Mercurias

There are ultimately only three real fates for villains: -Capture -Conversion to the good guy side -Death Personally, I've killed off a loooooot of my villains.

M'sato, if he could see his future self, would probably just jump off of a cliff and get it over with. Soren would have mixed feelings because there aren't as many people around as he would like, but he would think that his adult self was pretty cool. Young Solomon would look at Old Solomon and raise his juice cup to the glorious bastard he'll grow up into. Garrett would look at his future self and vow to dedicate his life towards never, ever becoming the monster his adult self is. In working towards preventing that horrible future, he would become exactly the same thing without ever realizing it was happening until it's far, far too late.

"Are you okay?"

I kinda don't know where you're getting all of that. The absolute literal definition of a player character is a character who is directly controlled by a player as opposed to the GM. And I could, technically, go off onto lots and lots of paragraphs on why all wrong, but I kinda don't need to argue with you on the point of a definition. The next point on this portion of your post I disagree with, is that a pure antagonist is incapable of being a PC because responsibility to drive plot and conflict turn the...Character...Into a glorified NPC? I kind of don't understand that. If you, as any kind of PC, aren't willing to drive plot and conflict, then what exactly are you doing? I can't think of any character I play who is incapable of doing that. And I'm afraid that my post never stated that I believe fair grounds in combat should never happen. I wrote that, in order to establish fair grounds, I tend to play villains who are more powerful than those I would normally play. Have you never played a tabletop game where the party turns on one another? It happens all the time. honestly, I'm sort of surprised and disappointed that two RP groups on Balmung haven't taken to getting into outright warfare IC while being friendly OOC. It's fun! You should try it sometime! So in other words, my points are flawed because my subconscious wants to win in a fantasy game if I establish my villain character as a PC rather than a "glorified NPC"? If I have characters on both sides of the conflict (which I do), then does this balance out my conflict of interest or do alts not count as PCs at this point? And what if my whole interest is to tell a good story, regardless of which players win or lose? Where's the conflict there if I just want to make it all interesting? And if your conflict of interest concept was really the case, wouldn't the storyteller, who decides how the stage is set for both parties, be able to curb that? I've actually got a very good pair of storytellers I work with, by the way, and a significant part of their job is to take requests from both sides of the conflict and incorporate them into the overall story in order to satisfy all parties, since, as my storytellers believe, villainous PCs are still PCs. Killing off the villain in the middle of the story kind of ends the story. What players normally want to do is automatically kill the villain and end the story. At that point...They've ended the story themselves. There is no interest. Boom. Over. More to the point, there's actually a significant amount of OOC communication between the storyteller and both sides of the conflict. I still don't get the part where you assumed I don't work with a storyteller. Also, you're speaking of assumed consent. Half of my posts were referencing the difficulties i'd had as a villain PC of protags attempting to force consent down my throat. That is sort of the problem I'm talking about. As a villain, I will never FORCE a player to interact or get injured, and all I'm asking in return is the same courtesy. I never stated that I was unwilling for my character to ever be harmed. Honestly, I treat 'my own' stories purely and entirely as side stories. What I always concern myself with, on either side of the table, is always going to be the story as a whole. You don't have to be a Storyteller to want to make the story better. The point of the story isn't to win. It's to make people respond and have fun. We're entertaining one another. That's why I talk with the storyteller and establish what goes down at that point. Also, most of my roleplay tends to happen in a group where people don't like talking to the authorities. I've always been willing to have my characters captured if the story demands it, and in other games (not this one yet), it's actually happened. You're right, if the storyteller tells me that a bunch of NPCs catch my villain, then my villain is caught. Hurray! Fixed that for you. Every player is a potential storyteller, and let's be honest, if you can't put your character's importance away and respect the stories of others, then you shouldn't be roleplaying with them. You should be writing a novel. There are a massive amount of bad villains out there who want to power trip, do evil things, and never, ever reap any of the consequences of any of their actions. There are also a massive amount of bad heroes out there who want to power trip, perform violent and/or risky actions, and never, ever reap the consequences of any of their actions. Consequences are part of RP. If you can't accept them, then why bother? That goes for all PCs. Other way around. Villains are dime a dozen. Storytellers can shell them out like there's no tomorrow, at no consequence to themselves. Roaming Villains need pitch their story in a way that's interesting, believable, and respectful to both Characters and Players alike. Otherwise, it's just another ooc person on a power trip. I'll agree that bad villains or GM-controlled villains are a dime a dozen. GOOD villain PCs are rarer than gold. I don't think that they should have to make a pitch. The way roleplay works, any player can always say they don't want to interact. I've never really had anyone say that about my villains, though. Almost as if I'm not 'fundamentally incorrect'. I'll be damned.

