[Suggestion] Paid Race Change Program.

[Daemon]

Is that a cultural thing over there? Elderly ppl do that here as well but its due to the eyes loosing the ability to see colors as they once did so purple looks gray and true gray looks something else I don't remember. Which is why there are so many purple haired grannies they think they are dying their hair gray

Honestly I'm not sure. I went to Japan in 1999. At the time girls were rockin these white long socks with School girl dresses and they all dye their hair whitish grey. I hung out with a music producer and his artist Mao Denda during the time who told me that Elderly woman and men dye their hair blue or purple.

[Camiie]

Name change and hairstyle change are realistic & should be implemented. They would have to add a sticky to the forums here listing everyone who changed names with old/new names, so that you don't end up in a Ls with somebody who stole your KC or w/e and is going under a new name & you don't know its them.

Said it before, but just because something can be abused doesn't mean it shouldn't exist for those who won't abuse it.

Hairstyle changes is of course realistic and should be possible if you want to, say once per year. Face change is unrealistic, as is gender and race.

I'll paraphrase the MST3k Mantra: "It's just a game, you should really just relax."

What people don't appreciate is that in ffxi some of the core storylines involve marriage between NPCs and the whole storyline hinges on it. If it were a world where the bride could suddenly change gender and race or get a new head, that would make such plotline romances meaningless.

We're adventurers. As such, we have crazy adventures that the vast majority of NPCs could only dream of. By our nature we encounter strange and ridiculous things that they never will. Much of Vana'diel understands this because they hear tales of our exploits and probably wouldn't be all that surprised if one day that wacky, heroic elf suddenly returned to town as a wacky, heroic mithra.

Even if that doesn't do it for you, the 3 nations seem to possess what can only be described as Retcon Magic. They explain it as "sealing your memories," but what is the real effect of that magic? Reality changes such that to the rest of the world you never completed any of the missions for that nation. Who is to say such magic could not be used to explain a change in one's identity? I don't mean that if we use one of these services that we get our missions reset, but reality itself could be altered such that, to the rest of the world, that wacky, heroic elf was always that wacky, heroic mithra.

Or, "It's just a game, you should really just relax."

Also re; FFxi has magic spells & teleports etc. and is therefor a fantasy and not like Earth, there are shamans in Mexico and the Amazon who for thousands of years have possesed magical powers, and mastery of 'dreams' to they extent they can fly in spirit. Whether or not you believe it is irrelevant, many people on Earth believe in magic and claim to have witnessed it. So FFxi and Earth are actually more alike than some might have it. But neither Earth nor FFxi have people that are born from magic spells, we are all born by natural process, and to suddenly change Vanadiel to a place where people overnight change their heads, bodies, race and gender, would rob the game of its realism.

[FrankReynolds]

I am relaxed, thanks.


I don't agree with your angle of 'adventurers are so special and different to shopkeepers etc. that we should be allowed to change race/heads etc. just because we put on armor and hit mobs.'

Windurst is the city of magic, almost all NPCs there have innate magical abilities, and yet they are ALL born to real flesh and blood parents, and raised as children. Taru and mithra kids go to magic school in Windurst, to learn about the elemental spectrum etc. But they don't change into humes magically, as that would break their parents heartarus.This is called REALISM.

Re; its just a game, its a 'role playing game' in an online cybernetic ecology (virtual world). Vanadiel has seasons, days and nights, NPC's with active A.I., and hugely immersive game content. This sets it apart from "just games" which would include Tekken etc.

Just because you don't understand that changing the basic rules of life in an RPG actually sabotages the whole atmosphere which is what many people play RPGs for. Example, the marriage of two famous NPC's in a ffxi storyline, what happens if the handsome groom wakes up in bed the morning after the wedding and discovers his beautiful wife has overnight changed into a galka. That would have knock on effects if they were supposed to be parents to a plotline character. If players can do change race and swap heads overnight, then that also means it is the base reality of all Vanadiel, which means that next time you go see Prince Trion or Ghatsad, they might have turned into mithras or something. Don't you understand that kind of basic logic, that you can not build realistic rpg's unless they have "constancy", realism and a sence of permanence.

