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White Mage Lore? - Annaveil - 08-09-2013
Meep! I'm trying to get into the nitty gritty of my character's background and figure out certain details of her past that I'm completely in the dark about! If anyone can answer some questions or point me towards a Wiki excerpt I may have overlooked, I'd really appreciate it!
Eve (my character) isn't meant to be a particularly scholarly type. I'd like for her to be a White Mage, but would it make sense for a character that's not been groomed for years to take that up (I really know very little about their training)? I don't mind sticking her in some sort of training for a couple of years or something, but is it a thing that's meant to be super rare and difficult to accomplish? I will be playing her as a White Mage in the game itself. So it'd be great if she could be a White Mage IC as well!
If not, are there any alternatives to healers on an IC level? I don't really care if she's a White Mage. I would prefer it, but if it just doesn't make sense then...yeah. Mostly I just care that she would specialize in healing/support.
Would it make sense for a character to have an innate gift towards the healing arts? Perhaps that could give her a boost in that direction?
Thanks for any discussion!
RE: White Mage Lore? - FreelanceWizard - 08-09-2013
The "normal" healer in XIV is the Conjurer, who calls upon the Aether of the world through the elements to heal and support allies. White Magic is its own kind of thing -- historically, it's been a forbidden style of magic, though the Padjal are now apparently bringing it back (main site).
The thing about RPing Jobs is that we don't quite know yet how they're going to work lore-wise in ARR. In 1.x, you had to do a lot of genericizing to RP them, as their lore basically had your character as the only person with the Job; obviously, that was problematic.
We don't yet know how they're going to work in 2.x, though it will remain true that you'll have to complete a quest to learn the Job.Any any rate, you don't need to play a White Mage to be a healer. Conveniently, Conjurer is the main base class for White Mage, so you can start RPing as a Conjurer, then RP that you've learned White Magic, depending on how feasible the quest lines make that.
As for having an innate talent for healing, yes, there's in fact two NPC examples of this in the Conjurer quest line -- people can heal without formal training, albeit at a terrible cost to themselves. The Conjurer quest line revolves around convincing such a person to receive formal training and learn to hear and commune with the elements as a true Conjurer.
RE: White Mage Lore? - Annaveil - 08-09-2013
Oh I see! Okay then, that makes sense. Thanks so much! You basically answered all of my questions.
I was a bit confused about the lore behind the White Mages. I'd seen somewhere that they were rare because of this or that, but your explanation makes it a bit more clear.
The bit about having an innate ability to heal is SUPER helpful. Again, I really appreciate you taking the time to write all that out!
RE: White Mage Lore? - Sounsyy - 08-09-2013
Hey Annaveil! Freelance did an excellent explanation of White Mage. I just wanted to post the actual "history" of the job, so you might better understand just why White Magic is so rare.
Quote:The Fifth Astral Era is said to have begun approximately three millennia ago. The ice age that ushered in the Fifth Umbral Era made the land a barren and merciless place, and man was pushed to the limits of his resourcefulness in the struggle to survive. Yet survive he did, through the discovery of magic as we know it - an event which marked the dawning of the Fifth Astral Era.
At first, man was well pleased just to keep the cold at bay and compete with the other races. But man is nothing if not an ambitious beast. It was not long before he sought mightier magicks, hoping to win greater glory. It was this desire that brought forth Black Magic, the arcane art of destruction, into the world. In order that this force of chaos be kept in check and balance preserved, at roughly the same point in history, white magic, the arcane art of succor, came into existence.
Emboldened by magic, man went on to reach the zenith of glory. But his hunger knew no bounds. Over time, even they who donned the white began perverting their powers for the sake of self-gain, and in this single minded pursuit scrupled not to sully the sanctity of the Twelveswood. In his pride and avarice, man brought down the wrath of the Elementals upon himself. A great deluge was sent to cleanse the land of his wicked presence, in the wake of which the forest rose to swallow up all that was not washed away. Thus did the Sixth Umbral Era begin.
-Raya-O-Senna, The Wheel of Disaster
So after this, White Magic was supposedly lost to Eorzea for over a millennia. It made it's second appearance about 500 years ago, with the creation of Gridania and the end of the time of Gelmorra. Because of this calamity, the Elementals of the Twelveswood would not allow anyone into the forest, out of fear and anger at it's previous inhabitants in the Fifth Astral Era. So, the Elezen built a vast city underneath the forest called Gelmorra, but they were not allowed to the surface. It wasn't until Hyur started migrating to Eorzea that this began to resolve itself.
