Valence

I was also hoping to slightly balance nerf Hanzo to match with nerfed WM as well since Hanzo's arrow can hurt a lot still (I dont mean his ulti) Tbh, Hanzo having twice the hitbox on characters than anyone else is what makes him so powerful. There is a video where the poster is actually trying to shoot near heads of the bots in the training area (will have to find it back...), both with widowmaker and hanzo. I was the first stunned to see it, but there seemed to be no hitbox difference. I think that feeling might more come from a difference in behavior between arrows and instant hit projectiles... EDIT; I think it's only without scope EDIT2: nevermind, i'm confused by all the vids that show the contrary now.

So I was going through the text of the series of recent quests for Haurchefant's mourning as well as the introductory cutscenes to the Weeping City and stumbled on those bits:

Slow down a minute please. That is just misinformation. I live in Paris (nearby). We don't have the amount of firearms casualties every year that the US seems to get (actually, something like 10-15 times less per inhabitant). Most of those are caused by hunting weapons when they happen, mostly in the countryside. Those are the only licensed guns besides small arms used in clubs with very strict regulation around. Those are the ones that are the most easy to obtain, and yet you need to pass a certain amount of regulation as well, but hunting is still a thing and those rifles are the most easy to get for anyone. Remove them from the equation and you would probably get even less deaths by firearms around. Will this get rid of the problem in its entirety? Certainly not. But don't start making assumptions on how it's not even better in countries where gun regulations are strong, because it does make a difference (just have to check the facts/numbers really). It certainly doesn't reduce crime or violence, but it certainly reduces the stupid amount of firearm mass murders around (like, in universities and schools for one). Is it the only factor that plays into this? Certainly not. The Paris attacks (two in a year), were mounted by an organized group with the baking of ISIS, which is no small fret. Dozen of people were involved in them both, and they acted in groups, not lone individuals. Half a dozen of them if not more have been arrested if not killed since then. I didn't want to answer here before knowing a bit more about the pulse killer. Did he have backup? Any network to get his hands on black market weapons like they did in France? Was he acting alone? Because you certainly can't get your hands on a AR-15 rifle (it was an AR-15 or something here right?) under strict gun regulation, just like he did, under a license. Can you by buying it from back market, or at least a more available thing like an AK? Totally. Is it easy? I don't think so, not for lone individuals. I think there is a strong line to be drawn between 'common' mass shootings that we almost never see around there, and those specific kinds of scenarios when terrorism is involved.

My character has that interesting love/hate relationship with Seekers usually, where she loathes their culture and still manages to find good friends among their ranks. Feel free to poke me ingame!

Obviously, but what is it about here?

Just out of curiosity... different lore interpretations? How is that?

Yeah the idea about dropping manacutters from high altitude was just if we assume that dense wind aspected aether can always be found at high altitude, but that's a stretch at best. Was just an idea. The idea was basically to attach your manacutters to your usual airship that can go everywhere, and launch them where aether is favorable enough, and get them back when it's not anymore. I like the idea as it allows the transportation of them between favorable spots (even if the high altitude idea = always favorable goes to the bin). Thanks for the aid anyway. Some of those tidbits can at least provide lots of stuff to discuss ICly at least.

Yeah perhaps but it pisses me a little got to admit, just having to even consider to lore bend it... Because it's super special snowflaky, unless it's just... Working toward it as you say... I don't know what to do and I guess I'll have to think about it... Maybe attaching small cerruleum tanks that barely alliws any range...? Still requires the technology though... How about harvesting garlean tech on the airships that crashed around the Agrius? I'm not comfortable with those solutions... What is a wind aspected aether dense space to begin with? I mean, where do we find those? Everywhere as long as it's in the sky? Could manacutters work everywhere as long as you drop them high enough in the sky?

As far as I know aether personal reserves have nothing to do with body mass. Anyone can be born lucky with a big aether connection or born unlucky with almost none (like one of the coco brothers). The aetherotransformer merely taps into that reserve. If you pull too much off that reserve, it will kill a roe as surely as it would a lala, if their aether reserve is similar.

That looks super interesting actually! I'm a bit sad that I don't really see my character needing a bodyguard or with any bodyguard hooks (or maybe but uhh.. Why), but I'm interested. I also like confrontational characters or situations. Modest 3 dimensional everyday characters and all! I'm up for it.

I would think that Limsa's trials are probably not that more fair than others: if you are a wealthy captain with many connections and political leverage, or if you are just a lominsan sailor... If they have trials to begin with... For Ul'dah I would actually expect them not to force anyone with a lawyer (unlike Isghard) : you can afford one, or you can't. If they have even lawyers to begin with... For warnings, kerp in mind that's typically an american thing. I don't think Eorzea is America. Actually I think that trying to equate Eorzean laws and trials with contemporary concepts is a slippery slope... Even detectives. We have Briardien ingame yes, but he is also presented as an oddity rather than a common thing. How do city states resolve crimes I think? Isghard actually does that with trials by combat or religious inquisitory requests to the Holy See (as seen in the MSQ). They couldnt care less about the truth, but more about appearance and/or political implications. The testimony of a noble vs the word of a commoner, etc. Why would it be different with the other ones? Detectives are oddities and probably not a thing/rare and not actually part of the law and even less of the system. Keep in mind that actual rational investigation is a pretty modern thing even IRL. The only case where I could see them operate is either for private contractors or behind the scene for governments on sensitive cases. But they probably have no legal leeway in the case of actual justice.

