|
Next update is in progress, but because my life is a tragic farce two of the four teachers on my team have been out this week and I've also been helping two groups of kids set up after school clubs. While also catching up my paperwork from the week I had Covid. So, you know, that's be a fun workload. Every time I ever commit to an update timeline on a writing project The Fates feel the need to dunk on me :/
|
#
?
Aug 11, 2022 17:40
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 11, 2024 13:50 |
|
|
Hang in there, Sang. Sang in there.
|
|
#
?
Aug 11, 2022 18:21
|
|
|
Ganbatte Sanguinia.
|
|
#
?
Aug 11, 2022 20:16
|
|
|
DrakePegasus posted:Sang in there.
|
|
#
?
Aug 12, 2022 00:16
|
|
|
|
|
#
?
Aug 12, 2022 00:31
|
|
|
If I had photoshop skills I'd add a tankbuster marker to that. 
|
|
#
?
Aug 12, 2022 00:32
|
|
|
I hope life gets better for you.
|
|
#
?
Aug 12, 2022 01:11
|
|
|
Well, at least I have all of you lovely people who like to read my junk even if I'm producing it more slowly.  quote:Amazing
|
|
#
?
Aug 12, 2022 01:42
|
|
|
Closely examining your junk yes
|
|
#
?
Aug 12, 2022 01:49
|
|
|
Cythereal posted:If I had photoshop skills I'd add a tankbuster marker to that.  I don't have Gimp skills and still did.
|
|
#
?
Aug 12, 2022 06:53
|
|
|
Chapter 12: Trim the Sails and Roam the Sea Kheris and the gang hurry across the water to the mysterious tower. Alisaie consults her map, informing us that this island is known as Onokoro and that eye-catching landmark is called Heaven-On-High. The first name is another Japanese cultural reference. It alludes to the Shinto origin myth as conveyed by a 7th Century chronicle, the Kojiki. The story goes that the world began as a formless mass of primordial oil and seawater. From this ocean arose the first gods, who then ascended into the heavens. The first several were genderless entities who were then followed by gendered couples. The last of these pairs were named Izanagi and Izanami. Those two were given the mandate to shape the mortal world and a tool to do it in the form of a jeweled naginata. They churned the liquid to begin the process and pulled the weapon back out. A bit of salty water clung to the blade before dripping back into the primordial sea. Where these drops fell, the mythical first island Onogoro-shima (sometimes pronounced as Onokoro-shima) manifested. Upon this bit of Mount Olympus-like land, the two gods built a palace centered around a great pillar, which they then used for a marriage ritual so they could start making babies. And by babies, I mean eight islands that would go on to become Japan and the kami (gods/spirits, more or less) that would live on them. Funny side note: Hokkaido, the northmost Home Island, was not known to the folks who wrote down this myth and is thus not part of those eight islands in the story. However, later legends would bolt the divine couple’s first child, Hiruko, onto a popular fishing deity, Ebisu. The stories would claim that after he was abandoned and set adrift by his parents, he washed up on Hokkaido’s shores and was raised by the native Ainu people to become a divine fisherman, thus tying the missing island back into Japan’s origins via Religious Retcon. Why did the couple abandon their first child, you might ask? He was conceived after Izanami, the lady god, messed up the marriage ritual by speaking first. This meant they had to disown him and do it over again. Japan: Crafting Problematic Portrayals of Women Since the Literal Dawn of Existence(tm) We soon discover that this island is home to the Confederacy’s headquarters.  That new season of Bleach is going to get weird, apparently. The pirates built a substantial settlement beneath Heavens-on-High because most folk from the region studiously avoid getting near it. The origins of the structure are unknown, but local superstition claims it was built by the kami. Anyone who sets foot on the holy island where the gods made their tower supposedly risks incurring divine retribution. This belief (and the pirates’ disregard for it) has provided several centuries of protection to the Confederacy’s extortion racket. The Scions are confused as to why Gosetsu would send us here. It was made clear that the Confederates would not openly oppose the Empire. When we find Tansui and tell him what happened, he reminds us of this immediately. On the other hand, we again see that he might not be entirely on board with that stance because he arranges for us to be taken straight to the Confederacy’s leader, a Roe named Rasho. Lyse asks to take the lead in our negotiations.  …  She’s a little shaky at first, understandable given the dire situation and our need for haste, but she manages to lay out the whole story. Rasho knows Gosetsu, if only by reputation, and is as confused as we were about why he sent the Scions to the Confederates for help. He has no intention of breaking the ‘peace’ they have with the Empire. We try a few different arguments on him, but ultimately his position is unbending. Striking first might save the people in that village today, but the Confederacy will pay the price in lives tomorrow when Garlemald marches on the Ruby Sea. Their oath is to sever all ties to other nations and protect each other. Doma was on its own when it fell and is on its own now. Thoroughly pragmatic and entirely self-sabotaging, as we’ve seen before. Yet, for the bluntness of his dismissal, Rasho ends his speech with an interesting comment. “Hate is a luxury we can’t afford.” Under the surface, he knows what he wants to do regardless of what his head tells him he should do. It’s no big surprise when he tells us we’re welcome to stay despite his verdict. Oddly enough, Lyse is not discouraged by this exchange. She believes that if Gosetsu sent us here, there must be a way to change their minds. To that end, we take the usual tact and start asking for problems to help solve. Given that the plot gave us a severe ticking clock, this might seem objectionable as a means to our end. However, the writers smartly have Alisaie note we’re not trying to earn anyone’s trust and gradually persuade them this time. Our objective is to gain insight into the Confederacy’s