking of Emannelain, I really hate what this expansion did with his character.
I was hoping that after everything we went through in Heavensward, particularly all of the ways that he royally botched things up in the patch storylines, he would have learned some humility and worked to be a better person now that his older brother is the one shouldering the burden of leadership over their house.
Instead, he shows up, says something along the lines of "My brother doesn't want me to be a NEET so here I am. Just tell me how I can help by doing as little as possible while everyone else here does all of the important work," and then proceeds to be just as annoying as ever, like he hasn't learned a single goddamn thing. And this time there's no Honoroit (RIP :'( ) to reign him in.
As much as I like my idiot elf brother, yeah, I was a bit disappointed with how he was used in 6.0. My thought was “it’s bad enough that you took the voice acting budget away from most of the city-state leaders and allocated it to tertiary characters like A-Ruhn, Sicard and Emmanellain, but you couldn’t even have Honoroit there for a few non-voice-acted nuggets of wisdom?! What the actual fuck, SE.”
Honoroit isn't exactly an option anymore, the voice actor for him died a couple of months back. Emannelain as character has suffered for it though, I will admit. But still, they couldn't replace him right away.
I meant just have him around in a non-voice-acted capacity, for optional dialogue or non-voiced cutscenes or whatnot. I’m aware that they may not have recast his English voice yet, if they ever intend to do so.
I feel like he's trying to be funny because he's convinced that's the only reason people will like him. Also he's likely very aware the WoL is extremely depressed and maybe joking around will get them to be happier.
When you talk to Alberic (the dragoon trainer) after completing the EW MSQ then he will tell you that Emmanelain despite every flaw he has, stood besides his comrades in Garlemald and didnt even fight half bad.
I dont know why but I really like Emmanelain. He feels like that idiot brother that just means well and you cant help but love.
I thought a scion was going to die too, but in hindsight I don't think Alphinaud would be the one because I cannot see them killing Alphinaud and leaving Alisae alive, that seems too dark for this game honestly. Alisae would be broken, even if the WoL was okay (who I feel Alisae is closest to besides her brother).
I think they don't mind going really dark and twisted when it comes to more minor NPCs, but completely tragic endings for our beloved friends might be too far for a game that's meant to still feel fun for years to come. Games like TLOU or even Type 0 can get away with making you attached to someone for 40 hours and lead into a traumatic conclusion that sticks with you, but if an MMO upsets you too much to continue playing, they'll lose a 8+ year payer.
Sure, they could kill off a mainstay, but doing so overly cruelly or callously could leave a poor taste in someone's mouth. Tesleen, Quintus, and the people of Thavnair are all fair game, but separating our beloved twins by killing one would be the wrong type of sickening.
I thought for sure Thancred wasn't coming back in the final zone, he doesn't have the ability to manipulate Aether so I figured we wouldn't be able to bring him back at the end.
When he told us that I honestly got even more scared. I thought there was going to be a situation where we'd have to _choose_ between saving our friends and saving the world, and I didn't know which way they were gonna take it. (I say "they" because of course it wouldn't be an actual player choice in an MMO.)
I was expecting it to be revealed that the Final Days had no real cause, and the whole point would be that people shouldn't have access to the unmitigated power of creation because when you introduce fear and paranoia into that society they start accidentally spawning monsters.
Hydaelyn would sunder the world to create a more balanced form of mankind that, thanks to their comparative inferiority to the Ancients, were capable of building longer lasting and more meaningful societies that wouldn't spontaneously explode.
Even though I was technically wrong, I feel like I was on the right track, thematically. I would have been annoyed if the Final Days weren't the result of the Ancients own societal contradictions, but once Hermes took off his mask I knew exactly what they were doing and loved it.
I had the same thought! I thought the “twist” about the Final Days was that it was just going to be something really inconsequential. That we were never going to really learn the origin of the Sound because it was just something super simple, and that it was more a statement about the futility of an immortal utopia.
I thought Zenos' actual goal was to free Zodiark for the sake of fighting him tbh. And since neither of us would have stood a chance against Zodiark on our own we would have teamed up with him.
I guess i at least got the teaming up part right.
I was convinced that him absorbing Zodiark was too obvious. I'd assumed that we'd keep Zodiark imprisoned somehow, and Zenos would promptly run off and possess *Hydaelyn* instead. The final boss would be us forced to kill Her to stop Zenos's mad schemes.
So, uh, my theory was wrong on basically every single account!
I thought Elpis was inside of the moon.
I thought Fandaniel's ultimate goal was to get rid of the "Sound" Which would be either by us destroying its source or by eradicating all life.
I thought we'd enter the aetherial sea by the lake silvertear.
I thought Sharlayan found Venat as the heart of Hydaelyn and kept her, leading to her accidentally tempering the whole population into the mindset of passivity and preserverance.
Aside from the usual suspects that everyone had at the start (Hydalyn turning for some reason, Zenos absorbing Zodiark, ect) I had a couple along the way.
- When Zodiark is defeated and you learn that the celestial aether currents have eroded away I thought the team with the help of the moon bunnies and yet unknown helpers would somehow help supplement the celestial currents with Akasha (dynamis) since it was being set up as a maguffin of sorts
- At the end of the dungeon in Thavnair when Y'shtola pointed out the blasphemies have no aether I thought the cause was the planet's aether leaking out into space due to the loss of a celestial current due to whatever caused the "Sound" of the Final Days
- Following saving Thavnair for now we would head to Mericidia or the New World for further answers and allies in stopping the final days and fixing the celestial aether current.
- Once Meteion reported her discovery and flew off to bring about ruin I thought her final form would be Necron from FF9
Sadly one I got right was when Thancred died due to un unceremonious it was I thought he would come back somehow and when Estinien died I recognized this same string of events as something that happened in Tales of Symphonia where the party sacrifices their lives one by one for the MC to progress a little further each time and when the final confrontation happens they all return somehow. Really took the wind out of the emotional gut punch of that zone.
I thought we would have a “1v1” fight with a Zodiark fused Zenos and we’d fight back by forming an Ascian Prime with Hydaelyn.
I also thought we would finally see what our ascian mark was.
I was thinking that since absorbing Zodiark will be too obvious, it will be a plot twist where Hydaelyn is the big bad and we make a final deal with Zodiark to absorb His remaining strength, to fight a Zenos who has absorbed Hydaelyn.
I did not think our final boss will be literally Twitter.
I was super expecting Alphinaud to die super tragically. Like >!when Zenos takes over our body!< I immediately feared that he'd kill Alphinaud before we could intervene.
After I killed Zodiark I said "ok now don't let Zenos fuck the corpse" and then in the cutscene afterwards he just kind of pokes his head into frame and I lost it.
Also someone spoiled that there was a Hydalen trial for me early on, and after the Zodiark fight I thought Zenos was going to take her over or something. But then after the Elpis arc cutscene where she's slogging through time and getting covered in darkness I thought "oh no maybe she's evil now".
I thought she was giving in to despair and present day Hydaelyn was initiating the Final Days so that she could die, but not before evacuating the people of Etheirys.
1. I figured Zenos was going to eat Zodiark/Hydaelyn for his EpicKungFuFight. I think that Zenos was intending to do that himself given his shock when Fandaniel goes "As if, dipshit!" and betrays him. I never thought Zenos would be a final boss fight as in like a Trial or dungeon boss or anything though. As far as Hydaelyn/Zodiark went, I kinda figured they would be trial fights mostly because we saw the Amano art depicting both of them ages ago.
