Kylin

This is Square Enix's holiday event. View in detail here: http://lodestone.finalfantasyxiv.com/pl/topics/detail?id=a71beaf5f2522baba8c1f903853af083cd4fdd50 The history of Eorzea is a dark one, stained with the blood of those who have fallen victim to innumerable episodes of strife. Several generations ago, one such episode erupted into a series of battles that not only claimed countless lives, but left thousands homeless and without food. Yet none were hit harder than the children of Ishgard, who, in addition to being left hungry and alone, were forced to endure the chilling alpine winds of Coerthas in order to simply survive. But it is oft said, the darker the history, the brighter the acts of good do shine. Each night, while on their routine patrols of the city, a handful of Ishgardian knights would seek out these children and offer them room and board within the walls of their company barracks. This, of course, was strictly forbidden by the knight's charter, and so the kind men and women, many of them once orphans themselves, would disguise the children in the jackets of their scarlet uniforms, allowing them to slip into the building unnoticed. After many months, the fighting eventually subsided and peace once again returned to the realm. As Ishgard rebuilt, the number of orphans in the city-state eventually dwindled back to zero, and soon the wartime tradition was all but forgotten... Until a group of former orphans gathered together in order to pay tribute to the knights who rescued them, and ensure that no one ever forgot their remarkable deeds. On the coldest week of each year, they would dress up in brilliant scarlet uniforms and pass out gifts to the children of the realm, in turn, passing along the happiness that they once received on a starlit night, many years past. And that tradition lives on today in the Starlight Celebration.

Can't give much beyond an estimate in terms of schedule. One of them will be coming around February or March. The second likely won't come until 2-3 months after the previous event.

Now that the successful Full Cold Moon event is concluded, there are two more -major- events on the horizon. Thatâs not to say there wonât be other large events (such as a planned date auction, among other things), but the major RPC events include the coveted Eorzean Olympics and Epic events. First, let me explain these two events as much as possible to those who are still unfamiliar with the concepts. Eorzean Olympics: The IC background info to this was in the first issue of the Tonberryâs Lantern. The event is basically the same as our real world Olympics. Those interested in the event can attend as a mere spectator or as a participant. Participants will sign up under one of the 3 city-states and take part in whatever challenge they sign up for. The full details will be dealt with by the Olympics Committee. There will be an opening ceremony that consists of a parade, followed by about 2 weeks of scheduled competitions, followed by the awards ceremony and wrap-party. Potential competitions include racing, monster slaying, fishing, and whatever else the committee can come up with. Non-Rpers on Besaid will be aggressively recruited to assist with things such as the parade, competitions, etc to make for even a bigger event. Epic: The Epic is a server-wide storyline that will bring the entire community together to deal with a major threat. The Epic Committee will create various quests that will span over the course of several weeks, along with an enticing storyline that will eventually reach a dramatic conclusion. Aside from the pre-scheduled quests, there will be tons of individual and linkshell sub-stories of each individualâs own making. These sub-stories may tie into the larger story in various ways. Letâs give a sample real quick. This is merely a sample Epic and does not necessarily represent the story for the first one. Sample--A deadly plague suddenly begins to encompass Eorzea, its origins unknown. Adventurers would be brought together to help find the source of the plague and find a cure for it. Various RPC quests (complete with player made NPCs) will advance the plot and rules will be put into place, enforced by a team of âGMs.â Outside of these quests, however, would lie an infinite amount of possibilities for sub-plots. Some characters may get struck with the plague, or someone they know may get struck with it. Some characters may simply wish to gain as much knowledge about the plague as possible for the name of science. Other characters may use the plague for their own self-gain, such as promoting false cures to make money or manipulate other circumstances to their favor. The possibilities are endless and will depend on the individual and/or the RP linkshell. Originally, I planned the Olympics to begin around February to coincide with the RPCâs 1 year anniversary. However, there are some hurdles with this. The Olympics is an event that truly depends on game mechanics and availability of things âto do.â And as we all know, there really isnât much to do right now outside of leves. Heck, we still donât even have chocobos, hence making chocobo racing impossible for a competition. We also donât have fireworks, which may make for a dull opening parade. Thus, it may be a good idea to do the Epic first and hold off on the Olympics. On the other hand, SE is supposed to give more frequent updates as part of their âplanâ to fix the game. So we could very well end up with plenty of things to do before February hits. But itâs kind of a gamble. The Epic, however, is not entirely dependent on available game content. Some notorious monsters would probably be the only real content needed, and those are coming right around the corner. Thus, it could benefit us to plan that first. My issue with it is that I wanted to wait until the PS3 users got here before doing this event. Though I suppose we could always plan a 2nd Epic event after PS3 release if the first is successful. The plan was to originally only do one per year though. Thoughts, comments, questions, suggestions? Which one should we focus on first and why?

