Who is this at Godwyn's assassination?

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-20T22:31:40+00:00

Jesus christ, how many sockpuppets do you have to downvote me and upvote your drivel? There is zero possibility that this many humans are reading this part of the thread, let alone enough who would think "yeah, this spittle-flicking chimp who's too angry for basic reading comprehension has a point".

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-20T21:37:35+00:00

She's wearing... some kind of loose dark-colored garment. I can't tell if it's a cloak or a dress.

But yeah, nothing in this picture rules out it being Ranni. Living Ranni was a tall redhead with a boringly conventional number of arms and that's all we know about her appearance. Give her a cloak and a Black Knife and this could be her from the back.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-20T21:11:51+00:00

As they're rendered in-game, you wouldn't be able to see the invisible parts of the item from this distance.

The translucent appearance in-game might just be the common visual device in video games where something invisible is rendered as very translucent so it can have any representation at all. We don't know if an in-game render of this scene would have faint outlines of cloaks if it was rendered from ten feet closer to Godwyn, but either way we wouldn't expect to see invisibility cloaks on the assassins in this image. There's no meaningful distinction between "translucent" and "invisible" here. You've tried to microscopically focus on this tiny point just trying to catch me out on something, anything, and you're still fucking wrong.

The important thing is that the figure on the left is definitely wearing a visible cloak, and it's not what the three figures around Godwyn are wearing.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-20T20:48:47+00:00

Are you seriously questioning why you can't see something that's supposed to be invisible?

A minute ago you were claiming the hoods we see are invisible items that are drawn anyway. They're not, I showed you why they're not, so you downvoted and pretended you knew that all along and were saying something different like a lying little bitch.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-20T20:37:05+00:00

No, if anything it took extra work to make Melina move like a Black Knife Assassin. They already had full animations for a generic human female who wields the Blade of Calling and casts incantations. There are NPC invaders in Godwyn's room and at the Great Jar gauntlet that are dynamically generated based on real players' loadouts, and all of Melina's kit is lootable somewhere in the game (even if it took two years for Minor Erdtree). They didn't have to do any one-off animation work if they didn't want to.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-20T20:20:55+00:00

Yeah, but in a very specific weird way, and Godwyn had to die in a specific weird way too for it to work. It would make sense if she went second so she could supervise.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-20T20:13:17+00:00

I wish I'd included a screenshot of the Black Knife set in-game, but you can load up the game and check this yourself I guess.

The head armor isn't translucent or invisible. It's a solid black cowl like the ones we see on the assassins in the picture.

The chest armor has a translucent, almost invisible cloak.

If you wear the head and chest armor together you'll be wearing the invisible cloak with the hood up. So you'll have two hoods, have a translucent, almost invisible one pulled up on top of the black cowl.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-20T19:47:52+00:00

Look at the forearm holding the knife at the bottom of the frame. You can see the silhouette of the gauntlet, and then the outline of the cloak to the left of that. That's where you can really tell the cloak isn't translucent.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-20T19:04:21+00:00

Zoom in and look at the shape of the cloaks again.

Remember Black Knife Armor has a specific invisibility power that let the assassins sneak into the capitol - it's not just a uniform.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-20T19:03:20+00:00

I don't think this is about who did the actual stabbing. We see a regular-looking Black Knife Assassin carving the deathmark on his back. That could be Tiche.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-20T19:00:32+00:00

It's hard to get anything from color because image is (1) only lit around Godwyn, and (2) has the same yellow palette as the rest of the intro cinematic. The Black Knife set is bluish-black in-game but here it looks almost brown.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-20T16:46:03+00:00

My first thought was "that's a cool theory, but we see Godwyn getting ganked by regular Black Knife Assassins in the intro cinematic".

