I think I mentioned this in some thread way back in the day, but Chachan came into existence as a character due to Gogon, and a bit vice versa.
More clearly, Gogon existed first when I made him on a non-RP server (Zalera) to hang out with my little sister when the Recruit-a-Friend mechanic first went live. His name was Tmesis Oan then, because I knew nothing of naming conventions, and I went Lalafell Arcanist because the idea of a book-caster grabbed me - and Carbuncle is one of my favorite summons - and I've had a fondness for the wee races ever since I watched a Gnome Warrior tank Onyxia. Plus, the little blurb said Dunesfolk Lalafell were academic by nature, so having one being a magic math nerd seemed appropriate.
When I found out about the RPC and Balmung and all that, I decided I wanted to sneak a character onto it. I decided I wanted the character to be the younger brother of Tmesis, so that locked his race and gender. I had also stumbled across the naming conventions thread on the FFXIV forums by this point if I remember correctly, so I had already been musing on a "proper" Lalafellan name for him.
I was leveling everything on him, so what sort of name would work for someone who could "do everything"? Flitting through the name randomizer, either Gogonji popped up on its own... or something close like Gogoshogu or something did. Gogo the Mimic - that'd work. So I had the AA in the AAC-BBC Dunesfolk naming pattern. Just needed the rest.
The Doman stuff had just dropped around this point, and I got it into my head that I would like to play a Doman Lalafell. And then during all this musing, the Genji armor came to mind and it all just... fell into place. Gogonji Gegenji. The "black sheep" elder brother of a smithing family that was interested more in combat strategy rather than combat equipment. I didn't have the firmest grasp on Lalafell family names, so I figured the little brother would be a Gegenji too - and the musical naming pattern brought its own solution: Go-Go Dancing and the Cha-Cha.
Chachanji Gegenji.
So I had myself the youngest child of a smithing family that had come to Eorzea. What would he be like? Well, I was (and still am, to a degree) worried that people might not want to play with me. So I tried making him open, friendly, and cheerful. To try and get as many RP opportunities as possible. I came up with the idea that he wanted to use the equipment he learned how to make to help people himself, and it all sort of flowed from there.
He entered the world, interacted with a lot of interesting people, and become the timid little hero wannabe smith that he is now. Gogon was brought over from Zalera to serve as a villain for a big moment event for the little guy (and I was growing lonely on Zalera...), and people were kinda interested in him too, so he ended up staying as a character instead of being written off or Fantasia'd into something else. His character by this point had been a spin on the fact that I had been more or less doing everything alone or in PuGs on Zalera while Chachan had all these nice, friendly folks to play with. And developing him as a villain resulted into delving even further into the hows and whys - including on how I "powered him up" to serve as an appropriately difficult "Final Boss" of the event. Which I then stripped him of and turned that loss into a developmental moment.
Comparatively, Judge was a much simpler idea. I like to buck trends every now and then - if everyone's playing sexy and toned superheros or criminals (Champions Online and APB, respectively), I throw out a hefty character like Lard Almighty or Chris "Chrisco" Colander. And the tiny-tank idea was alive and well with little Paladin Chachan. In FFXIV, I noticed that most characters were in their teens and early twenties, with a few outliers on the thirties. I felt a great need for a grandpa.
The Au Ra were being hyped at this point, and were still being toted as possibly descended from dragons. So, I decided that I'd want to go with a DnD-style Elder Red Dragon type of character - old and powerful. But what to have him do? Well, I'd always been amused by the FFTA Judges and wanted to play something along those lines for laughs. And since I was also kind of developing this character to help Warren out at the Grindstone, the Law angle fit even better. So Judge Jredthys came together - with his Discworld Death-style speech and horribly outdated black-and-white view on everything.
And I've been having fun with all three.
More clearly, Gogon existed first when I made him on a non-RP server (Zalera) to hang out with my little sister when the Recruit-a-Friend mechanic first went live. His name was Tmesis Oan then, because I knew nothing of naming conventions, and I went Lalafell Arcanist because the idea of a book-caster grabbed me - and Carbuncle is one of my favorite summons - and I've had a fondness for the wee races ever since I watched a Gnome Warrior tank Onyxia. Plus, the little blurb said Dunesfolk Lalafell were academic by nature, so having one being a magic math nerd seemed appropriate.
When I found out about the RPC and Balmung and all that, I decided I wanted to sneak a character onto it. I decided I wanted the character to be the younger brother of Tmesis, so that locked his race and gender. I had also stumbled across the naming conventions thread on the FFXIV forums by this point if I remember correctly, so I had already been musing on a "proper" Lalafellan name for him.
I was leveling everything on him, so what sort of name would work for someone who could "do everything"? Flitting through the name randomizer, either Gogonji popped up on its own... or something close like Gogoshogu or something did. Gogo the Mimic - that'd work. So I had the AA in the AAC-BBC Dunesfolk naming pattern. Just needed the rest.
The Doman stuff had just dropped around this point, and I got it into my head that I would like to play a Doman Lalafell. And then during all this musing, the Genji armor came to mind and it all just... fell into place. Gogonji Gegenji. The "black sheep" elder brother of a smithing family that was interested more in combat strategy rather than combat equipment. I didn't have the firmest grasp on Lalafell family names, so I figured the little brother would be a Gegenji too - and the musical naming pattern brought its own solution: Go-Go Dancing and the Cha-Cha.
Chachanji Gegenji.
So I had myself the youngest child of a smithing family that had come to Eorzea. What would he be like? Well, I was (and still am, to a degree) worried that people might not want to play with me. So I tried making him open, friendly, and cheerful. To try and get as many RP opportunities as possible. I came up with the idea that he wanted to use the equipment he learned how to make to help people himself, and it all sort of flowed from there.
He entered the world, interacted with a lot of interesting people, and become the timid little hero wannabe smith that he is now. Gogon was brought over from Zalera to serve as a villain for a big moment event for the little guy (and I was growing lonely on Zalera...), and people were kinda interested in him too, so he ended up staying as a character instead of being written off or Fantasia'd into something else. His character by this point had been a spin on the fact that I had been more or less doing everything alone or in PuGs on Zalera while Chachan had all these nice, friendly folks to play with. And developing him as a villain resulted into delving even further into the hows and whys - including on how I "powered him up" to serve as an appropriately difficult "Final Boss" of the event. Which I then stripped him of and turned that loss into a developmental moment.
Comparatively, Judge was a much simpler idea. I like to buck trends every now and then - if everyone's playing sexy and toned superheros or criminals (Champions Online and APB, respectively), I throw out a hefty character like Lard Almighty or Chris "Chrisco" Colander. And the tiny-tank idea was alive and well with little Paladin Chachan. In FFXIV, I noticed that most characters were in their teens and early twenties, with a few outliers on the thirties. I felt a great need for a grandpa.
The Au Ra were being hyped at this point, and were still being toted as possibly descended from dragons. So, I decided that I'd want to go with a DnD-style Elder Red Dragon type of character - old and powerful. But what to have him do? Well, I'd always been amused by the FFTA Judges and wanted to play something along those lines for laughs. And since I was also kind of developing this character to help Warren out at the Grindstone, the Law angle fit even better. So Judge Jredthys came together - with his Discworld Death-style speech and horribly outdated black-and-white view on everything.
And I've been having fun with all three.
~