(05-19-2017, 09:10 AM)Vexander Wrote: Likewise, I'm not sure I believe Sharlayan has White Mages and Black Mages... I mean, there doesn't seem to be a reason that knowledge wouldn't be available to them, and it would help measure up to Minfilia's statements that the Garleans fear Sharlayan's magical might.
I couldn't say one way or the other whether Sharlayan still has practicing Black or White Mages. I doubt it, considering the harm those magicks cause. But they undoubtedly have record of them - because 1) each of the Archons from the Circle of Knowing possessed detailed knowledge of the Sixth Umbral Calamity, and 2) traces of both of those magicks can be seen in modern Sharlayan.
Sharlayan has taken the golem magicks perfected by the Amdaporian White Mages and not only employed it in their defenses, but built upon it to develop Quickening magic to imbue other inanimate objects and simple creatures with sentience and magical ability.
Y'shtola Wrote:So we are to eliminate the golems. That should be a simple enough affair. The automata were employed as sentinels, and by design can be unmade with a coded command. At the time of the exodus, it was “Noughts and Crosses,†and I see no reason why it should not still work.
Remnants of the Mhachi methods of binding voidsent to the corporeal world have also been employed by Sharlayan magi for multiple uses, not all of them purely academic. They use voidsent to guard their knowledge and also to bolster it. Perhaps one of Sharlayan's biggest mishaps, which very likely contributed to their paranoia over dangerous knowledge escaping the archipelago, was the lost copy of the Necrologos, a Sharlayan tome containing volumes of bound voidsent.
Encyclopedia Eorzea - Bibliotaph Wrote:Following the disappearance of several forbidden tomes on the subject of voidsent summoning... as well as the disappearance of those curators who were tasked with the books' preservation, the Great Gubal Library's mages concluded that the safest, most efficient manner to safeguard works bound to the void is to employ energies of the void itself. Bibliotaphs were created to serve as vessels for voidsent middling rank who, in return for being allowed ingress to the realm of man, would serve the library as guardians of their most dangerous collection.
_______________________________
(05-19-2017, 09:10 AM)Vexander Wrote: That said, I have a hard time believing a nation of Scholars, Academics, and Mages would not have something up their sleeves to defend themselves if someone launched a war on them. Red Mage seems like it would've been the ideal job Sharlayan devised to protect itself from foreign threats.
This is where Sharlayan's automaton servitors come in. In the Encyclopedia's beastiary it says the clockwork magi we fight in the Antitower were originally created to serve as Sharlayan's standing army should the need ever arise. Lore on the centuar statues shows more evidence of the Sharlayans employing Amdaporian golem magicks to animate stone for their defenses.
Encyclopedia Eorzea - Automaton Wrote:Outspoken purveyors of harmony, the Sharlayan shunned nearly all endeavors and advancements concerning the propagation of war. The city-state did, however, recognize the need for protection from those who did not share their love of peace, and thus begrudgingly allowed for the development of magicked automatons which would serve as ersatz soldiers designed to fight in the Sharlayans' stead.
Encyclopedia Eorzea - Centuar Wrote:These suits of hollow armor designed after the mythical half-man, half-horse warriors of legend most often served their Sharlayan creators as sentries in places of government. The enchanted creatures would sit motionless, apppearing as naught more than a lavish decoration, until an intruder was detected in their presence, at which time the centuars would come to life and impale their quarry from behind with their impressive halberds.
So yes, Sharlayan does have its own means of defense - one that doesn't involve risking its own people's lives on the battlefield. That's not to say Sharlayan doesn't teach its own advanced combat techniques magical and melee. Obviously Alisaie and Alphinaud both picked up sword play. Moenbryda learned to fight with an axe. Yda, her fists. All of the Sharlayan magic we've seen so far. Sharlayan just doesn't want most of these secret techniques disseminated to the barbarians.
Again, red mage could've come from Sharlayan. The Sharlayans could have knowledge of it or teach some form of it, but ultimately the lore says it came from Gyr Abania and the concept fits pretty solidly? Not sure why it's wasted potential when we literally only know a single vague paragraph about them. Their story hasn't even come out yet. We don't even know for sure if Red Mages still exist in the present day. They could've died out hundreds of years before Ala Mhigo even was founded, destroyed by the regional warfare. All we know is the art's origin. The quest giver could just as easily be a Sharlayan archaeologist who is taking advantaged of alliance presence in the region to investigate rumors of an ancient soul crystal found by some qiqirn peddler. We just won't know till Stormblood.
