#I know there is a way to solo it on drk but it takes some planning + cheesing

[impossible-rat-babies]

you know I didn’t think the rig for the final boss in the lvl 95 dungeon was reused, but

[alphadrg]

Timeline of Absalon/Distra going from ok to absolutely not ok what happened to you

Age 0-11 (before Ferndale’s disaster): A brat. Always with his mother and very shy. But he is a good boy (tm). Is the kid to go out and pick flowers to bring back to his mother. Likes to chase sheep and is a pretty carefree kid. Dreams in becoming a knight and maybe a dragoon. 

Age 11-13 (post-Ferndale disaster): Extremely not ok and very reserved and distant. Doesn’t really want to be with anyone else and is very secluded. Will only participate in events if he has to. Sees his adopted mother more has just someone who takes care of him and feels like a burden. Mega survivor’s guilt and thinks he’s the only one left of Ferndale. Will not speak to people unless spoken too. Beginning of his obsessive hatred of dragons. Small rumor mill starts up in the tribes that he’s a bad omen because he was found covered in blood. Adoptive mom can’t do much to stop it because she hasn’t caught anyone in the act of speaking it.

Age 13-15: Meets Distr’a and opens up a little more to him. Considered his first friend in the village. Distr’a begins to get Absalon to become more social and open up to more people and defends him from the rumor mill. Less brooding but still has survivor’s guilt which no one in the village including his adoptive mother bring up. Becomes less and less talkative about his life BEFORE Ferndale and refuses to talk about Ferndale as a whole. Starts to alienate himself from his Ishgardian heritage but still clinging onto the small parts of his life before Ferndale (ie: house ring, religion). Hatred of dragons still a simmering boil but more in line with casual vengeance. 

Age 15-20 (gets scar): Basically lives his life as a Keeper. Opens up to his mother more and sees her as his Mother. Completely has disregarded his Ishgardian heritage, but still longs to go home and be with his real family. Never has completely grieved over them and still suffering from survivor’s guilt. Gets his scar from the dragon Naul which is the hammer that nails in his seething hatred of dragons. Trains in secret to become strong enough to kill dragons. Distr’a learns of this and pleads with Absalon to fight not for vengeance but to protect others. Absalon agrees if only to please his then boyfriend, but only helps in making the rage stronger down the years.

Age 20: Distr’a and Absalon leave the Keeper tribe and work to hunt down marks. Both become elite hunters and Absalon hones his skills as a SMN/SCH and LNC. Distr’a and Absalon marry, though unofficially. 

Age 21-25: Pretty uneventful. Garlemald begins to move in and Distr’a and Absalon start to hunt less and begin to do more odd jobs. Echo forms around here, but its still rather dormant.

Age 26 (1.0): Distr’a and Absalon take a seemingly harmless hunt which brings them face to face with a dragon. Absalon triggered by the memories of Ferndale, goes into a blind frenzy and mutilates the dragon. Distr’a and Absalon argue and split up, only for Distr’a to be killed by a passing Garlemald patrol. Absalon kills the patrol and overcome with the grief of his husband AND family, swears to kill every dragon. The rage which he kept hidden for years comes out in full and otherwise timid personality he had turns into a raging monster. Takes his husband’s name in his grief and completely rids himself of any last ounce of his Ishgardian persona. Echo manifests in full.

27-30: Becomes a solo elite hunter. Word spreads of how he basically massacres dragons. Otherwise uneventful. Often keeps to himself because of the Echo and actively avoids being with people for too long.

31 (ARR): Is recruited into the Scions to kill primals and pushes his hate into Primal killing (again, massacring primals). Meets Alberic and becomes a Dragoon finding it an even BETTER way to kill dragons. Meets Estinien and tries to find some connection/companionship because ‘this person knows me from before I became this’ which inadvertently makes Distra see that he’s becoming a mindless beast like a dragon (in his eyes) because of how DIFFERENT Distra’s self is compared to the sweet young lad he was versus now. Nail in THAT coffin is Estinien trying to kill Alberic and learning the truth. Decides not to become a Dragoon in order to kill more dragons, but to do it to protect people as his husband originally wished. STILL HATES DRAGONS, but now giving them peaceful deaths instead of massacring them. Rage is still taken out on Primals.