circumstances and discover any available leverage we might use to force their hand. Pretty sneaky, sis! Onokoro is surprisingly peaceful and lively, given that it’s the headquarters of a pirate commune. Children run around playing as workers tend to ships, hoist goods, take care of prisoners, and generally go about their pirate-y routine as if they’re not in the direst circumstances their organization has faced since its founding. We’re told this is often the first posting for recruits so they can learn the ropes of their job in relative safety. This is helpful because many among their number never even saw the ocean before they came to the Ruby Sea to escape their troubles and forge new lives. Kheris takes some time while exploring to get a better look at the Heaven-On-High. Up close, it’s easy to see that the thing is distinctly technological rather than magical. The aesthetic design doesn’t appear similar to any advanced civilization we’ve seen in the past, so we can’t leap to “Allagans did it,” this time. Any further investigation will have to wait because the Confederates have posted a guard to keep people away from the only visible door.  Despite the picturesque surface, all is not well on the island. Kheris observes that many of their stored weapons are in a state of disrepair, as are their largest ships.  A deckhand tending to their flagship notes that it was always rare for the big Sekibune-class ships to get into a scrap, as the Confederacy favors swarms of small patrol craft. Still, since the Empire started throwing its weight around and they started backing down to avoid provoking them, battles of any sort have become scarce. (As a brief indulgence, the design of this ship is pretty interesting. It’s drawing from 16th-century vessels widely used during the great naval battles of the Imjin War, Toyotomi Hideyoshi’s infamous effort to topple the Joseon and Ming dynasties and take over Korea and China. The overall boxy shape, the pagoda-like deckhouse, and the use of a single square sail are all accurate to the real-life sekibune. However, that double-prong design for the prow instead of a classic v-shape is very much not. The only ship I could find with a similar look is the much older kentoshi-sen, which was used to send diplomatic envoys to Tang China in the 7th century.  Neither design placed the deckhouse at the ship’s keel, that’s more typical of western sailing ships. And it’s pretty rare at any time or place in history to see a sail jammed at the rear instead of near the ship’s front or center. I don’t know if any of that is significant, but it’s interesting.) We can infer that the Confederacy’s refusal to confront Garlean shipping has had a knock-on effect on their overall prosperity when combined with Hingashi banning the payment of the Ruby Tithe and the general decrease in traffic that’s come with the tensions. Many of the crates Kheris inspects on the docks are empty, and Lyse discovers that their food stores are plentiful but severely lacking in variety and flavor. One of the jobs we’re asked to undertake involves hunting walrus-like critters, and the local who sent us complains that while the meat is nutritious, it’s also disgusting. In less challenging times, they wouldn’t even bother with the stuff, let alone stock it in large amounts. He’s also careful to ask us to retrieve every arrow we find around the hunting grounds because they can’t spare any. Another quest mentions how a crew member was recently killed hunting rare and dangerous sea creatures, hoping game of that caliber would help their struggling community. The state of things leads Alisaie to conclude that everyone here knows confrontation with the Garleans is inevitable. Most of them even seem to want the fight. They’re suppressing that instinct and embracing a ‘what can you do?’ attitude because they’ve internalized the belief that any conflict will result in their defeat. To have hope of changing their minds, we need to convince them they have a chance, just like we did in Ala Mhigo. Our efforts also give us some critical context for Rasho’s attitude. It turns out that he’s Doman, and he joined the Confederacy 25 years ago, meaning he came to them as a means of escaping the conquest. The Garleans killed his entire family before he got out. No wonder he’s so conflicted about what to do! Between trying to protect his new family, a desire to avenge his old one, and confusion over whether he wants to fight because it’s the right move or because he wants payback and is thus betraying his oath and everyone he’s responsible for, the whole situation has to be pretty paralyzing. A turning point comes when Kheris is asked to go shark hunting. A Confederate party had already been given the job, but they’re running late, so she’s asked to check in on them while she’s out there. She finds only one member of that group, and he’s under attack by a Red Kojin.  After she takes care of the turtle, the survivor tells Kheris that a Garlean captain has kidnaped the others. He made sure to confirm that the Confederates were Doman before he attacked. Leaving aside how insane Yotsuyu’s hatred of Domans has to be for her to be ordering them hunted down one by one even if they live outside her borders, this is an escalation that Rasho can’t ignore. Or so one would think. When we bring him the news, he is appalled at the thought of his Doman ‘siblings’ being killed for Yotsuyu’s sport… but he still refuses to fight.   Lyse can’t keep herself in check any longer after hearing this. She learned her lesson in her hometown and tried valiantly to keep a cool head and remain diplomatic, but the captain abandoning his Doman subordinates to protect the others is too much for her to handle. She unloads on Rasho and Tansui. In a voice overflowing with contempt, she informs them that every sailor down in the village would die for the Confederacy and their leaders without a second thought. Then she accuses them of being cowards throwing their people’s lives away to protect their own. That second statement is a low blow and untrue based on what we know about these characters, but the two Pirate Captains can’t even bring themselves to rebut her attack. Tansui looks away in shame, and while the camera does not show us Rasho’s face, his fist grips so tightly in suppressed anger that there’s an audible creaking sound. Somehow, I don’t think he’s angry at Lyse. Alisaie sees her moment. The pair are vulnerable after that shot, and she has an idea that might crack them open. But she warns Kheris it’s an absolute dumpster fire of a plan that might get us all killed. Does Kheris trust her enough to follow her lead, knowing that?  