Final Fantasy XIV - Kiwi Free Company

[Kane Lives]

The people that'd leave Garleans to die will almost never understand that they'd be considered the villains in the setting. Same with people that think Yotsuyu doesn't deserve empathy because "she worked with imperialists", albeit these people are a lot rarer than the ones that call you a fascist for liking Garleans.

I'm in a FC with at least one of these illiterate hacks.

Naturally, said hack considers xirself to be a writer, and loves Eclipse Phase. These stereotypes really do write themselves. Won't be surprised he's a fat AmeriNEET irl.

 

[Sunflower Samurai]

I get it that half of the playerbase goes garlemald bad because muh fash but wasnt it sorta clear from ARR that most garlemald grunts were pumped with magick roids or some shit that made them into drones or was that never a thing

at that point you're just killing a bunch of lobotomites

 

[CharcoalChkn]

I get it that half of the playerbase goes garlemald bad because muh fash but wasnt it sorta clear from ARR that most garlemald grunts were pumped with magick roids or some shit that made them into drones or was that never a thing

at that point you're just killing a bunch of lobotomites

I feel like of the story was told from the Garlean's perspective it would be very easy to make them out as the good guys.

They got their lunch money stolen, beat up and shoved in a locker by the jock magic users. And are now trying to take back what was taken from them/they were bullied out of because they were weaker.

Idk just goes to show a ton of people really aren't able to see from multiple perspectives and empathise with others despite wether or not you agree with their course of action.

When people can side with Emet and say he's right but think the Garlean's are irrideemable and totally wrong for what they are doing, my brain does some flips.

 

[Zeke Von Genbu]

I get it that half of the playerbase goes garlemald bad because muh fash but wasnt it sorta clear from ARR that most garlemald grunts were pumped with magick roids or some shit that made them into drones or was that never a thing

at that point you're just killing a bunch of lobotomites

We've had chemical infusion steroid enhancement test experiments that turned people into monsters, Zenos iirc was tested to be made even stronger then the average Garlean, but on a mass level? Most the conscripts are effectively cannon fodder to protect and expand the superior Garlean race and its empire, which if you consider that then Asahi despite being an unquestionable jackass is also a victim in his own right but most people ignore that due to him being an asshole.

I think they might have like magick gadgets that let them faux manipulate aether to imitate low level spells from ARR and other miscellaneous buffs, but I don't think that is what you're talking about.

 

[Sunflower Samurai]

We've had chemical infusion steroid enhancement test experiments that turned people into monsters, Zenos iirc was tested to be made even stronger then the average Garlean, but on a mass level? Most the conscripts are effectively cannon fodder to protect and expand the superior Garlean race and its empire, which if you consider that then Asahi despite being an unquestionable jackass is also a victim in his own right but most people ignore that due to him being an asshole.

I think they might have like magick gadgets that let them faux manipulate aether to imitate low level spells from ARR and other miscellaneous buffs, but I don't think that is what you're talking about.

now that i read on the wiki i was confusing it and that was only a thing since the garlemald bit of EW, apparently they were just conscripts like you said

 

[Übertroon]

We've had chemical infusion steroid enhancement test experiments that turned people into monsters, Zenos iirc was tested to be made even stronger then the average Garlean, but on a mass level? Most the conscripts are effectively cannon fodder to protect and expand the superior Garlean race and its empire, which if you consider that then Asahi despite being an unquestionable jackass is also a victim in his own right but most people ignore that due to him being an asshole.

I think they might have like magick gadgets that let them faux manipulate aether to imitate low level spells from ARR and other miscellaneous buffs, but I don't think that is what you're talking about.

Magick casters in ARR are usually foreign conscripts who have magick aptitude. Hell, there's the 4th legion that has mages coming out of every orifice

 

[Vapewizard]

Some of the Garlemald discourse I've seen on twitter includes people who base their complaints on being from a 'colonized' country, but then it turns out they just grew up in a comfortable western country and/or are using shit that happened to their grandparents as ammo to complain about a storyline in a weeb MMO and I always found that to be funny.

