Hello, fellow Celestians! Welcome to another edition of the Celestia Citizen newsletter! Now that we are back on schedule for the new year’s run of newsletters, let us get right to acknowledging this month’s theme. With a few more weeks of winter ahead, and spring scheduled for March 20th, let us dream of spring.
Final Fantasy XIV News
On the FFXIV news front, it is currently due to be a nice and quiet month ahead.
Patch 6.35 is set to release on Tuesday, March 7th! A reminder of what is slated to arrive with that patch is on the 6.3 Patch special site linked here (look for full patch notes via #announcements on Monday night): https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/endwalker/patch_6_3/
First on the docket is a continued promotion regarding officer availability. We are still talking officer applications at our respective Discord server for:
Raid Officer (24-Man Raid events every Tuesday)
Administration (documentation, such as meeting agendas/notes, spreadsheets, and announcements)
Primal Farming (Farming current expansion content for items)
General Officer (Helps for filling in at weekly FC events)
PvP (hosting PvP content, such as Rival Wings, The Feast, Crystalline Conflict, etc)
Applications may be accepted in the FC Discord server under the #officer-directory channel.
The next item to address is regarding the in-game fellowship system. Earlier this past month, this feature was disabled and retired from use. This will result in Discord serving as the primary means to coordinate activities for the Free Company.
Next, we have the conclusion of our recent social event that occurred on Saturday, February 18th, the Housing Decoration contest! Our winners are:
(House)
1st Place = Mct Windsor!
And 2nd Place = Ivy Leaf!
(Room/Apartment)
1st Place = Sadie Black!
2nd Place = Faey Baali
Our next social event is scheduled for Saturday, March 18th, the Bingo event! Come participate in our regular Bingo event where you can win a prize should you complete a Bingo card successfully! Refer to our Discord server and the #social-event channel for details.
Beyond the Light
For our next Beyond the Light interview, our winner of this month’s draw is Sky Rendwyrm! Before we go any further, please participate in our Beyond the Light interview and tell us about yourselves so you have a chance at being featured here for the Free Company newsletter! Details are on the Discord server and in our #announcements channel (or you may message me directly at Scarlette Valanorr in the FC Discord for a copy)!
What is your in-game character’s name?: Sky Rendwyrm
What race are you currently in-game?: Viera
What drew you into your current choice of race?:
When I was a young boy, my father took me into the city to buy a gameboy game by the name of Final Fantasy Tactics Advance. He said “son when you grow up, you are going to buy things with your own money so you better get use to it now. Use your christmas money because I am not paying for it.” One of my first recruits was a tan lady with bunny ears. She was an archer! Then I eventually trained her to be a sniper. She was in my party until the very end. Viera were a big part of my team because I was so impressed by this first archer.
I always said I would never play a female character on an MMO…personal decision. But when Viera came out, I had to BREAK that tradition! I was so excited…!
And then…then…BUNNY BOYS! Male Viera! A dream come true! I don’t even care that there are no hats. Isn’t like it much matters since my off time is spent (non-E) RPing as a pirate and Snow’s haircut has a little bandana that is very pirate-y so it fits well for me!
When did you first start playing FFXIV?: July 2017
What drew you to pick up and play FFXIV?: I got a fancy new gamer PC because I had money and a local shop. missed WoW. asked my friends who is playing some MMOs and one of my buddy is like JOIN FFXIV. Im like okay. So I played it…and got addicted.
How far have you gotten into the MSQ (Main Story Questline) of FFXIV?: I have gotten all the way through MSQ. Its a tradition to wake up early on patch days and get MSQ done before work.
What was your first (job? class? role?) when you started?: My first job was Dragoon.
What motivated you to pick that first (job? class? role?)?: I didn’t want to be a healer and casters seemed BORING. I didnt like the idea of casters. monk looked silly. Dragoon looked AWESOME. I played DRG up to E1-4. I couldn’t clear much content. I thought extremes were too difficult. I may have wasted a lot of time on a class im terrible at…
To date, what favorite jobs/roles/classes do you have?: My favorite job is…Red Mage! When Coco started getting to on-level trials and stuff in Stormblood, I switched to Red Mage to be more supportive
What kind of content do you enjoy?: MSQ, Savage Raids, Crafting and/or Gathering, Duty Content, Glamour Collecting, Casual Content, Collectible Gathering, and Roleplaying!
What would you say is your favorite content type from above to do? And why?:
My favorite content is definitely MSQ. I love that FFXIV is an mmo RPG and not a MMO rpg, if that makes sense. I love the story and how long-lasting it is. Coconu and I will randomly think of something in the car about the MSQ and we will have a conversation out of nowhere about it.
My next favorite content is tied between Extreme trials, collecting mounts, and RP. I really like the extreme trials because they are challenging and also give us awesome weapons and mounts. As of late, the mounts have been hit or miss… I am not sure if I would adopt any of these kitties if I saw them in the shelter! Hahahahaha.
The roleplay content is fantastic when I have time to really get in with a group and get lore started. Unfortunately, with life being so busy recently I have not had much time to devote to my venue(s) and getting involved. I hope that changes once I graduate with my masters.
What is one thing you like about FFXIV that distinguishes them from other MMOs?:
I answered this in the previous question but… “I love that FFXIV is an mmo RPG and not a MMO rpg, if that makes sense.” The game is more about the story than the multiplayer aspect. My first MMO was World of Warcraft, like most peoples. I will say that World of Warcraft has one piece of storytelling that is superior to 14 (at times) and it is that the world goes on without you. Sometimes being the Warrior of Light is exhausting and most decent roleplayers cut that out of their backstory entirely (can’t have 50000 people who all claim to have defeated [REDACTED] with their giant [REDACTED] right in the [REDACTED]!)
BUT this is about what makes FFXIV different and I have to say that the fact that it is always a story first, multiplayer last…. At least if you aren’t a heathen who skips cutscenes.
Which brings me to my next point – You decide how you play. If you want to skip every cutscene and just do Ultimate content forever, you are 100% capable of doing it and you will find a community open to it!
If you could make at least 1 change to FFXIV based on personal preference, what would you pick and why?: One change? Hmm… that is a tough one. I am a pretty go with the flow sort of person – or at least I believe I am. I would say that the change I would like to see is probably… more saved waymarkers.
What is your most memorable/favorite moment in FFXIV?:
This is a tough one! There have been so many great moments but I think the best moment is probably with the release of Endwalker. It was the first time that Coconu and I were both starting content at the exact same time and we were able to throw theories at each other across the room as we played. The excitement between the two of us was absolutely fantastic and was definitely some real magic moments in FFXIV.
Another memorable moment is when I was part of King’s Guard and we finally cleared P3S. We were all so happy after so much frustration. Our hard work and teamwork paid off.
Do you have any favorite visuals of your character you want to share with the FC for the newsletter?:
When did you join Celestia?: May 2021
What drew you to join Celestia? Was it a person, an advertisement, etc?:
Without going into too much detail and drama, Coconu and I were looking for a new FC that we could just disappear into and just be another face in the crowd. I went on the FFXIV FC website listing and looked at the top most active FCs and found one. We were greeted, within 15 minutes, to someone explaining how they were going to tie…well..do something to someone. We left and ran to the next FC on the list and found Celestia. We got invites and said “Yes. Now we can be quiet and not get attached to anyone.”
That…didn’t work out.
What do you like about Celestia as a Free Company?:
We all seem to show respect to each other most of the time. One of the first voice calls that Coco and I ever joined (maybe Coco should be part of this interview too…) someone was saying something about someone and Harli said “Now be quiet. They are not here to defend themselves.” That was…exactly what we needed to hear at the time to decide to remain for a long time.
Also the events that we have. Our leadership team really seems to care about making sure that this FC is more than just #s. It is a family.
It is also really cool that I have got to meet so many people in real life too!
What is your favorite weekly event to participate in with Celestia?: Favorite weekly events is probably Primal Learning, Primal Farming, and Maps.
Z’attania’s House Tours
We have a new block here for the newsletter, taking up another fun social aspect that comes following the success of this recent Housing Contest! Requested by our fellow Celestia FC member, and house decorator, Z’attania Tsu, this section will be to promote various housing-related items to our interested members.
Expect to read details, and see details, regarding various housing aspects such as:
A different member’s house each month
Photos of their recent decorating efforts
Details about the context and implementation to achieve the desired decoration result
With that in mind, here is the very first of Z’attania’s House Tours!
NOOK AND CRANNY
A House Tour with Z
(featuring a new member’s design every month!)
