Tiergan

Faye, I heart you, but I have to admit that when I read "Ultimately it's just folks choosing self-gratification over believability which as the OP stated isn't inherently bad and doesn't mean I won't RP with anyone, I just may not always think it's the best decision, so I try to shy away from it myself." it was a little off-putting. You may not have meant it that way, but for those of us that are being labeled as 'inauthentic' because we're not playing Isghardian Elezen or Ala Mhigan Highlanders, it sort of reads like: "Ultimately, these people want to make characters that please themselves over making characters that are believable and lore-abiding. I'm not saying this is inherently bad or anything and I'll still RP with someone whose character is more about satisfying the player's wants over being a realistic character -- I just don't think it's a good idea." If that's how you actually feel, that's okay. But I also don't think it's unreasonable to expect people might be sore about how they were labeled. Maybe it's worthwhile to say I don't think self-gratification is a bad thing. In the end that's why we all RP, even why we all chat and debate here on the RPC. This is how we spend our time, it's for our own enjoyment. "Self-gratification" was probably not the best term in retrospect given the negative connotation. But I don't believe there's anything wrong with choosing a character you want to play over the lore or anything else. I'm certainly no lore nazi myself--while I try to never "break" it I do frequently "bend," and while it may not be my own practice, if someone wants to RP even something as extreme as a Garlean Miqo'te princess who can shoot lazer beams, screw the lore and let 'em if that's what they have fun with! We're here to have fun, and how lore fits into that "fun" is different for every individual. I also don't believe playing an exception, say a Miqo'te dragoon, is "inauthentic"--it just can be a bit harder to accept and need some extra reasoning behind it to explain it away if it's going to make sense given the game's lore. It's certainly not lore-breaking or "wrong," just harder to believe at face value without full context given. Thank you for elaborating. I will admit that while I'd accept an Elezen Ishgardian pretty instantly, I would probably want to hear more about the Miqo'te Ishgardian's backstory to learn about how they got there and why - considering the racial diversity with Ishgardians is pretty stacked in one direction. I suppose feel that people place a lot of emphasis and frustration with "What the hell is with all of these miqo'te players and why do they play as [x]?!" It was the core example the OP brought up and "why is it always Miqo'te?" was a question that the OP asked. To me it's pretty clear it's because there's a metric buttton of miqo'te players. The higher the population, the more likely you're going to run into a whole lot of different concepts. Some will be right up people's alley and some won't -- but it's the same with pretty much anything we RP. I've endured a lot of random aggression or unpleasant assumptions made about me purely because I'm roleplaying a cat (though weirdly, most of that aggression comes from male players who hate my mancat, but are totally willing to hit on my ladycat :V) I've had people tell me to my face that a certain group likely won't take my RP seriously because I'm RPing a miqo'te. I've had some RPers warn me that I'd have to work twice as hard to prove that I was a decent roleplayer. I've had people straight up ask me, openly in a linkshell, whether I was ERPing with someone just for standing in place with another cat somewhere public RPing things that had nothing to do with sex in /say. I understand this happens because there's a larger pool of unpleasant miqo'te roleplayers to sift through due to the larger pool of players, but it still really sucks. I don't enjoy playing as one of the most popular races in the game. I'm honestly hoping that when the Au Ra will come out, half the miqo'te will become dragon people just so that it'll be less of a problem - especially when some folks will fixate on miqo'te for months. There have been multiple times where I've considered just rerolling and fantasia'ing my characters into something else because of it, but I've spent way too much time on Tiergan and have built up too many different relationships with him now to do it. At the end of the day, people will like what they like and hate what they hate, but man does it bum me out dealing with it so often.

Faye, I heart you, but I have to admit that when I read "Ultimately it's just folks choosing self-gratification over believability which as the OP stated isn't inherently bad and doesn't mean I won't RP with anyone, I just may not always think it's the best decision, so I try to shy away from it myself." it was a little off-putting. You may not have meant it that way, but for those of us that are being labeled as 'inauthentic' because we're not playing Isghardian Elezen or Ala Mhigan Highlanders, it sort of reads like: "Ultimately, these people want to make characters that please themselves over making characters that are believable and lore-abiding. I'm not saying this is inherently bad or anything and I'll still RP with someone whose character is more about satisfying the player's wants over being a realistic character -- I just don't think it's a good idea." If that's how you actually feel, that's okay. But I also don't think it's unreasonable to expect people might be sore about how they were labeled.

