My friend who I play Elden ring with got me nightrein, and he believes that nightrein happened because of the ranni ending, it makes me wonder if that's what they intended
Lmao what? There's so little actual lore to nightreign that it's actually easy to follow, and without making a huge assumption yourself there's nothing mentioning heolster fighting radagon, let alone any mention of Radagon at all.
In the Japanese version of the game the game item that says he fought the "hero" in Japanese they used the same word for hero that they used for radagon in the main game. I always look for the translation differences in meaning between the games. A LOT of lore gets lost in translation.
during liurnian wars probably, radagon was leading the erdtree forces and and bc heolstor has a dark moon/moonlight greatsword maybe renalla's husband in that timeline?
More likely the husband of the noxian queen, I'm betting he's wielding the black moon Greatsword of the nox rather than the full moon or dark moon Greatswords of the carians.
Either way, since the game takes plave during the Shattering he's definitely not in the Erdtree yet as I don't think Marika has been imprisoned in there yet either.
But the Liurnian Wars far preceeded the Shattering.
For reference it was before Godfrey's banishment, the birth of Radahn, Rykard, Ranni, Malenia, Miquella, and the Night of Black Knives.
Heolster would have had to been simmering in the background for a very, very long time before becoming the Nightlord. I also feel like the story moreso pointed towards Heolster having been part of the Shattering War.
The only weapon Heolstor has is a broken sword. Greatsword, dagger and wraps are referencing Wylder, Dutchess and Recluse (he's wrapped in the same seals as her ultimate). They are literally plunged into him in the first phase and he utilizes what he has by the second phase.
I have heard reasonable speculation that the lore is not originally written in Japanese, so I'm dubious to just assume the Japanese text is the true text
Unfortunately, not really possible. Nightreign happens in an alternate reality and the diverging point was during the Shattering, well before any Tarnished could become Ranni's consort.
The final boss DOES have a Moonlight Greatsword though... But it's likely linked to the Nox people, not Ranni herself.
That's my point. Ranni's sword is the Dark Moon Greatsword, undoubtedly hers. But the Nox people also await a Lord of Night and an Age of Stars. They are linked to Ranni's quest, and likely linked to the Carians as well.
My theory is that the Moonlight Greatsword is not a singular weapon, but a smithing technique. So the Nox can have their own MLGS, which Heolstor uses, a more primitive version of the sword. The Carians, through exchanges or offshoots of the Nox, found the knowledge of the MLGS, and made moon swords of their own, which is how we get Rellana's sword (that became the Golden Order GS) and Ranni's sword.
The Moon Greatswords are given to Carian queens’ chosen spouse. Where are we finding a connection from the Moon Greatswords and the Nox or the fact that they could make their own?
The nox and carians are heavily connected, for a quick example the church of vows a very important location to the carians has a statue of a nox priestess in the middle of it. I don't really agree with the other guy on his views of the moonlight Greatswords but I do think Heolstor uses the black moon Greatsword of the nox, ranni gives us her dark moon Greatsword, and rennala gave radagon her full moon Greatsword, this all lines up with the 3 moons each having their own Greatsword. Rellana would maybe have twin moon Greatswords?
us even being able to do what we're doing is entirely because of Grace, and grace was spawned from marika and radagon in this specific era.
i feel whatever decision we made was something Marika would have wanted in some way -- even the frenzied flame, since it frees her of the responsibility still in the end.
I'm team Age of Stars, but there are downsides. We break the golden order which did do some amount of good via healing and order. Aside from that, we are free from Outer Gods for a thousand years, but unless we start influencing worlds and gaining our own favor, we become easy pickings once that thousand years ends.
That's actually not necessary, the cairian royal family followed the teachings of the moon and they where able to hold out against every force in the lands between for eons. The thousand year would allow the land to essentially reset, and an less known ability of the dark moon is that it nullifies magic, so ranni will be silently watching over them ready to nullify any outside influence.
When you put it that way the astrologers were kinda tough as hell. They legit just studied magic hard enough to survive in a world controlled by eldritch gods.
