#They're heading to Tural for vacation

[cadrenebula]

Junelezen - Day 25 Old Friends

[autumnslance]

LynMars's FFXIV Write 2024 Master Post

We're back again! The list and links for all of my completed prompts for this year's FFXIV Write. Stats and ramblings about writing will go under the Read More cut. Eventually these will be revised in some manner and tossed onto Ao3.

Asterisks again mean there's wolship nonsense happening.

01. Steer - Vignettes of less sociable times over Aeryn's life. 02. Horizon - WoL at the end of Ultima Thule, EW 6.0. 03. Tempest - WoL returns to Amaurot to contemplate, EW 6.4. 04. Reticent - C'oretta & Dark Autumn have a chat. Sort of. 05. Stamp - Aeryn finds a memento while cleaning, post-EW 6.0 06. Halcyon - Tanzel, Emelia, & understanding grief. Backstory. 07. Morsel - Zenos heading to Camp Broken Glass, EW 6.0. 08. Free Day! 09. Lend an Ear - Emperor Varis is very much alone. StB patches. 10. Stable - Hydaelyn as the avatar of Light. Endwalker. 11. Surrogate - Weird West AU. Unexpected new roles for the Strikers. 12. Quarry* - Dominants AU. Thavnair comes to Tural's aid. DT 7.0. 13. Butte - Dark Autumn versus seedkin in Xak Tural. DT 7.0. 14. Telling - WoL reflects on Emet-Selch's expected reaction. EW 6.0. 15. Free Day! 16. Third-Rate - Aeryn's annoyed by the Unbound. DT Role Quests. 17. Sally - Dark pays a final visit to a traitor, post-StB 4.1. 18. Hackneyed* - Aeryn, Thancred, & terrible literature. 19. Taken - A young wood warder tries to save his sibling. Backstory. 20. Duel - Wuk Lamat's challenge does not go as expected. DT 7.0. 21. Shade - WoL ruminates on some of their ghosts. Thru DT 7.0. 22. Free Day! 23. On Cloud Nine - A chocobo & her Warrior of Light. End ShB 5.0. 24. Bar - 2 different adventurers starting out. Legacy & ARR. 25. Perpetuity - Aeryn, Deryk, & questions of faith. EW 24man raid. 26. Zip - C'oretta helping out Hamon at the Coliseum. Technically DT. 27. Memory - In a future, music makes Iyna remember. EW Patches. 28. Deleterious - Aeryn & Shale discuss regulators & history. DT 7.0. 29. (Free) Deleterious 2* - Thancred & self-recrimination. ShB 5.0. 30. Two Heads are Better than One - Gulool Ja Ja muses. DT 7.0.

Previous years: 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023

Ended up a touch Aeryn-heavy this year, though Generic WoL, various NPCs, the other OCs, forays in the FC's AUs, and some supporting family cast members make appearances. There's even a callback to a previous FFXIV Write entry. Lots of Endwalker and Dawntrail due to recency bias, but it manages to span the spectrum from backstories through various expansions.

I only did 1 Free Day, due to having 2 solid ideas I ended up writing for that prompt. It was right at the end of my annual birthday vacation week, so I was pretty rested (may also be why they're among the longer entries!). Unusually, the rest of that week's works are not any longer than the others.

I'm also still working on some original writing, though, so that did cut into fanfiction time.

Below 500 words: #2 Horizon (347), #3 Tempest (415), #7 Morsel (499), #10 Stable (400), #13 Butte (477), #14 Telling (355), #17 Sally (464), #20 Duel (499), #24 Bar (462).

500 - 1,000 words: #1 Steer (944), #4 Reticent (581), #5 Stamp (588), #11 Surrogate (964), #12 Quarry (844), #16 Third-Rate (564), #18 Hackneyed (577), #19 Taken (915), #21 Shade (764), #23 On Cloud Nine (728), #25 Perpetuity (958), #26 Zip (592), #27 Memory (810), #30 Two Heads are Better than One (500).