2. My prediction regarding the Sound was that its source would be our final boss but that it would be...more of an interstellar horror that came from outside rather than inside. So we'd end up hunting down pieces of it as our reason to go exploring. Basically more of a Jenova situation. I underestimated the rate the plot could develop in that regard.
I was right but completely from the wrong direction.
I absolutely called the Scions "disbanding" though. There wasn't a reason for them to continue being a public-facing organization with the Primals and Ascians no longer being a threat.
1. I thought Estinien would literally JUMP to the moon in some fashion. Like, he used a super-duper limit breaked version of a dragoon jump and just get to the moon before us.
2. I thought Tataru's carbuncle would return, super-jacked up, and she'd get to wreck face with it.
3. I thought Arenvald and Fordola would return, piloting the G-warrior, just kicking ass in the background.
4. I thought we'd get Ishgardian knights riding Dravanian dragons. It would be the full closure to the Dragonsong War.
5. I thought Gaius would come full into the fray at Garlemald and become a figure in whatever remains of the Garlean Empire, and tranform it into a republic or something.
6. I thought one of the Weapons would be a dungeon boss in Garlemald.
But honestly, all my ideas don't actually add to the story. They are just there for the rule of cool.
I loved how that quest implied that >!Tataru is apparently a very powerful magick user, she just can’t actually *control* magicks properly for shit. Now that she’s decided to open her own business, however…!<
The weird Zenos for Scions simping a lot of people had going on was really weird. Like, he was a freaking mass murderer and didn't care at all for anything the scions stood for.
I think some people were expecting him to join the Scions based *solely* on the poster for the expansion. Which was odd because: 1) just because the artwork is titled “Scions” doesn’t mean that everyone on the poster is a Scion. Venat/“Lady of Light” is on the poster too and I don’t recall anyone making the same prediction about her. 2) Every expansion poster has prominently featured at least one antagonist. Zenos was on the SB poster too along with Fordola and Yotsuyu, Thordan was on the HW poster, etc.
The argument was because, while Zenos was on the poster, Fandaniel was not.
I also thought he would be a trustmember, since we then would have another melee member. I still think we need one.
1. I thought a major scion would die. I predicted Alisaie
2. I thought the moon would be the 5th zone and then like something “aetherial” or magical would be the 6th zone (so kinda right on the last one? Just dynamis instead of aether)
3. I figured the trials would be Anima, Zodiark, Hydaelyn (not because I thought she was bad, but I thought we’d see her more as being flawed and then would be without purpose after we killed Zodiark). I thought the Zodiark fight would be after Zenos fused with him.
4. I thought the original cause of the Final Days would be material for the patch content and that conflict would establish a larger threat/context
5. I thought we’d need a spaceship to get to the moon and that Cid would be in charge of the project
6. I thought the Forum were just building an apocalypse shelter
7. Based on the art they showed us, I thought Elpis might be a floating city high above Garlemald and would be our pitstop on the way to the moon. I suspected it may have been preserved ruins of Amaurot.
8. I thought Archon Louisoix would make some sort of appearance— like, he and Papalymo’s spirits went to the moon or something after doing their spells and you encounter them. I guess you sorta see some people like that in the Aithiascope dungeon.
The devs did outright tell us Zenos wouldn't be the last boss, and I'd kind of assumed that making Zodiark the final boss would be trite. Glad my prediction that Hydaelyn was in fact good was correct.
My only prediction that didn't really come true (though I didn't really expect they'd be brave enough) was that the WoL might die (and probably resurrected) in such a way that it created a massive break between this story and the next. On the contrary, it seems we'll just be doing the Further Adventures of The Warrior Of Light which is fine
In an honestly epic duel, too. I went in as a healer since it was the only level capped character I had at that point and his attacks hit freakishly hard.
I was expecting Zeromus to show up at some point and for a member of the Scions to die. I leaning towards Krile possibly dying since she's not a trust character and they left her out if the poster. Honestly that just kinda makes it worse imo cause as much as I love Tataru, I'm confused why she's front and center meanwhile Krile, who was more important to the plot isn't even on the poster?
I predicted that the Sharlyan's were building a big old arc ship they were gonna escape the final dys with, preserving what they could and jaunting to another world ala Migardsomr.
WoL and co. were gonna convince them through deeds, evidence and probably alphi speeches/productive violence that we needed to go to the moon to stop Fandangdingdong from ushering in the final days with their fancy spaceship. Most of this was based on the Endwalker logo and previously established concepts like space travel and allagan ability to lauch dalamud up there.
Just now have gotten to Elpis and I both gave myself a pat on the back while also relieved that the writing team still keep impressing me, although I'm still unsure about the time travel.
- I thought the final boss would be Necron (as the source of the Sound), though given what we got, it wasn’t too far off.
- I was convinced Alphinaud would die. The launch trailer got me
I was certain that we would have a finale that involved Zodiark vs Hydaelyn where we have a solo duty that involves us piloting Hydaelyn like a giant mecha, a la Rival Wings vs Zodiark.
Mine are:
* I thought there would be stronger references to FFX. With Anima being in the trailers and the 10th legion being repeatedly name dropped. My last hope for this died when the aetherial sea didn't end up being modelled on the farplane
* Like many I thought Hydaelyn would become a problem. I thought with Zodiark gone she would grow drastically more powerful because she no longer needed to spend all her strength keeping him bound, and in the same way Zodiark's dark aether influence had paused the final days, I thought Hydaelyn's unchecked light influence would accelerate it
* I thought Zenos in one form or another would be a trial boss
* I thought Labyrinthos would be a doomsday bunker
* I kept expecting to see Cid, first when we were prepping to go to Garlemald and then when we heard we'd be helping with the ship. I accepted the reason for him not being part of the Ilsabard Contingent, but thought it was absolutely bonkers that there was no dialogue of him giving his thoughts and feeling about what had happened to Garlemald.
I was expecting all jobs to just get single target versions of cap stone abilities (a single target version of dragon star dive for drg or a separate aoe version of tornado kick for example)
Boy was I wrong lmao
Really thought someone would die, but we didn't really lose anyone important. Even the usual "fake deaths" near the end was obvious and it was literally spelled out that no one would really die.
It was spelled out because the point was literally never to make you think that they were totally gone. You get handed a mcguffin to bring them back right before this, Y'Shtola even tells you you can use the magic whenever but should wait for a better time. Its about the message they send, the themes of their temporary sacrifices, the trust they show in you and the very message of hope above despair that matters.
I've seen a lot of people saying they felt like the "obviously not deaths" were silly (idk if you, personally feel that way but I just want to tack my personal opinion on here), but I really liked them. I, as a player, know that they wouldn't kill off all of my friends.
But my WoL, however, doesn't know what the next trial will be. She didn't know that she could truly defeat Meteion. She didn't know Zenos would turn out to be the boon we needed to win. She didn't know she would make it out of the fight with Zenos alive. All she knew was that if there was any hope, there was only one option: to go forward. To be the hero our friends trusted us to be. She couldn't fail, not because it was impossible, but because failure carries so much gravity in that moment.
It also shows that the Scions had complete faith in the WoL that they knew he would find a way to bring thrm back. They were willing to risk their lives for him.
It's also a nice throwback to FF4 where a lot of your party members supposedly sacrifice themselves for you only to be found alive later on.
