mmorpg-escapism

[mmorpg-escapism]

Whoops I died for a bit there. It is, unfortunately, not quite over. Deets under the cut if you're inclined, and if not I'll be back properly in a couple weeks.

Short version: Ow. Ow ow ow ow ow.

Long version: I am incredibly prone to repetitive stress injuries. This means I have to be very focused on ergonomics and keeping my wrists in particular happy with me since I'm a gamer and also work in the IT industry. So I had a fun split keyboard (the Ergodox EZ, if you're curious) and it kept me from being in pain all the time significantly more effectively than anything else I'd tried since the initial injury that has been haunting me for just shy of 7 years.

And that keyboard, after nearly 5 years of use, finally bit it in a way that I couldn't just fix on my own. So I have my backup keyboard, which is a traditional layout, and the pain returned instantly. I've got a replacement ordered but because it's not an off-the-shelf thing, but rather custom built by ZSA, I have about two weeks until it gets here, if I'm lucky. Which means about two weeks of minimal gaming and typing.

Took me thirty minutes to write this :( So just silence and the occasional like from me until it gets here and set up the way I need it. Then I'll be back to my usual analysis-posting :)

#a realm rewritten: writer rambles #please wrists stop trying to fall off

[mmorpg-escapism]

you

??? you

like the foe? jail for warrior of light!

[mmorpg-escapism]

Okay, hold up, my nerd brain refuses to let this go.

The space under Sharlayan that makes up Labyrinthos is so *massive* that it encompasses at least twice the size of the island above, and is under CONSTANT expansion. And to have a climate down here? Impressive was understating it, past me.

The artificial sun itself is essentially a nuclear-style reactor fed by fire aether to keep it burning bright/hot enough to sustain everyone down here. Which... HELLO?? What kind of science/aetherology genius did they have who could come up with that? This is literally the only bit of lore we were given about the place, in a side quest.

I can't find anything on the panels that make up the sky but my best guess is that either they're effectively magical viewports to above-ground and there's some sort of magic detection system in place to change the weather accordingly, OR the Forum has a regular session where they sit down and determine the Labyrinthos weather plan for the year. I can't decide which one I like better.

I want to know so much more about how they built this place, how all of the little details work, all of it, but alas... I either haven't found the appropriate side quests, or they don't exist.

Labyrinthos is... impressive. An entirely man-made domain underneath Sharlayan that could easily be mistaken for the surface. Man-made sun and weather is so many levels of insane scientific achievement I don't even know how to describe it. All built in a massive cave that started as a storehouse and has grown into significantly more than that.

We also see a bunch of gleaners running around (hi, Erenville, I see you over there) and learn something new about them: As a rule, they work alone. Whatever the Forum has them working on is enough of an undertaking for them to break that rule.

...Krile? Are you ok? Hearing things? Huh. We'll come back to that later, first we've gotta interrogate some gleaners.

#ffxiv escapism: endwalker #endwalker spoilers #labyrinthos #I wrote this in a sleepy haze last night #and it has been bugging me in the back of my mind ALL DAY #so now I'm nerdposting \o/

[mmorpg-escapism]

Labyrinthos is... impressive. An entirely man-made domain underneath Sharlayan that could easily be mistaken for the surface. Man-made sun and weather is so many levels of insane scientific achievement I don't even know how to describe it. All built in a massive cave that started as a storehouse and has grown into significantly more than that.

We also see a bunch of gleaners running around (hi, Erenville, I see you over there) and learn something new about them: As a rule, they work alone. Whatever the Forum has them working on is enough of an undertaking for them to break that rule.

...Krile? Are you ok? Hearing things? Huh. We'll come back to that later, first we've gotta interrogate some gleaners.

#ffxiv escapism: endwalker

[mmorpg-escapism]

You know how in most games, escort quests are infuriating because the NPCs will walk juuuust slower than your character's run speed to where you're looping around them in frustrated boredom because they're taking so long?