Over 1,000 words: #6 Halcyon (2,479), #9 Lend an Ear (1,326), #28 Deleterious (1,099), #29 Deleterious 2 (1,231).

Shortest: #2 Horizon Longest: #6 Halcyon

Total: 20,382 words. Not my shortest but far from my longest. Comparing with the previous years, I can see a clear improvement in my grasp of both NPC and OC voices, and more confidence in general.

Even so, "Butte", "Sally", "Bar", and "Zip" were the hardest for me this year, and I may need to warm up to them. I love "Halcyon" for a lot of reasons, and am also fond of the lighter offerings in "Duel" and "On Cloud Nine." I like a lot of the others, particularly when trying to get into NPC heads (even if they're really weird places to be ffs, Zenos).

Not too many shippy entries this year, one of them for one of the AUs, one mostly talking about it rather than seeing it, but I like "Hackneyed" a lot as it's been awhile since I've written about Aeryn & Thancred's literary tastes (and opposite ways of treating their books).

These will eventually be revised and added to Ao3, and then we await next year!

[vasheden]

Shows up several months late with this meme

They're heading to Tural on vacation now that everything's settled somewhat.

[higharollakockamamie]

Dawntrail Thoughts

Just putting my thoughts together.

SPOILERS FOR THE WHOLE EXPANSION

Overall, I enjoyed it. The parts I liked less were more missed opportunities than anything outright bad. There was definitely nothing on the Werlyt scale of bad, which is what I was afraid of ever since I heard my personal enemy Werlyt Guy was working on MSQ. You can see where the less experienced writers are getting a feel for things, but I think they did a reasonably good job of it.

Things I Liked:

The environments are gorgeous. I spent plenty of time just ramming my face into plants so I could look at the leaves. Those leaves!

Meeting the different people of Tural was a lot of fun. I liked the summer vacation feeling of just exploring and learning about different cultures. I liked that there were a lot of things for us to do besides "go here kill this", like trade some wool for fancy mezcal like that one guy who traded a red paperclip until he got a house.

I loved seeing fantasy with a Central/South American inspiration. It's really fresh and the colors and designs are wonderful.

The centering of female characters. We had lots of women in major roles, and I really appreciate that. I especially love to see a female villain. I am a full supporter of women's wrongs.

Bakool Ja Ja going from a goofy enemy it was fun to give crap to (I love Wuk Lamat's delivery of, "Be quiet, Bakool Ja Ja. No one cares what you think.") to a tragic child overloaded with expectations was great.

Zoraal Ja betraying his Obviously Going to Betray Him Evil Vizier was hilarious, though it came at the price of giving us less Sareel Ja, who I enjoyed

I liked that the WoL stepped back and took a mentor role. I don't really invest in these kinds of blank characters - they're just a wall for the characters to play tennis against - so you could replace the WoL with a piece of cold pizza with "nods" pepperoni'd onto it and I wouldn't care. So I'm down with them being a supporting character.

Wuk Lamat. I love her design, I liked seeing her journey and growth throughout the story, and I liked the story being based around the development of a leader, this time based on maintaining the peace rather than overthrowing an oppressor. I also thought her voice suited her well. I understand the frustrations of people who thought she monopolized screentime. More on that in Missed Opportunities.

Sphene's part of the story was a lot of fun. I loved how openly friendly yet very suspicious she was, and I enjoyed trying to guess her secrets. Exploring her lands and figuring out the dark side of this ostensibly happy place made me and some friends think of The Giver, and that was fun to compare and contrast.

The combat and dungeons were a ton of fun. Vanguard is a personal favorite. Gotta love any dungeon you crash a train into.

Things I Didn't Mind:

The music used the main leitmotif a lot, but then again, so did Endwalker. In that case a lot of the big bangers that massively slap came in the patches, and, given how Honey B Lovely's theme has taken up residence in my head permanently, that pattern looks to hold out. Also I love the jazz in Tuliyollal.

