#now ysayle? i love ysayle. but you know what they did to her.

[plounce]

i like critiquing(/complaining) about stormblood's flaws bc theyre pretty easily-explainable bullet points. to summarize:

the wol should not be The Winner of the nadaam

the 3 gyr abania zones should have more visual variation (specifically their color schemes)

the ala mhigan quarter is an empty set of hallways

sirensong sea is not a good msq dungeon due to it being totally irrelevant to anything

lyse should not be a blonde white woman (but most people are too harsh on her actual character)

however heavensward just makes me cartoonishly rub my temples because there's So Much To Unpack and it's just. i think 3.0 is a total mess. my idealized rewrites of hvw are sooooooo much more drastic than stormblood. but people are a lot more fond of hvw than stb (or at least, stb lovers are a lot more used to criticism lmao) for various reasons so i feel that being a #heavenswardhater is more likely to make someone sad and/or mad at me. plus hvw's plotting & pacing are so bizarre that I barely remember what happens when

[anneapocalypse]

WIP Wednesday

Sneaking this in before midnight aha. Thank you @myreia for the tag!

Tagging: @dreadfutures @chocochipbiscuit @rosella-writes @ialpiriel @tallbluelady and anyone else with something they'd like to share!

A bit from Harsh Light. Ariane and Alisaie's conversation at Camp Overlook goes on a bit longer.

***

Alisaie trailed off, still troubled. “Ah, pray forgive me. This conversation has been rather one-sided, hasn't it. Mayhap you could recount some of your adventures in Ishgard?”

There was much that Ariane could have said. She might have told Alisaie of their journey into Dravania, of Ysayle and Estinien, constantly at one another’s throats, yet moved to a kind of respect at long last. She might have spoken of Azys Lla, of the archbishop’s machinations and his defeat, of the changes that had come to Ishgard with the revelations of the past.

She might have tried to spin a tale of encouragement, of hope. Surely there was some to be found, even if it could never fill the hollow in her heart. And yet, with Alisaie’s candid words, she was moved to honesty.

“I lost someone very dear to me,” she said quietly. “In truth… I find myself struggling with many of the same questions. Why did he have to die? And what he gave his life for… was it worth it?”

Was I worth it? Why me, when everyone I love—

Alisaie turned to look at her, startled. “Oh, Ariane. Forgive me… Alphinaud mentioned that you’d lost some dear friends along the way. I didn’t realize there was someone… special to you. And here I am, rambling about my own troubles.”

“No, please, you’re not rambling! I’m happy to listen.”

“Well… the same goes for you! I won’t pry, but if you want to talk…” Alisaie eyed her, hesitant. “I would like to hear of him.”

So she told Alisaie of Haurchefant. Not everything, of course. But enough. Who he was, how he had come to be their friend and ally, how he had offered them aid in the rescue, and refuge when they had fled Ul’dah. “That carriage you sent got us as far as Black Brush station. From there… Cid carried us to Camp Dragonhead.” It still hurt to speak of it. To remember. Gods, what she wouldn’t give to sit before a fire with him once again. His had ever been a presence that said, Take heart! All is not lost.

He had been safety, comfort, and a well of unending faith in her.

All taken from her in a single, terrible flash of light.

All the same, she steadied herself with a breath, and did not break down as she recounted the tale to Alisaie. “Your brother was in poor spirits, needless to say. Haurchefant brought us hot chocolate, and he said to him, ‘So, Master Alphinaud, are you content to remain a broken blade? Is there no flame hot enough to reforge you?’” In spite of everything, his words brought a smile to her lips even now. “’What of the fine companions who yet stand at your side?’”

Alisaie ventured a smile too. “I think I’d have liked him.”

“I dare say you would have. He was… kind, and brave. It was hard to despair, in his presence.”

“I’m sorry I hadn’t the chance to meet him.”

“I don’t blame you, you know,” Ariane said. “For leaving. …Did I ever tell you I had a sister?”

“I don’t believe you did.” Alisaie gave her a searching glance. “Had?”

“Her name was Gratienne. We weren’t twins, but we were quite close in age. A mere eighteen moons apart. Growing up, we were never far from each other… she was my dearest friend.” Ariane looked down at the grass, gathering dew in the cool of nightfall. “I suppose that might be why I’ve always struggled making friends. I never needed to… I had my sister. Or perhaps it is just me. Grati never had trouble. She was strong, and clever, and funny… You remind me a little of her, I must say.”

Alisaie was silent, waiting, so Ariane continued, “I lost her in the Calamity. Along with our parents.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“We were best friends… but like you and Alphinaud, we weren’t much alike. She was the adventurous one… I was the obedient little mouse with her shoes lined up.” Ariane sighed. “She wanted to be an adventurer. And yet here I am… and she never got the chance. It’s terribly unjust, really. And it’s my fault. It was I who convinced her to stay home, and keep Mother happy. And perhaps if I hadn’t… What I mean to say is, never let anyone shame you for seeking your own path. Not even Alphinaud. He might not understand yet, but he will in time.”

“Thank you.” Alisaie cast a glance at her, drawing her knees up to her chest. “…Don’t blame yourself, for your sister’s choices. I daresay if she’s anything like you describe her, there must have been some part of her, too, that wanted to stay, or you couldn’t have made her. Just as Alphinaud couldn’t have made me, even if he tried.”

“I—thank you,” Ariane said, though she did not quite believe it. She smiled. “I am glad to know you, Alisaie.”

At that, Alisaie smiled too. “And I you, Ariane.”

[elizabethrobertajones]

A Dragoon's Work Is Never Done part... three? four? I did not caption the first in this series with that and so I can't even find it now.

Anyway the important thing is this seemingly completely normal diplomatic mission from Radz-at-Han where the Satrap has brought his sister for Fete Day over to visit the dragons in the other city state perched on a rock with a long history of dragon relations for good or ill. Estinien is refusing to dress up as a diplomat, which he is now when it comes to dragon things, whether he likes it or not. He claims he's just here for the Fete food. G'raha is here because he's glued to Frog and likes witnessing history happening in nice ways.

Day 6: Celebrations | Holidays

Oh, wait the above images were a spot the difference

#I'm so interested in Estinien's and Frog's relationship (platonic) and how he fits into the puzzle now that she and Aymeric are A Thing @lilbittymonster

OKAY this will be unnecessary long to explain why Aymeric is getting so smirky.

So way way way back I did actually ship Estinien and Frog a bit, because I'd done dragoon 50 before HW and was therefore Completely Normal about the Estinien/WoL relationship. But I couldn't quite make it stick in my heart, and for whatever reason despite Estinien actually being, I personally think, the character with the closest bond to the WoL on the deepest levels bar the characters who are literally part of the WoL (you know, like, the 3-5 of them we cram in there), it ended up feeling more like just an unbreakable platonic friend bond. *shrugs* sometimes your heart just decrees stuff.

In Frog Canon this translates to the Stormblood 70 Dragoon quest being a moment where after sharing the dragoon eyeball tether for the first time, Frog and Estinien are riding an absolute high of connection and feeling really good about accomplishing Good Dragoon Things (and the reason I keep captioning Estinien and Frog doing dragon stuff as "work never being done" is them chasing that high again by tying up loose ends like taking Vrtra to visit Hraesvelgr or Middy, or taking Azdaja and Middy out for curry together).

That night on the steppe, they camped out together and shared a drink and the spoils of a hunt, Orn Khai was asleep by the fire. And completely unprompted Frog and Estinien both decided at the same moment to swoop in for a kiss, which lasted roughly 3 seconds and they broke apart like "woah, no, that was weird. We don't need to do that again. Nope. Sorry." and they instead solemnly vowed their friendship, and then laughed about it and decided to take that incident to their graves.

(At this point Frog had no idea Estinien had literally ever had a relationship in his life, never mind having been with Haurchefant as well and technically at the same time as her since Haurche had only nebulously mentioned "other partners"; Estinien did know she had been madly in love with Haurchefant, and Aymeric, who in turn Estinien had his suspicions was madly in love with Frog since like, seeing them interact once even in early HW. So it was a bit of a shock to her but he'd been idly contemplating her place in all this now for a while. But since he, Frog and Aymeric were all technically single or on a break or whatever Estinien thought he was doing while ghosting Aymeric for his own mental health SB > ShB patches, there weren't any of those connections to actually like. Build anything on.)

Fast forward to Endwalker, and I'm fully on the "Ysayle needs to know she won and Estinien has gone full dragonfucker" train, because he and Vrtra are an incredible power couple and it really represents to me a sort of final stop on Estinien needing to come to terms with everything that happened to him ever in his life and having accepted all sides of both the grand scope of history and also his own relationship to dragons, Nidhogg, and relations with dragons. He returns to R-a-H post-EW very very intrigued by what Vrtra wants with him, and they pretty much immediately get together.

I think by this point he's also encountered Aymeric enough times to have started to realise they never really broke up so much as stopped seeing each other, and Aymeric is exactly as devoted to him as he was last time they met, and Estinien only actually feels guilty about avoiding him so long, and mostly because Ishgard itself gives him the heebie jeebies immediately after HW and nothing to do with what Aymeric has done or not. So he's completely ready to resume that and just needs an excuse.

Which of course is Vrtra suggesting gently that there's a valuable connection there for Estinien and for the future of the two cities. AND Frog is on his case about seeing if Vrtra wants to meet the Dravanian dragons. Which he does. And then it only belatedly occurs to him when standing in Ishgard with Aymeric that maybe Frog also was manoeuvring. (I actually credit more G'raha machinations that Frog enacted, if you dig deeper :P)

Aymeric sort of ends up the orbiting twin star to the centre of the Frogicule, since he's the connection to all that and brings this whole side in, and considering all the pining on Frog's side to others, he's really got the more stable side of it all somehow...

She's glad of it because most of why she broke Aymeric's heart in the first place post-HW is because she thought it was cruelly unfair how little time she could spare for him and that he would only be mistreated by her coming in and out of his life at random.

The solution? A SECOND partner who comes in and out of his life at random and has very little tolerance for being in Ishgard! \o/ Between the two of them, maybe they add up to one full time partner?

(cue both of them getting on ships to Tural without consulting each other)

I don't think she goes out of her way to avoid seeing Estinien and Aymeric at the same time or finds it at all uncomfortable (low boundaries between them after all), but also she and Estinien are mutually uninterested in each other romantically and only passingly physically so aren't really interested in anything more than perhaps sharing a bed for platonic sleeping with a nice comfy buffer of Aymeric. It's easier just to enjoy spending time with them doing fun things like hanging out in the Firmament chatting to dragons and eating fair food, then take her catboy and leave. To the catboy's eternal disappointment. (Sorry G'raha, now this post isn't about you and we're talking Estinien today!)

Aymeric is here at this party realising he'd bed literally anyone there including Big!Varshahn (jury out on how he'd take to actual dragonfucking but it's like. A Catholic guilt loophole meeting a dragon who looks like a guy.) I don't think Vrtra and Aymeric are quite ready for anything but the simple fact of his existence is like an accessory that's making Estinien 1000x hotter in Aymeric's eyes I guess. Ser, that's a fellow head of state, please stop objectifying him.

Aymeric can not believe his luck that in a matter of months he's gone from staring forlornly out of a window alone to glancing between his hot girlfriend and his hot boyfriend, and is suddenly thrilled to go down in history as Ishgard's most eligible bachelor (never married, so many close friendships, all his letters and diaries spontaneously combusted on his death, how sad).

... as stated before, I am such a fan of Aymeric being a messy bitch who lives for drama and also is full of Secret Yearning and Weird Thoughts and would do wildly unstable things while projecting an aura of control and calm. Literally who knows if five to ten actual years down the line he and Vrtra end up publically married to unite their countries forever or something, but for now, this is where we're at.

Frog is just happy everyone is happy, and lacking the Ishgardian upbringing had given zero thought to Vrtra as a sex object and actively restricts herself from patting big!Varshahn on the head like he is still tiny. Little-brother-gender dragon snares another big sister. Estinien's love life remains a blissful mystery to her except for occasionally comparing calendars with Aymeric and swerving around the weekends he's blocked off for Estinien.