That's a huge topic but yes. I'm not at my desktop so I can't write an exhaustive answer but in summary : Limsa's laws for example have a huge take into making cutthraot pirates living together under the Thalassocracy. There is also a huge part of that with the customs of Melvaan's gate (ACN quests) and the pirates 3 rules (rogue quests). All in all they are quite lax and lenient but for freedom loving pirates they sure prove restraining. Gridania's laws lie on the Pact of Gelmorra: everyone has to comply to the laws of the Elementals, or risk starting a Greenwrath or various other dreadful ends about pissing off the forest. In a nutshell the gridanians take great care listening to their Hearers and try to police every poacher, or individuals creating elemental imbalances. In Ishgard too, everyone has to follow the Halonic code on heresy, heterodoxy, etc, but the nation has been going into a serious restructuration where everyone has been wondering how to interpret the holy scriptures now that Heavensward has happened (cf quests for the scholasticate for example).

Then re-enacters are stupid I guess...? But I don't do that as well anyway.

Personnally I believe it's all about lingering aether signatures. Be it primals, battles or individuals, we know that all leave their mark on the land and that can even be measured by aetherometers.

+ A-Towa Cant in the WhM quests.

I understand the pros and cons on being able to pick several identical heroes in the same team and that people have different tastes, but I really wish they added a game mode where it's prohibited. I really loathe that cheese. :c

Take that from a main WhM, it will feel spammy at first, because the job is rather straightforward and probably the healer the most novice friendly. The thing is though, while the job is the easiest to handle among the 3 healing jobs, it is also hard to master. There is a LOT of little subtleties and tricks to discover that will create huge gaps of efficiency between a good WhM and a normal one. If I had to say it in a few words, the difference between a SCH and a WhM also lies in the way to handle things. If you play a SCH, it's a lot of planning and things applying over time. SCH has a piss poor reaction time but is strong in terms of damage mitigation and sustained DPS. WhM is all about huge bursts of healing or DPS. Like, HUGE. Which also tends to deplete your mana like nothing (that's where the main difficulties in playing WhM lies, SCH is more technical overall).

To me there is no real lore bending here. The thing is possible: Sounssy demonstrated it above. I think you nailed what the real crux of the matter is though: the character 'specialness'. All those specific events and chains of events in her background eventually add up to give something rather... special yeah. I wouldn't say special snowflaky though. Not that far. Glad it works out for you though, as simple modest characters are often the most nuanced and three dimensional anyway.

Oh right, Cerruleum... I'm le stupid. Which brings me to the question: why not using cerruleum and attaching Magitek wings for those manacutters then? Hard to replicate on small ships? Maybe the same process that saw the design of bigger airships, that weren't initially propelled by cerruleum power?

For all we know maybe Ilsabard is not connected either to Eorzea and Othard and Xaelas are just bad Sailors... Though it would make sense (it would even have to be) that sea contacts with eorzean ships would obviously have made them known at least to a few.. I think it might well be like for the New World: it is explicitely stated that ships have interactions with it but the lore has yet to be expanded around it... It is there and we know that maybe some eorzeans have heard about what is there, but us the players dont know (yet?).

A few musings... 1) I'm also interested into corrupted aether. Most specifically corrupted crystals (which are concentrated aether in any case). What is that corruption? Void shenanigans? Umbral corruption (though I would not call it corruption then)? Something else? Also, they use it extensively from time to time in the MSQ. 2) I went through the Heavensward MSQ part where you go beg Cid to bring you over to the Aery to go confront Nidhogg, so he offers you to try his manacutter prototype that Biggs and Wedge designed. They say mainly that it uses corrupted (??) crystal technology to turn ambiant aether into elemental wind that go blow into the sail and bits of the thing. They also say the power output it brings is pretty shitty though, so it only flies in places where wind aspected aether is really strong (like the Aery). Does that mean they can only fly there? Or they seem to imply that it's a problem they have to fix before doing anything, so you then get to deal with things with the Sultana while they are working on it. So, the question is, they fixed that issue right? Found a way to go around? But the only thing Alphinaud says when it's ready is "engineers say manacutters are ready!"... So, I'm a bit at a loss here. Did I miss something? So yeah, I was looking for technicalities on how the things work, just to find those... plot holes. 3) Heh then, how do airship fly? Not the garlean stuff mind you. The eorzean version that is everywhere and stems from Ixali designs.