Personally speaking, if someone can find at least one example of a race/nation combination in-game, I'm usually okay with it. Even if not - if someone can spin a decent, plausible narrative on why the're an unusual combination, I'll roll with that too. Worst comes to worst - I don't agree with them and we just don't wind up RPing together all that much, but there's plenty of other roleplayers in the community for us to choose from so it's not really a huge loss for either of us. I'll play with the people my RP values align with, and they can play with theirs. In regards to the whole "Authentic Ala Mhigans should be Highlander" bit: For my part, I was part of the initial 1.0 crowd. I was playing FFXIV back in the beta when I was raging at SE for making the least intuitive cumbersome mind-numbingly awful UI/controls/etc I'd ever seen in an MMO - and doing jack all to fix it because they were really only using the US beta test to stress-test the servers rather than get actual feedback. My one and only character back then was Lurial because I had played a mithra with the same first name and appearance in FFXI, and I wanted to repeat it just for nostalgia purposes. I decided upon making her Ala Mhigan, because at the time, being a miqo'te Ala Mhigan refugee wasn't really a big deal. At least not to anyone I RPed with back then - and I was literally in an all Ala Mhigan 'guild'. As Sounsyy pointed out, there were plenty of examples in 1.0 of Ala Mhigans of various races, from midlanders to roegadyns to lalafell. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfxBo5lQ97s Then there's J'moldva - the Hellfire Phoenix - the Ala Mhigan miqo'te champion Sounsyy mentioned from the 1.0 Gladiator quests. When 2.0 came out, we got a whole influx of new folks who weren't able to experience all of the things in the 1.0 storyline. Because of this, I get why most folks would initially quirk a brow at "Ala Mhigan" and "miqo'te" being next to each other in the same sentence. The majority of Ala Mhigans seen in 2.0 are both highlander and midlander hyur with a smattering of roegadyns. That said - none of that lore from 1.0 just evaporated. The Hellfire Phoenix is still in the game and even shows up in the Blacksmithing quest-chain. She has a specific breed of Ala Mhigan fighting fish named after her - The Moldva ("This Ala Mhigan fighting fish has never known defeat, and for this remarkable feat folk have named it for the celebrated gladiator.") And there are roegadyns IN little Ala Mhigo dressed in a way that implies they're also Ala Mhigan refugees and not visiting adventurers. Minfillia - as annoying as she is - is Ala Mhigan despite being a midlander. It's admittedly a little frustrating that Sounsyy and other folks have presented this information before, yet some people still harp on about how it's 'not authentic' to play anything other than a highlander if you're Ala Mhigan - even with game lore staring them in the face. What I feel this actually boils down to is frustration with the miqo'te race and miqo'te players period. And honestly? I get it. We're goddamn everywhere. You can't throw a rock in Ul'dah without hitting a scantily clad cat person. And because there's such a massive pool of miqo'te players in comparison to the other races, there's also a proportionally larger pool of shitty ones, ones that do nothing but dump you with unsolicited ERP requests, and ones that are so ridiculously over-the-top and lore-breaking that you can't help but roll your eyes so far back you can see your brain. It might even be annoying for some folks to see a miqo'te for every single character type and backstory known to man -- from book worm scientists to blood-crazed gladiators, to erudite mages to Ishgardian knights and Ala Mhigan refugees. There are ones that RP really unorthodox concepts really well, but chances are, you're probably going to remember the ones who pull it off really horribly a lot more clearly. We've all got a story about that 'one really weird creepy miqo'te' player who made you really bloody uncomfortable in RP. However, the sheer number of miqo'te players and how irritating it might be that there's a miqo'te for basically everything doesn't invalidate how 'authentic' it is for someone to play a certain character type if the game itself has provided a precedent for it.

