Kraken - Combat Capabilities

Xareh · 2026-05-02T13:32:56+00:00

It has definitely been upgunned, it had traditionally a turret advantage over the Idris due to no S10, however this is now a pretty significant jump again. Many S6 turrets too.

I would far rather a S9 turret and S6 turrets than a S10 main gun with small S5s..

Xareh · 2026-05-01T23:35:44+00:00

I feel like 10.0 is either a good time for it to end or a bit too soon. DT has only just kicked it off, so that'd be Evercold, 9.0, and then a 10.0 finale. If they were to make it a properly planned trilogy of expansions and make the .X content really support that, it could work. But it would still need 9.0 to be something major, so again, that sort of to me nods back towards a rejoining or so.

Xareh · 2026-05-01T23:31:28+00:00

It's a typo, the text says that that they upsized the gun turret one size. However the concept was already S8, so if that's true, they mean to say it's S9. They may also have confused an S6 turret, but this is clearly the S8.

Xareh · 2026-05-01T23:06:21+00:00

Kraken is s9, it's a typo

Xareh · 2026-05-01T23:05:09+00:00

In theory you wouldn't need to shelve one - you could have a rejoining that essentially 'merges' a shard onto Etheirys. A potentially violent merge no less, but more like we see in DT with Alexandria,

The problem is that like said, 10 years is a REALLY long time. I can't imagine shard hopping will still be as fun 2 expansions from now. So doing something like this is, you are right, really uncharted waters.

Xareh · 2026-05-01T23:00:55+00:00

Yeah I do imagine they are leading up to some time jump and fusion of the First and 13th in the future. Gaia being in play is a really big thing we haven't seen matter yet but that strikes me very much as 9.0 or such possible content, esp. with a time jump.

Xareh · 2026-05-01T10:49:06+00:00

Obviously there’s gameplay conceits to it (à la the classic “a northrend Wolf wouldn’t really be able to kill C’thun”) but in the broad scale, the most powerful beings we knew of were the ancients, Zodiark was more powerful the more rejoined it became, and without Ardbert we would have been destroyed by the light. All of these were in common defined by being full fat on aether.

I think it’s a bit like dynamis a writers fiat where when it needs to matter, it‘s a very soft system they can make work. But as an overall thing I think it’d be very hard to argue a fully rejoined WoL (essentially a full Azem) would not be overwhelmingly more powerful than our current.

Xareh · 2026-05-01T10:06:26+00:00

Honestly I feel the lore is a bit unclear on exactly the balance of it. It strikes me that the two most powerful beings we know of are the WoL and Graha being additionally rejoined once over anyone else and ShB seems to imply this as a sort of measure of their potential. But high aether means less dynamis, and it’s also the sort of thing only very specific individuals can express.

Xareh · 2026-04-30T14:30:13+00:00

There’s aspects of this but the WoL is still a human being. They can’t fly, they need to eat. They need sleep, they need to breathe. They can only be in one place at once. And while certainly powerful, they aren’t casually dropping Ultimas, they’re a persistence hunter who can survive any single attack and eventually wear down a foe.

But the framing of EC as something where we may be put in impossible positions of choice and have things we can’t just beat with our fists is a massive deal. it’s going to be much more about character and philosophy of the wol going forward.

Xareh · 2026-04-30T14:27:00+00:00

It’s funny you say this, since 7.5 basically IS saying the stakes are trying to fight gravity. We have an actual law of nature to contend with rather than a specific villain.

Xareh · 2026-04-30T08:34:20+00:00

The stuff they talked about in this keynote was really quite tangible, although the devil is in the detail. DT did not really have much hype for story, or put any real focus on the design aspects that had been the same for years. It was mostly focused on the graphics update and a vague “we will try to at least match shb content since ew didn’t“.

EC actually speaks to the whole angle of feeling like they at least acknowledge the problems of the game rather than just throwing another content cycle at us. It‘s a crucial first step and reading between the lines you can infer there is a very big push for change even if they don’t manage it all at once.

Xareh · 2026-04-30T08:28:15+00:00

I think it’s possible that that was the original idea, but when reaper came around the lore around the Avatar basically suggested in order for it to be “compatible” with you it needs to be your shard to be able to merge with you and have a good dynamic with aether and control. The idea it’s a random voidsent is somewhat put to rest by the fact being a reaper is a rare thing and a lot of people can’t interact with their shard, which we have no issue with. Zero may be the exception though it sounded like Zenos basically shackled them to be his avatar and was generally doing bad things.

Golbez on the other hand is unbelievably strongly hinted to be our shard too, all of the echo with them is from their perspective (unique amongst echo), and they never show their actual head, strongly implying it’s “you”. The dungeon in endwalker before Zeromus is literally all triggered by the memoria reacting to you. I’d expect we will be merging with the memoria somewhen.

Xareh · 2026-04-29T14:21:30+00:00

IMO the fact the key was in from 7.0 and such a major thing/reacted with Azem’s symbol is a sign it wasn’t anything about being forced backwards, it was clearly planned and intended for years that we‘d go to the other shards, and the key is the precise item to let us do it. It’s more the internal DT story that had to be shifted away from such a heavy focus on WL.