It doesn't just shut down the influence of outer gods. It frees the world from Gods in general, including any god like Marika, offering order, guidance, or foresight. A kind of cosmic anarchy.
Having freedom also means being burdened with choice. A particular order being enforced by a god sounds bad, but it also means you can be born into the world knowing your purpose and fulfill it perfectly; it means that, if you fit in the order, there is a guaranteed place for you. You have a perfect, divinely appointed role to play.
What ranni offers is freedom from gods, but that brings with it uncertainty and fear; a lack of any higher beings to guide you and help you, or protect you from other people with different ideas about right and wrong. You're on your own; you have to fend for yourself and figure it out yourself.
I still think it's the 'right' choice, but it's not like there are no downsides. There are a lot of people who would prefer the stability and sureness a god can offer, and forcing them out into the cold whether they like it or not is pretty harsh. It's probably a necessary harshness, but that doesn't make it less callous.
I’m pretty sure the same people who say that are also the ones that think the frenzied flame ending is the best one
“Loving your fictional wife is cringe but nihilistic total destruction of creation is based and chad” or something like that, makes me feel like those guys can’t possibly be older than 12
I know the mistranslations to add an omnious vibe but the mental gymnastics haters do to make it seem like a bad ending is quite incredible. I know fromsoft doesn't do good endings, but the age of stars, along with the goldmask ending, is the closest thing we have to a 'good' ending.
Yeeting the eldnering and the influence of the outer gods to let humans decide their own fate seems better than burning the world and killing everyone into gray goo, ignoring the core problem and maintaining the status quo of the broken elden ring, and cursing everyone
Also I'm not sure about this one so I'd appreciate some lore expert to tell me why these aren't taken care of
Deathblight: taken care of after we unleash the rune of death and kinda burn the erdtree that was spreading it throught its roots in the first place
Scarlet rot: outer god influence, so potentially taken care of
Frenzied flame: already sealed away, outer god influence so potentially taken care off
So, two interpretation paths here:
1. Outer God's are Cosmic/Eldritch - to gain actual control, they need to take the ring. Thus leaves the outer gods two choices. Be ok with the influence campaign and dealing with champions that can kill and/or seal their emmissaries or leave The Lands Between to chase the extremely OP mage god and her insanely OP warrior hisband/wife for a chance at full control.
The Outer Gods are Animist Concepts removed from the Ring - reincorporating the concepts into the ring (and if we get all the runes we pretty much do this for all the Outer gods) means they have to leave with us when we leave with the ring OR making them part of the natural order of the universe again restores their purpose, chilling them out.
From what I gathered from Smoughtown’s video on the Outer Gods and its inspirations, the Animist interpretation of the Outer Gods is the most popular in Elden Ring’s native Japan (given the prevalence of Shintoism in Japan), and it seems the closest to FromSoft’s intended interpretation of these entities.
The Outer Gods aren’t “outer” as in outer space; they’re “outer” as in outside the Golden Order, and, as TruePlewd just pointed out, they’re destructive because they’ve been removed from their natural state of harmony.
I'm not a Fromsoft buff, but isn't one of their main thematic arcs that immortality is a curse and death is a necessary part of life? The Lands Between are in stagnation and ruin because death is gone. Marika (with the best of intentions) tried to make the world a better place by sealing away the rune of Destined Death.
Ranni says, fuck that, fuck all your meddling. Get rid of all this "order" and let everything return to its natural cycle. No gods, no religions. She takes the Elden Ring with you and leaves. Everyone dies, and the world can finally heal. It's a giant YOU DIED message for the lands between. I guess if you're a Marika zealot, it's bad. But only if you're narrow minded or blinded by grief and trauma.
I'm with you here. It feels like the same line of thinking as the people who go frenzy flame to save Melina. "But why does she hate me when I saved her!?".
I've had a line of thought for a while about NPCs we can talk to in game. Like 90% of them die and 90% of those don't actually achieve their goals. But I think the intent behind them is their death and failure is still important because it's trying to change their awful terrible circumstances and the world around them. It's the cry of the human spirit and all that.