HW: All of the unsung grief and identity issues come back in full and is spent disassociating or outright avoiding people/certain conversations. Begins to crack underneath the weight of being back home but being so far removed from his heritage that he doesn’t know what to do. DRK helps in giving him some modicum of peace and as HW progresses he too begins to fully accept and cope with his hate. Still rejects his Ishgardian heritage and keep people at an arm’s length but is beginning to actually make peace with himself. Tiamet helps him cope in a weird way. Cannot bring himself to talk about Ferndale still.

SB: Zenos challenges his resolve which in turn makes Distra’s rage rear its ugly head with it being an extremely raw and sore spot for him still. Distra actively welcomes Zenos’s battles as it helps him not have to think about all the terrible things he has to think about even if for a little bit. However, seeing Zenos die actually leaves Distra worse for wear and goes off to do some soul searching. DRK helps him handle his grief and goes off on an adventure with Orh Kai (DRG/DRK70 essentially) and the whole thing brings Distra a little closer to peace and being able to grieve like a proper human being. Hatred for dragons closes off into wary/unrest, still has straying thoughts of wanting to kill them, but is otherwise a little closer to peace. Still nervous about Ishgard and reclaiming his identity, and does not want to talk about who he really is.

SHB: (DABS) THIS IS WHERE WE INSERT FUN WACKY RP TIMES IN. LETS GO WILD. LETS GO FERAL. LETS DO THIS.

[angry-healers]

Eureka.... Just Eureka... it has got to be the worst content I've ever seen. Especially when healing. I honestly don't know what the fuck the devs were thinking when making this.... I know this isn't really healer centric but I just want to scream at this point. its like this game punishes you for being anything but a dps main. I'm sorry for the incoherent thoughts but I'm just so burned out at this point.

I’d say that’s fine, but that’s probably just because I happen to have several DPS at cap level so I don’t get bored. I’ve also done my fair share of healing in the place and yeah you’re right. It’s really monotonous especially because unless you’re near, at or above the level of the mobs/current fate, you won’t do much damage to the enemies even with your element set for DPSing so you might as well be a raise bot.

What’s happening right now was the state of healer in FFXI which is what this content is heavily based off of. Healers did what they were supposed to do back then, which was heal. There was no room to drop responsibility and DPS. All you did was heal and when you weren’t healing, you were on your knee resting your MP back. And when you weren’t doing that, you were raising people. And when you weren’t doing that, you were rotating hastes across the entire alliance and spamming esuna. Naturally, the boss fights actually called for this game play and did not even remotely give healers a chance to DPS which is why DPSing healers was not a thing outside of lowman/solo content in FFXI back in the day. If you took your club out and started wacking the enemy, you’d be kicked in an instant. That’s not entirely good in this game because haste doesn’t exist, bar spells don’t exist and not everything needs to be esuna’d. So this leaves a ton of downtime for healers who can’t do damage due to elemental level.

I think what made healer way more fun in situations like this back in FFXI was the buffs we got to cast between attacks to help the party and such. If we had like, Eureka-only skill trees with new elemental weapon skills like Red Lotus Blade and bar/bar-ra spells to boost elemental resistance and enspells to add elemental damage to weapons and the blm elemental rotation spells to lower enemy resistance, then it’d be really fun. I mean it’s possible imho. They gave speciallized attacks and spells in PvP. Why not Eureka, where elements matter?