Missed Opportunities:

I would have liked to see the Scions take more of an active mentorship role. Like, for each culture/area, have one of our buddies teach a lesson: like, Alphinaud should have definitely gotten a chance to talk about not letting yourself think you're the big omnipotent smarty boy who can solve everything yourself. This would have been a fun way to show the Scions' development as well as helping us not overdose on Wuk Lamat by having her be the focus alone.

Where's Zoraal Ja's mom? Where's Gulool Ja's mom? If it weren't for two-heads requiring two parents, I'd think these were those lizards that reproduce parthenogenically.

Zoraal Ja was a little underbaked. He's got this idea of sowing warfare to teach people that war is bad, but where did he get that notion? Why's he willing to go so far for it?

While effective, the idea of fighting someone who is trying to preserve the past at the cost of the present was a bit of an Ascians retread. It's strange that no character ever mentioned that similarity - or, with the idea of things that maintain their existence by sapping the life of other beings, the similarity to Primals.

Also, I hate to argue for more Thancred, who sucks, but "a person you loved and lost continues to exist but at the expense of currently living people" is something he should have been around to have an opinion on.

Where's the Ironworks? There's so much technology they'd have a field day with. Where's Nero? SHOW ME MY BOY

[forgetsrotation]

[hc] [allie baelsar] [dawntrail msq]

(7.0 / Dawntrail spoilers)

Various Allie-centric thoughts I had during Dawntrail! Yes, I am talking about Allie Baelsar.

Context: Allie goes with Makoh'to to Tural! It's a nice opportunity to see more of the world and put some of her healing studies to use in the field - if anyone remembers my "Allie goes to school via the Ameliance exchange student program and learns healing arts, and also is girlfriends with Miladeen" headcanon. :d Before the release of 7.0 I was really wanting to include Allie on this trip! Gaius... he got to go to Tural before 7.0 with Makoh'to during a vacation (perhaps it was a family trip and Makoh'to and Allie ended up staying leading into 7.0?)

Spoilers after the cut.

The first half of the game focusing around the succession rights and learning about all the various cultures fit SO well with the narrative I envisioned for Allie. Makoh'to is an old hand at this sort of thing already, but Allie is the next generation... "the children are our future, so we should guide them with kindness" theme is something I see for Makoh'to's narrative in DT re: both Allie and Wuk Lamat. :3

Some random headcanon tidbits for Allie during this expansion:

Allie is really moved by the Ihih'hana ritual. She thinks of her siblings when everyone's life force is being collected to replenish the land.

She feels a horrible pit in her stomach every time Zoraal Ja speaks of the Garlean Empire the way he does.

While Makoh'to is helping Wuk Lamat with trades in Urqopacha, Allie is off on her own conducting a series of trades as well! She observes the first one and goes, "I see..." and the gears are turning in her head. Remember that Allie is quite good at talking people into things - convincing them they need something re: her scene with Valens. The bargaining culture of the Pelupelu, however, is far more enjoyable and she appreciates everyone is left improved rather than taken advantage of. Allie quickly trades her way into souvenirs for Gaius and Miladeen. :) She's quite proud of herself!

Allie offers Wuk Lamat some tips about motion sickness, although the thought of Allie piloting machines has the opposite effect on poor Wuk Lamat lmao

When Gulool Ja Ja pulls Makoh'to aside to talk to him, he does so because he can recognize the parental bond Makoh'to has with Allie.

After the first trial in Yak T'el, Allie goes off with the twins for a tour led by Erenville. She's not present for the ransom and battle that follows.

Based off Erenville saying he contacted a few colleagues via linkpearl, and assuming said colleagues are stationed in Sharlayan, I assume linkpearls work long distance. Allie and Makoh'to both call Gaius almost nightly to update him on their adventures. Allie doesn't parent Gaius, but she's intuitive and knows her father is very lonely when they're all away, so she tries her best to check in on him.