[disciple-of-frost]

Holy Shit, Oh My God, This Is a Long Ass Lore Post

Alrighty then. Thank you to @hikari-ni-naritai for the absolute plethora of questions. To be honest a lot of these are questions I never really considered before, so I gotta do a bit of digging around in my brain meat.

2.) How did they acquire their Echo?

I never thought of this before, but I now want Ishi to have acquired it after going on her investigation in Kugane to find her parents. She looked/asked around for an Auri couple for what felt like an enternity and one night as she went to sleep after a particularly fruitless day of questioning she had an incredibly vivid dream. A woman's voice, stars raining down from the sky, etc. The next day after walking through the Ijin District she witnessed a Garlean accosting some random passerby and she experienced her first Echo vision. She saw the same Garlean accusing her parents of espionage and took them into custody. The only lead she had after that was that they were taken somewhere called Castrum Abania.

---

3.) Does their Echo function like it does in the MSQ? Or is there a twist to it? 

I think Ishi's Echo would function like the one we have in game for the most part. But, I LOVE the idea that the Echo allows the character to see the different battle mechanics that we, the player, are able to see and that is why our WoL is so hard to beat in combat.

---

5.) Where are they from? What was their childhood like?

Ishi grew up in The Tail Mountains, the home of the Angura tribe, with her mother (Veda), father (Ashish), and step sister (Willow). She was a bit of a know it all and super arrogant when she was little because all of the adults in her life would heap praise on her and call her a child prodigy because of her natural aptitude for magic. After her parents found Willow abandoned and took her in she mellowed out a bit, but was still a bit prideful. She didn't have many friends because of her attitude, but the one friend she did have, Varun, saw the good in her and he was the only person she could be completely vulnerable around.

 ---

7.) How did they deal with Haurchefant’s death? 

.:Stars Align:. Ishi didn't personally know him that well. The only frame of reference she had for his character was through U'tala and how his death impacted her.

.:Diamond Aegis:. Ishi thought of him like another brother, very similar to Varun, both men being very bubbly and their strong willingness to defend the innocent. When he died she was devastated, but she didn't have time to mourn him properly so she was fairly cold and distant, she cut herself off from her emotions to an extant in order to continue on with the pursuit of Thordan.

---

11.) Were they more sympathetic to the dragons, Ishgardians, neither or both? 

100% sympathetic to the dragons. In my .:Stars Align:. timeline she straight up joined the heretics because Ysayle showed her the truth to the Holy See's transgressions. Though she did come to the conclusion that it was wrong that the innocents of Ishgard were going to be the ones to pay for the consequences of their ancestors deeds and that the Church was content with that if it meant Thordan stayed the Arch Bishop.

---

13.) Are they close with any of the other Scions? Who do they get along with the best? 

Ishi get's along with basically all of the Scions, but she is closest to Y'shtola, G'raha, and Alisaie. Y'shtola she sees as an academic rival and love's having intellectual conversation with her. G'raha is her platonic soulmate, they bring out best in each other. Alisaie is her pupil, in my canon Ishi was the one to teach her Red Magic, with X'rhun's help of course, put Ishi was her primary teacher.

---

17.) Who is their favorite Alliance leader? Who do they get along with the best out of them? 

I'm just gonna say that anytime I see Aymeric pop up on screen I act like a giddy school girl and leave it at that.

---

19.) What do they think of the Heaven’s Ward? 

Bastards, the lot of them. Thordan's perosnal goon squad and nothing more.

---

23.) Are there any side quest storylines that you’re particularly fond of or think of as being canon to your WoL’s experiences? 

The Hildebrand Quests are all canon for Ishi. I used to be of the opinion that the quests were too silly, but my partner and I did them all together and I was able to see the heart in them and have fun with the silliness.

---

29.) Did your WoL suspect anything was amiss with Urianger or the Crystal Exarch? Did they feel betrayed? Upset? When the truth finally emerged? 

She believed Urianger up until she overheard the argument between him and Y'shtola, if Y'shtola was able to tell something was off then it warranted concern. She even opened the door and joined in on the conversation too, if this concerned her safety and the safety of the group then she felt she should be privy to any information Urianger had.

The Exarch was a little more complicated, though Ishi did have her suspicions that he was in fact G'raha Tia she didn't push him on the matter. Hells, the last time they interacted she didn't even know if G'raha saw her as anything more than a work colleague or that he cared enough about her to keep secrets from her. So her initial interactions with him were very professional, but through his actions she could see that The Exarch was a genuinely good person. When she saw that she was right about The Exarch and G'raha being the same person it initially hurt, this person she cared about lied about who he was so she wouldn't try to stop him from killing himself to save everyone, to save people he would never get the chance to know.

---

31.) What were their first impressions of Hien? 

Ishi thought Hien was going to be another super serious noble who only cared about his royal duty, but seeing his warmth, kindness, and playful banter with Yugiri and Gosetsu made her reconsider that stance.

[eemamminy-art]

for the how hot ask game: Ysayle, if you haven't gotten one already?

Not My Type | Alright | Cute | Adorable | Pretty | Gorgeous | LORD HAVE MERCY

I think she's just stunning, she has these like really large pores on her cheeks?? And there's something about the way her nose bridge blends into her cheeks that looks like little lines, I love it so much

Half tempted to put little red lines showing what I mean.. I hope you can see it 😂 I love to exaggerate it in my art though, it's such a charm point!

Possibly surprising, possibly not, but before I got back into ffxiv so majorly, I had actually played ARR and HW during their launches but took a long break before coming back in 2018 and having it take over my life. At that time we all know that the elf boys got me in their grip BUT before that, when I was just doing the ARR patches as they came out, I was obsessed with Ysayle (and Yugiri too but that's another matter) ahaha the last thing I did in msq before unsubbing for 3 years was go on the little roadtrip with Ysayle and I was SO excited for what may come of it

It feels so long ago now both in real time and in terms of the story, but whenever I replay those parts I feel that excitement again :3 of like, who is she, what is her story, what is this secret she wants to tell me-- even though I know the answers to all of those questions.

Maybe running a bit off topic just from what I like in her appearance, but she's just a character I really enjoy but I don't talk about her too much these days!

[jefarawol]

“Why don't you tell us what happened after you left us in Azys Lla?” Alphinaud asked, his face full of concern and trepidation, she could see he was eager to learn the truth of Estinien’s fate, as painful as it would be for her to recount it.

“Alright, after…” She struggled for a moment, unable to say the name she had been avoiding. “Estinien gave me the eye, I went through the teleporter. It took me over to the gamma quadrant, almost as soon as I stepped off Midgardsomr came to me.” There was a collective mumbling around the room, not a single person had known of her covenant, the only soul she had told had been Minfilia. “Midgardsormr? How?” Thancred was the one able to voice the question. She sighed, the time finally arriving to come clean. “I guess there's no point hiding it now.” she began. “But I had been traveling with Midgardsomr for some time at that point. Ever since I confronted him on the wreckage of the Agrius and he stripped my blessing of light.” “He what?” Alphinaud stared at her incredulously, “How could he do such a thing!?” “Of course, that's when your eyes changed back…” pondered Y’shtola, Jefara nodded at her correct assumption. “You said it was nothing to worry about but Minfilia assured us it was just your power settling. Why would he take it from you?”

“To test me. He thought it took too much from the grace she gave me. If I was to fight, I would do so alone.” She took a steadying breath as the air seemed to thicken around her. “Since we came here, I began to break through, restoring my crystals of light much like I had done when I had earnt her blessing in the beginning.” 

She began to list them, remembering each one as she did.

“Our parlay with Ysayle, slaying Tioman, then Nidhogg, Bismarck and then when we retrieved the book from the Gubal Library.”

“That's five, there were six no?” Alphinaud questioned, she could see he too was recalling the journey they had taken. She nodded again before continuing. “The last happened on the gamma quadrant, unsealed by a mere conversation with the creature who lived and suffered in that place: Tiamat.” Silence fell over them all. “Another of Midgardsomrs seven sired. The mate of Bahamut, chained and enslaved by allagans following the summoning of his primal form. That's why he had come to me, to speak to her and learn from her. To hear what her grief and sorrow had turned her into.”

She could feel the tears in her eyes threaten as she remembered Tiamat’s words, how she had wished not to feel the eternal heartache of losing one you loved to darkness. Now she did know.

“With my blessing restored, our covenant was broken and upon his back I flew to the flagship and into the Research facility.”

“All that time a dragon was living in Ishgard?” She could hear the disbelief in Artoirel's voice. “In a sense, yes,” she confirmed. “Bound to my soul watching and observing our deeds when needed.” She dared to glance around the room at them all. Aymeric and Edmont both masked themselves well, their faces unreadable, well practiced in keeping their emotions in check.

Her fellow Scions all looked wide eyed and her apa took in the tale with deep breaths unsure of how to handle the incredible journey his child had walked thus far. “Where was I?” “The Flagship.” Alphinaud supplied helpfully. “Right,” she took another breath. “First I encountered Reguls van Hydra who fled again after battle. They had been unsuccessful in chasing down the Archbishop but I kept going, until I reached the centre reactor.” Again she felt the tension rising as she reached what everyone was anxious to hear. “But it wasn't the Archbishop I found.” They were all silent. “It was the Ascian I encountered after Bismark, Igeyorhm. And she wasn’t alone.” “Lahabrea…” Thancred’s voice growled as he said the name, she knew it was not easy for him to speak of his time under the Ascians influence, but she hoped he might find some closure to what she would say next. “They're dead.” There was a small gasp from Alphinaud. “Permanently.”

  “I fought against them.” She spoke directly to Thancred, his attention trained fervently on her. “They fused together into what they called Ascian Prime and when the battle was won in my favour, I was able to seal Igeyorhm with the white auracite. The one Urianger had found in Moenbryda’s possessions and then I shattered it with the power of Nidhogg’s eye.”

“But you had only one auracite,” Y’shtola mused. “So how did-?” Tataru wondered beside her.

“Well, before either of us could ponder our next move. The Archbishop and the Heavensward made their appearance.” She turned her gaze now to Aymeric. “Carrying a coffin between them. Inside was the preserved body of Ser Haldrath, the first Azure dragoon.” “Preserved how?” Barham asked, looking up from his hands.

“With the other of Nidhogg’s Eyes.” She paused again and steeled herself. “The Archbishop took it, its aether source infused with a thousand years of ishgardians prayers-” “No…” Aymeric cut in, as realization dawned on him. “It’s not possible.” “He became a primal!?” Y’shtola gasped, reaching the same conclusion. “Yes.” A single tear dropped from her eyes. “And he struck Lahabrea out of existence without a trap.” She could feel her resolve wavering, but there was still much to be said, she pressed on knowing if she stopped now she may never find the courage to keep going. “He said he was going to end the war. The war Estinien and I had already ended. Innocent lives, not just Ishgardian but Dravanian too were nothing to him. He knew I would fight. And so he bid me follow.” She felt the pressure crushing her now, words were becoming a struggle, 

“That's when Estinien caught up with me.” She took a shuddering breath. “How he made it to the flag ship I don't know but that's not important.” 