Harliqyn Mave’s FC apartment
Address: Free company house, room #6
A cozy, moody library in mostly black, with some accents of red wood and a few gothic touches, this is an ideal place to kick back with a book on a rainy afternoon. Harli has thought of everything. There’s a stepladder to reach those books on the top shelves, a apothecary set on the coffee table to practice the potion recipes you research from the restricted section, and just the right amount of paper-related clutter.
What the homeowner is proudest of: That drop ceiling! Harli achieved this design without any glitching or floating techniques, and getting that ceiling just right required a lot of work. And it shows.
What Z especially liked: Those orchestrion players are pretty big and bulky. By sinking his orchestrion part-way into the wall partition, Harli created a more slim and sleek version, which is nice! I also like that all the furniture matches Harli’s chosen aesthetic: dark and moody but comfortable.
Conclusion
Another month gone, and we are close to being a full third of the way into the new year. As we look forward to warmer temperatures, the first blossoms of spring and the return of sunshine to places that have missed it for months now, we must remember that this year is another new year for us to catch up. To see people we have not seen for a while, to see things we have not seen, do things we have not done, and to find new ways of embracing our lives and making them just a little bit better.
Patch 6.35 is still on the horizon, drawing closer with each week and day passed. Expect that there may be news on this upcoming patch by the next newsletter. Until then, please be kind and excellent to each other, embrace spring when it comes, and look forward to another long year of accomplishments and betterment for yourselves and for others you care for.
Hello, fellow Celestians! Welcome to another edition of the Celestia Citizen newsletter! As you may have noticed, there has been another disturbance in the Force Void. Our latest newsletter was uploaded mid-month to put it on par with how recent scheduling fared. However, an evaluation of things made it to where we would rather get back to the start of the month for things. So here we are, dropping early in the new month of February with a new edition!
And with that out of the way, let us go ahead and get going!
Beyond that, things are currently quiet in the FFXIV news front.
Free Company Updates and Social Events
We’re gonna party like we’re single again!
We have quite a few tidbits to share today!
First off, a brief acknowledgement to the Free Company as a whole. This year will mark the 10th year of the Free Company’s existence, and the 10 year anniversary will be this coming August! This date has been saved for acknowledgement later this year. Expect a special edition newsletter to acknowledge the Free Company’s 10 years of existence and celebrate the best of it!
Next, officer recruitment is continuing at this time. There is currently an available spot for a Raid Officer (for the 24-Man Raid Event scheduled every Tuesday) and an Administration Officer(documentation, etc.).
The next item to discuss is the Sightseeing Log event that occurred on Saturday, January 28th. This event covered the Heavensward expansion’s sightseeing logs. Turnout was very good, and led to the exploration of some beautiful vistas and vantage points from which a beautiful world could be appreciated. Below are some images of those vistas, including a screenshot of all of our participants, and of the two prizes offered to all participants (either a Zu mount, or a Fat Cat minion):
Picture of the participants before the eventThe Zu mountThe Fat Cat minion
Our next event is scheduled for Saturday, February 18th, the Housing Contest. Specifics about the contest, including participation details, sign-up, and reminders, is available on the Free Company’s Discord server. All are allowed to attend and steal admirethe glorious housemaking contributions our resident designers have sought to produce for themselves!
Beyond the Light
Would you say you have more than one relationship with a person?
Well, here we are. We have a brand new interview to get out of the way for our Beyond the Light block for this newsletter. From our current pool of entries, we have a new winner: Junno Highwind!
What race are you currently in-game?: Miqo’te
What drew you into your current choice of race?: 8-9 years ago my brother got this game, i never played a MMO before but I’m kind of interested in Final Fantasy games, so one day, after months he stop playing it, he told me to try it, and so i picked up the race i though was the most fitting, and also one that i could do a character that resemble (somewhat) my IRL look. so i chose Miqo’te and created somewhat on my liking at the time.
When did you first start playing FFXIV?: 2013
What drew you to pick up and play FFXIV?: Well as a kid i use to play some games with my brother on NES and SNES, and one day our parents got him Final Fantasy 3 (6) for Christmas, we played the hell out of that game, we would leave the TV on with the music on the background while doing some other things. from that day on i became a final fantasy fan, and started playing all FF games. and i said previously i started playing FF14 because of my brother and i loved it, was a Final Fantasy game that never ends…. so…. well here i am xD
How far have you gotten into the MSQ (Main Story Questline) of FFXIV?: Completed! (Victory Fanfare!)
What was your first (job? class? role?) when you started?: White Mage!!
What motivated you to pick that first (job? class? role?)?: well, i had some talks with my brother about the game, he told me the classes i could be and what i could do, i was deciding between PLD and WHM but i got to WHM because it was “easier” and didn’t have the Tank responsibility that i though was a little more intimidating when talking to my brother.
To date, what favorite jobs/roles/classes do you have?: Well i love most of them, but lately i been doing Ninja and Samurai Stuff. my favorite job its Red Mage, but to be honest haven’t been playing with it much. i usually jump from class to class in each patch lol.
What kind of content do you enjoy?: MSQ, Savage Raids, Crafting and/or Gathering, Duty Content (dungeons, trials, raids, expert content), Glamour collecting, Collectible getting (mounts, minions, housing items), and Other: Anything with Friends and people to enjoy!! 😀
What would you say is your favorite content type from above to do? And why?: GLAMOUR!!! because you cant play a Final Fantasy game without looking good! 😀
What is one thing you like about FFXIV that distinguishes them from other MMOs?: i have not played much other MMOs but i tried to play wow and i though it sucked that you needed to change characters to do other things and get all the mounts and collectibles again. i like that FF has one character and you don’t need more.
If you could make at least 1 change to FFXIV based on personal preference, what would you pick and why?: More glamour space? do i need to say more? XD well i think the game sometimes feels a little dated, i mean its not bad but the years are starting to notice. i think it would be soo cool to have a more updated HUD and technology for the game.
What is your most memorable/favorite moment in FFXIV?: i don’t really recall, i had many good days and experiences, but i think my most memorable moment was looking Savage content as something impossible to do and out of reach, to be able to do it and be as good as the other players i used to look up all the time.
oh another good thing is that i have won many Glam competitions and at some point i did some Glams for other players, had a little business running, one time i was in gridania and someone send me a Private message saying “oh you are the girl that make glams! you are fantastic” that was a highlight for me 😀
Do you have any favorite visuals of your character you want to share with the FC for the newsletter?:
When did you join Celestia?: October 2022
What drew you to join Celestia? Was it a person, an advertisement, etc?: our Fc was disbanded and well for one reason or another my friends got scattered on other FCs and i had a friend inside Celestia, i asked around looking for what FC to join and people told me Celestia was relaxed, active and with a lot interesting people to meet. choice made!
What do you like about Celestia as a Free Company?: i like people! i like how everyone is close and fun, and talkative, and as far as i can see not much drama is around, that’s something i found in all others FCs i was part of. so I’m glad here is not present.
What is your favorite weekly event to participate in with Celestia?: Season events! halloween event was so fun! also maps but i havent been able to participate as much.
And with that, our interview is done! Thank you to Junno Highwind! 🙂
Conclusion
May the odds be ever in your favor for love!
We reach the start of another February, with the coming of love, romance, friendship, and deep seated feelings for those most special of people we keep in our lives. Remember that this year will allow everyone more of a chance to restart things in their life and get things going toward a better outlook. Yet do not despair in doing it alone. Whether you have a passionate romance, a subtle one, or a mutual one, remember that there is also someone out there for everyone. But do not expect perfection. Instead, focus on what is ideal and what you both can come to an understanding on, for a relationship is built on the foundation of compromise, walled with decisions, decorated with memories, roofed with understanding, and beats within with love.
Until next time. See you, Space Warriors of Light!
https://celestiaxiv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CEL_Banner_Contest.png00Scarlette Valanorrhttps://celestiaxiv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CEL_Banner_Contest.pngScarlette Valanorr2023-02-02 00:22:402023-02-05 23:28:23The Celestia Citizen ("Early Bird, But Right On Schedule" Edition)
Hello, fellow Celestians! Welcome to another edition of the Celestia Citizen newsletter! As you may have noticed, it felt like ages since the last one. With a long year came a short holiday, and many of us here at the Free Company took the chance to embrace it. December saw the absence of a regularly scheduled newsletter. However, with the holidays done and the start of a new year upon us, we are back on schedule! And here we are, opening up the new year with a major Final Fantasy XIV patch having dropped!
And with that out of the way, let us get things going!
With the holidays now done, we are now starting with a clean slate of announcements.
