What're the least and most lore-friendly jobs for an RP character to have?

[Vyrerus]

I think most roleplayers get this idea that the jobs are specifically harder to get due to the way they're setup, but also due to the way RPers approach wanting to try to perfectly mesh being a young character in the world in a relatable way. You see tons of overlap and such between RPers, because let's be honest, when RP is communal people often steal/take/lift/bite/borrow/blend ideas they see other people do. It results in flavor of the month sort of characters that change every few months to whatever's in style.

That aside, you just have to realize that RP is essentially writing. The limits to it are tied to your imagination. While the game does like to make proclamations such as, "This is the last scion of the noble Allagan house of pantaloons, and you just so happened to be able to master it and kill off the only remaining heir that could possibly master the technique!" It is also just as quick to dismiss or retcon such notions with things such as, "Character X was presumed dead by Ye Olde RDM mentor or Ye Olde BLM mentor, but they weren't. They were just missing on the other side of the world, and hey, guess what, they taught the super special snowflake unique arts to some chick you see at a cursory glance in Ye New Bozja content."

This absolutely gives you the freedom to do the same. It's a wild and fantastical world, and until something concrete completely contradicts your idea, then you needn't give what seem to be complications a second thought. A lot of the world in FFXIV will forever remain a mystery so that the devs can continue the game for as long as it prints money, which ain't happening any time soon!

Some ideas just off the top of my head, for even the lost/special/one and onry types of jobs:

SMN - Character winds up being the son or daughter or what have you of an Allagan Clone who went off rails and managed to reproduce naturally with a loving man/woman, passing the art onto their offspring, who inherited the same primal residuals via genetics.

SCH - Every technique comes from somewhere. Someone has invented every job. One such Arcanist fond of butterflies and knowing of Fae style myth delves into "new" aetherial geometry, creating their own fairy/pixie. Later on they learn they weren't the first person with this idea. There's nothing new under the sun.

RDM - An ex-Crimson Duelist, thought slain by the traitor, instead he clung stubbornly to life, devoid of memory and magicks for no few years. Time heals most wounds, and certainly ends them all, so one day this person finds they know a spell called Jolt. Over the proceeding moons, more follows, and soon they've a small sword and catalyst in hand once more, ready to strike out to find what became of the other RDMs and the traitor.

DRK - "Do you truly think that Ser Ompagne Deepblack was the first person whose heart burnt out of time with righteous indignation for all those suffering under oppression or betrayal? The first person whose aether swirled and churned from a burning black heart? The only one ever moved to possess a technique allowing one to move their broken body in spite of any missing ligaments or sinew? Then you're a fool who's ignored history. I know not where my mentor learnt the arts, nor where he found these soul crystals, but he did and now I do, and neither of us are Ishgardian." - A large Hyur, all in deepest black, wielding a sword that's less a sword and more a giant slab of steel.

I could go on, and while I wouldn't(and don't) have the best examples for how to do this, my point is that if you can think of a way to write it in, you can make it make sense. There's a lot more room for this kind of stuff than a lot of RPers think. Particularly because the NPCs we encounter in the game are not anywhere close to all knowing. They are frail and fallible and certainly not the lore keepers or masters.

[WhiteArchmage]

It IS kind of a debatable point about the canonicity of the other players you see in the world. Tongue-in-cheek dialogues will say they're your adventurer friends and are lore-accurate, but as ARR jobs took pains to establish how rare these arts are and how forbidden they are and how no-one else would ever be using this fobidden magic anywhere... (likely to make the jobs feel that more special over their base classes) It ends up painting that immersion into a corner (ans, as has been previously debated endlessly, the race/gender combinations are not exempt from this, such as a newbie will see a flood of Au Ra around Coerthas Central before they're at the point that Ishgardians consider maybe not shooting them on sight. Hell, the PC may be one of those).

Outside of a handful of Jobs that have positioned the WoL as the unique practitioner, or at least unique-outside-of-specific-race (WHM and SCH come to mind), the rest find some lore justifications: You can headcanon White Mages as simply random conjurers who just so happen to know Holy... for reasons. Or Alphinaud's unique Academician job can serve as a headcanon for other Scholar players. Or maybe X'run ended up training other people and didn't mention it, or other Red Mages that eventually trained their own pupils that show up in Bozja. GNB actually deals with other practicioners who were away from Bozja and ended up training their own disciples (Thancred among them). While MCH is specifically recruiting new members at all times. Dancers don't seem to have a problem bringing in new people, either. Even Summoner brings in more people with the ability to Summon in their story, if you get enough job crystals (of which there is a surplus in the SMN job quests) you just need to go on an expedition, absorb some of the constantly resummoned Primals' aether, and you got yourself a new Summoner, with the added benefit that apparently everyone in Eorzea got a healthy dose of Bahamut-flavored aether, so even Dreadwyrm trance is rando-canon.