I think that's jumping to conclusion and a lot of assumptions here. We only know that a good lot of ishgardians are conditioned by the last decade in isolationism to be extremely xenophobic, which is justified by religion (a powerful motivator if you will). We also know that a good lot of other ishgardians are also very, very liberal compared to their brethren as I said above. You can perfectly find a DRK that is still a good bigoted ishgardian on race issues, or one that just doesn't give a shit. Actually, their views on race is probably totally unrelated to their own beliefs of social justice, but the reasonable assumption to my eyes would be that as long as you seek social justice like a batman, you usually don't get to be too bigoted in terms of xenophobia, or that stops being about justice. Of course, you can still find excuses for some DRK that only seeks justice for his kin only, or whatever, but that's starting to get very specific and I don't think that's actually what we are being sold by SE. I fail to see anything lore wonky myself. It makes sense, and I'm certainly not judging the quality of the story here or if it's good or bad. I'm just saying that everything is definitely totally lore friendly to me. What would not be would be an Au'ra character that is a Knight or a Dragoon for example. There is basically nothing required race wise to run a DRK to my knowledge. Anyone living in Ishgard could do that and be batman. It would not be possible BEFORE 3.0 timeline since Ishgard is closed, but after? Yeah. I don't see anything preventing it. Don't have especially to be elezen or hyur to play batman. Of course then, if it's about being a Knight, who is actually a Dark Knight in the sense of a shady ishgardian knight playing batman at night, then yes, there is suddenly a racial requirement. _________________________ Now then to the OP, it would seem though that you are going for the ideals and the skills of the DRK right? I mean, your exiled DRK mentor is just here as a plot device to teach your character about playing batman and fixing evil where evil lurks, by using dark stuff the DRK usually use, correct? I mean, is your character actually going to do that in Ishgard especially? As Virella said above, why would she do that here? It's actually a good point, since we now know what forged her into that (felt betrayed by her tribe, felt betrayed by Ishgard?), but now, what is her motivator? Where does she want to fight evil? Why? What are her motivations here? Also, last thing I think... To avoid any timeline wonky issues or special snowflake stuff since we know that basically most Au'ri have come to Eorzea very recently since the fall of Dhoma... Maybe it would be best if you keep all that DRK initiation... recent actually. I think it might be best if your character is actually just starting to train under the mentor, or looking for another one?

With that now, the way I see it, is that Au'ri are probably regarded either through bigoted eyes (probably lots of them still, the fall of the Holy See is very recent as we can see in the folks not very happy about it in 3.2 and the ceremony for peace), or either as a race like any other. A case can be reasonably made for both until specified the contrary. I for one do not especially see non hyur/elezen ishgardians (except for aristocracy that is purely elezen) not to be a thing. For citizens I would argue that it's just a matter of demographic representation: we see few of those, if none at all. It can reasonably be argued that ishgardian citizens are probably for most of them hyur and elezen, and the possible remaining percentage extremely low. However, especially since the opening of the gates, the amount of foreigners strolling all around had probably dramatically increased. It is actually a fact since we already see those (Cid's entourage, Ronsthal the roe in the MCH questline, etc). The same way that a case can be made very strongly for ishgardian xenophobia, the opposite case can also be made for liberal and/or progressive ishgardians that are extremely present in LOTS of quests (MCH questline, Haillenarte/Fortemps Houses, the MSQ, etc) and are actually a growing movement that currently HOLDS the advantage politically through Aymeric the Blue. In short, I do not, absolutely not, see an ishgardian DRK taking a non hyur/elezen as a disciple as weird, especially since DRKs are rebellious and all for the greater good and benevolence, yadayada. I do not see other races present as a minority in Ishgard as weird either, but I would see that as technically very bizarre to see them with actual citizenship or very ishgardian roles though (dragoon, halonic priests, scholars, knights, nobles, etc).

I must probably have misunderstood something, but you say that ishgardians don't give a damn about foreigners (which is true), so how exactly would that make draft3 better? Why would that ishgardian DRK care? Because DRK? Then it works for draft 1 and 2 equally (as long as said DRK is in Eorzea and not Othard). I really, really don't see the difference here? Because it sorta happened in the questline? You get a hold of a Soulstone? Don't know how the DRK caring part would happen. But I guess it makes most sense? Think randomly finding a Soulstone and becoming a DRK while on Ishgard ground would make most sense, especially as a non Ishgardian. I would leave out the DRK being friendly to them, and instead being of some hidden Au ra tribe in Coerthas I suppose? I don't know either way what would make most sense, just that finding a soulstone would be the most fitting. Personally I wouldn't RP any of the options and just go an Elezen or midlander Hyur. Or a Au ra swordsman. I don't anything of it is really lore friendly, but stumbling onto a soulstone makes most sense for me. To be honest, I find the "I stumbled on a soulstone" excuse to be quite weak/easy/trite and cheesy, to speak frankly. Not contesting the fact that seeing anything else than ishgardian Elezens and Hyurs with an ishgardian background is a bit weird of course. Either way, I cant really tell because I have yet to do the DRK storyline and see for myself what is presented exactly with that Au'ra NPC. Is it implied that the NPC is an isolated anomaly? Or is it actually implied that DRKs are themselves the anomaly?

I must probably have misunderstood something, but you say that ishgardians don't give a damn about foreigners (which is true), so how exactly would that make draft3 better? Why would that ishgardian DRK care? Because DRK? Then it works for draft 1 and 2 equally (as long as said DRK is in Eorzea and not Othard). I really, really don't see the difference here?