Personal Profile Character Name: Tiergan Vashir Gender: Male Race: Mixed-Heritage Miqo'te Domestic Profile Civil Status: "It's Complicated." Place of Residence: Originally Ul'dah - now the Mist of La Noscea. Occupation: Mercenary Free Company: The Coral Sea Social/Meta Profile Super Outdated Wiki That Needs Updating ---------------------------------------------- Personal Profile Character Name: Lurial Vashir Gender: Female Race: Mixed-Heritage Miqo'te Domestic Profile Civil Status: Single Place of Residence: Spends most of her time in Ul'dah, though also stays in the Mist Occupation: Information Broker(cover) / Assassin (true occupation) Free Company: The Coral Sea Social/Meta Profile Wiki that needs Revamp because much of it has been retconned and rebooted.

THIS THIS THIS.

EMBER!

Piggybacking off of Warren's post... This was the 1.0 map of Coerthas, which was still an alpine region - cold, snowy winters and such - but wasn't yet completely frozen over pre-Calamity. As you can see, the region hasn't changed much in 2.0, and SE has pretty much confirmed that Heavensward will re-open up these other outside regions as new Coerthas zones. Anyways, the Coerthas Lowlands to the south as well as the Miller's Glade region in the Fields of Glory to the East were actually farmlands in 1.0. Sheep/Karakul provided wool for clothing and textiles, as well as milk and meet. The lowlands were fed by the runoff waters of the White Maiden. There were also several hamlets in the surrounding areas, Falcon's Nest, which in 2.0 we learned was frozen over solid when the Snowcloak glacial shift came in from the west. Then Owl's Nest in the East, which in 2.0, access has been blocked off. Here's also a few snippets of Fishing and food item description lore on how Ishgard might feed themselves and what:

I would strongly vote against running with assumptions or guesses individual roleplayers might have on what the cultural background of the Ala Mhigans might be like based upon real-world cultures. No two groups of roleplayers will likely agree and it might limit the turn out for your event. The most we could possibly know regarding real-world cultural inspiration is that highlander's first names are Germanic or Normandic at their roots -- but we don't know if the actual culture of Ala Mhigo itself necessarily falls in line with that. Elezen have French names, but the Elezen certainly don't really have many (if any at all) cultural similarities to the French. (And they honestly probably only gave the Elezen french names because the Elvaan in FFXI had very obvious French roots.) Instead, it would be much better to use all the things that have already been presented to us in the lore: We know they were a technological advanced military nation living in the highlands of Gyr Albania that often sent forces out to conquer the west even as it was repelling attacks from the east. Gyr Albania was historically beset by warfare and conflict -- likely leading to why Ala Mhigo became such a military powerhouse to begin with. We know Ala Mhigo was home to the Fists of Rhalgr, monks and war priests whose power became so expansive, they were eventually incorporated into the nation's standing army and Rhalgr the Destroyer became the city's patron god. Ala Mhigo once had greatly influential Lancer legions that favored the longspear - which were well known to be effective against the mounted units of Ishgard. They had a mostly hyuran highlander population with a much smaller population of elezen, lalafell, miqo'te and roegadyn mixed in. We know that the Highlanders are a warring race and their last names tend to sound more violent, as they will often adopt the colorful nicknames they have earned during battle. The biggest chunk of history we know is about the actual fall of Ala Mhigo itself and the last king of Ala Mhigo. King Theodoric - also known as the King of Ruin - was a paranoid tyrant who crushed any hint of opposition, eventually changing the patron god of Ala Mhigo from Rhalgr to Nymeia and naming himself chosen for the throne by Nymeia herself. (Thus making him king by 'divine-will'). He outlawed all worship and likenesses of the rest of the Twelve, including Rhalgr - and demanded all prayer and worship go to Nymeia instead. Once he successfully baited the Fists of Rhalgr into rallying against him, he had the Fists utterly crushed and nearly wiped out by the Ala Mhigan military. He then went about beheading every possible member of the royal family who could be a threat to his throne. Once there were none left to challenge him, he turned upon the nobility and merchant class who might have the power to turn against him. His paranoia grew to the point where he eventually had beheaded everyone from his own wife (who eventually sympathized with her people and tried to orchestrate regicide to end her husband's killing spree) to randomly executing beggars on the streets. No one was safe. His horrible reign as King is credited as one of the main reasons why Garlemald was eventually able to finally able to conquer Ala Mhigo as by the time the Garleans had arrived - the city was practically in the midst of a civil war with no leadership or solidarity. It's said that some Ala Mhigans even welcomed the Garleans in as saviors from their Mad King before they realised what was truly at stake. There's also some concept art of what the city itself looks like, but since it's just early stage concept work, we don't know how much of it actually got the green-light and whether it's what Ala Mhigo will actually look like when we finally get to see it in game. From here, you can craft events surrounding these aspects of the lore. Sporting/martial events could be linked to fist-fighting (Monks of Rhalgr), the use of longspears (like the Lancer legion), or just dueling and combat (because it was a pretty warlike area to begin with). You could have a bragging/storytelling area where people tell their most impressive combat/fighting/war exploits. This is based upon the fact that Highlanders' last names are nicknames earned from battle - which suggests they might place importance on memorable acts from combat. You could have an area that places an emphasis upon Rhalgr, explaining the details of the god and other events surrounding him. You could have a historian (Sounsyy? ) talk about the history of the nation and things like the Autumn War, famous historical figures like General Gylbarde, etc. You could have some kind of game where people throw knives at a representation of King Theodric's head and then set it on fire at the end of the event. There's plenty of ideas you can pull from the lore - even though there's not too much of it.

