allgivenover

I'm not too familiar with 4th edition Dungeons and Dragons at all. I assigned stats to Rakka'li based on my familiarity with 3rd edition. The scale is like this: Numbers on the left, following by the bonus, or penalty, to your roll when using that ability score, and on the right are examples what this means for both strength and dexterity. 1: -5 (as bad as you can be, almost unable to move if referring to strength, or unable to speak if referring to intelligence) 2-3: -4 (wasted away or born with some congenital defect, barely able to speak, cannot learn to read) 4-5: -3 (very bad physical ability, a person with severe learning disabilities might have this score) 6-7: -2 (bad, a very sedentary person, a very old person with dementia or very young person might have this intelligence score) 8-9: -1 (below average) 10-11: 0 (average) 12-13: +1 (above average) 14-15: +2 (very good, Someone who does light resistance training with regularity, or a college professor might have this score) 16-17: +3 (someone who does intermediate to heavy weight training might scale here, the top professors in the region might have this score for intelligence) 18-19: +4 (people with very, very good genetics or people who do weight training as a career would have this score for strength, genius level intelligence - very, very few people would have this score in the intelligence slot) 20-21: +5 (pinnacle of human ability, the strongest of the strong, the smartest of the smart) ...and so on forever. Every two points gives another +1 bonus. Going in to the 20s is considered superhuman (being able to lift a bus by yourself, or calculate advanced linear equations in your head - without using paper)[/b]

Rakka'li Kuhn STR - 12 (Not terribly strong, but walking everywhere and making a living off of your labor as he did for so long is going to build some muscle.) DEX - 15 (This is mostly due to his heritage and youth spent exploring the Blackshroud - and his stint as a street rat in Ul'dah) FORT - 8 (Due to old injuries he just cannot take a punch any more, and he tires easily, especially during the day) INT - 16 (Terribly lacking in education - though he's quick to follow a situation, parse out the information he needs to know, and follow up with reasonable solutions. In another life he would've been a scholar) WIS - 8 (Partly due to youth, he is always making poor choices - Though his hearing and sense of smell are greater than a Hyur's) CHA -10 (Sometimes affable, sometimes downright unlikable)

I'm all over Aldnoah.Zero right now. Ug_waNMjLa0

That's the thing, what are the rules? I don't think we could even settle on them if we tried! The setting is really inconsistent and undefined in a lot of places. If we tried to make a compendium of all the "rules" it would degenerate into endless arguments. Why? Because the devs arn't thinking of RP and lore consistency when they write this material. They don't make these games for us unfortunately (and it would probably be a financial flop if they did, so I don't blame them). I favor things "making sense" as well, but I quickly realized that getting a consensus about it is going to be damn near impossible. Interesting theory about Hildebrand, but I think it's just as likely he's comic relief that they didn't put very much thought into.

My point is that it's a great example of how it's not that important or worth vehemently arguing over. If you want more concrete rules where everything is explained, fine. If you don't care that things are inconsistent (and oh boy are they!), fine. It's just two different styles of RP. :P:P:P:P:P:P:P:P:P:P:P:P:P:P:P:P

I agree with your reasoning about aether "amping" people up physically, but you would only benefit from dropping condescension from your rebuttals. Do you really want to open that can of worms? Because there's very little chance anyone here can honestly say they "know" something about actual combat. Further you go on to draw an axiom from a sport that that has defined rules and restrictions and is pretty darn far from "actual combat", which has nothing of the sort. Finally, when you throw weapons into the equation size begins to matter a whole lot less and technique can definitely prevail - though I do agree that the Lalafell size disadvantage is far, far greater than the comparatively smaller differences in human sizes and that's why I agree that we need some sort of magical explanation. (Also the whole blocking attacks from giant monsters thing)

That's the other thing, we don't know if it's an exemption or if there was a mistake in the Miqo'te naming convention post on the lore forum or if they changed design direction midway through and didn't communicate it where it needed to go. The two sources directly conflict and personally I place more validity on the in game portrayal that features fleshed out characters and events that are tied to the main scenario plot than I do a blurb of translated text from a community rep on a topic that is way, way down the ladder of importance for the vast majority of players.

That's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is that the fanservice is not the only characteristic of the tribe and that there's plenty of good lore there. It's your personal disgust that pushes you to label it a "fanservice tribe" when there's a lot of interesting stuff going on aside from what some guy playing the game may or may not be getting off too.

I don't disagree, but calling it a fanservice race is kind of discarding all the good potential in my opinion. Personally I have always been attached to the idea of matriarchies as extremely fascinating because it's something that's so absent from life here on Earth, yet no one would call that niche appeal fanservice. It's only labeled so if enough people are disgusted/putt-off by it as is the case with Seekers. Everything you listed in support of labeling it fanservice is not inherently bad, it only becomes so when you place it next to the context that someone might be getting off to it in a way that disgusts you.

I don't really know what happened with that discrepancy. Perhaps a change in direction mid-development? Or they're just not explicitly stating that the forgotten springs tribe is an anomaly? Either way. I think "fanservice tribe" is a little heavy handed in criticism - clearly I prefer Keeper of the Moon Miqo'te myself but I also think there's interesting cultural clashes and potentially positive portrayals that can come from the Seeker side of things. Conflict is good and a variety of portrayals is good. Whether or not someone is getting their jollies off the idea that Seekers live in a harem is irrelevant. People give SE shit for the Seeker tribe now and then, but compared to some other games in the industry like WoW, every Korean MMO ever, and Wildstar (*shudder*), SE is pretty damn mild when it comes to fleshservice. In fact they're the only one I can think of that provides a fair amount of beefcake along with the cheesecake fleshservice.

