Au Ra physiology and other lore.

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Originally Posted by Balipu

Ah, you beat me to it. As far as we can determine only her face is unscaled. And as usual for asians she has long silky black hair. I likes it
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Nobody said anything about this being the unmasking. Maybe she gets unmasked earlier and stays that way for the rest of the story. She looks like she is at a meeeting. Maybe some diplomatic stuff.

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I doubt they would pointedly mark her face under BtFp2 if we see it in BtFp1.

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Originally Posted by Asheilin

I doubt they would pointedly mark her face under BtFp2 if we see it in BtFp1.

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Unless they want a big surprise. We know the unmasking is comming, we know that she is an Au Ra so we have a general idea of what she looks like, so only thing left is to make the exact time a surprise.

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Originally Posted by Alice_89th

EDIT: Asheiling correctly points out that this was from the second part of the trailer. So a good 2 months before we see her then.

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This is likely due in part to the art team giving themselves up until the very last minute to make any changes they feel are necessary to the Au Ra model. They got unveiled at Tokyo Fanfest, but you can bet your butt that there are at least small adjustments being made to them even now, and probably will be made all the way up to the March in-game reveal.

Of course, it's possible Au Ra will appear in the game a little earlier;

for various reasons, it is extremely likely that the main body of the Dravanian Horde is composed in significant part of Au Ra, and that the dark-scaled Au Ra are in fact going to be the "Dravanian" clan. So it's very possible we'll see at least one during 2.5 part 1, and definitely during 2.5 part 2 with the siege of Ishgard.

But yeah, there's a good reason Yugiri won't be unmasked until March - as much as her concept "art" has been done for a while, it's very, very likely small tweaks are still being made to the Au Ra model and animation skeleton, and the art team wants as much lead time as humanly possible before releasing Yugiri and her brethren into the wild, as it were.

[QUOTE=StarDrake;2708284]Of course, it's possible Au Ra will appear in the game a little earlier;

for various reasons, it is extremely likely that the main body of the Dravanian Horde is composed in significant part of Au Ra, and that the dark-scaled Au Ra are in fact going to be the "Dravanian" clan. So it's very possible we'll see at least one during 2.5 part 1, and definitely during 2.5 part 2 with the siege of Ishgard.

I would love to know these 'various reasons', because I (personally) fully expect said horde to be actual dragons only.

Well, the hoard will be composed of Dravanians, not necessarily Dragons. I don't think Dragonflies Boast and Aevis are "true" dragons, like Safat, Moracco, Svara, etc are. And there are all the heretics who will also be fighting for Dravania. For the black-scaled Au-Ra to also be part of the hoard as footsoldiers or the like isn't any sort of impossibility at all

Dragons are likely the top of Dravanian society, with their lesser kin and slaves below them.

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Originally Posted by Alice_89th

I would love to know these 'various reasons', because I (personally) fully expect said horde to be actual dragons only.

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There are three immediate ones, one of which is a bit meta.

The first is that it simply makes no sense to add the Au Ra to the game if they are not part of the Horde and are not going to make a substantial appearance in Heavensward outside of player models. The other elements that have been previewed all match Heavensward thematically - Dark Knights who will be of either Ishgardian or Dravanian origin (and given that they love to show off DK with this burly Au Ra, I lean toward the latter), Astrologians of seemingly a combined Ishgardian-Sharlayan origin, Machinists because we'll be dealing with airships and cannon and whatnot a lot in Ishgard, bird beastmen who live on the Sea of Clouds, etc. Adding the Au Ra purely for player use and one major NPC makes no sense - we're going to be seeing a lot of them. And the most obvious place for Au Ra to be is in the Horde, in some capacity.

Secondly, and somewhat relatedly and on a half-meta level: the story has been pushing the idea that at least some Au Ra are Dravanian for a while. Yugiri, first of all, seems concerned about her appearance and how Eorzeans will react to it - and yet, despite how easily Alph lets it slide when he brings it up, by itself this makes no sense in context. Ul'dah is a little hostile to the "beast tribes" and Gridania as a city is a bit wary of outsiders in general, but significant parts of Eorzea, especially Limsa, are places where Goblins and Mamool Ja walk the streets alongside Hyurans and Lalafells. Yugiri has a very "normal"-looking body shape and voice (and, on a meta level, we know thanks to the Au Ra reveal and the 2.5 trailer that ultimately she looks far more "human" than the aforementioned Gobbos or Mamools or whatnot and that she's very pretty) so it seems very strange that she'd think the reaction to her appearance would be one of fear, "disquiet" and hostility...