“Together we chased down the Archbishop and the Heavensward, all of them taken by their own primal forms. The ones we had seen in the Vault. They all fell to us. Every single one. And when it was all over only one remained alive barely clinging to life…”

[abimee]

same anon as the stew ask - i forgot to mention this but your tags about fat really reminded me just how much i love love love your depiction of nophica. I love the way you draw skin and fat, your drawing of ysayle (i forget if it was her or someone else but the point still stands) with acne almost made me cry with happiness when I first saw it. Please keep doing what makes you happy and I hope you can continue to find love in the act of creation. I was surprised to hear that you once got told that your work was depressing but more over I'm so happy for you that you're finally reaching a point in your creative journey that you can be proud and happy of. Thank you for sharing what you make with us.

oh yar it was pretty common in both my fanfiction and art to get told that but admittedly i do think i wasnt really drawing anything of substance besides vague sad thoughts and emotions i was having in highschool LOL

like looking back on it i cant blame people for extrapolating the Bad Emotions from the stuff i made even when the piece wasnt about that cause i was in like, a really bad spot constantly but it being the only thing i heard was definitely something people could've lighten up about cause i was also just trying to draw fanart and live in peace but even my friends from back then told me such and its like GOT DAMN (ITS REALLY FUNNY NOW)

but i am really happy to know that im at least a little more well enough that that has stopped being prominant in my art and that people get good fuzzy emotions AND IM HAPPY that i can finally make ''the art'' i want..... i can never really describe how i felt held back in a way i didnt know of back then but i really do think it was because the artists around me just never Talked or Made an effort to draw things in their art like acne and such, and since i had no way of learning about art besides by listening to big artists back then i never Thought i could do that, or i thought people wouldn't like my art if i did that that i even refused to draw features I Had (i even remember once trying to hide that i started forming acne as a teen because i was so hyperaware of being seen as unsightly on the internet for it after having smooth skin and that was rough. ROUGH) so the fact that now what i once feared of ''what if people are rude about the way i draw people'' is entirely flipped upside down to ''people really love the way i draw characters'' i think also helped me get out of my shell of insecurity with my own art and actually Enjoy drawing because i feel like i can really express something

thats a lot of rambling but what im trying to say it is from viewers like you that my art has made it where it is today and i wouldnt have developed how i have and with the love i have in creating without it so [pbs channel voice] Thank You..... im hanging this one up on my fridge as well

[xiv-wolfram]

Drowning - Comic Script

Stormblood patch 4.1

Wolfram is at a low point, but an old friend is there to help.

TW: depression, suicide, alcoholism, brief gore

Wolfram Saga Comics (Chronological)

This is the script for a future comic. Posting for those who don’t want to wait to get the story. Numbers indicate frame number. A/B mean a frame is split.

Part 1

Wolf in the ruins of his village in The Fringes, just south of Schism, pacing. Asuna (his chocobo) is nearby, wearing a saddle bag, pecking at some weeds.  Narrator - "This is one of the few comics that you *really* need to be familiar with Wolfram’s major plot points up until now to understand. So for those that are - Wolfram has just left Raubahn sobbing on the roof of the Menagerie in Ala Mhigo after Rau confessed his love for him and, with a lot of internal struggle, Wolf rejected his friend's advances. He did what he thought was best for him without giving him a choice in the matter. Now Wolfram finds himself wandering in the ruins of his home town in The Fringes.”

Wolf looks miserable, tears in his eyes as he glances around at the destruction he caused 19 years ago - “If I have to feel this… I may as well feel all of it. Tis a good time to drown.” Dark Thought - ‘Drown? You’re so dramatic. Why don’t you *drown* your feelings with booze like you usually do? You cried the entire flight here - normally you’d have gotten rid of me by now.’

A) Wolf pacing around the ruins, pitiful expression, tears falling down face - “Because I deserve this…*I deserve to feel this*. He was *devastated*. I’m *devastated* too. Having to tell the love of my life - who I thought was lost to me - that we cannot be together was the hardest thing I’ve ever done." B) Wolf pacing - "And godsdammit if I have to mourn him I may as well mourn my family as well… really think about what I did. Why do I keep hurting those I love?” Dark Thought - ‘I’ve said it all along Wolfram - you’re a monster. Just as much as me if not more. You hurt those you claim to love. You lie to them all. You kill…far more than what I did here. The Garlean lives you've taken could easily fill this village 5 times over.’

Wolf sits on the ground, leaning against a ruined wall, tears falling down his face as he looks at the sky - “I ruin everything… everyone I care about. It’s as if my very existence causes pain. My family… this town. All the friends I’ve lost along the way - Moen, Harchefaunt, Ysayle, Minfillia. Poor Krile…she still can’t talk about what they did to her. Many other allies as well… Far too many close encounters. It’s only a matter of time before I get the other Scions killed.” Dark Thought - ‘Beating yourself up like this - Are you just going to do my job for me?!’

Wolf sniffles, worried expression - “Apparently so…And of course I keep hurting him. Once he’d told me what Ilberd did to him in their youth, so much about him made sense to me. Thrice damn me - I know how hard that was for Rau… to kiss me. And then to tell me how he felt even after I didn’t return the affection. I know that my answer hurt him more deeply than he’d ever let on… he must think me so incredibly cruel…” Dark Thought - 'Well, that *was* incredibly cruel. Surely he hates you now.'

Wolf crying into his hand *muffled sobs*. Dark Thought - ‘You know what the worst thing is - the absolute worst thing about you? It is that you would choose to lose them all over again, simply for another moment with him.’

Wolf surprised, looking at the ground - “N-no! No I wouldn’t! Seven hells, why would you say that?!” Dark Thought - ‘You said there is no cause on this star worth losing him for - and you meant it. For a moment you scared yourself because you knew you'd spoken from your heart. And that - my pathetic friend - makes you a truly selfish, evil bastard. Just like me.’

Lighter tears, worried expression - “No… no that's not what I meant. I didn’t - “ Dark Thought - ‘Yes you did. Yet despite being perfectly willing to let the star burn for him - you rejected him and left him sobbing on a rooftop without even telling him that you love him too.’

Wolf annoyed - “That’s because of *you*! I can’t be with him because of *you*! You evil prick!” Dark Thought - ‘Oh but you could. If you really wanted to, you'd find a way. But you won’t even entertain the idea because deep down you want him to suffer. You want him to suffer for leaving you first.’

Wolf brings his legs up to his chest, crossing his arms and resting himself on his knees, lost expression, more tears forming - “No - I left because he was upset and I was the reason. Didn’t leaving make him feel better? Suppose I don't’ have a way to know. Anyroad, I’ve forgiven him for the past. He had every right to kick me out for lying to him all those years ago.”

A) Wolf stands, pacing, frustrated - “And I lied about *you*. About my family! Who - by the way I should be thinking about right now. Not what a shit person I am talking out loud to a -” B) Wolf surprised. Dark Thought - 'Ah, finally noticed did you? You can’t even control yourself, how do you think you can control me?'

A) Wolf surprised. Thought - ‘I…I can’t.’ B) Wolf glances over at his saddlebag, defeated frown. Thought - ‘This was a foolish idea… I should never have tried to let myself feel this. No - I’m done with feelings. Done with pain. Done with you.’

Wolf walking over to Asuna. She tilts her head - "Kweh?"(concerned)

Wolf pats Asuna. Smiles sadly - ‘Not much longer… I’ll be free soon.'

Wolf looks determined, reaching into his saddlebag. Thought - 'And this time I’ve a mind to stay that way…’

Part 2

Wolf standing on the rocky area above the falls in the middle of the river near his village. Hands resting at his sides, looking out at the landscape of The Fringes with a peaceful smile on his face. 

A) He turns his head to look behind him. B) Turns around fully, beams - "Oh! I haven't had this dream in a while…It's nice to see you again."

Ysayle stands before him with her hair up, wearing a flowing light blue gown. She smirks - "Oh my dear friend… when will you trust that I am not a dream? I simply find it easier to visit you here than the material plane."

Wolf embraces her, beaming - "It matters not what you are…I've missed you terribly, Ysayle."

A) Ysayle beams, holding him back - "And I, you." B) She pulls back, smiling sadly, looking into his eyes - "Now tell me - why are we here?”

Another zoomed out shot, focused on the falls. They’re standing apart. Ysayle - “If I recall… this place was significant to you.”

Wolf looks at the ground guiltily. Smiling uncomfortably - “Aye, it is. …after I had summoned the hellhound, once I’d regained my mind… I walked through the village, stinking with the shredded carcasses of my family and friends. I knew I could not let that happen again. This was where I came to end my life…“

Ysayle smiles sadly, gently guiding his face back up to look her in the eyes - “And why are we here once more?”

Wolf sighs, worried expression - “I can only assume… because I feel similarly to that night. You… you’ve seen everything, correct?”

Ysayle smiles comfortingly - “Yes, my friend. I have observed your recent struggle. Know that I do not mean to intrude - merely that watching is what I have been tasked with and there is little else to do here.”

Wolf smiles warmly - “Worry not. I trust you with my present as I did my past. You understand me in a way no one else can. Hells, it’s almost a comfort to know you’re watching…provided this is more than a dream.”

She laughs - “Of course. I would be concerned if you didn’t question my existence… So - back to the task at hand.”

Ysayle smiles sadly - “I am sorry about what happened with your beloved. I am not here to say what you should have done in the moment but to caution you - do not let this consume you. The darkness within you feeds on your suffering, as you well know. You must continue. You must survive.” Wolf confused - “Why… why must I continue? What is this life if not struggle and pain?”

Ysayle holds him close, resting her head against his chest - “When my world had been shattered. Everything I believed to be true - gone. My ideals dust in the wind - you embraced me. You comforted me and told me not to lose faith. You helped me to survive that moment Wolfram - and so I’m here to do the same for you.”

He puts his arms around her, smiling sadly - “Aye… but for you your fight, your purpose, it was not over. The war continued. You had that to hold on to.”

Wolf beams - “And besides - you are a beautiful soul. Someone who saw allies in those you were told to hate. Who wanted a better life for her people and fought to get it. Because of you Ishgard is freeing itself from the sins of the past. Dravania are once again allies. The war would not have ended were it not for your sacrifice. You were right to continue.”

Ysayle steps back, smiling sadly - “And yet… I think of myself as Lady Iceheart. I look back on my deeds and remember the innocence my negligence took. The attack on the bridge. Men transformed, unable to return to their old life. The path to peace was paved in blood.”

Wolf worried - “Ysayle…” Ysayle smiles - “Worry not - I am trying to view myself differently. It will take time but I am determined. And so I must give you the same advice.”

Ysayle grinning - “Where I am… I see not one future but many. I cannot divulge too much at this time. Each path I see ahead of you - provided you survive to take it - those paths are *extremely interesting*.”

Wolf laughs - “Interesting? You want me to stay around for my own entertainment? Simply to see what happens next?”

She grins - “You’ve said it yourself - I understand you. So yes - I know that is the motivation you need. At your core you are curious. So live. Live for the next person you can save, the next mystery, the next battle, the next breathtaking landscape, the next calamity to thwart.”

A) Wolf chuckles, wiping a tear from his eye - “That is wonderfully simplistic.” B) Wolf smiles - “So you’re saying the fight isn’t over? That I’m still needed?”

Ysayle beams and holds his arm comfortingly - “Yes. In every future I’ve seen - your role is larger than you can imagine. So yes - you will suffer, as does everyone. Yet you will also see unimaginable beauty. The pain will be balanced with pleasure. You will feel anger but you will also feel joy. Do not give up. You are needed for the struggle ahead.”

Wolf tears up, beaming - “Thank you, my dear friend… truly. Thank you.”

She gives him another hug, smiling - “In the meantime… when things are difficult there is something you must do.”

They separate. Wolf curious - “Alright…” Ysayle looks serious - “Do NOT listen to that separate voice within you. You must quiet it completely for a time. And you already know how to do that. It will not be forever. You will get past this grief just as you got past it before. That voice is simply not something you can handle right now.”

Wolf looks at the ground and nods. “I see.” Ysayle smiles - “And Wolf, you need people to talk to. I cannot visit you often. Nor can Raubahn be your confidant. It's not fair to either of you. There are others in your life that you love and who love you back. Please - trust them. Let them into your heart and they will help you to survive so that you may save countless others."

Wolf grins - “Alright then Ysayle…I will do as you say. I trust you completely - be you ghost, guardian, or a figment of my imagination.” Ysayle ponders. Thought - ‘I wonder if that’s why she chose me… hmm.’

Ysayle beams up at him - “I must leave now my friend, you will wake soon. Remember my words - and do whatever it takes to survive.”

Wolf beams, kissing her forehead.

A) Wolf waking up groggily. Blinks. B) Zoom out shot. He's passed out in the village ruins with a bottle in his hand. Off frame - "KWEH!"(urgent)

Asuna is fighting off an antlion.

A) Wolf worried - "Fuck!" B) A chakram lodges into the antlion's skull.

Wolf has one boot on the antlion's skull, pulling the chakrams out of the carcass with effort. Asuna facing away from him, head up, eyes closed - "Kweh!"(disapproving)

A) Wolf, standing back up, looking guilty - "I'm sorry! Thank you for protecting me." B) He pets her on the beak. Asuna - "Kweh!"(forgiving)

A) Wolf drinking from a bottle standing next to Asuna's saddle bag. B) Asuna looking at him. - "Kweh!"(concerned) Wolf points at her humorously, eyebrow raised - "Hey, don't you judge me ma'am. I said I was done listening to that bastard."

