Saefinn

This Captain will surely be there. Kudos for the EU love, though I have learned to be nocturnal anyway. The Captain is normally well composed these days, but who knows? Somebody might spike his drink *looks to Poe*, your sister better not be coming, she's enough trouble as it is, last time she spiked people's drinks people could have died.

Hello everybody! Well, Wayward Star has kinda just weaseled its way in. We've now found our feet ICly, so I would like to post up our favoured RP spots, should anybody wish to say 'hello'. Locations for Pirates of A Wayward Star Anchor Yard - AKA Wayward Point Wolves' Den Aleport

I pretty much dropped from most of these, they're a bit outdated. If you haven't already, may be worth looking up Adventurer's Guild, granted it's not a hotbed of conversation most of the time, but it has more active players to reach out to. We maintained our RP contacts with our own OOC LS, we invited people as we went along and as it's our FC's primary chat channel it meant a lot more communication for RP. Maybe worth hooking up with other FC's in their OOC LS groups - or at least, linkshell capacity permitting. You are pretty presumptuous, you admit you know nothing about us, yet you're quick to assume. I've not made any assumptions about you or your FC. We have supported the Gilgamesh community since its conception, we were one of the groups who helped get this community get off the ground - though we've always been small and though we've not necessarily had as much gravity as some groups, we've stuck through the good and the bad. We've pushed through issues and tried to resolve them. Heck, there were issues going on for the passed 2 months that have demanded our attention and we have pushed through them trying our best to resolve them and we resolved most of them. But in the end we have decided we'd do what is best for *us*. You may not like it, but we're here to have fun and trying to *fix* things can take a toll after a while, and I'm the sort of FC leader to support my own members and they will always come first. If this points us in the direction of Balmung, so be it. If my members decide Balmung isn't what it's cracked up to be, I will support any move back to Gilgamesh - heck, we've prepared for such a contingency. As they say, "the grass is always greener". All I've seen you do is complain about what other people do. If you feel so strongly about this, rather than complain about what we're doing, perhaps you could make a more constructive turn and talk about what Gilgamesh's existing community can do support itself? What can you do for the community? Perhaps offer the olive branch, I can see a few FC leaders posting in this thread, this would be the perfect opportunity to do that. Perhaps show Parker, who is concerned about the community, that it is not dead and there's still opportunities for him and his FC. Despite me jumping ship, I still have a lot of positive things to say about the Gilgamesh community and I do hope it continues to be great. But, chances are, we'll no longer be a part of it, but what we do is our prerogative. That is a ridiculous strawman. People seem to take the 'small country town' thing as derogative, though it was coined by somebody still within the community and not at all intended to be derogative. Heck, I explained my interpretation of it. Considering I've not said Gilgamesh is dead and have in fact said on more than one occasion that it is NOT dead, I have said it is not what it once was...and that's an accurate summation, because it has been almost a year since its conception many have come and many have gone. If anything, it is expected of any community, even our own FC, our FC is different to what it was 9 months ago, because our membership 9 months ago was different. *shrugs* Take what you will, but I sincerely think you've got the wrong end of the stick.

I'd like to make a point that Shade is now being led by Russet Rose, and while it did take a hit to their membership, it is still in fact there and they intend to start hosting events at their house. Yeah I just saw their post in the linkshell hall, nice to know they're getting back into it.

Now that's a face I've not seen in a long time. Didn't even know you lurked, one thing Gilgamesh needs again...a burlesque house.

No, I understand that completely. This is about the most I've posted on here for a long time. I wasn't implying inactive at all. The population is smaller, there's not a big open world roleplay - though it does exist - one of the wonderful things about the Goblet is that it is home to many RP FC's - sure Shade & Drift no longer exist and we've packed our bags, but we're not the only presence - Black Sails is another major FC there, for example and the's also Gold. The idea of a small country town is that almost every family knows one and another. That is a good thing, there has been a lot of cohesion in the Gilgamesh community, everybody's connected to somebody somehow. It's doesn't mean there's less activity, a small country town can be extremely eventful. At least, this is how I understood the analogy. Nobody. They're two different servers with two different communities. It's purely down to what people want out of a server's community.