WHM/AST/SCH would get the bar-ra spells.BLM/SMN would get the elemental debuffs (Shock, Burn, etc)NIN would get their elemental spellsRDM would get En-spellsBRD would get either Elemental resist buffs or debuffsWAR/DRK/PLD would get specialized elemental resist CDsand the rest of the DPS would get elemental weaponskills based on weaponThere could even be room to make it so Eureka Weaponskills can skill chain and add even more damage to the bucket. These are the things that turned the grind back in XI into a more fun experience. There was more to do and more strategy during downtime. Plus, I survived a lot because I was on call with some friends after a while. So there’s that. Having a distraction works wonders.

-- Mod Mhi

PS: But all in all, I highly suggest bailing the content if you don’t wanna do it. Even as a huge FFXI fan, even I know that game is NOT for everyone. Thus this content is not something everyone will enjoy. Just don’t be like some people I saw last night and complain constantly while still doing the content that other people are enjoying. It makes no sense to do something you dislike. You should totally take your concerns to the feedback forums, though. I 100% recommend this.

[textsacc]

[01:56] セン: hi i went to study baseball. [01:56] セン: um. [01:57] セン: drawing yozora with a baseball bat is a missed opportunity. [02:00] セン: okay so maybe its for aesthetic. [02:00] セン: so [02:00] セン: thats fine [02:00] セン: but [02:00] セン: hear me out [02:00] セン: i now have opinions on yozora/sena for baseball [02:06] セン: so in baseball, theres one designated catcher, apparently, who acts as the backbone and effectively works as the leader with the most important job out of everyone, because they're the only one that gets to see the entire field and give instructions to others

that's yozora because she's club leader, and effectively club can't happen without her orders, but also because she's the smartest, schemiest person in the club, so it makes sense for her to strategize for her team. it also comes with the heavy burden of responsibility and getting hurt a lot to try and catch the ball (see ch. orion for more info)

for maximum efficiency, the catcher has to work effectively with their pitcher. the pitcher can be swapped in, usually they swap every 5 people or so, because a pitcher's work is super demanding; this means that the catcher has to know each person well enough to maximize their throw-catch rate, which essentially falls to the leader anyway, aka its still yozora-best-fit there [02:11] セン: now the pitcher usually consists of 4/5 people on rotation, so it could be literally everyone else on the team who's eligible for play (rika, yukimura, sena, kodaka) but the reason why its super important for sena to be the pitcher and for yozora to be the catcher is because of personal catchers

Because of the close mental relationship and trust that a successful pitcher must have with his catcher, a number of catchers throughout history have become preferred by pitchers on their teams, to the point that the catcher will almost always (especially during the regular season) start along with the pitcher. The catcher is then informally referred to as that pitcher's personal catcher. Personal catchers are often used for pitchers that specialize in throwing knuckleballs, due to the difficulty of catching such an inconsistent and erratic pitch.

you can theoretically swap out any pitcher during the game, sure, but you can't swap out catchers if i understand it correctly. literally anyone else on the team could be a catcher but they wouldn't have the same synergy as a leader would after they've bonded with everyone unless they did the same thing

which, technically, none of them have except for kodaka, and he sucks ass at everything to begin with, so he's not even qualified physically to do it and placing bets on him to do it would weaken the team performance significantly [02:24] セン: its like trying to get aigis instead of minato to lead the team in p3; like yeah itll work but at what cost

anyway yozora's secondary is sena in terms of performance, but since she's lacking in the social awareness department it's very difficult for her to accurately guess what her pitcher's going to do, and i'm not even going to get started on rika/yukimura if that's the case

so finally, why is sena the perfect personal pitcher?