Exactly. This is the problem you run into as a villain. Everyone wants to show that they are heroes...And the end result is that villain characters end up being some kind of evil doppleganger of John McClane who has to fight through the really, truly impossible odds. Remember boys and girls, respect your villains. They're rarer than gold.

I absolutely would want to see this happen personally, but here are the ogistic issues I think we'll come across: -Someone ain't going to want to have their pet chocobo shot down, since that's going to involve some animal cruelty. -Big fights will mean bigger areas covered, so we'll be seeing people emoting in /shout unless a group big enough for an entire alliance is formed. -Heavy Air Gang is going to win it all because it's just too amazing.

Let's face it, there are going to be several characters who will completely fall in love with the concept of flight in Heavensward. My FC-mate, Severus, and I had a long-running joke of forming an air-biker gang swarming the skies. He hasn't mentioned it in a while, but it still sounds like a whole lot of fun. I can see it going a couple of ways, honestly. First, it could be a genuine thrill-of-flight group, just a mob of people flying around and exploring zones just because they can, just for the thrill of it. They go in groups because it's safer and more fun to explore with others who can share the excitement. The other is an actual GANG, bandits or pirates who waylay travelers on the airways and threaten to knock them out of the sky while patrolling groups of more goody-good oriented sorts can try and step in and stop them. Dogfighting a possibility, even. What are your thoughts? Group flying? No group flying? Aerial combat or no?

My alt is a pilot. He's going to be flying stuff. I personally probably won't, say, make him have all six ponies he can summon with whistles, or the Kirin mount, but he's going to have a personal flight mechanism, and when he gets it, he's rarely going to touch the ground again because he loves to fly. Personally, my ultimate goal for him is the one-or-two person airship.

This was actually done before in Guild Wars 2 with...Mixed success. There were a number of people willing to play the infected so long as they were treated right off the bat, but they usually got bored waiting for a cure. There were a lot more people looking for samples of the virus to release in other locales, which resulted in my character, as a mage in the city guard, having to pull some pretty crazy stunts in order to keep from happening. The main thing was that people were required to SAY they were participating. Only ONE well was tainted rather than the whole thing, and it could be prevented by boiling your water so the outbreak was contained. No one could FORCE you to become sick, and you never had to participate in the story. Also, Guild Wars 2 was a much smaller and community with no personal housing, so people from different groups had to interact a little more than in FFXIV, where most people go to their houses and RP. If you WANT to start an 'Outbreak' model, I would start is more like a zombie thing. One person catches it and bites someone else, who has to consent. I would make a thread and link it to someone before they even interact, and I would, at the top of the thread, state that the imposition of the plague/poison/whatever would end after something like two weeks if nothing from other parties is done, retconned as the sickness passing and the person getting better. That way you aren't really putting a lot of impositions on other players who don't want to be involved.

Snort Scoff snicker bark growl snarl hiss burble bubble howl squeak whimper whine Like this?

