The Grim in FFXIV

[Araun]

So, FFXIV is coming soon – August 27th, in fact. I'm going to be founding a chapter of The Grim there, as a Free Company (translation: a guild). Before that, there will be a free open beta, and in theory characters from the open beta will be copied over to the final release*.

We'll be founding the guild during the open beta, and actively recruiting during that period as well. So if you have any interest in Final Fantasy XIV, you can come check out the beta along with The Grim. The tentative server of choice at the moment is Gilgamesh Balmung, but we'll see what ends up being the "official" non-Legacy RP server.

* Square has made it clear, though, that this is not guaranteed and they may wipe everything out if, say, someone blows up the entire economy with a dupe bug.

What needs to be done?

If you're interested in FFXIV, sign up for the beta here and join the guild during the open beta.

I'll also need some help with banners for the website, small sig images, and maybe small promotional images for recruitment posts if anyone can assist with that.

How much like WoW's The Grim will it be?

As close as I can get it. Guild chat, party chat, yell, /say and /emote will all be IC as usual, with a linkshell (translation: channel) for OOC talk.

PvP is nearly nonexistent in FFXIV, so we'll have to define ourselves as an RP/PvE guild.

The Grim in FFXIV will be an association of adventurers dedicated to seeking forbidden knowledge and treading dangerous paths in pursuit of the power needed to defeat the Garlean Empire. Or at least, that's where it will start; we'll see how it develops once actual players get involved.

RPing in FFXIV

This being a Square game, there's a lot of information and background lying around, and there's likely to be a lot of confusion between what happens in ARR and what happened before in v1.0. There's a bunch of information available on the general Final Fantasy wikia, which can serve as a starting point:

http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Eorzea

The Lore forum also has some discussion threads and, should you find yourself drawing a blank on a name, a series of stickied posts on naming conventions for the various races:

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/forums/491-Lore

[Krinathalasa]

I've signed up for Beta. No idea if I'll be doing the fulltime thing.

[opalexian]

*gloms Araun* I knew you'd never REALLY abandon us! ; 3

Will PS3 servers overlap with PCs? Just...wondering >_>

[Araun]

Will PS3 servers overlap with PCs? Just...wondering >_>

PS3 and PC players are all on the same servers (you can usually identify PS3 players by the fact that they'll walk a little bit before they run, due to the analog controller).

The PS3 and PC clients are separate purchases, however, and they haven't explained whether or not owning one allows you to log in using the other - or if you have to buy registrations for both.

[Sunderpalm]

Philo and I fully intend on playing ff14. This announcement to have a grim guild pleases me.

Also, I believe you will be able to play PC chars on ps3 and vice versa. Will prolly have to buy the game twice though.

[Lunataure]

An old friend who is a FFXI nerd got me into the first FFXIV beta which sucked ass and now I am in this beta and I think I could actually play this one. I believe my whole household may be playing FF in August.

[Araun]

Yeah, the first beta was horrific. I remember thinking at the time that I had played WW2-era tanks with better steering than this.

The difference between that and ARR has been astonishing.

[Lunataure]

Well they let the first beta run as an for free game for those who were so horrible addicted to FF that they couldn't help themselves.. cough, cough.. my friend. So they basically have been in beta since that first beta. After all this time I would sure hope they could find and fix the issues. I need to let loose on them all my complains so far which aren't huge but annoying little stuff like the the handover of items.

[Araun]

So it looks like it'll take me a week or so to get to level 25 and be able to create a Free Company - in the interim, we'll create a linkshell (basically a chat channel) to keep folks connected. We'll be called "The Grim Echo", referencing the fact that we're a spinoff, the phenomenon in FFXIV called "the Echo", and more poetically "the grim echoes of the past" that we are searching for.

For now, I want to lay out my idea for how The Grim will work in FFXIV. I am mostly overthinking this, and the TL;DR is: less dark, more nerdy. Just play the game, have fun, and everything else will sort itself out.

A New Mandate
We can't be the same murderers in FFXIV that we were in WoW - the game system simply doesn't support it. Fundamentally, WoW is about a war between two intractable enemies, and FFXIV is about three nations uniting against a common foe - so "Peace Through Annihilation" will not work in Eorzea.

What FFXIV does have, in abundance, is mysteries. The one the main scenario is built around is "what the hell happened to Bahamut after he blew the shit out of everything, and why are we not all dead?" - but there's smaller ones too. There have been six astral and six umbral eras before this one, and each featured great empires and massive wars; the remains of those eras are scattered around in ruined heaps all over the continent.

So how does that give us a new mandate? Well. This world is going to be new to us - we're going to be learning all this stuff firsthand. And, frankly, we are all nerds here, and that means we're going to wonder about the things we learn; we're going to come up with wild fan theories to explain it. So why not make that IC? Let's bring in that whole meta-game of making up stories about the game lore - like, say, what the hell a Goobue is and why it exists.

Of course, we're still Grim, so it's not enough to just know things: we have to use them. We have to take the things we learn and turn them to our advantage. So, that's the new Mandate: go out, discover what you can, then turn it into a weapon - and wield that weapon against our enemies. Like DARPA, but run by a guy with cat ears.

This doesn't mean everyone needs to play an academic, though; if you decide your character prefers the wielding part to the discovering part, welcome aboard.

The fundamental lesson of The Grim is: knowledge is not power, strength is not power; the world is only changed by those who act with both. The Grim are relentless and uncompromising in pursuit of their goals; at their best, they are resolute defenders of Eorzea, and at their worst they are arrogant, impulsive, and heedless of the consequences of their actions.

So, really, not very different from WoW's Grim at all.

Anyway, it's an excuse to write stories, married to an excuse to raid dungeons. I just haven't come up with a succinct three-word phrase that encapsulates it - something you could yell as a battlecry.

[Aquizit]

"I don't know what I just found, but it's going to fuck your world UP!"

No... no too wordy.

[Greebo]

peace through excavation!

[Neevah]

Knowledge is power?

[Yrzuli]

Started playing around with it today, and wow, this game is beautiful looking.

But I'm stuck at level 9, not seeing quests anywhere and the one quest I have I cannot complete (Passing Muster, requiring level 5 gear, but I've not found a quest to give me level 5 pants). Will make another character, for a different starting zone, and see how that flies.

EDIT: Holy fucking shit, when did SE drop their monthly rate? Back when I was first playing it was 15$/month, and now it's 7 or less?! Hmmmmm...

[Thalevia]

Buy pants from a vender Coy then you can advance. You are blocked until you do so and none of the quests give pants, its sad.

[Neevah]

Sunder and I got our beta invites.