Personal catchers are often used for pitchers that specialize in throwing knuckleballs, due to the difficulty of catching such an inconsistent and erratic pitch.

a. she's definitely wanting to throw knuckleballs. since they're almost a sure-fire way of leading the opponent batter astray, this means that all she has to do to ensure an out for the opponent team is to get her own team's catcher to just. catch shit. b. her stamina, strength and recklessness probably already add onto the effectiveness of the top -- the winning strategy here is to be as chaotically powerful as possible, which she does (see ch. orion for more details) and because it's a solo play she's allowed to go ffa instead of holding back to help her team out

c. i point out the synergy between yozora and sena in the following - i. werewolf (hotsprings) - ii. basketball (orion) - iii. romancing saga 2 (drk/pld)

tldr they're super fucking gay, but also yozora is able to go through the impossible mental gymnastics to support/hinder sena and it shows. because of how good their game rapport is even especially without communication, their tactics on the field are going to be amazing with how crazy sena's pitches will get and how yozora will do almost anything to get herself to follow through and catch them

d. sena is probably going to be able to last the excrutiating work of pitching on the field for longer than anyone expects, which means more impossible hits for the opposing team, which means a higher chance of winning the game [02:28] セン: e. as long as sena isn't the catcher (i think), she can also bat against the other team, and we know she'll be good at batting because of how much physical prowess she has. itll be especially good because the batter is the only offensive one on the field at that point of time, with everyone else on the benches as the opponent team fills up the field with defense -- she'll basically have a trip exerting herself on solo-mode if she's made to bat (which is entirely possible) e.i. also she's probably super lucky so she'll get to make a lot more successful hits than expected e.ii. yozora would probably be terrible at batting, but not to say she doesn't try -- she'll probably be one of the better batters on the team overall, but normally catchers don't take the offensive, they stay on defense (haha like a tank)

[02:29] セン: most of the reason they'd make a good battery pair just lies in c but a and b are also really good points, d and e are just if im not wrong [02:30] セン: f. yozora literally bleeds for sena i cant stress this enough (orion) so like her being the catcher is totally fucking apt because they have to be super padded to play catcher otherwise they'll be injured like 90% of the time [02:30] セン: thank you for coming to my ted talk,

[02:41] セン: hi im gonna run over some tldr quotes from butterfly soup to hammer in the idea of yozora/sena is literally perfect especially when put into the baseball allegory

(Noelle pitching) "Noelle doesn't have enough upper body strength to throw it that far."

"With a knuckleballer pitching, the catcher has to focus so hard on stopping it that runners on base will have an easier time stealing." "So basically, it's hard to throw right, it's hard to control even when it's done right, and it's punishing if you miss." "Knuckleball is the pitch of someone with nothing left to lose."

- The ball ricochets off Liz's mitt and catches her bare hand, striking her thumb at a painful looking angle. - Liz's thumb has turned a swollen purple. "Are you okay?" "I'll live..."

"I chose it because... uh.... it's hard to catch." "So Diya has to be the one to catch it. Since it'll hurt everyone else." "Diya's immune to it because she's special."

"Is it really that surprising? Diya (catcher) has always been good at sports." "No, but you don't understand! This goes beyond being 'good at sports'!" [02:58] セン: "A lot of knuckleball pitchers end up having one catcher who specializes in catching that pitch just for them. They're called personal catchers. The two of them get traded together, as a set. It's like a weird baseball marriage." "I should learn how to throw a knuckleball, and you can catch it for me!" "Wait, but didn't they just say it's really hard to catch?" "So what? You're like a baseball goddess!"

(Min, as pitcher) "I don't need anyone. I'll do everything all by myself. I'll become so happy and successful that everyone who was ever bad to me have to beg on their hands and knees for me to forgive them."

[spinneryesteryear]

Spinner plays FFXIV Stormblood

Finished FFXIV 4.0 MSQ over the weekend (DRK to 70, WHM to 77), hoo boy. I know I've got the 4.x patches to go but I did wind up liking Stormblood more than I thought. Spoilers ahoy!

Highlights:

- started the SB questline right about the same time as everyone else started ShB *sobs* It did mean I landed in the midst of some good FATE-grinding parties, however, at little as that matters

- I liked the Baelsar’s Wall but those last twin bosses can go die in a fire

- couldn’t get really sad over Papalymo because he barely contributed anything to the story except to snark at Yda. I like him better in DFFOO, where he is an excellent black mage. So, like, the exact opposite of my feelings regarding Thancred.