 

[Rich Evans Ayypologist]

Garlemald suffers from ludicrously inconsistent characterization between the first three iterations and then gets two wildly different characterizations in the fourth. then it gets cucked in the fifth - which is supposed to be that arc's climax - so we can run some errands underground, hang out with bunnies, and remember that no-one's ever really dead about 3 separate times. I can't really blame people just slapping whatever interpretation on the empire that they want, because the ball was dropped pretty hard on giving it actual gravitas.

For every slice of content that meditates on the geopolitical factors that drive a people to empire and conquest, there's another that has them being saturday morning cartoon villains.

 

[Zeke Von Genbu]

Magick casters in ARR are usually foreign conscripts who have magick aptitude. Hell, there's the 4th legion that has mages coming out of every orifice

I know that, but I also am pretty sure their were casters and other soldiers who used abilities that are meant to basically be magitek stored gadgets that acted as a technological catalyst. I think one spell they casted was like "Aegis" or something like that. Which is why in ARR you see conscripts who need to cast "spells" to use Rampart or an evasion buff that wasn't called Featherfoot back when Featherfoot was an actual ability they could have used instead. It was very much an early thing during around the ARR era as after that they conscripts are either purely physical or they just use aether normally like the Ninja Garlemald agents, but it did exist.

 

[Zilortha]

I mean the whole idea is that she's literally Satan.

That's not a joke by the way, both are godlike mythical beings accociated with light who caused mankind to be "exiled from paradise" or sundered in her case. It's just she goes for more of a Gnostic angle without there being a evil god on the other side.

Wouldn't Zodiark be considered the "evil got on the other side" from our perspective?

 

[Dave.]

"I was crying laughing during this and before this and after"

Right...

 

[Zeke Von Genbu]

Wouldn't Zodiark be considered the "evil got on the other side" from our perspective?

Zodiark isn't really evil imo, he's more a reflection of the wills of his creators. Now if you consider them evil is hotly up for debate, but I personally don't at least enough to be considered "dark gods" or what have you. FFXIV uses dark and light fantasy cosmology as more "states of being" then "moral alignments" like the very overused Good vs Evil and Law vs Chaos alignment axis chart where good/evil and chaos/law are actual forces that define morals. Light isn't good/evil it merely is, and the same goes with darkness they're more like extensions of the six elements then anything else.

Now my Gnosticism is very surface level as I only looked deep enough to understand a few concepts I kept seeing being referenced as being gnostic in other media. So if people more well read want to chime in and correct me I'll take that L, but basically from my understanding in Gnosticism (which is a sect of Christianity I believe) "God" as we'd see him is effectively evil and their are beings above even him. He is effectively a greater being who fell from what we'd likely consider Heaven and made the world shit out of spite when he fell from his paradise. The more true god is known typically as "Monad" (Xenoblade 1 fans might recognize this), and the God in our realm and our creator is typically known as "the Demiurge" or for you Persona 5 players "Yaltabaoth".

Zodiark doesn't really embody Demiurge or Monad to me. Hydaelyn is closer to the Demiurge, but the motives are vastly different. Zodiark from a mythological stand point more represents how Japan sees the moon, as in Japanese folklore the moon is in simple terms as I understand it is the paradise of the Gods/Kami and is a sacred place untouched by the flaws of mortals.

For example in the story of Princess Kaguya, Kaguya is a moon child who falls to earth and brings blessings to those around her like to her adopted parents, and when her moon people try to take her back when she becomes a young woman she must forget all she knew from earth to return to the moon. Because she is in essence one of the unwashed masses to the moon people. Kaguya attempts to vouch for the good in people despite their flaws and if anything those flaws make them who they are (where have I seen this before?), but she ultimately is forced to wear the veil and forgets everyone and ascends to the moon. The moon represents purity in its absolute form, which I feel is why EW uses the moon the way it does but it doesn't make any god damn sense in the game itself. It is like trying to understand what Elpis represents except you don't know what the Garden of Eden is at all. So it just looks like a cool clean forest-y area.

 

[John Titor]

I remember during the WoW streamer wave, Talisien (who has a reputation of being a spergy Blizzard simp, at least on 4chan) made a video about Praetorium and said they should move the bad guy speech into the battles. I was thinking "is he right?" I guess someone in SE agrees considering they moved some of Cid's lines to the gameplay moments.

