ArmachiA

I'm still leaning toward troll, but polite troll.

If you like horror in your rp, having your character being trapped in the void for a while would do the same thing. We know it's possible to be trapped - from World of Darkness and the void is... basically a limbo. "Demons" (Called voidsent) live there, trying to escape to our world because they want to feed on our Aether. They are scary, very scary and your character would have had to have found away to escape - one they did only to realize quite a lot of time has passed. Once she comes out, she would have to relearn how to live and function in this new society. It could have made her somewhat off, weird... That's just an idea though, I'm not exactly sure how being trapped in the void works really (Does it age you or would you need to be put in a sort of Stasis?) Warren is right though, if it's never brought up it doesn't much matter, though I'm not sure why you asked for advice about it, then...

I don't think anyone has said anything rude. You asked for advice and it was given.

No one is seeing it as a personal attack, we're discussing it's lore validity and how much people would want to interact with said person. In all honesty, is there a reason why you can't go with a girl who has Amnesia? Or, if that's too normal for you, someone who was stuck in the void for a thousand years from Ampador and knows nothing about the new world? Or someone from Doma who knows nothing about Eorzea? Why a God? Why an EARTHEN God? You'd get the same results with a more lore compliant character.

MMm.. I wouldn't say our storyline is "on a track" either. How we generally plan it is pretty simple: We plan the beginning out pretty meticulously, finding ways to get as many players interested in it as possible - usually by having a big event or just by hurting a popular, well established character. The basics of the plotline are laid out, I.E: "Ieza gonna wreck shit." then we outline the beginning. "At the start, Ieza is going to do this and this to hopefully get people involved." AND THEN It's open. I never really plan beyond that. After that it's left in the players hands. Everything THEY do, the Storytellers react too. Anything they want ("I want to be kidnapped!" or "I want to try to be corrupted") we facilitate. I never know how the story is going to go - the middle and end are all vague to me - because it's the FC that decides it. The Storytellers keep very close tabs on what the players do (Spies, spies everywhere) in order to react to THEM. I actually don't like scripts. I keep it open and freeform once the initial beginning is finished.

THe sad part is you can come up with a "special" character that's completely lore compliant if people don't like playing "normal" characters, but they never actually look into the lore with any depth to do so. They just see it as an obstacle and thats really sad

It's not a mechanic. They actually built an entire world, with it's own story. Stories that are the characters realities. Elementals control the Succor. There are Twelve Gods. Bahamut almost destroyed the world 5-6 years ago. These aren't mechanics, these are things about the world that are the reality for all the characters living within it. None of those things have to do with the way the game is played, but the way the characters LIVE in the game. The lore isn't mechanics, its the living, breathing essence of the world. Which you are choosing to ignore... so you can be a God. The next time you ask if your character should be reworked, please actually don't get mad when people tell you "Yeah it should be"

Kefka still has his own motivations, even if we don't understand them. Every villains should have their own internal logic, even if they are crazy as all hell.

This world is already built however, it's built by the Developers and GMs of the game, so it indeed has restrictions. This world isn't built by us, the players, it's built by an extensive team at Square Enix. They gave the world it's own set of rules and checks/balances that - as characters living in Eorzea - our characters abide by (Because that is their reality, it is like Humans and Earth. There are certain rulesour reality has). They made they rules, completely ignoring them is basically saying "I do not want to live in your world" which again, why are you rping here then?

It's not about cookie cutter. Why would you roleplay in a game where you ignore the lore completely? That makes... no sense. The lore IS THE WORLD, if you ignore the world and the rules that govern the world... why are you here? I like how you assume a fisherman's daughter would be boring though...

I was not really interested in the lore to be honest. I rather build a character entering world like its fresh and build up from there. A...are you a troll? Valkerie or not, the Elementals would never let her access the Succor. They control who gets to use it.

I'm just gonna pop in and say there've been a few Fanfictions touched by publishers (50 shades came from Twilight fanfiction and the ever popular "The Mortal Instruments" Series? Harry Potter fanfiction) and it's getting more popular to look for fanfiction authors. "My Immortal" will never get published because it's TERRIBLE.

