Viera/Miqo'te Half-Breed

[Slapperfish]

Disclaimer: I'm pretty new to these forums and I'm not entirely sure what the consensus here on in-game spoilers are, older content or otherwise, but I figure anyone who's reading this and has suggestions on improving the character concept detailed below is already pretty up-to-date on main scenario events. Needless to say, there are a couple spoilers for A Realm Reborn and Stormblood here, but I'll likely remove this disclaimer if that's not an issue.

 

Hey-hey, everyone! I've yet to formally introduce myself here on the forums, but I'm a fairly new player who's been completely engrossed in Final Fantasy XIV for about six months now, and I've been looking to dip my toes into the world of FFXIV roleplay at some point! Although I'm not the biggest roleplayer out there, I do have some past experience with RP in other previous long-time MMO outings such as World of Warcraft and Guild Wars 2, and let me just say that the community in FFXIV is one of the frendliest and most helpful I've ever had the pleasure of being a part of in an online experience! Ever since I started playing, I've been going out of my way to complete every in-game quest available, and I do mean EVERY quest - I've made it a personal mission to level every job to 80. I almost never skip cutscenes or quest dialogue, just so I can learn about the world of Eorzea to simultaneously get myself acquainted and up-to-date with the game's rich history. Since I'm a sucker for character customization in MMOs, many of my RP-centric characters have often been made in mind with a specific look and appearance first, then coming up with their personalities, affiliations and goals/desires, and finally doing lots of research and reading up on lore to ensure that everything about their backstory checks out, often adding a touch of a humor to it all to make for a fun and interesting character.

 

Originally, my first planned RP character for FFXIV was going to be a lifelike Allagan construct who was secretly created for the sole purpose of destroying (or re-containing) Bahamut, only to end up being reactivated five years too late and lacking any sort of true purpose in a post-Calamity Eorzea. Ultimately, I decided against it for risk of it being deemed too Mary-Sueish. My second concept was an incognito Teledji Adeleji who had been rebuilt with magitek from the ground-up (or rather, from the waist-down), utilizing those weird Wolfseye/Wolfliege boots that turn you into Aegis from Blazblue for some inexplicable reason. Obviously, the idea of taking a pre-existing NPC and roleplaying as them for the sake of a quick jab at his unfortunate demise wouldn't be all too popular with the RP community at large.

 

And so, struggling to come up with a fun, interesting or unique concept, I went back to the drawing board and decided to glance over countless character and glamour screenshots for possible character ideas. Inspired by a handful of images of how the seasonal Werewolf Ears look on the new races introduced in Shadowbringers, as well as the Mega Mog Station sale currently ongoing at the time of writing this, I decided my first dive into the world of Eorzean roleplay would be the concept of a Viera/Miqo'te half-breed. Often times, I hate leaving how a character actually looks up to one's imagination or some detailed in-game description, given certain limitations of the character creator (features such as body piercings, facial markings and unique or otherwise unobtainable hair styles and skin colors come to mind), and I only ever incorporate features like these into a character's design when I can actually achieve the desired look in-game. The Werewolf Ears will certainly help this specific concept become a reality, and I can't wait to put it into action. As of writing this, I've yet to make her into an official character proper, but I have a good chunk of her concept and design already planned out.

 

Personality-wise, she's somewhat stern and a bit of a tomboy, due in part to a rough childhood and her desire to prove herself and rise above her half-breed status. She's also scrappy, rambunctious and impatient, willing to help others but only doing so as quick as humanly possible. She's often the first one to join the fight and the first one to leave it. This, of course, would be justified out-of-character by trying to speed through as much in-game content as I possibly can. (I've already seen nearly everything the game has to offer story-wise, but I'm not sure I want to watch it all a second time!) Age-wise, she would definitely be on the younger side, in about her early 20s.

