Now I KNOW it's not my computer...
So I've been getting those lovely "Program has stopped working' messages/crashes for a few days now. I would make it to the "Now Loading" screen as I'm logging in before the crash happens. I got it on my original character (I have two currently [more on that in a moment])and tried everything under the sun to fix it, nothing worked. So I decided to see what would happen if I created a new character on a different server.
Turned out, the game worked just fine on the new character, so I hunkered down and pressed onward on character #2, thinking I'd be alright.
I was able to get up to the quest "It's Probably Pirates" on my first character before it started consistently crashing on me. Turns out, I'm now on the EXACT SAME QUEST on my second character, and it's started crashing again. That can't possibly be a coincidence...
I'm about ready to give up altogether, if I'm not even able to play the game past the introduction of the first dungeon.
Checking the event viewer, this is the error information I get (from three crashes within 15 minutes):
Faulting application name: ffxiv.exe, version: 1.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x522639d7
Faulting module name: ntdll.dll, version: 6.1.7601.18205, time stamp: 0x51db9710
Exception code: 0xc0000005
Fault offset: 0x00036fc5
Faulting process id: 0xeac
Faulting application start time: 0x01ceabfe20dedf58
Faulting application path: C:\Program Files (x86)\SquareEnix\FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn\game\ffxiv.exe
Faulting module path: C:\Windows\SysWOW64\ntdll.dll
Report Id: fb3a56d8-1831-11e3-871e-90fba6847670
~~~~~
Faulting application name: ffxiv.exe, version: 1.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x522639d7
Faulting module name: ntdll.dll, version: 6.1.7601.18205, time stamp: 0x51db9710
Exception code: 0xc0000005
Fault offset: 0x00036fba
Faulting process id: 0xe2c
Faulting application start time: 0x01ceac3ecc82145d
Faulting application path: C:\Program Files (x86)\SquareEnix\FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn\game\ffxiv.exe
Faulting module path: C:\Windows\SysWOW64\ntdll.dll
Report Id: 1b7ae26d-1832-11e3-871e-90fba6847670
~~~~~
Faulting application name: ffxiv.exe, version: 1.0.0.0, time stamp: 0x522639d7
Faulting module name: ntdll.dll, version: 6.1.7601.18205, time stamp: 0x51db9710
Exception code: 0xc0000005
Fault offset: 0x00036fba
Faulting process id: 0x94c
Faulting application start time: 0x01ceac40489f43c3
Faulting application path: C:\Program Files (x86)\SquareEnix\FINAL FANTASY XIV - A Realm Reborn\game\ffxiv.exe
Faulting module path: C:\Windows\SysWOW64\ntdll.dll
Report Id: c02fbf2c-1833-11e3-871e-90fba6847670