A series of blog posts about a Warrior not that fond of war.<<< First | <<Previous | Next >>——————————————————————————————————————————————
Nidhogg has fallen. There is peace in our time. We are five levels deep into a ten level expansion.
I had not expected the great root-gnawer wyrm to fall so soon. Braced for a shocking twist, I sent Dominique through the clouds and into the Aery, where our Warrior proceeded to murder fifty or so dragons with a big axe and watch Estinien swoop in to killsteal the final one. Oh sure, there were some revelations on the past after the deed was done, but this has gone altogether too smooth. If you have been following along, you will know why I am leery of happy endings.
How did the events that led to this come to pass? The Echo could only show us the aftermath, but it also defogged our lightning crystal so I cannot be too displeased. Once Nidhogg was succesfully molested in the olden days, there were six knights and a freshly eyegouged dragon. One was Haldrath, first of the dragoons, who had royalty thrust upon him after the death of his father. He parried the thrust and left the other five knights to figure things out... four knights, after an unnamed one saw that this whole nobility business is a fool's bargain. Still got that Ratatoskr juice running in the common folk of Ishgard. The others formed the four houses of Ishgard, which was widely (in Dominique's circles) considered a bad move (by Dominique). There was just one thing - Nidhogg's remaining eye was yellow, while the past had both as quite crimson. Now, which dragon had golden eyes again?
I was preparing to write up a whole crackpot theory section when Estinien surprised me with his wit by spotting this connection. It seems he has been training his brains alongside his glutes. We went back to Zenith to reunite eye with eyesocket, found that the duration on Ysayle's stun still hasn't run out, then tooted the horn of summoning once more to summon Hraesvelgr. The dragon was not overly glad at our presence even with the gift of good will. I would have thought he'd love to see the blood of his brother covering Estinien!
Truth being told, the circumstances of the eye transfer do not seem to have been amicable. Nidhogg guilt tripped the white dragon into giving up his power, Nidhogg went on to live, and by his vengeance do we have this whole bloody plot. "Should have just let him bleed out..." I muttered to myself. I didn't expect Ysayle and Estinien to share my sentiment.
Meanwhile, things were rotten in the state of Ishgard. The Archbishop's theoretical primal path seemed likelier and likelier with him intentionally allowing Dravanians to wreak havoc upon the city in the name of faith, complete with Lahabrea returning to speak vague nonsense. Not openly, of course, but the cutscene dimension gives us insight Dominique lacks. Our group quickly returned to try and resolve this, assisted by the sorely missed Haurchefant. Ysayle went in from of her kinsfolk and spoke of peace, full of conviction, and... wait, they retreated? They actually laid down their arms and walked away? And Estinien stopped a Temple Knight from giving chase??
It's all going too well. The only problem right now is the small problem of Ishgard's social stratification and faith being founded on a complex web of lies. This didn't change Dominique's opinions on the system but came as a shock to count Fortemps and Aymeric, whose bastard blood seems to come directly from the Archbishop. He went off to tell the old man off. The rest of the group started plotting heresy in the likely case he didn't return. This gave me a perfect stopping point for some further diversions.
The art of tanking requires getting hit so that your friends may focus the entirety of their brainpower on the art of murder. The key presses required of a damage dealer take a signficant amount of processing power; we do not want their precious, lovigly glamoured heads to overheat. Does it not therefore behoove us to learn something of these mystical finger twister arts so that we may make our compratriots' jobs as smooth as their
brains rotations? Dominique possesses a surprising subtlety when
the situation calls for it. Why not hone these arts and take up an offer provided long ago? Dominique went to The Dutiful Sisters of the Edelweiss and traded the violent ways of the axe for the even more violent ways of the twin daggers.
The inhabitants of the Rogues' Guild, to give it its proper name, are a colourful bunch (the colour being green). Limsa Lominsa has its Yellowjackets to uphold the law, but long before laws, the pirates of this city had a Code. It was more of a set of suggestions, but one strenuously suggested by the Upright Thieves. When the current admiral banned outright piracy, a place was found for non-capital letter laws, but the Code remained, and its custodians just had a change of name. Frankly, Dominique had just expected to learn how to move in light armour and stab people as opposed to bisecting them, but it was not an unwelcome surprise. Over twenty levels, we went through a surprisingly fun quest line of setting things right, getting into contests with the Yellowjackets, and, best of all, murdering the ever-loving shite out of slavers.
Moving from heavy armour to light had been a curious experience for reasons beyond having to parse the Rogues' cant. Why does a level 58 Warrior start anew as a level 1 Rogue? I reason that there's a lot of muscle memory getting in our hero's way. The daggers require an entirely new system of slashing, and trying to lean into a blow without an inch of metal between you and your vitals means you're still getting stabbed in the kidney. From an actual gameplay perspective, it's still early hours. I haven't even unlocked the three-piece combo, and the Ninja job still looms on the horizon at level 30. The lack of AoE is the one big thing I'm getting used to, what with the first option locked away until level 35. I'll let you know how I feel when I figure out how community-based law enforcement evolves into ninjutsu.
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OPEN QUESTIONSYou can tell this peace is fleeting by the fact we still have nine open questions.
WHAT IS THE NATURE OF THE ECHO? If we make the (fair) assumption that Nidhogg's an Echo-wielder, I find it curious that his death left no corpse behind, much like the Ascians.
WHAT IS AN ASCIAN?
WHAT IS THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE ASCIAN WHITE ROBES?
WHAT IS ELIDIBUS' PLAN FOR MINFILIA?
WHAT IS THE NATURE OF MIDGARDSORMR'S COVENANT? Yet another crystal defogged, and the wyrmlet is suspiciously silent about the death of his brother.
WHAT BECAME OF THE OTHER SCIONS?
WHAT IS THE NATURE OF A PRIMAL? WHAT HAPPENED TO HRAESVELGR'S EYE? It's Nidhogg's eye. Was. Now safely back at its original place.
WHERE IS NIDHOGG'S OTHER EYE? One is with Estinien. Two were in Haldrath's hands during the flashback. One remains unaccounted for.
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CRACKPOT THEORIESI've my eye on that Eye.
The Archbishop has the eye and it is a key component of his plots. I think it is safe to assume that the Archbishop plots the genesis of a primal: Knights of Round, to use the Final Fantasy 7 name. They literally have a round table up in the Vault. I never partook of that game, but I know the summon by its reputation. The one 100% confirmed primal wielder we have now is Ysayle, and she possesses the Echo. It is a fair inference that draconic powers might be a manifestation of the Echo. Therefore, the Archbishop might need the eye to grant himself echo-like powers, which would in turn allow him to embody/mantle/insert-appropriate-verb the Knights of Round.
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I'm no rogue myself — I
will thank you reading! I will link no socials. I have been implicated in a scandal regarding my ancestry and am not open to comments.