First off, please welcome our newest General Officer, Squirrel Guile!
In addition, please welcome Xerxes Oshika as a new officer for PVP Co-Lead!
We also have a departure from the Officer position. Zee Zephos has stepped down as an Officer and King’s Hand. Please wish Zee well in the next step of their journey!
In terms of social events, we have a Sightseeing Log event coming for Saturday, January 28th at 5PM PST! Please note that this content will cover the Heavensward Sightseeing Log. There will also be a raffle for 3 prizes for all participants. To sign up, please proceed to the Discord server and sign up via #social-event channel!
There will also be an event held in February for our annual Housing Contest, scheduled Saturday February 18th. This is being posted well in advance to ensure that awareness of the event is given, as well as time to prepare. Get those houses trussed up and dressed up, and come sign up via #social-event channel when the invite goes live!
Beyond the Light
What would you say…you do in XIV?
With a new year also comes a slew of new folks to interview! We had a slough in November, and a break in December, but we are going to aim for getting interviews harder than ever! As the one who crafted the Beyond the Light interview, we are going with a new approach to getting more of our members to open up!
At times in-game, I will be promoting the Beyond the Light interview option to our members for awareness. To participate, please go to the Discord Server and reference #announcements for the available Google Form (a free Google account will be required).
With many new participants, our winner for the monthly interview is Rekilic Renatus!
What race are you currently in-game?: Miqo’te
What drew you into your current choice of race?: Male Cats get Ear wiggles! The emotes are the best, the voices are the best, This is truly the master race of Eorzea. I mean….. We have the power houses Graha, Yshtola and my personal favorite Vekkebe. (Rogue Quest line, you learn to love her!) I can go on, the gear sets look the best having a tail run around as you go. You could come up with the best Puns with the kitty race such as Catrick Swayze! I mean come on! you get a Tail, the hairstyles all fit, the facial expressions. There’s everything to love there! Plus If you want on Our leaders good side. heh go Kitty! Blessed and Scura will thank you! Did I mention the Ear wiggles and tail? oh good. Ya thanks!
When did you first start playing FFXIV?: June 23, 2015
What drew you to pick up and play FFXIV?: I played it back when It first dropped on PS3; before ARR and it was terrible, My buddy said it got better so I picked it up with the Heavensward Expansion and gave it another shot…. It took me away from World of Warcraft (since 2004), KOToR,Guild Wars, and GW2. I play other games in between but FF14 from here on out is my Game to Play. The player base is just fantastic. People are really friendly. I have real life friends who play so its great to get in groups with them to escape the tragedies of this world.
How far have you gotten into the MSQ (Main Story Questline) of FFXIV?: MSQ is all caught up. In fact played through it twice!
What was your first (job? class? role?) when you started?: WARRIOR!
What motivated you to pick that first (job? class? role?)?: I mained tank and Heals through all other mmo Experiences. So I picked the better tank I knew Id like at the time…. which is with a meaty beefy Axe and not a toothpick with a dinner plate…. I mean, What is a Paladin really? There just a tower selfish healer…. or so I thought. then WARRIORS GOT ALL THE HEALINGS AND DMG….. Silly Paladins. 😀
To date, what favorite jobs/roles/classes do you have?: I prefer Melee, So My top 5 are SAM, NIN, DRK, WAR,and BLM. I like DRK and WARs about the same, they both play good, haven’t really gotten into GNB for tanks yet and PLDs are just silly… SAM to me is really fun. Biggest reason Its my favorite job is do to the animations and smoothness of moving in and out. NINs are just my favorite in General and BLMs I sometimes feel lazy and just wanna drop bombs….ESSSPLOOOSION!
What kind of content do you enjoy?: MSQ, PvP, Savage Raids, Duty Content (dungeons, trials, raids, expert content), Side quests (Hildebrand, Beast Tribes, Eureka, Bozjan, etc), Glamour collecting, and Other: The best content in game is makeing new friends and progressing towards something awesome!
What would you say is your favorite content type from above to do? And why?: My other answer. I think making friends and connecting with people all over the world who enjoy the gameplay as much as you do is just A+. The diversity too Ive made friends in other countries. Send gifts back and fourth. Learned a lot of new things of how they live and whats different from the USA. Some of the friends Ive made here have become best friends and I would give my organs to them if they ever need.
What is one thing you like about FFXIV that distinguishes them from other MMOs?: The Players camaraderie. A lot of what I talked about with the last question as well. There’s something in FF14 for EVERYONE, Unlike other MMOS and they keep the content updated. The BEST thing is the DEVS LISTEN TO THERE PLAYERS AND DONT LAUGH OR DISSREGARD THEM LIKE WOW…. (cough cough) They care more about what the player base thinks then most mothers to there child…. Thank you Yoshi P.
If you could make at least 1 change to FFXIV based on personal preference, what would you pick and why?: I would Change how PvP works a little bit. I would add a tournament in game style session with prizes at the end of them to claim (or a currency for in game tournament style 1v1 only option.) Do like for each section 6 players queue, three matches happen at the same time in a 5min time frame. then wheedle it down. if you lose its knock out tournament and you can queue for it whenever you have 20 mins to spare… its the length of a dungeon if you think about it… I feel it would be really cool and unique to other games… you always see 2v2s, or 3v3s or 5v5s, or the big battles…what about a 1v1 little tournament style game? why not right!
What is your most memorable/favorite moment in FFXIV?: When I first played the game I was scared of the PvP… (yes let me tell you something wild). I didn’t know what to do… In all my other MMOs it was PvP heavy first, Raiding when I felt like it. In FF14, It was haha Story first, Raids, Deep Dungeons, uhh wanna pvp? No, not really…. then the BUG kicked. I ended up at the den the first time Garo gear came around…. I was on ninja when Shadow bringers was about to hit. Made a Hrothgar cus I wanted to try to be the big kitty. I was training with a broski and a friend at the time. (no idea what I was doing.) Then this metal Hammer monk walks up in the ring wearing the most bad ass gear set Ive seen in game and just starts squashing people in duels…. LIKE BAM SMASH GONE!!!! My buddy at the time tells me…. “look at that title… hes in the top 100.” So im like woo-ow, I wanna fight him. My buddy said. “you will lose, don’t talk to those guys.” So I challenged JERILITH to a duel and he showed me the ropes…. he disappeared on me one day before season 14 popped. Then showed back up, we Monked around for a bit, and I chose DRK to be my Season Job. I showed him DRK as a trade off to him showing me how to PvP Monk. Well the memory of why it was my favorite is long! there was alot that happened in my first season. BUT In the end of my first season I got in the top 100 and truly its thanks to Jerilith. So thank you brother! My PvP adventure wouldn’t be the same without ya!
Do you have any favorite visuals of your character you want to share with the FC for the newsletter?:
When did you join Celestia?: Feb 13, 2022
What drew you to join Celestia? Was it a person, an advertisement, etc?: Was looking for a home with Jerilith and Falena online, they wanted a big FC I wanted Small originally. So I found this one… We went and talked to Blessed and I believe a few Officers in the FC and told them our thoughts and what were looking for. We clicked and joined. haven’t ever looked back!
What do you like about Celestia as a Free Company?: Mostly the members… Being a FC as big as this one I don’t like do to the (family feeling). most big fcs just blow off there little guys. This one takes you in as one of there own and ROLLS with it. There’s something here for everyone to enjoy and the people is what makes me stay.
What is your favorite weekly event to participate in with Celestia?: I like most all content. I don’t have a favorite at the moment.
Conclusion
This is the end of 2022, and the start of 2023. As we got ourselves through a long year, recovering from all manner of hardships, we are graced with the hope that things will get better. Things will be harder before they are easier. We will suffer before we ease. And coming into this new year, take stock in the idea that just as Endwalker has shown us, it is darkest just before the dawn. And the dawn is coming for us all, to usher in those better things.
For your New Year’s Resolutions, endeavor to do something new, to better yourself, to make new friends and loved ones, to expand your lifestyle, and to do whatever is needed to make your life better. We have another long year ahead, so let us work to make it a good one 🙂 .
That is all for this month’s newsletter. See you, Space Warriors of Light!
Hello, fellow Celestians! Welcome to another edition of the Celestia Citizen newsletter! The weather has been getting more dreary with each passing day and week. And while it is hurricane season for some, soon it will be snowstorm and blizzard season for others. Nevertheless, remember to hope and pray for your friends, family, and loved ones who live in these places and that we will make it to 2023 with a strong finish. This month has us honoring four things: veterans, thankfulness, and dirt cheap sales. And Final Fantasy XIV. Let us not forget that!