I wouldn't say RP on Gilgamesh is dead, not at all. We've by no means 'rage' quit. That said, no, the community isn't what it once was, which is fine. People move on. There has been a decline in population for a while and that does affect RP. Whilst there has been some issues, but we did our best to resolve them and we did persevere. We found in the end the best decision for *us* was to jump ship, that said, it's only the best *perceived* decision. Our house and FC still exist on Gilgamesh and we still have alts on there, it could be we actually come to regret the decision, we are well aware of the phrase "the grass is always greener". We could find we hate Balmung so much that we want to pull our hair out. FYI, we're not a sinking wreck, as an FC, we're as strong as ever. We're not feeling the need to recruit, it has rarely been an issue for us. We keep ourselves a moderately small FC and keep it cozy. The only time we've had to push a recruitment drive was after Christmas when we took a big dip, but we recovered and have been a comfortable size ever since. We've always picked up our members doing what we do best: RPing and making friends and placing ourselves in parts of the RP community. We also use our OOC LS to join up with all of our friends from other FC's and communicate with our community that way too. Yes, some of the people jumping off of these FC's server jump and I agree the ideal thing is for everybody to continue to support their community, we've been doing that for a long time, but in the end, we've decided to do what we think's best for us. After all, we use the motto "FC comes first". Drama in Wayward Star is absolutely minimal, in fact, it has been a long time since anybody in the FC has had an issue with another member, because we are relaxed, but where drama has occurred, it has involved people outside and to a degree they can be ignored - though ignoring a problem isn't always the best means of dealing with it. We found 95% of the issues were resolved, but that doesn't change the reasons behind members all wanting to jump. This wasn't a council decision, but a practically unanimous decision of the FC. I don't think Gilgamesh will die as a community - at least for a while (I wish not to claim anybody's immortal), but at the same time, we felt for us, a move would improve RP for us. I think it is accurate to say that the community isn't what it once was, because so many different faces have come and gone. By no means is it a jab at Gilgamesh, because I have absolutely loved my time there, I don't regret it one bit and I say that to the "I told you so's". I also suspect that the server jump won't be something we regret either. But in terms of recruitment? I don't wish to be ignorant, but I am not familiar with your FC. I don't know if it helps, but we've kept links through the Coalition/Adventurers Guild LS groups and through different RP events, showcased our RP, invited people into our OOC LS group, been inclusive and invited people to RP on a fairly regular basis, building arcs with people, not just in the FC and it's by these links that we've attracted people into wanting to join, so when a person does move on, it's not a big hit and we can keep a comfortable flow of members. Because FC members comes first and get more of a say in how we do things, so they do gain something by being a part of the FC and get to feel a part of the crew. I think this is a fair analogy. Gilgamesh you could say was a bigger more bustling town, but is now a nice small countryside town. Each have their advantages and disadvantages. We already are aware of the disadvantages of moving to New York, hence we're prepared.

It was a sad decision to make, it was not mine alone, heck, I hadn't suggested it and it wasn't made lightly. We've always had a great love for the Gilgamesh community and have supported it right from the beginning. But the community isn't what it once was, we've had a fantastic time and a lot of stories to tell, met lots of great people, seen them come and go, but I don't think our RP would continue to survive if we remained. There were drama llama issues going on in The Goblet, which we know to house a number of popular RP FC's, we did our best to resolve them, but it did become a drain on many of us. To the point where we started feeling more introverted and the decline of players didn't help - not really a community 'feeling' anymore. We welcome RP and respect people's RP, so we love RP with people outside of our FC. The numbers are also a lot smaller compared to what they were. I've found typically when talking Gilgamesh vs Balmung, typically people would say you get a lot more RP on Balmung (also open world RP), but you're more likely to get quality RP on Gilgamesh - though quality is not exclusive to either and of course, nothing is guaranteed. But it's based on the experiences reported back to me. But now, I think Balmung is looking to be the brighter place for us. Also, for us many of our friends in RP have come and gone, we have left a handful behind, regrettably (yourself included), which is why it wasn't a light decision. Seeing Drift completely split, that was a big surprise, it was almost like seeing a god fall. It makes me glad we've managed to keep our FC in order for so long, but again, if we stayed, I suspect we would eventually meet the same fate and we love what we have going, so we'd never want that fate, not until at least we grow sick of each other. Though, it will be *fun* saving up for another house. We've had to leave ours behind on Gilgamesh as you know, but hey, most of us craft and we have wealthy Russian investor So maybe we can make the funds in due course.