What you seem to be saying, is that you don't like being Elvaan and want to be mithra. I also played an Elvaan female briefly in 2004, but I personally didn't like the Boeing 747 ears, or the 'running underwater' animation on that model. I realised this after 10 levels, and deleted the char and built a mithra which I then played for 9 years. My point is that you have got hundreds or thousands of levels on your Elvaan, and didn't stop to think that maybe those ears were not your thing. You should have realised that around level 10, or level 50 at worst. Its actually your fault, for not changing race when your character was still early stages. Its not the developer's fault, they made a realistic virtual world, with weather and fluctuating market prices and food you can eat. etcetcetcetc. Asking them to sabotage the intrinsic realism of their whole RPG just because you decided too late that you don't like your ears, is actually absurd. Especially as you can build a new mithra to competent game standard in a month, starting your new character's storyline from the beginning, as it was always supposed to be, in Earth and Vanadiel.

In my magical fantasy RPG world, This character model you see is just a magical skin that I have created to hide my true form because it is so terrifyingly beautiful that merely gazing upon it would disintegrate your entire being and leave nothing behind of your soul. Not even a hint of a memory of your existence. ANd I can change it any time I want cuz I'm just that bad ass.

There is no intrinsic realism in this game. Only what you have created in your head. And if they decide to allow character model and name changes, you'll just have to create a new reality in that crazy head of yours.

[Mirage]

A lot of the things in this thread is completely realistic, but that's never stopped SE from ignoring things before, remember!

[Demon6324236]

You make it sound like someone is just going to stand in Jeuno and cycle races all day. People are talking about a paid feature where if you do not like the name, race, or look of your character you may change it accordingly. I am sorry to inform you not everyone is going to accept that you have to go out and do everything you have done over the last few years just to get back to where you were all for the sake of having your character look different. In my particular case I hate my Hume, why, not because its a Hume, but because he looks like he's pissed off all of the time, my characters face & hair are something I picked quickly without care, if I could, I would change it. I no reason at all why it would be a bad thing, you make it sound like it would break the games lore in to little tiny pieces and all sense of realism would be lost, no, I have a cousin, he was a girl, now, he is not, changing sex was not impossible, magic, or unrealistic. At the same time, race may be a bit different, but we are the only humanoids on earth who have evolved into the same kind of race, unlike Vana, where the 5 races are all very similar, so that comparison is impossible to really give. But in the end, we also do not have magic, and to place limits and bounds on what such magic can do to a person seems stupid, this is not D&D no matter how it is based off of it, so in the end, there is no telling what can and can not be done with the magic.

As you said, we can die and come back, we are basically immortal, but any other character in the story is not nearly the same, to them, home points might as well not even exist, like in most games. Why would it be so much of a game breaker for my immortal adventurer who can not truly die by any means, to be able to change his race or gender, when he's already so different from the others in this world? If anything, going by the logic you presented before, the idea that they should not allow us because then NPCs should be able to do the same, well, I propose home points should not exist any more, if you die, that's it, your dead. If we can come back to life that breaks lore doesn't it? I mean, what if all of a sudden after killing Kam'lanaut he just popped back up at his home point in Jeuno? I mean, that would completely break the story, so no more dying and home pointing, either you get raised, or your dead forever.

[Demon6324236]

We are not "immortal" in the Vanadiel storyline aspect, NPC's sending you off to battle pray for your safe return and even near to tears (Star Sibyl etc.). We are allowed to revive from KO because that is a fundamental aspect of every videogame ever made, you can play again after you are beaten, its just that in an evolving online world you don't start at lvl 1 every time you die, you are classed as KO only. That is a fundamental game mechanic, it has nothing to do with Lore, and certainly doesn't mean you are immortal. You are the same as all the NPC soldiers in the game, just another mortal born of the flesh, its just that for the purposes of gaming you can only be KO not killed entirely. I'm sorry if you can't see that, you buy a game and your char dies and then you have to create a new char, that kind of game never actually existed. At worst you would have to start on lvl 1 with the same char like in the arcades (sometimes).