Veteran’s Day has come and gone with Friday, November 11th. Thanksgiving will arrive on Thursday, November 24th. And Black Friday (the start of the deep discounting of a year’s worth of products) will arrive on Friday, November 25th. What of Final Fantasy XIV, you may ask? Yes, you may. With the Live Letter having just premiered Part 1 this past Friday as well, we have some information on the next major patch coming: Patch 6.3. And a taste of what is to come will be present in here.
With that introduction out of the way, let us get to it!
Final Fantasy XIV News
First, let us get the details out of the way for recent changes to Final Fantasy XIV. On Tuesday, November 1st, the addition of the new data center was completed and enabled. With the new worlds, housing was also scheduled to become available for purchase on Friday, November 4th. Details on the expansion are here: https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/85ed6ec307c5fa7732b2b8d33b9b64e0b536f24c
Lastly, the Live Letter’s summary is to be discussed. With the timing of the Live Letter, and no officially published details on Patch 6.3 available as of yet, please refer to the Free Company’s Discord Server to read on this information as was captured live on Friday, November 11th. The content is available in the Discord’s #ffxiv-updates channel.
Free Company Updates and Social Events
Don’t let an overdone turkey keep a good party down.
On the Free Company side, we had our Halloween Costume Party on Saturday, October 29th. With the conclusion of the Halloween Costume Party, submissions were accepted for the FC Costume Contest. After several days of voting, here are the winners:
For the green/orange color theme, Junno Highwind took the First Place spot with Grey Rat in Second Place!
For the ‘witchiest’ costume, Sadie Black won First Place with Elhana Greenwood taking Second Place!
And for the Cosplay theme, Grey Rat took First Place with Kazuo Akagi taking Second Place!
Please be sure to give congratulations to our resident winners!
From 11/2 to 11/7, intrepid Celestia fisherfolk participated in Eorzea Shark Week, chasing down various sharks by rod and spear in pursuit of glory. We had 18 participants and distributed over 60 raffle tickets for the main prize! At the end of the week, the drawing for the $25 of mogstation merchandise was won by Eternal Slumber. Individual events during the week were also won by Urbosa Vah’naboris and Illiana Rostova. Credit goes to Simera Yeep for this.
The next Free Company event is going to be the Hide & Seek event, scheduled for Saturday, November 19th.
Beyond the Light
Hello, everyone! Here is where our monthly Beyond the Light interview would go…
However, we did not receive enough entries this month for raffling off for one to be featured. My apologies.
This is a personal section of the newsletter I created to allow our FC members to tell us more about themselves, and give themselves a spotlight for a time as everyone gets to know our resident Warrior of Lights beyond what is on the surface…beyond the light.
This section will thrive and function at the contributions of our resident FC members. Please do not be shy and be encouraged to share your love for the game, and your character, with everyone else who can appreciate and enjoy your efforts.
If you have any questions or concerns, please reach out to me via Discord 🙂 .
Black Friday Preparations
As mentioned before, the day after Thanksgiving is Black Friday. It is considered the start of the holiday shopping season, and sits in the middle of one of the busiest shopping weekends of the entire year (between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday). Many businesses will do deep discounts on many items from the last couple of years, resulting in cheap items that one or many can take advantage of for themselves, or for others.
But how does that work out for you? In the case of multimedia, whether it is movies, TV shows, or video games, you can find many sites that offer substantial discounts in a trackable fashion.
And of course, if you’re looking for good ol’ scans of ads, you can utilize various Black Friday ad sites that will have these up when they are available. The most popular one is BlackFriday.com via: Black Friday 2022 Ads | BlackFriday.com .
Conclusion
We are now under 2 weeks away from Thanksgiving and Black Friday. And once we cross that threshold, it is one month straight to Christmas. As we venture deeper into November, we will be appreciative and thankful for many things because of Thanksgiving: health, life, love, comfort, friendship, family, perhaps a new XIV patch, and more.
Please remember that this time of the year is also going to impose upon us other things as well. But that is going to wait for the next newsletter come mid-December. 🙂 For now, please be thankful and worry about being joyous next month. Apologies for the short newsletter this month. Be sure to use your free time advantageously this season and enjoy yourselves! See you, Space Warriors of Light!
https://celestiaxiv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CEL_Banner_Contest.png00Scarlette Valanorrhttps://celestiaxiv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CEL_Banner_Contest.pngScarlette Valanorr2022-11-13 01:24:562022-11-13 21:47:53The Celestia Citizen ("Turkey Day and a Patch On The Way" Edition)
Coming soon…the Nightmare Before Christmas marathon!
Hello, fellow Celestians! Welcome to another edition of the Celestia Citizen newsletter! We are nearly a month into the fall season, and we can already feel the draw of cool air pushing its way across the country. In a couple of weeks, we will be on the cusp of the spookiest time of the year, a Spookymas of sorts. Where all good little Lalafells (or I should say, not-so-good Lalafells), naughty Miqo’tes, and slender ‘Zens will gather with many of other denizens of the world of Final Fantasy XIV to celebrate with costumes, candy, contests, and creepy stories.
Meanwhile in the real world, our Spookymas is little more than All Hallow’s Eve, or Halloween. Expect to see trick-or-treaters out and about on Monday, October 31st, as they come for goodies to fill their bags with, show their cute costumes, and to spend a night out having spooky fun. For adults, look toward costume parties, dancing, drinking, and enjoying a festivity that allows you to show your creative side in spooky fashion.
Before we get into the newsletter here, a quick blurb on Final Fantasy XIV news. A Halloween themed event is coming, along with confirmation on Patch 6.25! And of course, a concern that will be explained for account safeguarding. With that out of the way, let’s get to it!
One Year Anniversary!!!
So some good news. This marks our 1 year anniversary of the Celestia Citizen newsletter’s revival. Our re-launch was a gentle one. Brief newsletter, giving hints and tidbits about what was to come for the current iteration. Moreso an investment of hope to the Free Company that there would be a return to form for our publication. And now here we are. And to commemorate this one year anniversary, this newsletter pulled out just a little more effort to get in some information we could have had for the first newsletter (such as the coverage of Halloween, horror content, and other spooky things). Thankfully, that is to be found here for this year’s newsletter!!!
Thank you to all Free Company members who have read this newsletter, and kept up with it over the months, and have given us focus to bringing you this content to read and to enjoy. And thank you to our esteemed Officers, and the King and Queen of all creation (least up to the fence lines of the house), Scura and Blessed Darkangel, for continuing to be awesome. And of course, to all Celestians who are working devoutly to making Celestia one of the biggest FCs, if not the biggest, throughout the Hyperion side of Final Fantasy XIV!
Please look forward to another year of newslettery goodness!
Final Fantasy XIV News
Remember when I said I would eat you last? I lied.
The news last month was rather light due to us being between patches. 6.2 was live as of August 23rd, and 6.21 was over two weeks later (into early September). In waiting these many weeks, the announcement of 6.25 was made on Friday, October 7th. Details from the Live Letter that aired this date are available on the Free Company Discord server and under the #ffxiv-updates channel.
Before we touch on specifics regarding the Live Letter and some upcoming changes, an important notice was shared on behalf of the developer. On October 6th, an attack on Square Enix’s Account Management System was flagged with attempts to use a combination of email addresses & passwords that were retrieved from 3rd party online services. Per the linked article here: Precautions for Guarding Against Unauthorized Account Access | FINAL FANTASY XIV, The Lodestone
The article states explicitly to observe precautions being taken to safeguard your online access. One of these recommendations is to ensure that you do not utilize the same password on other services. If this is the case, it is strongly recommended to change your password for SQEX and FFXIV (as per the article above). In addition, a recommendation for enabling One-Time Passwords is also being made. This will conjunct with a recurring article that has been a part of the Celestia Citizen newsletter for months now. Refer to the section for 2 Factor Authentication/Multi Factor Authentication further down in the newsletter for the how-to in setting up ‘OTP’.
On the game side, Patch 6.25 was confirmed with the recent Live Letter to release on Tuesday, October 18th. An All Worlds maintenance will occur Monday, October 17th. Details here: All Worlds Maintenance (October 17th)
Another bit of news confirmed was the Addition of a new North American “Logical Data Center and Worlds” still occurring. The first phase was delayed from August 2022, but has now been confirmed for Tuesday, November 1st alongside the maintenance for Patch 6.28. The new data center name, the world names, and listings of special bonuses for creating/transferring characters to these worlds is listed here: Addition of New North American Logical Data Center and Worlds | FINAL FANTASY XIV, The Lodestone
Lastly, news on Fan Fest aka Final Fantasy Fan Festival. As confirmed in the linked article, physical, in-person events are due to be held for Fan Fest through North America (July 28/29, 2023), Europe (October 21/22, 2023), and Japan (slated for Early 2024). Details here: Announcing the FINAL FANTASY XIV Fan Festival 2023-2024 | FINAL FANTASY XIV, The Lodestone
Free Company Updates and Social Events
The least they can do is bob for those apples…
On the Free Company side, we have a new officer announcement. Please welcome Matten Renegath to the Officer roster for covering our Primal Farming side of end-game content & events!
