Who are we?

[Con_Carne]

Something I've been wondering is... Who are we?

Do we have a past? Childhood? Parents? How about our original place? Are we from Eorzea? Thavnair? The New World? I didn't played 1.0, so... Where was my character during Dalamud's fall? Did he saw the red moon and Bahamut?

Or we were just suddenly created by Hydaelyn and sent to the world the same day we travel to a city-state to become adventurers?

[alex4815162342]

You are want you want to be !
We don't have background, you create yourself.
You need to make some RP about your origins.

[Zojha]

We are generic silent protagonist number #376249.

We were created in the snowflake factory to vanquish the local evil overlord. Up until the start of the game, we spent our time permanently wasted in a shabby bar somewhere at the back of beyond, which explains why we have no memory of the time.

The rest is up to you.

[Cilia]

Players who start at 2.0 and onward are implicitly not from Eorzea. The rest is up to you.

[Tracewood]

Players who start at 2.0 and onward are implicitly not from Eorzea. The rest is up to you.

This is perfect for Au'Ra roleplayers. Especially when you find out why in the 2.X patches.

I did play 1.0, but barely stuck around after beta and was a lala. He died before the calamity, head canon is that he was the one who arranged my smuggling in.
(incoming mental gymnastics)
2.0 I'm an Ala Mhigan Highlander (yes, I'm Au'Ra right now but that's gonna change), chased away from his homeland by the Garleans. Now, I try make a home in Limsa as a sellsword and a courier, only to end up as a high ranking officer and known as the Warrior of Light. 3.0 more of the same, except this time with dragons, moogles, and way too much snow.

4.0 Return to my roots as a Cowboy Samurai. (Which is apparently a trope, and here I thought I was being original.)http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.ph.../SamuraiCowboy

[Anonymoose]

Even during 1.0 it was assumed that you were coming to Eorzea from some vague otherwhere. (One example, the adventurer unit of the Maelstrom is called the Foreign Levy.) However, the purpose of this assumption on the part of NPCs has nothing to do with what the developers intend for you; rather it just makes more sense for them to go on expository rants teaching you all about Eorzea if they assume you're newcome to the realm.

For example, an Eorzean has little reason to teach another Eorzean about what aetherytes are, but it's the first thing you get lectured about when you show up. Why? You need to how know that game mechanic works. "OY, PLAYER FOREIGNER! OVER HERE! I WILL TEACH YOU OUR GAME MECHANICS AND WORLD LORE MYSTERIOUS AND EXOTIC WAYS."

There is not a single thing in this game that lends weight to the assumptions of these NPCs, though. It's up to you if you want to opt-in and go along with it or opt-out, tell yourself these NPCs are mistaken, and write your own Eorzean backstory.

[Vulcwen]

Well, it's mentioned you're not from Eorzea, as in, you come to Eorzea, however:

In the SMN questline (lvl58) it is mentioned that Bahamut's aether was spread across all of Eorzea and that you absorbed some of it (as anyone else).. so it'd indicate you were there or at least close by.

[Serilda]

Since I'm a Duskwight I RP as though I'm from Eorzea, just not from directly around the city-states - since otherwise I have to come up with a complicated story about how I got to where I started out and it's too annoying and snowflakey. Zojha's summary neatly resolves most contradictions (lol) and I assume most NPCs don't know what they're talking about. Why, the Valentione's Day guy told me this year that he hoped I'd find love - while I was wearing my eternal bond ring!

Figuring out what was and wasn't canon for my character in the 1.0->ARR chaos was a real pain as a new player.

[Enkidoh]

Professor Moose and others have explained the basics for it, but to add a little more lore information to this, the player's character is a foreigner who has come to Eorzea to take up work as an adventurer, the lore reasons for doing so however actually appear to differ slightly depending on whether or not your character starts in ARR or was a Legacy character from 1.0.

Characters who were originally from 1.0 were foreign mercenaries and sellswords who were originally attracted to Eorzea answering the call from the (hastily cobbled together) alliance of citystates that were expecting the Garlean Empire to assault the entire realm after the fall of Ala Mhigo... except that invasion never came (save for Gaius's disastrous foray into Mor Dhona that ended with him fleeing with his tail between his legs when Midgardsormr and the Dravanian Horde showed up). So the citystates disbanded their army, leaving lots of heavily armed youth suddenly unemployed (which brought the inevitable social problems with it). Accordingly the adventuring guilds were set up to put these bored, restless, sellswords to meaningful work, and 1.0 characters were among them.

Many of these very adventurers later served at the Battle of Carteneau during the Calamity, many dying or injured during the battle, with a handful spirited away by Louisoix to five years in the future (ARR's beginning), with the memory of their identities becoming obscured "as if by a bright light", thus they became an ideal of what adventurers should aspire to be like, becoming known after that as the "Warriors of Light." A 1.0 character who satisfied certain requirements in 1.0 (namely, they had to have passed a certain story battle in the 7th Umbral Era story in 1.0), were part of this later group, where they teleport back into Eorzea five years later at the start of ARR.

ARR characters on the other hand, were foreigners attracted to Eorzea after the Calamity, having heard tales about the Warriors of Light saving the day at the Battle of Carteneau, and were inspired to become adventurers based on that ideal. The game seems to assume that unless you are a 1.0 character with the 'Legacy' story, the original Warriors of Light never returned, instead becoming a legend that attracts idealistic youth to Eorzea to become adventurers and protect the realm from evil, which is what all ARR characters are.

Either way, regardless of whether your character is a 1.0 character, a 1.0 character with the 'Legacy' story, or an ARR character, your character is basically a blank slate with it left up to the player to fill in the blanks about their origins, past history and personality, very much in keeping with the FF series (and RPGs in general) table-top RPG roots (after all, the player characters in the very first FF game are nameless generics only identified by their Job class).

[Naria]

Well, it's mentioned you're not from Eorzea, as in, you come to Eorzea, however:

In the SMN questline (lvl58) it is mentioned that Bahamut's aether was spread across all of Eorzea and that you absorbed some of it (as anyone else).. so it'd indicate you were there or at least close by.

This line actually has a few different variations:

As a 1.0 "meteor survivor" player, I was told I'd adsorbed Bahamut's aether at Carteneau, and I believe if you've cleared coil prior to that quest you are told that it is a result of encountering Bahamut there.

Honestly its a vague "somewhere else" but if you want you could always just say that you are from a remote Eorzean community that did not interact with the cities much or have an aetheryte. This was the basic story I used as a Keeper and a Raen and it works for both since as a Keeper of the Moon and a Raen both characters would have been from isolated communities that wouldn't be considered mainstream Eorzean in culture.