- Shinryu, Omega, and Cid all disappeared for the majority of the Stormblood questline and tbh it suffered for their absences. At least Estinien, of all people, was tracking the first two down.

- thankfully the WHM quests were all in the first zone I got access to and I already had it at 70 so I just zipped through them

----- me: *fails repeatedly at WHM lvl 70 quest*

----- me: *returns w/gear 10 lvls higher* Time for my vengeance.

----- (Yes, I know I should always keep my gear up to date and to be fair I always keep it at the appropriate level or better when other people are involved. This, however, was single-player duty and my lack of better gear didn’t matter since I didn’t even have the lvl 61 dungeon unlocked yet.)

- never cared at all for Zenos. Nope. Not at all. He and his golf club bag of swords can go fall off Shinryu's platforms. (I also had 0% trouble w/his solo fights on DRK? Maybe it was the new flat damage reduction baked into all tanks, idk, or maybe it was having Aug Shire/at lvl gear for each instance. I kept my health up just fine and had to be wiped out via his insta-kill move for the duty to end. But honestly it felt like good DRK job fantasy, taking on this insurmountable foe and clawing my way past death to defend my fallen comrades.) Also my character literally viewed him as a troubled teen taking out his issues on everyone around him via murder and wasn't impressed w/him in the least. But anyway.

- I came to tolerate Lyse but that's it. Hot-blooded people who rush off and act w/o thinking irritate me greatly IRL and it's no different in virtual life. Plus, she's almost literally an anime version of me who traded book smarts for punching ability. Even her name is a mere one letter from mine. It's kinda weird. She’s my mirror universe self. Ugh.

- it’s really disappointing Square Enix gives me so few options in killing myself. Let me jump off cliffs to my messy death already, dang it. Skyrim let me do it within the first 2 minutes of ever playing, haha.

- the sharks fly. the bears fly. the goobues fly. why not.

- ah, yes, gyuki. Skyrim prepared me for unreasonably bloodthirsty walruses. And for the unreasonably powerful and murderous mammoths.

- I liked M'naago, wished she had been the lead instead

- genuinely loved Gosetsu (Conrad who?) and was upset at his 'death'. I'm at once glad he survived and annoyed at another death fake-out. *Drak voice* Kill more! Kill 'em all!

- Hien is an adorable badass and I wish to adopt him and take him home with me. Doma 4 lyfe

---- me: *interiorly grumbles every time I hear the words ‘Ala Mhigo’

---- also me: *cheers for Doma & the Steppes*

- I just... really don’t understand why Highlanders live in a desert nation and have geographic and cultural neighbors based off of India and yet they have Old English/OHG names. Why???

- also why is Lyse blindingly white (and Minfilia, for that matter) in stark contrast to other Highlanders???

---- me: So, Lyse, if you’re from Gyr Abania then why are you white?

---- Alphinaud: Oh my god, Spinner, you can’t just ask someone why they’re white.

- once again, I'm probably the only person who loved the WHM quests (all SB job quests seem to return to their 1 - 30 [or 30 - 50?] roots and I don't mind). Did lots of screaming over DRK 60 - 70. I saved them all up and did them right away when I hit 70; they flow much better w/no interruptions

- explored/quested/ground FATE's on DRK but ran new dungeons on WHM as that's my comfort job. Failed twice on the mechanics of Bardam's Mettle 2nd boss but no wipes so we're good. So many overconfident gunbreaker tanks, though. T__T *I* did a better job tanking/killing a pack of like 12 mobs as WHM in Sirensong Sea than one bunbreaker, smh.

- I found Magnai to be entirely too amusing. I also want his moves on WAR. 

- somehow missed Shisui entirely? Still haven't got all aether currents in the Ruby Sea RIP me

------ (2 month later addendum: finally unlocked it and got my aether currents. Now, to never return to that area ever again.)