Come on, girl. We fought your Grandpa and the dragon that blew up the world together. Get serious. Her proposal is simplicity itself. Rasho wants his side to get stronger and the enemy to get weaker, so The Scions and the Warrior of Light shall provide both. We’ll create a formal alliance between ourselves and the Confederacy. Then, to prove ourselves worth allying with, Kheris will single-handedly break the partnership between the Empire and the Red Kojin. If we fail, the Confederacy loses nothing and can return to bleeding out at Yotsuyu’s whim. If we succeed, they attack the fishing village with every man they’ve got. It’s a bold proposal… which she has no idea how to accomplish. But it’s also one Rasho wants to buy into, so he directs us to the island where the Blue Kojin hide their settlement. Perhaps they’ll be able to help us bring down their Red cousins. ~*~*~ Up to this point, the story momentum had been fine. I’d been a little bothered by the fact that we were stopping for Standard MMO Chore quests when our friend was being tortured, but at least the dialogue had addressed that we were only doing that to find a quick route to get what we wanted. Then I saw EIGHT sidequests unlock when we finished talking to Rasho and were told to head for Turtle Town.  I usually love the sidequests in this game. They almost always add worthwhile meat to the story’s bones. A few times, the deeper context they’ve given me for plot points has been crucial to creating a complete understanding of events. This batch isn’t an exception to that rule. There’s some good stuff here. But EIGHT quests? While I’m in a hurry to save Gosetsu’s life? That’s a bad call. Worse, not one of these quests would have been out of place in the section right before this when I was running around doing chores for the Confederates! Some even ask me to kill the same monsters or visit the same spots as quests I’d already done! What a needless flub in the story flow. Every moment I worked on these quests, the voice in the back of my head was screaming at me to knock it off and get back to saving Gosetsu. Spoiler warning, that voice is only going to get louder. Anyway, the main thrust of these quests is to give us more insight into the Confederate way of life. Some are just rehashing the food collecting and pest extermination quests, although these are a bit spicier. The food collection includes the gathering of some poisonous sea serpents, and I’m told the Confederates use their venom as a death sentence to any member who betrays the organization by slipping it into their grog. In a related vein, another quest has a Confederate officer ask you to threaten one of his sentries because he’s suspected of treason. This turns out to be a lie, and the real goal was for Kheris to be realistically menacing so the guy would do what he was supposed to do, run away and get help instead of confronting the problem himself. Cute. As for the pests, I have to help get rid of the same ghostly jellyfish (or some close relative) I saw in the Sirensong Sea. They are called Shiranui on this side of the world. The name refers to a real-life optical phenomenon that appears in the ocean off the shores of Kyushu. It’s traditionally associated with spirits, like a Japanese Will-O-The-Wisp. Ruby Sea folklore claims these invertebrates are the souls of those who die at sea with regrets, and their stings can drive people to a state of berserker madness. Kheris has to subdue some rookie crewmen who were stung without killing them so they can be healed. Other quests focus on the day-to-day struggles of running the Ruby Tithe racket. For example, Kheris is enlisted to help solve a murder when a Confederate is found stabbed in the back. The culprit is a fisherman who is a ronin samurai in disguise. His boat was stopped some months ago, and things got bloody when they refused to pay. He returned to get revenge for his friends who died in the scuffle, and it’s heavily implied that this sort of thing happens to the Confederacy frequently. Quite ironically, they mention that getting the tithe from ronin is always trouble because most masterless samurai are little better than criminals. Perish the thought, my sea gangster friend. The most noteworthy quest introduces the Confederacy’s Treasurer, an Au Ra named Tsukikage. Kheris finds him engaged in some monetary policy negotiations.  These two gentlemen have been claiming association with the East Aldenard Trading Company to threaten the Confederates into letting them sail without paying their Tithe. Tsukikage takes a dim view of this, as many merchants are trying similar tactics since they believe the Garleans have rendered the Confederacy toothless. It’s not entirely clear whether his promise to use that sword to collect an arm in place of money (and a later threat of some good old-fashioned knife torture in the dungeons) is earnest. Setting the threats aside, he does tell Kheris that the standard policy in cases of non-payment is to board the ship and confiscate goods as compensation. The problem is that in addition to Yotsuyu’s demand that Hingan ships no longer pay the Ruby Tithe, she’s also demanded that Hingan merchants no longer trade with Confederates. The bakufu government has conceded to this request, meaning that even if the pirates collect treasure as their toll, they have no way to fence it. To that end, Tsukikage and his assistants Suzume and Hansuku have been seeking an in-road to doing business with Lolorito’s associates. They figure that a foreign company from a country at war with Garlemald won’t care much for Yotsuyu’s edicts. Since Kheris has a relationship with the branch in Kugane, she’s given a flag and a cargo manifest to confirm whether the things they confiscated are Company property. If they are, they can be returned as a goodwill gesture; if they’re not, the Confederacy caught some imposters on the Company’s behalf. Win-win. On the Kugane docks, an inventory specialist named Kikimo confirms that none of these things are Company property. She also laments that it was the Warrior of Light who came asking because, given the value of the cargo, she would have been happy to lie and claim the stuff anyway. These two organizations deserve each other. Regardless, Kheris plays courier since the Confederates are not allowed in Kugane to do their negotiations. Kikimo turns out to be ecstatic at the terms and conditions Tsukikage offers. The Ruby Sea is the only source for some precious luxury goods, and they have become even rarer and more valuable since the Garlean occupation.  