Glacirus

Glacir: Nerd keeps reading books and being nerdy to find ways to help people. Otgiva: Tomboy punches people, joins military, defects, punches more people. Zansetsu: Boy winds up adrift, lands in strange new place, makes region's biggest fool his basis for 'good citizen'.

These last 4 years have been Bah Humbug for me... 2012 I lost my job on Christmas Eve. 2013 I was stuck in the hospital from the 19th to the 23rd so there went all present shopping/cookie baking/tree getting time. 2014 was ok, but after 2 years of crap all our traditions were pretty messed up, so it was small. And now this year. The oven has all but died, so there's no cookies or other baked goods. Saving to replace oven has wrecked present budget. And the weather being in the 60-70's has just thrown us all off, making it just not feel like the holidays. Still had a decent Christmas all things considered, but the energy/spirit isn't there like past years. I personally blame adulthood...

The reason I think they take different sources is from the class quests: Conjury makes a big deal about "We take the blessing of the elementals and aether from nature to cast spells, and ignoring the elementals and they get angry and deny you their aether. Thaumaturgy makes a big deal about drawing on internal aether reserves, and not having enough means casting big spells can/will kill you. Arcanism is vague in their quests, but I gather it's releasing the aether within other objects (i.e. gemstones for Carbuncles and bacteria(?) for Bio/Virus). Really, I'm fine being wrong about this point, but the quests seemed to make a big deal about it As for the schools just being different thought processes, that works well too. Again, I felt the quests for each class made points that there are deeper differences behind the schools than just that, but it could just be me over thinking it. I do think as they're presented in 2.0 onward, they have specializations more or less.

So for the past few days I've been mulling over ways to flesh out my characters' wiki pages, and as I thought about Glacir's story, I found myself thinking about the different schools and methods of spell casting, and what factors contribute to a spell's power and/or a person's affinity for certain methods. I understand the basic differences between the schools, but want to toss a few personal thoughts and see if you guys agree/disagree, and/or have lore to prove/disprove my thoughts. First I'd like to discuss Glacir's situation specifically. He's studied the main four schools of magic (Conjury, Thaumaturgy, Arcanism, and Astrology) but has an easier time grasping Arcanism and Astrology compared to the other two. My reasoning is that those two schools are more formulaic; rooted in numbers, math, and logic. Arcanism is all about the formulas and patterns written in the books, and Astrology is tracking the stars and constellations to draw upon the powers from the six gates which is all angles, spheres, geometry, etc. Where as I see Thaumaturgy and Conjury being more free-form, just imagine the spell and it will be done. I'm not sure if that's exactly the best way to compare them, but that's my reasoning for Glacir's greater understanding of certain forms of spells. This part is more in general, to make sure I understand spells properly (and for a secret event idea I've been mulling over that hinges on part of this being confirmed). The way I see it spells, and their strength, is dependent on a number of factors: Knowledge - If you don't understand how a spell works, you're not going to be able to cast it, but if you master it you can bring out its full potential. School of Magic - I'm sure a Conjurer could make ice and fire if they had elementals aiding them, but they focus on the less destructive elements, so it's harder/impossible for them to do it. Aether Source and Quantity - Obviously each school draws from a different source, but if you either don't have access to it or don't have enough to draw from, your spells will fail, and reverse the more you have the stronger they become. Focus/Weapon - This is the one I'm most interested in for now. I know different materials channel different spells better (Bone/metal makes good thaumaturgy tool, wood for conjury, etc.). What I'm wondering is: how does a lower-grade focus influence spells. Does it limit the aether that can be used, or is it just if you try to use more than it can handle, the tool will break and your spell most likely explode in your face?

So, I recently had the urge to make yet another an alt. I've now got an Au Ra sitting and waiting for an idea to strike me, and I believe it has. Since my current characters are mostly serious, I took on a challenge and tried to write up a more comical and/or goofy story for my new character, Zansetsu: Taking some inspiration from the Ninja quests, Zansetsu wants to adopt Eorzean mannerisms in order to blend in a bit better. Since he's an Au Ra, he knows his appearance will stand out enough and fears it may cause some people discomfort so he thinks acting as a proper Eorzean Gentleman will help them stay in their comfort zone. You probably noticed the emphasis on Gentleman. And there in lies the comedy: Zansetsu models his 'Proper' behavior on the stories he's heard of none other than Hildibrand Manderville. He'll act a lot like Hildibrand does; self-assured even when facing hopeless odds or is obviously wrong, insistent that he can/should help even if he's likely to do more harm in the end, often jumping to the first conclusion he makes and sticking to it until proven wrong, etc. It's less he's actually that naive or boneheaded, and more that it is the first example he's seen and he's going to stick to it, and as a result he'll get into tons of misunderstandings and crazy antics and other tomfoolery. What I wanna get from you guys is some input on the idea and some general mannerisms (besides the obvious Gentlemanly Pose that I gotta rush to 50 for xP) that I can use to sell the act.