... unless, of course, she had specific reason to think her appearance would cause some upset. Like the fact that her Dravanian cousins have been participating in a war against one of the nations of Eorzea for literally an era, and that being recognized for what she "is" might lead some to suspect her cause is some form of strange Dravanian plot more than anything else. Never mind running into an Ishgardian by accident, as they may well try to kill her on the spot.

Either way, Yugiri's appearance has been deliberately played up as "dangerous", and I don't think that's just the developers being coy about showing the new race. If nothing else, FFXIV's plotting, especially in the patches, has been too tight for that.

Moreover, in 2.4 they very deliberately introduced this idea of Saint Shiva "laying with a dragon", and the flight of fancy this would inevitably lead to. While I don't actually think this will be the origin of the Au Ra, I do think it's part of Ishgardian folklore regarding the origins of the Dravanian Au Ra. And either way, on a meta level the writers wished for us to make this association with Dravania and half-dragons before introducing the Au Ra publicly at all. I really can't see that as coincidence.

On a more general level, as noted, even what we've seen of the Horde to date has been very varied. In addition to "normal" quadrupedal dragons (of several sizes), there are dragonflies, drakes/biasts, aevis-style ground-walking flightless-winged dragons (who seem to serve as the Horde's general infantry), wyverns, two-legged "dragon giants"... with such company, it is not remotely out of question that Au Ra could be part of the Horde. So long as you have an axe to grind with the hominids, you're welcome to help out, seemingly.

Finally, there's one other thing that is purely in the story.

The Akh Afah Amphitheater.

Specifcally, the Akh Afah Amphitheater. It's named in dragon-tongue, and it seems fairly clearly to be a Dravanian structure (it never showed up anywhere on the old Coerthas map), but it's a properly-made amphitheater, with seating, entrances, and a stage, all scaled for human-sized sentient bipeds. What possible use would dragons have for such a structure? (Cue an image of Svara and Maracco doing a comedy routine? :V) What possible use... unless there is a significant element of permanent Dravanian society who are "human"-scale?

Like, say, some Au Ra?

Ultimately it's largely still conjecture, but that's basically all we have at this point. There is, however, a mountain of evidence pointing to the idea that the Au Ra will be part of the Dravanian Horde in Heavensward - probably a significant part.

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Originally Posted by StarDrake

Excellent arguments

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This was a very interesting read.

I am a bit of a sceptic when it comes to linking the dravanians and the Au ra, but you do make some compelling arguments. Thank you for taking the time to write them down :)

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Originally Posted by Alice_89th

This was a very interesting read.

I am a bit of a sceptic when it comes to linking the dravanians and the Au ra, but you do make some compelling arguments. Thank you for taking the time to write them down :)

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Well thought out arguments, but I am skeptical as well. I expect most of them to be from Doma, even if the are Shiva's descendants.

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Originally Posted by Grayve

Well thought out arguments, but I am skeptical as well.

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As am I. I still suspect Au Ra originate from Othard.

The reason the Au Ra are shown as the new jobs is because they're the new race and, right now, can't get enough air-time. They're just showing off their newest products.

The amphitheater could just as well have been created by humans for humans. Ishgardian heretics have existed for a long, long time now considering St. Shiva's lore and I imagine humans allying (and sleeping) with dragons would speak the language.

As much as I may dislike it, most everything the devs do isn't given any forethought regarding lore, they then rely on the lore team to explain additions or changes after the fact. (ala Dalamund)


EDIT: And, uhh.. By "humans" I mean Elezen.

Hey guys, been meaning to post some speculation-style lore on the au ra. As a quick note, I have not played through the new MSQs as of this posting. So I don't know if anything I post here is wrong or way off. Anyway enjoy!


So I wanted to talk about the recent preview of Yugiri's face. As I assumed earlier, it's possible Yugiri may have a unique face and/or hairstyle that player au ra may not have, but with the recent preview, I think that Yugiri may, at least, have a generic model and here's why:
http://i.imgur.com/JnxFu7U.jpg

Yugiri's hair bears remarkable similarity to another piece of au ra art found earlier on this page:
http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/img/.../321/ss_15.jpg

Our astrologian promotional artwork and Yugiri herself both have the same hairstyle! This is pretty good evidence to suggest that au ran (Auri? Au rese? Au rinian?) females will have the option for the same hairstyle. Given this is a very long, tied hairstyle, I wonder if there will be long looser hairstyles available to female au ra.

