Thread Closed
My oh my, so many topics touched. It's difficult to know where even to start.
Firstly, I don't think anyone is trying to police anything. Granted, I may well have missed something among the many posts that veered this way and that, but all I've seen, to paraphrase the thread in its entirety with regard to "dragoons: yay or nay?" was the OP posting a capture of a snippet from the lore book, and people either refuting it or saying "well, this is the lore, now." I don't recall reading anyone saying, "Dragoons, you MUST follow this or the RP Police are coming for you!"
Now, personal opinion... I do think it a bit silly that so many people are attempting to refute or work around what is stated while still claiming to be "lore adherent" (I'll touch on this a bit below). This book is written by the people that created the game you're now playing within. It's their world and their story, not yours. If you wish to call yourself "lore adherent/abiding/following/whatever", then it stands to reason that you should find a way to work within this newfound information, rather than around.Â
That being said, if you choose to ignore it, as has been said countless times in this thread... not everyone has to agree with your decision. No, there won't be a witch hunt, but there will likely be people that deny you a chance to RP with them or write off the encounter with your character as an encounter with someone who is mad.
Onto the point of lore adherence: McBeef made a good point, one with which I completely agree... the very existence of your character within this world (again, SE's world, not yours) is lore bending/breaking/grey area (for the purposes of the rest of this post, I will refer to it as lore breaking). You are inserting your fanfiction character into a narrative that is not your own.Â
That being said, where you go from there is entirely up to you. You can either a) acknowledge the fact that your character's existence is as stated above and try to keep that as the only time you lore break, keeping yourself as best you can within the known lore, or b) acknowledge the same and continue to lore break whenever you find it convenient for your personal fanficiton within another person's (people's) narrative.
Here's the secret: Neither option is wrong... and honestly, no one is policing it outside of their own personal circles/companies/linkshells. At least, I've yet to see any policing happen here or in game outside of those particular areas.
As to "special snowflake" being considered mean... well... that's a game of context and semantics that all bases itself around opinion... so... yeah.
Now, to the topic at hand:
Those who have roleplayed dragoons that wish to follow the lore stated within the book... there are several options (certainly not all of them) that come to mind as possible solutions.
SE uses the word "normally" when describing the amount of dragoons in active service. Since they don't go into detail as to when a "normal time" may be, that 30 likely could have been +/- any number during the time your dragoon was alive.
Claim to have been one of the 30 +/- that the book states. With the end of the war, it's now down to 10, most (if not all) of which have been named/seen in game.Â
a) This means your character could have retired for any number of reasons: age, injury, no longer needed, turned to adventuring, etc.
b) Your character may have run off for any number of reasons: flat out fear, political upheaval within Ishgard, etc.
c) Your character is dead.
d) Flat out retcon.
Does it suck that SE slapped this down? Yes. Of course it does. But that is the danger of roleplaying within those grey areas of the lore... once light is shined upon it, you need to react.
You can either react by adhering to the lore and doing one of the options listed above (or one of your own creative devising). Or, you can choose to ignore it and continue to push your own fanfiction into another person's narrative.
Either way, I have serious doubts anyone is going to go around on a witch hunt, policing what you do or don't do. I have strong faith that large majority of the community will do as stated above: choose not to RP with you, or write off the encounter as an encounter with someone who's mad.
Firstly, I don't think anyone is trying to police anything. Granted, I may well have missed something among the many posts that veered this way and that, but all I've seen, to paraphrase the thread in its entirety with regard to "dragoons: yay or nay?" was the OP posting a capture of a snippet from the lore book, and people either refuting it or saying "well, this is the lore, now." I don't recall reading anyone saying, "Dragoons, you MUST follow this or the RP Police are coming for you!"
Now, personal opinion... I do think it a bit silly that so many people are attempting to refute or work around what is stated while still claiming to be "lore adherent" (I'll touch on this a bit below). This book is written by the people that created the game you're now playing within. It's their world and their story, not yours. If you wish to call yourself "lore adherent/abiding/following/whatever", then it stands to reason that you should find a way to work within this newfound information, rather than around.Â
That being said, if you choose to ignore it, as has been said countless times in this thread... not everyone has to agree with your decision. No, there won't be a witch hunt, but there will likely be people that deny you a chance to RP with them or write off the encounter with your character as an encounter with someone who is mad.
Onto the point of lore adherence: McBeef made a good point, one with which I completely agree... the very existence of your character within this world (again, SE's world, not yours) is lore bending/breaking/grey area (for the purposes of the rest of this post, I will refer to it as lore breaking). You are inserting your fanfiction character into a narrative that is not your own.Â
That being said, where you go from there is entirely up to you. You can either a) acknowledge the fact that your character's existence is as stated above and try to keep that as the only time you lore break, keeping yourself as best you can within the known lore, or b) acknowledge the same and continue to lore break whenever you find it convenient for your personal fanficiton within another person's (people's) narrative.
Here's the secret: Neither option is wrong... and honestly, no one is policing it outside of their own personal circles/companies/linkshells. At least, I've yet to see any policing happen here or in game outside of those particular areas.
As to "special snowflake" being considered mean... well... that's a game of context and semantics that all bases itself around opinion... so... yeah.
Now, to the topic at hand:
Those who have roleplayed dragoons that wish to follow the lore stated within the book... there are several options (certainly not all of them) that come to mind as possible solutions.
SE uses the word "normally" when describing the amount of dragoons in active service. Since they don't go into detail as to when a "normal time" may be, that 30 likely could have been +/- any number during the time your dragoon was alive.
Claim to have been one of the 30 +/- that the book states. With the end of the war, it's now down to 10, most (if not all) of which have been named/seen in game.Â
a) This means your character could have retired for any number of reasons: age, injury, no longer needed, turned to adventuring, etc.
b) Your character may have run off for any number of reasons: flat out fear, political upheaval within Ishgard, etc.
c) Your character is dead.
d) Flat out retcon.
Does it suck that SE slapped this down? Yes. Of course it does. But that is the danger of roleplaying within those grey areas of the lore... once light is shined upon it, you need to react.
You can either react by adhering to the lore and doing one of the options listed above (or one of your own creative devising). Or, you can choose to ignore it and continue to push your own fanfiction into another person's narrative.
Either way, I have serious doubts anyone is going to go around on a witch hunt, policing what you do or don't do. I have strong faith that large majority of the community will do as stated above: choose not to RP with you, or write off the encounter as an encounter with someone who's mad.