Wolfram Saga Comics (Chronological)

[motheatenscarf]

Okay, I'm at the point where I need to do a trial in order to progress the story and I'm a tank, so I'll actually have to watch a video for that, so I took a day off to parse my thoughts on things that WEREN'T unspeakable goddamn tragedies.

I will also post thoughts on the tragedy, but later. I want to see the consequences of this loss in the narrative play out first before making a value judgment, but so far I am already leaning towards "good story beat, actually emotionally impacted me and the characters in text and was thematically appropriate."

For non-tragedy thoughts, I'm just going through screenshots and gonna post my thoughts in order based on what I clearly thought was worth screenshotting;

Okay, I already talked about how I came around on Estinien, but I also really like Ysayle. I love that she earns the name "Lady Iceheart" but is the most emotionally driven character so far in her desire for peace and believes that she's the reincarnated soul of this ancient dragon's old flame. Quite the blow to realize she isn't that and this guy doesn't recognize or care about her and that she just summoned up a primal based on her own desperate beliefs. WOOF. That's a good character arc. I want to see where she goes from there.

Also the fact that she just loves Moogles because they're adorable and makes a comment like "My heart is aflutter from mere... fluffiness??" and like, girl, same, they're so cute.

Another interaction I liked from the Moogles was when Alphinaud got mad at them for making his trial of worthiness just be the chores none of them wanted to do. He got so pissed he went and said something like, "I don't know what a 'kupo nut' is but I know they use it for currency and I've half a mind to demand some for the work I just did!" and, YOU GET EM, SWEETIE! We'll make a lil pinko out of you yet, demand compensation for your labor, work to rule, honey! I'm so proud of him!!

And another fun Alphinaud moment was when he said, in the fanciest little lad way possible, "Last one to finish their job is a rotten egg!"

And speaking of babies, Nanamo's okay! I've actually got mixed feelings on that.

On the one hand, I really like Nanamo and I fucking love Raubahn, I'm full on going to switch my faction allegiance to the Immortal Flames once I max out rep in the Malestrom, but man. The MOST exciting part of the end of ARR was when they shifted the status quo that hard! I grant you the scions are still missing and we still had to retreat to Ishgard to seek new allies, but man, handwaving it so that things can more or less go back to the way they were before kinda sucks.

I was EXCITED for that change! I'm of course glad that Ruabahn is okay and gets to keep being surrounded by tiny adorable lalafel, and I really liked Nanamo and her struggle to figure out how to help her people was compelling, but man... idk... I feel like there was more to be explored with that Ul'dah crew on the run and the city in chaos that had a lot of potential we never got to see :T

This is a relatively minor complaint, of course, the stuff with Isghard is certainly gripping enough. I'm fine if Raubahn only ever gets to be that gif of the drunk girls with the puppies when it comes to keeping all of the itty bitty babies in his life safe

Final thought, UH, they kinda dropped a bomb on me that apparently half-elves exist in this world???

I .... I mean, one would assume it was possible, but we haven't seen any until now, despite there being plenty of instances of inter-species relationships that it actually raises MORE questions than it answers. Even if Dragon Age is a copout answer, it at least means they don't have to program unique models to make all children between elves and humans just humans. It means the same of probably other pairings as well, but if you put half-elves in a setting, it BEGS the question, okay, what do mixed heritages look like across the board? And namely, uh, where are all the others? I refuse to believe that this Hilda woman is special, if there is ONE thing I know about humans and elves in any given setting it's that you can't leave them alone for 5 goddamn minutes together without drowning in half-elves. Also, the others, huh? Where are the human/au-ra babies? Where are the Au-Ra/Elezen babies? I know people be fucking these anime uwu catboys and catgirls, where are the lanky elf-cats and scaley dragon cats?!

My brother actually pointed out a very real possibility that if we have humans, and we have hrothgar..... maybe that is where miqo'te came from in the first place, which begs the question of like, okay, if you can have a half and half baby of mixed heritage, what happens if that baby has babies with a third entirely different option?

You cannot introduce this element so cavalierly and then kill my goddamn elf husband and expect me to forget, I WON'T FORGET THE HALF-ELVES THAT COULD HAVE BEEN, FF14, YOU WILL ANSWER ME!

[wirewitchviolet]

The Entire Plot of Final Fantasy 14, with all the expansions, and some serious analysis of how good it actually is. (Part 4 - Post-Heavensward)

At this point my schedule for posting these is mainly limited by how rare the windows are where Tumblr will let me hit the “new post” button. Hopefully the congestion clears up soon.

Last time, we got through the end of Heavensward. A story about awful fantasy-catholic blueblooded aristocrats letting their own people starve to death while pursing a genocidal war against some real chill dragons that technically has you helping the terrible people for most of it, but at least you get to kill the pope. Which of course means now Ishgard is going to stop being a horrible place full of terrible bigots, right?

Post-Heavensward

Oh no of course not! The main structural thread of this interim of free patch content is you having to babysit this uneasy peace you mostly established and make sure none of these terrible people mess it up. Or, you know, the big dragon who was the primary aggressor in this thousands-of-years-long war who went ahead and possessed the guy who killed him because for real Estinien what did you think was going to happen when you held both eyes at the same time? Honestly.

There’s a whole bit with someone commissioning a giant version of this mural from Ysayle’s little underground dragon church of the original actual Shiva and Hraesvelgr falling in love to hang outside the gates of the city which I swear is all framed perfectly for all kinds of video edit jokes, possessed Estinein flying in and really starting crap. At one point while having kind of a party someone slips something into the protagonist’s drink before getting a riot started and hey, Warrior of Light, this is the second time that’s happened, maybe lay off wine in the future. Church loyalists don’t like that you killed the pope and exposed their whole everything as a lie, some people still hate dragons, someone tries to assassinate Aymeric, things get pretty damn awful and it largely comes to a head with some jerk flinging a small child off her roof who only survives because one of your chillest of dragon pals just happened to be heading over to maybe have a chat. Ends up being a real good PR moment for team dragon when she catches the kid.

As is usual with this stuff there’s a lot of plot threads running in parallel as we had episodic updates when this first all came out, but this particular topic doesn’t stretch on too much longer, culminating of course with possessed Estinein who has the eyes fused to his armor looking kinda like Nightmare from Soul Calibur and when you fight him he’s flipping between this and a full on dragon form.

Hraesvelgr shows up to help with this mess because seriously, Hraesvelgr is a solid pal. We get some dragon on dragon fighting that doesn’t go super well for the big H, but turns out that’s because his ace in the hole is letting you borrow his eye that was already out and loose and all. So you have your big satisfying one on one (well, 8 on 1, but the plot always pretends those other party members don’t exist) boss fight, then you and Alphinaud tackle him so you can just pry those freaking eyes off his armor and toss them into the massive imposing ravine you’re fighting over. They’re stuck in there pretty good though, and the only way you get them out is with the help of the ghost of Ysayle showing up. Whole band’s back together! Hauchefant’s ghost is here helping too, but I’m sorry, he just did not leave the impression on me the writers figured he would.

Estinein is fine, of course. Again, he’s all tied in with the Dragoon job quests. In fact, when you’re stuck in the boss arena with him in dragon form waiting on party recruitment, you can totally slip out, head to the next town over, advance some Dragoon quest stuff and spar with him a bit before the main event. Stuff like that amuses me. Anyway, this whole confrontation honestly is a very good scene. Someone should really take notes at how much better all this works when you have nice unambiguously good characters not only fighting some evil jerk but actively trying to save people they care about than wannabe Game of Thrones morally grey political stuff and shadowy robed figures with ambiguous goals whispering in people’s ears. And apparently someone is. My understanding is there was a big shift in the writing staff after this expansion and the grimdark folks kinda take a back seat while the woman who wrote the real standouts of the Rogue’s Guild and Dark Knight quest lines got tapped to write the better half of the next expansion and basically everyone for The Good One.

Estinein also finally takes off his busted blood-drenched edgy armor after this, and probably takes like his first bath ever, happy that his militant badass role is no longer needed and he has friends who take care of him. Which is nice but I can’t get over how wrong he looks without the helmet. I know he’s an elf but this semi-femme look is just weird for the guy always pulling the giant eyes out at meetings.

The next major story hook we have going on, which again is pretty intertwined with this one, is that all the less friendly monster folk kinda went and took advantage of your back being turned and started summoning their gods again. Canonically this is like the fourth or fifth time you’ve had to deal with this in some cases, because there is generally some plot justification for having the hard mode versions of those fights crop up (as opposed to the hard mode versions of non-summoned-god boss fights, which are rationalized by there being this bad hanging around who comes up with extra embellished versions of your exploits and then those go into the boss fight a la carte menu).

Hey, didn’t you used to have a whole party of friends whose whole deal was keeping tabs on exactly this sort of thing? Really is high time to get that band together too. Alphinaud has been with you the whole time, getting like half the dialog in the expansion. Y’shtola you dragged out of teleport limbo earlier. Urianger just never left your original base of operations because books are hard to move, you just haven’t checked in (past starting optional boss refight questlines) because who wants to spend time with Urianger? Papalymo and Yda are missing, but we get cutaways now and then showing them hanging out behind enemy lines doing resistance stuff. That still leaves Minfilia and Thancred. Thancred you know made it out because his scuzzy barfly pseudo-spy instincts kicked in and he got out from The Incident early but he’s been way off the grid. To help track him down, you get a little assistance from Matoya eventually, but also from that friend Minfilia’s been trying to invite to join the party since a half-audible phonecall near the climax of the base game, who’s been waylaid since by stuff like the empire full on destroying the island she was living on, Krile. Yes like, from FF5 Krile, has a grandfather named Galuf and everything... and wait where the hell is this line from? This has to be an edit, right?

Aside from being a walking FF5 reference, a big nerd all your nerd friends know from nerd school, and the owner of this custom-made catgirl hoodie, Krile is on that list of Lalafel I can count on one hand who aren’t Just The Worst. Another is Rauban’s adopted son who I think gets introduced around here somewhere. Anyway her and Matoya work out where Thancred’s been hiding. He also headed way up north you just never bumped into him, and he’s had eyes on this odd situation where while in particular the bug hivemind is getting their god up and running again and you show up to do your thing, this other goup of people come out of nowhere and killsteal him.

They introduce themselves as the Warriors of Darkness. Their whole deal is that they WERE the world-saving heroes of an alternate universe, but they claim they saved it a bit too hard, setting off an apocalypse where the whole balance of light and darkness tipped way too hard towards light and now this wave of holy radiance is just gradually glassing their whole world. They came here because one of those Ascian losers taught them the whole die and have your soul head off somewhere else trick, and put it into their heads that they can avert this apocalypse by coming here and scoring enough points for team darkness to screw your world over or kill your plot immunity crystal goddess or some such, but first they need to grind some god refights to power up and presumably recharge their personal metaphysical Zelda crystal chamber progression rooms, like you had to do during Heavensward and maybe spilling into Stormblood? I don’t recall when they all come back online.

The other thing with these guys is you’ve kinda seen them before, sort of, presumably, if you let the whole intro play out in the base game. There’s the whole bit where we see that end of 1.0 apocalyptic scene play out, then these five teleporting into the woods somewhere. The implication was clearly supposed to be that this is a party of 1.0 characters showing up unscathed afterwards but... no we are totally retconning it. This is a group of dimension hoppers party crashing. Actual 1.0 survivors had to start over at level 1 with no gear and nothing to show for it but those 1.0 veteran neck tattoos I’ve seen in the wild all of one time.

This gets real confusing real quick though, because the intro movies for every expansion have a pre-rendered stand-in for your character who looks more or less exactly like the guy in the middle. Also I’m pretty sure what you look like if you just mash through character creation without changing anything from its default postion. Also that central primary actually-took-the-Warrior-job Warrior of Darkness in particular kind of is canonically your sort-of-twin/counterpart from another dimension and I figure the only reason he isn’t actually just straight up given a copy of your character model is he has a ton of voiced lines and they’d sound weird coming from whatever you actually look like. Still super confusing though that when you first see this guy in the intro you incorrectly figure that’s you, and then in all the other intros when you do see you, you might think you’re seeing this guy now that you’ve met him. It’s also weird that they all summon chocobos in hindsight, but whatever we’re retconning an old cutscene now and that oddity only becomes odd in the expansion where we see where these people came from, still several years off.