Three cheers for a super successful event! The chat box was super insane to follow most of the time. But I do believe just about every remaining active RP shell was represented at this event by at least one member from each shell! Talk about bringing the community together! :bounce: Lots of prizes were given away and lots of data was gathered for the future Eorzean Olympics and Epic. Thank you Oria and everyone else who helped with this, whether it was guard duty, cooking, donations, auction preparations, and whatever other tasks went into this awesome event! I think there were over 10 staff members.

This is definitely big news. I do feel for Tanaka though since I donât think any of this is totally his fault. Release dates and timelines tend to be set by the higher powers that be, not necessarily developers. So itâs not totally his fault that it was released way too soon. The new blood will be nice though. Theyâll probably feel the need to prove themselves and push themselves that much harder. PS3 pushback sucks, but itâs probably for the best. And I certainly wonât put up any arms to even more free play, so long as the game doesnât switch FTP permanently. Thatâs when Iâll walk away, since thereâs no way weâll get any good future updates at the point. The last big update was a huge success though in my opinion. I personally donât think they need to work TOO much more on the UI interface or anything, save minor tweaks in some areas and maybe an overhaul of the linkshell member management system and the party system (and of course the ward system, though the upcoming search feature should make it operate similar/identical to an auction house anyway). The main issue is content. A lot of basic features have already been promised (mail system and /search system in March, etc). Guild leves are fine as is, but there shouldnât be such a huge dependence on them. Currently, all you can do is log in, do your daily leves within about 30 minutes or so, and thatâs about it (aside from crafting). Thankfully, we have RP to keep us busy when needed but the rest of the community doesnât utilize that luxury. Notorious monsters will be a nice addition but not entirely enough. Hereâs what I personally think they need to focus on after this monthâs update (in no particular order): --Player/company housing: Role-players are very limited in what we can do in terms of locations. We have no NPC houses to utilize and the only buildings weâre allowed to enter are stores and guild headquarters. Heck, weâre having tomorrowâs masquerade at a freaking temple and have to pretend that itâs a mansion because that's the only real option available. Player housing will allow us to forge lots of potential environments for RP, ranging from clinics to regular houses to offices. I recall turning my FFXI mog house into all manners of things to enhance some RP scenes. --Quests: Leve quests arenât really the same thing. Theyâre all mostly the exact same as one another. Follow your map to the targets, kill them, end of leve. Some of the faction leves are a bit more awesome (Iâve only done 3 thus far and enjoyed them all) but itâs still not enough variety. Some traditional styled quests would be an awesome addition and give more life to the so far lifeless world. I donât even care if theyâre just random fetch/delivery quests with crap rewards to start (like FFXIâs bat wing fetch quest in San dâOria). But itâll add a lot more to do and a lot more general life to the world. --Grouping: Thereâs very little incentive to do anything in groups, hence nearly eradicating the MMO from the RPG. All storyline missions thus far can be completely soloed. You get a path companion but thatâs it so far. Maybe I just havenât got far enough yet. But so far thereâs no FFXI equivalent of the 2-3 dragon, 5-1 lich, or 5-2 shadowlord fights. The storyline may be great (and it is), but thereâs no feeling of accomplishment on anything so far. My greatest accomplishment so far is acquiring onion gear from faction leves, and that isnât saying much. Soloing is a nice option to have but Iâd rather have some things that force you to group. Hopefully, NMâs help with this a bit. I want some bcnm styled fights that feel epic and can be reused in the future for RP events.