So, your character is from Earthen God lore but was banish to Hydaelyn? I certainly can't tell you not to do that but, to be honest, you're not gonna find a lot of people who would be down with that and want to RP that you're character is a God... from Earth... while there is evidence of being able to travel between worlds - it seems that only Final Fantasy worlds are connected and Earth isn't Final Fantasy Also you're character wouldn't be a White Mage. Period. A Conjurer, sure, but saying your character from Earthen God lore is going to get the blessing of the Elementals to be a White Mage and use the Succor is just against all lore ever. I'm just trying to stick to the facts with lore, and not... interject my opinion.

I don't quite understand your backstory... are you a Norse Goddess? Those don't exist in FFXIV and Odin is a Primal, not a God.

I'm the same, I need both. I WANT to play the game as well as build a story around the game.

Fillion Fineas. Garlean game master turned Co-worker. Fillion is a man without fear and sees everything as a high stakes game. He's stabbed people (Armi once), drugged them, almost killed her boyfriend-at-the-time (Which caused their inevitable break up when he couldn't deal with almost dying), kidnapped the man she thinks of as a father figure, sicked his sisters on her friends, and had his legion of allies try to destroy everyone. Why? Because it was a game. He wanted to see how these "filthy" Eorzeans would react. The NB killed his sisters, and his second in command overthrew him - dismantling most of his power - he barely reacted at all. And when they went to finally put him down... An even bigger threat appeared that he could help stop and now he's working WITH them. She hates it, but Fillion likes to pretend he and her are friends. He asks her questions about Eorzea, tries to get her to teach him how to talk to them. And she has to go along with it because everyone knows he can help. At least for now.

They don't have to be "Good" motivations or even logical ones, but they should be beyond "This character is evil, therefore does evil things." Every character has a motivator for what they do, even serial killers do - even if we don't quite understand it on our usual morality path. "The power to cause pain is the only power that matters, the power to kill and destroy, because if you can’t kill you are always subject to those who can." is a perfectly fine, well written motivation. Villains should be treated with the same care as Heros. Three Dimensional.

Things I've had to research for Armi: Being a Nun/Priest: Armi was pretty much a Nun so I had to do a bit of research to see what being a nun is actually like. Did a lot of reading, watched a few documentaries. She was a devout as they came. Now she's an ex-priestess simply because there just wasn't enough lore about the subject ever put into game for me to be comfortable and in 2.0 I pulled her out. However, it's very ingrained in her history. PTSD - Carteneau did a number on her, so did things that happened in the FC in 2.0. Honestly, if your character if in dark, deep storylines this is pretty much mandatory study. Musical Theory! Since I planned on making Armi a singer/songwriter (Eventual Eorzean Idol) I actually studied song crafting, lyric writing, and melody composition. The orginal intent was to just write all my own music, but that... was an over shoot. So now I just write lyrics to already established (But not well known) melodies. How to be shy - I'm not actually a shy person at all, but Armi is. I actually had to study how to do that... and while she's a lot less shy now (More weird) I still have to remember how to play shy.

I think what makes a good villain is what also makes a good hero - well roundedness. A Villian should be just as fleshed out as a hero would be, having motivations behind what they do beyond "I am evil". That's it, really. Even Hedonistic Villains can fall into under umbrella, provided they are fleshed out well enough. There are plenty of very good Hedonistic Villains in fiction and as long as they aren't pressuring or harassing me for ERP, they can be a hedonistic as they like.

