The Dawntrail expansion is an opportunity for Final Fantasy XIV to launch a brand-new story, one that doesn't have to get wrapped up in all the details of the Hydaelyn and Zodiark tale that concluded with Endwalker. However, that doesn't mean that the new update won’t build on the game’s decade of storytelling and lore-building, and now we have a hint at where things could be going. During the Dawntrail media tour, director Naoki Yoshida detailed a couple of pieces of lore that he thought players should be familiar with before Dawntrail, so we’ll help break everything down.
Myths of the Realm Alliance Raid
During a group Q&A that Inverse attended alongside the Dawntrail media tour, a pre-submitted question was asked about what lore should players be familiar with, and Yoshida, at first, seemed cagey on answering. After a few seconds of thought, he said “Myths of the Ream, the new Alliance Raid, would probably allow for some background information into more of the lore.”
That’s an interesting choice, as the Myths of the Realm raid dove into a vital longstanding piece of lore, the pantheon of gods known as The Twelve. When you create your character in FFXIV you have to choose a “Patron Deity” from the Twelve, which at one point determined slight elemental resistances of your character, but now doesn’t seem to change anything. Still, for ten years we knew nothing about these gods until finally meeting them in Myths of the Realm. Playing through the Alliance Raid series, there’s a ton of lore for the gods and Eorzea itself that you’ll learn, so if you’d rather experience it all yourself, stop here.
If you want a quick and dirty explanation, the Twelve are essentially godlike beings that were given reincarnated from Ancients that lived in the unsundered world. Specifically, each of the Ancients the Twelve are based on were friends or colleagues of Venat, who went on to become the goddess Hydaelyn. Using the remains of the Ancient's souls Hydaelyn created the Twelve to serve as the protectors of the main world, also called The Source.
Past that, the other important piece to know is that while they aren’t Primals, the Twelve’s power grows with the prayers of the people, and occasionally the god’s realm overlaps with humans, which is how art and stories of their likeness sprung up amongst people.
We don’t know how the Twelve might factor into Dawntrail unfortunately, but we do know that the new continent of Tural is filled with various tribes and peoples, some of which likely worship the Twelve. We could also see the major character from the quest series, Deryk, appear in Dawntrail.
The Convocation of the Fourteen
The other little hint that Yoshida dropped was in the form of a question, asking about players in general, “Can people name all of the 14 Seats of the Convocation?”
The Convocation of Fourteen was the main governing body of the unsundered world and the leading individuals of the Ancient’s society. Members of the Convocation have served as the main villains of the franchise for the last decade and became known as Ascians. This includes Lahabrea, Emet-Selch, and Fandaniel. We’ve also learned that the player character, the Warrior of Light, is a fragment of the soul of another member, Azem.
Through the various expansions, raids, and dungeons, we’ve seen or heard about most of the 14 members, but there are still a few unaccounted for or still alive in some way. There are two that have never appeared, Halmarut, the cultivator of botanical and mycological creations, and Dedalaphon, the patron of architecture and invention. The latter certainly seems like they could be a good fit for Solution 9 — the mysterious cyberpunk-esque area that’s been teased for Dawntrail.
Beyond that, we also know some other Convocations members who are still alive after we’ve briefly seen them, including Pathtarot, Altima, and Lohgrif.
That’s not a lot of information to go on from Yoshida, but it’s extremely interesting that he’d mention the Convocation members. One might think the end of Hydaelyn and Zodiark means their stories had ended, but this seems to suggest the Convocation and the Ascians, might not be done playing a role in FFXIV quite yet. If you’re invested in the game’s story, it’d behoove you to brush up on the member’s lore before Dawntrail.
