Gelmorra And The Duskwight

[Cleretic]

This is the sort of lore I would love to have explored and made widely available in the game present day.

You know what would be amazing? Like really, REALLY amazing?

To have a Historian that players could talk to, for each race: And get a detailed recounting of their origins, society, life, cuisine, social structure, etc. It'd even be amazing to have a racial story arc as side-quests. Let all of us explore the races at our leisure. Bonus points for doing quests relating to each race. By the twelve, that would truly be great.

Fun fact: back in 1.0, that was basically Erik's role, albeit in a different space. He had jumbo-sized infodumps, you can find some on Youtube in videos about 1.0. Given the fact that when he came back in the Monk questlines in the live game, the joke about him was that he's go on long pointless lectures that nobody listened to... I kinda get the feeling that approach might not have been popular!

Something I think could fill this role is the Unending Codex. Historically, both in this game and in others, people tend to like a sideline infodump they can read whenever they want, as long as said infodump isn't essential to understanding the story (thank you, FFXIII).

[bitterhorn]

I'll add to this that it'd be lovely if certain dialogue trees - particularly in Gridania! - were at least slightly modified for Duskies to reflect their 'othered' status in the modern Shroud. It felt really weird to have NPCs repeatedly elfsplaining who Duskwights were from a Gridanian POV to my Obviously Duskwight Character. I seem to recall the archer questline being particularly jarring ^__^;

[SentioftheHoukai]

I'll add to this that it'd be lovely if certain dialogue trees - particularly in Gridania! - were at least slightly modified for Duskies to reflect their 'othered' status in the modern Shroud. It felt really weird to have NPCs repeatedly elfsplaining who Duskwights were from a Gridanian POV to my Obviously Duskwight Character. I seem to recall the archer questline being particularly jarring ^__^;

I don't know how well in game fantasy racism would be taken in an MMO like FFXIV, tbh.
Seems like the kind of pit Square would wanna avoid. Kinda like Gelmorra, so far!

[Cleretic]

...in-game fantasy racism is a huge core element of the game's story. 'They don't want to touch that' seems unlikely given they do a lot with that relating to the Garleans, Ala Mhigans, beastmen, Ishgardians (granted that's more classism), Ascians, and even actual Duskwight content we do get.

I think the reason you mostly don't see that to a Duskwight PC is because that character isn't necessarily 'one of those Duskwight'. Also because that player wouldn't necessarily know that's going on so they still need the explanation anyway, and because a lot of it would lead to tangible differences in treatment and tasks required of the player, which is just not a great idea.

[EaraGrace]

I’m flashing back to the fascist Emperor ranting about the one true race and how it’s supremacy is justified over the “lesser” races.

If they’re avoiding racism as a topic they’re doing a pretty bad job of it.

[SentioftheHoukai]

If you say so. I've seen enough to where I suspect Square would be in rather hot water in fantasy racism was directed at the player character rather than faceless NPCs in the background that are forgotten the very next patch. The labels and accusations the public would bandy about.... Yeah, not a pretty picture. This isn't Mafia III, and even they had to slap a big fat THIS GAME HAS A METRIC SHIT-TON OF RACISM IN IT warning before you launch it.