 

As for her appearance, most half-breed NPCs in FFXIV often tend to inherit their mother's race and their father's prominent racial features. As such, I plan for her to be a Veena Viera with grey skin and facial markings similar to those of her Keeper Mi'qote father (at least, to the best of my abilities). And, of course, her most prominent feature - her distinctive, cat-like ears portrayed by the aforementioned Werewolf Ears - often makes her liable to turn heads. As a subversion of - or possibly in spite of - the fact that most Viera characters often wear more revealing armor and clothing (for... a number of reasons), I plan to have her prefer wearing thick, protective light armor that covers the near entirety of her body, barring her head and ears; actons, halfrobes and armor such as the Filibuster/Royal Volunteer dungeon sets come to mind here.

 

Of course, I still have a couple holes in her concept backstory that I'm looking to fill, to avoid any part of it conflicting with preexisting lore. And so I turn to you guys for assistance in the matter:

 

1.) Should her parents be a part of the Dalmascan Resistance? I don't recall seeing a single Mi'qote among those in the resistance during the Ivalice questline, in Echo-induced flashbacks or otherwise, and I know Mi'qote are a bit of a rarity in Othard.  However, I definitely feel like it would give some credence to her appearance and attitude; I imagine her parents telling her to "run away from them as fast as you can" being the source of her incessant haste, as well as giving the character another tragic layer to an already rough upbringing.

 

2.) How common are half-breed characters in the RP community? I take it a good majority of these characters face discrimination on a frequent basis, or go to great lengths to hide their status as a half-breed. Also, I don't plan on marrying her off anytime soon, but I would assume most half-breeds are inherently sterile.

 

3.) As both a Viera and a Mi'qote, would she refer to the Echo as such, or as the Mist? Would she interchange the two depending on whether or not she's conversing with other Viera?

 

Lemme know what you guys think of this character concept as I attempt to flesh it out! I would love your feedback and I can't wait to be a part of something greater!

 

~Slapperfish >*)))>{

 

P.S. My heart pretty much skipped a beat when I accidentally refreshed the New Topic page while my internet was temporarily down. I've been working on and off on this post for a good hour or two, and I'm just lucky the website auto-restored my post. Note to self: Next time, write this stuff out in Microsoft Word first, just in case!

Edited September 19, 2019 by Slapperfish

[Valence]

1) Dalmasca is described as one huge melting pot of cultures and races. if you look at its demographics, it's actually very, very diverse (Dalmascan Hyur 40%, Bangaa 20%, Seeq 10%, Viera 5%, Others 25%). Being of any race in there doesn't even ask for many justifications. Generally you can perfectly play any race coming from any city or part of the world, though some places obviously don't have some races as natives so you could have to spin things a bit around (they're part of a merchant enclave, they're a foreign mercenary, whatever). Fortunately here, you couldn't find better than the Kingdom of Dalmasca when it comes to mixed races and racial tolerance. 

 

2) I have no idea how common they are in the RP community. I feel like they're rather numerous but I don't RP much anymore. In lore however, they're rather uncommon, since they're part of a taboo, which is interracial mingling, at least in Eorzea. They indeed face a lot of discrimination and misunderstanding from the majority of your average joes. It's however a subject that's way more open and carefree among the more traveled and liberal adventurers. Also, so far, we have literally no confirmation as far as I know if halfbreeds are sterile or not. I would assume not at least in the case of halfbreeds of the same race, like Seekers/Keepers, since a lot of NPCs for example tend to exhibit some odd traits from the other subrace (like seekers with round eyes).

 

3) What do you mean by the Mist? We don't yet know fully what the Echo is in lore, but we still have a good idea of some of its capabilities, that tend to vary a lot between individuals gifted by it (able to understand all languages, able to predict imminent things, able to read people's past, etc). We also know all Ascians have it, and that it prevents people with it to be tempered by primals usually. It's also... not that a common knowledge in Eorzea among the rabble, but it's not that a rare piece of knowledge either.