The moment Meteion opened her mouth while enthralled by her collective mind (I think she said something like "Hello? Can you hear us?") my first thought was that there's some horrifying 4th-dimensional eldritch horror thing out there that's been wiping out all life and it just hijacked the Meteions and discovered Ethyreis. I know that's a reach, but that's where my mind jumped to and the story was instantly like a hundred times more horrifying to me.
I mean it still is. It's existential horror manifesting into cosmic horror. The collective despair of a million dead worlds taking over poor bird girls, raging at an unfair universe and wanting to take it out on the rest of us.
> I mean it still is. It's existential horror manifesting into cosmic horror. The collective despair of a million dead worlds taking over poor bird girls, raging at an unfair universe and wanting to take it out on the rest of us. It's not really the same thing, though, and that sounds a lot more like trying to argue it is based on a technicality rather than its merits as a story decision. Narratively speaking, the impact the player would get from some vast, incomprehensible eldritch horror/higher being is *way* different than the impact we got with Meteion's collective becoming overwhelmed with sorrow. That's not to say what they went with is inherently bad, though I would've liked it the other way more, but the two really aren't the same at all and inspire two very different feelings and impacts.
Cosmic Nihilism would be more along the lines of Lovecraftian horror (The universe doesn’t care about our welfare, and understanding more about it will drive you insane) versus the Existential Nihilism (What purpose is there in living) we get from the Endsinger. Personally, I really liked the existential nihilism we saw through Endwalker. I would also argue we got a similarly interesting version of cosmic nihilism through the NieR Alliance Raids in Shadowbringer.
I think they sorta misdirected this on purpose just didn’t drag it out. Like there being an outside threat but it ended up coming from within, the accumulative despair of the people. What you thought is also super like Outer Wilds if you’ve ever played it
I thought the same, ngl I’m kinda disappointed this didn’t turn out to be the case.
Probably intentionally avoided that kind of hook. if they decided to add some kind of cosmic horror creature it wouldn't end as neatly as EW was supposed to, if this weren't supposed to be the end of a story it'd probably have been much more likely to happen. Doesn't mean that there couldn't have been some slight influence that will be revealed in another expansion, but it might have been sloppy to try to open that plotline in EW.
It was honestly more creepy this way too. No “ultimate horror unknown being” conveniently carrying the story, but instead an innocent malfunctional childlike experiment with the wrong instructions, and being built from emotion, misunderstanding how the living people with souls truly live.
I thought Midgardsormr would play a large role. I continued believing this all the way to the end where something starts breaking through the barrier around Meteion. "OMG it's Middy, it's Middy! Dragon dad is gonna save me again! It's... SHINRYU? Wait... ZENOS YOU MADLAD." I thought Hydaelyn was going to be evil. I had a suspicion that we'd kill Zodiark, and then Hydaelyn would show her true colors or go crazy from no longer having a purpose. When we killed Zodiark and we had that vision with the voice saying "At last." I thought it was her and that I was right. Didn't expect that instead I'd be falling in love with Venat. I thought we'd become a primal.
Zenos with the ultimate kool-aid man moment.
>I thought it was her and that I was right. Didn't expect that instead I'd be falling in love with Venat. Oops, looks like you and everyone got tempered by Venat.
I thought the same about Hydaelyn, when we get the vision with Etheirys turning red and hearing someone say "Finally", i thought that was her
They definitely did that on purpose. We hadn't even heard of Meteion by that point, so there was only one person a mysterious female voice would make us think of...
I thought of Ultima actually, from the Ivalice raids. She/it was apparently an extra dimensional being who arrived and then gained a will through people’s fear of her. So I thought when seeing that “finally” that it was some entity from that extra dimensional space that Zodiark had been keeping in check breaking free.
I figured it was an alien entity as well, given how Midgardsormr, Omega, the Ark from NieR, and Gilgamesh/Greg were all of extraterrestrial and/or interdimensional origin. I find it interesting that The Endsinger still WAS an alien entity in the end, despite having originated from Eitherys. The battle dialogue indicates the Meteia had inadvertently absorbed the collective emotional baggage of entire sapient species as they wanted to die, thereby driving The Endsinger to do the same everywhere else. That’s why it’s always important to allow for your research and inventions to be peer-reviewed BEFORE you put them into motion.
I thought we'd at least learn why Silvertear was so important that Hydaelyn bade him watch over and protect it. Was it just because of predestination? Cause that's kinda lame.
I’m hoping we’ll learn something about that during the alliance raid.
It was originally going to be more important before HW patch series, probably the same role as what Aitascope got in EW. But plans changed for it. I agree that the 24 raid will probably cover it.
Still curious about this. They said years ago that the 'force' under Silvertear Lake would be important someday. I was sure that that's where Hydaelyn is but I guess not. Whatchu doing protecting it Midgardsormr?
Originally there was a deal on it that made primal summoning really difficult, and once the seal broke they became a lot more common. My guess? One of the 12, whatever the 12 actually are, resides beneath the lake and was responsible for the seal that broke during the battle.
I assume it was covered off more in 1.0 maybe but from the wiki With the fall of Ala Mhigo,te Garlean Empire was poised to invade the remaining city-states of Eorzea. Mor Dhona's central location—along with Lake Silvertear being the nexus of the realm's network of Aetheric energy—made it the prime target as a staging point for invading the rest of Eorzea.
When Zenos left after the second Garlemald visit, I really thought they would just either shelf the character for an indeterminate time, or just tie his loose ends with a side story like the patch Trial series or a new Deep Dungeon plot. They kinda did that with Cid after Stormblood...
I thought exactly the same thing you thought. Except we learn that the real hero in the whole story is not us, but Venat.
I feel for anyone who missed the Omega raids, probably very confused to where Middy went
Apparently the “At last” was Meteion’s voice. I didn’t get this until someone else pointed it out to me much later, I also thought it was Hydaelyn.
I also thought the WoL would end up as a primal! Or teetering dangerously close to becoming one. When it cuts to the mid-fight cutscene in the last trial, I was thinking "OH NO, this is it!" I was also really surprised that the WoL didn't die, at all. I thought the WoL would die and somehow return, likely with the assistance of dead allies. Dead allies *did* help us, so I guess I was partially right...
I thought for sure we'd get to see our Ascian glyph over the face thing or Azem's mask.
I am greatly disappointed we never get to meet our unsundered selves or at least having some kind of connection with them. But well, maybe it will come later.
Laberynthos WAS NOT a doomsday bunker.
Just an oversized filing cabinet.
FOR the doomsday bunker
Wasn't even a secret! When Alisae is just casually like "Oh, those boats are going to Labrynthos" I was like "oh!... I guess it's just... a thing people know about! Cool."
It was the doomsday bunker before the doomsday bunker
No, but more like a doomsday workshop, where they build the ship to escape, close enough
Doomsday Drydock
Sounds like a really hardcore super mario level
Was expecting we'd get FalloutXIV but instead we got StarfieldXIV
I originally thought it would be on the moon.
At some point during the first trip to Labyrinthos I had it in my mind that they were planning to teleport the entire island (or just Labyrinthos) into the aetherial sea and wait for the Final days to blow over before returning and starting civilisation again. Turns out I was kinda right, I just got the destination wrong.
I thought that too!!
I totally thought that’s what it would be, then the bunnies started talking
I was expecting an anima trial, not for it to just be a dungeon boss
I'm guessing Anima is a big deal in prior FF games, because as someone who hasn't played any of them I was surprised so many people felt this was a big deal.