This would seem to be the end of things, but there’s a twist on its way. To start their new business partnership properly, Tsukikage wants to gather some fancier items and present them to Kikimo as a goodwill gesture. Hansaku, the younger and more bumbling of the assistants, is eager to rush off and collect them. A running thread of this story has been how hard he’s trying to impress his boss. The more competent Suzume is exhausted with his antics, but Tsukikage wonders if he’s not rushing around so much to avoid spending time with the prisoners. After all, the boy came to the Confederacy because his former crew nearly murdered him over a petty disagreement, and those two merchants were members of that crew. Suzume is shocked when she hears this information, growing visibly pale and needing to excuse herself. Tsukikage is quite confused by her behavior.  …You know, the writing has been pretty careful about covering it up, but this quest does low-key underscore that the Confederacy are not nice people. Do you remember how I mentioned that there were two schools of Yakuza film? In the 1970s, the “Chivalry Film,” fell out of style and was replaced by the second. They were called “Actual Record Films,” and portrayed the Yakuza as ruthless, violent street thugs living for nothing but the indulgence of their desires. They were usually shot in a documentary style, complete with shaky cam, and often rooted their narratives in publicly available police filings. The film that kicked off this genre shift was called Battles Without Honor and Humanity, just in case anybody didn’t get the point. It’s nice that even though these folks are supposed to be on the protagonist side, they’re not being completely white-washed. When you’re on the weaker side of a war, that sometimes means getting into bed with less-than-savory people to keep your head above water. Kheris helps Hansaku after he inevitably screws up his mission, and Suzume continues to be in a foul mood, scolding him at every opportunity. Tsukikage is so focused on getting this trade deal done that he barely notices. The first meeting with Kikimo goes well despite the awkward shadow cast by Suzume’s dour mood, and the parties arrange for shipments to be conducted at a hidden dock on the far side of Sakazuki island, so the Hingan watchers at Ruby Price will not report that the Westerners are violating the trade embargo. The only problem now is that dock has been out of use for some time and needs to have the wildlife cleared out. Hansaku volunteers for this task, still eager to prove himself, but Suzume declines to help, claiming she was injured while diving for pearls, and plans to head up to the watch post to catch some rack time. Tsukikage is increasingly worried about her behavior, noting that he’s seeing her send dark looks in Hansaku’s direction when she thinks he isn’t looking. He hasn’t seen that anger in her eyes since she first joined up with the pirates, right after a sea-faring bandit crew killed her parents. The truth was pretty apparent at this point, but to milk an extra quest out of it, the player is sent chasing after a final clue. A ring of great value that’s supposed to be among the goods handed over to the Company ship has gone missing. This ring turns out to have been crafted by Suzume’s parents and was found on one of the two thugs who were once ship-mates of Hansaku. There’s only one possible explanation for all of this:  No, you dummy! She wants to kill Hansaku for revenge! Duh!  It’s never completely clear whether or not Hansaku is guilty of participating in the raid that killed Suzume’s family. He only says he’s sorry for what his shipmates did to her and that he “didn’t know.” That last statement at least implies he was part of the attack, though the fact that his crewmates tried to murder him might mean that he refused. It’s an ambiguity I appreciate because the story wants us to understand that his guilt doesn’t matter according to Confederate beliefs. Tsukikage intervenes before Suzume can finish him. He reminds her that if she kills a fellow Confederate, she will be branded a traitor and suffer the consequences. She replies that she already considered that and intends to go through with this anyway, to give her parents the peace they deserve. It’s a tense moment, but sadly the resolution to it is kind of weak. Tsuki gambles on Suzume’s loyalty to him, demanding that she finish clearing out the docks before taking her revenge since she knows the Confederacy might be doomed if this deal falls through. She agrees as thanks for all the man has done for her, and this short delay leads her to be attacked by sea serpents. She only survives because Hansaku pulls a Get-Down-Mr-President. When the monsters are dealt with, Suzume asks if he saved her to earn a pardon for his crimes. Hansaku assures her that he only acted on his instinct to help a fellow Confederate.   