So when its for life or death of a players character, its ok to allow them to be resurrected for the sake of the game, but, when it comes to changing ones appearance, gender, or race, its not allowed?

Also killing a mob would not count as killing an NPC, they are monsters not 'non-player characters' so your NM homepointing thing is a miss.

I did not pick a NM, I picked a character in the story you kill for story reasons, who is a living breathing person important to the story line, who conveniently dies, it is not a miss, because he is a NPC. It would be like if Wolfgang died in Adoulin, it could be a dramatic moment, up till he comes back to life in Western because that's where his home point was set. That was my point I was attempting to make, not every gameplay related feature effects NPCs, our ability to come back to life at a crystal as we please while NPCs can not is simply an example.

My issue as I said is that changing your racial origins with a mouseclick is not something that fits into a stratified online world. It goes against the whole structure of a realistic RPG scenario. I also question gender change in a medieval world due to the surgery & pharmacueticals required.

This again, ignores the ideas of magic. Magic can be made to do a great many things. I gave an explanation earlier of how it could simply be explained in game as a powerful magic that would kill an ordinary person, but due to our power we have gained, we are able to withstand such things. There are many forbidden magics, this could surely be one of them.

My beginnings in FFxi was that I played hume F, taru F, elvaan F and then four different mithras,(on one content ID, deleting each char as I went along) I chose F because I'm a woman and I feel more comfortable role-playing something I know about. I played each char for a few days to see their animations and the frame-specific battle noises they made, and then I picked my personal favourite.
That seems like an easy and failsafe route to getting a frame you like.

Things are not always so clear cut and simple though. For instance, say someone wants to marry someone they met in game, they are a Mithra, but a guy, and their partner is a Female Hume, now, thanks to the rules of the game, an official marriage is impossible. What should someone do? Pay to have a character change that would then allow them to marry the one they wish, or create an entirely new character just to do so? Remember, in this scenario the person has been playing a long time, and never expected to find someone, let alone be effected by these restrictions. What exactly would be fair in this instance?

This is a simple and single example, but my point is, its not as easy as you seem to want to make it sound. Yes, some people can just instantly do that, I mean I used to play the PSU Demo with my Cousin who would remake his character on a weekly basis because the outrageous cost to change your characters appearance in that game, and he wanted to change 1 or 2 features of his character. I myself, am not one of those, and I doubt I am the only one not willing to redo all I have already done just so I can change these minor aspects of my character.

Earlier on there were comments like "I don't see why not" & so I replied because as a role-player I can see why not, and I just input what seems like common sense in an rpg game.

You shared your opinion, and I am sharing my opinion on your opinion in return, explaining to you what I see that makes little to no sense. I do think you have some inconsistencies for instance where some things are allowed to effect the game but not lore while others can not be done because they would effect both, in the case of sex/race changes vs death/KO.

[FrankReynolds]

Seriously... You're arguing that one thing can't happen because it's not realistic... in a game with gods, avatars, time travel, alternate realities, talking cat people, wizards, geomancers,, evil spear carring lizard people, goblins, moogles, power crystals, luopans, magical bards and dancers and well pretty much an entire world of make believe, often completely nonsensical stuff.

You're gonna have to come up with a better reason. No one is buying into this argument.

I mean just a couple of months ago they went "Hey guys, there's a whole other continent over there now and apparently those gods you guys killed aren't really gods, cuz uhh the grasshoppers over there will whoop your arse. Ohh, by the way, trees and rocks are your enemy now and you will need to save this land from.... well, we haven't made that part up yet, but here. Do some gardening while we figure it out..."