You know what...screw it, sign up Glacir Clayworth as an Astrologian. Was gonna wait until it was a primal closer to Limsa, but I can always just say he's out tracking stars in the area or something

You know...at low levels you can flip this around: "Hi, I'm an RP'er, this is an alt. I've run this hundreds of times so I know what I'm doing."

I've had a particularly bad group as I've been leveling Otgiva's pugilist class. Entered Toto-Rak on roulette. Started on a sour note as the tank died on the first Munty Plant trash mob. Stood in the Cone AoE and died. He apologized and said he was still fairly new. He was not the issue... After that death, the healer insists on running ahead, pulling extra mobs, and has me be Pugilist Tank when the tank goes afk for a few seconds, all the while doing a piss poor job healing us. This culminates at the final boss. I hop past the line and start the cutscene. I've seen it dozens of times so I skip. Healer has skipped as well, but the tank and arcanist have not. Healer jumps off the cliff and initiates the fight. I jump in to keep the idiot alive, praying that tank and arcanist skip the scene before the area seals. Arcanist jumps in. Area Sealed. No tank. Healer claims he forgot that the boss pulls and initiates when you jump down, really I think he's got patience the size of his Lala character, but I shrug it off. Round two! Tank is with us this time, things go well until phase 2, when the tail is exposed and he starts the giant pools of poison. No one attacks the tail so I assume we're just gonna try and burn the boss (I've seen it done on my healer *shrug*). Not the case here, just bad communication. So I swap targets to tail but too little too late, we wipe. Try 3! Tank takes an unfortunate Flesh Pod (the poison explosives) and dies, we wipe. The impatient healer goes "I don't know about this group. Good luck." and leaves. We got a Scholar replacement, and cleared with no issue the 4th time, but I want to pause on the tank's death to a Flesh Pod. I main healer. Glacir was leveled as a Scholar from 30-50, and I just got him to 50 as Astrologian as well. I've run this dungeon numerous times. I've run it with Physic as my only healing spell! I've never had people die to Flesh Pods in that fight. Never. Maybe it's because I focus on healing and don't contribute as much DPS as I probably could. Maybe it was the fairy covering an extra target. But my point is: this healer could have easily prevented the tank's death. But instead he appeared to have prioritized being 3rd DPS on the adds and neglected his main role. TL;DR - Impatient healer wanted fast clear and quit on us when the admittedly new tank got killed by something he could have prevented if he had actually been healing.

I was, back in the day... Wing, G, god I even sat through and watched the chibi series Gundam SD. What really killed it for me was SEED. Loved the characters, loved the cleaner style, but it was at a time where I just wanted more giant robot fights, and it was too much exposition/non-robot scenes for adolescent me. The irony now is that Code Geass has pretty much the same thing (giant robots, but 90% non-robot scenes) and I loved it...so probably means I need to go back and re-watch SEED and I'll enjoy it now. *shrug* But yeah, Wing still remains my definitive Gundam series. Always wanted models, but never found any at toy stores (my town sucks) and the one time I did it was on a vacation to Florida, and it was in the Japan section of Epcot, so the prices were ridiculous.

I get the same issues where I always seem to draw Spear or Spire, at times where no one needs or can even use them. Spear especially...we don't need cooldown reduction that often game, plz gimme Bole or something. Shuffle is a whole different can of worms I won't even touch...I'd rather toss a card on someone who doesn't necessarily need it than trigger another cooldown for the same/equally useless card.

Sign Otgiva up! She's learned a bit from traveling with refugees, and any chance to expand on that knowledge would be great.

I'd add another point between 3 and 4. - If that doesn't work, look at the party: if you have a Ninja, tell him to stop using Smoke Screen on you while you're pulling. ... It awfully happens a lot. I want to add another point, more specifically for low level dungeons: -Turn off the god damn bot program and play the damn game yourself! Seriously. I just had the worst run of Sastasha. Even pointed out the tank's bot behavior (no flash, straight-line movement, ignoring mobs we accidentally pulled and running in complete wrong direction) after the first boss, but they didn't want to kick the guy for whatever reason. So instead we suffered and I had to pugilist tank a good 80% of the mobs and every boss.

This certainly sounds like a great plan. Been considering a monk or warrior alt too, so comes at a great time to help me make that decision.

I can say, as a healer, tanks get it worse than healers in my own experience. Maybe it's because I'm a half-decent healer that can keep everyone alive 95% of the time, or because I actually own up when it's my fuck-up that wipes us, but for every bit of hate/badmouthing I get from PUGs, I get 3-4 PUGs where the tank gets all the hate.