We’re given the big message of the story, how the Confederacy is a found family, but more importantly, they’re a group who sever from their pasts so they can keep their eyes on the future. Suzume was easily irritated by Hansaku even before she wanted to kill him because she was still trapped by the loss that drove her to their ranks. She envied that Hansaku was living for a future she was holding herself back from. This is why, narratively speaking, whether Hansaku was guilty or not didn’t matter. By the Confederacy’s principles, he was reborn and left those sins behind when he swore the oath. Now that a person she saw only as an enemy has saved her life, Suzume can appreciate the value of that ideal and let go of her pain. It’s a neat little story, although I think it could have been told better. Many key revelations were backloaded and explained second-hand rather than shown organically to preserve a faux sense of mystery for an otherwise straightforward plot. Plus, that resolution was sitcom-level boilerplate. But in terms of showcasing the good and bad aspects of the Confederacy, I think it did a good job. Oh, and before I forget, there was one last interesting little quest. A Confederate lookout sees a body wash up on shore, a young woman with blue hair.  He’s squeamish about dead bodies and asks Kheris to check to see if the person is still alive. Thankfully she is! The blue-haired girl is an Au Ra who explains she was attacked and paralyzed by jellyfish while hunting for food. If Kheris hadn’t checked on her, she surely would have drowned or been eaten by an animal before the poison wore off.  With her thanks given, she departs on foot, promising to reward the Warrior of Light if they ever cross paths again. Far from home, eh? I wonder where she’s from that she survived being washed out to sea but also expects to return on foot. ~*~*~ The last sidequests settled, Kheris and Alisaie find Lyse brooding on the docks outside Onokoro. She feels like she let us down back there. She was the one who volunteered to spearhead negotiations, she encouraged us to keep trying and have faith in Gosetsu’s judgment, but in the end, Alisaie and Kheris were the ones who came up with the plan and sold it to the two Captains.   The irony is that we might never have gotten this far if she hadn’t been there to rip their faces off. She did a lot to put us on the road to victory, and she can’t even see it. Alis tries to speak up, but Lyse interrupts her to change the subject, saying it’s time we set off instead of standing around complaining. Alis silently accepts that Lyse doesn’t want to discuss things and instead makes us all a promise that when this is over, she will treat us to tarts and tea in Limsa Lominsa. Lyse agrees, provided we invite Y’shtola, the first time she’s mentioned our fallen friend in quite some time. It’s a charming moment of camaraderie. We beat feet to the island of Bekko, where we were told to seek out a cave near the island’s center to find the Blue Kojin. The place is pretty easy to locate since it’s surrounded by artificial pillars made of stone and seashells containing bio-luminescent moss. Road markers if I ever saw any. We follow the path and soon emerge into the Kojin village of Tamamizu. But it’s not underground… it’s underwater!   We’re lucky enough to meet Soroban near the gates, and when we tell him of Gosetsu’s plight, he offers to take us to the village elder. After all, this might be the perfect opportunity for… a business arrangement! Soroban, our friend is dying.  Chief Bunchin is intrigued by our idea of dividing the Red Kojin from the Garleans and leaving the Empire isolated. He explains the nature of their alliance and how it’s built on a lie. The Kojin believe that the Kami exist in numbers beyond counting, thousands upon thousands of spirits that travel between our world and the realm of the gods at a whim. However, these spirits need physical vessels when staying in our domain. While they can inhabit anything, they strongly prefer ancient, rare, and beautiful items. The Kojin’s sacred charge is to acquire treasures the Kami inhabit, as the divinity within such objects brings prosperity to all if they are properly protected and worshiped.  This fun religious concept is strongly inspired by real-life Shintoism, which holds that kami inhabit virtually every place and object on the planet and that cultivating harmony with these spirits will help you lead a blessed life. Of course, in real Shinto, spiritual balance isn't generally fostered by egregious materialism. The arrival of the Garleans complicated their sacred mission. Their militant atheism and sheer global reach meant that making an enemy of them might make acquiring and protecting the Kami vessels impossible. The Red Kojin decided the solution was to present themselves to the Garleans as allies. Of course, one cannot be a Garlean ally if one is motivated by faith, so they concocted a ruse whereby they would claim to be an entirely mercenary tribe interested in nothing but money and loot. The trick is that the Kami prefer to live in valuable things, so they’re acquiring religious icons under their master’s noses. This idea is pretty brilliant, but it comes with some downsides. For one, as the Garlean’s enforcers in the region, they do many nasty things. Blame for their actions falls upon the Blue Kojin thanks to typical human bigotry even though they have gone out of their way to not participate in these crimes. This makes it increasingly difficult for them to trade for their beloved treasures (and indeed is why Soroban wanted to deal with Eorzeans in the first place). The other problem is that they are actively denying their gods to continue worshiping them, which is something the Kami are not going to accept. The Blue Kojin are convinced this twisted form of faith is building up some kind of karmic debt that will fall on the Red’s heads sooner rather than later. In short, Bunchin will be happy to help us. He even knows how we might drive a wedge between the Reds and the Garleans. But before he'll tells us…   Also, one MSQ step after this, around six more sidequests unlock. Stormblood Writers, please. They’re torturing Gosetsu in that bar. It’s been days now… *sigh* More Ruby Sea adventures next time, everyone… 
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 05:59
|
|
|
For me personally part of what made the pacing halt here extra frustrating is that I didn't want to help the Confederacy. They're pirates who rob anyone who comes through the waters they have declared "theirs".