Wouldn't Zodiark be considered the "evil got on the other side" from our perspective?

You know, you raise an interesting point in how many people are even aware Zodiark exists.

Zodiark isn't really evil imo, he's more a reflection of the wills of his creators. Now if you consider them evil is hotly up for debate, but I personally don't at least enough to be considered "dark gods" or what have you. FFXIV uses dark and light fantasy cosmology as more "states of being" then "moral alignments" like the very overused Good vs Evil and Law vs Chaos alignment axis chart where good/evil and chaos/law are actual forces that define morals. Light isn't good/evil it merely is, and the same goes with darkness they're more like extensions of the six elements then anything else.

Now my Gnosticism is very surface level as I only looked deep enough to understand a few concepts I kept seeing being referenced as being gnostic in other media. So if people more well read want to chime in and correct me I'll take that L, but basically from my understanding in Gnosticism (which is a sect of Christianity I believe) "God" as we'd see him is effectively evil and their are beings above even him. He is effectively a greater being who fell from what we'd likely consider Heaven and made the world shit out of spite when he fell from his paradise. The more true god is known typically as "Monad" (Xenoblade 1 fans might recognize this), and the God in our realm and our creator is typically known as "the Demiurge" or for you Persona 5 players "Yaltabaoth".

Zodiark doesn't really embody Demiurge or Monad to me. Hydaelyn is closer to the Demiurge, but the motives are vastly different. Zodiark from a mythological stand point more represents how Japan sees the moon, as in Japanese folklore the moon is in simple terms as I understand it is the paradise of the Gods/Kami and is a sacred place untouched by the flaws of mortals.

For example in the story of Princess Kaguya, Kaguya is a moon child who falls to earth and brings blessings to those around her like to her adopted parents, and when her moon people try to take her back when she becomes a young woman she must forget all she knew from earth to return to the moon. Because she is in essence one of the unwashed masses to the moon people. Kaguya attempts to vouch for the good in people despite their flaws and if anything those flaws make them who they are (where have I seen this before?), but she ultimately is forced to wear the veil and forgets everyone and ascends to the moon. The moon represents purity in its absolute form, which I feel is why EW uses the moon the way it does but it doesn't make any god damn sense in the game itself. It is like trying to understand what Elpis represents except you don't know what the Garden of Eden is at all. So it just looks like a cool clean forest-y area.

I'm no expert either but the jist of it is that there are godlike beings called Aeons spawned from the Monad and one Aeon (Sophia) failed a ritual and gave birth to the Demiurge, which is identified as the Old Testament God, who created the material world and demands absolute worship. Humans are believed to be fractures of Sophia trapped in the material world and it's humanity's goal to become one again (I guess this is as close to the Sundering as it gets). There's a Lucifer type figure known as Satanael who realized the Demiurge is a false God and fought to free humanity from his reign which is close to Venat's role (although her XII counterpart is far closer to Satanael crossed with Prometheus from Greek Mythology).

 

[Zeke Von Genbu]

I'm no expert either but the jist of it is that there are godlike beings called Aeons spawned from the Monad and one Aeon (Sophia) failed a ritual and gave birth to the Demiurge, which is identified as the Old Testament God, who created the material world and demands absolute worship. Humans are believed to be fractures of Sophia trapped in the material world and it's humanity's goal to become one again (I guess this is as close to the Sundering as it gets). There's a Lucifer type figure known as Satanael who realized the Demiurge is a false God and fought to free humanity from his reign which is close to Venat's role (although her XII counterpart is far closer to Satanael crossed with Prometheus from Greek Mythology).

Venat I think represents Demiurge in so far as the fact that she makes the sundered broken world, as iirc the world we live in is effectively considered a fallen world and in Gnosticism Demiurge makes the fallen world more or less on purpose. Which is why I say she represents that, but the motives are dramatically different as Venat does make a "fallen world" just she had a less than pure evil and malicious motive behind it. She is the bringer of the fallen world, but I think you could probably apply multiple characters into the whole of Demiurge's roles in this mythos and that the WoL loosely represents Satanael.

My ultimate point is I don't think Zodiark represents Demiurge, he represents Japanese moon folklore in tandem with all the narrative context around him. So if anything Zodiark in a somewhat ironic twist represents purity of the untouched flaws of "mortals" if anything then evil.