The biggest problems i encounter when playing a villain are the following: Players who want to be the main hero - Y'know what? This isn't a problem outright if you're in a roleplay where there is one protagonist, but the vast, vast majority of the time, it's one villain versus a large army of good guys. I'm fine with your protagonist having a personal stake in carving my villain up, and it can amuse me to yank that chain in order to drive heroes up the wall, but please don't, as the player of a protagonist, demand that you have a greater right to my bad guy OOC or that you have a special privilege to affect the outcome of my roleplay. Players forgetting that Villain PCs are still PCs, with all the rights that entails - When I play a villain, it's as a player character who is evil, but put emphasis on PLAYER CHARACTER. You do not get to make a decision on how my character is going to end up without my consent any more than I have any right to your character. If you get uppity, then you don't get a bad guy. I'm always happy to work with players, but given the way any good villain is dogpiled by players looking to take him or her down, I have to play my part very, very carefully. You do not get to decide that you harm my character without my consent. You do not get to decide that you kill my character. Going Super Saiyan Godmode in roleplay will result in my villain withdrawing and you no longer having a villain. I have that choice, and I'm going to stay with it. Players getting upset that they can't kill me a third of the way, halfway, two thirds of the way, etc., through a full story arc - This is a 'Your Mileage May Vary" thing, but I personally prefer large and involved arcs to have an element of OOC communication in them so that at least some guiding players can know what a scene is about if it's plot-significant. When I'm a villain opening up a whole new arc that's been planned for weeks, you do not get to sneak up behind my villain and stab him or her in the back. At this point, the only thing you're doing is causing a fight scene and causing the roleplay to stretch out while you're either put on the floor so the scene can continue or I have to deal with OOC drama because you've decided you want to take out the Big Bad in the first act. Again, you don't get to kill my character without my consent any more than I can kill off yours. If you get upset and call me a godmoder at this point, you're going to no longer have a villain until you wisen up. Players who insist that they are as tough/strong/powerful as the villain solo - Look, I'm not going to tell you how to roleplay your character, but in order for a villain to survive longer than about ten seconds in MMO RP, he or she either needs to be hilariously well protected or be several steps above the protagonists in terms of ability just to keep breathing. I've tried to play weak, scheming villains before. They get taken out at range by Raiton in broad daylight even if that results in the bomb in the orphanage blowing up, because then Raiton Guy will somehow either force that to stop or call the villain a monster and be done with it. In order to keep a survivable villain, my bad guys are going to be at least a notch above your ilvl 9000 Monk/Ninja/DRG armed with a transforming Ascian-slaying Blade of Light. That's just the way it needs to be, and the less silly your character's assumed combat ability is, the less silly I have to make my bad guy's. Basically what I'm saying is that my biggest problem playing a good villain is other people - When left to my own devices, I will play baddies who are varying levels of inhuman monster and usually be sending tells to people apologizing and explaining how I'm not really actually this horrible of a person IRL and that I feel really bad for turning that kitten into a living bomb which set someone's baby on fire. My biggest problem is having to deal with heroes who don't understand or feel the need to extend courtesy to the villains whose actions drive the story that gives the heroes stuff to do. ____________________________________________ From an IC perspective, I honestly have no qualms playing characters who are bad, because you know what? Some people out there are just plain jerks who believe that they matter more than someone else. I had a villain, Ryad, who was a complete thug of a Thaumaturge. He cared more about feeling powerful and taking whatever he felt like than he did anything else. The only thing he respected was a power greater than his. He was a vicious, cruel-minded predator, and he died a dog's death during our current arc when I decided that our heroes needed a win that came in the form of a body bag. I had no qualms at all playing Ryad because he was the kind of person with absolutely no redeeming values. I would have enjoyed the chance to see someone try, just because it would backfire with literal fire. He THREW A LALAFELL AT SOMEONE. WHAT A JERK! That being said, I honestly found that playing a Thaumaturge was just not conducive to villain roleplay without going so overpowered that it went into Black Mage territory. I got lore-blocked from him performing his basic survival functions because of the sheer number of people who went at him aiming for a kill, and since he wasn't plot-essential, he died. Villains aren't hard to play, even the worst and puppy-kickingest. The hard part for me is keeping them alive long enough for them to BE evil. That limits the sorts of villains I'm able to play.

I'm kind of agreeing that a coking class would draw a more substantial crowd. There are going to be characters who are mistrustful or bad at magic, but I'll be damned if I've ever met a good person who doesn't like pancakes.