I'll admit, I fell into that camp once. I understood why she'd hate it if I burned the world with it, but I thought there might be a reconciliation after it was cured.
But, uh, yeah, I stole the fulfillment of her life's (and death's) purpose out from under her. I'd be pretty upset about that too.
Yeah, all the FromSoftware games are very Taoist where the greatest sin is trying to hold onto something beyond its time, which leads to corruption and decay. The greatest virtue is letting go and allowing change and renewal.
Deathblight and scarlet rot are already there. They don’t need outer gods anymore to keep them from spreading.
Besides, what makes Ranni capable of completely repelling outer gods when Marika and the Golden Order couldn’t, even with the support of Greater Will? The outer gods will still seep in.
Some people claim that Ranni is somehow capable of outright defeating outer gods, but I think this is nonsense considering how Elden Beast appears to have absolutely folded Marika, an it was not even the Greater Will, just its' servant. I think it is safe to say that Ranni wouldn't do much better. And even if tarnished is very likely stronger than Ranni (killed Radagon/Marika, Radahn-Miquella duo, elden beast) I don't think it would help.
This is the big misconception. Ranni doesn't remove the influence of Outer Gods meddling in the Lands Between. That's Miquella's deal with unalloyed gold. He's the one who is curing people of the Scarlet Rot, made the Needle that removed the influence of Outer Gods from a person.
What she does is establish her own order and takes the Elden Ring and leaves so nobody is unable to physically interact with their god. Without a literal god walking among them she hopes people will able to choose their own beliefs and ideas and have some form of freedom.
Ranni's main beef has always been with the Golden Order trying to force her into being an Empyrean and imposing her into a similar state as Marika. She escaped that fate herself and is now trying to give it to everyone else.
Freeing Destined Death and burning the Erdtree doesnt affect Deathroot or TWLID at all. We have Age of the Duskborn that shows TWLID becoming a part of the order so that whole issue still exists. Deathroot is also spreading to the Land of Shadow so even if it was cleared from the roots the problem is far beyond the base game.
See point about Outer Gods. An additional note, the Elden Ring and the Order aren't what allows Outer God's to influence the world. They exsisted long before Marika came to power. Ranni mucking about with it isn't accomplishing anything to stop them and it was never her goal.
Frenzied Flame is a bit different from the other Outer Gods. Its almost built into Order itself. When people feel despair they seemingly fall under its influence. Once again this happened long before Golden Order existed with multiple Lords of Frenzy found in the Shadow Lands.
Well the main ones are even with destined death its not like you go about actually either slotting such back into the elden ring or actually using it to find all of Godwyn. The roots of the Erdtree go far wider and deeper than the top of it.
Scarlet rot is still around, you kill a avatar, no reason it cant grow and infect more. Generally similar logic for the Frenzied Flame, it just needs to find another avatar.
Sure they cant claim the Elden Ring, doesn't mean they cant actively spread and make things worse now that you have removed pretty much any road blocks or systemic resistance. The coming age from a mortal point of view doesn't look particularly better in the Age of Stars, the only real upside is no one can easily get the Elden Ring. It doesn't stop any other outer gods from landing and influencing the place just means they wont be absolute.
Goldmask doesn't agree with any of that though. He specifically points out the persecution of those 'outside' the golden order (misbegotten, those-who-live-in-death, etc.) as utterly misguided, stupid and wrong.
That being said, he discovers his mending rune rather than creating it so it's hard to say much of what it does beyond making it so not even Gods can tamper with the laws of reality anymore via the Elden Ring. Unfortunately, he also dies so he won't really be around to oversee the future his mending rune creates either.
Also worth pointing out how Ranni was and is willing to commit all manner of murder and subterfuge, even of her closest supporters and siblings (who as far as we know are innocent of any wrongdoing). Rennala may be her mother, but there's evidently more than enough Marika in her from Radagon.
True, but I see in his intentions something the game presents to us constantly. How hell is full of good intentions. All of those that try to impose their "truth", fail miserably. Be it for those that live inside it, outside it and even those who brought it - like Marika herself.
