FFXI Plot-holes and unclear issues

[calinz]

Anyone else find Adoulin City really unfitting for the setting of Ulbuka?

1. The city seems too big for the population of NPCs it has and the fact that Ulbuka is largely untamed and no other closeby civilizations exist.

2. The city appears to be too advanced for the supposedly primitive state of things on Ulbuka still. How did they build all this, considering they need our help to gather even the most basic of resources? How did they even survive on what they have before inventing waypoints to the Middle Lands?

3. Adoulin is a waterfront city, covered in docks. Yet, no ships can sail to Quon because of some strong current BS? But the researchers who brought the waypoints still came with a boat. Using magic or something to stabilize it.

4. There's a freakin airship agency in Western Adoulin!? NPC says crystal propulsion issues prevent the airships from flying. But still, they have airships!? Bet we'll never use them apart from a mission cutscene like the one to Al'taieu, or those over Aradijah.

[Toth]

I believe in the lore that the islands themselves were the city is located is abundant with materials that probably served as building blocks for the city itself.

[Eurell]

They mentioned a few months back that they trade with Sandy a lot as well.

[Rocl]

They mentioned a few months back that they trade with Sandy a lot as well.

There's a bunch of evidence that they had deals with Tavnazia as well. The way I see it, Adoulin is the archipelago and that's doing fine. It could continue to exist that way, but it's an annoying life--they have to grow food in the Waterways, and that's recently been overrun with monsters I guess?(edit: i contradict his point)they're dependent on trade for some shit. However, to the west is this biggole primordial jungle full of fantastical and rare materials.

The way I understand Adoulinian/Ulbukan history is thusly: The five races have existed in the Adoulinian isles for quite some time. They drove the Velkk out and into Ulbuka. Also, I believe the Sacred City of Adoulin is actually on a peninsula of Ulbuka and that great divide to the west connected oddly straight to the ocean is meant to represent Jorius Yett. They went out to colonize Ulbuka before, but failed, apparently miserably and after many decades (a century or two maybe even?). So they decided to focus on exorcising and raptor fights or some shit. The entirety of the Adoulinian Islands are populated afaik, it's kind of like imagining Caribbean colonizing the US I guess.

There's some mention of Cid in at least one NPC's dialogue, so I assume they know of airships. What I'm more confused about is why they expect them. After all, airships are powered with Zilart technology, which afaik, exists only in the Middle Lands. (Arajidah only ever having Olduum things, which we were never really brought up to speed on.) I can imagine another airship crashing into Ulbuka though, but it probably won't be because Alexander shot it out of the sky (speaking of which, wasn't the excuse for no Airships to Whitegate being "it's too far"?? so wtf)

The journey to Ulbuka by sea is apparently much further than to Arajidah. If I'm remembering right, and I may not be, the Open Sea Route only took like 20-30 minutes? which is only half a Vana'dielian day. The journey the waypoint dudes took was more than seven and a half Vana'dielian days. It's said they used runic magic to help navigate rough seas, yes, it also said they took massive detours to navigate rough seas too. It's probably just too impractical to make a long journey with the potential danger, especially considering runic magic may or may not be responsible for their safe arrival.

Waypoints have apparently only existed for ~10 years too btw.

[Spira]

apart from the main isle of Adoulin, there are actually a bunch of other smaller isles where people stay and such. i'd assume that trade in this case might also include inter-island trade.

They've been mercantile for like 100 years, after the king banned pioneering, so thru trade they developed a whole bunch of stuff.

they have an airship dock which isn't in use. i think it might not be used save for missions and quests.

The city itself is pretty old. certain aspects of it are considerably modern. the rala waterways appear very high tech lol, but apart from that i think it isn't too jarring.

...on to story discussion..