 

[Zilortha]

Zodiark isn't really evil imo, he's more a reflection of the wills of his creators. Now if you consider them evil is hotly up for debate, but I personally don't at least enough to be considered "dark gods" or what have you. FFXIV uses dark and light fantasy cosmology as more "states of being" then "moral alignments" like the very overused Good vs Evil and Law vs Chaos alignment axis chart where good/evil and chaos/law are actual forces that define morals. Light isn't good/evil it merely is, and the same goes with darkness they're more like extensions of the six elements then anything else.

Now my Gnosticism is very surface level as I only looked deep enough to understand a few concepts I kept seeing being referenced as being gnostic in other media. So if people more well read want to chime in and correct me I'll take that L, but basically from my understanding in Gnosticism (which is a sect of Christianity I believe) "God" as we'd see him is effectively evil and their are beings above even him. He is effectively a greater being who fell from what we'd likely consider Heaven and made the world shit out of spite when he fell from his paradise. The more true god is known typically as "Monad" (Xenoblade 1 fans might recognize this), and the God in our realm and our creator is typically known as "the Demiurge" or for you Persona 5 players "Yaltabaoth".

Zodiark doesn't really embody Demiurge or Monad to me. Hydaelyn is closer to the Demiurge, but the motives are vastly different. Zodiark from a mythological stand point more represents how Japan sees the moon, as in Japanese folklore the moon is in simple terms as I understand it is the paradise of the Gods/Kami and is a sacred place untouched by the flaws of mortals.

For example in the story of Princess Kaguya, Kaguya is a moon child who falls to earth and brings blessings to those around her like to her adopted parents, and when her moon people try to take her back when she becomes a young woman she must forget all she knew from earth to return to the moon. Because she is in essence one of the unwashed masses to the moon people. Kaguya attempts to vouch for the good in people despite their flaws and if anything those flaws make them who they are (where have I seen this before?), but she ultimately is forced to wear the veil and forgets everyone and ascends to the moon. The moon represents purity in its absolute form, which I feel is why EW uses the moon the way it does but it doesn't make any god damn sense in the game itself. It is like trying to understand what Elpis represents except you don't know what the Garden of Eden is at all. So it just looks like a cool clean forest-y area.

I'll admit my knowledge of Gnosticism is lacking too. But I was talking about from the player's perspective in the story. One of the major themes of the story is how morality is dictated by perspective and experience. So it's hard to define any of the villains as pure evil. Characters do evil things, but often for what they see as good reasons. The grey nature of morality is a reoccurring theme that the game focuses on time and time again.

From our perspective Zodiark and the Ascians are trying to destroy our world. At first we don't understand their reasons, but as the story progresses, we learn exactly why.

Spoiler

And as the story progresses we also start looking at the Ascians as much less sinister, cliched evildoers and more as sympathetic figures that we have no choice but to fight against.

And from the Ascians' perspective,

Spoiler

their world has already been destroyed, and we're actively trying to stop them from saving their reality.

So from the player's perspective? Zodiark is basically the embodiment of evil. I might be oversimplifying things a bit, but that's how I see it.

EDIT: I'm a retard and don't know how to do the cool spoiler, so my bad about that.

 

[CptnSnshn]

Wouldn't Zodiark be considered the "evil got on the other side" from our perspective?

Zodiark is more of a status quo than anything, he's not the god Venat is rebeling against in this analogy he's more of a personification of the system itself. God in at least most Gnostic interpretation tends to be a more active force of evil or conflict.

Interestingly though if you look deeper into Gnostisim a lot of familiar concepts come up, Humanity all having shards of divinity in them, Anima, Archons and Archons. Hell even the archons role could be seen as the same from an Ascian perspective.

"The demiurge creates the physical universe and the physical aspect of humanity.[73] The demiurge typically creates a group of co-actors named archons who preside over the material realm and, in some cases, present obstacles to the soul seeking ascent from it."

One could see the Archons as the Scions (Most ARE Archons after all) and the Demiurge being Venat. Of course none of it is one for one but it's an interesting thought that Gnosticism could have helped inspire the Ascians lore.