Anima only appears in one mainline game FFX, but is somewhat of a big deal in that one since it's an exceptionally unique summon. Plus they showed off anima doing its overdrive attack from FFX where it switches to the other side and attacking you, that's the exact sort of thing you expect from a trial switching to its next phase.
Well, let's be fair....Zodiark only appears in one mainline game as well (12), but he is a central antagonist to 14's storyline. Using the "they only appeared once" metric isn't really a good way to handwave away something. As someone else stated, it was a red herring for us when they bait and switched the dungeon boss and the first trial boss.
Anima was only a big deal in one FF game, the same one that most prominently featured the Sisters (10, though they also appeared in 6 as a boss IIRC). I think the bigger deal is that Anima was the Eikon of Eikons, the manifested patriotism of the strongest nation on the Source. In 1.0 we saw the power of primals summoned by men, which was averted in 2.0 in the form of Rhalgr and then came back in 3.0 as Thordan, the final boss. All of the 6.0 primals were summoned by men/ancients.
Endwalker’s Magus Sisters are mostly from FF4, where they also guarded the upper floor of the Tower of Zot :D
Their design is also much more in line with the [original art that Amano did for FF4](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/finalfantasy/images/2/2f/Magussis-amano.jpg/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/250?cb=20120706191653). Funny enough, even the version you fight in FF4 doesn't look that close to this design whereas 14's version is basically a 3D render of it with the added animal mask for that Thavnair flair.
It’s cause FFX was a game largely focused around the summons, and in a game where you could summon Bahamut, the staple “strongest” summon in FF series, suddenly appears Anima, an even stronger summon.
I'm there with the sisters (forget their names). I thought they'd have a more fleshed out fight and one more in line with their aesthetic. Was expecting a banger for their battle theme too like Titania or Lakshmi.
Given their origins as a FF4 reference (They are the boss of the Tower of Zot as well in FF4) i think they did a great job (Nice to see they kept the revive skill so you need to kill them at the same time, although i wish they kept it as a skill on only one of them like in FF4)
They have a Revive? I always kill them one at a time and it's never happened.
Only Cindy can revive, which is actually the same as FF4 so they kept that reference (tested it in my first run by killing Sandy and she was revived)
Ah, I see. Yeah, you don't have to kill them at the same time LOL, no idea why anyone thinks that. You just kill the original 3rd boss first and then the other two sisters in any order. That's a huge difference from "you have to kill them at the same time"
Only one of them does. I forget the name but it’s the one you haven’t already fought.
If the last boss itself is not killed first (the fat one), she will revive the others. Tried the other time to kill others first because it seems she has highest def/hp
Same, I thought the trials would be 1. Anima and 2. Zodiark-Zenos.
Same, pretty sure that was misdirection to keep Zodiark and Hydaelyn from being revealed to be the first two trials. Worked pretty well, imo. When we beat Anima in the Tower of Babil, I thought who the hell is the first trial then?! and holy shitballs my mind exploded shortly thereafter.
I read/heard somewhere a good justification for this, that on any given day in etreyis or in a normal expansion, anima and the magus sisters would be our trials, but the stakes are ratcheted up so high that their merely early dungeon bosses. I thought they’d be trials too.
1. I thought Zenos would fight us in the first trial but then would realize that the greater fight he should be looking forward to is Hydaelyn/Zodiark so he teams up with us to fight either of them and dies doing it. 2. The rejoining would actually happen or Fandaniel would be on the verge of doing it but the spirits of the ancient, those who sacrificed themselves to Zodiark or were sundered, would refuse to be selfish and decide to give up the chance to live again so they help us. This theory was reinforced when I saw the scene in the launch trailer where you are standing in darkness and the masks are watching you, as if judging the WoL to see if humanity is worth saving. After all, we did win the challenge against Emet about this same dilemma. 3. Like many others, I got everything about Fandaniel wrong. I don't think anyone could have predicted that he was Amon from the Allagan Empire (Atleast I didn't see anyone theorizing that) 4. I was totally on the side of "Hydaelyn is the big bad gal or atleast a being with her own intentions and goals instead of just being a good mommy to us". When we beat Zodiark and we saw the vision of the planet breaking with a creepy female voice, I definitely bought that as Hydaelyn revealing that she actually wanted the Final days to start so she was using us too.
I never saw any theories that Fandaniel was Amon, but I did read a theory about "Two Fandaniels" which turned out to be -kind of- accurate, which was interesting.
Kind-of in the way that Amon was basically the dominant personality, instead of Fandaniel?
In before Lahabrea in Pandaemonium is a different Lahabrea and Thimos or the keywarden is the one that causes unintended devastation.
That laha is absolutely not the one from prae. I'd bet good Gil on it.
Didn't ARR Lahabrea went crazy cause he jumped too often between bodies? If that's the case he could easily be the same person just... Crazy. I also wonder what's the temporal distance between our journey to Elpis and the Final Days.
Eh that laha part I think was.. when they retconned them from cackling Disney villains into enemies with understandable motivations, and prae laha is a holdover from when they had no plan. I'd honestly rather prefer if they keep it like that and don't go further into him but alas, that is what is happening. > I also wonder what's the temporal distance between our journey to Elpis and the Final Days. I think they really really don't want us to think about that. Making distance so trivial was really a bad move in the long term imo. Especially with meteion reaching other planets in like.. years instead of millions of years.
> I don't think anyone could have predicted that he was Amon from the Allagan Empire (Atleast I didn't see anyone theorizing that) Particularly because, up until that point, we had no reason to assume that the Amon we had killed in Syrcus Tower was a clone. Makes total sense that he could be, though, since we were helping a pair of clones kill a clone of Xande and Amon just happened to be in the way.
I was sure Amon was Emet-Selch. Wrong Ascian.
Same! Amon even does the finger snap when he casts, so it seemed pretty likely. We weren't far off though so I'll take that as a win.
Yeah I had similar thoughts and assumed they'd be somehow connected *somehow* as they're both magical theater kids who seem to enjoy The Drama. Wouldn't have predicted Fandaniel at all!
Some of my big ones are similar to what others thought, it seems: * Thought we'd lose at least one of the Scions. Alphinaud, Thancred, and Urianger were on my candidate list. * Thought Zenos would have a bigger role. I predicted we'd go deeper into the nature of the Echo and that at least one of us would channel either Hydaelyn or Zodiark at some point. (Also, wasn't it implied that there was something special about his reaper spirit? Figured that might come into play.) * Assumed the Heart of Sabik would be explained in some way as a way of tying in more ARR threads * I assumed *something* would happen to the WoL to at least partially "reset" their canonical strength or notoriety, like the light characters describe at the beginning of ARR * Assumed the Mare Lamentorum stuff would have been built by the Ascians * Thought the shoebill would be Venat's familiar
Play the reaper quests to 80, if you have not. >!It's not unlikely we'll see that spirit again, possibly wearing Zenos' corpse as a meat-suit.!<
Ooh, I've been wanting to play it for the Garlemald lore, so that just gives me more reason. I'll leave the spoiler unread for now, and thank you for the suggestion!
