Heavensward Site Updated- FRESH LORE

[Steel Wolf]

http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/heavensward/#story_area

 

New updates to the site with some little information about characters, beasts, and regions of Ishgard.

 

It's not a feast, by any stretch...but we all like a taste, no?

[Zelmanov]

As an Ishgard nut, want to point out/expand/speculate:

 

Stated here, Ysale is leader of the heretics full stop. So all are rallied beneath her, not just a sect it seems.

 

Thordan VII: Thordan is the name of the man who led the people to Ishgard by Halone's guidance and was the one who was tossed into the sea of clouds by his men when Nidhogg sewed madness into them by sheer presence. This is the VIIth person to bear this legendary name, and most likely reserved for the popes. Possible confirmation that Thordan was Elezen (for those who care about race) and likely pronounced with a french accent (though I've been saying it as Thor Dan in my head).

 

Possible resolution of the DRG job quest with the fact Estinien went missing for a time after the climactic confrontation between him and the warrior of light, seems like its the classic japanese "beat the ever loving reason back into them" trope.

[Telluride]

As an Ishgard nut, want to point out/expand/speculate:

 

Stated here, Ysale is leader of the heretics full stop. So all are rallied beneath her, not just a sect it seems.

 

 

Please, please, please, please SE... don't force the WoL (Woobie Of Lameness) to have to suck up to her without at least making her life unpleasant again for a moment... one more moment... please? PLEASE?

 

Yes, I am spoiled. RP People Problems.

 

Yes, it IS becoming a personal obsession of mine to see the WoL grow a spine. Just a teensy teensy spine. Or, at least let Alphinaud grow one! Even freaking CLOUD STRIFE finally got his moment of pounding the One Winged Monologue into paste.

[Chris Ganale]

I thought Ysale was possibly one of those well-intended extremist types that I like -looks sidelong at Chao- up until she went full-on cackling evil after tearing down the first ward of the Steps of Faith. Yes, your plan on stopping the Dragonsong War is to....let the whole goddamned horde into Ishgard where they can murderfuck the hell out of everyone and everything, including civilians and innocents, wholesale?

 

Nope, this calls for a kick in the [REDACTED].

[Aaron]

Mmmmmmmmmm that Bismarck primal though.

[Telluride]

I thought Ysale was possibly one of those well-intended extremist types that I like -looks sidelong at Chao- up until she went full-on cackling evil after tearing down the first ward of the Steps of Faith. Yes, your plan on stopping the Dragonsong War is to....let the whole goddamned horde into Ishgard where they can murderfuck the hell out of everyone and everything, including civilians and innocents, wholesale?

 

Nope, this calls for a kick in the [REDACTED].

 

Exactly.

 

If any part of this new story requires the WoL forgiving her YET AGAIN, without her having to suffer SOME sort of penitence, then some piece of computer hardware is gettin' tossed across my room when I see it.

[Chris Ganale]

Exactly.

 

If any part of this new story requires the WoL forgiving her YET AGAIN, without her having to suffer SOME sort of penitence, then some piece of computer hardware is gettin' tossed across my room when I see it.

 

Most heartily agreed. I'm thinking out a window and into some dumbass storywriter's face.

[Mogoi Qestir]

Guys....

 

 

 

We're not warrior of light anymore.. remember Midgardsormr?

 

[Telluride]

Guys....

 

 

 

We're not warrior of light anymore.. remember Midgardsormr?

 

 

We're the protagonist. It doesn't matter what claptrot that micronized twit spits out. He should still be sore from the hundreds of my arrows that stuck in him and BEAT HIM IN COMBAT. Nyah.

[Mogoi Qestir]

Guys....

 

 

 

We're not warrior of light anymore.. remember Midgardsormr?

 

 

 

We're the protagonist. It doesn't matter what claptrot that micronized twit spits out. He should still be sore from the hundreds of my arrows that stuck in him and BEAT HIM IN COMBAT. Nyah.

 

My sides.. they hurt so much from reading this

 

I'm pretty sure it's a good thing we can't make live choices to shape this story. Can you imagine how screwed most places would be? I'd personally let Ysale go crazy over them. But, Dragonsong did show more of her, so maybe there's reasons she needed to get into Ishgard to stop it? 

 

Act as middle man between dragons and the elezen?

[OttoVann]

Damn this expansion is still unappealing to me for anything RP related.

[Aaron]

Otto you'd be the richest bitch in game selling airships out your new airship company.

[Gegenji]

Otto you'd be the richest bitch in game selling airships out your new airship company.

 

He's a goldsmith/fashion designer by trade. Obviously he doesn't make money making airships. He makes money pimping them out with sweet bling and style.