This is a neat idea but I can't help feeling like something like this already exists? Personally if I wanted help from the GC RPers I'd probably use /shout but then again I'm sure a lot of RPers have /shout disabled. It honestly depends on the time of night and availability of the players. In order to find a member of the Brass Blades/Immortal Flames, a group of people in our FC once had to stage an armed bar fight in the middle of the Quicksand because nobody was paying attention "Without due cause". While hilarious, I'm reminded that I should probably use the forums to try and hunt down some actual members of GCs in case I need to beg them for RP. Speaking as a former longtime member of Seraph Falcon Company in GW2 (basically a police force for Divinity's Reach, which was Ul'dah with better weather and more nobles and jerks), the big problem with playing a policing force of an LS is that you'll have to do the following before you really do more than wander around the city: -Gain the trust of the RP community. -KEEP the trust of the RP community. -Establish rules for imprisonment/consent to RP (because, you may be surprised to know, people whose characters are criminals seldom actually enjoy being put in the clink). -Find a roleplay base and establish rules for when and how far one is allowed to leave that base (i.e. the "Why are the Brass Blades patrolling in Gridania" rule). In other words, while it's awesome to have one or two people around acting as GC agents, it's a very difficult thing to keep going and be part of the community where the GC members don't feel put-upon or treated like NPCs. I like those policing military forces a lot and want to make sure they get their wins sometimes too.

I want this to happen now.

Soren would buy them drinks and make sure there are no hard feelings after tonight.

It's been stated before that a midlander married, or as good as married, a Seeker in the Alchemy quest line. In lore, interracial relationships are seen as odd or frowned upon more than same sex relationships in the eyes of society, so that may be an issue concerning some priests and/or priestesses. I could even consider it a plot point of the marriage: Finding someone to conduct the wedding.

Shamefacedly bumping after nearly three weeks and no replies. Still looking.

"There once was a Seeker named Sato Whose grump was at first just bravado As such is the place For a lonely nutcase Right now he thinks all love is hollow." "Solomon Laguerre With manner cocksure Did meet a girl named Eraiya With pelvisy thrust He didst gain her trust Their bedsheets are highly impure." I think this one is pretty self-explanatory.

Name: Chivalorous Hester Concept: Coward and Gambling Addict who keeps getting roped into saving the world. Race: Hyur Quote: "No. I'm not going to do it. The tables are full and I've got good cards. You can't make me leave and chase the Lord of Bloody Darkness and Evil or stop the Armegeddon Magnet or whatever bloody thing you want me to do. The only time I'm going to run off and the only time I'm going to leave this table are the same time, and that is when I run out of money, so leave me a-..." *checks cards again* "Well then, shall we be off?" Chivalorous Hale believes in Fate. He believes he's fated to strike it rich, that Nymeia has granted him an inordinate amount of luck and that, despite all the evidence to the contrary, he's going to meet a bright future by doing nothing but cheating at cards, a lucky high-risk venture, and maybe the mildest of petty larcenies when no one is looking. He believes himself to be a charmer, the snake-oil salesman who can take a tin of paint and a run-down racing bird and turn it into someone's fantasy, the mighty and inexhaustible gold chocobo. After all, when you sell dreams, they only need to last until you leave and their eyes open to the truth. Sadly, Nymeia has more in store for Chivalorous. She intends for him to live up to the silly, made-up name his Dirt-farming, illiterate Limsan parents gave him and turn him into a force of good and change in Hydaelin, even if he has to do it while kicking, screaming, and dragging furrows into the dirt with his fingernails. Circumstances forces Chivalorous into the Battle of Carteneau, joining the ranks of the Maelstrom in order to escape, however temporarily, a small mountain of gambling debts that had left him bound to the life of a fugitive. Having found that a coward's survival tendencies make for excellent instincts on the field of battle, he received a field promotion to Sergeant and, after having his initial plan of bravely charging as far away from the battle as possible rebuffed by his superiors, led his command into the thickest of the fighting, hoping to go all the way through and out the other side before anyone noticed, yelling bravely (but with a whiny, high-pitched edge to it) all the while. This led him to be one of those legendary Warriors of Light hurled into the future, his name and reputation wiped clean from the annals of history. Including his gambling debts. For all of about three days, which was how long it took for him to be run out of the township of Swiftperch with nothing but the clothes on his back, to start it all over again with nary a lesson learned. Defining Characteristics Cowardice - "What good is being destined for riches if I won't be alive to spend it!?" Cynical - "Yes, because love and truth and goodness will save the day rather than, I don't know, maybe not trying to convert the man we just saw grilling a kitten over a house fire that he started!? He's still got fur in his teeth!" Over The Top - "Why on Hydaelyn would a man live small and within his means? Why would he speak in small and measured words? Life is bombastic, explosive, riddled with dreams, riches, and quite clever sounding words whose meanings you don't really have to understand to sound impressive! Every breath taken is Nymeia's gift because she could easily put some manner of brain-devouring spore in it to turn you into some manner of gibbering imbecile! Sing a bawdy song! Buy a handsome and talkative chap a drink! Maybe roll some dice! Live! Doesn't that sound ever so much better than pointing that sword at me? Friend? It was only a few thousand gil, after all." Why I Can't Really Play Him A character like this needs cooperation from a group, because otherwise they'll actually let him run away. The driving force behind the character is that he's being forced into acting on the tiny smidge of better nature he possesses, and that means he'll need someone to force him. I would have to find a group willing to put up with that nonsense, and frankly there aren't many who wouldn't in the heavier RP scene where motives are supposed to be deeper, and while I could take this character and give him a great deal of depth, most likely, I still don't think I could find the time and the correct group to do him justice.