I find it usually depends. Attitude is important, and effort is too. I won't necessarily pick the most skilled person - skill rarely is a criteria, though it will work to your favour somewhat, but if the skilled person is an a-hole, you will guarantee that I won't give you a commendation, but if you're new to tanking, show a positive attitude and try your best - despite wipes, I will give you a commendation. If you don't learn from your mistakes, then perhaps not. DPS is usually the hard one to judge, but if the healer or tank hasn't made an impression on me I will default to my preferred DPSer. If nobody has made an impression, I will pick at random - possibly I like their name? Or the way their character looks or just happens to be where my cursor it. Egos are a big turn off. I strongly believe in rewarding positive attitudes, but then I suppose I work in customer services, so I feel more inclined to show favour to the people who have a good attitude and do the bare minimum for those who choose to be ignorant. Yes, losing your rag with a customer services agent is unlikely going to make them helpful...I apply the same logic to dungeons and PvP, but also can be inclined to do what I can't get away with at work, I might decide to troll. Hey, if somebody's going to be a d-bag and attempt to ruin my fun, why can't I use them as sport? Fortunately, FFXIV is a mainly mature community, WoW on the other hand, I was almost always encouraged.

For me, the character needs to fit in their surrounding and fit with the lore of the game. I don't care if they're an average Joe or Tits McGee. I would also say something that's well written - not necessarily award winning, but nothing to make you cringe. But how this game is set out appeals to me, I would struggle to RP in something like WoW, but here, the human condition is more present, though there is 'dark' and 'light' as per the crystals, but really, those considered good and bad have human traits that show that they have good and bad aspects to them. The kind of characters I like are therefore easier for me to write, because I write with both dark and light and often bring about the human condition. Yes, I wanted to be a pirate, but I feel I was realistic about it and consider that the stereotypes really don't apply. Granted alcohol is strongly present, but it's not like the stuff of children's stories. Essentially I would say a character that makes themselves convincing in their environment. Whilst Saefinn is a Pirate Captain, X'hayu is a Sultansworn, Steinn is an entreprenuer - all pretty high roles, I play them realistically - or so I like to believe. I also have Uhanu'sae, who is a sailor, Oskar who is a labourer (though he is my antagonist, which makes him more interesting) and I am to introduce Felix, Oksar's brother. But truthfully, I don't enjoy the 'normal' characters so much. I feel the setting of Final Fantasy permits me to being your average Joe. I don't think either is wrong. It's about what you're happy RPing and if you can be convincing, then I'm sure people will want to RP with you. Suppose it depends on the crowd, you can't please everybody.