The plotline apparently revolves mainly around the old king (August was it?) who declared that people were not to step onto Ulbuka, his reasoning for doing so, and of course.. the reasoning of Ygnas and members of the twelve orders to decide to go ahead with it again.

from the quests I've done so far, it seems that there's some kind of darkness that lies beneath Ulbuka, something which the Umbril are related to.
The leafkin might be involved, as its suggested that both Umbril and Leafkin have been around for a long time and may be natural enemies.
skirmish may also be tied into it..

and the current theory floating around is that theres a alternate dimension that exists below Ulbuka, like a shadow cast upon it.. or something.

edit: i think they mention cid because of his son Midras... who i havent personally seen in the quest yet ;o

[Rocl]

@your edit: yes, i just started this quest now, i don't know how i missed it. i nearly spit out my drink though

[calinz]

Ok, that's all good and stuff, but how did they conduct trade with Tavnazia/San d'Oria before the advent of waypoints, if flying is impossible, and naval transport is impractical?

[Spira]

the impractical way.

i did some dat sleuthing. Midras came to Adoulin by boat too.

i just don't know where the spot to get his CS is. i'm assuming its behind one of those stupid knotted roots on the east side of the zone. and sadly no one does reives there.

[Ophannus]

Glad they brought Mid back! (Cid's son in FF4 was Mid)

I wonder what the Umbrils connection to Fomors are also. Additionally either the GEO or RUN flavor text mentioned Siren. There is Siren's Hair in the game which mentions Siren as well. Then there's these Siren-esque reskin of Garuda/Harpeia/WOTG Final Form Lilith. Maybe these will be regular mobs/NMs could be Sirens/Spriggans or whatever. Or maybe she's the 'Avatar' of the Jungle.

[Spira]

mid's been his name is pretty much every FF where Cid has sons lol..
Balthier's full name is Ffamran mied Bunansa.

there's like a guardian of the Skirmish realm.. i saw it last night in the dats but i cant remember offhand what it was and i dont wanna check again.. but if u can't enter they give a message saying

"Balodin's will prevents you from entering", except that the name isn't Balodin, its something else that starts with a B that i can't recall.

no more Hands of Darkness lol.

edit: Balamor.

[Kirin]

Any chance of combing through some of the old Limbus mythos and seeing if theres any reference to knowing of lands before the emptiness takes hold of it and turns it into what Promyvion has become? Maybe Skirmish is some form of Limbus just as the emptiness begins to take hold.

I remember Promyvion being mentioned as a rip or tear in Vana'Diel itself as it slowly decays. I've been wondering this a bit since it seems like the mission screen for SoA will also be split into chapters and acts like CoP was.

[Ophannus]

Well Apollyon is "Promyvion-Alteiu", that is, it's the Empty from that mpthercrystal just as the other Promyvions are the emptiness from their mothercrystals. Temenos is a lab used by the Zilart for their biogenic labs; used for enhancing creatures, conducting tests etc. The chamber of eventide resides here as well. Additionally, TemenosApollyon probably has some connection with the crystal-line as the souls of creatures and beings that have long-since died are revived here... Kaiser Behemoth in Apollyon and some of the Beastmen NMs in Temenos were from the crystal war and seemed to have manifested themselves here.

[Tarage]

So... Odin did it?

[Spira]

There's no actual lore for Limbus.

However, you can draw inferences from the CoP story to figure out how it happened.

Apollyon is actually Lower Promyvion, or Promyvion-Al'Taieu, so it isn't very much different from the other Promyvions, except that it wasn't caused (mainly) by Selh'teus drawing light from the ark but by the crystal naturally losing power due to power drawn from the Crystal Line and possibly in relation to Promathia himself. It's like a distortion in space created by the absence of the crystals light.

Temenos, on the other hand, is actually Ou'Phat's Obelisk, which iirc is less of a lab and more of a mausoleum. The existence of beastmen and weird creature is actually anomalous, but it likely has something to do with a distortion of the crystal line as mentioned by Ophannus, which all things supposedly return to in death - explaining the presense of Doggdvegg.

therefore, not Odin, for once

[Tarage]

There's no actual lore for Limbus.