So, they suck, and go around doing their thing while you’re dealing with other things. Thancred swoops in to help you out when you first meet them, and then later since he’s keeping tabs swoops in when they happen across Allisae when she’s just minding her own business/still waiting for you to find a party for that Bahamut raid already and take her down with a poisoned arrow that almost kills her. Trying to recall if that’s one of the several times when someone mistakes her for Alphinaud or vice versa. There’s definitely one of those the first time she meets Estinein which is pretty great.

There’s also a whole bit where we get cutaways to the Warriors of Darkness having planning sessions with a mysterious shadowy figure that is just so very clearly Urianger. Like that’s a really distinctive beard and also literally not one other person in the entire world talks like that. It doesn’t turn out that Urianger is secretly evil though, just... really curious about their whole backstory and all the interesting cosmology it brings in and stuff. Plus you know, they are trying to save their world from an apocalypse, that’s worth trying to help with, just not with the plan they’re going for. But also like, hey, Urianger, you’re hanging out having chats with an Ascian, that’s never a good plan.

Allisae tags along after getting pretty plainly pulled into this mess, and she’s honestly a pretty cool no nonsense hothead type which balances out all these academic nerds some. She’s around when you meet this tiny little kobold kid freaked out because the local priest is going to sacrifice his parents to summon Titan again, and you show up uh... between the part where he killed this kid’s parents and the summoning bit. The kid’s pretty traumatized by this, and in begging for his parents back, kinda ends up, you know, summoning Titan. Who does not bring his parents back. That is explicitly a thing gods can’t do (at least if you don’t want soulless zombie-like husks of people, they can swing that). But only hackney writing can truly bring back the dead. Interesting side note here, you have to fight Titan again, but it’s not a new fight? It’s just, like, “to proceed with the story please bring up medium difficulty Titan and knock that out real quick.” Weirdest thing. Anyway at the end of this we just have this SUPER traumatized to the point of catatonia kobold kid and Allisae is super invested in his eventual recovery and it’s kind of the defining moment for her character and pays off nicely later.

There’s a lot of lore dumping associated with all this and honestly none of it fits in super well with what’s previously been established about cyclical apocalypses and it all gets retconned pretty hard again the next time it’s relevant and that revison is way better world building than “wow those evil manipulative Ascians sure are trying to make this party of noble* heroes do evil stuff to plunge the whole world into darkness” business.

* I am just never going to be able to let the whole deadly poison in an arrow fired at a random civilian thing go. There’s really no justifying that and it directly conflicts with everything they try to do with these characters later.

Anyway turns out Minfilia’s dead. Kinda. It’s complicated. To work out what’s up with her you have to go bother poor Matoya again and check out the upside down tower in her closet I accidentally mentioned too early. Which arbitrarily ends by the way with a fight against Calcabrina, that really memorable creepy doll fight from FF4. Sadly you can’t skip the big boss by killing all 6 little dolls at once here. So, your personal goddess Hydaelyn has been having connectivity issues for a while (again, this is why you needed an immunization booster in the form of a soul pact with Midgardsomnr, who still pops up to chat here and there and also manifested a cooler mount form for Azys Lla touring). So... when Minfilia was kind of just adrift in the lifestream there with Y’shtola, she kinda went “hey can I like hollow out your body to use as a mouthpiece for talking to the protagonist? It’d really help me out” and not having any sort of actual personality Minfilia agreed. She’s kinda still in there but, yeah. Also like I already assumed, just because this game is so very diligent about hammering home that all religions and gods are inherently false and parasitic, that we’re eventually leading up to a big “and that absolutely includes Hydaelyn” moment, and this here really feels like tipping their hand towards that but... somehow not one single character in the whole game sees this as a red flag or has any problem with it.

Eventually you have your big ol’ showdown with these Warrior of Darkness jerks, and its kind of a neat one showing off a lot of new mechanical concepts that will be commonplace soon, and it’s a big ol’ party vs. party thing where you fight their whole team and the Scions pull their weight for a change helping out. Allisae (who’s never really been formally on the team but is definitely A Party Member from here on out) kinda surprises everyone by announcing she’s sick of being all passive in the background with her little caster book that matches Alphinaud’s and whips out a big ol’ glowing crystal sword she’s gonna try tanking with for a change. After this she decides that’s not really for her and goes for a lighter one once the Red Mage class gets introduced.

So you beat these jerks up and send’em packing back to their home dimension, but you do feel bad for them, so Minfilia/the voice of god goes along with them to see about maybe helping out there. You know, again, we wasted a perfectly good Moonbryda to avoid killing Minfilia off earlier and then we go right and turn around and pull that trigger anyway, basically. And now we’ve just got one and a half major plot developments left and I kinda want to save the one that really sets up the next expansion for last, after I get into the sidequest stuff.

The half though is that somewhere in the middle of all this a real big preposterously tough weirdo samurai washes up by Urianger’s place, having just come over from Doma by just taking a damn rowboat over. Possibly going the long way around the world, too. I just generally enjoy this broad character archetype.

And yeah it’s weird he’s British in the English dub. It’s weird that everyone’s British. Well everyone but Gaius I guess. When we get to the third expansion people start having accents from other parts of the UK at least for a little variety, but it’s weird. Anyway Gosetsu here is a cool new friend but he’s mostly here to let Yugiri know we’re kinda getting the resistance band going again over in Doma after things were rough enough for a bunch of people to have to immigrate over here and get involved in ninja job quests. Can’t foreshadow things much harder than that.

Time for side stuff though. First off, hey, with all these flying islands we have in this expansion, we really should have some cool friendly air pirates. The sort you’d see in Skies of Arcadia, or various Ghibli films. So we do! They’re fun! And we get involved with them as they’re dealing with this big scary floating doom ship that survived a past apocalypse with some evil guys looking for ancient relics. Typical stuff from those wacky Allag- oh! Hey for like the first and only significant time it’s NOT the Allagan empire! We’re dealing with fallout from one of the OTHER world ending apocalypses and dead civilizations! This isn’t just out of the blue or anything. This stuff does come up a bit in the slew of optional dungeons that opened up after the base game, and in various class/job questlines, particularly like all the spellcaster ones.

Way back when we had three big civilizations of nerds all at once and at war with each other. We’ve got Ampador (white mages), Mhach (black mages), and Nym (scholars). And the big war they had went down in history books as the War of the Magi... because damn if the writers for this game don’t bend over backwards to work in every reference and every maybe-this-is-even-the-same-world-centuries-later deal with every old Final Fantasy game, but especially the SNES ones, and ESPECIALLY FF6. Surviving details are sketchy but basically Nym got taken out with a plague that turned everyone into tonberries, and the other two really went at it until a point where thanks to black mages spamming fire ice and lightning, and white mages spamming wind and earth, the whole world’s elemental alignment got skewed because the only people who ever cast water spells are ninja, and this caused a global flood. Really that’s what this wiki just told me.

The Mhachi got out by building a big flying arc powered by bound demons, including the queen of demons, which is just an absolutely ridiculous and irresponsibly dangerous thing to do and yes I am 100% just setting up a callback joke for when I explain what happens in later expansions. Also the demons are specifically bound in giant coffins, as is the Mhachi style, so... we have this gigantic airship made of coffins looking all Event Horizon and having this general manta rays and mind flayers aesthetic going on. I actually genuinely like that this setting has such a convoluted history with multiple fallen empires just kinda tucked away in the background so we can pull stuff like this out now and then and appreciate the shared themes and aesthetics stuff from various eras has. That’s some solid nerdy world-building I’d like to see more people tackle. I’d also kinda like to see more of it here because for real this is the only time it’s ever not the Allagans.

Helping you deal with all this and giving you ancient history backstory is this weird little familiar that’s survived since Mhachi times whose name is, can you guess the reference we’re dropping? Cait Sith. He looks... odd. Anyway, this is our big alliance raid trilogy for the expansion. Noteworthy cameo bosses include Doomgaze from FF6, who has a bunch of hard to read full party kill attacks and is a lot of fun to learn and then watch other people die to constantly, and Diabolos, who you’re actually fighting for a second time if you did an optional dungeon. Plus a bunch of reasonably original vaguely Gaelic and/or fishy demons.

Anyway speaking of weird little artificially created cute familiars, remember our dumb friend Hildibrand? You pull him out of a snow drift and have some fresh wacky shenanigans with him. This time as you pull him out, you also pull out this adorable as all hell little clockwork Black Mage called Gigi because that’s the sound your little head gears make when your memory isn’t working right, and we didn’t want to just directly go with Vivi. Hildy and his assistant Nashu argue about Gigi’s gender but totally just decide to collectively do the adoptive parents thing. At first they’re living in the gazebo of the noble family you’re still sort of crashing with (and we absolutely get some oldschool RPG nerd gazebo jokes) but eventually they decide if they’re really going to be a proper family they need a gazebo of their own, and settle for a vacant house in Idyllshire, that sort-of-a-town in the ruins of Sharlayan set up by cool goblin pals. Gigi decides their new residence needs a proper family crest too, and creates one.

Gigi is freaking adorable. Oh and Hildy’s dad also shows up during his, at one point using his renowned artisan skills to craft Gigi a new super buff muscle guy body to be a Proper Manderville Man which is pretty great while it lasts. Other little clockwork black mages/vikings/cool little guys with void faces exist incidentally, they’re called mammets and aren’t quite relics of a lost civilization, but were created early enough in the history of the current civilization that people are kinda 50/50 on still having the knowledge to fix them. Gigi is special though having this whole time reversing power that leads to various shenigans and some angsting about not being able to fix everything and a big heroic sacrifice moment leading to a powered down state, after which Gigi goes on your list of little summonable minions along with chicken-Enkidu and a bunch of other random things, to hang out and hopefully remember stuff. Oh and Hildy gets launched like half a world away again because someone points out that if Gigi is his child that makes his incongruously hot and violence-prone mom a grandmother and she cannot deal with that.

Briardien the other inspector from the last batch of Hildy stuff also pops up again, with his own longng line of really just cutscene sidequests and... I’m gonna be real with you. It is some boring Harry-Potter-ask magic school crap and my eyes glazed over as soon as it started and I just kinda blindly mashed through it all to get the little glasses-adjust emote at the end and get those exclamation points off my screen. It’s lame, he’s lame, doing a Harry Potter sort of thing is lame, I don’t care, and I’m glad he never shows up again.

But then we’ve got the "normal” raid set. Seeing chunks of this are literally what got me to take a chance on this game to begin with (well that and it’s totally free up to the end of this post you’re reading), and kept me going through the absolute slog to get to this point. Freaking Alexander as this combination city/god/confusing timefolding thing/set of a dozen or so little mini-dungeons/bossfights with really great music and where you fight a combination of goblin mad scientsts and smaller city-like robots that live inside the big one, some of whom transform.

It is just a blast playing through this bit. You’ve got all kinds of steampunky little sections where everyone has to split up and dive down big tubes and ride ultraspeedy ultra-thin conveyor belts that careen all through this big city, there’s this wacky mad scientist fight where people have to jump into pools of mystery goo that transforms them into gorillas so they can punch aside big cartoony bombs, the transformer in that bit I just linked where halfway through the fight you have to run over and jump on as it turns into a jet and just nukes the whole arena, then do a timed button press to hop off safely, and of course the specific thing someone showed me that hooked me in is the bit where you fight a set of five robots, then they fight Voltron, with a remix of an earlier track from the area in the style of a 60s tokusatsu theme.