[Chris Ganale]

If we got to make live story choices, 2.55 would've had a very different ending.

 

And I may have wound up in charge of Ul'dah via the old "you toppled what passed for government, you're responsible for it now" adage.

 

Regarding Iceheart, there never would've been a Shiva trial because she'd not have made it to that aetheryte at the end of Snowcloak.

[Telluride]

If we got to make live story choices, 2.55 would've had a very different ending.

 

And I may have wound up in charge of Ul'dah via the old "you toppled what passed for government, you're responsible for it now" adage.

 

Regarding Iceheart, there never would've been a Shiva trial because she'd not have made it to that aetheryte at the end of Snowcloak.

 

Yuuuuuuuuuuup.

 

"I'm sorry, heretics - your Ice Princess is in another... afterlife."

 

Add that a certain Uldah resident would still be completely hale because my WoL isn't afraid of some blue coated scrub.

 

[samuel L. Jackson Mode]

 

"Ooooh, I get it. You think... you think you're good with that cute little sword. Huh. Funny story. I was tearing off Titan's grundies, stuffing them up Ifrit's backside, and ripping Garuda's tailfeathers off and stabbing Leviathan in his briny eyeball with them, while you were busy taking bribes and being a third-rate tool. Oh, sorry, no, too late. This confrontation ends only one way, and that's with you leaking blood like, oh, the Garlean commanders, whom I also took down like b****es. Please look forward to it."

[Chris Ganale]

Yuuuuuuuuuuup.

 

"I'm sorry, heretics - your Ice Princess is in another... afterlife."

 

Add that a certain Uldah resident would still be completely hale because my WoL isn't afraid of some blue coated scrub.

 

[samuel L. Jackson Mode]

 

"Ooooh, I get it. You think... you think you're good with that cute little sword. Huh. Funny story. I was tearing off Titan's grundies, stuffing them up Ifrit's backside, and ripping Garuda's tailfeathers off and stabbing Leviathan in his briny eyeball with them, while you were busy taking bribes and being a third-rate tool. Oh, sorry, no, too late. This confrontation ends only one way, and that's with you leaking blood like, oh, the Garlean commanders, whom I also took down like b****es. Please look forward to it."

 

All of my yes, holy shit. Every single one of my characters would've torn ill-bred, lolorito, and every single one of those scrub brass blades/crystal braves apart.

 

 

At least two of my characters would've prevented the sultana's death altogether because they'd have seen that setup coming a mile away.

 

[Telluride]

At this point, we can't say much more that doesn't start to sound like the demented ravings of a schoolchild playing with water guns. I'll risk it once more (fills squirt gun).

 

But this is an inherent narrative weakness in this type of story anyway:

 

1) Declare the protagonist to be the Powerful Chosen One

 

2) Have Protagonist win every fight against opponents of Demigod-level power.

 

3) Force Protagonist to conveniently forget this fact so that half-arsed, weak villain with scrubs not fit to wipe the Protagonist's boots can create artificial tension in a weakly written narrative, to which Protagonist, like a 7-year-old's Rage Comic, says, "Okay."

 

"Hey, Player! Guess what - your protagonist doesn't get to fight our scrubs, so we can stop you from being heroic when everything THAT YOU HAVE DONE AS A PLAYER becomes inconvenient to our narrative!"

 

 

FFXIV's plot has Joker Immunity, sometimes, and I no longer accept that I'm just spoiled. Other media have had to deal with this contradiction - I mentioned Superman, earlier, as an example, and a LOT of Superhero and fantasy stories have addressed the problem of how to handle an uberpowerful character. SE hasn't been reading, or heeding, any of these, so far as I can see in this game.

 

I get that the WoL is supposed to be an "Everyman", to risk the gendered term, for any sort of human player, but who CAN get behind this character, acting the way he/she does? Even if we say that the WoL doesn't want to kill, and wants to make people happy, how in the heck does it excuse...

 

Warning - 2.55 Spoiler

 

 

 

 

....the WoL, who was not at all poisoned, or physically affected during that final scene, simply watching Ilberd, who really is just a scrub in comparion, attack Raubahn. The WoL is held by just a few regular old soldiers - soldiers who should fall like shot ducks within seconds should the WoL decide to fight back. But no - our selfless hero, who has handled EVERY fight challenge so far, must be CHOOSING to do nothing at all while every guilty party in the whole Uldah conspiracy shows up at the same place, kills Nanamo, and pins the blame on the apparent Invalid of Light.

