Fun Lore Facts?

[Stingcat]

Does anyone have any interesting lore facts? A common one being ishgardians like to lick salt rock instead of grinding it down like a normal being...

[Caseal]

did you know Cid's goggles were given to him by someone very important in a way that impacts the entire story afterwards

[MikkoAkure]

I would take the canonicity of the Skybuilder material "facts" such as that one with a chunk of communal rock salt, especially since I think they only exist in the English version and smell like a bored translator having fun. There's other instances of the flavor text being a little too flavorful and at least one case of it having been walked back. But don't let that get in the way of your fanfic or headcanon where your WoL and Aymeric share a salty indirect Ishgardian kiss at the banquet scene in Heavensward.


My favorite FFXIV lore are the really small local legends or daily life tidbits.

One fun fact is that the first aetheryte camp in La Noscea most adventurers would bump into in 1.0 was Camp Bearded Rock, which was more or less where Summerford is now. It was destroyed in the Calamity, but it had its own little lore tidbit about how it was named. In the aftermath of a failed attempt at the Trident (Limsa's potentially literal obstacle course election process), the loser was chained by his rival against a rock in La Noscea. But he was so stubborn that he refused to die and his beard kept growing and growing until it wrapped around the rock. I played in 1.0 and don't remember seeing the rock or a pile of hair though.

Another "fun" fact related to Limsa Lominsa is that Carvallain is today mostly a butt of jokes with him and Rhoswen, but despite being a runaway Ishgardian noble, he's one of the more despicable pirates in the city since he controls the "pleasure" trade and an NPC mentions that pretty girls often "end up" on his barges which implies it's under less than willing circumstances. Though it feels like the scale of how "gritty" the pirates of Limsa are at any moment of time, from real life history to Lazy Town, depends on the writer.

[Soge01]

If you do a certain quest in Sharlyan, you can meet Papalymo's dad! And while its brief, I remember that it was pretty touching with what he tells you.

I hope we get a side story later of him visiting Ala Mhigo and talking with Lyse. I would love for them to reminisce over Papalymo and the legacy in what Lyse has become that he left behind.

[Cleretic]

Oh, you want tiny lore fun facts, you know where you should go? Fishing, that's where!

• 'Maiboi' is considered a great insult among the Vanu Vanu, so if you want an obscure in-universe swear word, there you go.
• According to a fish in Coerthas Western Highlands, First Inquisitor Charibert (you know him, 'Sickness Must Be Purged', that guy) either was a cannibal, or was at least rumored to be.
• Ostrakon Hepta, which we never saw, was a society where heirarchy was entirely decided by number of legs. Not surprising that one didn't work out.
• One of Allag's methods of asymmetrical warfare was to specifically screw up the local ecosystems... through methods like 'introduce a shark made of knives into the river'.
• Weirdly, the Azim Steppe's big thing about the sun and moon doesn't just spread to the xaela tribes, because a few of the Azim Steppe fish also have two versions, like the Dawn and Dusk Crayfish.
• There's a surprising amount of white or albino marine life in Norvrandt, much of it having been mistaken for sin eaters. Most of them aren't.

And for a non-fishing one...

The in-universe story of Starlight traces back to an order of Temple Knights that sheltered a group of orphaned children. In the live game that order has never been named, but in 1.0 it was, and we've even met a member of it in the live game, albeit not in a great state: Ser Yuhelmeric, the second boss of Dusk Vigil.

[Iscah]

There's a surprising amount of white or albino marine life in Norvrandt, much of it having been mistaken for sin eaters. Most of them aren't.

Not really surprising – sounds like natural selection at work after a hundred years of surviving better if you blend into the glare of eternal Light.

[SannaR]

So Allag took the Omnicron route of screwing over the ecosystem? Makes you wonder if they really cared about the places they took over after the conquering was over. Though maybe not to the same extent considering who was pulling the strings.

[Cleretic]

So Allag took the Omnicron route of screwing over the ecosystem? Makes you wonder if they really cared about the places they took over after the conquering was over. Though maybe not to the same extent considering who was pulling the strings.

Nothing we've seen about Allag, and that the era Azys Lla was from in particular, makes me think they were ever even remotely kind or cared. They didn't conquer Meracydia because they thought they'd run it well/better than the people who were there, or even because it had resources, they conquered it because it was there and they hadn't conquered it yet. And then left it a blasted wasteland, because their only real objective was conquering it.

This trend continues in all relic lines until the Manderville weapons really (though I've been so put off by XIV these past couple of years that I actually haven't finished one to its current highest progression point). Though some of the weapons from FFXI that were referenced were actually just various strong weapons from different endgame eras in FFXI's history.

Does this trend actually continue until Endwalker? Because relic weapons stopped getting unique names with the Eurekan Weapons in Stormblood, with the brief and short-lived exception of the first-tier Resistance weapons. The .0 job gear gets named weapons, and for Warrior have all been FFXI weapons: Farsha in Stormblood, Chango and Skullrender in Shadowbringers, and the Gigantaxe (usually spelled with a space) in Endwalker.

By my reading, either the trend stopped in Stormblood when relic weapons stopped getting unique names, or never stopped because every time WAR gets a level-cap weapon, it's one it had in FFXI.

[Vyrerus]

Trend Continues

Yeah, it has. The oddities to it are... the weapons referenced aren't always relics from XI rather NM drops or non-rares. Some of the XIV jobs do get unique weapons that have no XI counterpart to my knowledge.

Also with the Eurekan weapons(Stormblood), the naming convention manifests twice, once at the start and again at the Hydatos stage. Idk. I'm going completely off memory. But like, the DRG spear eventually becomes the Daboya, and that's an Empyrean weaponskill spear from the alternate upgrade path through The Walk of Echoes rather than through Abyssea in FFXI, resulting in a weaker weapon but granting access to its powerful WS.

I guess in Endwalker the trend continues with job AF armor referencing item level AF armor from XI in addition to the AF weapons granted by the MSQ this time around. Though those aren't the actual relics.

The trend could still pop up again at the very end of the Manderville line, I guess. We'll see.

[Brightamethyst]

The wings and fins on dragoon equipment are actually flight stabilizers for for powerful and accurate jumping.