The plot associated with this is neat too. Alexander is just kinda there, in this big frozen time bubble, barely shifting now and then to get a little bit of itself out and giving you a new entry point. Cid and friends are checking it out, because showing up to check out the cool new techy raid dungeon is their entire deal and a repeated thing. Turns out it just sort of appeared out of nowhere a few years ago, vaporized this one woman’s boyfriend, and vanished, with just a book about it and a cat left behind. One of the local goblins found the book, studied it, decided that Alexander is just the coolest thing, and summoned it the way FF14 people do to be the new utopian home of his people. Cid is horrified by this and says something along the lines of “what kind of a monster takes something as pure and beautiful as a giant robot and goes and makes a god out of it?” So you head through, cool goblin techno getting louder and more distinct as you approach the center, have a big confrontation, time travel mode gets turned on, you all get a good view as you jump back a few years, watch this guy get vaporized, and the head goblin’s cat decide he sucks and hop off with his notebook, realize there’s all sorts of time loop shenanigans as you make friends with his adorable cat.

And of course partway through all this there’s a bit about dead boyfriend gal talking about her people’s creation myths also mentioning what sure seems like Alexander popping up at some point and dumping out her Adam and Eve equivalents, so yeah, that’s where things end up for her and her less-dead-than-suspected boyfriend once all the timeloop business wraps up and you have the proper fight against Alexander, on top of Alexander, with Alexander looming in the background because time and space are all kinda going screwy on you. I swear when people say they like Heavensward what they really mean is they like this Alexander stuff you get access to after it.

Eventually though once you’re done playing with time traveling robots, air pirate demons, building a city for moogles and dragons, helping bugs reject their abusive parents, and leading dance squads for owl people, it is time to get back to that main story progression. Ishgard eventually gets it together enough to come join your alliance, and you’ve finally got the whole continent united to deal with that evil empire. The one that’s been occupying your immediate neighbor for two decades. With all the refugees. Isn’t it, uh, about time you get around to striking back and doing some liberating there? A lot of people sure think it is. This is what Papalymo and Yda have been busy with. That whole coup leading into this expansion was tied into false promises of pushing back there. For some reason though, the collected heads of state aren’t quite willing to push the button there yet though. I guess they want to intercept a fresh attack wave before they counter? That’s the go to plan in strategy games. Maybe deal with the recent summoning wave some?

In any case it really gets under the skin of the local terrorist scene as headed up by Ilberd, that guy who cut Rauban’s arm off, and they decide it’s time to force everyone’s hand by stealing a bunch of military uniforms from everyone else and assaulting the nearest imperial stronghold themselves. I am fully in support of this plan, honestly, people are really dragging their feet too much. Unfortuantely the Empire has, you know, lots of guns and death robots and while they’re too blindsided to get the real heavy ordinance out, Ilberd stole uniforms from EVERYONE, and has this whole Watchmen plan going which involves his own assault squad getting pretty well slaughtered even as you and your actual armies rush in to help, because all of them getting desperate and panicky and him busting out a big ol’ bit of aether storage in the form of one of Nidhogg’s eyes he climbed down to get from the big hole you tossed it down let’s him do a big ol’ large scale summoning. You suck Ilberd. Could have just forced a war all regular.

It seems like the new summon is coming in all extra huge and Bahamut looking, and Papalymo, having recently borrowed what’s left of Louisoix’s staff (oh yeah, there was a whole thing with Ascians wanting that because it has some ancient super good aether channeling rock built in, this came up with the Moonbryda stuff I think), decides to recreate that whole save world from giant god dragon thing from the ol’ intro, despite the fact that he knows it kills the caster, and the fact that like, you’re right there. You kill gods, it’s your whole thing, you could take it. Yda’s pretty upset with this plan because those two are pretty close and goes all “if you’re dying here so am I.” Thancred just goes “no you’re freaking not” and drags her off. Hey, finally everyone’s getting some real characterization here. Anyway Papalymo’s dead. I guess that’s kinda tragic. He’s certainly been around the whole time. If I’m honest he was never really well established though? He’s a healer, he fusses over people like C-3PO. I guess he’s on that short list of Lalafel I don’t hate. But the most interesting thing about him is a bit we only just find out here now that he’s dead.

Yda is also dead. Has been for some time. Apparently since some time in 1.0, even. The original Yda was a monk with serious self-esteem issues with her face and/or a desire to hide her traditional Ala Migan face tattoos, and therefore always wore a mask, so when she died in some big attack, her younger sister Lyse just had to steal her mask and pretend to be her for uh... basically as long as anyone present has known her aside from Papalymo. The big reveal is that like most of the Scions, she has these fancy neck tattoos everyone in 1.0′s Scions equivalent had, but the real Yda died after getting those, and these were an illusion Papalymo was creating. I feel like this would land a lot better if the real Yda died more recently, like, oh, when things went bad in Ul’dah? But even then she hadn’t really been established as much of a character. Just a little bit of a bimbo, kicks people, hangs with the short healer. But it’s pretty significant to her, so she’s ditching the mask, going back to using her real name, and really keen on being basically the main character for the next expansion like Alphinaud was for this one since the whole fallen fortress/giant god summon thing did totally force everyone’s hand.

Oh but first that there god is still there, just kinda temporarily bound, and we don’t have a moon handy to lock it up in. Which of course means it’s time for you to kill it right? Well... normally it would be, but Cid and Nero are kinda “on again” just now and Nero found this cool robot buried underground and mostly worked out the manual and he just really really pretty please wants to see a big cool CGI fest cutscene where a big Godzilla-ish spacey dragon fights a weird vaguely Gamera like robot. This is objectively a horrible idea, for the record. You totally can and do just go punch that dragon to death like every other god, and Nero’s robot kinda goes on to cause a real problem in the next post-expansion, and then again like, time of writing, the Ultimate difficulty fight with it has only been beaten once by people who were exposed as flagrantly cheating. That’s all on you Nero, so I hope you enjoy your pointlessly indulgent cutscene.

Are you happy now Nero? Are you? You know I STILL haven’t finished FF5 thanks to Omega. Gotta go and add that to this game too huh, well I hope you’re happy. I guess big dragons and robots fighting in cutscenes is a series tradition though, and it’ kind of neat to get a preview of what some bosses’ deals are going to be WELL in advance of when you get to fight them. For now they’re both down for the count, we get a shot of the Domans heading home, the main villain for the next expansion seeing and appreciating that splashy fight because that’s the sort of thing he’s into, and for the 4th time, we have a very long credits roll, marking the end of what you can play without putting up any cash. Which is admittedly a solid chunk of game, only most of which is super boring and tedious!

So yeah, again, I honestly straight up do not like Heavensward. Too much time hanging out with just the absolute worst people, even if you do get to personally kill kind of a lot of them, and none of the dungeons or boss fights are particularly interesting either (Bismark would be if it had teeth). Post-Heavensward though? Pretty solid overall. We really start fleshing out the main cast, and have some really just bonkers side quests with a lot of creative energy and memorable moments. As of here though I would still say no FF14 is a terrible game with a bad plot but has some really neat optional content once you’re an expansion deep. And I would have to stop here since again, this is where the free version ends, and while I got here just around the end of when the free-trial availability’s hammering of the servers forced them to shut down new character registration and I could invite some friends in, they all bounced off before even the first dungeon. People I know who’d been in it a while though went and gifted me the other expansions and several months of time cards though, so next post I’ll be talking about the second expansion. Is that where things finally get good? Eh kinda. They get pretty OK at least. It does weird me out that things get much more enjoyable right at the point you need to put money in though.

Speaking of money I am still like one bad day away from being homeless, and I have a Patreon. You don’t have to give ME money to learn what’s in these next 3 expansions, but I’d sure appreciate it if you did.

Next time, Stormblood... which I swear will be a shorter write-up. But then I always think that.

[plounce]

btw i made up bio parents for my wol tomte :) she has no knowledge of them, they have no knowledge of her, and one if not both of them are dead.

the one on the left is gentianne. she is very sincere, very naive, and very kind. she's a healer, using a combination of conjuring and herbal medicine - she learned it all from her mother. she's a trans woman (upon deciding this i was like AHA! FINALLY MY WOL CAN HAVE A MORE INTERESTING RELATIONSHIP WITH MY FAVORITE CHARACTER (urianger) (who in my personal canon is a trans woman. you all know this) (and very maternal regardless). she's from a small village in the dravanian mountains made of ancient pre-war stone ruins and populated by "heretics" by ishgardian standards, but they are simply keeping by millennia-old traditions from before the dragonsong war. folk beliefs. they make monthly cattle sacrifices to the dragons to keep their peace. they are a separate population from the proto-ishgardians who drank ratatoskr's blood, so while there has been some intermarriage with heretics who entered the population, most of the population cannot transform (and thats not part of their practices anyway - i think that dravanian religion is full of a lot of scattered sects and traditions) (although there might be some shiva veneration). they respect dragons as massive beings that are the embodiment of the sky and of weather and of song. ishgard does not know the village exists, although some heretics do.

the one on the right is theodorette. she is an exiled scholar from the sharlayan colony. imagine if lord asriel from hdm was butch (i know the image says mrs coulter but asriel fits better now that ive cleared away my focus on Evil Woman). she's ten years older than gentianne and was friends/colleagues/cousins with the augurelts. i'm still figuring out what area of study she was into, but being a bit of a mad scientist is why she got exiled. she was a sinister part of sinister sharlayan. theres lots of routes i could take but i want it to be 1. cool 2. appealing to me 3. aligned with tomte's character beats even if they have minimal impact on her actual life. some possibilities:

worked on the antitower, got too obsessed with it (tomte is the half of azem who was in love w venat)

biologist who did too much experimenting w dragon stuff and was exiled to keep the colony's neutrality in the war (tomte's co-wol was raised ishgardian and is very wary of dragons, while she is more open-minded (and in love w ysayle))

experiments on children's aether (since ive been reading the hdm books)

there's the connection with the augurelts - theodorette might have taken the fall in some scandal and been exiled, while the augurelts took the last copy of their research and disappeared with it before it could be seized and destroyed, leaving their child behind to be cared for by the neighbors.

alexander?? since it's the colony

something else idk i havent decided yet

when theodorette (dora) was ejected from the colony, she made her way to the village as a site of aberrant aetherial activity and/or it was known to sharlayan anthropologists and classified as neutral territory. weary from life outside the city, she was taken in by gentianne, who had recently lost her mother and who cared for her, ingratiating her with the village and teaching her how to live in a place that did not control all the magical and technological innovations over the past thousand years. country girl/city girl romance.

unfortunately dora was not a great person. this leads to tomte getting dropped on the porch step of an orphanage in the north shroud as a baby - either dora did it as an act of petty revenge, or gentianne did it to keep her safe from her other mother. an obvious plot beat is that dora also did something that led to the village getting destroyed either by dragons or by ishgard or by Mad Science, but i'm kind of attached to the village now and i don't know if i want to go that route. i think it would be sweet if ysayle spent some time there at some point.

ive also grown very fond of gentianne... i think it would be nice if tomte met her at some point and they did not know who each other were, but they were kind to each other. maybe when ysayle fell to earth, the village found her body and gave her their rites (sky burial). maybe in the hvw patches while tomte is trying to process the grief swirling around her from her co-wol's devastation over haurchefant and her own unrecognized feelings for ysayle she manages to find the village. i think the meeting is sweet - they're both very kind people, although gentianne is much more of a talker than tomte.

anyway those are my thoughts for now. /showleft

[shivasdarknight]

I'd like to know about canon mounts and minions for your FFXIV OCs! If you haven't answered that already

THE MOUNTS AND MINION STUFF IS FUN and it's pretty obvious as to who has the most convoluted answer. and that's all down below - I'll cover as many as I can remember :O

Surkie's first "minion" was the coeurl kit, but it's the black coeurl kit with the normal one's story. She rescued both the coeurl kit and the wolf puppy during that one 15 quest in Aleport, but she couldn't take care of the both of them and only took the kit with her - who she named Henri! She genuinely thought this was a boy, she was wrong, that is her baby girl. Henri has traveled with her since the start and has grown up into that dark knight tank mount coeurl, and she follows Surkie around through most of her adventures. Obviously there's stuff she can't join in on so she ends up as a sort of semi-permanent fixture of the Rising Stones, but she also winds up living at the Borel Manor and is a terror upon Aymeric's cat. She's very gentle with Surkie's allies (and yes, her kids too), and is just this big lovebug despite being a huge fucking coeurl. Her first mount was Prompto, her chocobo. He's a big percheron (as in the massive feral ishgardian breed that can carry 2 people) with natural black feathers, and a really nasty attitude. He's about as stubborn as Surkie is and she's gotten into a fair number of verbal arguments with this bird, it's funny. He doesn't see as much travel as he used to due to transporting issues, but he's very well loved regardless. He's very calm around Henri (especially since he's known her since she was a cub + he could very easily do damage back if she tried anything) and they have a routine where Henri plays dead on his back to sneak her through cities. Surkie canonically has Fenrir, as she found him after the events of Azys Lla still alive and recovering from even more wounds than the ones that should have killed him when they went through Snowcloak. Even in spite of what he did to Seraphin, Surkie can't bring herself to put him down since he's one of the last remnants of Ysayle (in her eyes at this point) and heals him up and they end up fairly close. Hoarhounds can act like familiars with people they grow close to, and this bond often extends to people that the owner was close to - so he's quick to warm up to Surkie, and he winds up a much better "mount" than Prompto since Hoarhounds weird and can just find you wherever; even across the Rift. He's a trans-affirming misandrist, but he puts up with Surkie's male partners and her sons. He's very affectionate with her and Ysayle, he's grown fond of Allie, and is a big murder puppy.