First, welcome to the game and the forums. We're glad to have you, and we hope you have the best time ever. I also turn 30 this year. Let us both weep quietly into our keyboards and wonder where our youth went. Looking over your concepts, I like them, and while I'd be super careful about the WHM thing (white mages are very hard to do as far as lore goes), I've seen some others who were forced to make the time jump and had everyone who didn't jump, including friends and family, forget about them. Some characters have a lot of trouble with that if they were close to their friends and family, while others just don't give a flip. If you get bored, please feel free to hit me up for RP on the forums on on my listed alts in the game! I hope to see you around!

Fixed.

Hi Whuggles! I'm sorry this post hasn't been responded to so soon. You might have an easier time with this sort of thing if you check out the Gilgamesh section of the forum. You can also poke the Making Connections section, though personally I've not seen a lot of success there (Two threads and never had a response). Mostly, though, what I recommend is the following: -Locate an event or place where there is roleplay going on. -Find someone whom you think looks/sounds like s/he would be interesting to interact with. -Send that person a tell asking if it's okay to interact (sometimes they're in the middle of something or mostly AFK or ERPing in tells, w/e). -If the person says it's okay, then walk on over and say hi. -I'd try not to get romantically involved until your characters are long acquaintances. Be friends first. I wish I could give you more tips, but I'm actually on Balmung. My best suggestion, like I said before, is to check out events where players are going to gather and talk to people there if they're wiling to hang out.

M'sato will go and explore for the sake of exploration in his free time as well as any work-related excuse he can find. He has a love of seeing new places and doing new things. Solomon might visit Ishgard, his old homeland, once or twice. He hasn't been back past Coerthas since he left when he was fifteen. Soren is also from Ishgard and resents the entire place. He washed his hands of it, took a new name, and gets work flying airships going places that are not Ishgard as often as he can. He never wants to go back. Naturally, this means he's going to be the character of mine who spends the most time there, because I love torturing my characters. Garrett will likely go there to kick every puppy he can find in the name of a brighter Garlean Imperial Future.

Uh, to revisit (and apologize if my previous post caused offense), Gunblades are possible in lore. It sounds like what Aaron's looking for it something like what Cervantes from Soul Calibur uses, which is a blade with an actual pistol in the hilt. It's documented that they exist in lore. One is even Cid's weapon, if I recall. Personally, if it were a weapon I were going to introduce to my character, I would allow for the barrel of the gun to be damaged over the course of the fight and give it a limited number of shots with the statement that it's difficult to reload the thing in the middle of combat (to keep it from being potentially overpowered).

M'sato is a very curious soul and he doesn't overly much care about bad reputations, considering his own. He would probe for more information as safely as he could and then get out of dodge at the slightest hint of more trouble coming. Solomon would very politely thank his savior and, because this person is the sort of commodity which could be trouble, would not introduce himself or say where he lays his head unless absolutely necessary. He would be grateful, but he wouldn't want to have to deal with the trouble a Black Mage could be. Soren would offer to buy the mage a drink and try to get to know him, because damn that was cool. Garrett would offer the mage a job. If the offer was refused, then he would put an arrow into the BLM's eye. Too dangerous to exist except as an asset.