Elezen and Hyur do not typically suffer each other's company. The Hyur invaded Elezen lands and it was basically all out war between the two races until 500 years ago, where in Gelmorra, the Elezen and the Hyur put aside their differences and sought to find a way to reach the surface of the Twelveswood. (This is where the Gridanian Flag comes from. The twin adders are representative of the two races making peace.) To do this, they needed to appease the Elementals. Thus after many many years, Conjury was created. This magic used the aether of natural world around them and through meditation, Conjurer's were able to manipulate it into a spell. Because the Elementals are part of Nature, this form of magic allowed the Gelmorrans to communicate with the Elementals.
The Pact of Gelmorra was struck between the Elementals and the Gelmorrans. The Gelmorrans would be allowed to live within the Twelveswood if they swore on oath to never defile the forest, never let it come to harm, never abuse the aether that coursed through the land. They agreed and Gridania was built. Now it's the way of life in Gridania to take from the forest only what you need and give back everything you have in excess.Â
How do White Mages fit into all this? The Elementals never forget anything. They remember back to the days when the Twelve still walked the land. They remember the power of Succor. They knew that if the wounds of the forest were to properly heal, such a power would have to exist in Eorzea once more. So they entrusted the knowledge of White Magic to a select few conjurers. The Elementals also blessed these conjurers, changing the very chemistry of their body. When these select Hyur Conjurers had children, these children grew up with incredible control of conjury and white magic. At puberty, these children stopped growing and became Padjal. They started growing horns. That's why all the Padjal you see in game look like children. Except Kan-E-Senna who looks older, which leads many to believe she was one of the first Padjal/White Mage and that she may not have become Padjal the natural way.Â
Hope this helps!
RE: White Mage Lore? - Mtoto Wamoto - 08-09-2013
(08-09-2013, 08:53 AM)FreelanceWizard Wrote: As for having an innate talent for healing, yes, there's in fact two NPC examples of this in the Conjurer quest line -- people can heal without formal training, albeit at a terrible cost to themselves. The Conjurer quest line revolves around convincing such a person to receive formal training and learn to hear and commune with the elements as a true Conjurer.
I think you're misinterpreting the quest dialogue slightly.Â
The girl in question, Sylphie, is indeed healing without proper training, however, it isn't the lack of training that's detrimental to her health, but the method of casting.
Conjury relies on the elements found in nature and the aether therein. When using conjury to cure, the aether surrounding the caster is used to heal the person in question. This is why conjurers study earth, wind, and water - the elements most ready and abundant in nature.
Sylphie on the other hand, is using her own aether. This isn't conjury by definition of the magic. It's thaumaturgy.
While it isn't blatantly said, it's heavily implied and we can infer that the spell she's using is akin to sacrifice, which was a thaumaturge spell which used the casters own innate-aether to heal their target.Â
Keep in mind that aether is the lifeblood of all living things. So when a caster uses a spell that drains their aether and continues to do it without restraint, they can kill themselves, which was the case for Sylphie's mother.Â
When Sylphie claims she can cast raise and brother E-Sumi-Yan admonishes her, it because she's not casting raise, she's likely casting a thaumaturge spell akin to resurrect, which in practice of thaumaturgy, is in line with necromancy. This is likely what he means when he saysÂ
Quote:"You know not what you do─what you risk! You are meddling with forces beyond your comprehension! Should you even attempt to use that spell, I will have no recourse but to strip you of the name of “conjurer†and banish you from our halls! Do I make myself clear?"
Anyways, just wanted to drop that by. A person can likely learn conjury on their own without major ramifications such as the ones Sylphie experiences so long as the method of casting falls in line with being derived from nature, and not within oneself. Freelance pretty much hit everything else on the head tho
RE: White Mage Lore? - FreelanceWizard - 08-09-2013
I don't entirely agree, but then, I don't entirely disagree.
My recollection is that E-Sumi makes it clear in other parts of the quest dialogue that Selphie is in fact highly talented in Conjury, but her choice to not study and learn to commune with the elements (driven by her desire to only heal people) results in her failing to cast "properly," thereby using her own life to heal others. My read of that is that she has a special talent, but that talent is for using one's own Aether to heal others. Of course, as Sounsyy pointed out in another thread, E-Sumi could also be being devious here, since what Selphie is doing may be coming dangerously close to the proscribed art of White Magic.
