Ambrosia Software Web Board: Seldane - Ambrosia Software Web Board

I was thinking about the seldane and a few things struck me as somewhat odd. Why is it that they seem to have had possession of two pieces of the crolna (the one in Maayti and the one Timon found)? Also, why do they seem to be linked to all four mystic items, despite their locations of north, south, east, west? And then why do they have ruins in the west and south, along with their underground city and LKH where they apparently lived in before in the north, but ironically nothing, it seems, in the east? The crolna in particular bothers me…I always assumed that having four shards meant one shard for each elemental, but there is no way to connect their any of the shards to the sylphs or the ignae.

It is possible the Seldane didn't actually have possession of the Shard in Maayti. The Undine might have corrupted the Shard, used it to drive them from there, and placed it there to prevent their return.

I'm not certain about the Shard that Timon found. It too may have been corrupted, lost when Maayti fell and the Seldane were driven to Ayrit, or even possibly placed there for him to find (since the Undine wanted all four shards found).

It is interesting to consider how the Undine seem to have come into possession of at least 3/4 of the Crolna. It is possible that all four elements initially had one Shard, and the Undine managed to claim those of the Sylph and Ignae in whatever chaos came along with their respective downfalls.


Which four mystic items are you referring? The helmet, armor, and spear?

They are all described as being Seldane artifacts in the hintbook. I suspect the link is that they are all buried in the Earth.


I had not noticed the lack of ruins in the east. Perhaps gandreas intended it as an intentional irony?

Selax, on 05 February 2011 - 02:40 AM, said:

Yeah, I meant the three mystic items. Which itself always puzzled me, why there’s only three, but that’s another thing.

Selax, on 05 February 2011 - 02:40 AM, said:

The thing that made me think this was weird, though, is why do they have so many connections to the four pillars? While it would indeed be strange if all their stuff was crowded in the east of everything, it seems odd that everything seldane (who are only one elemental) would revolve around the four pillars thing.

I think Sabinate said something like the Seldane were forced out of Maayti because of the Crolna. They locked the doors to keep the corruption confined within. To me that implied that they couldn't touch or move the Crolna, and that the Undine had put it there to be mean.

I'm not sure, but I think each element originally had a shard of the Crolna, but that was a long time ago; & by the time the game took place, the Undine had possession of all four and had corrupted them. One they left under Catamarca to cause a plague for political reasons, one they put in the headwater ruins (either a long time ago, to force out the Seldane, or recently just so Timon would find it), one they put in Maayti to force out the Seldane, and one they held on to.
It is possible, too, that the Crolna was invented by the Undine from the start & never belonged to any other elements. I don't know. I think where did the Crolna come from is a very good question

The "mystical" items, I think, don't have anything to do with the four pillars. They're just some cool things the Seldane made.

I also think it's weird that the elements aren't found in their direction (like Seldane in the East or Ignae in the South). I assumed the directions were just symbolic and didn't mean physical direction. But then Ignae says something like "I'm from the South, though I'm not there now" which implies that he does mean the real physical south? I don't know... Buzzy, you're always bringing up things I never thought about before!

BreadWorldMercy453, on 05 February 2011 - 12:04 PM, said:

Well there is that volcano in the south…

Yeah, maybe Ignae was the minister who married Jhiaxus & Jinrai! (Which would make a good Chron for Valy's challenge, btw)

I think Gandreas was probably just trying to make it realistic. I mean as time goes on people grow and spread out and if war and struggle get mixed in, then people start to get displaced. What happens in current Cythera is the result of all the different forces moving together.

Well yeah, but that’s why I found it weird how the Seldane have/had three cities in every direction except east. For that matter, UrSylph didn’t really choose to hang out where he is, did he? And according to Omen, the undine are everywhere. The Seldane probably have ruins because they are the earth elemental, whereas the undine probably live in the sea and Ignae/the ignae (?) in fire, etc., the locations just seemed odd to me.

BreadWorldMercy453, on 05 February 2011 - 12:04 PM, said:

Interestingly enough, I was speaking to Ignae recently and his conversation about destroying the balance stuck out to me this time:

"The balance between North and South, East and West, has always been precarious, but always it was balance. Until the West found a way to have their powers trancend the axis, and drove the East from their seats of power. This all happened, of course, long before you humans ever arrived. I'm still not sure how that happened. You humans, it seems, are outside the four pillars, or perhaps are a combination of all four - I'm not sure. You could be quite an ally to any of the four pillars, though who would be master and who would be slave is hard to determine."

To me this suggests that Ignae did not know of or at least did not understand the crolna. That would mean that each pillar did not have a shard. In the topic about Glenn Andreas quotes, there's one where he refers to the crolna as being the Undine's "most powerful artifact," which I take to mean it was something the Undine obtained unbeknownst to the others, since they apparently claimed sole ownership of its powers.

An alternative possibility is that Ignae knew of the Crolna but either does not know that it had had anything to do with the Seldane being driven from Maayti or does not wish to tell you. It may be that none of the elementals understand exactly what the Undine did to corrupt the Crolna.


The statement about the Crolna being the Undine's greatest artifact is a very interesting one. If the Crolna is the Bane Stone mentioned in the Cipher Manuscript, it is possible that the device is of extra-Cytheran origins.