Scholar lore

Has anyone else felt that it was more than a little odd to associate the Scholar class with fairies, given that the class is described as being a military strategist and fairies in most forms of fiction are peaceful?

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Originally Posted by AspectOfWinter

Has anyone else felt that it was more than a little odd to associate the Scholar class with fairies, given that the class is described as being a military strategist and fairies in most forms of fiction are peaceful?

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Maybe only if you use today's fairies. Fairy tales I grew up to had all fairies as evil children stealing, life sucking creatures who lived only for themselves.

As odd as this may sound, it's most likely a nod toward Final Fantasy XI.

In that game, Scholars were military strategists from an age past (much like ARR). However, going back in time led to not only rediscovering this lost art (and thus, the Scholar job), but also bearing witness to species before they went extinct. This included faeries, who did similar things as the Scholars: provided succor and help to those around them (fooooorrrr the most part....).

I'll agree that Scholar wasn't exactly my first pick for a pet job, but they made it work well enough, and they even provided a tie-in to multiple aspects of the game (lost civilizations, monsters, etc.)

Thing is, I have always felt that the military theme in WoW is the reason why the Alliance and Horde are depicted as being so chauvinistic. It's kind of like how many if not most female characters in TV are extremely emotional, most military personnel in video games in my experience are fanatical warmongers and have that attitude of "my country, right or wrong".

However, the class itself is murky in lore - so until we travel back in time to that era we simply won't know what the general temperament of the ancient Scholars was. It's confirmed that during times of peace they took on the role of doctors, so it's certainly conceivable that many of them actually had a lot in common with Jedi Consular from SWTOR.

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Originally Posted by AspectOfWinter

Thing is, I have always felt that the military theme in WoW is the reason why the Alliance and Horde are depicted as being so chauvinistic. It's kind of like how many if not most female characters in TV are extremely emotional, most military personnel in video games in my experience are fanatical warmongers and have that attitude of "my country, right or wrong".

However, the class itself is murky in lore - so until we travel back in time to that era we simply won't know what the general temperament of the ancient Scholars was. It's confirmed that during times of peace they took on the role of doctors, so it's certainly conceivable that many of them actually had a lot in common with Jedi Consular from SWTOR.

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Well, nationalism is sort of implied in the SCH quest lines. It can even be stretched that it may have been what caused the War of the Magi (nationalism starts a lot of wars...). Though, I doubt this may have been the case for Nym, considering they only really boasted small, elite units rather than a large, expansive navy. Nationalism almost always implies great (or seemingly great) military strength. Nym only had great minds on their side. I'm gonna blame that one on Amdapor, personally...

As for faeries...it is only really implied that they forge a very strong bond with their SCH counterpart. It doesn't really say where they came from (as far as I can remember) nor does it say why they coexist. We (read: I) simply don't have all the information.

Wasn't it stated that Nym was constantly being attacked by foreign sea-going powers but always managed to repel them? I remember seeing mentioned in game info stating something about Nym routing a previously invincible thousand-ship strong fleet. I can't remember where it was I saw that though.

And nationalism was stated even in 1.0 as being an underlying cause of conflict in Eorzea's long and turbulent history, specifically cities guardians from the Twelve, using their respective deity as favouring them - it was stated as such in the original 1.0 manual:

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Originally Posted by Version 1.0 manual

Throughout it's history, the landscape has played home to a number of city-states-the tenuous relations between them fluctuating from friendly to hostile and back again.

The pantheon of the Twelve is followed devoutly by most, and doctrine holds that the past wars of the realm were the wars of the heavens, with the gods and goddesses choosing nations as their respective champions. Whether because of this celestial struggle or more worldly grievances, war spread throughout the realm, discouraging unity and peace.

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Of course this is naturally very vague and general, but it does go some way to explaining possible reasons for the War of the Magi, particularly when you look at the fact that Nym apparently venerated Oschon the Wanderer as their guardian, which might have put them at odds with the Amdapori, whichever of the Twelve they worshiped (as far as I know there is no mention as to what their guardian deity was, if any.).

http://i62.tinypic.com/n532q1.png

The way I see it is, if Nym had more or less the same political philosophy as Ishgard and Ala Mhigo, then Scholars being associated with fairies is almost as contradictory as if it was decided that Dark Knight would be a pet based tanking class that calls on holy angels or something. If they were more like the modern day Twin Adders then I could maybe see a fairy teaming up with them if they were mainly just trying to protect their people from invaders and maintaining the peace.