I think being isolated is almost something that naturally happens with an FC Leader. You're so busy making sure your FC runs smoothly, it can be really hard to venture out. We have our ooc ls, which we have a few members who are from different FCs in it, but I generally am in the corner a lot. Uh... for your questions... Unpopular Policies Our most unpopular policy, BY FAR, is our strict adherence to lore. Members have gotten tells asking if our lore policy was real, and people have heard it was very strict. Which it is - currently we don't allow anyone in who plays a WHM ICly, and we have a very strict BLM policy as well. When someone apps with us and says they are a WHM (We've had many oddly enough) we do tell them "We can only accept you in you play a Conjurer ICLY at this time" and only 1 or 2 people have actually made the switch to get in. When we see something in someones background that isn't lore compliant, we work with them to make sure it is before letting them in, or - if they were let in first - we work with the before rping with other members again. A LOT of people take this as a slam against their character, they start thinking they are terrible roleplayers or that we are being bullies. But it's not. Most of the time, I'll try to work to make your story the SAME but more lore complaint (I.E. Explaining that being a White Mage isn't necessary to be a really powerful healer and just saying your a talented Conjurer won't change your personal story). Our second most unpopular is, sadly, the idea you need to practice Coil gates before the guild will clear for you. A lot of people get into the guild and expect carries - since we do T5 runs regularly and we have a group that can farm T9 - and don't actually want to get into the instance to practice before hand. It doesn't matter how many times you say "Practice the fight and when your ready we'll take you through", a lot of people just here that as "I am being unhelpful." Yeah we have T9 on farm, but we aren't Rare Ex, we can't carry someone new to the fight in there.... it would just be a waste of everyone's time because there would be no clear. What we Offer: Big Guild Storyline: We have an ongoing, large storyline in the Night Blades that is run by two people - with helpers of about 10. It has it's own villains (Played by FC mates) and is run very much like a story would by the Devs of FFXIV. Since we can't really say we're a part of the main FFXIV story in any way, we wrote or own off to the side somewhere that our FC can affect. The villians become so engrained, people get excited about the idea of taking them down, and they feel just as accomplished as is they were in the FFXIV main story. It's something we pride ourselves on, but it's a lot of work. Because of the workload, we have two officers who's ONLY job it is is to facilitate the main NB storyline. They write it, plan it behind the scenes with helpers and get people involved. They do nothing else. The story has been going on since launch, ever changing but still in the same timeline. It's currently in it's climax and will be coming to a close before Heavensward - where we'll start all over again. Small Guild Events: The first year of running the guild we learned a lot, and one of those things we learned is that the guild CAN'T rely on the "Main Storyline" in order to succeed. For one, it takes a lot of time to plan so the main story is slower, and two, some people in our FC don't really want to be involved in the main story, but want to rp with everyone else anyway. Because of this, in the second year of operation we introduced more events off to the side and away from the main story. These can be one off storylines such as looking for treasure, or even just Chocobo Racing at the Golden Saucer. All Officers are told to come up with an event once a month and other members are free to put whatever event they want onto the Calendar. Roll20 events!: You like tabletop RP and miss that feel in FFXIV? We do a lot of Roll20 events and even have our own system (Called UNI-FFXIV) for dice rolls which is accessable by just going to our website (Or looking here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1gxwbrqa1I4qe3qXfzro1DhGRHSF5YqwVeK_8BZcxS0A/edit#gid=694329376) End Game: On top of RP, we also raid and consider ourselves 75% RP/25% Raid. We currently have one group in Final Coil and are working on getting another group together for T9. We host a lot of practice runs for T5/T9/Shiva Ex/Odin/Ramuh Ex as well as clear parties for all of them (Including getting people to Shiva Ex). We try to help as much as possible in order to help people reach their goals in endgame, though currently we aren't worried too much about it because Heavensward is coming. We still do T5/T9 practice (Have those this weekend actually) and a raid group, but right now our focus is gearing people, preparing for new job changes and making note of who wants to raid come 3.0. Active off game shizz: We have an active mumble server, an active website, and many many of us talk together on skype. Active IN GAME Shizz: We have an extremely active OOC ls, and an somewhat Active IC LS that people do use a lot, but I'm actually trying to get them to use it more