Various new notorious monsters have been revealed for those not keeping up on the Lodestone updates. The ones discussed thus far are levequest NMs that appear to be temporary endgame content (the gear you can acquire is around rank 50). The gear you can obtain will certainly be nice IC additions for characters who are knights, pirates, or entertainers. NM Deadeyes (Harlequin attire): http://lodestone.finalfantasyxiv.com/pl/topics/detail?id=19ffc3542e1873eeda6ff736423a0b2cd61af236 NM Tarbh Uisge (Templar attire): http://lodestone.finalfantasyxiv.com/pl/topics/detail?id=4155195e98fad0550afdf2dd76d263ca519bec7d NM Zanig'oh (Buccaneer attire): http://lodestone.finalfantasyxiv.com/pl/topics/detail?id=c19faf5cfe02fe5a121c9d162bcc6086ca9da632 Additionally, open world notorious monsters have been confirmed: http://lodestone.finalfantasyxiv.com/pl/topics/detail?id=1b5e205fb853192b4789b4ed91ca0cb8d415264a

All attached threads moved to new topic in Assembly Room to avoid mucking up this thread and get to the heart of the matter seeing as it's an important topic.

Verified via email that Randirim is considered "inactive." The word "disband" was not used and so I'll just mark it inactive for now. The shell may/may not make a return at another point in time. If it does, please contact an admin/moderator and we'll unlock the thread. Or you can just make a new thread too.

I have confirmed with the leader via email that this linkshell is disbanded. Locking thread and marking as such.

In Gridania, outside the adventurer's guild: In Ul'dah, outside the adventurerâs guild: In Limsa Lominsa, outside the adventurer's guild: Tonberry's Lantern, Issue #1 (click the link)

Ownership of thread transferred from Hiname to Nikolai. You may now edit the OP as needed, Nik

After playing around a bit (keeping in mind that this is NOT a content update but rather a technical update), I personally am extremely pleased with this update. UI lag is vastly improved. Chat functions are better.The game is just overall much more playable and less frustrating. I'm looking forward to the mid-December content patch now more than ever Of course, there are always going to be people who complain and nit-pick about every single update. But ignoring them, I definitely believe this update was a HUGE step in the right direction. Now we just need some more content ^^

Patch is now available for downloading. Though even if you get through it all, maintenance time of completion won't change. I'm currently stuck at 5 hours for the download >.>;

The details for the version update have been fully released on the Lodestone: http://lodestone.finalfantasyxiv.com/pl/topics/detail?id=159e4a58b58fd0214620ec8d64ddd138d5ab599e

Happy turkey day to all who celebrate it! I'd post a picture of a turkey but I'm too lazy to do so. So instead, we'll just do the next best thing: :chocobo: :chocobo: :chocobo: :chocobo:

Upgraded the forums to the latest version. Please let me know if anything isn't working properly all of a sudden. Known issues: Icons on the left side of the screen in the legend bar are not presently being displayed. Also deleted Courtyard section, sending all posts there back into the Assembly Room. All RP/storyline related inquiries should now go there. Stripped down the Bazaar section to more simplistic Buy/Sell sections without the further subsections. The entire Bazaar may still get nuked later down the line.

Haven't seen many thoughts on any of this. So don't be surprised when things start being moved/edited around the middle or end of next week. As of right now, I plan to delete the Courtyard section and move all posts there back into the Assembly Room. Archives section will be deleted, along with all posts in it. Bazaar section will have the sub-categories removed (armor/weapons/etc) so it's simply divided into Buy/Sell categories. The entire section may end up completely nuked by the New Year depending on how/when SE implements the search function.

That's fine. Elements did as well until they can get an updated one. Since the Elements is the first group to send a group shot, everyone may now see what the directory page would essentially look like: http://ffxiv-roleplayers.com/linkshells/Elements Note that the picture can be enlarged when you click on it.

Instead of making yet another thread, I'll just post this here. New details about the Nov. 25th update were posted today: http://lodestone.finalfantasyxiv.com/pl/topics/detail?id=ae522972e787f44f3f98486de21b1ab2f941c524 Inventory sort, ease of equipping things, chat changes, targeting enhancement, and more! Please note that SE stated that this is not the full list of expected changes for the Nov. 25th update, but just a portion. Details on the rest of the stuff will likely be brought up at a later time.