For events, the first to discuss was the Bingo event occurred on Saturday, September 24th. Our resident winners were, from left to right: Scarlette Valanorr (oh wait, that’s me xD), Elhana Greenwood, and Eviane Rosariae. Please extend congratulations to our other winners, and to all participants of the event!
Saturday, October 15th saw the scheduled Triple Triad tournament, as held by Blackhawk Slater and other supporting officers, engaging in a ‘duelist kingdom’ of sorts, or a ‘battle city’ of some kind. The winners that triumphed in this event were: Urbosa Vah’naboris and Aaliyah Amari. Please extend congratulations to our winners and to all participating entrants of this wonderful tourney!
For upcoming events, Saturday, October 29th will be the Halloween Costume Party, featuring 3 distinct themes: Orange and Green Costume, “Witchiest” Costume, and General Cosplay (Completely open creativity to all participants). Entrants may participate in 1 or multiple categories. Please sign up via the #social-event channel on the FC Discord!
Next, Eorzea Shark Week will commence on 11/2/22 and consist of a series of fun pop-up events where participants can earn raffle entries towards a $25 mogstation gift card at the end. Some events will be 90 only, but others are open to all level ranges. If you have a rod and some bait, there will be events you can participate in. Due to the shifting nature of weather requirements for some activities, the notice may be short…so keep an eye on general-dol-doh and make sure you’ve signed up for the dol/doh role to get pinged when an event is popping up! Credit to Simera Yeep for her wonderful write-up of this!
Lastly, Saturday, November 19th will be the Hide-and-Seek event for the Free Company.
For any details or signup information, please refer to the Free Company Discord Server, and refer to the #social-event channel!
Beyond the Light
Here is our next Beyond the Light interview for our Free Company newsletter. As discussed before, this is to give our FC members an opportunity to tell us more about themselves, and their love for Final Fantasy XIV by answering some interview style questions.
This month’s interview is brought to you by our FC member Squirrel Guile.
What is your in-game character’s name? Squirrel Guile.
What race are you currently in-game? Miqo’te.
What drew you into your current choice of race? After playing Tauren and other massive races, I decided I wanted something a little more pleasing on the eyes. And who doesn’t love cats.
When did you first start playing FFXIV? February 28, 2016.
What drew you to pick up and play FFXIV? I’ve played WoW since Vanilla, and when Legion came out I was pretty much done with that game. A few friends tried out FF and got me to come over.
How far have you gotten into the MSQ (Main Story Questline) of FFXIV? Finished
What was your first (job? class? role?) when you started? Monk for life.
What motivated you to pick that first (job? class? role?)? Every game I play, I play as an agile character. I love running around enemies, dodging attacks, being such a loud nuisance right in their face. usually duel wielding. The closest job to that was monk. I don’t need to hide behind a massive sword; my fists are the weapons!!!
To date, what favorite jobs/roles/classes do you have? Paladin and Monk.
What kind of content do you enjoy? MSQ, PvP, Savage Raids, Duty Content, Side Quests, Collectible Getting.
What would you say is your favorite content type from above to do? And why? I love raiding. Nothing is as satisfying as learning the boss fight and crushing the baddie……… after countless wipes and repair bills.
What is one thing you like about FFXIV that distinguishes them from other MMOs? There is the msq. The MSQ revolves around you, the character. The npcs know and interact with you, and they respect the power you have. You are not just “The Champion” who kills things, then the named nps gets the credit. The game respects your time. I don’t feel guilty if work gets busy and I missed a week playing. I’m not going to fall behind in some weekly capped power gain.
If you could make at least 1 change to FFXIV based on personal preference, what would you pick and why? Playable squirrel race!!!! Gotta have that fluffy tail…. or a buff on people that says the name of the mount so you dont have to do a stupid google search of “ff14 floating pirate ship mount” and hope you find a picture of it with a name.
What is your most memorable/favorite moment in FFXIV? (Redacted) almost murdered me when i was using ilv 40 gear on my lv 85 weaver. Idk i mostly play this game solo.
Do you have any favorite visuals of your character you want to share with the FC for the newsletter? None shared.
When did you join Celestia? September 20, 2021.
What drew you to join Celestia? Was it a person, an advertisement, etc? Looking for a larger FC after friends quit playing. Saw post on lodestone community finder.
What do you like about Celestia as a Free Company? There are always people on and something is always happening.
What is your favorite weekly event to participate in with Celestia? Maps are fun when I have time for them.
Thank you very much to Squirrel Guile for participating in this month’s Beyond the Light interview! 😀
However, we have many months ahead and we need many more entries from our FC mates before the next newsletter!
Don’t fall for the plying of a Limsa Lominsan Rogue. Safeguard your valuables, be they physical or digital!
Please ensure that you safeguard your Final Fantasy XIV account, and your Discord account. Below is a copy-and-paste of my prior announcement made on our Discord server:
I am making a general awareness announcement to the FC in regards to security and safety for both your FFXIV accounts and your Discord accounts. With all of the rampant account hijackings occurring in the Discord world, you may have seen other servers stressing to avoid clicking on ‘sus’ (suspicious) links and downloads, especially from fellow server-mates. We are encouraging the same behavior in Discord so nobody has their Discord accounts hijacked and endangers others. If a member from the FC here does provide suspicious links or downloads directly to you, please reach out to one of our Magistrates ASAP. But what of the FFXIV front?
It turns out that ‘Yes’, you CAN have your FFXIV account get hacked. If a hacker gets your SQEX login that has a XIV account and sub attached to it, they could log in and give you a bad day. Do your diligence and safeguard yourself through the glory of 2-Factor Authentication in both Discord AND in FFXIV.
In FFXIV: Go to your Mog Station page (where you can manage your licenses, go to the shop for buying stuff, etc) > Square Enix Account Settings > “One-Time Password” > Select your choice of “token” or authenticator (per the image attached):
Security Token (key ring type, physical token): Retails for $14.99, no software on phone to juggle
Software Token (smartphone app): No cost, and uses Square Enix’s official Software Token app
Software Authenticator (smartphone app): No cost, offers flexibility on choice of authenticator app (Google, Microsoft, IBM, Authy, etc)
As always, be safe and keep yourselves secure for full enjoyment of these wonderful services, everyone!
Halloween: A History
No, not this Halloween…
So here we are. A little miscellaneous section I was planning to work in for the time of the year. In a couple of weeks, we will have Halloween upon us. But what is Halloween, aside from being a day where people wear costumes, enjoy candy, and do spooky things?
Halloween’s history reaches far back to Christianity for its origin. The origin of Halloween specifically seemed to commemorate with Allhallowtide, a series of days when the ‘dead’, particularly souls that had departed the Earth and had yet to reach Heaven, and saints, were honored. October 31st was regarded as All Hallows Eve, while November 1st was All Saints Day (or All Hallows Day), and November 2nd was All Souls Day. Some believed that the souls who had yet to reach Heaven would linger on Earth until All Saints Day (November 1st) and then would pass to the next world.
All Hallows Eve was believed to have been the last day where these souls would attempt to get vengeance on their enemies before passing on. To avoid recognition by vengeful souls, the living would wear costumes to hide their identities from the dead. Speaking of costumes, it is believed that the earliest instances of Halloween costume parties was tied to the danse macabre, a festival of the dead when they would rise from the grace. The living would dress in costumes and masks, sometimes taking the image of ‘corpses’, and would hold these danses as a reminder to “not to forget the end of all earthly things”, thereby paying respect and honoring the dead.
There is also a perspective that many of Halloween’s customs instead originated from the Celtic, or Gaelic, countries, and amongst Paganism. Samhain was regarded as starting the evening of October 31st, lasting until the morning of November 1st. There is also the belief that the boundary separating Earth from the other plane thins on this day, allowing for spirits or ‘fairies’ to emerge among the living. The dead were believed to venture to their homes and families, seeking hospitality for a night. These families would leave their departed loved ones food and drink, even setting places at supper tables for them.