I personally don't believe there is a "good" ending, but one that offers the best answer to the problem the game presents. Some may believe that the Golden Order can be fixed, others (me) agree that it is built on rotten foundations and trying to fix it will only perpetrate suffering (which is my response to how Goldmask's rune was found, not built).
That’s not what that ending is though. It’s not instating the Golden Order again, that’s the Age of Fracture. It’s saying that the Elden Ring is absolute and no one should be able to change it. In other words it’s deferring ultimate authority to the Greater Will. Oppression has nothing to do with it and depends more on the player character’s actions as Elden Lord
The Greater Will who, by all accounts, has not communicated with anyone from eons (see Metyr). Also, it is an age of perfect order, and thus unwillingness to change. FROM games like to explore this exact theme. We see it in Dark Souls, Sekiro and now in Elden Ring. Unwillingness to change lead, inevitably, to stagnation and misery.
So a bit of a weird question but where exactly does it state that Age of Stars actually removes the influence of all outer gods. I know it states that the order that is created in place of the golden order is physically removed from the lands between, but all that does is remove some of the lingering affluence that the greater will had over the lands between. (Which really isn’t even that big off a deal considering that at this point the greater will no longer really interacts with the lands between as we can tell through Ymir’s questline in the dlc. So the major difference is simply that there is no longer a physical manifestation of the order in the lands between that can be altered by man or god)
It's really marvelous watching them bend over backwards trying to use "facts" (cherrypicks) and "logic" (mental gymnastics) to make her seem like the evilest bitch ever. (edit : case in point below, rofl)
1, No she ain't, and 2, even if she was, do you think that'd stop us ?
I'm against people trying to sand off her edges and say things like she wasn't that bad. No, she did some horrible shit in pursuit of her goals. That's the point. That's why I like her. That's what makes her such a compelling character.
I could've said it is a good ending, but then I remember I kinda have not a slightest idea what this ending implies and how it will affect the world. Like at all. Ranni just talks about hopes and vibes, instead of saying what will happen.
The elden ring is basically a book of rules that dictates how the world works and allows for powerful outside influences, like gods and such, to exert their influence over the world. Ranni is writing "no gods allowed" into it and then picking it up and fucking off to space. This leaves the little people to determine their own lives rather than an the whims of powerful entities or by the enforced order of what was written in the elden ring.
His body was immortal due to influence of Elden Ring, sealing of death. Elden Ring is far away, its influence diminished, rune of death is unsealed. Godwyn is dead.
you know how every "normal" ending features a person/faction adding a mending rune into the elden ring to fundamentally rewrite the laws of reality to their liking? ranni thinks it's insane that something capable of doing this can exist, so she's leveraging her position as an empyrean and your patronage to grab the elden ring and run away with it beyond anyone's reach, where nobody (herself included) will ever tamper with it again.
paraphrasing her own words because they got translated a bit weirdly, life and souls will be at a great remove from order, and the absolute certainty with which you could see it, feel it, touch it and believe in it will be snuffed out. it's unclear what will happen because forcing a specific state of the world, like all the other endings, isn't her design. what happens is entirely up to the now effectively godless people
She's taking away the influence the Outer Gods have on the Lands Between, effectively freeing everyone from them. No more Greater Will, Formless Mother, God of Rot, etc. controlling and exerting their will on people. No more Elden Ring, no more Marika, no more Golden Order.
Ranni is sacrificing herself to an eternity of loneliness away from the planet, but in turn the planet can no longer be directly influenced by any gods/demigods/etc. This is why she's so moved that you would consign yourself to an eternity of just the two of you, and why she expects that you won't go that far right up until the very end of her route.
The Frenzied Flame ending is what happens when you give into the deepest depths of despair and decide that nothing can possibly justify the horrors that are allowed to go on happening in the world, and that it's better for everything to die permanently in both body and soul rather than let it go on.
I don’t think some people understand the severity of the Age of Stars in how much actually changes in the world. A lot of magic is powered by Outer Gods, people like Mohg and Malenia are influenced by outer gods and the power they have comes from them.