Yeah, FFXIV did it correct. Alisaie is guiding us to Labyrinthos, so we get a little bit of a slow walk - which I'm pretty sure is matched to player walk speed? I don't know the button to switch from run to walk so I just did the circles until she started running... at the same speed as the player character! I could keep up by way of her pathing being locked to the road so all I had to do was take the more direct route if I fell behind.

I just think it's neat :)

#ffxiv escapism: endwalker

[mmorpg-escapism]

For as long as we've known Alisaie, she's put on as brave a front as she can manage. That hasn't stopped us from finding out that she's a big softie deep down, though, not after Stormblood and Shadowbringers.

So the coffee break chat just makes my heart break, and my fist clench. Fourchenault deserves several punches to the face for treating the twins like that. Alisaie is struggling with the weight of that entire interaction... Between the gossip that's spread like wildfire, losing access to her own home, and having to hear her father call her and her brother fools to their faces, I'm surprised she hasn't lashed out at anyone yet. I would have, by now.

Instead, she tries to focus to use that experience to improve herself. She grabs a "what if" out of the air, regretting that she found herself speechless when her father demanded justification for the sacrifices in war. It comes with some self-awareness, too, that she does have some of the same stubbornness and self-righteousness she sees in Alphinaud. I love that character growth for her.

#ffxiv escapism: endwalker

[mmorpg-escapism]

It makes me really sad to see Alisaie get the cold shoulder from the patrons at the Last Stand. It makes sense, her dad is a jerk who disowned her and has made it VERY clear that no one is to help her or Alphinaud, but the way it's expressed is either pure disrespect or just fear of what would happen if Fourchenault found out that person had helped Alisaie. It's cruel.

Thankfully the proprietor of the Last Stand, Dickson, is old friends with Alisaie... so at least someone is willing to help. Even if he can't unseal the unfriendly lips, he can point us in the right direction... by enlisting us as a server. OK... We've done stranger things on this journey.

Through this neat little ruse, we learn that no one outside the Forum has been informed of the Telophoroi or the Final Days in a way that would give us any information - the best we get is that someone saw it in the newspaper and wrote it off in much the same way as Fourchenault did to the Elder Seedseer: It's just an excuse for more warmongering.

...okay, that's not entirely accurate. We get a primer on "gleaners" which are Sharlayan's collectors - they go out to gather specimens and knowledge that the island nation doesn't have yet for study - and they've been extremely busy. Hm. Maybe that's a path we can take.

#ffxiv escapism: endwalker

[mmorpg-escapism]

Yeah, the WoL is just Not A Scholar by default. Exhibit A:

Anywho, Krile and Alphinaud exit next and do us the favor of recapping what we saw of the Final Days in the Amaurot dungeon and speculate a little about what the Telophoroi actually mean when they say they want to bring about the Final Days again.

Finally, Y'shtola comes out and basically tells everyone that we're not gonna find anything, because there are "forbidden" tomes that got sealed away, like one in the Great Gubal Library that Urianger learned about the Source/reflections deal from.

And now we "wait" for the Scions to finish burying themselves in all these books and tell us what they did or didn't find. Yay! We'll get stolen by Alisaie and hit up the Last Stand for a coffee break.

#ffxiv escapism: endwalker

[mmorpg-escapism]

Alisaie and G'raha are next out of the library, and the conversation quickly turns to where each of them likes to read - in the context of "we have a lot of books to dig through for information" - and then living arrangements. While G'raha is fond of reading outside, Alisaie wishes she could have brought everyone to the Leveilleur estate.

See, Fourchenault's disowning of the twins was not just words. He's instructed the servants to not let them even into the building, much less interact with them outside it... which means the comforts of home that those two have been away from for years are tantalizingly close, yet unreachable.

We also get some history behind where G'raha grew up. I hope we get to visit Corvos at some point... That would be cool. His breadcrumb text after the cutscene also mentions that they have flying carpets. Please, YoshiP, take me there!