As aside, I also found another picture detailing the heights and total height each of the current races can reach with the character creator:

http://www.swaggerffxiv.com/wp-conte...le_heights.jpg
http://www.swaggerffxiv.com/wp-conte...le_heights.jpg

This gives us a slightly more accurate look (using the current in game numbers) on the relative heights of each of the races and we can still posit that the au ra males sit somewhere inbetween elezen and roegadyn heights and may be able to stretch as tall or taller than roegadyns. Female au ra, may not be able to get as tall as the shortest highlanders. Those of you who were concerned about their heights will at least be happy to know that they can at least be taller than the average hyur midlander, though.


Now that's out of the way, let's talk a bit more about Yugiri and why she hides her face.

First, there's no real indication that speculation regarding Shiva's union with a dragon led to the creation of the au ra. The event has simply occurred too soon in the general timeline of Eorzea that a race of dragon-bred people could've populated into a function society and emigrated out of Eorzea and into Othard. Secondly, I don't think we'll really, truly, know the origins of the au ra at this time. Simply put, we know little about the origins of the current five races. Only that they arrived on Eorzea centuries ago in the distant past. There may be mythical elements in the ancient past that led to the creation of the five races on the other continents as well as those of the au ra. But any origin story on those five races will likely be brought up at the same time as those of the au ra I believe.

Now regarding the dragons on Eorzea. It's important to note that the dragons fighting Ishgard are collectively called the Dravanian Horde. They are a mix of different species of dragons from wyverns, aevis, quadrupedal (four-legged) dragons, monstrous dragons like Giruveganaus, and even 'lesser' beasts like dragonflies and drakes. Hence the name "Horde". We all know about Nidhogg, but there's likely to be a number of different dragon leaders within the Horde that all converse, plan, and strategize their attacks on Ishgard and its territories. In the end 2.5 trailer we've seen a black-ish dragon land on the Steps of Destiny, preparing his attack on the city and we've seen a brief look at a white dragon seen in the Heavensward teaser (pic below)
http://s1.dmcdn.net/HiVQ1.jpg

Dragons, and the dravanian horde are shown to be quite malicious on Eorzea.

But what if they're not the only dragons on the planet?

We know that a continent to the south known as Meracydia was inhabited by dragons thanks to the Coil of Bahamut lore. We know in the ancient past that the Allagan empire invaded and enslaved the dragons there and even took down Bahamut and imprisoned him in the artificial moon of Dalamud. It stands to reason that there may be other dragons located on other continents and it stands to reason that the other dragons, hordes or otherwise, may also be as malevolent as the dravanians are on Eorzea. Thus, a race like the au ra, who bear draconic features would likely be just as feared or hated on their home continent as they would be on Eorzea.

Recall that Yugiri once said that she had encountered people who took to fear when the once saw her and that experience taught her to keep her face hidden from those who aren't used to seeing her kind. Know that also, Yugiri had never been to Eorzea before, recall that she did not know what a primal was. She had heard of gods like those found on Othard, but never encountered ones like those in Eorzea. It stands to reason then, that Yugiri has no knowledge of the history of the dragonsong war between Ishgard and the Horde. Thus, Yugiri's experiences regarding her appearance likely stem from her homeland either in Doma, or among the other civilizations that exist on Othard. We can then assume that the au ra, who originate from Othard are an incredibly rarely seen people. And that they themselves do not venture much beyond their borders. In fact, I suspect that Yugiri may have been an orphan au ra who wound up in Doma and was adopted by one its families before the country fell. She trained in their fighting styles and took a name from their culture. It may be that Yugiri was accepted by the people that adopted her, but others among the continent and perhaps even in the country do not share similar sentiments.

Which then brings us to the question why the PC au ra decided to show up in Eorzea come Heavensward. Perhaps it has something to do with the ending line uttered by the dragon at the end of 2.5 trailer, "My brood have heard the song. Ishgard shall burn!" Perhaps the au ra come because they too can hear the song? Though I don't think they descend from dragons (perhaps they were cursed by one powerful dragon akin to Nidhogg, Bahamut or Midgardsormr?), their draconic features and horns may give them a special type of hearing or understanding of dragons that the other five races lack. Perhaps the coming exodus of au ra from Othard to Eorzea is due to another event. Maybe the Garleans uncover their hidden homeland and its residents are forced to flee westward? Maybe a large portion of au ra develop a sense of wanderlust and decide to leave their homes in search of adventure. I imagine that this aspect of why player au ra leave for Eorzea will be kept open ended for players to develop and role-play their own reasons.

