discussion How do you RP the Main Plot?

[Guns Blazing]

I can't really say I blame them considering the state of the game at that point. Cheap retcon, but it worked  sorta.

 

State of the gamePLAY, maybe. A lot of the people i know from 1.0 still think the 1.0 story was better than the 2.0/3.0 story, in most places. Some of the newer story is pretty good, though!

 

Personally, I think so long as you don't play THE Warrior of Light, you're fine. You can even RP as the WoL if you're going to do it in a closed circle of role players, but if you do that publically, you will probably find a lot of people will snub their noses at you. I wouldn't personally... My character would probably just think you're the "biggest fibber," in her words. I'd still RP with you. lol

[Val]

I can't really say I blame them considering the state of the game at that point. Cheap retcon, but it worked  sorta.

 

State of the gamePLAY, maybe. Most people i know from 1.0 still think the 1.0 story was better than the 2.0/3.0 story, in most places. Some of the newer story is pretty good, though!

 

I wouldn't know! I skip all the cutscenes 8-)

[Faye]

Short answer is "I don't role-play it." Faye's not much of an adventurer, and trying to play the WoL goes against my personal tastes not only of what I find enjoyable but what I find fair to others. I do acknowledge major plot happenings (Gaius's death, new Garlean emperor, the Sultana's "death," Ishgard opening its gates, etc.) since I like for it to feel like the role-play really is happening in the same world and same timeframe as the MSQ, but I try not to bring these things up in role-play, especially without good reason, in case someone may not be up to that point in the MSQ.

[Seriphyn]

If there is an opportunity to handwave RP as an Immortal Flame NPC in the MSQ, I seize the opportunity. So, Castrum Meridanium for 2.0, apprehending the Flame traitor in 2.3 (or was that 2.4?), fighting Vishap, and the final duty of 3.2. 

 

3.2 especially excited me since there is a Flame NPC that wears the same armour I've RP'd in for two years. AND he was wearing a full face helm, so can easily self-insert.

 

Strictly background participation, however.

[Blue]

... This all sounds horribly complex. I know. In actual practice, though, it's much simpler. One of those things that's easier to show than explain.

 

On the topic of showing, one of our members has fairly recently offered to keep logs of our adventures. We've been going since launch, so a huge chunk of all we've done is missing, but here you can find the logs of our most recent RP sessions. This includes both social RPs , where MSQ is not involved and character development is the main focus, and MSQ sessions, where NPCs and PCs interact with each other.

 

http://tales-of-hydaelyn.guildwork.com/forum/5670aba6002aa80b73c232a3-rp-logs-archive

 

I wouldn't know which one to recommend for a read, I think they're all pretty good. You will notice lines from NPCs that you don't remember being in-game... that's my attempt (I'm our Pacekeeper, I should've mentioned) to make them feel more "real", as actual RP characters. For further questions, you can address Mae.

[Eses Fafa]

"Hey, did you hear about the Warrior of Light, Eses?"

 

Who, that teenager with the prepubescent moustache?

 

"No no, I'm sure it's a roegadyn with purple lipstick and a goatee."

 

Billy down the road says it's a lalafell in a chocobo outfit.

 

"I get the feeling that we don't have very good info sources.."

 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Essentially, the WoL will be a faceless figure to my character who she has never encountered nor seen, but acknowledges the individual as a living legend with a different story to be given by every single person she meets.

 

Because the Warrior of Light is a Paladin.

The Warrior of Light is a Monk.

The Warrior of Light is a hyur.

The Warrior of Light is an elezen.

 

The Warrior of Light is anything and everything whose identity can take on any form within the game, thus making it impossible to determine what race, class, gender and job the Warrior of Light truly is, but in an RP community, the WoL still exists as the driving force for the main plot and the advancement of Eorzea and its people, just that nobody knows who they are, because in the game, you are the Warrior of Light, there can be no other.

 

What now? There are millions of others? Preposterous!

It is total nonsense that the WoL can be anyone other than your character in the game, so in the RP community, the WoL should exist entirely as who our characters believe them to be, but having never seen them legitimately. Despite this lack of knowledge, they are responsible for the world around them changing as a result of the main plot. Access to Ishgard was enabled thanks to the Warrior of Light, for example, not the community, but the roleplayer is able to act based on the WoL's actions on the story, and enter Ishgard where they would have been unable to go in before the WoL did their magic.

 

Because that ruins the fun of a legend if someone's supposedly debunked it, no?