House Darnus is namedropped here, too. If you don't do the Weapon raid series post-ShB or Coils of Bahamut in ARR, the name means nothing other than being yet another Garlean house like Baelsar or Galvus. However, since my WoL blorbo is Bozjan, I'm all but required to be aware of at least one related name: Nael van Darnus was the one responsible for both the Bozja Incident and the fall of Dalamud that brought the end to 1.0 way back when, via an intense interest in Allagan tech.

It's that singular focus that kicked off the chain of events that put G'raha into the care of the Students of Baldesion, so in a way we have Nael to thank for G'raha's presence in the story. So Shadowbringers is *also* her fault.

#ffxiv escapism: endwalker

[mmorpg-escapism]

The Noumenon is a place I would love to visit for myself... 6 floors stacked from bottom to top with shelves full of books. My nerd heart would be so happy to have access to a place like that.

We're here for a purpose, though: read about Sharlayan history or Forum policy to try and uncover clues or hints about why they're being so squirrelly about... well, everything.

There's a LOT of lore in here even among the books we don't necessarily need to read through. We learn about the founding of Sharlayan (which happened after the Sixth Umbral Calamity and some Big Teleportation Magics), about the colony we now know as Idyllshire (it took 50 years to be recognized as such), the founding principles of the Sharlayan scholars and the prosperity that came from them (renounce war and pursue enlightenment through knowledge), about how a Sharlayan scholar approached keeping healthy (I wish they'd let me read further, I could use those tips), about an early foray into space travel and study (this one's foreshadowing!), and about how the Forum came to be as it is today.

...I appreciate that the WoL doesn't have to do any *real* deep dives, because they've always been characterized in my head as someone who generally dislikes long study sessions. They're an adventurer, a wanderer at heart, and those types don't like to sit still in ways that lengthy book readings would require. So, of course, the WoL is the first one done and outside as a result.

#ffxiv escapism: endwalker

[mmorpg-escapism]

So. Choices.

On the one side, we have Krile, Y'shtola, G'raha, and the twins who want to explore Sharlayan and figure out wtf the Forum is up to before we make A Mess Of Things for them. On the other side, Thancred, Estinien, and Urianger want to get the lay of the land in Thavnair and respond to a request from one of their alchemists.

We will eventually end up doing both, of course, but there's no real pressure one way or another other than for the story. I started with Thavnair on my main so I'm going to start with Sharlayan this time.

#ffxiv escapism: endwalker

[mmorpg-escapism]

I think Shadowbringers is a great example of how knowing or guessing the "reveal" doesn't hurt a good story, and writers who understand that will write more confidently and tell better stories. That the Exarch is G'raha Tia is not hard to figure out. He has a distinctive lip shape, he has the same voice, he's the guy who was in the Crystal Tower! He's not even a very good liar at the end of the day. And none of that makes his arc as the Exarch any less powerful, imo. I don't think trying harder to obscure the Exarch's identity would make Shadowbringers a better story. Because the emotional core of his arc isn't in shock value. It's in the unfolding story of G'raha's journey, how he came to be here, why he is hiding his identity, why he pretends not to know you or who G'raha Tia is. It's in the culmination of a hundred years of planning and secrecy and loneliness, in how he's willing to die to save two worlds and you, in why it all goes wrong at the last minute, in how hard he tries to play the villain so you'll let him go, and in how unconvincing he is in that role. It's in the choices he makes when he realizes he doesn't have to die. It's in everything he chooses to be. He has a good story, and a good story doesn't lose its power when you know all or part of the ending, because a good story is about the journey.

#ffxiv #shadowbringers #ffxiv escapism: shadowbringers #on top of not being convincing to others #he's not even convincing to *himself* #he crumbles the second time you say his name and not just from the bullet

[mmorpg-escapism]

I was gonna do Endwalker content and make a post last night but then I got sidetracked because this gremlin of a sprout

decided he wanted to start the free trial and dragged me into it. He's not on tumblr anywhere but I got permission to share the screenshot :) We had a good laugh when I *actually* lost sight of him and had to search the bushes in Thanalan for two whole minutes.