Bump. Still no signups for the 19th so I'm going to assume that nobody will be taking that slot. Also, since the free trial period is extended again...I can change the schedule up as needed. Please discuss with your linkshells when a decent time is for you. It can be anytime this month or next month. As long as it's after 4PM EST, I can probably do the event. If not, groups can certainly do this without my temporary alt's attendance. Just be sure to submit the picture ASAP to better pimp out your shell's advertisement.

Wow, wasn't expecting that >.> Edit: Moved to Headlines section since it's a pretty big announcement. And they revealed the first update's tentative date:

A handful of tavern patrons gather near the billboard to read the newly posted notice. A highlander snorts at the flier. "Hrmp, isn't Valina that stuck-up little brat?" "Indeed," an elder hyur woman said. "But I hear her artwork is unrivaled. She can paint things in a way that makes them look completely real. It's sort of scary to tell the truth." "Hmm..." The highlander seemed somewhat intrigued but remained suspicious. "And she's just doing this for practice? No fee or anything? Sounds a bit strange to me." "I'm sure it's legit," the woman said softly. "And if you can put up with her attitude, it's certainly worth it. Her paintings are truly a work of art and could be worth quite a fortune in the future." Sign up List: Please indicate TIME and LOCATION. Location should be one of the 3 cities. Schedule: Times can be flexible if the linkshell agrees on a better time. Event Rules: OOC Info:

Happy B-day Brin!! Hope it's a pleasant one. :moogle:

I don't plan to change anything for another 3 weeks or so probably, but I wanted to get the discussion going beforehand anyway. Now that forum activity has finally leveled out and reached a steady point, we can work on getting the forums a better and more friendly layout. If any of you have any suggestions about any particular sections, please speak up. Archives section will be nuked in about 3 weeks so keep that in mind. Also transfer profiles to the wiki if you haven't yet. I started deleting some of the threads there that were already transferred. I'll probably send out a mass email next week (even though only the first 500 registered members will get it >.>) to remind people. I'm thinking of merging the Courtyard subsection (in the Townsquare) back with the Assembly Room once again now that the section isn't flooding with overly important stuff anymore. The Bazaar may get changed a bit. Heck, it may even get totally nuked. I don't know yet. Thoughts would be appreciated. I'm also giving some thought to merging the Storyboard with the Town Square section. We'd just have to add labels to everything is all. This is still an iffy also so any thoughts on the matter would once again be appreciated. Feel free to suggest any other changes that any of you would like to see.

There's never been much lore about linkshells/pearls. It's pretty open to interpretation on a shell by shell basis. The visual part is mostly a remnant from FFXI's Sylph RP community. There were 15 RP shells and about 350 role-players on the server. Every single one of them used the visual aspect of the linkshell. It was mostly based on player-made lore but it greatly enhanced our RP experiences in ways that audio only would have never achieved. As a RP shell ages, it generally starts having less events than it did in its glory days. As such, people grow bored and trickle away. The visual aspect helped alleviate this a bit more and quite possibly helped keep members around. Whether Sylph's stance on this issue was partially responsible for its major success as a RP community or not, we'll never know. There are various IC means of how they would display images but the images were always very vague ones. You could never see extreme details. Generally, images were transmitted into your mind via the pearl. This was either because the linkshell was enchanted or was an upgraded version of the original linkshells. You could also have had larger pearls than normal (as a result of a larger linkshell) and actually peer into the pearl to see the images. These larger pearls could have been equipped to your gear (such as Daishi's description) or worn as a necklace. While most shells in FF14 will use the audio only feature, there will be some that integrate visual aspects for an "enhanced" RP experience. I kinda wish the primary shell I was in used visual as well. Heck, had I gone through with creating my own linkshell, I too would have made it audio/visual (though I would have made an IC explanation about it on the group's site to avoid confusion). As I said, it's mostly player-made lore. And there's nothing wrong with that since it only impacts the individual linkshell. And physical interaction was still never allowed over the shell unless the individuals were right next to each other (so you couldn't emote over the shell ::Pokes Castiel:: unless you were standing right next to me in game).