Many Gaelic/Celtic countries practiced mumming and guising during Samhain, where people dressed in costume, guising or mumming themselves in costume, and would venture from home to home delivering song verses for food. Some even believed this tradition was also to allow the living to act on behalf of the dead, and accept offerings on their behalf. Those homes who gave offerings would receive good fortune, or mischief, based on whether they capitulated or not. This is most likely where the inspiration for modern day trick-or-treating arose. Children in costumes saying ‘trick or treat’ seems to stem from guised people venturing from home to home, offering either mischief or ‘tricks’ or the payment of ‘treat’ to placate them for the night.
What about the jack-o-lantern? This was based on the use of hallowed out turnips, or mangolds (which are a type of beet) with grotesque faces carved into them to serve as lanterns to either ward off spirits or represent them. In North America, this would lead to the pumpkin’s use instead as the medium due to its much softer and larger mass allowing for ease of use. The story of the jack-o-lantern also has Irish Christian roots in the form of a folktale.
In this folktale, Jack is a character who encounters the Devil and tricks him into climbing a tree. The Devil is trapped in the tree when Jack quickly scribes the holy Cross into the bark. He uses this to bargain to the Devil that he can never have his soul claimed. Despite this bargain, Jack lead a sinful life and eventually dies, unable to enter Heaven. The Devil also upholds his bargain in not taking Jack, and gives him a hot coal from Hell itself. Jack places this hot coal into a hollowed out turnip to keep it live, and uses it to light his way through the dark night to find a place to rest.
And there is the culinary side of Halloween. Because it was used to encourage no meat being consumed by some Western Christian groups, this led to a rise in vegetarian style foods becoming popular. Apples were candied and became popular to give. Pumpkin was expanded to its use of its seeds served when roasted, along with the popular ‘pumpkin pie’, which used a special type of pumpkin ‘sugar pumpkins’ for mixing the pie together; picture a much smaller pumpkin with less pulp and less of a stringy texture, then imagine it is cooked until soft and then mixed to make the pie filling. Candy also became popular around Halloween due to the number of children that came to participate, and the giving of chocolate, candy corn, candied apples, or any other form of sweets served as an easy means to fulfill tradition.
Halloween is also given a bit of wide berth when it comes to allowing its celebration among other cultures. Judaism forbids gentile customs from being participated in, which Halloween falls under, and Islam forbids participation due to Halloween’s Christian or Pagan roots. Hinduism does sometimes acknowledge Halloween, but they practice a festival preceding it beginning in mid September known as Pitru Paksha (for keeping their ancestors’ souls at rest). Neopaganism, or Wiccanism, practices Samhain for its Celtic/Gaelic heritage but also acknowledges Halloween.
Horror Movies
Another thing to discuss with this time of the year: Horror movies.
October has also become synonymous with being the time of the year when we can kick back with popcorn, relax through the opening credits, and be left a frightened, stressed, tensed mess by the ending credits. And the last several decades have given us numerous horror movies to enjoy in the process. If you favor something suspensful, or something slashy, or something scream-worthy, there’s all sorts of horror movies out there to enjoy.
Here is a list of some of the popular ones:
The Universal Studios “Monsterverse”: Yup, the granddaddy of it all. Frankenstein. Dracula. The Wolfman. The Invisible Man. The Mummy. The Creature from the Black Lagoon. The Phantom of the Opera. And many others. Some of these characters from stories of old found their stories immortalized in black-and-white film and led by horror icons such as Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff, Lon Chaney Sr and Lon Chaney Jr, and Claude Rains. To this day, their very essence still permeates into many adaptations that sought to bring the likes or Dracula, Frankenstein’s Monster, the Wolfman, and other horror icons to modern re-tellings.
Halloween – A series of movies focused around Michael Myers (not the actor), a psychotic serial killer who is regarded as strong and as dangerous as his reputation has left. His trademark is a giant knife and a white faced mask with hair (the story behind this is the mask is the inner part of a William Shatner mask turned outwards). This series put Jamie Lee Curtis on the road to the aforementioned ‘scream queens’ category, and helped in her rise to become a known actress. As of recently, the series saw a soft reboot with Halloween in 2018 continuing off of the original 1978 movie (which was also done by John Carpenter, a legendary film director behind such movies as Big Trouble in Little China, The Thing, They Live, Vampires, Escape from New York, and more). Halloween Kills released in 2021, and Halloween Ends releases this month!
A Nightmare on Elm Street – A child killer known as Fred Krueger was punished in life and burned to death. This failed to lay him to rest, re-emerging as a vengeful entity who preys upon teenagers in their dreams and kills them. This led to several sequels, as well as a crossover to another major horror franchise that is the very next callout in our list. Also, the series owes its origin to Wes Craven, who also was behind another major film series in this list. One very meta movie in the list is called Wes Craven’s New Nightmare, which utilizes both real world and in-movie elements to make for a real interesting take on the character. This also serves to bring him to a more menacing and serious position as a villain, dialing back the comical changes that befell him with prior sequels.
Friday the 13th – Jason Voorhees, who drowned as a young boy at Camp Crystal Lake, returned as a mass killer who stalked the camp with each movie until more creative direction took him to other venues. One fun tidbit is that Jason does not show on screen until the second Friday the 13th movie (which is clarified in the original movie as to why). There is also that mention about a crossover movie. In 2003, Freddy vs Jason released which saw a story crossing over Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees. Despite the movie being touted as a fanservice, appealing to horror fans who hoped for such crossovers with many other horror movie villains, it has served to become a cult classic horror flick.
The Conjuring – One of the most recent franchises to have emerged, this series serves to present the protagonists, Ed and Lorraine Warren, as they cover some of their most notable haunting cases. From this franchise came the mainline series of 3 films, and spinoff films around some of the entities the Warrens have encountered (such as Annabelle, La Llorona, and a particular ‘nun’).
Scream – Have you ever wondered of a movie portraying a serial killer who knows the horror franchises of old? The first entry in this longstanding series was in 1996, bringing Wes Craven (of Nightmare on Elm Street fame) back to the forefront. Two sequels would arise within the next 4 years, with the 4th movie in 2011. This would be the last that Wes Craven would direct, before his death in 2015. In 2022, a sequel/reboot called Scream premiered and encouraged a sequel which would be the 6th movie in the franchise.
Texas Chainsaw Massacre – Leatherface calls this movie home. Regarded as a killer and a cannibal, he touts himself as wearing a leather mask (a patchwork of human skin) and wielding a chainsaw. His family uses the ploy of a gas station to lure victims in, for them to do their business. The movie was touted as a “true story”, but is considered a fantasy. The movie series saw many sequels over the years, though their releases were far more staggered. One notable fact about the series is that some of the more well established film actors in the modern day had roles in these movies. Dennis Hopper starred in the second movie, Viggo Mortensen was in the third movie, and the Next Generation movie in 1995 saw a young Renee Zellweger and Matthew McConaughey in the leading roles (and it was due to their quickly rising stars of fame that the movie saw a full release in 1997, though was panned badly. A remake in 2003 saw Jessica Biel in the starring role, and a couple of other attempts over the next 20 years led to mixed successes.
Saw – Another recently spawned series of immense popularity. A mysterious individual known as Jigsaw popularized the usage of elaborate traps and challenges to teach sinful individuals the value of survival. Every movie seems to tie to the previous ones in some form, carefully expanding the storyline of John Kramer and those who were touched or influenced by his presence in life. The latest movie, Spiral, came out recently starring Chris Rock.
Child’s Play – The Lakeshore Strangler, Charles Lee Ray, gets fatally wounded one night and uses a voodoo ritual to implant his life and soul into a Good Guy doll. In the pursuit of a young boy named Andy Barclay, he seeks to leave the doll’s body and become human again. While the first couple of movies are considered incredible, with the third movie also good, this has led to a further sequels, a ‘reboot’, and a TV series paying tremendous respect and love to the OG series that is due to see its second season air very soon on SyFy! It is called “Chucky”.
Stephen King movies – It. The Stand. The Shining. Cujo. Misery. So many good horror flicks that came from the mind of the great Stephen King. While some adaptations were less faithful than others (The Shining), and some took things in interesting directions (such as the Fog remake with Thomas Jane), Stephen King’s influence is felt in horror to this day.
Tales from the Crypt – Okay, so this isn’t so much scary as it is funny and niche. This series from the 90s brought us the famous Crypt Keeper to TV screens and brought in a slew of horror stories that featured many actors of various fame from across the 90s to appear in roles for this episodic series. There were two movies, Dark Knight and Bordello of Blood, that released to mixed reviews but maintain a particular niche. And this series is known for featuring rather dark but ironic or funny endings to some of their tales, leading it to stand out in this regard.
