ansemaru

I've thankfully only witnessed a handful of whining and heckling about RPers on Balmung or Gilgamesh. For all that these servers are the community-designated RP servers, there are always going to be players who aren't RPers, and among those, there are going to be those who for whatever reason don't tolerate RP. They might find it embarrassing or simply don't understand it. And to be honest? That's their problem. If they're going to go on a public channel to tell other people to keep their RP private, as if it were ERP, they're being the embarrassing ones. (I'm speaking to a particular individual I encountered in Ul'dah yesterday, though I'm sure they're not the only one who has gone on the /shout channel to whine about RP.) They've got no obligation to hang around RP hubs or even listen to RP. No obligation to keep the /say channel turned on, since outside of RP it hardly even has all that many applications. And on our part, we've got no obligation to respond, acknowledge them, or even have the /shout or /yell channels on. Responding in turn feels good- indulging in your anger always does- but giving hecklers and whiners the cold shoulder and letting their topics die works better. Especially if you ignore them in order to RP more.

The basics: Coerthas used to be a more temperate region, but post-Calamity has more or less inexplicably frozen over. Even outside of Ishgard, it's primarily home to midlander hyur and wildwood elezen. Plenty of caves in the area, and buildings are heavily fortified in case of dragon attacks- dragons being an ongoing problem in addition to the mortal and moral enemies of the Holy See. Holy See basically being the Catholic Church but with more stuck-up elves, and dedicated to a) worship of Halone and b) hating dragons. There's a real sense of xenophobia pervading the region, worse than that in Gridania by a good degree, and adventurers/outsiders aren't even permitted in Ishgard right now. There's also paranoia regarding those who may be heretics against the worship of Halone and who wish to betray the Ishgardians to their Dravanian foes. There are four major noble houses in the region, all elezen. Make of that what you will- I'm assuming you want to know more about the general culture and the lay of the land beyond the noble houses and Ishgard. Lot of cold and ruins all around, lot of mountains. Lot of xenophobia. Coerthas in a nutshell. Most of this stuff comes up once you reach the high 30s in level and start to do quests around Coerthas, if you haven't already.

Yeah, it feels kind of BS to have to limit myself to the first tier classes for the sake of lore compliance and not making my character an overpowered Gary Stu, and not get to say that I'm playing a Summoner/White Mage/Black Mage etc. I don't like it, but the problem is primarily on Square's end for writing themselves into a corner.

In this case, the lore is really unfriendly to actually RPing your character among other characters without insisting on your character being a special snowflake. Honestly, it's better for the community to figure out a somewhat consistent way of handwaving the snowflakey-ness of some of the specialized jobs. Either generalize them so that they're accessible to more than one person while still paying some respect to the lore, or assume that every dragoon is a lancer, white mage is a conjurer, summoner is an arcanist, and so forth. It's not ideal, but it's better than having one jerk insist that their character is the One And Only White Mage in the whole of the game's player characters, or insist that all the thousands of players playing one character class are Unique Snowflakes who are the exception to the rule.

"Too long"? Really? There's a character limit on names, and your character has a fairly normal Elezen name. What was that person's problem?

I do really think we have to keep in mind what happens in the last quest for the SMN questline, though.

Nothin' saying the Padjal always accurately communicate the desires of the Elementals. Not saying some of them are outright liars, but there's always the possibility of miscommunication or misunderstanding. But there could also very well be outright lies.

The Veil of Wiyu belonged to a summoner maiden who sacrificed her life to save the rest of her companions in the Sylphlands. There's not much more to the backstory as far as I've seen, but I'm guessing there are more details that arise once all the steps of the quest are complete. Her name was Wiyu, she was Allagan, she was a summoner.

I need a drink.