Damn @Zeke Von Genbu beat me too it.

 

[Zilortha]

Zodiark is more of a status quo than anything, he's not the god Venat is rebeling against in this analogy he's more of a personification of the system itself. God in at least most Gnostic interpretation tends to be a more active force of evil or conflict.

Interestingly though if you look deeper into Gnostisim a lot of familiar concepts come up, Humanity all having shards of divinity in them, Anima, Archons and Archons. Hell even the archons role could be seen as the same from an Ascian perspective.

"The demiurge creates the physical universe and the physical aspect of humanity.[73] The demiurge typically creates a group of co-actors named archons who preside over the material realm and, in some cases, present obstacles to the soul seeking ascent from it."

One could see the Archons as the Scions (Most ARE Archons after all) and the Demiurge being Venat. Of course none of it is one for one but it's an interesting thought that Gnosticism could have helped inspire the Ascians lore.

It's interesting to consider at least

 

[Zeke Von Genbu]

I'll admit my knowledge of Gnosticism is lacking too. But I was talking about from the player's perspective in the story. One of the major themes of the story is how morality is dictated by perspective and experience. So it's hard to define any of the villains as pure evil. Characters do evil things, but often for what they see as good reasons. The grey nature of morality is a reoccurring theme that the game focuses on time and time again.

From our perspective Zodiark and the Ascians are trying to destroy our world. At first we don't understand their reasons, but as the story progresses, we learn exactly why.

Spoiler

And as the story progresses we also start looking at the Ascians as much less sinister, cliched evildoers and more as sympathetic figures that we have no choice but to fight against.

And from the Ascians' perspective,

Spoiler

their world has already been destroyed, and we're actively trying to stop them from saving their reality.

So from the player's perspective? Zodiark is basically the embodiment of evil. I might be oversimplifying things a bit, but that's how I see it.

EDIT: I'm a retard and don't know how to do the cool spoiler, so my bad about that.

Inline spoiler is under the 3 dots next the font size button, farthest button on the right from there or you can just use [ISPOILER.][/.ISPOILER] (remove the periods) and place your text between it like this. I only use it when I feel using the normal spoiler breaks text formatting too much from my point as the normal spoiler is better at condensing my spergy tangents like this one.

I suppose from that perspective, especially very early in the story, you'd be correct. I just tend to see people to run with "Zodiark evil" because he's the dark crystal, when obviously that's not true and I think missing that be it due to illiteracy or just a simple mistake misses a lot of points about the plot. To this day I swear people still think "darkness bad" even after playing Shadowbringers, or they just bitch that Shadowbringers didn't make the WoL evil because muh dark knight. So I felt a need to correct that and I apologize if I was being too presumptuous

Still Zodiark and the Ascians don't really fit in the gnostic framework I think, as I understand it anyway, because the evil god Demiurge makes the entire world in all its misery on purpose for generally malicious reasons that no one in this game gets close to reaching that level of evil imo (closest is like Zenos or even Meteion and Hermes if you can set aside the sob stories they get in EW), which isn't true in this case. The world is in many ways miserable even beyond the Ascians and Zodiark existing and meddling. They obviously make it worse but they aren't in essence the bringer of suffering to the world that would otherwise be more akin to a paradise or at least more comfy as opposed to an existential burden of seemingly suffering for no good reason. That's why I assert that Venat fits that role better on a surface level due to their actions in EW.

I also wanted to use this discussion as a means to emphasize at least my interpretation of what Zodiark actually represents within the wholistic context of the plot thematically and symbolically, because while it didn't fix all my issues with EW's plot understanding Japan's moon mythos puts things in a different perspective that makes its usage of the moon make more sense.

 

[CptnSnshn]

Regardless of anything I do enjoy the irony that Zodiark the dark Primal embodies Status where as Hydalyn is about change.

 

[Delay BASED Netcode]

I once thought that the FF14 Harassment guidelines and conduct was over the top. But never did I believe that I could actually be retroactively jannie trannied by the mod team for an FC name and a inactive alt i've kept on another data center. Trap is offensive, Thot is offensive and even fucking Lewd is offensive when these motherfuckers let 18+ ERP brothels run wild in the PF board. Inshallah may they commit 41 faster.