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 06:10
|
|
|
Yeah, these guys are no Merlwyb. They honestly seem like a bunch of losers trying to keep a graft going compared to Merlwyb.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 06:15
|
|
|
Yeah, this section sure is... a thing. It's also very weird that there's no mandatory dungeon for this section.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 06:15
|
|
|
SirSamVimes posted:For me personally part of what made the pacing halt here extra frustrating is that I didn't want to help the Confederacy. They're pirates who rob anyone who comes through the waters they have declared "theirs". Well if they manage to live another hundred years or so, they'll just be a nation with proper borders and everyone won't bat an eye
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 06:26
|
|
|
Craptacular! posted:Yeah, these guys are no Merlwyb. They honestly seem like a bunch of losers trying to keep a graft going compared to Merlwyb. At least the confederacy didn't steal their land, broke treaties and genocided "beast tribes" They're far more honorable than Limsa Pirates, is what I'm saying
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 06:29
|
|
|
Blueberry Pancakes posted:Yeah, this section sure is... a thing. It's also very weird that there's no mandatory dungeon for this section. To be fair, the optional dungeon is maybe my favorite Stormblood leveling dungeon.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 06:32
|
|
|
I don’t have that many thoughts, positive or negative, on the confederacy aside from really enjoying the research here, although I will say I do like the Kojin a whole lot both as individual characters and as an interesting fantasy race and therefore had a lot more fun doing their questionably placed sidequests and learning more about them. I think they’re neat.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 06:35
|
|
|
Craptacular! posted:Yeah, these guys are no Merlwyb. They honestly seem like a bunch of losers trying to keep a graft going compared to Merlwyb. This bit is one of those more awkward recipients of the indeterminate time bubble the writers mostly operate under (they've cited not being able to make people who are catching up and can do everything in one go feel the same length in the story as those who've been playing the entire time and had to wait months between patches). How long has it been since ARR in-universe? Well, you know... longer than a day, probably far less than the four real life years that passed between the releases of ARR and Stormblood. How long has it been since leaving Gosetsu to Yotsuyu's care? Well... In any case, their philosophy towards side quest unlocks in these expansions is less to do with story beats (unless the side-quests require something have happened in MSQ first) and more to do with trying not to overwhelm players with markers all at once. So it's closer to a flow of "you've had a bit of time to intro the area in plot, now you can stick around to learn more or you can get on with the MSQ". They haven't always gotten the balance quite right.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 06:42
|
|
|
Zomborgon posted:Well if they manage to live another hundred years or so, they'll just be a nation with proper borders and everyone won't bat an eye Honestly, it's kind of weird that they're not already considered a sovereign nation. We're told the Confederacy's origins and their policing of the Ruby Sea already goes back so far in history that neither great nation on the Sea's border remembers their origins. It Has Always Been This Way as far as they are concerned. They're certainly a De Facto nation if nothing else. If I had to wager a guess why they don't want to be treated as such and maintain their weird psuedo-soveriegn status, it probably has to do with how they take in cast-offs from every other place no matter what their previous crimes might have been and give them a clean slate. If you have treaties and ambassadors and other formal legal junk tying you to your neighbors, they're much less likely to be OK with you taking in criminals and exiles and telling everyone that whatever they did before didn't matter because they're Sworn Pirate Crew now.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 06:42
|
|
|
Monkey Island and Connect Four in one update? How cultured…!!