You just said yourself that she could have aged gracefully. This fits with the theory that the developers didn't have the time/resources/motivation to make aged facial presets for non-unique characters (Cid being a unique character model, as opposed to one created with the same presets as player characters- like F'lhaminn)- it's a convenient excuse for them to use the relatively youthful facial features that the engine permits, give her some secondary characteristics that are associated with age, and call it a day. I'm not entirely sure why you're so obsessed with all of these secondary (and less likely) possibilities surrounding the aging process. I never even said that Miqo'te live substantially shorter lifespans than Hyur inherently- they may be subject to environmental and lifestyle factors that mean the average lifespan of a Miqo'te is a bit shorter than a Hyur's, but that's because of Miqo'te living in nomadic/tribal lifestyles. The actual difference would be less than a decade on average, and insubstantial in the case of Miqo'te who live in the city-states proper. F'lhaminn does not appear to have lived a tribal/nomadic lifestyle for most of her life, so it's completely reasonable for her to be able to live as long as the average urban-dwelling Hyur. I'm beginning to suspect you don't understand my argument.

Jomoru, have you ever heard of Occam's Razor?

...but given the WEALTH OF RELATED CONTEXTUAL CLUES, F'lhaminn's glasses are almost definitely there to imply that her vision has gotten worse with age, not because someone decided to moeblob her up out of personal preference or because she's supposed to be implied to be an intellectual NPC. Seriously. She's Minfilia's mother. NPCs very early on in the new story content refer to her having aged. Grey hair. Comparatively modest clothing for a character in Eorzea. And honestly, if she was supposed to come across as an egghead, that would actually be conveyed in any of her dialogue. A retired songstress with a talent for mining isn't exactly the same as an Arcanist, let's keep in mind. Seriously, is it that hard to believe that the creators of the game didn't make facial presets for elderly/middle aged Miqo'te women because they didn't think anybody would want to play one, not because they wanted to imply that Miqo'te don't age the same as, say, Hyur? The same thing, you may note, is the case with women of the other playable races. Go into the character creator and try to make an aged-looking Elezen, Hyur, Roegadyn, or Lalafell woman. You'll notice the same thing across all five playable races- there just aren't presets there to make a character look convincingly older than their 30s, if they're a girl. There are certainly options for the men, but pretty much across the board there are little or no options for women. And this points towards a fairly obvious answer regarding F'lhaminn- she looks as old as the game will let her look.

From just a cursory check of the FF wikia's section on 1.0, Paladins were in it, though not until patch 1.21, when the advanced jobs (save for Scholar and Summoner, which only rolled around in 2.0 along with Arcanist) were first introduced.

In re: alternate methods to get an Egi-

Seconding the "it's a gameplay convention that you have to defeat the respective Primal before gaining the ability to challenge their Egi" call. For that matter, most people tend to overlook the "exclusive" nature of promoted jobs for the sake of RPing a character with the combat role but not necessarily the narrative role- a Scholar doesn't have to be someone who's revived the lost arts of healing from Nym in RP, after all. So in the case of a Summoner, it's entirely reasonable to assume that they did the ritual to bind an Egi without having stared down Ifrit/Titan/Garuda personally. There's, uh. Also a secondary way to gaining an Egi to summon that comes up in the level 50 quest for Summoner, but I don't really want to spoil it for you.

I'm going to say that given the circumstances of her being the adoptive mother of an adult woman, mentioned as aging in-canon, and having grey hair, her getting glasses is probably meant as a way to show she's older without creating new facial models that are going to take up time and resources for a major game, for a single, fairly secondary NPC. Facial models and features that are of going to be of limited appeal and use for the average player, since it's not typical for someone who's decided to play a catgirl to play an elderly or middle-aged catgirl. Glasses are shorthand- your eyesight gets worse as you age, and you're more likely to need glasses at all. Makes more sense than "it's their fetish", seriously.

That person sounds like they were being a dick. Honestly, even if you have a misunderstanding of lore, the solution isn't to tell you to go away and give up! Rather, adapting one's ideas into something that does work with the lore so you can keep the heart of what appealed to you about the concept without the elements that run counter to the game's setting and possibly make it difficult to rp with you. It'd be great if you could talk about it here, but I also understand if you're anxious after that experience. My inbox is always open for PMs, and if you'd rather talk in-game, you can /tell Aumeric Chassebel your woes, and I'll see that this question gets resolved without any shame or hurt feelings.