Note for mods: This a new thread for a new start. If our old thread can be archived or deleted, it'd be appreciated. Link IC Intro - The Scholar Captain Hey everybody...you thought I was going to say, "ahoy there mateys!" didn't you? Come now, that's just an offensive stereotype, but luckily for you I'm the generous kind of captain or I'd have cut your balls off already (or tits, let's not be sexist). Yes folks, I am the Captain of the Pirates of a Wayward Star. I'm sure you've got lots of questions, such as, "if you're a captain, where's your longcoat?" and "Really, you're calling yourself a pirate? Why don't you just shout it out so the guards can hear ya?", "aren't you a little well spoken?" or "you're a flipping cat! Why should I take orders from you?" Well, for each of those questions is a story and you may one day know the answers or not. For the time being, why don't you hook up with my crew? So, what's in it for you? I could say, "adventure" but there's so many adventurers these days and adventure is kind of a given. But being a pirate is about being free, I know, idealist drivel - I've sailed with pirates and met all sorts of captains making slaves out of a crew. A pirate's life isn't free and it isn't all whistles and songs, don't let the bards kid you. It's the rubbish they feed you when your mummy kicks you out of the house for stealing. My old captain was like that, he was a real piece of work. I staged a mutiny, killed the bastard and it paid off. Now, I could give some inspirational rant about how everybody's a brother or a sister and make you throw up. Truth is, I avoided becoming the captain I hated. But this is a bit of a tangent. Ah yes, now I'm back on track, I'm a captain and I need more crew! And what is this crew to do? Well, for starters, I'd like to avenge my old crew. What happened? You don't need to know, really. Maybe we'll do some noble things, like save an orphaned child...well, maybe if there's money to be made. Or less noble things. I welcome all odds and sods, except maybe those who'll stab us in the back. If you're new to this whole pirating malarkey, don't worry, we'll take you under our wing. Can't fight? Can't tell your head from your toe? Don't worry, that was me once and now look at me (I still can't fight, but I can do magic tricks), you'll pick it up. Best of all, you don't have to be a stereotype. If you really want to "yeargh", it's up to you, knock yourself out. OOC Our Website Hello folks! Pirates of a Wayward Star, one of the founding Free Companies and Linkshells of Gilgamesh has made its way to Balmung. For various reasons we have decided to make Balmung our new home and hope to get some good RP with our new neighbours. It was sad for us to leave, we've made a sacrifice in saying goodbye to some friends and also our house and rank 8 FC, but onto new pastures and such, we have already started raising money for a new one, possibly a medium or large and of course, we hope to make new friends here. The FC We're a cozy group, we've never had the intentions of being a large group. But we encourage those looking for some relaxed fun and quality RP to join. We take a down-to-earth approach to RP and management and we discourage drama as we like to keep it a comfortable environment to RP with. But, our way is not everybody's way, which is why to join the FC we now ask for interview procedure - just to make sure you're going to be happy with us. The LS We are split into 2 different LS's, OOC and IC. This was approach that we found wonderful for our RP on Gilgamesh, we found we made lots of friends with people of other FC's and this was a brilliant way to keep in touch and encourage RP. In fact, it was the place to be to know what we're doing. We are taking the same approach to Balmung, if you wish to join. Let us know. Bear in mind, FC members will *always* come first. Our Approach We're primarily an RP group, we're very much story arc focused and we enjoy a dramatic approach, for us RP is more of a living novel than a form of a social media through characterisation. Though we are very social and try to be as inclusive of anybody as we can. We intend to make friends with the people we RP with. Our group also extends to endgame content, though it doesn't take advantage over any RP, we of course play to experience the game and endgame is a big part of it so we include it in our activities. Whilst we are laid back, we do have a certain amount of structure and we do expect rules and guidelines to be expected, though such things are never perfect, so often or not we look at situations. Whilst we love and respect lore and encourage people to respect it - as it affects people's immersion, we'd not lore Nazis and of course, are always willing to offer help and advice. Our Council We're a democratic crew, we respect the views and opinions of our members and act out of their best interest both ICly and OOCly - for example, our move to Balmung. The Captain may be a drunk and a fool, but after all the hell he's been through, he values his crew above all else. But to shoot us up in game, the council is below. Captain: Saefinn Liljasson First Mate: Cassandria Everfree Recruitment Officer: Strawberry Charlotte Game Officer: Hana Ohara Roleplay Officer: Beldrem Cando Enforcement Officer: Kazas Arkon You can contact us in game or through our website. I am working on a new website with possible email accounts - stay tuned. How To Join Get a hold of us and we can give you an interview so we can begin. Contact us via the website/submit an application through the site Find us in game Post Here PM Me Find our FC in game - Wayward Star[star] and submit an application

