Sig

Much of fanatasy and cinematic combat does revolve around flashy displays. Not all of it does, however. A Song of Ice and Fire and Game of Thrones comes immediately to mind. There is some fine knife fighting to be found in those. Real combat is boring in real life. But in RP? The imagination and sky is the limit. This echos my sentiments extremely well. A proper knife fight can really play to the emotions and allow characters to focus on interaction and tension. Flips and explosions rarely have the same effect. I find that the more RP'ers focus on kinetics, the softer the emotional impact of the RP usually becomes. No one disputes that Eorzea is a surreal place filled with all sorts of magic and mystical objects. Those objects can also be used in direct, brutally efficient ways. And absolutely, it is most unwise to bring a knife to gun fight, or any fight that features larger arms. Armor is frustrating but most suits have convenient little slits that conceal squishy parts. Ultimately, a good knife is an amazing side-arm. It is sad that it is not used in more colorful ways. But this of course is entirely subjective. Some folks love flashy pomp.

Forgive the rant, friends, but it's been a terrible day at work thus far. Allow me to crack my knuckles and vent. This is going to be a very nerdy and subjective post. Brace yourselves. Something has been bugging as of late in the wonderful world of Eorzean RP. /Rant Most Eorzean knife fighting is.... painful to watch. Yeah, I said it. I mean no offense and will elaborate. You are probably are already very familiar with most types of Eorzean knife fighters, especially rogues and ninjas and the like. Many other types of characters also carry knives as side-arms (Sig, for example, has more than he knows what to do with). It's safe to assume there is an obscene amount of knife fighters roaming the streets at all times. And most follow a similar pattern. Most Eorzean knife fighters are skilled dancers. They move like cats and emphasize graceful, sweeping strikes, akin to swinging a longsword or staff. They frequently weave jumps, twists, and other amazing acrobatic feats into the melee. We'll call this style "dancing with a knife." There is nothing wrong about dancing with a knife. It can be very entertaining to watch. It can also be effective, as evidenced by Eskrima and similar disciplines. But the flashy show and excessive flourish drown out the true beauty inherent in knife fighting, making it painfully scarce. Simplicity is the most beautiful and effective aspect of knife fighting. Basic, rote movements reduced to repeatable patterns. A hand grasps the opponent's outer shoulder, gains a purchase on clothing, and proceeds to pump the blade into the mark like a piston. This is the essence of knife fighting. There are a few variations but not many. Movements are fast, simple, and direct. Traditional knife fighting is something that almost any character could master in a day, and is so brutally effective that very few could stop a well-timed attack. But alas, we never see such displays. They don't make for a good show, afterall. ...But, at least one character in this zany world, finds few shows more entertaining than a proper, simple knife fight. Give it a shot sometime in-character, sometime. It's fun and indisputably effective. /Rant.

Emotionally Taxing -- Sig is extremely bipolar and runs the emotional gamut. I absolutely love RPing him, but it can be very emotionally taxing and disturbing at times, especially when he is in a poor or self-destructive mood. I Need to Shut Up More Often -- I have a bad habit for excessive length posting and dominating scenes. So many good ideas flood through my head at such speeds that I find it hard to resist making large, entertaining posts. Thankfully, I'm pretty observant of this, and can usually reign things in rather quickly. All RP Is Fun -- Sig has engaged in numerous obscenely violent combat scenes and intense ERP scenes. He's also engaged in countless well-mannered, polite scenes, and solo-scenes involving simple things like sampling wine and carving simple wooden objects. Variety is the spice of life, and I've yet to find a type of RP I have not enjoyed. I find it somewhat silly how some gawk at tasteful ERP, yet proceed to lop off heads without hesitation in combat RP. Too Much RP! -- I stretch myself too thin at times with RP (especially with my relatively limited play schedule), and feel bad about not being able to RP with everyone I want to RP with, ;_;. Creative Writing is Hard -- I come from a professional writing background, so finding colorful phrases or clever adjectives to describe scenes is difficult. It's the opposite of what I do for a living, .