 

The WoL either A) has kryptonite stuffed in his/her pants to nullify what was enough martial ability to figh Midgardsormr, B) Secretly is fine with letting Uldah burn and Raubahn get disarmed, or C) Got nerfed.

 

Seriously - Ilberd cannot be that damn tough, or else he'd have been pulled in to fight some primals himself. A PLD WoL capable of TANKING #$%#%$ MIDGARDSORMR, for example, should laugh, laugh, LAUGH at Ilberd and, frankly, half the Brass Blades in the city all at once, and help Raubahn cut a bloody swathe... or at least apprehend... every Monetarist in town.

 

 

 

 

....ahem.

 

This really had stopped bothering me for awhile. I was content to let the bad writing be bad writing and go on with having my game. But SE says that no one gets into Ishgard without sitting through this story, and there are already hints that our protagonist is going to be the same SuperSheep that put up with all this.

 

I take it personally because it's bad writing, bad writing that we have no choice but to endure to get to the actual new, fun content that we're all waiting for, in which we all can write better, more intelligent stories than the one we're being made to endure.

 

By the way, this is the same kind of thing that made the movie Alien3 flop, and deservedly so.

[Dravus]

The Warrior of Light is just an awkward stand in for our characters, though that doesn't matter since it wouldn't make sense for anybody's character to be the Warrior of Light in the first place. It's silly that a lot of the lore revolves around the actions of a single character despite it being an MMO but...that's no different to WoW, GW2 and the various other MMO's that embraced such a path.

 

Putting that aside, however, the lore is rich and interesting enough for role-players to have plenty of stuff to do. What the Warrior of Light does or doesn't do is largely irrelevant - at least in my eyes. Then again, I'm not interested in interacting with anybody who is brushing shoulders with the Warrior or Light or claiming to be him so...each to their own, I guess!

 

I'm really looking forward to exploring Ishgard. Next to the Garlean Empire it's the second most intriguing thing in-game for me.

[Martiallais]

At this point, we can't say much more that doesn't start to sound like the demented ravings of a schoolchild playing with water guns. I'll risk it once more (fills squirt gun).

 

While typically your posts are really good and entertaining and fun to read....jfc we get it. You hate the MSQ. YOU HATE THE MSQ. YOU HATE THE MSQ.

 

Please, fellow RP'er, step away from the story quest. It's going to be okay, I promise. I don't think anyone who's read your posts thinks for a second that you and the story are waiting for a reunion/makeup special of any kind.

 

Honestly, and I have a friend who's an amazing roleplayer that's done this, you can skip every single cutscene. Every time I mention what's happened in the MSQ I literally get a big 'huh'. Maaaaybe give that a shot? Because no matter how much we yell and raise pitch forks about the quality (or lack thereof) found in the MSQ...it's still going to be there....just not being beaten like a dead horse in most threads.

 

Deep breaths, friend. Deep breaths.

[Telluride]

The Warrior of Light is just an awkward stand in for our characters, though that doesn't matter since it wouldn't make sense for anybody's character to be the Warrior of Light in the first place. It's silly that a lot of the lore revolves around the actions of a single character despite it being an MMO but...that's no different to WoW, GW2 and the various other MMO's that embraced such a path.

 

Putting that aside, however, the lore is rich and interesting enough for role-players to have plenty of stuff to do. What the Warrior of Light does or doesn't do is largely irrelevant - at least in my eyes. Then again, I'm not interested in interacting with anybody who is brushing shoulders with the Warrior or Light or claiming to be him so...each to their own, I guess!

 

Believe it or not, I agree with you 100%, every point.

 

Since we're bringing up other MMO's, I offer LOTRO's story in comparison.

 

LOTRO puts us in a hero's skin, true, but it reminds us constantly that we are not the BIG hero, despite everything we do and accomplish while the story of the Lord Of The Rings keeps happening just a little bit ahead of the player. The player in LOTRO is, in effect, the clean-up crew - the players are there to keep every OTHER problem in Middle-Earth at bay, and we're constantly reminded of that fact, that Frodo's ahead of us, and we've got to keep him safe, just like every other major player in Middle Earth. We aren't the Big hero, but we have the relative joy of knowing that...

 

1) We aren't stuck in the "Little Guy Vs. The World" role. We are there to make sure the humble hobbit can get his job done, and so there is no contradiction with the "Everyman" role.

 

2) We actually kind of ARE the heroes. What the players do in LOTRO's story is make sure that the world stays in shape and that evil doesn't get a foothold, and that the Fellowship can go about its business.