Drunk pirates captain chasing rum who's a bit camp? Loved by wenches. Most might think Jonny Depp. But throw in intelligent, scholarly, rare moments of charm and with potential for gentlemanliness? Well, Jonny Deep could probably pull that off too, but I think Robert Downing Jr could pull off Saefinn too with Robert De Niro as his grandfather. I think him as more of RDJ drunk than a Jack Sparrow, that said, it could sit somewhere between. The nun/brothel situation could happen to both actors. As for others?If Denzel Washington could be made to look like a Roe, he'd pull off Steinn. X'hayu? Little girl from Kickass maybe, just s an adult...we can wait.

I play a Scholar, a Scholar captain who happens to be from Limsa and also is a recovering alcoholic. Intelligent men can drink, can get drunk and can be alcoholics. Heck in history there's some great thinkers who were under the influence, not just alcohol, but stronger stuff too. As Captain Saefinn has spent so much time at sea, he's found one of his favourite pass times is to read, he spent a lot of time sat reading a book and despite being the son of a sailor, he has managed to become quite well educated for this reason. The alcohol comes with the company he keeps and it helps with a lot of his guilt. Only when he takes it too far does it affect him poorly. Getting drunk != lack of intelligence. But you don't need to dance around with the alcohol because it seems traditionally Limsan, because it's not like it's a mandatory thing for a Limsan to do, even if somebody Limsan might thing you weird or drunk when you pass out for some given reason. Heck, you don't need to use the main storyline on your character.

I would say for villains, of course first seek the permission of other players when it comes to some of your general jackassery. But I have found subtlety to be my best tool on my villain characters. I have 2, Oskar and Lenu, Oskar is your honest-Iago and Lenu, I don't even know if she's a villain yet. For a bit of backstory with Oskar. My characters Steinn and X'hayu are defectors from the Garlean Empire, Steinn who's now an entrepreneur responsible for a larger number of Ala Mhigan refugees and X'hayu who, after the guilt of her crimes has sought a selfless goal of essentially helping those in need. It has earned her a place among the Sultansworn. The two essentially have knocked their head together to leak Garlean military tactics and are backing the Ala Mhigan resistance. However, in their Garlean days, Steinn and X'hayu were responsible for dealing with Ala Mhigan insurgents and it wasn't pretty. They murdered Oskar's family in cold blood. So he's blinded by hate and only wants revenge. Steinn and X'hayu's secrets were protected by our pirate crew and we work closely with them and they're essentially under our protection. Oskar basically allowed himself become a part of the furniture as an Ala Mhigan employee. This meant he had one valuable asset. Information. So with that backstory, I had a motive and a means of him manipulating things to his favour. So I had to work him into one of our FC's arcs. It took a while for Oskar to actually have a presence. Instead of, "hey, here's a villain", I took things in stages. The first stage was: have Garleans discover X'hayu. So she was hidden by our crew. We managed to kill off the trail of breadcrumbs leading to X'hayu so she could walk free. The second stage was to have Steinn blackmailed into turning himself over to the Garlean Empire. No names were mentioned, just an Ala Mhigan hinted. By this point Oskar had shown his face to the crew, but his true nature was unknown. We as a crew investigated what blackmail they had over Steinn. The Garlean Empire was in possession of a list with all the names of locations of everybody involved with our crew's operations. This meant we had to find a means of retrieving that list. Once recovered, the contents of the list was enough to shake people up. But one location was circled - where the Captain's family lived. They were assassinated. Once people knew it was this guy Oskar, he was instantly hated. After Saefinn captured him and after what a crew mate did to him, Oskar has been in hiding, his face resurfacing once in a while to crew unease. But his RP essentially worked because I've managed to work his motive into why he would target people in our group and rather than being overly obvious or to be an over-the-top Disney like villain, his actions and manipulation speak more and I don't have to have long periods of playing on him. Which leads me onto Lenu. I barely roleplay her, when I do roleplay her, it's for short periods of time. My approach to her is "less is more", she saved Saefinn's life, she seems to appear at certain points in different arcs and seems like quite a reasonable character with selfless aims. But she has left random and vague notes, like "you debt must be settled, life for a life" and she turns up at points unannounced. With a more recent issue, we've had somebody kidnapped, and after a moment of almost screwing things up. She just walked into our house and saw 2 members of the FC and said "tell your Captain, his debt has been paid, life for a life." Each time she appears, things are very ambiguous and to add, I've made her a White Mage, which in itself is one hell of a taboo unless you're a Padjal. Everything about her is merely implied and ambiguous, I'm letting people fill in the gaps. When I'm ready, I will reveal her true nature, but I'd rather just keep placing seeds into people's heads when she is about in hope that she unnerves people. I find with my villains they need to seemingly have a big impact, but not be too obvious and announce themselves. To use a bit of subtlety and manipulation. I like Iago as a villain, though Othello bored me as a whole, but it worked well.