Gimme dat Shadow Run: Hong Kong.

....Whaaaat?! Those two things effect emotional states of being all the time! Hell, they control most actions for many, many men. ...But really, this thread is starting to drift sligggghtly off the rails. I think we're stuck in a pattern of, "who cares vs. depends on individual vs. is menstruation even real? vs. this is a... special topic vs. fat cat references vs. why gods?" Another tonberry for your thoughts: :tonberry:.

The most common form of public RP is usually 1-2 line dialogue or light emoting. Single paragraph posts are not rare. Multi-paragraph is a little more rare. The RP on FFXIV is very diverse - its one of the best things about the server. There are a number of ways to weave para-form RP into a scene. It depends largely on the crowd and your personal preferences. I usually post around a paragraph, sometimes more - sometimes less, even in settings where people are posting one-or-two line dialogue. Why? It's what feels natural and brings me the most satisfaction. It weaves in nice details but keeps things moving nicely. The most common post conventions I've observed are: pure emote: /em reclines back in that rickety chair - stuffing the wooden pipe poised between his fingers back into his lips, toking sharply on the sweet fumes, smoke billowing from the corners of his mouth. The room had started to spin. emote/dialogue: /em || Sig reclined back in that rickety chair - stuffing the wooden pipe poised between his fingers back into his lips, toking sharply on the sweet fumes, smoke billowing from the corners of his mouth as he muttered, "...This is a hybrid post, friend." Pure dialogue [often used after a pure emote sets the scene or to keep things moving along] /say "...I love tonberries. They are cute, and I want to hug them. And collect them." Ultimately, it's about staying flexible. Some folks who RP 1-2 liners are wonderful, witty RP'ers. I tone post length down for them gladly. Others write small novels. I increase post length for them. Go into the Quicksand sometime and start RPing if it is plausible for your character to do so. RP what comes naturally. Good things will follow. I promise.

Under this line of curious logic, it is reasonable to deduce that Oskwell's fat cat actually is Okswell, and manipulates the man by a series of levers, pulleys, and other simple mechanical devices, from an internal control system. This thread is getting really... deep and semantic. Gods help us all. Should we simply start requesting that female characters designate their views on IC menstruation prior to starting RP? ...Talk about a novel hook and stepping off on the right foot, <3. (("...Hey, before we start this scene, I really need to know your IC and OOC views on IC menstruation. It could be a REAL dealbreaker. Rly. ))

That's a two-way street, though. Two people are fighting one another. One is super over the top, complete with Tekken-style air juggling. The other is a gritty, super-duper-realism fighter. Who should be deferring to who, exactly? There's two suspensions of disbelief going on here: The air-fighter believes that they're capable of flying combat, and the gritty person believes that's absurd. So if the over-the-top style attempts to uppercut the gritty style into the sun, which result should be permitted? Does the gritty person godmode a result by only allowing themselves to be hit and nothing else? Does the over-the-top person godmode by forcing the other person to deal with cartoon physics? Second point/question: If dice are involved, and these two go through the same thing, what should happen? If the over-the-top person wins the roll, is it godmoding to have the gritty person take the hit but not accentuate the giant reaction? If the gritty person wins the defense and choose to block, is it unfair of them to not go flying from the force of things? Opinions? Thoughts? Work-arounds? The fundamental problem here is that this type of god-modding is relative to the style of RP at hand. You're basically thrust into a dilemma where someone -has- to godmode to retain continuity with their character's roleplay norms and styles. This is sad because OOC disposition has clearly impacted the RP by this point. If the roleplayers are skilled (and polite), they should recognize the dilemma and react accordingly by meeting somewhere in the middle. It is the least of all evils. SSJ 40K Goku should probably find some sort of plot device or motivation to tone his attacks down to a palatable level. Ser Gritty-Mc'ParryaLot should realize that he is fighting an agile, bouncy opponent and react accordingly by upping the intensity or turtleling to an appropriate level. The RP'ers must meet in the middle - or it's just going to be a lop-sided, boring e-peen fest, flopping between various levels of toxic denial. This applies with and without dice. Ideally, RP'ers should not find themselves forced into this dilemma before a fight breaks out. Basic physics and assumptions should be plain and understood on the front end.