I think, for 4.0 to work well with pre-established patterns that 2.0/3.0 use, the content has to be semi-gated. What I mean is Classes/Races/Zones should be made available to access just by purchasing the expansion, but MSQ/Dungeons should require at least 2.55 MSQ to be completed, if not 3.X as well. I feel this would work best because we'd stop people from going "I just want to play as DRK now while I'm just unlocking Brayflox!" while still having them play through the old dungeons/content to learn mechanics. Let everyone play as Red Mage (or Blue...or Dancer...or whatever else they're teasing will be next xP) instantly. If anything it'll help them learn the class faster, and decide quicker if they want to really use it.

I don't talk to pugs in duty finder unless I have to explain mechanics. Why? Because it makes me less of a target when bad things happen, because most pugs don't yell at a brick wall. "But it's only 2 letters" means that I'm opening to conversation. I'm not here to talk and be friendly. I'm here to kick ass. (Please note that it's not me being unfriendly and anti-social, I just prefer to get stuff done over having conversation. Plus I tend to mess up more when talking because I can't multi-task to even that degree. I don't care about the mood or atmosphere, saying nothing doesn't add or take away anything.) As a healer, 100% the reason I don't open my mouth in PUGs. I get enough focus and hate from people who seem to think I should heal them when they're on the opposite end of the boss area and my spells don't reach. I don't want to draw extra attention to myself and get berated even more. I will say 'Hi' if everyone else in the group does (this way they don't go "O-holier-than-thou healer won't say hi? Jerk.") but after that, silence. But like I said, even going silent people will bitch at me. Sunken Temple especially it seems. Every time I get Sunken Temple in roulette at least one person dies to Doom or the Wasps and bitches at me.

I'm very much in the moment when I RP...so I don't save any logs whatsoever to go back and look over. That said, I do think back to some things and see how I've changed/improved from then. I think it's good to remember where I've come from, but if I got hung up on the past then I wouldn't grow better.

God, so many games could be listed here...but I'll try to contain myself to the first/introduction to certain types of games. In no real order: Yoshi's Island (First real game experience) Final Fantasy/FFII/Earthbound/Pokemon (First RP experiences) Ragnarok Online (First MMO and Class/Job focused game) City of Heroes (First in-game RP experiences) FF Tactics Advanced (Game that returned FF to my life) ...god, so many more games come to mind, but I'd really go on and on and on, so I'll stop now.

Figured I'm quick poke this thread to say: I've made the transfer from Diabolos to Balmung. Looking forward to seeing people and joining in some RP soon!

I. Basic Info Characters: Glacir Clayworth Primary character: Glacir Clayworth Linkshells: None Yet Primary RP linkshell: None Yet II. RP Style Amount of RP (light, medium, heavy): Medium-Heavy Views on RP combat and injuries: Cuts, scratches, bruises are all fine by me. Breaking bones and beyond are negotiable if necessary. Death is right out. Views on IC romance: If love is in the air, so be it. Views on non-romantic RP (family ties, etc): If we discuss OOC an IC relation then I welcome it. Views on lore: Ignore lore and I ignore you. I'm all for pushing its limits and small inaccuracies, but it has to be within reason. Views on chat functions (/say, /linkshell, etc): Everything is IC unless bracketed. Linkshells/FC chat depend on their own established rules since I'm joining them, not creating them. In /say I will use ** to denote actions and in /em I'll use "" to denote speech III. Other Info Country: US Timezone: Eastern Contact info: PM me here or in game, other info might be given once I get to know you. [align=center][glow=blue]~Special announcements can be found in the posts below~[/glow][/align]

Glacir would probably best be one of two roles: Either the recurring NPC who delivers perfectly timed exposition and information on where to go next, or what to prepare for for the next boss. Or a mid to late game optional boss who gives you that one spellcasting job you're missing and really want to use, but by this point in the game you'd have to really grind levels to have it catch up to other jobs and be viable.

INTJ for both myself and Glacir. His margins were a bit wider, but I guess that's because he's a more emphasized, focused version of myself. The whole "Does what they know and know it well" part as well as the "Knows what they can't do" really spoke to me. I acknowledge my failings, and while I work to fix or improve them, I don't make excuses for them when they occur.

Glacir is a perpetual researcher and student of all things arcane and complex, focusing on planning and theory before putting his skills to actual use, so he best falls under Arcanist IC'ly, while dabbling into other magic jobs, alchemy, and a bit into machinist after encountering complex magitech in his travels. OOC'ly, I started as Arcanist and mained Scholar up until I got into the 2.2-ish content, where I gave Summoner a try. Currently I'm swapping between Machinist/Astrologian while I take a break from MSQ, but I intend to return to Scholar.

Playing mostly Healer, I just realized those classes don't really favor one hand over the other too much. CNJ/WHM spells have the weapon float in front of you as you use both hands to cast. AST is similar where you hold the Planesphere in your left hand, draw/use cards with the right, and cast most spells by raising both above your head. SCH has the most favoring with the book in your right hand, quill in your left to write the formulas. That said, my characters all tend to favor their right hand heavily, as it's what I know best.