And that's all I have to talk about today. I have some more speculation and lore stuff I'd like to get into in the near future regarding the dragons. I'm not certain if it'll be entirely related to the au ra, but maybe as I rummage the ideas in my head I might be able to make a connection. Until then!

I firmly believe that the Au'ra are genuinely draconic in the same way that Miqo'te are genuinely feline. Would the Au'ra protest to being call "Dragon Descendants"? Probably yes being as the Miqo'te in general are offended by the idea that they are literally descended from cats as well as humans in our world (And likely Eorzian Hyurs) are offended by the claim that we are descended from Apes.

So Draconic, Cat-like, and Ape-like doesn't necessarily mean shared blood. As for them coming to Eorzia, it's possible that Yugiri is indeed an orphan but the Au'ra and the Domans do have some history together. But Doma is not the only nation in Oethard nor is it the Only Oethard nation that Garlemauld has conquered. Lets say that The Garlens have fought dragons before on Oethard and the dragons there were even more malevolent than the Dravanians. Then by exterminating the area's "Dragon Problem" some nations may have joined Garlemauld by choice. Then the Now Garlen territory that is now no longer plagued by the "Evil" dragon kin are assisting in the conquering of their neighbors. Imagine their shock and horror when they come across a race of Draconic Humanoid people that a terrifyingly similar to the beasts that terrorized them in the past. Yea you'd freak out too.

My wager is that since Eorzia is seemingly the only nation as a whole to mount a solid opposition against Garlemauld, and do so not once but three times, upon hearing that Eorzia has taken the Doman refugees in the Au'ra may have decided to send "Reinforcements" to Eorzia so that the remaining Domans stay free and they could form a proper resistance through a potential alliance with Eorzia (Then hello 4.0 taking us to Oethard and Garlemauld's front door)

BTW I spell Au'ra with the apostrophe because I believe the final name will be spelled that way ala Miqo'te vs Miqote

Unrelated, but in the 2.2 questline, I noticed that Yugiri mentions "beings of yore" similar to the Primals that existed in her homeland in ancient legends.

Does this mean that Eorzea isn't the only place that can potentially have Primals? I always found that kind of limiting, because the Primal threat is such a huge part of this game and if future expansions to other places outside Eorzea don't have them, that'd be kind of lame. =/

So the next bit of speculative lore I'm going to talk about are the dragons and their possible relation to the au ra. This bit of information probably has more to do with dragons than with the au ra, but like we're all theorizing, there's bound to be some connections between to two. Like before, this post is before I've played through the new 2.5 MSQs. As I have yet to play through them, most of my information is speculative and could be completely wrong, so feel free to disregard everything if it turns out that I'm way off here. But I do hope that you readers will consider some of the information that I post here.




So, according our lore guru(s), the dragons have their own language which they use to speak and communicate with themselves. This language has likely evolved and transformed over thousands of years of use and communication between its natural speakers and those that learned the language. Yet it seems like it may not be the only means of communication between dragons. As seen in the 2.5 trailer, dragons seems capable of communicating through song and whether that song carries words (sounds with meaning) or is even audible to mortal ears or non-dragons is completely up in the air at this point. We do know of a few words used by the dragons and were recently translated to us by the lore guru(s); "Ahk", "Morn", and "Afah". These words translate into "Circle", "Death", and "Eternity" respectively. We don't really know many other words used by the dragons, but these three words seem to give us a little glimpse into how they might sound. It seems that the dragons have a tendency to speak in mono-syllabic or bi-syllabic sounds. Short and sweet and a very compact language as suggested by the lore gurus. And I suspect that the au ra is a name given by the dragons to represent this particular race.

We know about the miqo'te, hyur, roegadyn, elezen and lalafell races and the fact that their names of their species tend to originate from their own language and origin, but au ra are unique in that they possess a name that's not quite similar to the other races. The word aura, a word closely related in spelling to au ra, originates from the minor greek goddess or goddesses of the breeze. The aurai are said to be born from the gods of the four winds and resembles nymphs or ghosts. The au ra of Hydaelyn don't appear to carry any similarities to the Grecian myths. Further, the name au ra likely carries a different pronunciation than what we may be used to and probably closely relates to the Japanese pronunciation of aura.