Good lordy. Thank you for writing all of this out! I will probably take you up on your rp battle help offer in the future. :>

On how to deal with trolls. This has worked far, far more effectively than ignoring them as often times trolls will simply take it as a challenge to see how long you can hold out before you break. Just laugh it off, joke around with them, and act like what they're doing is extremely amusing to you. Do exactly what they're doing back in a light-hearted manner as though it's not really a big deal that they're interrupting. If they're dancing in scantily clad gear on your table, put on your most ridiculous outfit and do the same. If they're emoting lewd things at your character, blow back kisses at them. Have fun with it and above all -- don't say anything that would indicate that you're annoyed or bothered or even vindictive. Anything you say should be as though you're joking around with a friend. The whole point of trolling is to aggravate and piss people off -- the second you act as though you're getting a kick out of what they're doing is the second you've robbed them of their power and their goal for trolling you in the first place. They'll either start feeling awkward and run away, find it neat that you're not taking things so seriously and leave, or they'll just get bored and go find someone else to harass. Sure it might be annoying to have to stop the RP just to do something like this, but it usually only takes 3-5 minutes of time -- whereas I've had persistent trolls stick around for half an hour when trying to just ignore them.

This, I think, is very very good advice. I can definitely understand the frustration with the 16 year old magical prodigies that have mastered every single martial and magical combat skill known to man while also being an excellent cook, skilled alchemist, and isn't completely socially cripple somehow from all the studying they had to be doing. 9 times out of 10, it's led to some pretty awful RP. That said, I've seen some character concepts that for 99% of all RPers would result in ludicrously awful, mary-sue-level, crap storytelling times get pulled off extremely well in the hands of people who knew how to spin a narrative in the right way. Then there are folks RPing pretty unique character concepts that fall flat because the player doesn't really know how to execute them well. Barring someone breaking the lore, I tend to give most people a shot just to see how their RP turns out and then make my decisions after.

Warren is not a mod and is incapable of locking threads. Bright blue names are mods. Red names are people who have donated to the website. Your original thread made a bit of a show asking for another arbiter or someone to talk to. However, it is extremely clear you already knew who you likely had to speak to and just wanted to air out your problems for the entire forum to see in an attempt to stir up trouble. If you actually wanted to resolve things, you would have sorted it out privately in PMs or tells with the appropriate folks instead of dragging the entire RPC into this. Take the appropriate channels, or don't be surprised when the mods are forced to take action against you again.

When its an ordinary farmer doing crazy acrobatics with a flaming pitchfork, I will accept that the WoL and Ilbred's abilities are something anyone can do. Until then, I keep my belief that such feats are achieved through luck, supernatural means, or years of dedicated study and training, not something the average nobody just picked up (those dragoons being the best of the best, not low- ranking footsoldiers) Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm not sure if you and Zyrusticae are exactly in disagreement with each other? It seemed like Zyrusticae was not saying that *anyone* (like a merchant or a pig-farmer) could suddenly start doing crazy dragoon-jumps with little to no training - only that this video (and Raubahn/Ilberd's fight) show that zany acrobatics and superpowered abilities are not purely limited to Derplander and his WoL party. Any character that has undergone a logical amount of training could potentially do what Ilberd/Raubahn did or the dragoons have done in the video. So while an ordinary farmer might not be able to do crazy acrobatics - someone who has spent over a decade or more training in this form of combat might.