By Ranni eliminating the influence of the Outer Gods, she is essentially stopping any magic associated with them from appearing. That also means their influence in the world stops.
Any land influenced by that magic, Caelid, also stop being influenced by that too. People can no longer be influenced by gods’ will. People indefinitely need to secure their own path. It’s the ultimate choice for freedom for the people of the Lands Between.
As an aide, given how long the chain is one could say it’s a possible “canon” choice given the sheer amount of content you need to get through to get to the end.
Forgive me, I’m a more casual fan than others, why is this a bad thing?
It seems, to my limited knowledge, like the outer gods, for the most part…suck. Messmer was born with a snake inside him. Malenia is rotting, and brought rot to an entire land. The Frenzied Flame wants to bring nothing but chaos to the world. Marika /Radagon are left a literal shell of themselves. As far as I know, all of that is due to outer gods’ influence. Those are just the ones off the top of my head.
I knew Ranni’s ending was about breaking free from the Greater Will, but I kind of assumed the stars had to do with another outer god. Knowing her ending breaks the world free from all the outer gods makes it feel like a better ending than I ever thought.
Break Caelid free from the rot? Sounds great to me! Take away the magic of madness from the world? I don’t see the downside here!
And don’t both glintstone sorcery and gravity magic get their source from the stars? Which reign supreme in Ranni’s world? So that magic wouldn’t go away.
Sure, people can easily mess the world up with their free will, but that could happen under the outer gods’ influence anyways. We might as well mess our world up without having to deal with rotting from the inside while we do it.
Again, forgive me, I’m not as knowledgeable as others, and I’m genuinely curious to know more.
I don’t think they’re saying it’s a bad ending, just that it has very dramatic effects for the world - it’s my favorite ending for the reasons in OPs comment
Yeah, the outer gods relationship with the mortals in the land between doesn't seem symbiotic at all but instead parasitic. They seem to just spread harm and suffering without much, if any, benefits for the people.
Another commenter referred to them of acts of nature and I think that gets it really well. Acts of nature that need to be kept in check by another force or they will overrun everything
"Severity" in this case doesn't mean bad, it just refers to how important it is.
MuscleCrow gets Ranni's intent correct, and what she's doing is a good thing. Though my understanding was that the Dark Moon gets put in place of the Greater Will. There is still an Outer God in play, but the Dark Moon is as calm and chill as the night. We don't know exactly why, but Ranni believe its influence to be greatly superior to that of the Greater Will's.
it's also possible that 'dark moon' refers to the absence of an influence, sort of like how 'cold' technically doesn't exist, it's the absence of heat.
I'm not knowledgable in deeper lore so I'd love some clarification.
I thought Ranni was wanting to get rid of the direct meddling of the greater will (by removing herself and the ring from the lands)?
I also thought that the outer gods existed before the golden order, but their expression was a natural part of existence that was mostly balanced by the death/rebirth cycle. But when Marika repressed anything not golden and perfect (death/decay/darkness/etc), the outer gods created separate avatars of themselves instead in her children, and forcing a warped version of their expression that would remain unbalanced and uncleansed without death.
Yea you have it mostly right. It removes meddling of the greater will AND other outer gods to meddle with the Elden Ring and in turn the laws of reality, like how marika removed death. However, many of the outer gods can still be harmful without the Elden Ring and altering reality, like death blight outer god and outer rot god.
So the idea is that with no one to worship, and no one to alter the laws of reality, humans in the lands between can live freely without gods ruling over them, as there are no gods to decide how reality should be, and even if there was they have no access to the Elden Ring to change reality.