Hmm, I've been thinking about remaking a temporary alt I scouted this server on. It might take me a little while to catch up to where I can actually join the Immortal Flames with him, but if you're at all interested in a Wildwood elezen who's fiercely loyal to Ul'dah, I can hypothetically provide. Or alternatively, I could remake my other temporary Balmung alt- if you want an Ala Mhigan refugee hyur.

And right on the heels of that is my finished commission for Aysun! http://i.imgur.com/zo2PZvT.png[/img]

Okay, I gave in and made one for Aumeric. You may notice a theme here.

I have way too many side-blogs as it is, but you're making me want to make one for Aumeric and/or Ahlek'zi now... Dammit!

Ahlek'zi heard a voice, and the unmistakable sound of something crashing through the underbrush. A person. A woman, from the timbre of the the call, though she was distant enough that he couldn't make out what she had shouted. He rose to his feet, looking around the clearing and through the surrounding trees to try and determine where exactly she was coming from- and what she wanted. All he could see was trunks and dense underbrush, however. He knew it wasn't safe, precisely- she could be a poacher or a bandit, or even a particularly fractious Wood Wailer who'd try to haul him in over some perceived crime. There wasn't time to think about which direction she was coming from or who she was. Ahlek'zi had to take cover. A few of the small houses were built after the fashion of the East Shroud, raised off the ground with a gap underneath, separating the homey wooden planks of the building from ground that was all too willing to offer up rot and burrowing insects. Normally, they were walled off, but five years of neglect had left one of the houses with a gaping hole in this siding, opening up a makeshift shelter. Feeling a mild pang of disappointment at the home's state of disrepair, Ahlek'zi darted over to it, slipping inside the gap effortlessly thanks to his small frame. It didn't seem like the hole had opened up on its own, which would have been worrisome were it not for the more pressing concern at hand. Whatever miteling or tree slug had trundled through the rotting planks and made it would have to wait, if it was even still around. Ahlek'zi watched as another Miqo'te crashed into the clearing, as clumsily and recklessly as a wild boar on a rampage. That... wasn't exactly expected. Was she chased? That was awfully careless. The girl had recovered from her blunder quickly, though, and proceeded to give the area a look over. It wasn't immediately apparent what she was looking for, just that she was looking for something, rather than running from something. Doesn't look like she's in immediate danger. But she still might be danger herself. He hunkered down in the damp soil and bits of scattered and rotten wood, ears flattened against his head and eyes narrowed as he observed. From the weapon she carried and her garb, the girl looked to be a nomad, from one of the Keeper of the Moon tribes that traditionally called the Black Shroud home. There was something familiar about her, but not familiar enough that Ahlek'zi could put a finger on it. Her face? Her tail? He had no mind for people, but he felt a growing suspicion that he'd seen this girl before. The feeling that she was of no harm grew along with it, but it wasn't until she called out again that he felt at all comfortable in leaving his hiding place. Ahlek'zi crawled out of the hole in the building's side, paying no heed to the grime and leaf litter clinging to his clothes as he stood to face the other Miqo'te in the clearing. It took every onze of courage in his body to stand there, and a few more that he had to borrow from Nophica just to speak up and let her know he was there. "O-over here. I'm not a threat," he called out, barely even a shout. His ears still remained pinned back and his tail hung low and threatened, twitching slowly back and forth in a tempo of anxiety as he balled up his fists and dug his nails into his palm. I can do this. She's not going to hurt me.

Ah, good old Earthen Fury RP. Or was it Elezen RP? Oh, I know. Electrum RP.

I've gotten things back on track, and I've finished the commission for Olofantur! Aysun, you're up next. And I believe references are owed by LandStander for your two headshots, so if you could PM me those, that would be great.

The implication I was trying to get at is that perhaps what the Ishgardians assume is Halone is not, in fact, Halone. If an icy goddess comes up to you and says she's your pantheon's icy goddess, are you really going to question her on that?