Are Hipparions native To Eorzea?

[jomoru]

Or even found in Eorzea currently? It seems likely based on the fact that all the other Seeker tribes are named after creatures found in Eorzea, however the reaction description given in the heaven's turn event about Horses confuses that issue since as best I can tell Hipparions are a prehistoric species of horse that was native to North America

[Anonymoose]

Or even found in Eorzea currently?

The naming conventions for miqo'te imply (if I'm reading it correctly) that the tribes were named after totems before they came here in the 5th Umbral Era, but had very different sounds attached to them. They decided that since Eorzea had a 26 letter alphabet and they had 26 tribes, they assigned a letter to each tribe based on which was closest to its totem. Therefore, they could have picked up the totem of horses anywhere. Some references to horses in the game, though...

The fishing log entry for Sea Bo fits with the story we get from Oliver in the recent Raven article, which managed to get a legitimate lol out of me. The levequest, Great Hoary Toads mentions a horse owner in La Noscea, once upon a time (perhaps an exotic import!), and then, of course, there's everything related to Odin.

Also, there's this (possibly) genius (possible) pop-culture reference.
You know how sometimes Erik drones on and on and it'll just show sentence fragments connected by dots?

And so... <blah blah> ...irony of ironies... <blah blah> ...If it hadn't been for that horse... <blah blah>

Back in 1.0, we also got this Lore Drop via Bayohnne and the Lore Team.

For some time there have been murmurs saying “Hydaelyn is a world where no horse exists,” but this isn’t the case at all. We actually created the whole world view with the vision that horses and their subspecies inhabit (or used to inhabit) the world.

For example, one of the four High Houses of Ishgard, the House of Fortemps, features a red unicorn on a black background for their crest’s motif. This unicorn is one kind of horse species. Shields that NPCs have equipped also have unique drawings on them, so if you are interested, try hunting those down.

Also, Odin, which we introduced in the 2.0 documents, is also riding his famous steed. While I can’t get into too much detail, we have laid down the proper foundation for Odin’s companion.

So while it may seem like there are no living horses in the currently accessible areas of Eorzea, there are in fact horses when you consider the entire planet of Hydaelyn.

Hyur and Lalafell travelled to Eorzea long ago and it is because their ancestors utilized horses as mounts that you can see remnants of this in their speech and crests.

So… why aren’t horses imported in modern day Eorzea? The reason is that trustworthy chocobos, that are better suited for the weather and environment of Eorzea, exist.

For once, I think that actually clears up pretty much everything. Huh, now I don't know what to do.

So, we got lots of horse stuff after all! ... But what about Bears?

[jomoru]

I just find it abit odd that every other tribal beast seems to be findable in Eorzea. Do no K tribe children ask "what's a Hipparion?"

[Magis]

I just find it abit odd that every other tribal beast seems to be findable in Eorzea. Do no K tribe children ask "what's a Hipparion?"

Well, Eorzea is a pretty damn big continent. I don't know if the maps they use is all of Hydaelyn or just the main continent though.

I'd assume there are more tribes outside of Eorzea, we just haven't gone there yet. There are a lot more primals (rewatch the 1.0 intro when the lake in Mor Dhona explodes... like 100 primals fire out, including Ifrit and Titan) to be worshiped.

I hope they bring a Yagudo like race in though. Those guys were badass!

[Enkidoh]

Well, the Ixal are pretty much the same as the Yagudo (they're classed as being birds, even though the Ixal are more monstrous and have lost most of their feathers, are zealously devoted to a goddess, live in a mountainous area - it even has the word 'spine' in it's title - and are antagonistic to FFXIV's version of Windurst, ala, Gridania.). The original 1.0 beastmen races (Ixal, amalj'aa, kobolds), are in fact all based loosely on FFXI beast races. It was only after Yoshi took over that literal FFXI beast races made appearances, like goblins, qi'qirn and mamool'jaa.

[Anonymoose]

It was only after Yoshi took over that literal FFXI beast races made appearances, like goblins, qi'qirn and mamool'jaa.

Qiqirn were in from launch, and Goblins came in five days after Yoshida-san was announced as the new P&D. That didn't seem so weird, though. They were like quirky sidekicks to the world in FFXI, and it's not too hard to see them turn up like Tonberries over time. Their lore was relatively shallow - they could fit in anywhere. Goblins would tinker with cogs, Qiqirn would steal food; it was all jinglyshine and clink clink.

It's the Mamool that are jarring to me. I'm hoping to warm up to them, but so far all they've done is make their race look weaker and lower than they were in FFXI and reignite theories that Hydaelyn is Vana'diel in a different age (which I thought was a door Squenix wanted to stay closed). I loved the Yagudo, but much like the Mamool, I think they had a great home and identity in XI and I fear that recycling them would only serve to cheapen them.

[Enkidoh]

Yeah, the mamool'jaa do seem rather 'tacked on' to XIV - there's little backstory given to their race in XIV, other than they come from the 'new world' (the mysterious newly discovered western continent) and were attracted east to Eorzea to fill labour shortages in the wake of the Calamity. So in XIV they're nothing more than a migrant workforce to be exploited sadly. Ah well, the game is still new, so there's plenty of time to flesh out their backstory (such as a possible Primal for them as well),