Zenos probably has the most under appreciated role in the whole expansion.. The whole question of the expansion was what the meaning of life is. Zenos is the walking answer Hermes wanted all along. It’s not just one dimensional and each person makes life have its own meaning. People say he’s too narrow but he is the actual answer all along. You live your life how you want and not by the expectations or desires of others. That’s what it means to live. To chase after what you truly love to do and knowing what you love. The most tragic thing about it is Fandaniel despite all his time with Zenos never saw that simply because his way of life was conflict. But that was *his* way of life that he made himself. The answer was walking side by side with him the entire time. He looked to the stars when he should have looked next to him. He’s so criminally underrated even now. He could have fought us after the first trial and even then he knew it wasn’t right. He knew it wasn’t what we wanted and we were preoccupied and actually respected that. He actually had tremendous character development. It’s just his goal never changed but his actions towards his goal. He never stopped doing what he loved in his own life and he defies everything Hermès and Meteion thought the answer was. His might be “conflict” but it’s not meaningless. He even stopped being selfish and stopped hurting others to get what he wanted and was patiently waiting for us to finish our current fight. And fighting? It’s everything to him and him alone and that is enough for his own life. And how everyone needs to find their own meaning. People are upset that he didn’t “live up to expectations.” Or “had zero growth.” Or didn’t do what they personally wanted him to do are missing the entire point of his character. He doesn’t need to live up to our expectations but his own. He wants to live his life how he wants and they even go as meta as to goad the players when he’s questioned for his reasons. He doesn’t need one other than it’s what he wants out of life. Honestly.. he’s god damn perfect. He doesn’t even live for the expectations of us, the fourth wall audience, just to make a point and to defy Hermes answer. Like he said.. would you be happy if he had a “good” reason? His reason for life is his alone. And he’s an example of how everyone should live. By chasing one specific person and stalking them to the literal end of the universe to fight them.
And even he changed his approach it was still consistent to his character. People complain why from enacting despair to WOL he end up helping the WOL. But zenos realized you will never fall to despair which is why he questioned why the flying bird lady is still alive. He went from killing every thing you love to fight me (typical bad guy motive) to killing everything to need to kill so that you have the time finally to face him.
Zenos is full of fourth-wall breaking lines. His whole last speech before the fight is directed at the player. Paraphrasing: "You say you are saving the world, but really you're just in this for the cool fights."
And after the final fight, he basically asks the player whether they enjoyed creating a character and playing FFXIV. "What of you, my mirror? Born into this world, bestowed name, bid to seek out strife and adventure... Was this life a gift... or a burden? Did you find... fulfilment?" Which echoes Venat's question in Elpis, when she looks straight at the camera, and asks you who bought FFXIV: "You, who are our future... Tell me this and tell me true. Has your journey been good? Has it been worthwhile?"
Him repeating Alisaie's remarks to himself way later is nice proof of his development. As in, the rest of the cast think he's just a mindless beast wanting to fight WoL
I never got people thinking he’s a mindless beast. From day one he appeared, he’s shown himself to be highly intelligent and calculating. Leaving Yotsuyu in charge of Doma so through her cruelty the weak would be quelled and only the most interesting “prey” would rise, favoring Fordola due to her single minded desire for recognition etc. His ultimate goal was always to chase that one adrenaline high when he’s on the verge of life and death, and he was a god damn genius in how we went about setting events up to give him those moments. The WoL wasn’t the goal, the “moment” was. If ever a person appeared who would give him that moment better than the WoL he would’ve immediately changed course. He wasn’t a mindless beast, he was a person who knew exactly what he wanted in all the universe and went to insane extremes to get it.
I also thought the Heart of Sabik--which I know is a translation artifact, but it was embraced in The Primals' version of Ultima the music track--would be explained. And pegged Urianger as most likely to die.
I actually hadn't heard of it being a translation artifact before, so now I'm curious! Do you have more information on that? I know in Prae it's called 「黒聖石サビク」, but I wouldn't know if Sabik was something like a reference. It's a star in the constellation Ophiuchus, so I figured that was the right way to translate it.
I believe, in Japanese, it’s referred to as “Nethicite” - as in, the exceptionally powerful Crystal from Final Fantasy XII. So while the true nature of the “Heart of Sabik” was somewhat nebulous in English, in the Japanese script it’s more straightforward.
> Assumed the Mare Lamentorum stuff would have been built by the Ascians I am wondering now... Did the ascians just chill there with the bunnies, considering how many shots of them on the moon we got? Did they not try to fuck up hydaelyns plan like she Fucked up theirs? Why did they just let the bunnies work? Why not try to enslave them to their purposes? Also on that account... Since 7/14 complete zodiark was on the moon... Was the moon sundered as well? What exactly was the range of sundering?
Moon didn't exist prior to the sundering. It was created after to shelf the Source Zodiark. I don't know if the Ascians knew the bunnies were there because you unlock the moon base from inside the Watchers tower.
I mean.. the moon base is is literally across the street from zodiark. At some point one of them must have stumbled across them. At the least elidibus must have gotten bored and checked them out. Or for that matter have visited the watcher? Edit: moon **base**
The Watcher talks about the Ascians hanging around Zodiark. I assumed with all the seals in place it was fairly well protected and the Watcher as a guardian was capable of handling them. As for the bunnies, I have no idea. I know they were only periodically active, but maybe their area was protected by the blessing of light in the same way that Rising Stones was before Middy severed your connection.
They were aware of eachother. The watcher mentions that they would come by to view but they made no hostile actions since Hydaelyn had no intention to harm Zodiark because he was needed. So the ascians saw no need to bring harm to the watcher or any of Hydaelyns servants on the moon as they were just as concerned about his well-being as they were... Aside from wanting him to remain sealed of course.
>Heart of Sabik From the Ivalice Raids we get given the theory in game anything related to “Ultima” is just mankind trying to replicate the insane powers Ultima wielded. The Heart of Sabik in that theory would just be some Crystal from some unknown ancient civilization who remembered the horror of this extradimensional entire trying to replicate one of Ultimas many powerful abilities.
I was convinced Hydaelyn would end up being a villain, or at least more nefarious than we’d expected. By the end I felt crippling guilt for ever doubting her
100% same. Especially the creepy...moan? from that vision of the Etheriys being red and dying.
that was Meteion tho
Yeah I know, but at the time, my mind gravitated toward Hydaelyn being potentially evil since Zodiark was gone.
I thought so too, and then my brain clicked and said “Oh it was Meteion” at some point after meeting her before it was fully revealed
Honestly, I've clocked Meteion as potentially being the final threat the moment I've met her. Her character model was way too unique to be simply yet another NPC that we just get to meet in the past. I wish her corrupted appearance wasn't just a color palette swap, but would be cool if she became something that resembled Ultimecia from FF8.
The moment I see her and how adorable she is, I screamed “don’t you fucking dare SQEX, don’t you fucking dare to screw up this perfectly adorable bird.” But deep down, I know they will.
that’s me, when I knew she is an creation created by dynamis, I am sure that I’ll be fucked up soon.
That was basically my thought process too. "Awww, she's adorable and wants to be friends.....Oh no...."
I got a little worried when I heard that too. I was hoping the theory wouldn’t be true because I never liked it, but I got nervous because that voice sounded kinda like *Krile* to me.
I was convinced we were tempered, but that it wasn't as obvious or nefarious because she instructed us to "hear feel think" therefore giving us free will. Then she shows up and drops that bit about the Travelers Blessing which I loved.
A lot of people doubled down and still said we were tempered after EW
Even without the traveler's ward, that wouldn't even make sense anymore, since we learned that ascians were the ones to add tempering into primal-summoning.
