Just beat the game and have lots of unanswered questions

[Ashray]

I feel the ending left me with more questions than answers. Or I'm just a dummy and everything flew over my head. Either way, I want some things cleared up before I jump into Deadfire.

 

• If the gods aren't real, who or what have I been talking to all this while? So the Engwithans made them, does that make them automatons like the eyeless or something?
• Why are the gods afraid of someone finding out that they're not really gods? If the real world is anything to go by, just saying gods don't exist isn't going to convince a believer. Doubly so in the Pillars universe where "gods" literally do exist.
• Why was Ondra trying to get rid of the Engwithans?
• If Abydon stopped the falling moon from wiping out the Engwies, how did they eventually die out?
• Why is Thaos trying to protect their secret if they themselves wanted his kind killed off?
• Not really a question but it's crummy how all the ending choices end up serving one god or the other. Wish there was an option to screw them over and do your own thing.

 

I'll post more as I remember them.

[Messier-31]

I feel the ending left me with more questions than answers. Or I'm just a dummy and everything flew over my head. Either way, I want some things cleared up before I jump into Deadfire.

 

• If the gods aren't real, who or what have I been talking to all this while? So the Engwithans made them, does that make them automatons like the eyeless or something?
• Why are the gods afraid of someone finding out that they're not really gods? If the real world is anything to go by, just saying gods don't exist isn't going to convince a believer. Doubly so in the Pillars universe where "gods" literally do exist.
• Why was Ondra trying to get rid of the Engwithans?
• If Abydon stopped the falling moon from wiping out the Engwies, how did they eventually die out?
• Why is Thaos trying to protect their secret if they themselves wanted his kind killed off?
• Not really a question but it's crummy how all the ending choices end up serving one god or the other. Wish there was an option to screw them over and do your own thing.

 

I'll post more as I remember them.

 

1. The gods are semi-real. Their origin is just not divine but artificial. Take them as super powerful entities made by kith. 
2. You believe in God? Say that it turns out there in fact exists a God, but he was a mechanical contraption all along. Sure, he exists and does his thing, but for you, as a believer, this most probably will be a serious blow in everything you believed in. So the Eora gods prefer to keep things as they are.
3. Ondra is the goddess of forgetting stuff, so it suits her agenda to get rid of the last people with ties to the so called god-creation-process. Also, vide point 2 above.
4. Abydon didn't stop the *entire* moon from falling. Years later Engwithans died out becuase there were few and far between, so you could say they just got extinct.
5. Thaos is Woedica's favoured, he got special treatment from her.
6. You can do so by not pledging to any of them and remain without a boon. But if it is the "what to do with souls" choice you are refering to, well, there are 11 gods in the pantheon, so it seems whatever your choice there will always be a god that will be happy with the outcome. Guess taking the power of the souls for yourself would be just too OP.

[LittleArmadillo0]

I will try to answer your questions as best I can

1.I guess this versions depiction of a god. I don't think it is like the eyeless as the eyeless are more of golems that have a shell encasing souls within. I think we were talking directly to their soul or their ethereal form not a physical one.

2. They are afraid because it challenges the notion of what a god is supposed to be. They were created through unnatural means by a race of mortals. I would imagine no matter how many powers the gods wield some people would not accept them as gods if they knew their origin.

3. Ondra believes strictly in keeping the secrets and one of the biggest secrets was the gods creation. I was logical to wipe out any knowledge of that off the face of Eora.

4.I don't know.

5. Thaos is an exception to the rule and all rules in general. Thaos also believes the ends justify the means. So what is his whole civilization was wiped out, at least every heathen faith that was created was destroyed and everybody is following the same belief.

[InsaneCommander]

I'll add some comments to what was said above.

I feel the ending left me with more questions than answers. Or I'm just a dummy and everything flew over my head. Either way, I want some things cleared up before I jump into Deadfire.

• If the gods aren't real, who or what have I been talking to all this while? So the Engwithans made them, does that make them automatons like the eyeless or something

 

They are real. But they are not what many would consider "gods".

 

• Why are the gods afraid of someone finding out that they're not really gods? If the real world is anything to go by, just saying gods don't exist isn't going to convince a believer. Doubly so in the Pillars universe where "gods" literally do exist.

 

 

Because the number of non-believers would increase over time. It could get dangerous in the future, especially if someone decided to study how to create other gods.

 

Or maybe they are simply offended that someone won't worship them.

 

 

• Why was Ondra trying to get rid of the Engwithans?

 

 

To destroy for sure the memory of the gods' creation. It's part of her portfolio...

 

 

• If Abydon stopped the falling moon from wiping out the Engwies, how did they eventually die out?

 

 

I don't remember if they explain that.

 

 

• Why is Thaos trying to protect their secret if they themselves wanted his kind killed off?

 

 

Because he is a religious fanatic and not a nationalist.

 

 

• Not really a question but it's crummy how all the ending choices end up serving one god or the other. Wish there was an option to screw them over and do your own thing.

I'll post more as I remember them.

 

 

They had to restrict things for the sequel. If not, yes we should have other options. Trying to absorb the essence, sending it to another god, try to resurrect Eothas, give it to Vela, Korgrak or Itumaak...

[house2fly]

Thaos believes that the point of the gods is to give people something to believe in. He's worried that if people find out the gods are fake the follow-up realisation that there are no gods will make them despair- as it did him.

 

The Engwithans were largely wiped out by the creation of the gods- look how many souls it took Thaos just to give Woedica a boost, what would it take to create eleven of them from scratch? The game is ambiguous but what I believe Ondra tried to destroy was the ruins of an Engwithan city- she was trying to erase the memory of them.

 

I also, and this is a lot more ambiguous after PoE2 but I still like it, think the Engwithans as a whole despaired when they found out there were no gods, in a "if there are no gods what is the point of life" kind of way. The creation of the gods was by design both projection of Engwithan values across the entire world, and a form of mass suicide

[Ashray]

Thanks for all the answers, everything makes a lot more sense now.

 

I don't know if this was ever mentioned, but if you restore the souls to the hollowborn, what happens to the children who were killed off or turned into wichts?

[Messier-31]

Thanks for all the answers, everything makes a lot more sense now.

 

I don't know if this was ever mentioned, but if you restore the souls to the hollowborn, what happens to the children who were killed off or turned into wichts?

 

Souls of the killed presumably go back to the Wheel.

 

Souls of the wichts, now this is tricky, and would like to know this as well. The body already has a soul of an animal inside, so it either (1) bounces off and goes back to the Wheel as well, (2) or it pushes the animal soul away and you get a Mowgli type person, (3) or sticks to the animal soul and you get a ravaging wild two-soul creature thingy.

[InsaneCommander]

They had to restrict things for the sequel. If not, yes we should have other options. Trying to absorb the essence, sending it to another god, try to resurrect Eothas, give it to Vela, Korgrak or Itumaak...

Actually, the end game location has the symbol of Woedica on the floor. So this must be the place where they created her. I imagine it wouldn't be possible to send the souls to other gods.