Surkie has other hoarhounds which include a puppy (has grown beyond the size of the minion now) named Hati that she rescued, and Hrodvitnir from the Zadnor skirmishes who is another rescue. He's smaller and skinnier than Fenrir and also doesn't have that issue with men, so Estinien's able to help with this one without being constantly glared and growled at (at least he's not Gaius, tho, because Fenrir nearly killed him upon seeing him). She also has a LYKAON PUPPY that she smuggled out of Elpis per Hermes' request. He saw how well she handled Fenrir (even in spite of him nearly mauling Emet-Selch) and asked her for a favor. While all the adults had been put down, he didn't tell the other researchers about the den of pups. She can't take all of them, but she does take one and that's Skoll. She keeps her tucked into her armor until they can leave (she was so fkn tiny) and she's very good with the hoarhounds thankfully. Yes, there's a theme here with the names. Surkie picked Hati and Skoll because of stuff she read up on the Old Gods when Ysayle introduced her to their existence. She also has a Hellhound (that varies in size) named Sétanta, who she summons whenever she so feels like. I'm thinking about making the faepup canon to her too, but she has the Hellpup which is also a big Hellhound. Turns out, this was a voidsent that used to be under the Morrigna but responded better to Surkie. I need to decide on which one, but she does have a canon motorcycle she got from Cid back in post ARR, and she's fucking obsessed with it. I just don't know if I wanna go with what I actually use (the SDS Fenrir), or the Garlond one from the Island Sanctuary. There's also a mod I have that turns the SDS Fenrir into an Omega themed bike, and that's a strong consideration... Recently canonized the Hydaelyn lynx as something that was a gift from Venat, as that's a familiar based on her own powers. Sassy fucker, but Surkie keeps her close. If we wanna get technical, the Starbird counts here, too; except that's not the Starbird that is Actually Meteion and chills with Surkie a lot because that's....kind of her aunt in a really weird way? It's complicated, but Surkie's not complaining because she'd rather Meteion do that than....y'know. Endwalker's plot. Last thing that I'll mention is that she does have a canon mammet, but that's not her fault. During post HVW, Altan sat down and worked on a Wind-Up Iceheart mammet for Surkie and gave it to her. She figured that since Eorzeans use them as ways to immortalize loved ones and remember notable people, she thought it'd be a good thing to do for her since she was really struggling with the fact she wasn't allowed space to grieve while Katsuro (wrt Haurchefant) was. Katsuro - naturally - had less than welcomed opinions about if she should have something like that because "not good coping" but she kept it with her regardless. This does, however, make Ysayle's return in 5.3 kind of fucking funny because now there's a fkn toy version of her that Surkie just has. And yes, Altan threatened to make one for her other partners when she learned of them, and she nearly got her ass beat (they do not exist, but the threat is there).

Katsuro is the one who adopted the wolf pup after Surkie left that one behind, and that boy's name is Kerberos - which was the name of a familiar that Charon had. He has other dogs and some kamuy that I still need to figure out the names of, but he's just got so many fucking dogs and Kerberos is just. Not the wolf/direwolf model we see in game, but just this big fucking more realistic wolf that won't leave him alone he's such a needy brat. Kamuy could count as a canon mount, but I don't really think about that with him very often.

Gwendoline collects those creepy voidsent dolls that were made by that one goldsmith. She knows they're haunted, she knows the Wood Wailers wanted them destroyed, but she doesn't care and has managed to get all of them. Why. Why does she bring them along, the group finds them weird. Someone get her to stop. SHE EVEN HAS CALCA AND BRINA. For mounts, Gwendoline does have a Chocobo but I need to design them...whoops. But she did rescue that Unicorn from the cnj30 quest, and her name is Hemlock. However, the unicorn came paired with a Voidsent that wouldn't leave the unicorn's side. So two for one deal since Hemlock likes Gwen, thus she also has the Nightmare, Rosemary. They're both girls. They seem to like each other. The lesbian has lesbian horses.

Seraphin has Camilla, who he raised since she hatched. Camilla is a true griffin that he found when she was an egg, given to him by Hamujj Gah when he accidentally stumbled upon a recovery effort by the Amalj'aa after some of their drake eggs and their own eggs were stolen by an Ul'dahn black market type. Hamujj Gah found the griffin egg amongst the others and knew he was from Little Ala Mhigo, so he gave the egg as a sort of way of peace gesture that even the adults would get to deter any potential retaliation from perceiving this child as in danger, and this wound up fostering positive sentiments towards the Amalj'aa in Seraphin. Camilla was raised in Little Ala Mhigo alongside him, and his parents did what they could to get him barding for her so he could have her as a regular steed, and she basically goes wherever with him (except across the rift).

Lillith has a griffin that I need to work on because there's an obvious tie in there with his mom, but he does have a big destrier chocobo by the name of Agni. Agni is named for his fiery plumage, and is just as energetic as his owner. He's also got that Hayate puppy that needs to be named, and honest to god I'm leaning towards Dogmeat because hey do i need to remind people that he was originally a Lone Wanderer agaiiinnn or is it still obvious. Dogmeat isn't the name he picked, his dad picked it as a sort of morbid joke based on the conditions Sulivaughn found him in.

Altan mooches off of her siblings minions and mounts, but she has a lot of stuff that she tinkers with. Most notably, she made herself a Cruise Chaser that she uses in combat and as a mount. She likely also made the Rubellite Weapon minion because she thought it'd be interesting to recreate it and Allie wound up stealing it for herself (Altan...cant complain too much). She also may have helped Allie build the big Landerwaffe.

Zirnghota has Spriggan familiars that double as minions and mounts! They chill out as earrings for her, and brings them out as she needs them.

Glyndwr rescued an Alkonost that's very attached to him. He wanted to release it because ethics, but he's now stuck because it's very dependent on him now (gee i wonder why he has a bird thing).

I need to decide on if the others have anything, but for the most part these are the big notable ones. I've cycled through stuff for Surkie like the fox kit, the grani, kamuy of the nine tails, ehll tou, etc. but they got cycled out for varying reasons (eg the Grani, who WAS MY MAIN MOUNT THROUGH HVW BEFORE FUCKING ENW CAME OUT AND RUINED THAT. that lore used to be a voidsent that got attached to her, but now i can't use it without people going "emet mount". so thats Fucking Fun.). Either way, Fenrir is baby and she loves him.

THANKS FOR ASKING AND TY FOR THE INTEREST ;A;

[yzeltia]

A Y'zel Story

Title: Fear Characters: Y'zel Tia, Mephina, Halone, Nymeia Rating: T for Tears, again? Groundbreaking. Notes: Haven't you already had this talk?

Night had come to Mor Dona. Everyone had said their goodbyes or found a place to rest at The Rising Stones, and Y'zel found himself alone for the first time in a long time. It had been mentioned, delicately, that perhaps he hadn't the gumption to lead the law offices of Gage Acquisitions. While he wasn't exactly in need of more responsibilities, he'd suddenly found himself imprisoned by his own anxieties. 

"Another amaretto," the tavern master asked while the Miqo'te gently circled the remaining liquid around in the bottom of his glass.

"I think not…," he answered, looking away as he sat down a few extra Gil, "Should my allies ask in the morning, tell them I grew homesick and returned home."

"Will do."

With a nod, Y'zel made his exit, yet did not blip away through aetheric and instead took the road east on foot, back to Silver Lake then through the passage into Omphalos. Arriving, he brushed his hand through his hair, feeling the unnatural light start to warm him. 

"A gil for your thoughts," a honeyed voice rang out.

Looking up, Y'zel found Mephina innocently down at him. "I found myself…ill at ease after I departed. I believe some of my allies have sought audiences with their patrons immediately after; however, I found it a bit more difficult to face Nymeia or Halone on my own."

"I see…," the goddess mused, thinking a moment before offering a smile, "I think, winter will be short this year. An early spring yields a greater bounty I suppose."

Y'zel stepped back, looking to the confused goddess, "I'm sorry?"

"Hm? If you're not going to speak from the truth of your heart, then I don't think it prudent to indulge in anything beyond idle small talk. If it's company you seek though, perhaps you should return below to one of your paramours? Or do you mean to answer me now in earnest, as you are so well loved for."

The Miqo'te was taken aback for a moment. Absorbing what was said, he placed his hand over the center of his chest, "Speak the truth of my…heart?"

"Yes, it cries out to me. It's almost drowning out all else," Mephina answered before shaking her head, "But a roll of a die and I would have been your namesake, surely you must know that I can feel the love within you as well as the fear."

Y'zel's focus shifted to the stone path as he clutched lightly at the breast of his shirt. "I fear…I've no more to give…or rather, I've come to fear I hadn't anything to begin with. By now shouldn't I have fallen into place?"

 "Is that my little Battle Master," a voice cut through. 

Y'zel and Mephina looked up as Halone approached, frowning as she noted the Miqo'te's tears, "What's all this then?"

"Y'zel's close to a breakthrough," Mephina hummed.

Y'zel nodded, "I've…defined myself by other's for so long…my father's son, my dad's son, Ysayle's brother, my Uncle's nephew, the Scion's cousin, Zoissette's paralegal, The Saint's helper…I realized, that I've yet to find a means to define myself. When I can cannot, through circumstance or removal, I don't know who I am…I'm…lost."

"Why do you think that is," Halone asked, crossing her arms as she looked down at him through her helm.

"Dig deep," Mephina echoed, "I already gave you a hint."

Y'zel held himself for a moment then looked up between the two before letting out a little sniff. "Because…I'm afraid of losing them like I lost so many others…Because I'll lose more of myself if they go away?"

The love goddess hummed then rested her cheek on her fist before answering, "Well, that's the glass half-empty answer."

"Didn't you just have this crisis," a third voice sounded out, "Surely you've shed enough tears over this my little helper. Just because Starlight has ended, the message of hope does not go away."

Appearing before them, Nymeia crossed her arms and lowered herself to kneel and look Y'zel in the eyes, "Would I weave your own words into a tapestry for you to believe them."

Y'zel swallowed then took a couple steps back, bumping into Halone. The Fury wrapped her arms around him, "I can always beat it into you."

Mephina giggled, "We all are the sum of the love others put into us, god or mortal. You are well loved, Y'zel. It is okay to fear loss; however, you shouldn't let it rule your life."

"But…when I have nothing left to give…"

Halone let Y'zel go, letting him stumble forward.

"Give? If love was an exchange then we'd have the Traders hold dominion over it! Love is not a resource, it is abundant my earnest little try-hard. Do you think I love you any less when you falter in battle or fail to master a skill? Have you ever worried about the depth of our love for you?"

"You've cursed your fate many times, but yet light up in my light come Starlight. There's never been any doubt I watched over you within you," Nymeia offered, setting her spinning wheel down to lean back on.

"If you can believe in our love and care, then why not that of your family, lovers, and friends? Up until now, they were far more tangible," Mephina asked, gently reaching out to pet Y'zel's ear.

The Miqo’te’s ears perked as the tidy realization hit him. Sniffling, he wiped his eyes then took deeply inhaled. “You make it sound so obvious,” he laughed softly.