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 07:16
|
|
|
As a proud adherent of the belief that side quests are good and good for you, it's gotta be said that you need to know WHEN to do them. If you are really into the story and there's a plot beat driving you on, those side quests can and should wait for the plot to take a breath. Nearly all of those quests are something you could have clicked on, saw it wasn't a life or death emergency and said "I'll get back to you when my good buddy isn't being tortured." The quest givers would have understood.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 07:47
|
|
|
Sunday Morning posted:As a proud adherent of the belief that side quests are good and good for you, it's gotta be said that you need to know WHEN to do them. If you are really into the story and there's a plot beat driving you on, those side quests can and should wait for the plot to take a breath. Nearly all of those quests are something you could have clicked on, saw it wasn't a life or death emergency and said "I'll get back to you when my good buddy isn't being tortured." The quest givers would have understood. Part of the problem with giving an unusual bulk of sidequests here is that it's tonally consistent with the fact that the main MSQ events are lacking a sense of urgency despite the scenario that's driving you to go out into the Ruby Sea to do these things is exceptionally urgent. But I'll talk more about that next time.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 08:13
|
|
|
Yeah, the pacing here feels off. I didn't do any sidequests when I leveled through Stormblood so it didn't feel quite as weird for me as it did for you, but it's one of the weaker bits, for sure. Overall the Kojin and the Confederacy are okay factions but they don't stand out as favourites in the game either. I think two or three of my friends who started playing late Shadowbringers lost interest in the story around here or shortly after, and committed the unforgivable crime of buying a story skip to the beginning of Shadowbringers. They definitely missed out, I think. Still a lot of great stuff coming in Stormblood, and this part isn't that bad!
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 11:20
|
|
|
SirSamVimes posted:For me personally part of what made the pacing halt here extra frustrating is that I didn't want to help the Confederacy. They're pirates who rob anyone who comes through the waters they have declared "theirs". And personally, as someone from the American South, I will always look with intense skepticism on any organization called 'the Confederacy.' I don't know what the group is called in Japanese, and there don't seem to be any active parallels to the CSA, but surely Koji Foxx knew that that name would raise some instinctive hairs on the back of American necks.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 12:34
|
|
|
Cythereal posted:And personally, as someone from the American South, I will always look with intense skepticism on any organization called 'the Confederacy.' I don't know what the group is called in Japanese, and there don't seem to be any active parallels to the CSA, but surely Koji Foxx knew that that name would raise some instinctive hairs on the back of American necks. I believe the Japanese text uses just Kaizoku Shu, or literally Pirate Territory. But that doesn't sound very smooth in English and Confederacy (as a loose alliance of groups) is technically correct. The translation is probably just chosen to find a term that signifies something more official than a gang, but less official than a country. Of which there aren't really that many terms because countries in real life have extreme incentive to not ever recognize such groups with such titles, unless they're specifically vassal states. Confederacy is probably the closest you're going to get in terms of a word actually used to recognize such situations (excepting the American South Confederacy, there's some other examples like the Iroquois Confederacy), and Confederacy, as a term, can be kind of nebulous in terms of actual officiality, something that fits the pirate Confederacy here. (Plus, Alliance is....kind of taken). AncientSpark fucked around with this message at 14:45 on Aug 15, 2022 |
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 14:09
|
|
|
Cythereal posted:And personally, as someone from the American South, I will always look with intense skepticism on any organization called 'the Confederacy.' I don't know what the group is called in Japanese, and there don't seem to be any active parallels to the CSA, but surely Koji Foxx knew that that name would raise some instinctive hairs on the back of American necks. Lol what.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 15:30
|
|
|
AncientSpark posted:I believe the Japanese text uses just Kaizoku Shu, or literally Pirate Territory. But that doesn't sound very smooth in English and Confederacy (as a loose alliance of groups) is technically correct. I guess the weird thing is that nothing about what you see in the game implies a loose alliance of different groups. There is one organization, Rasho is at the top of it. People are struggling to follow these traditional rules that go back hundreds of years. You don't see different pirates crews vaguely working together towards a common goal, that's more the vibe in Limsa, even though it's technically more of a stable nation state. Part of it is just the problem with the fantasy story tendency towards using Capitalized Proper Nouns for things instead of coming up with more specific, contextual names. The author can find the most perfect and nuanced term, but at the end of the day a large part of the audience (Americans) are just going to think "oh like the bad guys in the civil war". Which wouldn't be a problem if they were The Ruby Fleet or whatever.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 15:33
|
|
|
Cythereal posted:And personally, as someone from the American South, I will always look with intense skepticism on any organization called 'the Confederacy.' I don't know what the group is called in Japanese, and there don't seem to be any active parallels to the CSA, but surely Koji Foxx knew that that name would raise some instinctive hairs on the back of American necks. Yeah I know it's just a knee-jerk reaction to a perfectly normal word... but I do wish they'd gone with anything else. Or at least put another word in there so it's not just The Confederacy.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 15:40
|
|
|