Bottom-line is: uhhh, try to ignore other players as much as possible? And for RP purposes, I guess people would just need to get on the same page? If you're decidedly going full-in-universe canon then not everyone can be the only Non-Padjali White Mage, or one could handwave it for RP purposes as a cabal of "Not-White-Mages" closer to Eastern Geomancers.

As for the actual question, I'd think the most likely to have a bunch of people running around with job stones would actually be Blue Mage, given how they're actually SOLD, alongside a spellbook and a cane. After that, possibly Machinist, Monk after the events of 4.0, and probably Dancer; with the special snowlakes being White Mage, likely Scholar, and certainly Dark Knight. The rest sit somewhere in the middle as "rare but not incredibly rare, just not common to Eorzea"

[KageTokage]

It ends up painting that immersion into a corner (ans, as has been previously debated endlessly, the race/gender combinations are not exempt from this, such as a newbie will see a flood of Au Ra around Coerthas Central before they're at the point that Ishgardians consider maybe not shooting them on sight. Hell, the PC may be one of those).

It seems implied that the Ishgardians realized they screwed up with Au Ra after the incident with Sidurgu and his tribe because they simply refer to Alaqa as a foreigner and Adkiragh also tried to seek asylum within the city but was denied.

I'm honestly still kind of bothered about the lack of closure regarding that, since it doesn't seem like anyone actually owed up to the mistake.

[Duskane]

I misunderstood the thread title when I first saw it and I was prepared to come in here to say the most likely is "farmer" and the least likely is "WoL".

so Reaper?
thats all they are angry haunted farmers

[Cleretic]

so Reaper?
thats all they are angry haunted farmers

I'm really interested in getting to the Reaper story, because depending on the context we're given, it might be one of the least 'RP-friendly' jobs for entirely different reasons to stuff like Scholar.

With how seriously voidsent are taken as a danger in most of the game's story, Reaper might be one of the only jobs we have access to that's legitimately a pariah to most modern society. Especially given it's Garlean, which isn't exactly an ethnicity with positive connotations right now, either!

[Jandor]

What I mean is, your average joe isn't going to become a gunbreaker. There's not a million of them running around. If I remember correctly, your job trainer is supposed to be "the last one" until you become one.

Gunbreaker actually seems like one of the easier jobs for an average joe to pick up, the lack of trainers and weapons is definitely the main bottleneck.
The actual art of 'Gunbreaking' definitely strikes me as one of the easier ones to learn though, you don't need to remember a bunch of ancient incantations, bathe in demi-god aether, or master your inner beast/darkness/dragon/etc. You just need to know how to swing a sword and make sure you have some sticky labels for your various cartridges.

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As for other players out in the world and such, I don't know, people often seem very rigid in their thinking on this.
A bloke with a big two-handed sword doesn't have to be a Dark Knight specifically, they might just be a bloke that knows a bit of magic and can swing around a big two handed sword pretty well.

That's my take on it anyway, the other people knocking about are not the super special chosen one, but they are very very good at what they do and at a glance it does look very similar to what I, the actual super special chosen one, can do.

[Lihtleita]

remove your jobstone for rp and youll be ok

[kaynide]

A lot of the jobs leave room for generic versions of jobs to exist. Like for Dragoon, you become an “Azure Dragoon”, but there are other dragons about. Even Dark Knight, sure..YOU met Fray and did that quest line..but there is no reason someone else didn’t have alternative origins.

Even with Gunbreaker, I was always led to believe he just thought he was the last, not that he actually factually had to be the last.

For me, for RP, the most difficult ones would be location specific like Ninja or Samurai or even possibly Dragoon on a character NOT from Doma/Kugane/Ishgard…but even that could work somehow.

[Burmecia]

>>Link to thing someone else wrote<<

aka If you wanna get into stupid fights, pick WHM/BLM
and then spend your time wondeing: but how can I make even my retainer into WHM/BLM, just by filling up some paperwork?

[Tsiron]

As for other players out in the world and such, I don't know, people often seem very rigid in their thinking on this.
A bloke with a big two-handed sword doesn't have to be a Dark Knight specifically, they might just be a bloke that knows a bit of magic and can swing around a big two handed sword pretty well.

That's my take on it anyway, the other people knocking about are not the super special chosen one, but they are very very good at what they do and at a glance it does look very similar to what I, the actual super special chosen one, can do.

Granson comes to mind. He's definitely not a Dark Knight (it'd probably be known as something else on the First, if at all, regardless) but via "convergent evolution", on account of his choice of weapon, we see him with a greatsword even before what happened to him, and his subsequent inner turmoil, he's ended pretty damn close to one

how he ended up wearing Alliance gear from the Source is another issue altogether