“That’s because it was,” Halone answered, giving a little flick to his forehead.

Y’zel whimpered then rubbed the reddening spot as the Fury let out a laugh, “Come now, did you just come for reassurances, or are you here to cross swords once more!” “Assurances,” Y’zel squeaked out, garnering laughter from the three of them. “I believe, I should speak with him, given I am his Guardian,” Nymeia interjected, “Now that you’ve calmed down, perhaps you can lend me an ear.”

Y’zel was taken aback for a moment, “My ear? Should it not be the other way around?”

The goddess shook her head. “Come, I shall make all clear,” she answered, holding out her hand. With that, he followed on curiously, leaving his fears in the care of the other goddesses for now. If the lesson was finally learned, time would tell.

[vierandancer]

OTPs  +  nOTPs  + Meiko

send  "OTPs  +  nOTPs  +  [a  muse  name]"  for  me  to  list  out  my  favourite  pairings,  and  the  pairings  i  am  not  interested  in,  for  that  muse.

Oh my dummy dumb dumb bun. Let's skip the 'I do not ship with kids' silliness that is in everyone's rules, that's pretty obvious. I purposely made Meiko really open to most ships! She's just equally difficult-ish for most of her options.

OTPs

Sidurgu: Sidurgu was the first NPC that Meiko was immediately physically attracted while I was playing the game. Then they pulled in the co-parenting plot! And while Sidurgu is an angry boy once in awhile, he also makes it clear how much he cares for Rielle time and time again. That and he just has such good, encouraging one-liners towards the WoL that catches Meiko off guard. I would love to navigate the 'your dead best friend haunts my job stone' and 'we're raising a child together but we didn't make it' plot points, with some 'Rielle ships them why are they dense/ Rielle is afraid if being ignored if they get together' drama.

Thancred: Thancred by default ends up in friend territory, like the other Scions, but ... he was her first actual friend in the Scions because he is familiar. He is a La Noscean orphan and he's a flirt rogue, Meiko KNOWS that archetype! So even if he did flirt with her she's like 'lmao ok' and doesn't believe it for half a second. Mei and Thancred also have the 'older sibling protective of little adopted sibling' bond. I also only really am interested in this ship if we follow deep into the Thancred hates himself interpretation for a chunk of the early game. Because what do you get when you have someone with those issues + Meiko who has no confidence or self -esteem? MESS. YOU GET MESS. Note that Mei x Than ship can only work in a world where she doesn't pick up the DRK job, because Fray would intervene.

Y'shtola: This would not get even started until Shadowbringers most likely, because Meiko is a pansy coward who was too intimidated by all the smart adults in the Scions for most of the early game. But! Meiko, by default, very much admires Y'shtola from the get-go. Once she takes it upon herself to properly treat Y'shtola like a friend, she would 100% bring her coffee/tea when Y'sh is working late on stuff, and even be a little 'do u need help goin' down th'stairs' ish as politely as she could now that it finally sank in how blind Y'shtola is sometimes. I think it would very much be a slow burn, but it could work, because Meiko as WoL would be busy very often, and Y'sh doesn't strike me the type that needs to have her partner around 24/7.

Ysayle: DOOMED YURI. No, not doomed Yuri! Ysyale deserved to survive! And while I don't often ship Mei with any of the 'villains', Ysayle made it very clear early on in HW that she regretted her actions and didn't keep that title for long. I think they would have a very nice parallel in healing/growing in confidence that could be very sweet.

Honorable Mention: Yugiri. I don't see many queer Yugiri muses (or many Yugiri muses at all), but Yugiri was the first person Meiko had a crush on (emotional) in the game! That's literally why I had Meiko go with her during that bad-idea-plan in Stormblood. She was just being a simp.

NOTPs

Zenos: Absolutely not. I get why people love the WoL x Zenos ship, and I do love villains. I love villains that are obsessive! But Zenos has just done too much damage (and would be willing to do more damage to get what he wants) for me to even dream up a scenario where that would work. I think the best Meiko would ever have with Zenos is a single civil conversation. If he could just cool it on the FIGHT ME OR I'M BORED for a minute, I think she'd be curious to try and figure out what's going on in his head.

G'raha: I'm not into a lot of the popular WoL ships, I know, but G'raha and any male Miqote are strictly in "brother" territory and always will be for Mei. Again, I get the appeal of it, but it just won't do for Meiko. That cat is sibling shaped.

Urianger/Estinien/Haurchefant: Similar to G'raha, they're pretty deep in the family bucket for her. While initially not on great terms with Estinien and too intimidated by Urianger (in my hcs), she has since come to learn that they are both dorks in their own way. And Haurchefant is just... a bro! He's always been a bro! I promise I don't have a thing against male elezen!

[rowanul-tyr]

wolqotd: is your wol single, married, engaged, divorced, or not looking for love at this time?

the short version is: rowan is in a relationship with graha and estinien!

the long version: rowan and graha are the main "relationship" and estinien spends a lot of time with them, but all three recognize he's not wanting to be "tied" down so they just enjoy the time they have with him

to be a bit more detailed...super minor 6.55 spoilers but nothing else spoilery below

rowan knows that estinien isn't really looking for a relationship, and honestly prefers the single label most of the time. they've kind of talked about it. estinien did kind of carry a torch for ysayle despite their age difference, and he's only just now beginning to unravel the knot that is his emotions regarding her. (this was something i wanted to touch on in the 5.1 chapter of my ot3 fic, but it slipped my mind while writing and so now i have to wiggle it back in)

estinien is also finally learning to let himself feel things properly, since he was forced to basically repress everything no just because he was in-universe catholic, but because his job as the azure dragoon kind of required it. anyway it's like he's in puberty all over again so he's having to relearn his own emotions and redraw relationship borders.

rowan knows this. they've talked about it, kind of at length and kind of not. so rowan just made it clear that he does honestly love estinien as much as he loves graha, and that if estinien wants, he'll have a loving home with them. so estinien can mostly feel okay coming and going as he pleases.

estinien does also love roan, and would have been content to be monogamous--he had to be convinced to share, basically. dragon brain took over and that meant the desire to "hoard" picked up because rowan's precious to him. but because he trusts rowan he decided to at least try, but it took some convincing/coaxing to widen the hoard from one person to two. (as a side note, estinien having left over dragon traits (mostly personality-wise, physically it's just scars from the eyes and the suggestion of scales at those scars) is very important to me)

graha also needed to be convinced, but he learned to not have concrete expectations when it came to rowan during/at the end of 5.0, and honestly now that he's got a second chance at the life he led before the crystal tower, he's up to try anything! he also just...likes estinien? he thinks estinien is so cool. so one he'd officially met the guy and kind of figured out how he worked (with help from rowan) he was like, "oh. okay. yeah, this could work!" even if it took time to figure out...logistics, for lack of a better phrase.

estinien and graha actually really enjoy one another's company, both with and without rowan? and rowan is very glad they do actually like one another to the point that they're perfectly content and could even be together on their own, because that was the thing he was most worried about regarding being poly. it's nice if he can't be with them because of what he gets roped into. they make it work, basically, whether it's only two or all three together.

they're also enthusiastic in any combination of the trio. like. not to be ns/fw but graha probably has a much higher sex drive than the two dragoons combined (mostly bc rowan is ace but sex-positive) so working it out so they're all content with their respective tolerances for intimacy and ns/fw stuff works out surprisingly well.

i think estinien, given the context of the end of 6.55 MSQ, is away from his catboys more often than not as of late. they were together a lot, and they visited him in radz-at-han, but probably around 6.5 he asked for some space. and he might have mentioned wanting to go west and rowan foes "oh yeah im goin to tural btw" and estinien's like "ok babe see you there" and graha waves them off or something. who knows.

[meowww-ffxiv]

Sometimes Ptolemy heard about family members or friends who were once close and then fell apart because they couldn't take the other's bad habits and refusal to compromise any longer. And there was always the voice in the back of his mind from the years where he was afraid to disagree with Liios or felt like he had no right to, after everything Liios had done for him, and it was his older brother who apologized first and cut himself off of the enduring suffocatingly overprotective habits for years until the two of them were sufficiently independent.

Liios had rejected the thought that Ptolemy, his only remaining family and for whom he had given everything that he had, needed to need him; needed to like him, even. Ymir, Liios's teacher, had feared he would never recover if and when Ptolemy eventually passed first because there was no way he'd live a long life with his heart condition. And yet in this life, in every waking moment since Liios realized he might be suffocating him, he'd done everything to remedy it.

So Ptolemy was fine. He had friends, and he had made his peace with the fact that most people he knew would be growing old and passing on before he did, even if he wasn't going to make it that far for a member of his species. It was its own blessing, to have the privilege of knowing friends from youth to deathbed, to watch them grow and grow with them. People told Ptolemy they were content, more often than not, as he cared for them in the final days of their lives.

But what of Liios? He never brought up anything he deemed upsetting with Ptolemy when they were younger, out of genuine fear that causing him upset might exacerbate his condition. There was a grain of truth in that. But the condition was dormant, Ptolemy was more or less healthy in the here and now, and it was apparent to him that Liios had never, ever, really learned to depend on someone else. Period.

Maybe that wasn't fair to him. He worked well in a group. He knew how to pick up others' slack, how to push and cajole more out of someone unwilling while not being cruel or mean about it.

Yet Ptolemy talked to the Scions on the First, and none of them seemed to know Liios. Did he seem tired or upset last you saw him? he asked. I can't tell, Alisaie admitted. Ptolemy asked her, instead, if Liios had shifted about more often and fiddled with the straps of his left-arm gauntlet, and she said yes. Yes, he is tired, Ptolemy told her. He has a bad habit of snapping the straps on his arm like that to keep himself awake, probably because he had gotten no sleep last night.

Alphinaud thought Liios liked hearty, meaty stews because he cooked those things with Ysayle and Estinien the most when he was with him abroad. But Liios liked vegetable dishes, and actually disliked anything too meaty. It was not Alphinaud's fault that he didn't know, Ptolemy assured him. Hearty meat stews were all but a necessity in cold weather and with long travels ahead, when you could afford to. Liios just never told even Alphinaud something so personal, though he told the young man everything he remembered of Louisoux.

Funerals weren't rare for Ptolemy to attend. And he had gone to a few of them where the deceased's friends and surviving relatives talked about themselves and what their lost loved one had done for them. They couldn't come up with a single thing about the person aside from helpfulness, general agreeableness, and a great generousness. They couldn't tell what the person liked, if they were funny, if they would be missed for something other than that they were no longer around to provide their service.

It terrified him, it angered him, that these were premonitions for what his brother's passing might be like. Not that it wouldn't be fair, because Liios had made his mark almost exclusively in helping others. It was what made him well-liked and respected. But could any of the Scions, his currently closest acquaintances, go up on that stage and say anything about him that wasn't how he saved the world and liked the color green?

Could Ptolemy, even? Liios liked to worry about everything aside from himself, he'd say. He would sit days at my bedside, when we were young and I could not get up most days. He would read the textbooks for me, and the first spell he wove of newly-learned magic was an anti-gravity modification that allowed me to traverse stairs and steep slopes without tiring myself too much. He carried me on his back, heedless of the harsh snow of our tundra home, to the cliffs, that I might see the stars I love so well. He carried me out of the world we knew and left behind our clan, our family, because they refused to eschew traditions for the off-chance that outsiders could save my life.

--and in all of these things, where are you, my brother, Ptolemy thought. You who twanged the strap of your arm-guard to keep yourself awake after a sleepless night. You who could never manage a meal more complex than stew, no matter how much you tried to gain skill in the kitchen. You who crafted every single tool you wield with your own hands, who wore the feathers of the first bird you shot down in your hair after these nine decades still, who cried over the first animal he trapped, who couldn't bear to speak of our clan yet wore your hair the same way for all these years in exile.

Did your friends know you hated fish and disliked meat? Did your friends know you liked quartz jewelry? Did they know you wrote the papers that were the backbones of Labyrinthos's artificial biome as it was today? Did they know your sense of humor would have made highborn ladies faint, or that you flirted with older women just to make them feel beautiful? How could they not know you, after all this time together? Why are you hiding from them?