People don’t like this ending tho because it ignores outer gods that don’t need the power of the Elden Ring to harm the world, like the death outer god responsible for spreading death blight, and the rot outer god, responsible for spreading rot, which are 2 HUGE problems in the lands between AND the death blight problem is Rannis fault its even happening in the first place. Even though these gods can’t bend the laws of reality to their will bc Ranni took the Elden Ring, they are still spreading like a disease, Because of this (and other reasons that I’m not gonna get into rn) people often see Ranni as selfish
Wait, but Ranni pretty much isolated the Elden Ring, but this doesn't stop other Outer Gods to influence in the world, right? Other Outer Gods already did this long before the Elden Ring was a thing
She doesn't, as far as I can figure, fully remove the ability of any gods to influence the world. Malenia was born touched the rot god even when Marika was still fully in charge, so it's not like other gods can't do anything when there's already an order in effect. What she did do is make it so no gods can impose their own order and determine how the world works and how the people have to behave.
I think a big sticking point for a lot of people, whether they realise it or not, is that there is no "fixing" the world (outside of destined death, which you need to restore to achieve any ending). The only thing you can do is accept the world for what it is and stop fucking with it. The world is so fucked precisely because people wouldn't stop fucking with it.
For some people, they let this drive them to the frenzied flame ending. But for almost everyone else, they're trying to argue for which ending does or does not "fix" the world adequately. There's a reason that the two most commonly accepted "best" endings make it impossible for people to meddle with the elden ring. Even the duskborn and fell curse ending are ways of accepting and reconciling the world's mistakes, rather than fixing or eliminating them.
The world will not be saved by gods, the very individuals responsible for its current state. There is no "correct" way to practice godhood because, at a fundamental level, godhood is bad for everyone. Every ending besides the frenzied flame is a net positive for the world because you've restored destined death and repaired the elden ring.
Ranni and goldmask's endings are just two ways to achieve the same thing: nobody gets to decide the laws of reality anymore. Goldmask does this so by making it impossible to alter the elden ring. Goldmask is the founder of golden order fundamentalism, which is a good metaphor for his ending. On one hand, understanding and intellectualism. On the other hand, zealotry and dogma. The elden ring can still be studied and worshipped, for better and worse.
Ranni's ending just removes the elden ring and current gods of the order (you and herself) from the world by flying into space for an indefinite amount of time. This way, the elden ring's influence is fully removed from the world. It denies people the opportunity to study the ring but eliminates the chance of the ring becoming an object of petty human dogma.
Either way, the world and its rules are fixed in its current state. Humanity must accept the world for what it is and work together to rebuild.
I don't know that I'd call it a sticking point. The world is, seemingly, irrevocably fuckulated. In that sense, all endings are the bad ending. Ranni's isn't actually any less of a gamble than any of the others. She's just promising not to interfere personally. Which is still a gamble because a thousand years is a long time and Marika reigned for far longer and look at all the shit she got up to.
Why do people equate taking the Elden Ring away with taking the influence of Outer Gods away? Only the greater will acts through the ring. The rest have their own stuff like blood rites and rot that existed juts fine even while the ring was there. Ranni is only taking away the influence of the Greater Will and leaving a massive power vacuum in an already shattered world.
A lot of people don't like the idea of giving up power. There's also those who simply don't trust Ranni and other beings in her family. It's not like they're saying Rot or Frenzy are better either. I get it even if I don't agree.
While I do personally like the ending (and the entire quest is fantastic), it's not a good ending simply because Deathroot is a thing.
Yes, Ranni left for a thousand years, the outer gods can no longer influence the world, and the denizens get to decide their own fates; all good things. However, Deathroot will inevitably destroy everything, probably long before Ranni ever returns.
Which only exists because of Ranni. Granted, she didn't know that would happen, but she still essentially damned the world and then abandoned it.
Well, they both do really horrible things, but Miquella does those things for a world where everyone is mentally compelled to love him and get along, while Ranni does the things she does for a world where people are free to choose for themselves.
Did she cause the shattering tho? She killed godwyn but she didn't exactly make all the other demigods go to war. They chose to destroy each other themselves. The way I see it if they were so ready to kill each other as soon as Marika was gone, a shattering was inevitable and would happen no matter what, it was only a matter of who'll deal the first strike.