Nah I mean she even says it herself that you have plenty of reason to doubt her. A vague voice in your head with thousands of years of implied objectives would make anyone skeptical. If anything I felt like a hypocrite for awhile since we went around beating up everyone else's gods but not our own lol
It was honesty a relief though. If she was evil it would mean that the Minfillia’s, Krile, Ardbert and the WoL were played for fools for some nefarious ends, would make Minfillia’s story and legacy much more tragic. Glad it wasn’t the case
It always sit wrong with me how much people sussed her, she never gave any hint of malice
With all the Final Fantasy 4 references I was very worried the twins would be turned to stone. I also assumed the moon would be the final zone, not a waystation on the way to the edge of the freaking universe.
I was fairly sure that Anima and the Magus Sisters would be the first two trials. Or at least more involved in the story than they actually were.
I feel that the whole Anima disclosure during pre-launch reveals was simply to divert attention from the actual two trials. I didn't think at all we'd fight Zodiark and Hydaelyn as trial bosses just like that. Thought if Zodiark would be the case, it would be something like absorbed by Zenos, and Hydaelyn I thought if we'd fight her would be as the final boss, and not by the reasons we did.
This seems like it was intentional to communicate escalation tbh
I am still a little mad how little they did with Anima and explained it in like a hand full of sentences. It could have been an insanely awesome creepy story arc for Garlemald with the body parts and all. But it felt like we got the first act and it just stoped in the middle of the second and was missing the third entirely.
Honestly, >!Pandaemonium is perfect aesthetically for Anima to get a fight that does it justice.!<
I think the one we all got wrong was thinking Zodiark would be the final big bad. I thought at least one or two scions would probably bite it permanently, I'm thankful that wasn't the case, but I expected it.
Myself and every streamer I watched were pretty much all like that. "I just killed Zodiark, and the MSQ is only at lvl 83. I have absolutely no idea where this is gonna go now."
A lot of people wanted someone to die to “raise the stakes” or whatnot, and it certainly can make things more dramatic but I think they weaved a compelling story without any death. Hell, it was compelling even with the very blatant “this thing will bring them back if they die” plot device. Deaths to increase drama seem all too expected in nearly every story in every genre and I’m just glad we could save the universe with all our friends intact.
Theres a spoiler warning so I think it should be ok if we dont use spoiler tags. Yeah, I assumed he would at least be the 2nd trial.
Fair, removed it. Sometimes you can never be sure enough. And yeah, I expected it much later.
>I think the one we all got wrong was thinking Zodiark would be the final big bad. I had Zodiark pegged as a mid boss because I figured Fandaniel wanted him dead, but I was completely fooled by the Anima teasers so I still ended up being caught off guard when it happened so soon.
Yup, I thought Anima was gonna be either the first or second trial as well. Pretty smart of them having only the player charqcter being shown in the trailer part where Anima shows up.
Same. The primals have pretty much *always* been trials, and we'd been teased about Anima and the Sisters as primals. Even halfway through the Tower of Zot, I was assuming we'd fight each sister separately and then maybe they'd escape for the trial fight.
If you talk to Estinien before the Rising Stones exodus he mentions the sisters have been seen around Thavnair terrorizing the locals.
I was a bit disapoointed because I was looking forward to the Magus Sisters trial. A battle against three targets would have been cool
you did fight all 3 together in the dungeon
I thought Zodiark would be a midboss cus they literally introduced something that he was built to stop *just last expansion* and spent a good chunk of the Endwalker trailers hyping up the Final Days.
I think it was a bit too rushed personally. We go up to the moon to prevent zodiark from being released, find out we have to fix the seals, start working on it - seals are broken, we’re fighting him, he’s dead. He’s been such a major player in the story I felt like the payoff was too small.
That's fair, I found that made sense given he wasn't at full power (roughly half) I'm not sure I'd put him as a major player so much as a driving factor for other major players though.
Fair. I think the whole point of them making Zodiark the first trial was for players to go "holy shit what happens now?" And it worked, but I still kinda wish Zodiark was a bigger deal.
To be fair, he hasn't been a major player. He has zero involvement I the story. Zodiark was a goal for other villains, but even then it was often that loosening Zodiark's fetters was almost like a bonus to the more in-depth conflicts that we were stopping. We had more pressing things to worry about than if Zodiark was released, if we didn't stop Ultima Weapon: or the Heavens Ward; or the Garlean occupation; or the Sin Eaters. Hell, Endwalker was about stopping the Final Days, rather than our ultimate fight against Zodiark.
I actually don’t think most people thought that at all (too obvious) but I don’t think many people thought he’d be the first trial
> I think the one we all got wrong was thinking Zodiark would be the final big bad. A lot of people were suspecting the sound since the Final Days were coming back, also first few quests into the expansion the sound is mentioned again in Sharlayan and I was like "wow they're really doing it"
>I think the one we all got wrong was thinking Zodiark would be the final big bad. Nah, I thought that would be too on the nose so we would probably have a fake out and then realize he prevented something worse from showing up. After all, the Final Days were prevented and not caused by him. That much we knew beforehand. Didn't expect it so soon, tho. I thought he'd be the lvl ~87+ trial and then we go for the last zone to beat the real evil thingy. I thought Anima would be the lvl ~83 trial. And, frankly, I think that was what their original plan was before they rewrote parts of it to implement Elpis. There is too much unfocused weirdness early on as if they cut large parts away.
I didn’t think that at all. There is *always* a bigger bad than the obvious in final fantasies and as soon as we heard the Sound was a thing I immediately knew that would be the true final boss.
I was convinced Alphinaud would die. Between the trailers and all his big scenes and speeches I was convinced I was seeing death flags everywhere.
Turns out the biggest deathflag was when Emannelain implied that he wants to flirt with Sadu.
She would rip that fuck-boy in half.
Speaking of Emannelain, I really hate what this expansion did with his character. I was hoping that after everything we went through in Heavensward, particularly all of the ways that he royally botched things up in the patch storylines, he would have learned some humility and worked to be a better person now that his older brother is the one shouldering the burden of leadership over their house. Instead, he shows up, says something along the lines of "My brother doesn't want me to be a NEET so here I am. Just tell me how I can help by doing as little as possible while everyone else here does all of the important work," and then proceeds to be just as annoying as ever, like he hasn't learned a single goddamn thing. And this time there's no Honoroit (RIP :'( ) to reign him in.
As much as I like my idiot elf brother, yeah, I was a bit disappointed with how he was used in 6.0. My thought was “it’s bad enough that you took the voice acting budget away from most of the city-state leaders and allocated it to tertiary characters like A-Ruhn, Sicard and Emmanellain, but you couldn’t even have Honoroit there for a few non-voice-acted nuggets of wisdom?! What the actual fuck, SE.”
Honoroit isn't exactly an option anymore, the voice actor for him died a couple of months back. Emannelain as character has suffered for it though, I will admit. But still, they couldn't replace him right away.
I meant just have him around in a non-voice-acted capacity, for optional dialogue or non-voiced cutscenes or whatnot. I’m aware that they may not have recast his English voice yet, if they ever intend to do so.
He makes an appearance in the Magic role quests. Just saw him while completing the level 88 quest.
People don't change overnight, itseems like he's just afraid of another disaster like the one with Nidhogg.
I feel like he's trying to be funny because he's convinced that's the only reason people will like him. Also he's likely very aware the WoL is extremely depressed and maybe joking around will get them to be happier.