It's just we're missing an Allagan flamethrower, we all know it's about merchantising . I wouldn't say there's ataboo, but certainly something to make people feel uneasy. It could be seen like a Thaumaturge carrying a good sent, you have the essence of a primal, people gotta question that. However, among adventurers I imagine it's to die for. However, as Ascians and Allagans share an interest in primals, you can share the two sides a bit. I think Ascians would be very drawn by any kind of magic capable of manipulating another. That said, I think to like them in, you'd need to be high profile enough to gain their attention.

Hi there! Welcome to Gilgamesh, hope you enjoy your stay. There's always something going on at Ward 3 of The Goblet, there's a few RP FC's situated there, including our own at plot 14. Might find an RP FC you like and decide to join. But er...there's 2 pirate ones right next to each other, if you want to pick one, clearly, we should be your priority choice. Sorry Lalah. In seriousness, it's about who feels at home for you. Most of us are pretty welcoming and relaxed and we love new people and are only crazy in the best sense.

I created a friendly drama free FC, but inevitably there has been drama, I don"'t think it can be avoided, and yes it can take its toll when dealing with it, one of the problems I've had is that I try to please everyone, but have had to accept it is simply not possible. You've got to decide who is more important, as harsh as it sounds, but you don"'t things can fall to shit. But I promote a very down to earth approach, i'm pretty chilled and I encourage my members to be the same, if a person isn't, we've created a discipline process, frankly if their negative contributes affect the positive contributors, then I'm not going to worry about doing right by those having a negative impact, I'm polite, I will talk with them. If they unreasonable or persist, I'm not here to deal with bullshit, I'm here to have fun and RP with friends...you want to change that and show no signs of improvement after adequate warnings, then you're out. Simple as. If pursuing our RP or our attitude doesn't satisfy you, then really and truly you needn't be here, basically my FC has run since beta, we've been through good and bad times, but we've stuck to our guns, had RP fun and it has worked for us. For me, attitude is important for my membership, one personality can royally screw things up.