Part of that is also just issues with the historical context too. Kaizoku shu means something pretty specific in Japanese history, despite it literally translating to just "pirates" or "pirate territory"; as Sanguina pointed out, the Confederacy was inspired off real life Japanese naval histories, and kaizoku shu was used to denote local clans united together to hold naval power and demand tithes from passerbys (so ACTUALLY a confederacy, in the true sense of the word). It's inspired off times when power was not as centralized in naval power; once such armies were organized under the daimyo, a more appropriate term would be something like Suigun (or literally navy). In a sense, it's AS meaningful in Japanese as something like "the Ruby Fleet" if someone is familiar with the inspiration, but in other contexts, it's...not. Although part of me wonders if they could have just ran with Kaizoku Shu transliterated instead (I blame One Piece for the EN audiences knowing that kaizoku = pirates). AncientSpark fucked around with this message at 15:59 on Aug 15, 2022 |
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 15:49
|
|
|
Zomborgon posted:Yeah AncientSpark posted:Part of that is also just issues with the historical context too. Kaizoku shu means something pretty specific in Japanese history, despite it literally translating to just "pirates" or "pirate territory"; as Sanguina pointed out, the Confederacy was inspired off real life Japanese naval histories, and kaizoku shu was used to denote local clans united together to hold naval power and demand tithes from passerbys (so ACTUALLY a confederacy, in the true sense of the word). It's inspired off times when power was not as centralized in naval power; once such armies were organized under the daimyo, a more appropriate term would be something like Suigun (or literally navy). As Begemot noted, though, the Confederacy isn't a confederacy as far as we ever see in the game. It's a stable, centralized organization with a settled hierarchy that goes back hundreds of years. There's no real internal divisions, and the decisions the boss makes are final and obeyed by all (as far as I recall, it's been a long time since I was through here myself). Calling it 'the Confederacy' is, to me, a very weird choice that evokes historical ideas and images (to both Japanese and Western audiences in very different ways) that it bears little to no actual relation to.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 15:55
|
|
|
Yeah, ultimately, it's the perils of localization. The original JP writers chose a semi-pop, semi-historical reference to something that might be somewhat familiar to the JP audience, but both sounds absolutely hilariously dumb in English and which is completely meaningless historically to the EN audience. And then the localizers said "Well, we'll use the historical reference for it to preserve some of the meaning, but so it doesn't sound as dumb, and not worry about the utility of the name", only to accidently evoke a different history in English. This is not going to be the first localization issue that's going to happen (there's a very infamous one later, although in an entirely different context and for entirely different reasons that aren't inflammatory). This one just happens to be one where the justification for it is very subtle, but the reactions for it are very easy to knee-jerk due to how loaded the term is to Americans. AncientSpark fucked around with this message at 17:07 on Aug 15, 2022 |
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 16:28
|
|
|
From what we’re told of its founding, the label works. Over time it has just slowly condensed into a more unified organization but kept the name.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 16:29
|
|
|
Cythereal posted:And personally, as someone from the American South, I will always look with intense skepticism on any organization called 'the Confederacy.' 
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 16:52
|
|
|
It works out for me, because seeing anyone walking around with the <Confederate> title lets you know not to interact with them when you’d otherwise remain ignorant. Just like the <Pure White> title.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 16:55
|
|
|
Sure, but regardless of whether the label fits, if you're localizing something into English for a primarily American audience, and you call something "the Confederacy," that's going to come across as a specific reference for some of us. It's not like fatal to the project or w/e, but not at least putting an additional adjective in there is questionable, I had the same thought going through this bit of the MSQ. I think they even use the adjective "Confederate" at some point, which I've only ever seen used in reference to the CSA. There have been other confederacies, but we generally refer to them with the proper-noun part of the name, eg the Haudenosaunee (less properly Iroquois). Just calling them the Ruby Confederacy or the like would dodge this pretty adeptly.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 16:58
|
|
|
Aside from the blue quests that unlock things, I didn't go back to do all those Stormblood sidequests for over a year.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 17:35
|
|
|
Yeah, I too think the pacing is off in this update. Plus I was kind of annoyed that we had Lyse yelling at people for not fighting the Garleans and then feeling bad about it later again.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 19:14
|
|
|
The pacing of quests smacking up against the urgency of the MSQ feels like an inevitable and maybe unavoidable consequence of telling a story in an MMO. You wanna add side quests to enrich the flavor of the area, people expect them, and they might want to use those quests to level secondary jobs, but those tasks popping up removes the urgency of the narrative and the nature of an MMO means you're never explicitly locked into a narrative track. You can always walk away, the world likely isn't phased in a particular way to convey that urgency. It will be interesting to see Sang's reaction to this element over the future content. It's not something I interacted with much and I still have a ton of side quests everywhere to do so I never really thought about it.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 19:22
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 11, 2024 13:50 |
|
|
Gosetsu is a big guy, he can probably hold out for a while. It's true though, Stormblood has pacing issues and they're really apparent here. At least the Ruby Sea has some nice scenery.
|
|
#
?
Aug 15, 2022 19:37
|
|