haha. What we don't really offer: Hand holding: To be frank, if your looking for a guild to lead you through everything or feel like you can't jump in on your own unless someone invites you - this probably isn't the place for you. Everything we do - RP, Events, and Endgame Runs - are posted on our website and ANYONE is free to sign up for any of those. If I'm setting up a T9 practice on the forums, this means anyone in the NB is eligible to come along. If someone else sets up a roll20 event - it means the same. We assume most anything is a catch-all invitation and a lot of us get confused by "But you didn't ask me specifically". If people are rping in the Mansion, you are free to join them, no questions asked. People are free to jump into anything they feel like most of the time - the only exception to the rules are private rp or the Raid team (Which is a static). This doesn't mean we aren't helpful - we're very helpful - but when a guild is large we can't just give you one on one attention all the time. Super Heavy RP: While we have very deep storylines, epic plots, bombs, and deaths, we actually consider ourselves a Medium RP guild because people are not expected to RP everyday. While RP happens a lot thanks to some of our heavy RP members, a lot of our members don't consider themselves "All RP All the Time" people. This doesn't mean our stories aren't deep and engaging, it just means we aren't on the game to rp 12 hours a day. Total Hardcore Raiding: We are not hardcore raiders. While we keep up with current content, we aren't in a competition with the big raiding guilds on the server - they will eat us alive. Usually we're a few months behind, but hit the content way before it goes into the Duty Finder and we're perfectly fine with it being that way. We play current content, before Echo Bonus and Nerfs, but we're just not as fast as those who only focus on raiding. We like it this way. You may not. A Hugbox: While I don't allow racist or homophobic slurs, we are extremely brash, vulgar, and playfully mean to each other. There are rules in place protecting this kind of behaivor called the "Thick Skin Clause" that is not only in our charter, but in our application process so people know what they are getting in to. We criticize each others characters decisions, discussing them at length. We pick apart characters' personalities and motivations. To us, this is a show and we are the fans. And we talk as if we are the fans - deep conversations about RP sessions, the characters, and the decisions made. Many RPers can't handle criticism of their characters, wanting everyone to like them all the time, and if that's you - this is not the place for you. ~~~~ We have smaller things, too. Help with getting an FC Room, IC introductions with the IC officers so your character can get "in", a "Friends and Family" plan so if you like us you can bring your friends, guild meetings when needed, Always available Officers in game or on Skype to answer any questions you may have, help with smoothing background, help with storylines you want to start, etc etc. The Perfect NB Member: Somewhat independent - isn't afraid to set up practice runs on Ex Primals and Coil and put them on the calendar for everyone. Isn't afraid to just jump into FC RP. Thick Skin - Isn't sensitive. Can take criticism of themselves and their characters. Can take a joke. Isn't there to hit on all the ladies, oocly or icly - strangely, we have a lot of girls in our guild, this has caused some issues in the past. Drive - when they say they want to raid, they gear up and put in the time - event able to forgo RPing for a bit to do so. Enjoys darker storylines - We've had two IC deaths in the last month if that tells you anything. Doesn't take Lore Compliance as an insult. Because it's not one. Really. Talkative, or even shy but eager - this is a talkative, fast scrolling guild. A talkative person who can jump in or a shy person who isn't insecure are pretty much ideal. That's us in a nutshell.

In this context, Mary Sue isn't sexist, because it came from a Star Trek fanfiction where the main characters name... was Mary Sue. How is that sexist exactly? Do we need to change the name to male to fight the patriarchy? It came from a specific place and a specific character. It's like saying "Saying 'My Immortal is terrible' is sexist!" because the main character is a girl. No, it's really just because it is infamous and terrible. Context matters!

It really depends on what time it is for who I bring along, but it will be one of the officers I'm pretty sure.

They metric they used was of the entire player base, like it or not. A whole helluva lot (I'd even say most) RPers on Balmung play Miqote, obviously they like the aesthetic. Want more muscular women? Play one so SE knows we want them. "They are nice to look at" doesn't count. I play a Highlander female as my secondary main but don't rp with her outside my own FC (for reasons) since she's level 50 and somewhat geared, I've made my voice known. (That highlander women are hot)

I am good for anytime since I don't work, my FC also has a large mansion with a meeting room in the basement if you want to use it.

I can come represent the Night Blades. Be scared.