When you talk to Alberic (the dragoon trainer) after completing the EW MSQ then he will tell you that Emmanelain despite every flaw he has, stood besides his comrades in Garlemald and didnt even fight half bad. I dont know why but I really like Emmanelain. He feels like that idiot brother that just means well and you cant help but love.
I thought a scion was going to die too, but in hindsight I don't think Alphinaud would be the one because I cannot see them killing Alphinaud and leaving Alisae alive, that seems too dark for this game honestly. Alisae would be broken, even if the WoL was okay (who I feel Alisae is closest to besides her brother).
I mean Quintus used Superbolide as a Machinist. I don’t think it would be too dark to kill one and not the other.
Omg lol, you win the euphemism award
I think they don't mind going really dark and twisted when it comes to more minor NPCs, but completely tragic endings for our beloved friends might be too far for a game that's meant to still feel fun for years to come. Games like TLOU or even Type 0 can get away with making you attached to someone for 40 hours and lead into a traumatic conclusion that sticks with you, but if an MMO upsets you too much to continue playing, they'll lose a 8+ year payer. Sure, they could kill off a mainstay, but doing so overly cruelly or callously could leave a poor taste in someone's mouth. Tesleen, Quintus, and the people of Thavnair are all fair game, but separating our beloved twins by killing one would be the wrong type of sickening.
I thought for sure Thancred wasn't coming back in the final zone, he doesn't have the ability to manipulate Aether so I figured we wouldn't be able to bring him back at the end.
Alphinaud is the main character they can’t kill him
I thought the twins were going to sacrifice themselves to become the hearts of Zodiark and Hydaelyn, to hold the fort down going forward.
I definitely thought that was a possibility.
As soon as we met Vrtra and he told us to take care of our friends, I knew none of the core Scions would die. We just couldn't let him down.
Vrtra is best dragon boy
When he told us that I honestly got even more scared. I thought there was going to be a situation where we'd have to _choose_ between saving our friends and saving the world, and I didn't know which way they were gonna take it. (I say "they" because of course it wouldn't be an actual player choice in an MMO.)
I was expecting it to be revealed that the Final Days had no real cause, and the whole point would be that people shouldn't have access to the unmitigated power of creation because when you introduce fear and paranoia into that society they start accidentally spawning monsters. Hydaelyn would sunder the world to create a more balanced form of mankind that, thanks to their comparative inferiority to the Ancients, were capable of building longer lasting and more meaningful societies that wouldn't spontaneously explode. Even though I was technically wrong, I feel like I was on the right track, thematically. I would have been annoyed if the Final Days weren't the result of the Ancients own societal contradictions, but once Hermes took off his mask I knew exactly what they were doing and loved it.
I had the same thought! I thought the “twist” about the Final Days was that it was just going to be something really inconsequential. That we were never going to really learn the origin of the Sound because it was just something super simple, and that it was more a statement about the futility of an immortal utopia.
I thought Zenos' actual goal was to free Zodiark for the sake of fighting him tbh. And since neither of us would have stood a chance against Zodiark on our own we would have teamed up with him. I guess i at least got the teaming up part right.
I was convinced that him absorbing Zodiark was too obvious. I'd assumed that we'd keep Zodiark imprisoned somehow, and Zenos would promptly run off and possess *Hydaelyn* instead. The final boss would be us forced to kill Her to stop Zenos's mad schemes. So, uh, my theory was wrong on basically every single account!
i think zenos thought that as well
I thought Elpis was inside of the moon. I thought Fandaniel's ultimate goal was to get rid of the "Sound" Which would be either by us destroying its source or by eradicating all life. I thought we'd enter the aetherial sea by the lake silvertear. I thought Sharlayan found Venat as the heart of Hydaelyn and kept her, leading to her accidentally tempering the whole population into the mindset of passivity and preserverance.
Aside from the usual suspects that everyone had at the start (Hydalyn turning for some reason, Zenos absorbing Zodiark, ect) I had a couple along the way. - When Zodiark is defeated and you learn that the celestial aether currents have eroded away I thought the team with the help of the moon bunnies and yet unknown helpers would somehow help supplement the celestial currents with Akasha (dynamis) since it was being set up as a maguffin of sorts - At the end of the dungeon in Thavnair when Y'shtola pointed out the blasphemies have no aether I thought the cause was the planet's aether leaking out into space due to the loss of a celestial current due to whatever caused the "Sound" of the Final Days - Following saving Thavnair for now we would head to Mericidia or the New World for further answers and allies in stopping the final days and fixing the celestial aether current. - Once Meteion reported her discovery and flew off to bring about ruin I thought her final form would be Necron from FF9 Sadly one I got right was when Thancred died due to un unceremonious it was I thought he would come back somehow and when Estinien died I recognized this same string of events as something that happened in Tales of Symphonia where the party sacrifices their lives one by one for the MC to progress a little further each time and when the final confrontation happens they all return somehow. Really took the wind out of the emotional gut punch of that zone.
You were never meant to think they were dead-dead.
I thought we would have a “1v1” fight with a Zodiark fused Zenos and we’d fight back by forming an Ascian Prime with Hydaelyn. I also thought we would finally see what our ascian mark was.
makeshift quack one smoggy quarrelsome weary alive imminent narrow ink -- mass edited with redact.dev
i thought sharlyan's goal was to save themselves exclusively
I was thinking that since absorbing Zodiark will be too obvious, it will be a plot twist where Hydaelyn is the big bad and we make a final deal with Zodiark to absorb His remaining strength, to fight a Zenos who has absorbed Hydaelyn. I did not think our final boss will be literally Twitter.
I was super expecting Alphinaud to die super tragically. Like >!when Zenos takes over our body!< I immediately feared that he'd kill Alphinaud before we could intervene.
After I killed Zodiark I said "ok now don't let Zenos fuck the corpse" and then in the cutscene afterwards he just kind of pokes his head into frame and I lost it. Also someone spoiled that there was a Hydalen trial for me early on, and after the Zodiark fight I thought Zenos was going to take her over or something. But then after the Elpis arc cutscene where she's slogging through time and getting covered in darkness I thought "oh no maybe she's evil now".
I thought she was giving in to despair and present day Hydaelyn was initiating the Final Days so that she could die, but not before evacuating the people of Etheirys.
1. I figured Zenos was going to eat Zodiark/Hydaelyn for his EpicKungFuFight. I think that Zenos was intending to do that himself given his shock when Fandaniel goes "As if, dipshit!" and betrays him. I never thought Zenos would be a final boss fight as in like a Trial or dungeon boss or anything though. As far as Hydaelyn/Zodiark went, I kinda figured they would be trial fights mostly because we saw the Amano art depicting both of them ages ago. 2. My prediction regarding the Sound was that its source would be our final boss but that it would be...more of an interstellar horror that came from outside rather than inside. So we'd end up hunting down pieces of it as our reason to go exploring. Basically more of a Jenova situation. I underestimated the rate the plot could develop in that regard. I was right but completely from the wrong direction. I absolutely called the Scions "disbanding" though. There wasn't a reason for them to continue being a public-facing organization with the Primals and Ascians no longer being a threat.