 

3) We have to work as a team. We know that people more powerful than us are in the world, and we don't have to resent them, because they're busy, too - they're fighting the tough stuff at the same time as we're handling our own business. In FFXIV, this would amount to the Scions actually fighting a primal WITHOUT the help of the WoL, and Minfilia actually doing things like finding her way into Moria or facing down Balrogs instead of lingering in her office waiting to be kidnapped. Again.

 

4) I don't recall any time in the LOTRO story where my character just decided to let the villains escape. Sure, some of the enemies did, but they didn't just get to waltz on away with the player's good graces.

 

5) The player could pretty much take a full tour of the whole game and do any dungeon without "unlocking" it. Sure, the story took you to these dungeons, but I recall that I didn't have to wait until the game gave me its leave before I could try 'em.

 

Now, a lot of this went kinda screwy when Moria came out, and demanded that players do some very challenging 8-player dungeons to be able to advance in the now-gated story mode. It was the first time I can recall the game thus restricting the story... and it's one of the factors (though not the only one) that led to me getting tired of the game.

 

 

FFXIV has some WONDERFUL lore! I find it to be a very rich and rewarding game world... that deserves a better main story, is all.

 

EDIT: Ok, Zarek. I'm letting the thread go on without me, now. You may applaud

[Jana]

I've always RPed Jana as someone with the Echo who had the gall to say "no" to joining the Scions way back in the level 20 MSQ. Obviously, the end of the MSQ would have been very different if she were actually The WoL. That aside, I still follow the events of the MSQ with Jana having some knowledge that the public wouldn't (specifically, relating the the Coil storyline, but not the Ul'dah political landscape which would have been of greater importance to Jana as a Flame) via Echo-visions. I don't think that's a popular position to take, which is probably the only reason I can get away with it: No one else is claiming to have that knowledge.

[Aysun]

I've always RPed Jana as someone with the Echo who had the gall to say "no" to joining the Scions way back in the level 20 MSQ. Obviously, the end of the MSQ would have been very different if she were actually The WoL. That aside, I still follow the events of the MSQ with Jana having some knowledge that the public wouldn't (specifically, relating the the Coil storyline, but not the Ul'dah political landscape which would have been of greater importance to Jana as a Flame) via Echo-visions. I don't think that's a popular position to take, which is probably the only reason I can get away with it: No one else is claiming to have that knowledge.

 

I did that very thing for Aysun in 1.0. Went all the way to meeting Minfilia ICly and then she just was like NOPE and GTFO'd.

[Aaron]

If we got to make live story choices, 2.55 would've had a very different ending.

 

And I may have wound up in charge of Ul'dah via the old "you toppled what passed for government, you're responsible for it now" adage.

 

Regarding Iceheart, there never would've been a Shiva trial because she'd not have made it to that aetheryte at the end of Snowcloak.

^ this.

 

Aaron wouldn't a killed her outright. He'd probably take a arm or two.. or leg or two... and just kick her down the chasm to bleed out. He'd throw away his morals that one time just for her.

[Chris Ganale]

If we got to make live story choices, 2.55 would've had a very different ending.

 

And I may have wound up in charge of Ul'dah via the old "you toppled what passed for government, you're responsible for it now" adage.

 

Regarding Iceheart, there never would've been a Shiva trial because she'd not have made it to that aetheryte at the end of Snowcloak.

^ this.

 

Aaron wouldn't a killed her outright. He'd probably take a arm or two.. or leg or two... and just kick her down the chasm to bleed out. He'd throw away his morals that one time just for her.

 

She'd have been walking toward that aetheryte, all smug and shit while talking her trash, when suddenly an axe/spear in the spine.

[Zyrusticae]

All this ranting about the MSQ makes me appreciate how good Blade & Soul's story is in comparison.

 

Which is a bit mean of me to say because I know most folks won't actually get to touch it until its release later (much later) this year.

 

Anyway. Yes, there's a lot of stuff they could have handled better during the MSQ. A lot of their plot threads were way too obvious going forward, which, while not a problem in and of itself, only makes some of the jankier bits stand out that much more. And then there's the whole question of ascribing motives to the PC that the player almost certainly doesn't share, which can feel a bit problematic in an MMORPG where the PC is completely unique to that player.

 

Buuuut the game's story is more of an incidental thing - for me at least, it's just a fun little sideshow and not really something I take all that seriously. If it were more like an old-school Western RPG where we could pick dialogue options and affect the course of the story in some significant ways, I would actually have more reasons to care. Instead, I just take what fun lore I can get from it and otherwise largely discard it.

 

Oh, and occasionally I revisit the cutscenes so I can take pretty pictures. But, y'know, that has nothing to do with the story and a lot more to do with the cinematography and the graphics and the artwork and that sort of thing, so... Yeah. Mm-hmm.