How does the community treat the day/night cycles?

[Flickering Ember]

Being new to FFXIV and this community and all, I've noticed that the day and night cycles in the game are rather short. I'm curious how the roleplaying community here treats them in their roleplay.

 

When it's night do you roleplay it as night? What happens when it changes to day and then night again?

 

Do you roleplay the time of day as being whatever it is in server time?

Or do you try to keep it vague?

[Raeras]

Personally I tend to RP 'evening' when it's the evening and vise versa, though as of late I've been trying to keep it somewhat vauge since I realize my night could be someone's early morning.

[Magellan]

Whatever time of day it is in game at the start of RP, I usually go off that. Sometimes I use real life time of day, and sometimes I make it up on a whim. Everyone seems pretty flexible

 

I cringe a liittle every time someone mentions the rain though. It rains SO MUCH in this game, and its hard to keep up with the weather patterns! But, that could just be the way it is in Eorzea!

[Siha]

Personally I'm with Magellan, whatever time someone officially walks up to me during RP or when I start rping is what time I try to keep it throughout. And sometimes I don't even mention it until after I've consulted who I'm rping with at the time. I find the cycles too short to really stick by them when they change, after all a five minute conversation wouldn't span two days like it sometimes can with the in game time changes. As for the weather I'm a bit iffy on that one, I like referencing it personally but it's just as sporadic as the time sometimes.

[S'anhu]

I cringe a liittle every time someone mentions the rain though. It rains SO MUCH in this game, and its hard to keep up with the weather patterns! But, that could just be the way it is in Eorzea!

Haha, I understand this so much. Sometimes we acknowledge the rain while we RP, but if we do it every single time then our characters spend an absurd amount of time chatting in the rain.

 

On topic: I tend to think of it as the time of day when the RP starts, as well. Sometimes things will have to happen at a particular time of day, so I like to stay flexible. As a general fallback, evening is often what I'll go with if I ever sit around at a tavern or the like, since that's usually what kind of time you'd see my character in a place like that.

[AvaZope]

I haven't RP'd too much yet, but I was thinking about this as I was leveling the other day.

 

I was of the mind to stick to the timeframe I'm actually in, or the server time, like most of the games I've been used to RPing in. It wouldn't seem difficult to regard the random darkness of "night" at 2PM in the afternoon being a sudden dark cloud pre-storm. And it does rain a -lot- so that actually doesn't sound too hard to imagine.

[LandStander]

I think I am in the same opinion as everyone else here when it comes to time. If its night time when I first start speaking with them, then I will handle it as such and just avoid mentioning the time of day when it is day time again. What stinks is that I gave my character a disdain for the rain and it has become a bother trying to RP since it rains like every 30 minutes. I still acknowledge it 70% of the time, but the other 30% I just get too lazy lol. 

I have actually forced her to walk away from RP just to seek shelter before as I don't want to break her character too much. It has been interesting though as because Gridania seems to get the most rain I have had her completely avoid the area IC because of it and it has given her something to whine about during those random tavern RP's ^^. 

 

I really do like it when other characters react to the weather though. I have seen people guard their faces or raise their hoods when the wind starts to pick up in Thanalan, bringing with it sand and dust. I have also seen fighters slip in the mud while it was raining. I don't think we should completely ignore all the time it as it just adds delicious sprinkles to the RP sundae :3.

[LiadansWhisper]

I mostly ignore them.  Rain drives me nuts, tho, because I hate being out in the rain without an umbrella.  >.

[Brynhilde]

I like to keep it flexible. If the time of day is relevant to the RP, I will go by it. Alternatively if I'm RPing with my North American friends, I will go by their time, only wishing them 'good night' if it's really late(or early, as the case most often is ) for me.

 

Sometimes Bryn will remark on a beautiful morning or admire the stars in Eorzean time if I feel it will enhance a scene. Otherwise, I really don't think it's worth fretting too much over, as it's just one of those things everyone handles differently.

[Val]

Like most have already said, I generally go with either a preset time for the RP to occur or the time in which we start RP.

 

And oh god, the rain. It rains WAY too much.

[Kismet]

Same as others have said, whatever time of day it is when I begin RPing is what it remains throughout. Depending on what is going on in the RP and/or the duration of it, then we will have it progress to a later time as we go on.

 

As far as weather, sometimes I'll have my character comment on it, other times I don't. Due to how frequently it changes, I typically pretend the rain (or whatever it is) lasts quite a bit longer than it actually does in-game.

[Ildur]

Unless a specific scene requires a specific time of day, I prefer to pretend all scenes take place during the day. I try to keep it vague and not mention it unless someone else references it, though, and there are times when I just use Server Time (since it's easy for everyone to check it and it offers a more stable time than Eorzean whacky day cycles of Quickness.)

 

I tend to ignore weather unless, again, someone makes mention of it.

[KitKat]

I like to reference the time if it's a particularly attractive sunset/sunrise, even if I'm RPing in the same place for multiple cycles. I just tend to gloss over the speed of time and suspend disbelief for the sake of interacting with the environment in front of me.

[Dat Oni]

My main, a Miqo'te called Edgar, is absolutely horrified by rain, thunder, and lightning, not necessarily in that order. Every time it rains, he will mention it, and sometimes, I'll even have him "jump" (that is to say, I'll use an emote) just as the thunder cracks. It gets laughs out of people.

 

My alt, a Lalafell called Koporo Aporo, hates rain for an entirely different reason:

 

"Me armor'll rust."

[Maril]

I usually go by the ooc time, but being a european on an american server has made it difficult, because most other people I rp with will have bright daylight outside whilst I'm sitting under the moon (so if they use the same thing, my character is going to look a little nuts). My solution has been to roughly play it as it would be for the majority on the server, or otherwise adjusting to what the other rp'ers happen to mention from session to session. I would never attempt to rp following the in-game day/night cycle, it's so very fast - if it actually lasted a full 24 hours, I would follow that instead.

[AvaZope]

On topic-ish, while researching this a little, I found some interesting stuff out. If we were to take each day/night cycle as the actual cycle ICly, we'd be RPing a year's worth of days every 18-ish days. 

 

It's safe for me to assume no one here really goes by that?

http://ffxiv.gamerescape.com/wiki/Time

[Kismet]

I can't speak for others, but I certainly don't. I, as well as most of the people I RP with on a regular basis, attribute one day of real-life time to one day of in-game time...

 

...UNLESS we need to speed things up or slow things down for the sake of a story arc/event (or if we just need to pick up a scene from wherever it ended). But when said RP is finally wrapped up, we'll still treat it as though it all happened the day we began (or throughout the week or whatever may have you).

[Haven's Fox]

I usually take the time of day or weather in to account when we start a rp session at the time and roll with that setting even if it changes. Or just ignore it all together at times when rp's last for many hours vs something quick that last within the weather changes.

 

@Zope Hah it would already be like what 4 years later since the game released?

[AvaZope]

Hah it would already be like what 4 years later since the game released?

Something like that, yeah, lol. Still, the information was interesting to read, and made the whole time conversion grammar thing a little easier to understand.