Easy. Sig would own a vineyard and be an outdoor naturalist type.

I'll be buying a Tonberry plush next week. Sorry, not really on topic. Is that against the rules? Sorry. I just want to hug a tonberry. Tonberry's are NEVER off topic in one of my threads! Agreed. Tonberry affinity is analogous to the ultimate answer for this topic -- menstruation will effect female dark knights and warriors on a profoundly individual level, some may find their powers augmented or difficult to control - others will scarcely notice. Apparently, we all love Tonberrys, so maybe not as analogous as I had thought?

...So, basically, four pages later - it boils down to the individual? Brevity is beautiful. Love you all. A tonberry for your thoughts: :tonberry:.

War Siren's question is an example of an extremely important element of RP that is easy for most players to gloss over or ignore. I offer my response below: (1) Emotional Reaction - Menstruation cycles should effect female characters on an individual level, as bio-chemical reactions and personal temperament vary heavily. Some females should hardly notice a change in disposition. Some may notice no change. Others may be mildly irritable. Some may be extremely moody. (2) Physical Mitigation - The imagination should be the limit, unless a particular mitigation device is so unreasonable that it completely deviates from lore (i.e. - stuff a moogle down your pants). The most common elements would involve using some type of cloth for absorption or simply allow fluids to drip where they will. (3) Warrior/Dark Knight - It is perfectly consistent and reasonable for a menstruating warrior/dark knight to be more aggressive and emotionally driven than normal. It is equally reasonable for them to not be like that. It boils down to your specific character and their emotions.

After role-playing Sig for a while, I've hit a pretty consistent grove regarding his general background, demeanor, and disposition. In sum, he's a complicated, difficult character to role-play, considering he is extremely self-serving, manipulative, and emotionally unstable. It's one of my first attempts role-playing a character that does not fall into a fairly predictable trope or norms. I'm still immersing myself in basic lore, but only strive for relative compliance, seeing as Sig cares extremely little for grandiose conflicts or epic things. However, I'm concerned some facets of his background may breach lore or appear disjointed. Anyhow, it's been a while since I've engaged in such high-quality and fun role-play. Balmung is a great RP community. I welcome any lore critiques or constructive criticism. Stylistically, I feel like my prose could come off as robotic at times, considering my professional writing background. Feel free to rip into anything. Wiki link: Sigurd Sundsteigen

The best way to get into Balmung RP is to simply fork over the $18 transfer fee. You will find yourself swimming it high-quality RP from day one. It is worth the modest transfer fee.

Civil litigation (gag).

Late July 2015 Update: OOC: Amesoeurs is growing! We are trying to increase cross-linkshell IC chatter and expand the social net further. Hopefully, we can continue helping connect skilled RP'ers who enjoy RPing complex, interesting, and morally ambiguous characters! I intend to update the OP with the names of others who can extend in-game invites sometime soon.

Agreed. $18 is very little to pay for voluminous amounts of high-quality RP. Most bottles of decent wine cost more than that. Refrain from drinking for a few days or eat some ramen, ! It's worth it!

Sig possesses a matching flask and pipe set he carved from one of the remaining barrels that aged Bacchus wine. However, Sig does not carry it on his person very often, as they are irreplaceable, and offer only diminishing returns when compared to similar flasks and pipes he has made from more common materials.

I'll offer a simple answer in support of Balmung: volume and quantity of RP. These factors are extremely important for new RP'er on any server, and Balmung has a significantly larger population of RP'ers active at most hours. This lead to more social connections and more RP. The type and style of the RP is also more diverse and malleable. In my experience, the quality of RP on Balmung has been incredibly high, even in walk-up and public RP places. It has not once seemed cliquey or tacky. Highest regards. And, finally [forgive the shameless plug] --- Balmung has the following amazing thing going for it ----- Amesoeurs. I rest my case.