I go with the assumption that our Marauder friend is responsible for new discoveries on Nymian ruins, including the discovery of faeries. I would put this down to the Calamity too, particularly as far as exploring The Wanderer's Palace goes, description of the place: So I would say it's logical for adventurers to be attracted to this place, should they be lucky to survive. When Saefinn had a good reputation with The Maelstrom (when they found out his crimes, he lost that useful link) he helped with some trips to the ruins. Also *SPOILER* Tonberries can *potentially* have sentience too. We've seen this in the Scholar story line, though it was triggered by the faerie. */SPOILER* I have borrowed this idea in my own faeries' back story. But to explain how I've approached things in an IC perspective. Rather than Eos and Selene being 2 fragments of the faerie. I have made them two separate entities - Asarosa (Eos) and Asaviola (Selene), they consider themselves to be sisters. Both of them have very distinct personalities, Asarosa is the one who has struggled to adapt to the modern world, the one who was very shy at first, but through thick and thin has really kept Saefinn's back, to the point where she's allowed to have an attitude problem with him...some may recall an RP when she was chasing a rather drunk Saefinn almost off of a cliff because he mistook what was essentially a nunnery as a brothel. Asaviola on the other hand, she's the more adventurous, she's embraced the modern world and has been very poorly influenced by the captain, she's an alcoholic, like he. In fact, they're a bad influence on each other. If anything, it's Asarosa who keeps things together. But both share a similar trait - a facetious attitude, both like to make fun of the captain, particularly as he refers to himself as "The Scholar Captain" and they facepalm. With argument to summoning. I would suggest that aethyr is needed to summon, but not to sustain. Simply because MP essentially reflects aethyr use and SE has avoided using the mechanic from FFXI, whereby having an active summon meant your MP would be drained and if you wished to sustain your summon you would need to have the means of restoring your MP at a sensible rate (via gear & buffs). Whether you can summon more than 1 faerie? I suspect there is a restriction as far as binding goes, but a Summoner can summon multiple egis, just not at once. An Arcanist will use gemstones to summon carbuncle and carbuncle is able to be summoned in 2 forms, which is why I suspect Eos and Selene are 2 different forms of Lily, but it isn't explicit in lore, as far as I have seen. But, I would argue that it's not impossible for a Scholar to bind 2 faeries, like a Summoner has 3 egis ATM, so I would argue it's safe to play Eos & Selene as 2 separate entities. I am actually playing with my faerie story arc at the moment, through all Saefinn and Asarosa have been through together, their bond has grown extremely close, it is a relationship observed as "unfaithful husband and nagging wife". They are going down a romance route...which would mean Saefinn would need to be abstinent, because frankly, I don't ERP, so porn physics won't cut it. But I did write a story for when they suddenly realised how they felt about each other. Linky I have also had one of Saefinn's enemies kidnap Asarosa in ransom. Could he not just unsummon her? I have thought about that, I have a couple of theories, but I don't want to offer spoilers should my dear FC members stumble upon this thread.

I think with keepers you've got more room for creativity. Saefinn is a moon kitty, though you wouldn't by his name, but his grandfather is Uhanu'sae, he didn't like his clan and was really unformfortable with some of the rivalry and B/S that comes with it, for him it was all about who could be the most impressive and it came with big egos. But, clan culture was what he grew up with and he saught new horizons elsewhere, but the clan mindset never left him, he became a sailor with a merchant ship. He served with a mostly Roe and highlander crew, he was the token miqo'te, but they in essence became his clan, it was a strong brotherhood without the egos. It was led by a man called Lilja and upon his death they honoured him by referring to themselves as the sons of Lilja. So whilst I have pushed away from the clans, there is a certain amount of history involved and the lore has kinda influenced the general mentality. This history that was imposed onto Saefinn growing up, though he also had the culture of sailors too, but he seems to have inherited an important trait too - look after your own, he is extremely protective of his crew. His name however, was inherited from the kind of company his grandfather and incidentally, his father kept. I think of him as a Chinese guy called George. A close knit brotherhood is very important to him and is in his very nature as a moon kitty.

I was gonna say I'm gonna be there, I mean I am a Pirate Captain and am a long serving one and would egotistically stand on the stage and declare awesomeness. But I am away that weekend. I am sure one of my crew can fill in on my behalf.

Shame this is on Balmung, that said it was previously tried on Gilgamesh but don't think anything came of it. Though X'hayu would perhaps not want to see some of her tribe given some of the things she's done. Still, nice idea for grouping lore together to agree on tribe lore. Could potentially offer useful back stories and relationships.