Now here we are. about a third of the way into fall, and about to come upon both a new XIV patch and a fun, albeit, spooky holiday. But despite things getting darker and scarier out, know that eventually, one must come back into the light again. And speaking of the light, please remember that we still have plenty of FC members to find out more through the Beyond the Light newsletter. We want to learn more about our fellow mates, and to encourage opening up so that friends can be made, duties can be done, and homes can be had for those looking.
Expect the next newsletter mid November, where we will go into Year 2 of newsletter publication for the Celestia Citizen. And as always, see you, space Warrior of Light.
https://celestiaxiv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CEL_Banner_Contest.png00Scarlette Valanorrhttps://celestiaxiv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CEL_Banner_Contest.pngScarlette Valanorr2022-10-16 00:57:502022-10-17 22:44:07The Celestia Citizen ("Spookymas Comes with the 1 Year Anniversary" Edition)
Hello, fellow Celestians! Welcome to another edition of the Celestia Citizen newsletter! Fall is about to hit in just a few days,and bring some much needed relief to the northern half of the globe. But this time of the year is not just for the coming of cooler temperatures. It also brings the next phase in what so many gamers dread: New games.
One rite of passage for a gamer in this world is to have a backlog, a collection of titles they will just get around to sooner or later. For JRPG fans, it is especially notorious in reputation. I have historically treated JRPGs as both a sound investment in game time and game writing, which is what drew me in when I was a young boy. In the late 1990s, my introduction to JRPGs came in a new friend’s basement. Sitting on top of his giant TV was a game case, with a picture of a man with a giant sword staring up at a building.
Could one ask for a better introduction to JRPGs and Final Fantasy both?
I spent an entire weekend on the first disk my friend had lent me, and it got to where I did not want to wait for him to finish the second disk. The next weekend, I had convinced my mom to take me to my local FuncoLand and get a copy of Final Fantasy 7. Ever since, I’ve always used my birthdays and Christmas as an excuse to ask my family for help building up my JRPG collection. This would carry on for many years until I had graduated high school, and then began to work for my own money. And that money sometimes went to keeping the gaming going, through numerous JRPGs.
The theme of this newsletter is going to focus on JRPGs. This comes in response to a multitude of JRPG announcements and releases that had come out of the gaming world this year. With the world recovering from COVID, and gaming companies returning to form, there is going to be a demand for new games to play. And boy, are there many.
But do not worry! We will still cover Final Fantasy XIV and Free Company stuff as expected! 🙂 Speaking of which, let us get into it.
Take your hearts, and your wallets.
Final Fantasy XIV News
Let’s face it, you’re here for either Island Sanctuary or Paladin buffs…
As discussed in the previous newsletter, Patch 6.2 released on August 23rd. Coming along with it was a multitude of content updates. The biggest of which, was the addition of the Island Sanctuary. Within the Island Sanctuary, you can live out your Harvest Moon days (or Stardew Valley days) in the world of Eorzea by farming, raising animals, crafting and gathering items, and creating a truly unique sanctuary…on an island. For those who are interested in participating in it, the FC Discord has a dedicated channel for #island-sanctuary available with info, spoilers, and additional questions!
There were also various quests, PvP adjustments, items, system fixes, and more performed to expand the game out. For any PvP related questions or events, please refer to the #pvp-events channel on the FC Discord, or ask our PvP officers Rekilic Renatus or Jerilith Alrin. Patch notes in full detail are available for reference here: Patch 6.2 Notes | FINAL FANTASY XIV, The Lodestone
Another change was the release of Patch 6.21, releasing over two weeks later. This was meant to perform adjustments to certain issues, but the big change fell upon Paladin and Marauder/Warrior. Per the attached notes, potency adjustments had rolled out to mitigate the diminished damage these jobs/classes had experienced: Patch 6.21 Notes | FINAL FANTASY XIV, The Lodestone
This is all on the FFXIV news front.
Free Company Updates and Social Events
A company without a boss to fight is a rather dull affair…
On the Free Company side, things were nice and quiet. On Saturday, September 24th, the FC will be hosting its Bingo event to all interested members! There will be prizes given out to winners who nab their trusty Bingo on their card FIRST! To sign up for this event, please proceed to the FC Discord server and sign up via the #social-event channel that is there. Be sure to sign up ASAP to ensure that enough cards are produced for the event!
On another note, there are a pair of upcoming events for October that warrant advertisement (if to give our FC members adequate time to prepare accordingly). On Saturday, October 15th, we will be hosting a Triple Triad event. And on Saturday, October 29th, we will have a Halloween Costume party with 3 distinct themes. For questions or details on these, please refer to the #social-event channel on the FC Discord server!
And as always with the FC, if you have any questions, issues, concerns, or curiosities that the FC can address, you are encouraged to go to the FC Discord server, and utilize the #?help channel to create a ticket.
Beyond the Light
Tell me what you are. Eveything, beginning at the beginning…
Here is our next Beyond the Light interview for our Free Company newsletter. As discussed before, this is to give our FC members an opportunity to tell us more about themselves, and their love for Final Fantasy XIV by answering some interview style questions.
This month’s interview is brought to you by our FC member Elhana Greenwood.
What is your in-game character’s name? Elhana Greenwood.
What race are you currently in-game? Elezen.
What drew you into your current choice of race? I always liked Elf or Elf like races in games/movies/books. I’m actually an Elezen since the launch of 1.0. Never felt the need to change..
When did you first start playing FFXIV? September 2010.
What drew you to pick up and play FFXIV? I’m a huge fan of the series. Played every FF games beside FFXI. Never played FFXI because I didn’t have time for MMOs while studying.
How far have you gotten into the MSQ (Main Story Questline) of FFXIV? I have done all MSQs currently available.
What was your first (job? class? role?) when you started? Conjurer.
What motivated you to pick that first (job? class? role?)? Always liked healing and spell casting roles in games. Since I wanted to start the game in Gridania, I choose conjurer.
To date, what favorite jobs/roles/classes do you have? My favorite job in game is summoner followed by red mage.
What kind of content do you enjoy? MSQ, Crafting and/or Gathering, Duty Content (dungeons, trials, raids, expert content), Side Quests (Hildebrand, Beast Tribes, Eureka, Bozjan, etc), Collectible getting (mounts, minions, housing items)
What would you say is your favorite content type from above to do? And why? Mmm hard to choose one thing but if I really have to narrow it down I would say Duty Content. I got this game to play with people. If I just wanted to do solo content, I would limit my game time to console games.
What is one thing you like about FFXIV that distinguishes them from other MMOs? The community. I play MMOs do to content with people. I’ve played games that had great content but it’s not fun when you have problems finding people to play with.
If you could make at least 1 change to FFXIV based on personal preference, what would you pick and why? I would revamp the housing system. Not original I know. A lot of people are asking for that. When I pay a monthly suscription for a game, I want access to all it’s content. There is things in game I’ll most likely never have like, for example, the tank mounts. Not because they are not accessible to me but because I don’t want to spend the time and effort to get them. But I could change my mind someday and go for it. When it comes to housing, it’s really just a game of chance. You’ll get a house if you are lucky. No amount of time and effort will give you access to that content. Only luck when I feel like me paying a suscription fee should give me access to it.
What is your most memorable/favorite moment in FFXIV? I can’t think of any funny tale really but one of my favorite moment in game was when we ran one last 8 man MSQ roulette. I think there is still a picture on Discord about that run. For those of you who don’t know, Kiti used to organize a MSQ party almost every night. On the last night before the patch that would revamp and break down MSQ roulette into 4 man party runs, she organized one last run. We had a lot of fun saying our goodbye to the former prae dungeon. And now we are stuck with an Ultima fight MSQ >.>
Do you have any favorite visuals of your character you want to share with the FC for the newsletter? None shared.
When did you join Celestia? July 2015.
What drew you to join Celestia? If my memory serves me right, I left my former FC when or not long after heavensward dropped. I think it was Blessed that spotted me, FCless wandering in LL and asked me if I was interested in joining. I didn’t know much about Celestia but it’s not like I had anywhere else to go so I joined. Right away I like that fact that it was a big FC. I will not go into details of why I left my previous FC here but, at the time, I liked the fact that I could be just another player in the crowd while enjoying the perks of being in an FC.