:moogle:

[Caspar]

I think the idea of the WoL as a shadowy, ambiguous character is really fun, simply because alluding to the absurd heights of the MSQ on sparse occasions contrasts so starkly with how intimate we are to all the big conflicts and the source of world-shaking events when playing FFXIV's story. Originally I was spurred to RP again thinking about just what kind of personality I could actually see both killing demigods and taking out other people's trash, but from the start I felt playing WoL would be a bad idea in terms of cooperative writing.

[ShoggMommy]

As a completely separate alternative universe. The version of my characters you meet on Balmung are not the Warriors of Light.

 

But I do RP an AU with my levelling partner and their character, Shirogawa, where they are. We're already in a transformative mindset since we're putting that there are 2 "Warriors of Light", not 1,

 

 

Doing MSQ ICly is still fun, though, even if it's largely a personal && private RP. Would recommend if you ever have a character who's heroically inclined, a friend to level with, and the right mindset to keep two separate versions of the same character.

 

I do this as well actually. I AU it with my boyfriend's characters. It just makes the play-through of leveling characters a lot more fun for us. However this being said; when we rp with other people it is NEVER drawn over into group rp. We only ever AU rp between him and I because it does make the leveling go faster. It is never considered to be "canon" to our characters. I would never recommend anyone rping it outside of private AU though.

[Charity322]

I do see even more now how playing the WoL is really just ridiculous in a community setting, because yeah, we're all Warriors of Light and not being the ultra super person is what's weird. Also, it keeps reminding me of this.

 

 

I don't know if it's because I'm still relatively new to FF, having not finished the main plot yet, but I still don't like ignoring it and making a char version just for MSQ would be confusing. So I guess I'll ignore the chosen one/WoL stuff and just RP that my char is part of a group who fight Primals, try to right wrongs etc. and work around or change IC bits that don't make sense. I just think that there is a lot of RP opportunity in some of the main plot events that could shape a char and affect their RP.

 

I guess the problem there is talking about events that others aren't at the same point on. I guess I need to find a group who does RP main plot stuff to talk about that stuff with IC.

[Valence]

The WoL I play in solo is the Warrior of Light. My IC character I use for RP is my character. They are not the same people.

 

Somehow I find that keeping them totally separate entities is surprisingly easy. It would be even easier if the WoL actually had more than 2 lines of dialog in the whole story and a personality that goes with it, but well.

 

One can dream I guess.

[Shofie]

I actually do not touch the MSQ at all with my character. My character is not the/a Warrior of Light, she's just some lady running a blackmarket criminal empire behind closed doors, and an inept member of the waitstaff at The Coeurl's Whisker as cover.

[Yuella]

It's easy for me:

 

My main character is the Warrior of Light and my alts are the companions.

 

When I say I like to RP, I don't mean I like to RP with other players.  I RP by giving my characters backstories and RP them with each other.

[Jassy]

"Hey, did you hear about the Warrior of Light, Eses?"

 

Who, that teenager with the prepubescent moustache?

 

"No no, I'm sure it's a roegadyn with purple lipstick and a goatee."

 

Billy down the road says it's a lalafell in a chocobo outfit.

 

"I get the feeling that we don't have very good info sources.."

 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Essentially, the WoL will be a faceless figure to my character who she has never encountered nor seen, but acknowledges the individual as a living legend with a different story to be given by every single person she meets.

 

Because the Warrior of Light is a Paladin.

The Warrior of Light is a Monk.

The Warrior of Light is a hyur.

The Warrior of Light is an elezen.

 

The Warrior of Light is anything and everything whose identity can take on any form within the game, thus making it impossible to determine what race, class, gender and job the Warrior of Light truly is, but in an RP community, the WoL still exists as the driving force for the main plot and the advancement of Eorzea and its people, just that nobody knows who they are, because in the game, you are the Warrior of Light, there can be no other.

 

What now? There are millions of others? Preposterous!

It is total nonsense that the WoL can be anyone other than your character in the game, so in the RP community, the WoL should exist entirely as who our characters believe them to be, but having never seen them legitimately. Despite this lack of knowledge, they are responsible for the world around them changing as a result of the main plot. Access to Ishgard was enabled thanks to the Warrior of Light, for example, not the community, but the roleplayer is able to act based on the WoL's actions on the story, and enter Ishgard where they would have been unable to go in before the WoL did their magic.

 

Because that ruins the fun of a legend if someone's supposedly debunked it, no?

:moogle:

 

I have to keep this short because I'm at work, but this is pretty much my take. The MSQ is how I progress through the game, but as far as my character is concerned, the central figure in the MSQ is someone else entirely. Lhiri and all my other characters are simply trying to survive and figure their own lives out. Some of them are fighting toward the greater good as part of those lives, and others are just trying to make a living or see the next sunrise.