And nice getting some new faces as well. And as a result, I'm less hindered by my timezone differences, making it easier for me to play out stuff with my arcs and to get involved more with other people's. Naturally, we welcome more people to get involved, we've been having a lot of fun. Just er...don't mind the Captain, from being possessed by alcohol problems, now having overcome that, he's now possessed by possession problems, but hey, who wouldn't be tempted by the power of a Voidsent? Particularly when you need to save somebody you care about. For the time being, he's still in control, so don't be *too* afraid to approach him.

I like this idea, I miss having antagonists (something we used to have a lot in our FC, though still occasionally get). However, only just saw one of your guys IC and apparently I've been hired to do a job, now I learn we're dealing with 'bad' guys (I know we're not lawful, but we like to think we stand up for what's right) could lead to an interesting arc.

To add on some previous points, I think the housing has kind of benefited RP a bit on the server, Wayward Star from the beginning was very internally focused because we got so caught up in our own arcs and it took more effort to get involved with other groups. We did encounter RP in places like Limsa, but never fully embraced it (I'm not much of a tavern person). But since we've got our housing (heck, even before we got it) we found having an RP dedicated location just opened up more inter-FC opportunities. I have been stopped by fellow RPers - even strangers and taken up RP. I think this is the kind of thing people are perhaps perceiving Gilgamesh not having enough of. Ward 3 of The Goblet seems to be growing more and more with RPers and activity. It would be nice to see it in more wards. I do think one of the things puts people off with RP is dealing with non-RPers, especially trolls. It has been something I've had go in my head, but I remember that I am shameless and don't care what people think, hence I enjoy being such a weirdo IRL, so why should the internet be any different? I am well equipped when it comes to trolls, most of the time I know how to frustrate them and one of the funniest things in the world is watching a troll try too hard. That said, the Gilgamesh community has been pretty tolerant of RP - it doesn't get in their way and they don't get in ours, except may be a select minority, but that was more prevalent in the early days. But I think it can potentially discourage more open world stuff, except when there's an event and we're in bulk. But now, we have an RP neighbourhood, I remember people thinking housing would make groups more exclusive and RP to their own domains, but it's nice to see that it encourages interaction.

Yes, I think open world doesn't really happen, but the server ain't lacking IMO. I would say there's the perception that Gilgamesh is the secondary server...which is true, but I don't think it's necessarily inferior. There have people who have left, people who have jumped ship, but I think that's just a case of "the grass is always greener", I've had people find they didn't like to Balmung and I'm sure there's Balmungians who didn't like moving to Gilgamesh. But bear in mind too, server populations also naturally drop as people abandon ship, as is to be expected with any MMO, so we'll see numbers drop in the RP community. I would say they are 2 different communities who approach things in a different light. I don't do Open World RP, I love story arcs, I love drama and I enjoy stories, so my FC's efforts have been mainly pointed in that direction and in the early days were quite private and now we have a house in an RP community I think it has only helped us diversify how our RP works. We get some people walking in to join in and our FC's OOC linkshell has grown, but we've also managed to keep our membership from when people have dropped and moved on. Despite being a smaller FC (we prefer 'cosey') we've not struggled too badly to keep our RP alive, because we find it so fun. However, there's no real centralised 'world' RP and it has never once been an issue. I think what people will need to do is shout for joining RP networks, make use of this site (with regards to events) and use the resources already out there to join in with people's RP. I was almost tempted to restart the Gilgamesh Event Organisers and came very close, but I heard opinions from different people and I have found out that a number of people have made attempts to *revive* some RP relationships on the server, but I have actually found that actively the best way to get RP is funnily enough...by RPing. It's how we've kept our membership, it's how we've kept our relations with people in other RP groups and we find we have a lot of fun. Hence, I'm not concerned, it's interesting how long the perception that Gilgamesh RP is somehow dead/nearly dead for. However, I am all up for promoting and getting involved with RP...speaking of which, I will end that here (because I am missing out on some juicy RP right now )