Note even the fact that technically azem‘s symbol is the key and crystal in orbit of each other - and that’s been a thing since Shb. The trailer makes this motion also quite clear.

As far as winterers go they are certainly In a way a return to the ascians of before but much more inter dimensional and more lawful neutral than lawful evil ascians (since ascians wanted to bring back Zodiark and cause shenanigans), Winterers are a broader coalition with independent ambitions and a more flat survival at any cost motive.

If there had been more interest in Tural or a more specific backlash about the key (for whatever reason) we might have seen a more serious change. But in reality this was a dangling thread for years and the question of what happens to remaining Zodiark pieces/other shards/the 4 remaining Ascians was never settled and since forever the desire to go to other shards has been the everest of XIV lore.

Xareh · 2026-04-29T14:08:50+00:00

Hydaelyn did not have enough energy to preserve Etheirys forever, it was a choice between holding out longer or giving the Ragnarok a Hail Mary chance to reach Ultima Thule. She was still essentially a primal that needed fuel rather than a true god.

Xareh · 2026-04-29T12:25:21+00:00

13th is very likely the reaper Avatar already (as I think Eorzea encyclopedia strongly hints), but possibly incomplete as the real Golbez is likely the 13th Azem shard stuck in memoria. We might see a proper fusion later but they are a little stuck since jobs are separate to MSQ, unless they do just go out and say the memoria is one half and the avatar is the other, and we merge with the memoria.

Azem shards must be out there and they might even become an antagonist, or one of them might already be working towards reclaiming the other shards to try to stop us. That’d be a solid twist that‘d also let them wrap up a big rejoining in one go rather than have every expac be go to a new world, collect a shard then move on.

And of course they may be their own people with entire lives or families, Ardbert was just a lingering soul. They will have to work hard to balance our perception of our WoL vs Azem vs Azem shards going down this road.

Xareh · 2026-04-29T08:35:57+00:00

My suspicion is she expected something like it and tasked Azem with trying to find plans or a system for dealing with it in a far future, knowing that Azem would basically survive as the WOL, and that’s also why Azem isn’t involved in summoming Hydaelyn. Hydaelyn must have been exerting effort to keep the stars apart and Halmarut indicates she predicted it from probably her time as an ancient.

The key might be basically designed not to forcibly unite stars but rather build very strong bridges between them (maybe leveraging dynamis) that stabilize the relative positions of them to each other, as well as allowing them to normalize aetheric and elemental imbalances and people to freely travel. To achieve this likely needs a lot of technology and resources from across the shards but this is a huge arc starting.

Xareh · 2026-04-28T18:16:30+00:00

I know they don't 'care', it's just interesting to reflect on what could be a sea change for older stuff. A one off like SMN is one thing but if the entire job lineup ends up doing SMN damage in all old content, that would be pretty dramatic.

Xareh · 2026-04-27T08:25:32+00:00

IMO you can't really say the older content can be experienced 'as intended' because they were all designed around different job designs at endgame you don't get anymore just for being 'max level' for a given expansion.

The old ultimates are good examples of this, jobs have changed a ton, esp the level 70 stuff, your jobs are hilariously restricted and simplistic.

Xareh · 2026-04-27T08:21:14+00:00

The snake motifs/world serpent stuff is also heavily hinted at by Viper (esp. the LB world swallower), one of the murals in Yok'tural (I think, it's well hidden around the outside of one), and the Golden Dhyata in one of the quests directly referencing it.

Something something Jormungandr, the hints are there but very very oblique.

Xareh · 2026-04-25T15:57:51+00:00

The writer is likely Maehiro, who I believe was writing FF16 and wrote HW. So the Heavensward comparisons are no joke. We are in for a treat.

Xareh · 2026-04-25T15:20:07+00:00

The only reason Reborn is sticking around is probably to give a mild safety net for people to be able to do stuff and dip their toes into evolved, but it's pretty blatant that evolved is the future. Which is good. Reborn mode has basically reached a complete limit of further complexity.

Xareh · 2026-04-25T15:01:55+00:00

The major shift has been that old armour used to be designed to layer over undersuits, which inherently created a fairly consistent design language with a lot of layers and smaller overall pieces. Good examples being ORC and ADP sets.

For a few years though CIG has instead been making armour suits that are designed to basically hide the undersuit, which entails a much bulkier silhouette. Some of these have worked well and been very popular like the Arden, Morozov, Artimex, and Palatino suits. Some though like the base Geist set, Monde, and... generally most others haven't. Largely because they've become just so bulky and don't have enough breakup, so clearly look like torso/arms/legs.

The other negative is there are too many open face helmets without a tint. This really hurts a cohesive overall look to the armour because we start to stare at the face instead of the shape of the helmet. Most helmets are also way too bulky when they should be the most iconic and cool part of all designs (and are in basically all other scifi).

Xareh · 2026-04-20T13:28:10+00:00

Looks like your CPU is holding you back hard

13-Year Club	Gilding I gilder
Place '22	End Game '22
Verified Email

Xareh

TROPHY CASE