Anyway, eventually I'll get a picture of the actual (min height and very green) lala for folks. He's just trying to get to all the crafters because *that* is what keeps him in MMOs... story's drawing him in anyway though, despite the meme character.

#a realm rewritten: writer rambles #I seem to adopt sprouts everywhere I go #5 out of my 7 other static members were sprouts #I guess the ffxiv propaganda has been working #because I have so many people to do content with now!

[mmorpg-escapism]

1 - What do they do to pass time on long journeys? (caravans, chocobo rides, etc.) and 7 - What do they think of Garlean technology and their use of ceruleum?

On passing time: "Long trips that don't need me to drive are great for napping, if I can find a mostly quiet corner. Or I'll spend the time struggling to imbue my ammunition, because that's always needed.

"If I'm having to lead or guide? Well, I don't mind the boredom much anyway. It's nice to let my thoughts wear themselves out while I rest my body."

Sometimes she'll "nap" while curled up in a loose ball and just listen to the sounds around the caravan or cart to destress. It's less fun to sit in a chocobo saddle for so long, though... and neither of those happen as often as she'd like.

On Garleans and ceruleum: "... Next question."

Besany has very mixed emotions about the Garlean Empire. They are directly responsible for the event that caused her aetheric impairment that's almost completely disconnected her from a hereditary affinity for aetheric manipulation (magic), the loss of two families, and the death toll of the Bozja Incident. She didn't see the benefit of ceruleum and magitek, just the oppression that came from it.

It wasn't until the events of Endwalker that she was able to start letting go of a lifelong hatred that was only intensified by her experiences during Stormblood. Someday she'll be able to forgive, but she will never forget.

#a realm rewritten: asks and memes #a realm rewritten: characters #ah dammit now I wanna write EW stuff #the garlean hate is a core conflict to explore for Besany

[mmorpg-escapism]

How good are they at reading a map? How good is their sense of direction? If it hasn’t been asked for ask game o/

"... we're not going to talk about that."

With a map? Solid! Without one? Let's just say "wanderer" isn't exclusively because she likes exploring. She needs clear landmarks (structures or giant crystals, etc) or a map to be able to navigate places without getting lost. If she doesn't have either of those things, she wanders around until she finds someone to ask for directions...

She's only had to use her linkpearl for a pickup from the Scions twice.

#a realm rewritten: asks and memes #a realm rewritten: characters

[mmorpg-escapism]

9. Do they repair their clothes and furniture themself? For Besany! 🌸

"I... can? Furniture, at least. I had to learn to build shelter for myself and others way too young, and without tools to boot, so when I finally got a set of tools it all just clicked.

The sewing, though... I'll leave that to Tataru. I'm good with big stuff, not the tiny finesse that clothing repair needs."

She won't mention that fixing clothes is a habit she's not used to, because there was never anything to repair them with when she could/would have learned to do so.

#a realm rewritten: asks and memes #a realm rewritten: characters

[mmorpg-escapism]

What do they think of the political power of the WoL? (Alternatively, for WoLs: do they fear being backstabbed eventually by the city-states leaders if they deem the WoL too inconvenient/threatening?)

@ungrateful-cyborg also asked this! I actually have an answer for both sides of the question from Besany.

On her own political power: "It's nice that I can improve lives with it, but it comes with so much baggage that I really would rather not use it unless I have to."

On the fear of backstabbing: "While I'm sure that none of the leaders would dare to alienate me like that, we've seen subordinates try to make it happen once already so my guard is always going to be up. I think if I wasn't so damn good at solving their problems, I would actually get some peace and quiet for a while."

With her humbler (street urchin) upbringing she already feels extremely out of place anywhere near a throne or senate seat, so more often than not she defers to the Scions for political stuff and only shows up if she's absolutely needed. And the Bloody Banquet just made it that much worse...

(Edit, had the wrong person mention'd, sorry)

#a realm rewritten: asks and memes #a realm rewritten: characters