I haven't unlocked Scholar yet, but
From what I remember the fairies aren't... Quite entieties of their own, they are artificial much akin to Carbuncle

Fairies are beings of Aether. Kinda like miniature primals. Instead of directly drawing power from the land, the Sch is a conduit for creating the Fairy.

We call her Eos, but as my picture showed, she's really Lily; his "sun."

Fairies keep memories and feelings from user to user, and they can be passed to new users via the Stone. They're the accumulated knowledge and power of the Scholar itself; which is a specialty Arcanist, who specializes in healing rather than attacking.

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Originally Posted by WellGramarye

We call her Eos, but as my picture showed, she's really Lily; his "sun."

Fairies keep memories and feelings from user to user, and they can be passed to new users via the Stone. They're the accumulated knowledge and power of the Scholar itself; which is a specialty Arcanist, who specializes in healing rather than attacking.

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Whao... that also means fairies are the ultimate gossip queens.

They got dirt on everybody!

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Originally Posted by WellGramarye

We call her Eos, but as my picture showed, she's really Lily; his "sun."

Fairies keep memories and feelings from user to user, and they can be passed to new users via the Stone. They're the accumulated knowledge and power of the Scholar itself; which is a specialty Arcanist, who specializes in healing rather than attacking.

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Which brings up the question; who the heck did we inherit Selene from then?

Selene is the same thing as Eos. You only have one fairy. Just different aspected aether.

Eos is the sun, as Selene is the moon.

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Originally Posted by Enkidoh

And nationalism was stated even in 1.0 as being an underlying cause of conflict in Eorzea's long and turbulent history, specifically cities guardians from the Twelve, using their respective deity as favouring them - it was stated as such in the original 1.0 manual

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One of my biggest fears about the future of ARR is that the Final Fantasy hero storyline we have now could end up turning into a story of going to war, doing seriously reprehensible things in the name of your City State, etc (like the more recent expansions of WoW). I'm hard-wired to resent nationalism in MMOs, having been programmed by witnessing all the atrocities committed by the Alliance and especially the Horde in the last two expansions of WoW. To me, a Lawful Good person with at least some degree of intelligence and common sense would really oppose both of those factions...

I actually doubt that - FFXI had the nations of the Middle Lands who were downright distrustful of each other, had a similar history of antagonism, were more xenophobic and racially homologous than Eorzea's citystates are, and after more than a decade, SE still has never set them against each other as the game's story evolved (in fact they actually became more united).

Eorzea is much more of a cultural melting pot than Vana'diel is, with members of all races coming and going. Sure the citystates might each have their share of social issues, but especially in the ending to the main storyline

Kan-E-Senna makes it quite clear that the Alliance's ties are to be strengthened, and that she predicts in the future the nation lines will actually fade, with all of Eorzea united as one nation

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Considering also the true antagonist of the game is lurking in the shadows and plays mortal nations against each other, a fact now known to the nations of Eorzea, and due to the aforementioned commitment following Operation Archon, it shows that the three citystates will continue to be allied with each other, despite what past history they may have had - strength in numbers and all that.

Another thing to keep in mind is the player character is ultimately allied with the Sions, not the city states. To cite XI again, although you were a hero in the Middle Lands several times over, the player character also was frequently at odds with governments to varying degrees.

Back to the topic...

Do you think that the majority of the ancient Nymian scholars were of this personality type?
http://temperaments.fighunter.com/?page=choleric

If yes, then, in my own personal opinion, the contrast between class and minion couldn't be more stark.

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Originally Posted by AspectOfWinter

Back to the topic...

Do you think that the majority of the ancient Nymian scholars were of this personality type?
http://temperaments.fighunter.com/?page=choleric

If yes, then, in my own personal opinion, the contrast between class and minion couldn't be more stark.

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Well... my fairies alway do the "point finger at me, then the slit throat hand gesture". Guess I am screwed.