Thus the name au ra is likely draconic in origin and its likely that the species itself can speak or understand the draconic language. Or perhaps the au ra language is a derivative language rooted in draconic, much in the same way that latin is the root language of many others. In an earlier post, I mentioned the possibility that the au ra could come to Eorzea because they had heard the song of a dragon. While the possibility is faint, it does lead credence that the au ra could perhaps understand the draconic language or hear a song that the other mortal races could not, further belying their draconic origins. I wonder if the opening sequence for new au ra players will be different than the one used for new players of the five races, and bear some similarity to the legacy players who arrive five years into the future. Will a new au ra player awaken from a dream in which they hear the roar of dragon bidding them to come to Eorzea, and then from there hear Hydaelyn's plea? It's an interesting of bit speculation that might not end being true, but it'd be fun to see (or role play!)

Finally, there's one more bit of speculation regarding the au ra and the dragons. We've learned of rumors by the Ishgardians that dragons are capable of casting powerful illusions or shapeshifting into mortal forms. We witness this first hand during the MSQs on the way to level 50 when we engage the High Inquisitor, a frightful dravanian who had taken the guise of an elezen. Early lore from 1.0 also suggested that one could become a dragon by consuming its flesh or drinking its blood, such acts are considered heretical by the Ishgardians, but I wonder if such acts were similarly condemned by the people of Othard? Could the au ra be a mortal tribe that once hunted and consumed dragon flesh and blood and were thus permanently transformed into the beings we see now? Were they cursed or blessed by dragons or were they created by them from the aetherial realm? If there are dragon kings as powerful as Midgardsormr and Nidhogg on Eorzea, and Bahamut in Mercydia, then perhaps there is a dragon king as powerful as they on Othard. And perhaps they are responsible for the creation of the au ra.

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Originally Posted by Dynza

As seen in the 2.5 trailer, dragons seems capable of communicating through song and whether that song carries words (sounds with meaning) or is even audible to mortal ears or non-dragons is completely up in the air at this point.

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What if the "song" consists of "words without sound"? Just an idea that hit me while I read your post.

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Originally Posted by Mholito

What if the "song" consists of "words without sound"? Just an idea that hit me while I read your post.

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An all dragon a cappella group sounds awesome.

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Originally Posted by WyrahFhurrst

An all dragon a cappella group sounds awesome.

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Dangit.. now have dragon barbershop quartet singing "Mr Sandman" stuck in me head...

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Originally Posted by Wadoka

Dangit.. now have dragon barbershop quartet singing "Mr Sandman" stuck in me head...

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In The Labyrinth of Ancients no doubt. lol.

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Originally Posted by Mholito

What if the "song" consists of "words without sound"? Just an idea that hit me while I read your post.

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From the way we think to the way we communicate we use words to create a sense of precision of what we see, feel and hear. So I'm not quite sure what you're getting at when it comes to "words without sound". Unless you're talking about telepathy and non-vocal communication. Certainly, I think dragons could be capable of that, but we haven't seen evidence of it or contrary to it.


Anyway, just a quick thought here to get this discussion moving along. FF14 bears a number of spiritual similiarities to FF11 and so I want to throw out a what-if question to probe a response.

We know the lore behind FF14 was written years in advance, even before 1.0 was released, so here's a thought. What if the Au Ra were written way back then and were originally an NPC race. What if the Au Ra bear similarities to the Zilart and the Kuluu?

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Originally Posted by Dynza

From the way we think to the way we communicate we use words to create a sense of precision of what we see, feel and hear. So I'm not quite sure what you're getting at when it comes to "words without sound". Unless you're talking about telepathy and non-vocal communication. Certainly, I think dragons could be capable of that, but we haven't seen evidence of it or contrary to it.

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One way could be vibrations as well. Many animals IRL use infrasound to communicate over long distances which, Unlike echolocation, is an extremely low frequency noise that is below human hearing. Notice that Midgaurdsormir mentioned the song already being sung. Well I heard no roar or any other sound, the only sign is the "Dragon Star" what ever that is. So it seems to me that the Dravanians can communicate in a way that not even the Echo can detect which means to me that the spoken races can't hear it at all.

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Originally Posted by Dynza

From the way we think to the way we communicate we use words to create a sense of precision of what we see, feel and hear. So I'm not quite sure what you're getting at when it comes to "words without sound". Unless you're talking about telepathy and non-vocal communication. Certainly, I think dragons could be capable of that, but we haven't seen evidence of it or contrary to it.