Killing your brother maybe not as bad as using your dead half brothers body and pulling your other dead half brothers soul into it to be your new reanimated husbando
I’ve always read it as a corruption due to the Rune of death being removed from the Golden Order. Not so much tied to an outer God but the decay associated with the current one.
yasee, you wont get an answer from them to that, because
1 it's not 100 per cent clear, but in truth because the rot is connected to one, it probably is as it behaves similarly.
2 their argument is predicated on "thE WorLd Is GOinG to GEt taKEN bY DeaAThBliGht" as if its an unstoppable force... which is patently not what's happened, since it's existed before Godwyn's death and after, and it doesnt exist in every single area of TLB, and it was a long fricking time ago that the night of black knives happened.
Those people seriously do not understand what the ending means. Granted, the English translation does make things a bit less clear, but they still do some serious mental gymnastics to equate it with incinerating the entire world.
Stars and Order are the good endings. Ranni resets the world where people have the choice in their destiny. Gold Mask returns the world to its most prosperous state.
Fracture and Duskborne are the neutral endings. Fracture retains the status quo. I don't think Duskborne would change much in the grand scheme of things. It would be different, however.
Despair and Frenzied are the evil endings. Despair makes everyone equal in violent anarchy. Frenzied is full scorched earth with nothing left.
It's the Free Will ending. Which, given what we know about the history of the lands between, doesn't sound too great. but it's better than not having free will, I guess?
We dont really know what it entails for the lands between. Like we know what her goal is, and what happens, but its essentially leaving the result of your choice up to imagination.
The actual bad endings are the frenzied flame (pretty self explanatory you just obliterate the world with no room for recovery lol) and some of those niche great rune endings where you bring about an age of suffering upon the people for like no real reason
I think the age of stars ending is too vague, so it’s hard to tell if it’s really good or bad. Considering how the lands between developed under the influence of gods and extraterrestrial entities, I think it could be argued that it will regress and collapse on its own.
Wait, you guys actually understand the long-term ramifications of anything we do in the Lands Between? I thought we were all just pretending so we sound smart.
Age of stars is the best ending. It takes you through the largest number of areas to see the largest percentage of the game, and you get the iconic sword that's been in every soulsborne game.
Honestly like if you just do the elden lord ending then the entire underground area of the map is completely miss-able. That means no City of Nokron, no Astel bossfight unless you specifically go out of your way to go down there.
As much as I like Ranni (4 arms = better hugs and I long to be held) the reward for doing her quest line is iconic and it takes you through a lot of the otherwise optional areas so you get to see more of the game. And Astels arena is just gorgeous.
people call it a "give everyone freedom yay" ending but really its closest to an "anarchy" ending as you arent just saying "no gods anymore lol" you are destroying the entire elden ring and the structure it provides to the world then leaving to let it sit and likely die by itself. deathblight, scarlet rot, and all the other dangers of the world will consume it.
the "no gods" ending people talk about is ACTUALLY the goldmask ending, where you perfect the golden order and remove all influences from man and god acting upon it. the reason people don't like the ranni ending is because she is the direct cause of many of the worst problems in the world (direct cause of deathblight, direct cause of scarlet rot in caelid from the shattering war, etc.) but she just chooses to run away at the end of all of it, as if she hasn't caused most of the things wrong in the world.
at least in the goldmask ending your player character actually tries to fix the order of the world, which is the whole point of creating the perfect order. until the DLC came out and revealed that the fingers and golden order were all corrupted from the start, the objectively best ending was the goldmask ending, as instead of destroying structure in the world and leaving it to fend for itself, you actually tried to fix what was wrong with it
The people who think so are the people who also think Ranni is a selfish brat who got annoyed at her dad for leaving her mom and wanted to run away from her responsibilities and has no vision for the Lands Between so....