Frankly I can't imagine a setting that's honest about human nature while also being devoid of rape entirely - although XIV features "non-human" races they are not different enough to fall free of that assertion. XIV is a bright game about heroes, but these heroes also live in a dangerous world alongside good and evil folk alike. One of the more subtle themes of the story is that the mortal races are a chaotic force composed of both light and darkness, and it shows in the setting. Whether using rape is lazy or not is up for debate. I think that XIV could have gotten away without mentioning it ever and no one would've thought anything of it - mind you, this wouldn't have stopped any roleplayers from using the "rape as backstory" trope to their fullest indulgence - however SE chose to imply rape in the setting, so here we are. The disturbingly blatant implications of Sastasha kind of shocked me, but even though it shocked me it also served well to illustrate that these pirates were a big problem for Limsa Lominsa and as a result it became way more important for me to get rid of them. I also think XIV handles it in a way that I find acceptable - though I respectfully disagree with the crowd that believes that rape can never be used in a story acceptably I also understand that this is a very hot button issue with a lot of strong emotions surrounding it, so you'll not catch me arguing vehemently with those that feel this way. The way that XIV uses it that I find acceptable is that SE doesn't use it to make a major female character appear weak or play it for cheap drama. In fact the incident in Little Ala Mhigo I thought was well done in the way that the victim asserted that she's going to be alright despite what happened (at least that's how I recall it, correct me if I'm wrong). It goes without saying that rape is an extremely horrible trauma for anyone to experience, but it was refreshing to see a character approach the aftermath from a position of strength rather than the more common emotional devastation that follows. That's something you rarely see in media, as it's way way more common for raped characters to become fragile creatures that are forever marked and in need of delicate treatment or for them to become psychotic and fueled by a desire for revenge or random violence. These common portrayals and unfortunately real life reactions I think can be extremely harmful to a victim of rape as not only do they have to process their own feelings, they also have to contend with well-meaning but misguided people telling them that they are weak and/or damaged/marked/soiled or any number of negative projections. So in this case I thought it was unusual and welcome that they handled it differently.

Turn 7 is the static breaker. It's actually harder than t8 in mine and many other's opinion. So much can go wrong and far too much of it is dependent on RNG. There's sometimes morale problems because the mechanics make it very obvious who screwed up and it only takes one or two angry individuals playing the blame game to really heighten the tension and cause further issues. Worse yet, if your group performs too well in DPS you can cause a wipe due to skipping Cursed Voice casts or pushing the Renaud(s) to wake up and beat everyone to death (it's always the healers that die first in that situation). As for line of sighting shriek, always remember that latency can be a factor, move early. Even at the cost of a little DPS because if you get petrified and end up shrieked next cycle, or you're facing the main tank/DPS none of that damage is going to matter anyway. I must say though that the anxiety thing has to be tackled first. I can tell you now that the ones who yell and scream and play the blame game will destroy PUGs and statics - and they certainly don't end up clearing the content themselves. These people are toxic and will only make your problem worse, don't put up with them for the hopes of a clear at the cost of your own happiness. You're going to wipe a LOT learning these fights, and in fact it's mandatory to learn how to do it. In full PUGs there's often one or two assholes that rage and really build the tension, so I really recommend trying to put together or join a static group of people who understand that you have to wipe to win.

I am also curious about what it takes to keep this site running and if I can contribute.

I'm totally not frozen here, this is uh... holy light. Yeah.

[align=center][/align] [align=center]Read here~[/align]

The background and cultural lore might not be as thorough as we'd like but we can still draw conclusions from the way the world is actively depicted, and that depiction points to there being little reason to believe that women suffer as second class citizens in Eorzea.

Also does anyone else find it hilarious that magic, cat-people, dragons, fairies, and all sorts of supernatural nonsense is somehow more acceptable and "realistic" than a world where women are not automatically second class citizens? I mean, it'd make sense if we were playing an MMO heavily based off of 15th century Europe or something, but we're not even close to anything remotely historical. XIV doesn't seem to portray women with significantly less rights at all, and that's alright. Just because the setting doesn't have cars and other modern conveniences doesn't mean that women have to be under the boot of the patriarchy.

Fixed that for you.

Both of them are just as tough or tougher than Ifrit EX...

Other than it being the worst designed PVP I've ever directly experienced in an MMO? Nothin'.

I <3 what you did there.

Fantasia is the best example in XIV of how giving a paid account services item a little bit of flavor text is a terrible, terrible idea... ...unless you don't care about role-play and lore consistency, which describes pretty much every big budget MMO developer ever, including SE. If there was even a bit of evidence that Fantasia saw any use in the story I'd be for it, but there really isn't any mention of them outside of the items flavor text, at all. Granted, It'd be wrong of me to say your RP is invalid or bad because you use a Fantasia IC, but when I see the cliched "Oh no! I drank a Fantasia by mistake and now I'm a GIRL OH NOES" roleplay going on I am going to do my best to stay clear.

I'm going to try to go, but we'll see. I don't know what the limit on ticket sales is and they're going on sale a little too soon for me to camp them.