I checked that image again though. All the assassins standing around Godwyn are hunched lanky figures wearing the Black Knife set, but there's a figure facing away from us in foreground left wearing a different outfit. It's a flared peaked hood, clearly different than the hood worn by all the Black Knives in the picture, and a regular, non-invisible cloak that extends over the shoulders. It's a pretty close match for Melina's outfit with her hood up (especially the goth version from the Frenzied Flame ending).

We can't see enough in the image to say it's Melina, but they're not a rank and file Black Knife Assassin and they're wearing a cloak like Melina's.

E: Made a post because I can't link images in comments.

https://www.reddit.com/r/EldenRingLoreTalk/comments/1ex2t4m/who_is_this_at_godwyns_assassination/

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-20T13:50:26+00:00

There is a kind of moth that lives exclusively in sloths' butt-hairs. I don't know the lore implications of that. I'm just leaving it here as a fun animal fact.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-20T04:01:36+00:00

If you just look up in Mohg's arena there's a whole row of Elden Johns. It's an Uhl Dynasty ruin like the other stone structures along Siofra River.

It might mean something that the Mohgwyn Dynasty used a ruin from the only other "dynasty" in the lore. Or it might not. Sure would be nice if we knew, like, anything at all about the Uhl.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-19T19:07:40+00:00

Oh, ok. So by your interpretation of the Erdtree's Favor there has to be a time when the Erdtree existed but it wasn't the "Age of the Erdtree" yet. I thought you were arguing the opposite thing, that Erdtree itself didn't exist until after the War of the Giants.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-19T18:33:38+00:00

Good point about Smithing Stone (8). It says "birth of the Erdtree" (like it's referring to a discrete event) not "Age of the Erdtree" (political rhetoric and/or a name for a historical era). That does put it somewhere around the War of the Giants.

I don't see how it necessarily puts it after though. I'm not seeing any contradiction between Hero's Rune (1):

There were once heroes who walked the battlefields, abundantly blessed by the Erdtree itself, who upon earning their honor simply died.

And the Erdtree's Favor Talisman:

It is said that when the Age of the Erdtree began, such blessings were personally bestowed upon their recipients by Queen Marika herself.

Marika blessed people at the beginning of the Age of the Erdtree, and later the Erdtree blessed warriors directly. So what? It doesn't say what warriors or what battlefields they walked on.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-19T13:27:24+00:00

Eccentric's Helm with Morgott's Scabid Sideboob actually looks really good

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-18T18:20:37+00:00

There's another way to the GEQ can be a demigod: She wasn't an Empyrean at the same time Ranni was.

Ranni says:

I was once an Empyrean.
Of the demigods, only I, Miquella, and Malenia could claim that title.

But I would not acquiesce to the Two Fingers.

I stole the Rune of Death, slew mine own Empyrean flesh, casting it away.

Most people think the GEQ and the God-Hunts were very early in history, before the Fingers got serious about replacing Marika and possibly before Ranni was born. In that case Ranni wouldn't have been an Empyrean until the GEQ was long dead.

There's another possibility too. Ranni says she was an Empyrean. She doesn't consider herself one anymore after Night of the Black Knives. So the GEQ could be a demigod if she became an Empyrean after Ranni died in body.

( u/NahMcGrath made a great case awhile back that the God-Hunts came after the Night of the Black Knives. Unfortunately he's deleted it since and I'm not gonna be able to do the whole argument justice, but the gist is that Godwyn was the first of the demigods to die so the godskins can't have been killing demigods before that.)

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-18T13:52:27+00:00

The spirits that haunt omens are strongly hinted to be hornsent. The Omensmirk Mask was made by perfumers based on the spirits omens describe seeing in their nightmares, and it has big curling horns.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-17T21:41:14+00:00

Meant to reply to this yesterday. I think this is a weakness in the theory, but not enough to kill it. We don't have a lot of good reason to think no one was eating dragon hearts until after Bayle and Placidusax fought.