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I meant the fact that they can communicate in a way that most people can't hear. "Words without sound" is a part of the lyrics to "Answers". I just thought that there might be a connecction.

I remember Yugiri saying in 2.4 that there are sacred snow capped mountains/place similar to coerthas in which blood musn't be spilled. And that Coerthas has seen too much blood.

I'm not seeing anything to hate on in the character designs.

It's true Yugiri seems a literal copy-paste of the Miqo'te model/animation set with some changes to her head and a specific tail, however as we've seen, there are unique specific models for story-dependant NPC's, but they still have animation sets from the race set they are from. After all Alphinaud and Alisaie are also the same size, and they're shorter than playable Elezen. Also... there are kid Hyur NPC's, but no Miqo'te ones.

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Originally Posted by KisaiTenshi

snip

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Not sure who if any one is hating. The only thing I can say as far as copy and paste on Yugiri is that it was a place holder model to use between her first appearance and her official reveal as an Au'ra. I just personally don't like lumping them together with the Dravanians and Myracidians. I'm not even convinced that the Dravanians have any connection to Myracydians let alone the Au'ra. For all I can tell all of the surviving Myracidians were locked away in Dalamuld with Bahamut and kept in suspended animation so they could be tortured forever into keeping Bahamut alive. As for the Au'ra, if they came from "Mating with dragons" then that means that miqo'te came from "Mating with Couruls" since they're both half animal looking people. And we all know that the Miqo'te avidly object to that idea.

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Originally Posted by Kaiser-Ace

Not sure who if any one is hating. The only thing I can say as far as copy and paste on Yugiri is that it was a place holder model to use between her first appearance and her official reveal as an Au'ra.

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In general, the fact that there is a new race that wasn't there before becomes subject to scrutiny about retcons. I'm actually kinda excited to see them, as it's a welcome change from the typical "Big Amazon,Medium Human,Tall pointy-ear Elf,Chibi Dwarf" dynamic that every MMORPG insists on having.

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Originally Posted by KisaiTenshi

In general, the fact that there is a new race that wasn't there before becomes subject to scrutiny about retcons. I'm actually kinda excited to see them, as it's a welcome change from the typical "Big Amazon,Medium Human,Tall pointy-ear Elf,Chibi Dwarf" dynamic that every MMORPG insists on having.

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AH I see what you mean now. Not referencing any particular comments just the friction over the additional lore in general.

Thanks for all the work on this Dynza, it really has me even more inspired then I am already for the Au Ra race. My main is a female Miqo'te moon keeper and will always remain that way as I have a fairly deep back history for her. I have already added other characters that are part of her back story, the same will be for the new Au Ra that I will add. What I will love to find out is more about their lore as this will help in adding a new story dynamic for the new character. It will also be fun coming up with a name based on their new naming conventions.

I hope this thread is still around after Heavsward is out, it would be fun to post screen shots of our new Au Ra race we made, with maybe a short backstory we made for them?

We needs continue this thread! :D

Still holding out hope that Au Ra males gain some muscle in their neck to match that sexy artwork

Thanks for the praise. I've got some more stuff I working on now, but I don't think I'll have the time to post it until next week. I do want to ask the lore guys something (if they even read this thread) regarding any symbolic meanings in horn shapes or designs in au ra culture. I'm curious if there's any development there, I'll get into more details on my next post next week. I'm sure we'll get a bit of information from PAX East anyway.

One thing I do want to quickly discuss is Yugiri's face.
http://cdn1-www.craveonline.com/asse...06-o7ez8ne.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/JnxFu7U.jpg

Yugiri's facial structure/skeleton is completely different from the female au ra PC's in more than just textures. This basically means that Yugiri may end up having a unique face different from playable au ra and that could also mean that the hairstyle worn by Yugiri may be completely unique as well. Though I'd like to think that hairstyle will be available to au ra players, we'll have to wait and see. As a quick note on those who might ask why Yugiri's face may not be available to players, I don't really have the time to go into it right now. Suffice to say it has to due with the skeletal structure of the faces and the heads and the ability for them to be customized in such a way. All the heads used by each of the player races are all the same shape (roughly) and then the face is preset onto the skeleton from and then players can customize the details of said faces. For Yugiri (and a few other NPCs), she looks to have a unique facial structure that simply may not be customizable. So for those of you that want the scale pattern that Yugiri's face has, I think it would be best to request it, or you might be out of luck.