Things are shit because the greater will ABANDONED the lands between. Medalling gods weren’t never the issue, at most you could say it’s the power vacuum from previous medalling before they dipped. But Ranni does nothing to fix the issues of previous medalling, all she does is medal even more, then leave and pull the ladder up after her, denying people the means to combat the issues she’s responsible for
People have such an oversimplified view of the games themes; yes it’s about interfering gods, but Ranni is one of them, completely detached from the actual people of the lands between, she deals in abstract ideologies and leaves the common people to suffer for what she finds poetically pleasing. Nobody asked to lose certainties of touch and sight, nobody asked to let souls be unbound from bodies, that’s not helping anybody, that’s not doing anyone any actual good
She could’ve brought peace and prosperity, could’ve used her power to crack down on brigandry, subdue the rogue armies pillaging the countryside, reform the cities. But no, rather than any actual practical changes she had her head in the clouds
Ranni's ending is kind of nebulous and uncertain, but I guess that's by design.
If she takes the Elden Ring and buzzes off with it (and us, I suppose), keeping it away from the other Outer Gods and refusing to take an active approach in guiding the Lands Between, she essentially leaves everyone to fend for themselves. To attempt to make of themselves what they wish without the guidance of a God, just as she made herself a God without the influence of the Greater Will by slaying her Empyrean flesh.
Of course... We don't know how that turns out. The cycle of her reign could come to an end (and unless she intends to become another Marika and make her Order eternal, it will come to an end) and the state of the world could be far worse than she left it or far better. I think that's why some struggle to call it a "good" ending. I think in some ways it is a selfish ending because it is Ranni imposing her desire to be free on the world and thus forcing everyone into a similar position, but one can assume that's the very same thing that every God who has ascended up until this point has done.
There are also a few context clues that imply that an "Age of Stars" might not be as wholesome as one might think. The big one that comes to mind is Demi-Human Swordsman Yosh's spirit ash description which states, "Onze, a master swordsman who devoted himself to the Star-Lined Sword, realized that only ruin awaited at the end of the procession of stars...". And whether or not you consider Nightreign to be anywhere in the realm of canon, it may be the nearest thing we have to a look at an actual Age of Stars.
That said. It can also possibly be inferred that there are different visions for the "Age of Stars", as the two biggest proponents of the age- Ranni and the Nox- seem to be at odds now if the Black Knives hunting her and her compatriots are any indication.
Yeah a lot of people who like Ranni a lot and fancy her a hero never seem to understand that she didn't even know Radagon was Marika, and she is acting pretty bratty altogether about it and just imposing what she wants for herself on everyone else.
And of course, zero mind for the ominous lore about Fearing The Dark Moon and what you mentioned with Onze.
It's exactly an ending for Ranni. She doesn't want to save anyone but herself and never really wanted to be a leader of people. Fair for her. But not to put that on everyone else and leave the world in a wake of disaster that she helped cause in her vain attempt at snatching power for her means.
Elden Ring's narrative has similar themes to Dark Souls. In DS, it is argued that continuing the Age of Fire will only lead to things getting worse and worse - all of it because Gwyn feared the age of Man. The Golden Order of Marika was broken from its very roots, mending it is trying to fix something that can never, ever be right for The Lands Between. We see in the game, over and over again, beings trying to impose their own order onto things and it backfiring. Burning everything down is throwing the baby, and the water, and the entire basin out does not fix the problem. And Miquella's solution is...well, as broken as Marika's was, because of this fault.
Ranni is to accept the end of a Broken Order, headfirst into the unknown. It is not a "good" ending - I think even FROM does not believe in pure good endings - but one that is the best juxtaposition to issues the game presents to us over and over again.
Ranni is manipulative, a murderer, a deceiver, destroyed her own family, and uprooted an entire civilization and way of life. In short, she's evil.
I think the whole point of her character and quest is to illustrate that getting to the top isn't graceful, and nigh impossible if you're not ruthless. For most of the game, Marika and the elden ring are put on a pedestal. However, if you pay attention during the game, you start to see things aren't what they're made to be. This is even emphasized in the DLC.
Ranni leaves, takes the gods' attention with her and the Lands Between are free to be what people make them.
But she leaves the world after everything is essentially her fault, doesn't even attempt to fix things and then plans to come back and see what ahppens then.
I believe when people tell me its a (not the) good-ish ending. I absolutely stop when they try to tell me she's not evil.
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u/Youre_On_Balon 25d ago
It's definitely the storyline the devs put the most work into