When learning the truth about "blessed siblings", Allie has to take a moment to breathe. It's not the same, but the visceral feeling of needing to succeed where your kin could not and it all being for nothing... Makoh'to is there to hold her hand.

During the invasion of Tuliyollal Allie is out there protecting and healing whoever she can! I envision her as a more dps focused healer, although still in the WHM family of spells and the like. After SoW, she's wanting to do more healing than destruction, however.

That means she did not go to Xak Tural with Makoh'to, who had personal reasons to explore Xak Tural. She was going to go back and explore some of the other areas of Yak Tural once he left.

She never goes into the rift bubble at any point - Makoh'to felt it was too dangerous to risk and Allie's talents are needed in Tuliyollal at that moment.

In the aftermath of the invasion she stays behind to tend to the wounded and is not present in the second half of the expansion until they go to gate in the Skydeep Cenote.

Allie does not go thru the reflection gate, but she does stay to help protect those keeping the gate open

I'm still cooking in all the stuff DT gave me, but these were my notes for Allie as I went thru. :3

[shivasdarknight]

so yeah, i havent watched either dawntrail trailer 🤷

idk im finding it kinda hard to get excited about it at the constant reminders that they fridged one of their best and relevant characters back in azys lla, the clumsy handling of the void, the rancidly misogynistic shit in pandae, the solely white examples for the new lighting engine, the telling lack of info regarding femhroths that just screams disinterest because women, how absolutely terrible this could go because No i Do Not want road to el dorado references because idc if you guys are endeared to it that shit was racist

like on a more serious note, how am i supposed to get excited about an expansion where our summer vacation is getting mixed in with a different nation's political affairs when we're mostly fantasy europeans (excluding the variable of the wol but even then most are white eorzeans) and tural is fantasy mesoamerica. how am i supposed to be excited about this touristy angle when tourism is a major facet of colonization, especially when it regards the cultures that this region is based in. so framing you getting mixed up in yet another rite of succession from a culture you - in all likelihood - are not affiliated with as a summer vacation is just. it's deeply uncomfortable and it's hard to feel excited about this - especially with their history, continued bullshit, and refusal to remove egregious stuff like the "new world" set or the far northern attire.

idk. i wanna be wrong, but it's hard to be excited when the continuation of stuff they're Saying they'll address is right in front of us. the au ra showcased were pasty with blond hair and im p sure blue eyes and it was raen, not xaela - are they really that allergic to anything darker than a light tan? locations gorgeous, but I still see gifs everywhere of meteor fighting that mamool'ja leader - what happened to portraying them as people and not as monsters to take down? i only know that mamool ja's station because i know who the mamool ja are and the significance of large, two-headed ones. to most, that looks like a run of the mill dungeon boss since there Is a mamool ja boss, and the framing is similar to any number of inhuman adversaries shown in previous trailers. but if they're doing better about cultural sensitivity, then why did they make a member of their indigenous stand-in group be the big enemy for meteor to showcase Viper combat against? i really hope that - contextually - it's not something bad, but out of context it really just looks like taking down a big reptile monster which isnt great when that's your indigenous stand-in that's been portrayed like SHIT since ARR and hasn't had the same redeeming grace as the majority tribes - because where the amalj'aa are characterized by military strength and the noble savage trope, the mamool ja are portrayed as spineless mercenaries and sexual creeps. if we're in the mamool ja reframing expac, why does the trailer showcase that.

god dammit. i want to be wrong!!! i want to be overreacting because this would suck if true but their history doesnt give much confidence that they'll do better, and their current actions - the tourism angle, the lack of info with femhroths, the lighting engine - arent much to be confident about either!!

i wanna be wrong so fucking badly but i dont trust this team as far as i can throw them.