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I hope this thread is still around after Heavsward is out, it would be fun to post screen shots of our new Au Ra race we made, with maybe a short backstory we made for them?

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I hope the thread will still be here. Chances are pretty good. Even if I don't continue it, I'm sure others would like to contribute. Though I have to say that this isn't a thread to post screenshots of your au ra character, that's more of a General Discussion/Fan Art sort of thing. This is more to point out peculiar and interesting elements of the au ra design and discuss or speculate on lore behind the race. So please post the other stuff in relevant threads or create your own!

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Still holding out hope that Au Ra males gain some muscle in their neck to match that sexy artwork

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Their necks are fairly thin in their artwork as compared to their in-game models. They overall fit in better proportions both in artwork and in-game model-wise than the elezen do. Though the elezen by design were intentionally structured to resemble to "longness" and slender appearance of the Elvaan. That said, I think they might be able to buff up, or better define the broadness of the au ra male's upper torso. I would certainly like to see additional hairstyles on them, including ones that add more horns like one hairstyle currently does.

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In general, the fact that there is a new race that wasn't there before becomes subject to scrutiny about retcons. I'm actually kinda excited to see them, as it's a welcome change from the typical "Big Amazon,Medium Human,Tall pointy-ear Elf,Chibi Dwarf" dynamic that every MMORPG insists on having.

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We knew that they were working on a new race at least as far back as 2011. I think they had attempted to create several different race designs but may have had difficulty fitting them into the current story or setting. So they probably dived into their lore to find a earlier race or tapped into the Ishgard scenario outlines and found the au ra. I have no evidence of this, but this something I'm going to talk about in my next major post.

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I remember Yugiri saying in 2.4 that there are sacred snow capped mountains/place similar to coerthas in which blood musn't be spilled. And that Coerthas has seen too much blood.

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Yugiri does mention something about about sacred places where blood must not be spilled, but I don't think she was specifically referencing Coerthas in general. As far I know, we haven't met Yugiri in Coerthas yet, but that doesn't mean she hasn't been there yet.

@Dynza

In 2.4 we meet Yugiri in Coerthas (looking for the spies/conspiritors) where she says that line.

I wonder how are they going to fit in the Au Ra into the starting storyline, at least in terms of leveling. It's also going to be pretty awkward doing the Coerthas missions as one, given how similar they look to the foes that Ishgard is obsessed with purging.

Regardless of whether or not Au Ra are a new creation or something pulled from the existing lore and made playable, the au ra take some interesting cues from earlier and existing art, or perhaps vice versa.


http://static2.finalfantasyxiv.com/a...PaQ4_544eE.jpg
http://static2.finalfantasyxiv.com/a...PaRANGYAPw.jpg
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-4...0-00-34-86.png
http://imagizer.imageshack.us/a/img19/8469/wzgf.jpg

http://thelifestream.net/wp-content/...h-artwork1.jpg

We know that the Legatus' and his commanders' designs were inspired and based on the Judges of FF12 and the Ivalice Alliance. The horn designs of the legatus and his team are quite unusual and seemingly inspired the horn designs of the au ra PCs. One of the unique elements behind these horn and helmet designs, though, seem to suggest that there's some bit of lore behind them. Though, to that end I'm not entirely sure what it is, but it seems to tie into some old Allagan tech and bears curious similarities to the Ultima Weapon

http://images4.wikia.nocookie.net/fi...080_Weapon.jpg
Note that the Ultima Weapon bears horn designs similar to the female au ra PC and Yugiri.

One thing is certain though, all the legatus helms bear the Garlean third-eye design on them. Even Nael's and Rhitatyn's. So the whole design of the armors perhaps isn't entirely based on some foreign race or opponent they once encountered, but maybe the horns are partially based on some dragons the empire encountered or fought on Ilsabard or elsewhere. There are at least five dragons whose locations we aren't sure of.

In turn, the designs of the legatus helms could also influence that of the au ra horn designs, or vice versa (depending on how the story goes). We don't have an exact date of when the Garleans conquered Othard (do they even have complete control the continent? Lore strongly implies it), but had they controlled most or nearly all of it, could the Garleans have encountered the au ra there, fought them and/or conquered them and designed their helmets based on their appearances? Is the facial work on some of the helmets a design inspiration of Garlean pure-bloods or that of the au ra or that of dragons? They seem to pull from many different inspirations and build them from there. So what those inspirations are - in-game - is what I'm curious about.