However, you can draw inferences from the CoP story to figure out how it happened.

Apollyon is actually Lower Promyvion, or Promyvion-Al'Taieu, so it isn't very much different from the other Promyvions, except that it wasn't caused (mainly) by Selh'teus drawing light from the ark but by the crystal naturally losing power due to power drawn from the Crystal Line and possibly in relation to Promathia himself. It's like a distortion in space created by the absence of the crystals light.

Temenos, on the other hand, is actually Ou'Phat's Obelisk, which iirc is less of a lab and more of a mausoleum. The existence of beastmen and weird creature is actually anomalous, but it likely has something to do with a distortion of the crystal line as mentioned by Ophannus, which all things supposedly return to in death - explaining the presense of Doggdvegg.

therefore, not Odin, for once

However, it only became accessible because of Odin.

Therefor...

Dammit, if I had better shopping skills I would make a "I'm not saying it was Odin, but it was Odin." image macro. Maybe with Cid's head.

[Odin'sLaw]

However, it only became accessible because of Odin.

Therefor...

Dammit, if I had better shopping skills I would make a "I'm not saying it was Odin, but it was Odin." image macro. Maybe with Cid's head.

do you think Madara Odin and Aizen get together and have "Just as planned" chats? >.> because Odin's the biggest troll to happen to Vana'diel

[Ophannus]

Could also be a non-cannon "Omake" dungeon similar to how Dawn of Souls wasn't really canon, it was just a long ass extra dungeon filled with familiar faces as fan service.

[Rocl]

Could also be a non-cannon "Omake" dungeon similar to how Dawn of Souls wasn't really canon, it was just a long ass extra dungeon filled with familiar faces as fan service.

There's a throw away line in the Airship fight CS during CoP about Ultima/Omega in the Celestial Capital, but aside from that I wouldn't worry too much about what Limbus is. Just like I wouldn't worry myself over the Shijin in Sky. Four hundred years ago before northern Al'taieu was released Temenos and Apollyon did exist as Ou'phat Obelisk and Lower Promyvion and there is mention of the Obelisk in mission cutscenes. Calling the current incarnations of Limbus by those two names is a bit of wishful thinking I think though.

[Suteru]

Okay, I'm just making sure I have everything straight since it's been a while since I played CoP:

Mothercrystal shines, creates Paradise (does it create Altana & Promathia too?)
Promathia wants to die for some reason, kills self
Altana uses Mothercrystal to "revive" Promathia, splitting it into 5 and losing Paradise (was Paradise lost? From what I can tell it can't exist without a whole mothercrystal)
Zilart were created
Altana then..I guess "stores" the emptiness to keep Promathia alive into living things (does this include Zilart? Or does she start with the Kuluu, since they can't hear the whisper or whatever it's called?)
Broken crystal sort of "filters" a life force into a certain mold (crystal warriors?) and then the 5 races are created. Some shit happens with Al'taieu and Galka have to go through some bullshit to reincarnate since when they die, they can't return to the crystal.


So 1. Where the hell is Altana if Paradise is no more. Space?
and 2. Is there an afterlife in which we retain ourselves? Lion being the exception somehow.

[Spira]

1) The only time Altana has directly shown herself was in the Empyreal Paradox.. which is in itself pretty hard to describe, but maybe you can say its in the presence of a mothercrystal. She probably subsists somewhere on a higher plane.

2) There is no uniform cycle of life in FFXI. Generally speaking, all life returns to the crystal, which is the belief of followers of Altana, but also shown to be pretty factual. Lion never died, she threw herself at the crystal core of Tu'Lia and was "trapped" within the crystal.

Aht Urhgan mythos does however mention an underworld, which seem to be governed by Odin. supposedly its a place where souls are trapped for damnation, not unlike the real world concept of hell.

That said, there are many characters shown in the story that die and don't seem to return to the crystal or go to hell. They retain existence as a ghost, or a monster or don't appear to be different from a living person.. (kinda like unsent in FFX).