You're making a great choice -- I haven't seen a better RP community on an MMORPG in a really, really long time. The Quicksand and other areas have tons of great open world RP. RP'ers can be found at all manner of hours. The posters above accurately summarize the large amount of open world RP available. It is well worth the cost of a transfer! Based on your character description and forum posts, feel free to send me a message in-game an invite to a linkshell that I believe your character may fit quite nicely into! --- Amesoeurs

I'd recommend biting the bullet and shelling out the cash for a paid transfer. Balmung is on virtual 24/7 lockdown. For the cost of a meal out or a few drinks, your friend can enjoy dozens of hours on a great server. It's worth the modest transfer fee. Life's too short to waste waiting!

[align=center]Amesoeurs [/align] Purpose: Amesoeurs is a linkshell intended for tasteful, mature roleplay. It is a linkshell for those who value wit, charm, and morally ambiguous perspectives. It is a community open to those who sometimes shy away from grandiose conflicts and existential causes. It is a place that favors adventure, the glimmer of gil, and frivolity. But most of all, Amesoeurs is intended to help bring skilled role-players together and promote diverse forms of RP. Style: We flavor most roleplay with mature and clever themes. We welcome IC content in droves and clearly-designated OOC banter. Ultimately, we desire to promote a friendly, welcoming community of novel characters, rogues, merchants, outcasts, and others who walk interesting paths. We value entertaining and amusing role-play and commentary: OOC drama and nazi-like behaviors are expressly forbidden. Recruitment: Amesoeurs is currently seeking members. We would be pleased to extend invitations to interested role-players after a brief OOC discussion and/or RP session. If interested, please post below, or send me or Capheira a PM. Alternatively, please contact Odette Saoirse or Sigurd Sundsteigen in-game for an invite. [align=center][/align] The Vision: Sig had been relaxing at his usual haunt - the chair with the rickety leg, which happened to be sunk in the middle of the Quicksand. He wasn't quite sure when the idea hit: it might have been sometime after the fifth glass of wine, or the third bowl of moko grass. Yet, those icy blue eyes gleamed when that novel idea came to him - a most amusing social venture. "Amesoeurs," he muttered to himself, causing the wine-soaked wood pipe resting between his lips to bounce slightly. Moments later, Sig took another sip of wine and commented, "a fitting name." Sig lowered the strange mechanical contraption that had lit the moko grass tucked in his pipe seconds before, quenching the small flame. He tucked the device back in his coat, reclining back in the chair and muttering, "...Yes, that'll do nicely." Sig had been searching for affable colleagues for some time now; like souls, who walked walked between the lines. Those with wit, charm, and insatiable appetites. "Amesoeurs." With the name settled, it was only a matter of finding those who understood and could keep their footing. Ground Rules: We impose only a few rules because we trust members will treat others with respect and behave like adults: (1) be courteous and respectful to fellow members; (2) designate OOC comments and minimize OOC banter if the channel is being used for RP; and (3) please be at least 18+ -- we enjoy using "colorful language" over the linkshell. ----------- "Living alone, far away from everything, Standing on the roofs of the world, When night holds the town, Together we will run, Like fools in the dark alleys." - Neige.

It was awesome roleplaying with you, and helping you out! Don't be a stranger, feel free to hit me up whenever you'd like to roleplay again! (( I oversaw Dhemitar RPing in the sands this morning and was impressed with his character, general RP style, and demeanor. Sig was a bit preoccupied (and inebriated) but overheard some of Dhemitar's conversation. If you see Dhemitar RPing, I fully recommend striking up a RP with him, I know I will! ))

This is a difficult decision. I'm torn between either a strong imperial IPA (Pliny the Elder) or a spicy pinot noir wine. Both are solid choices that represent Sig nicely!

(( I've been told there are hugs. I've been told there are cakes. I desire hugs and cake. And good-natured RP as well. I'll keep an eye for an officer in-game, but please feel free to shoot me an invite if you see me in game! ))