In the real world, many of the horn designs we see on helms are based on real-life animals and the imaginations of the people and cultures living in the areas where such creatures roam. Including historic helms like this:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...y%2C_front.jpg

Or this:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...ned_helmet.jpg

Horns were used for a variety of things, including tableware, ceremonial, combat, fashion and other such uses. In-game crafters use horns for crafting a variety of items, and the horns found on armor, dragons and the legatus' armor. Au ra have horns instead of ears (or so it appears) and likewise appear to have different designs that players can choose for their character. In terms of lore, whether or not the horns of the legatus' helmet designs are based on those of dragons, au ra people, or some other animal is up in the air, for the most part. Still, with many of the horn designs found so far on the Garlean armor and of dragons, I tend to wonder if - lore wise - the au ra were at least partially responsible for the horn designs. And outside of the lore, I wonder if the leaders of the XIVth had at least partially influenced the design. I'm sure we'll find out sooner or later.


Note: Originally I wanted to talk more about the designs of the horns as a way to indicate gender between the species of different dragons and their relation to the au ra horn designs. This did not turn out well as the horn designs on dragons are pretty consistent across all the ones we've seen. Some dravanians even lack horns making it even harder to get any evidence for study. As such I'm putting the rest of this speculation on hold until later. If/when information shows up for more horns, I will beginning writing more up. But as it stands right now, I don't think the au ra bear much relation at all to the dravanian dragons

Well, if Neal and Gauis' words are true, than the Garlens are the Descendants of the Allagan. And the Allegan conquered and enslaved most if not all of myracidia. So it would make sense that a lot of Garlen armors would have a stylistic draconian appearance. And I still stand firm that the Au Ra are completely independent of both Myracidian and Dravanian influences. The Dravanians have always been native to Eorzia and the Myracidians were a draconic race on the Southern Continent. Oethard is to the East of Eorzia so it suggest to me that The Au Ra have absolutely nothing to do with the Dravanians or Myracidians.

Seems to me like with their close ties to Doma that the Au Ra may be the origin of the shinobi arts and through them and the Domans combined efforts they've been able to stay in relative isolation until very recently.

The Garleans are decendents of Allagan? That would be curious, particularly since the Allagan seemed to have a talent for Magic and Garleans are genetically incapable of manipulating Aether without mechanical help.

Still the horns on Garlean armour could have various inspirations. Draconic would be an obvious one. However outside the helmet, I haven't seen a lot of Dragon stylisation in Garlean design.

The Garlean emperor is filled with dragon iconography. I guess that's just Garlean heraldry, maybe they've had that even before magitek discovery? I know ala mhigo has the griffin. Ishgard has the horses. Gridanian the twin adders, etc.

http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb2...zos-galvus.png

Since allagans like genetic experimentation, would it be fatfetched if the au ra are a result of mixing dragon and man dna?

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Originally Posted by myahele

I guess that's just Garlean heraldry

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It's certainly possible that, since dragons were the first race(?), the Garleans simply adopted the imagery to project their sense of superiority over the other races of men. I mean, they do seem to give off a sort-of Aryan vibe.

I still can't share in the idea that the Au Ra are the result of any kind of experimentation or cross-species breeding however. No, the race was more probably either an off-shoot of the Othardian(?) dragon evolution or it's apex...or completely unrelated.


Regardless, the defeat of the Garleans by dragons at The Battle of Silvertear Skies is still plenty ironic.

One of the Triple Triad cards from the other thread says that Dragons go through a long 'evolution' during their lifetimes that alters their mental and physical properties and results in very diverse results, making it difficult to create set tactics to use against the dragons. I could see the Au Ra being from a group of dragons who, living with humans for thousands of years, slowly evolved to take on more human like characteristics. If we take, say, all the bosses of Stone Vigil HM to be different dragons then we can see that the level of variety can be huge.

I dont know if anyone has braught up the point of Eorza is a mear Continent not an entire world thare are portions we have not yet seen. there might be an area where there is a dragon/hyur hybrid unknown to dravania or meryicidia too empires on a Continent

PAX SE Booth has costumes of the Au Ra starting gear up for display. Somewhat more interesting is the wigs.

Hard to tell, but they may have subtly revealed another set of hairstyles for the Au Ra.
http://pbs.twimg.com/media/B_bXTn0VAAA64kX.jpg