- no underwater mobs is so disappointing. Let me throw fireballs and Holys and swing a greatsword underwater already. Let me tell you, nothing is as exciting as going diving in Morrowind with only a 22% chance to successfully cast Waterbreathing and this Kojin blessing is such an OP cheat.

- enjoying my Grani mount tbh. I have no idea if it's lore-relevant for ShB; I just saw the name lifted straight from Norse myth and was like, "Want." It's more of a horse-shaped reptile, however, with 'paws' that become increasingly creepy the more you stare at them. I wonder if it eats meat like the thestrals in HP.

- shooting minigames? Okay. Platforming minigames? AW HECK NO I THOUGHT I WAS DONE W/THIS WHEN I LEFT LEGO GAMES TAKE THIS AWAY FROM ME PLATFORMING IS MY GREATEST ENEMY

- I was derping around in Kugane and accidentally started doing the tower jumping puzzle. As soon as I figured out what I was doing I had to run away immediately to save my sanity.

- throwing on tank stance and rushing in to save someone from a mob or a FATE is still as heady a feeling as ever (except when they then run off and leave you to die, like, no why please). Or raising people out in the wild. I particularly love that cyclops boss FATE near Whitebrim bc I can go stand on the edges as a powerful WHM and raise people 10x as the bodies keep hitting the floor. I know I’ve mentioned it before, but it’s still so great.

- I do enjoy the Morrowind feel of walking through a new zone and taking in the scenery but I'd like it more if all the wildlife wasn't super powerful and aggro'ing on me every 10 ft. It feels less like an ecosystem and more like generic monster land when there are no longer any non-aggressive mobs like there were in ARR. The Gyr Abanian landscapes are slowly growing on me, however.

- me, flying through Porta Praetoria/Lochs: Those wooden bonfires must be awfully expensive, if wood is as scarce in Gyr Abania as I think....

- loved the Azim Steppe - atmosphere, music, lore, everything. Waiting for someone to call me out on this bc I just really love Xaela (and may make a male Xaela alt one day).

- had minor moral qualms over fighting in the Naadam for the Mol bc I wanted to claim victory for the Orl

- I do really like those moments in Heavensward and Stormblood when the game recreates the epic moments from the trailers (the WoL walking through the soldiers to fight the dragon; the WoL and Lyse sparring, etc.). 

- I was singing, “I don’t care, I don’t care,” to the tune of Let It Go during the Ala Mhigo cutscenes but the resistance singing their anthem really got to me nevertheless. Many voices united and uplifted and song always hits me hard emotionally.

- my character still looking at Zenos with 0% thirst (negative amounts of thirst, tbh) like, “Who is this sassy lost child?”

- then again my character is like 31 yrs old here with a backstory summed up as ‘angry single mom goes to check on friend, ends up killing a god and getting recruited to save the world’

- Pipin is best Lalafell; I will defend him with my life but he has Tizona now and doesn't need me. The absolute shortest guy around is calling the shots in this military campaign and I love it. At least his dad gave him a box to stand on so he could see over the table during the important strategic military discussions.

- the siege of Ala Mhigo taught us that thaumaturges/black mages are the living equivalent of heavy artillery, nice nice nice

- got lucky and had a competent crew in DF to fight Shinryu

- tbh my character would probably kick Asahi’s dad while he was down and cave in his ribs, just finishing him off. It’s no wonder Asahi turned out as bad as he did, with parents as horrifically self-centered as THAT.

- I humbly submit ‘Higwit’ as a fan-name for that elezen following Asahi around - an acronym for ‘Hien Is Great - Who Is That?!’ based on an old LOTR fan meme. Who else here remembers Figwit before he became Lindir?

- I liked the Tsukuyomi fight but I can’t remember anything specific about it now, not even the mechs. 

- I did spend a lot of time screenshotting Hien because he is an awesome bro and I would endure Ala Mhigo all over again for him