Ishgard and changing City-State

[Arasiel]

My girlfriend and I are going to change Grand Companies as well as race change to the Au Ra when Heavensward launches. It be nice to fully change City-State as well.

[Gunspec]

City state just indicates which starting questline you did. I remember them talking about adding a way to experience the other questlines or giving you the option of changing later, but that conversation was a year ago so they probably aren't going forward with it.

[jomoru]

Ishgard isn't getting a grand company nor a starting area.

[Iromi]

That would be impossible seeing as how they stated we have to finish the entire 2.x story line to even ENTER ishgard. >.>;;;

[Arasiel]

Ishgard isn't getting a grand company nor a starting area.

You sure about that? I could have swore they were getting a GC?

[Nikita]

You sure about that? I could have swore they were getting a GC?

I'm not sure where you heard this but it's my first time hearing it lol.

[Babette]

Imagining a frontline 24v24v24v24....

[MatthiasS]

Imagining a frontline 24v24v24v24....

Imagines: 56:07 in que, Avg Que Time: More then 30 minutes

[Bluevann]

You sure about that?

From the old Lodestone:

The Grand Companies of Eorzea are a military alliance of nations united in common cause to avert imminent catastrophe from engulfing the realm, each city-state charged with mustering its resources under the banner of an elite regiment.

Grand Companies are organizations that take the burden of organizing and administrating a city's military power with the aid of adventurers, sellswords, and freelance suppliers such as crafters and gatherers, and their leader works, if not as the city-leader himself (Merlwyb, Kan-E Senna), as a close second to that (Raubhan, member of the Syndicate, without which the Sultana cannot act). The Holy See is fully in the hands of the archbishop, who controls its economic, military and internal as well as external affairs in all their aspects. To allow a Grand Company to be established within Ishgard would go completely against the lore of fully independent, self-centered and xenophobic state as the one the Holy See is.

TL;DR: Grand Companies are, in short, factions established to unite resources in nations where they would be otherwise not be gathered together. The Holy See already has all its resources gathered under the will of the Archbishop, and as such, do not require a Grand Company to be formed.

I could have swore they were getting a GC?

I believe what you're thinking of is the news we received that the Grand Companies will receive new ranks. That is confirmed, but it's only applied to the three starting cities' GCs.

[kyuven]

There's absolutely no incentive for SE to add new GCs, considering there's no storyline reason for additional ones to exist.
Ishgard probably just has their own versions of GCs, implied through the existence of multiple Houses. However, even these aren't anything like the GCs we have, as they're internal factions whereas the GCs are more of an external one, and other than Ul'Dah there isn't all that much tension between the factions, with the Maelstrom and Twin Adders handling situations their "internal" counterparts the Yellowjackets and Wood Wailers can't.

There's also no practical reason for them to exist, as adding a new GC would upset the already grossly imbalanced PvP system. It's very, very rare for multiplayer games to have more than 3 factions, as things just get messy and spread way too thin.