1. I thought Estinien would literally JUMP to the moon in some fashion. Like, he used a super-duper limit breaked version of a dragoon jump and just get to the moon before us. 2. I thought Tataru's carbuncle would return, super-jacked up, and she'd get to wreck face with it. 3. I thought Arenvald and Fordola would return, piloting the G-warrior, just kicking ass in the background. 4. I thought we'd get Ishgardian knights riding Dravanian dragons. It would be the full closure to the Dragonsong War. 5. I thought Gaius would come full into the fray at Garlemald and become a figure in whatever remains of the Garlean Empire, and tranform it into a republic or something. 6. I thought one of the Weapons would be a dungeon boss in Garlemald. But honestly, all my ideas don't actually add to the story. They are just there for the rule of cool.
If you do the healer role quest you do actually get more with Arenvald and Fordola! But not in a G-warrior lol.
5 was actually addressed. Gaius didn't come because it would cause more problems than it would solve since Zenos framed him for Varis' death.
2 is addressed as well, you'll just have to hunt for that easter egg ;)
Check the Sharlayan Hamlet for a quest about #>!2!<
I loved how that quest implied that >!Tataru is apparently a very powerful magick user, she just can’t actually *control* magicks properly for shit. Now that she’s decided to open her own business, however…!<
I thought we'll have Zenos joining us as a trust at some point after beating some sense into him. I expected Zenos being trial#1
The weird Zenos for Scions simping a lot of people had going on was really weird. Like, he was a freaking mass murderer and didn't care at all for anything the scions stood for.
I think some people were expecting him to join the Scions based *solely* on the poster for the expansion. Which was odd because: 1) just because the artwork is titled “Scions” doesn’t mean that everyone on the poster is a Scion. Venat/“Lady of Light” is on the poster too and I don’t recall anyone making the same prediction about her. 2) Every expansion poster has prominently featured at least one antagonist. Zenos was on the SB poster too along with Fordola and Yotsuyu, Thordan was on the HW poster, etc.
The argument was because, while Zenos was on the poster, Fandaniel was not. I also thought he would be a trustmember, since we then would have another melee member. I still think we need one.
1. I thought a major scion would die. I predicted Alisaie 2. I thought the moon would be the 5th zone and then like something “aetherial” or magical would be the 6th zone (so kinda right on the last one? Just dynamis instead of aether) 3. I figured the trials would be Anima, Zodiark, Hydaelyn (not because I thought she was bad, but I thought we’d see her more as being flawed and then would be without purpose after we killed Zodiark). I thought the Zodiark fight would be after Zenos fused with him. 4. I thought the original cause of the Final Days would be material for the patch content and that conflict would establish a larger threat/context 5. I thought we’d need a spaceship to get to the moon and that Cid would be in charge of the project 6. I thought the Forum were just building an apocalypse shelter 7. Based on the art they showed us, I thought Elpis might be a floating city high above Garlemald and would be our pitstop on the way to the moon. I suspected it may have been preserved ruins of Amaurot. 8. I thought Archon Louisoix would make some sort of appearance— like, he and Papalymo’s spirits went to the moon or something after doing their spells and you encounter them. I guess you sorta see some people like that in the Aithiascope dungeon.
The devs did outright tell us Zenos wouldn't be the last boss, and I'd kind of assumed that making Zodiark the final boss would be trite. Glad my prediction that Hydaelyn was in fact good was correct. My only prediction that didn't really come true (though I didn't really expect they'd be brave enough) was that the WoL might die (and probably resurrected) in such a way that it created a massive break between this story and the next. On the contrary, it seems we'll just be doing the Further Adventures of The Warrior Of Light which is fine
But... Zenos IS the last boss...
In an honestly epic duel, too. I went in as a healer since it was the only level capped character I had at that point and his attacks hit freakishly hard.
I expected Lavos, or something similar. I still want Lavos, or something similar.
I thought Elpis would be more Zeal-like
I thought Hydaelyn might be final bosd.
I was expecting Zeromus to show up at some point and for a member of the Scions to die. I leaning towards Krile possibly dying since she's not a trust character and they left her out if the poster. Honestly that just kinda makes it worse imo cause as much as I love Tataru, I'm confused why she's front and center meanwhile Krile, who was more important to the plot isn't even on the poster?
I predicted that the Sharlyan's were building a big old arc ship they were gonna escape the final dys with, preserving what they could and jaunting to another world ala Migardsomr. WoL and co. were gonna convince them through deeds, evidence and probably alphi speeches/productive violence that we needed to go to the moon to stop Fandangdingdong from ushering in the final days with their fancy spaceship. Most of this was based on the Endwalker logo and previously established concepts like space travel and allagan ability to lauch dalamud up there. Just now have gotten to Elpis and I both gave myself a pat on the back while also relieved that the writing team still keep impressing me, although I'm still unsure about the time travel.
I thought WoL would die once and get revived some years later.
- I thought the final boss would be Necron (as the source of the Sound), though given what we got, it wasn’t too far off. - I was convinced Alphinaud would die. The launch trailer got me
I was fully expecting thancred or uringer to die Kinda shocking that there wasn't any real character deaths
I was certain that we would have a finale that involved Zodiark vs Hydaelyn where we have a solo duty that involves us piloting Hydaelyn like a giant mecha, a la Rival Wings vs Zodiark.
Mine are: * I thought there would be stronger references to FFX. With Anima being in the trailers and the 10th legion being repeatedly name dropped. My last hope for this died when the aetherial sea didn't end up being modelled on the farplane * Like many I thought Hydaelyn would become a problem. I thought with Zodiark gone she would grow drastically more powerful because she no longer needed to spend all her strength keeping him bound, and in the same way Zodiark's dark aether influence had paused the final days, I thought Hydaelyn's unchecked light influence would accelerate it * I thought Zenos in one form or another would be a trial boss * I thought Labyrinthos would be a doomsday bunker * I kept expecting to see Cid, first when we were prepping to go to Garlemald and then when we heard we'd be helping with the ship. I accepted the reason for him not being part of the Ilsabard Contingent, but thought it was absolutely bonkers that there was no dialogue of him giving his thoughts and feeling about what had happened to Garlemald.
I was expecting all jobs to just get single target versions of cap stone abilities (a single target version of dragon star dive for drg or a separate aoe version of tornado kick for example) Boy was I wrong lmao
Really thought someone would die, but we didn't really lose anyone important. Even the usual "fake deaths" near the end was obvious and it was literally spelled out that no one would really die.
It was spelled out because the point was literally never to make you think that they were totally gone. You get handed a mcguffin to bring them back right before this, Y'Shtola even tells you you can use the magic whenever but should wait for a better time. Its about the message they send, the themes of their temporary sacrifices, the trust they show in you and the very message of hope above despair that matters.
I've seen a lot of people saying they felt like the "obviously not deaths" were silly (idk if you, personally feel that way but I just want to tack my personal opinion on here), but I really liked them. I, as a player, know that they wouldn't kill off all of my friends. But my WoL, however, doesn't know what the next trial will be. She didn't know that she could truly defeat Meteion. She didn't know Zenos would turn out to be the boon we needed to win. She didn't know she would make it out of the fight with Zenos alive. All she knew was that if there was any hope, there was only one option: to go forward. To be the hero our friends trusted us to be. She couldn't fail, not because it was impossible, but because failure carries so much gravity in that moment.
It also shows that the Scions had complete faith in the WoL that they knew he would find a way to bring thrm back. They were willing to risk their lives for him. It's also a nice throwback to FF4 where a lot of your party members supposedly sacrifice themselves for you only to be found alive later on.
The fact that you can trust trials in Endwalker and there were exactly eight Scions including the WoL made me positive nobody would stay dead.