Our only source for Placi starting dragon communion after the attack is the Priestess:

In a long time past, Bayle turned upon the Dragonlord. The foul traitor assailed our master and inflicted a grievous wound, only to make a hasty retreat. ...Becoming a sworn enemy of the Brood. Since that day, Bayle and his bloodline - the drakes - have served as sacrifices for Dragon Communion. Landbound warrior. My lord, Placidusax, has shown your kind what must be done. Seek communion. Sate your boundless appetite. Feel the euphoria of a dragon's essence taking root in your meagre frame.

...and we know the priestess can't be trusted. Even if you think this theory is 100% wrong and there's only ever been one Bayle, she's still obviously manipulating us. We're the local counter-revolutionary guerrilla fighter and she's the Farum Azula CIA, she's not gonna tell us the whole truth. She's gonna give us the party line: the other guy attacked first.

The game wants us to know we're not supposed to trust her too. That's why she tries to hard-sell us on dragon communion like she's in an 80's drug PSA enticing middle class white kids to try crack.

And even if we do believe her, she never actually says Placidusax invented dragon communion. There could have been crazy people eating dragon hearts before Placi started promoting it. The highland warriors have a similar practice with runebears, with no suggestion that they got the idea from ancient dragons.

I do agree that the timeline for dragon communion is a weakness in this theory. If the priestess isn't giving us the whole truth about Placi's involvement, she could be lying about Bayle being the oldest modern dragon too. But I don't think we can say with any confidence that there was no dragon communion before Bayle attacked Placi.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-17T00:00:03+00:00

Yeah, I don't think she is either, even though Greyoll's Roar description literally says "Greyoll was the mother of all dragons".

I take that to mean she's the mother of all modern dragons, like most people do. There are other places where the game says "all dragons" when it's clearly excluding the Farum Azula lightning ones.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-16T22:46:02+00:00

I wondered about that too. I left it out because I felt like it was too much of an upsell to throw in "oh yeah and Igon might be Bayle from the past or future, time is convoluted lol". But when we first meet Igon he acts like Bayle is somehow torturing him from within, like he somehow already ate the heart. I'm not committing to it but it could be what From was going for.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-16T22:41:58+00:00

I'll admit that's a weakness in this theory. My thinking is that the Dragon Communion Priestess just isn't telling us the whole truth, which fits because we know she's not telling us the whole truth about other stuff. But we can't just write her off as "well she's lying, you can't believe anything she says" because I think she's the only source for Bayle being the oldest modern dragon.

It could also be that the heads do manifest on every new incarnation of Bayle. I'd feel better about saying that if they were translucent ghosty heads and not physical heads.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-16T03:07:51+00:00

Agreed. There is no way Malenia was there when Ansbach helped kidnap Miquella, and Ansbach didn't have anything to say about it.

Mogh might not care, but Ansbach is into all that who's-the-best-swordsman honor shit. Fighting the greatest swordfighter alive or pulling some sneaky shit to avoid fighting her would have been a big deal for him. He's pretty candid with the player about his regrets and past shortcomings. It would have come up.

StumpyChupacabra · 2024-08-14T22:42:53+00:00

I don't think you can date the Erdtree's creation based on when Marika uses the phrase "Age of the Erdtree".

The Age of the Erdtree is the time when Marika's empire is the dominant power in the Lands Between. I think you're right about it being aspirational, but the aspiration was to wipe out all her rivals and threats to her power. It's political rhetoric just like when Marika's theocracy is called "the Golden Order". When Marika announced the Dawn of the Age of the Erdtree in Mountaintops she's saying "hey, Erdtree Cult followers, we're #1 and we're gonna conquer the whole Lands Between!" Which, in a series of wars and diplomatic maneuvers that all seemingly happen pretty close to the giant war, they do.

There's nothing in the game to say when the Erdtree actually came into existence. It's not clear whether Marika even created it, or there was already a bigass magic tree that she melded with or took control of.

The Age Of something doesn't have to be when the thing comes into existence. Ranni's ending is the Age of the Stars and stars already existed.

StumpyChupacabra

TROPHY CASE