This is AMAZING. I think all you really need is to get a wig to get Hidle's crazy floofed up hair and you'd have nailed it. Everything else is pretty on point. It's just that Hildebrand's hair practically gives the guy 2-3 inches more height.

Tiergan is the silly drunk too and starts craving things like chicken and waffles. Unfortunately, he usually only gets drunk when he's REALLY upset or distressed about something. :V

HUT-BUTT. I AM PROUDS. KEEP GOING. YES GOOD.

Some updates are very easy to do this with. For this current one - almost all of my characters would be 100% unaffected and wouldn't really know much more than "Wow there's WAY more guards in Ul'dah than usual." and a few very minor tidbits. Other ones like when the Domans arrived however, are a bit more far reaching. Especially when folks started making Doman RP characters. As long as you're okay with OTHER people using MSQ bits for character development, you can probably safely get away with your character not really being in the know about stuff until she actually literally runs into them in game (like a Doman! Or an Au Ra.)

It's not too tricky. Time between patches is 3 months, and the time to complete MSQ patch increments is measured in hours. That being said, I do believe that there should be a certain 'grace period' in public RP locations like the Quicksand where people are discretionary about plot reveals out in the open. It took me 2 years to reach lvl 50 I'm a bit of a 'special' case. (though not a special snowflake!) You also took a massive break from playing for a while, hon. Also, please don't take this the wrong way as I don't mean this as harshly as it might come off, but if you have so little time that you can't tackle the MSQ - is it really worth paying the monthly subscription? I've always felt that if the game itself doesn't interest you enough where you actually want to play it, it would be much cheaper to just find a chat/tumblr/skype/forum-based RP community to engage in as it would be way more flexible, easier to tailor to your needs, and also free.

I don't remember whether you've had a great deal of experience RPing in MMOs or not. Generally this is always a problem that happens in MMOs that have any sort of basic overarching story. For the most part, in many MMO RP communities, every time a new patch comes out, its contents are the 'update' for current events happening in the world. Otherwise the world would still be in its extremely stagnant 1.0 version or 2.0 relaunch version of itself for all of the RP community which would be very stale, would lock out new things like Doman roleplayers -- and would even prohibit everything in the upcoming expansion as all of the events in the MSQ lead up to what is coming next. (AKA, you wouldn't be able to RP an Au Ra because they are virtually non-existent in the MSQ save for one main NPC.) Also, it would directly clash with small things SE does to the world itself to imply time has changed, such as Mor Dhona constantly being updated to show that as time progresses, it becomes a bigger and better place. While this isn't necessarily fair for newer RPers or people who are much slower to complete the MSQ - it would prove to be more of a detriment than an asset over time. Especially as SE continues to change/update the world and most of the RP community will have completed the story quests over those who have not.

^ Basically this. While most folks don't agree with playing as though all the events of the MSQ are happening specifically to your character (AKA, "I AM THE MAIN CHARACTER WHO DEFEATED ALL THE PRIMALS, FOUGHT GENERAL GAIUS, FOUGHT THE ASCIANS, ETC, ETC, ETC.") the events involved in the MSQ have realm-wide effects that even non-adventurers would feel. Ignoring those events means ignoring a huge chunk of the roleplay setting itself. It's also missing out on a bunch of great RP opportunities. I can only imagine what things might be like for Ishgardians and Ul'dahns who play certain character types. [EDIT: Removed obvious spoilers. Apologies!]

Not sure if anyone caught this one, but apparently Rowena has this to say:

Never change, Merri. (HOW DO YOU POSITION HIM SO WELL EVERY TIME?)

Very awesome looking! Also hngngng, the high allagan coat. Iwantthatsobadsob

After facing crushing defeat against creatures far beyond my ken, I have decided that perhaps I simply need to change my form. Perhaps I need to become a member of a race far more powerful and glorious than a simple miqo’te. The Glorious Lalafell Master Race. Notice how Tiergan even retained his grumptastic resting bitchface. Fair well, cat body. It was excellent while it lasted.

Ohh myyyy gooooooodddd!