That said, given what we know about the practice of Thaumaturgy, I think your interpretation is also equally valid. I definitely don't want to say my interpretation is the true one, since we've only seen the new quest line up to a relatively low level.
RE: White Mage Lore? - Eva - 08-09-2013
This is one of those places where I deviate a bit from what is established to be the lore. Eva is a lot like that little girl and I intentionally don't make clear where the source of her healing comes from. She is very much a white mage though, and she is very weak with elemental affinity (she's decent with water, but has little to no command of any of the other elements to speak of). This predates the jobs though before we had lore to explain much of this and I just kind of kept rolling with that and I can't imagine why anyone would give me a hard time for it.
While she is a bookworm, she has never understood magic in any capacity, but has tried to seek out the wisdom of those more knowledgable at several points in the recent past few years (prior to the Calamity). As I have described it, she was born with this talent - a 'Wilder' of sorts, if you are familiar with the Robert Jordan books. For her own part, the more she tries to understand what she is doing, the less adept she is with it. When she stops trying to make sense of things and lets her feelings and instinct take over, she does fine. So she doesn't understand what the hell she's doing, and doesn't really need to. I guess she views it as akin to someone not needing to know all the specific inner workings of a car in order to be able to drive herself to work.
Most mage-type characters I have interacted with (from 1.0 anyway) do study, or read, or otherwise learn throughout the course of their life how to perform these feats rather than are born with a sort of talent. In the end it's kind of the same thing. But the lore as we have it now doesn't support this (but doesn't really reject the possibility either) so that's what I've been going with for myself.
Please bear in mind though that this is just what we have opted for Eva, and there are now probably better methods that adhere more closely to the game's lore, so your mileage ('malmage?') may vary~
RE: White Mage Lore? - Annaveil - 08-09-2013
Awesome! Thanks guys! I think Eva had the same sort of idea that I had for Eve (as far as the car metaphor goes). She doesn't know the workings of how to do what she does, she just does it. Unfortunately, that does mean she'll screw up from time to time and if her oil needs changing or if a belt slips she's completely lost lol!
I think my plan will be to have Eve basically be a copy/paste of the NPC in the quest that you guys are discussing. She had this innate talent for manipulating aether, but realized that it was dangerous when she ran into an actual Conjurer with the proper training. He/She explained the situation, and maybe Eve spent a few months gleaning what knowledge she could from him. I don't see her as the type to stick around in an environment where she's going to be beneath someone (even a teacher) for very long. So she'll leave before she's had the full out training required, but perhaps decide to strike out on her own again and go her own way with her newfound knowledge.
Does anything look wrong with that? D:
RE: White Mage Lore? - Sounsyy - 08-09-2013
(08-09-2013, 06:35 PM)Annaveil Wrote: Does anything look wrong with that? D:
Not at all. There are a great many conjurer's that travel across Eorzea on their own. Most of those are more experienced conjurers though, but it wouldn't be far-fetched I don't think for your character to strike out on her own.
An interesting thing you could employ in your RP if you wanted to, would be to have your character suffer some of the mistakes that fledgling conjurers make. Like not being able to consistently manifest their aether into a spell, or even the spell they intended. Maybe using more powerful magic will drain your own aetherial stores instead of Nature's.
I might be cautious on the latter though, seeing as how we don't know how Sylphie's character in the CNJ questline will play out. (I'm still sticking by my theory that she possesses the power of White Magic and Brother E-Sumi is trying to tame the White Magic with Conjury before Sylphie kills herself.)
RE: White Mage Lore? - Annaveil - 08-09-2013
(08-09-2013, 08:07 PM)Sounsyy Wrote: An interesting thing you could employ in your RP if you wanted to, would be to have your character suffer some of the mistakes that fledgling conjurers make. Like not being able to consistently manifest their aether into a spell, or even the spell they intended. Maybe using more powerful magic will drain your own aetherial stores instead of Nature's.
This is something I actually did want to play with! I love characters that stumble along their way so this is the perfect opportunity to fiddle with that!
Thanks a bunch for the input! I'm finally starting to feel like her story is a part of this universe!