What do you like about Celestia as a Free Company? For a long time (years), I barely participated in the FC life but I was going on the 24 man runs every chance I got. Beside the fact it’s fun to run 24 man raid with all FC people, I always appreciated that I never felt pressure to perform, that it was ok to make mistakes and that players were never single out for doing poorly. I also always felt accepted even though I was not an active FC member. Celestia is a very accepting and non judgmental FC and that’s one of the thing about it I cherish.
What is your favorite weekly event to participate in with Celestia? I love to do maps! I cannot always join but it’s always a lot of fun. But I have to say my favorite weekly, well actually almost daily, FC activity is Midnight Ocean Fishing! It’s not an official FC event but something Kiti and Sim put together to replace the again non official evening FC MSQ roulette run we used to do. For anyone interested keep an eye out for FC chat. Sim, Kiti or I normally start the group around 11:45 EST and the boat leaves at midnight!
Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth [PS5/PS4] – September 29th
Note: This is going to be at least a port coming to modern consoles. However, it is likely to be a remaster as well. There’s currently no trailers for it, only a general announcement.
As for 2023, there’s a tremendous amount of speculated and confirmed titles regarding their rough release dates:
Forspoken – Jannuary 2023
Like a Dragon: Ishin! – February 2023
Octopath Traveler II – February 2023
Tales of Symphonia: Remastered – Early 2023
The Legend of Heroes: Trails to Azure – Early 2023
Final Fantasy XVI – Summer 2023
GrimGrimoire OnceMore – Summer 2023
Final Fantasy VII Rebirth – Winter 2023
Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot (PS5) – 2023
Persona 3 Portable – 2023
Persona 4 Golden – 2023
Suikoden I & II HD Remaster: Gate Rune and Dunan Unification Wars – 2023
Now you may be thinking, “So many JRPGs, so much to spend on”. Yes, there are quite a lot in the mix here. But there are times where you can take advantage of getting games for cheaper prices and in significant sales.
Holiday sales at major outlets (Gamestop, Best Buy, Target, Walmart, even Amazon) will see numerous games reduced to various prices beginning on Thanksgiving day and Black Friday. Ideally, if a title releases more than 2 months out from this time of the year, it has a good chance of getting reduced. Anything sooner than that is not likely (but there is hope).
Target will also have a Buy 2 Games, Get 1 Free sale that returns a couple of times a year.
Sometimes, Walmart or Best Buy may have a reduction that broadcasts to major savings sites, such as CheapAssGamer aka CAG.
For digital sales, DekuDeals and PSNDeals are a couple of sites that track this.
If you also want to save some money and get pre-owned, Gamestop is one option; but I have also found Gamefly to also be winning on the pre-owned front (they usually take very good care of their rentals, and ensure you get case, artwork, and sometimes even vouchers/codes included; the drawback is their stock tends to focus on recent releases mostly, versus Gamestop having whatever is in the wild).
Meet Zidane. Zidane is a thief. Don’t let a thief steal your stuff.
Please ensure that you safeguard your Final Fantasy XIV account, and your Discord account. Below is a copy-and-paste of my prior announcement made on our Discord server:
I am making a general awareness announcement to the FC in regards to security and safety for both your FFXIV accounts and your Discord accounts. With all of the rampant account hijackings occurring in the Discord world, you may have seen other servers stressing to avoid clicking on ‘sus’ (suspicious) links and downloads, especially from fellow server-mates. We are encouraging the same behavior in Discord so nobody has their Discord accounts hijacked and endangers others. If a member from the FC here does provide suspicious links or downloads directly to you, please reach out to one of our Magistrates ASAP. But what of the FFXIV front?
It turns out that ‘Yes’, you CAN have your FFXIV account get hacked. If a hacker gets your SQEX login that has a XIV account and sub attached to it, they could log in and give you a bad day. Do your diligence and safeguard yourself through the glory of 2-Factor Authentication in both Discord AND in FFXIV.
In FFXIV: Go to your Mog Station page (where you can manage your licenses, go to the shop for buying stuff, etc) > Square Enix Account Settings > “One-Time Password” > Select your choice of “token” or authenticator (per the image attached):
Security Token (key ring type, physical token): Retails for $14.99, no software on phone to juggle
Software Token (smartphone app): No cost, and uses Square Enix’s official Software Token app
Software Authenticator (smartphone app): No cost, offers flexibility on choice of authenticator app (Google, Microsoft, IBM, Authy, etc)
As always, be safe and keep yourselves secure for full enjoyment of these wonderful services, everyone!
Conclusion
The victory theme that launched a JRPG blockbuster…
After a blisteringly hot summer, we now have a chilly cold winter to look forward to. Thankfully, this will not be for some months. As you can see, we will have not just a large schedule of JRPGs on the way by year’s end, but we will also reach the 1 year anniversary of FFXIV: Endwalker. However, there is a certainty that the next expansion will not begin with info releasing until sometime next year. But no matter, as we will have plenty of games to enjoy, and new XIV patches to dabble in as the year progresses.
The next newsletter is slated to appear around this time in October. Until then, see you Space Cowboys Warriors of Light!!!
https://celestiaxiv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CEL_Banner_Contest.png00Scarlette Valanorrhttps://celestiaxiv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CEL_Banner_Contest.pngScarlette Valanorr2022-09-18 01:15:362022-09-18 13:10:39The Celestia Citizen (Why So Many JRPGs This Holiday Season?! Edition)
Hello, fellow Celestians! Welcome to another edition of the Celestia Citizen newsletter! We are nearly two thirds of the way through the summer season, with fall slated for late September. But before we get to that point, we still have places to go, people to see, and patches to download!
Speaking of patches to download, we are entering the home stretch for the release of the long-waited Patch 6.2. Yes, that great big patch that people thirsted for with the prior Live Letters from the Producer. A patch that would bring the next main story content, as well as a wealth of new things to try. Before we get into that, we need to cover the theme for this month’s newsletter.
The previous newsletter had focused on the famous Pimp My Ride show, which focused on taking junkers, beater, or old cars and giving them a hot, fresh, and stylish take. However, how many car repair shows are out there for us to discuss? Instead, I focused on another type of car show. One that has been well established for decades, focuses more on the presentation and practical meaning of having stylish, powerful cars, and has a much bigger following. I am speaking, of course, of Top Gear.
When it doesn’t want to work, a hammer helps.
Top Gear is a show that began in 1977, presented by Jeremy Clarkson and Andy Wilman on BBC. Based on a motor vehicle magazine, the original show ran to 2001, but was cancelled due to a dated format and a diminishing of presenters that guested on the show. The show was revived in 2002, and saw Clarkson return to present while Wilman was a executive producer. New members Richard Hammond, Jason Dawe, and James May all transitioned in to cover the series for 14 years until 2015. At that point, Clarkson was outed for a non-renewal of his contract, and Clarkson, May, and Wilman left the program to create a new show, The Grand Tour. After that, the series underwent a rough patch for 4 years with a mixture of presenters and hosts, including guest presenter Matt LeBlanc (aka Joey from Friends). In 2019, the show cast Chris Harris, Andrew Flintoff, and Paddy McGuinness for the hosts of the show, and recovered to continue on since then.
With that, out of the way, let us do as the Dwarves do.
Sounds right.
Final Fantasy XIV News
Reading is important, no matter what you are doing.
For Final Fantasy XIV news, the biggest announcement is the obvious one. So we are going to lead with that.
Patch 6.2. Yes, that heavily anticipated patch, teased for months and given hints on what is to come mere weeks ago, is finally due for August 23rd.
For more extensive details following the Live Letter’s premiere on Friday, August 12th, please refer to the #ffxiv-updates channel on the Celestia Discord! This detailed callback to the particulars of Patch 6.2 was brought to you by Harliqyn Mave, and by the Free Company leaders, Blessed and Scura Darkangel! Celestia Discord Server invite link here: https://discord.gg/eZf4XhsQsM
Next, with the meteoric rise of Crystalline Conflict, a 5v5 PvP mode that premiered with Patch 6.1, an official exhibition event has been created and will premiere on September 1st and September 2nd: The Crystalline Conflict Community Cup (North America). Details on the event, including links to the Twitch channel to stream said Cup is available here: https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/88da49c37af7d49ca2ac858fc6e664fb5b646fcb
NOTE: Our resident PvP officers, Jerilith Alrin and Rekilic Renatus, are putting together teams for Celestia to participate in the Community Cup. All interested parties please reach out to these members via in-game tell OR Discord (preferably Discord).
July was a rather quiet month for events. However, we have a couple of things to still discuss.
Firstly, the Community update.
As of July 8th, the Free Company’s Discord Server switched to a Community format. A couple of benefits therein:
Channels are moderated automatically – If a channel is created, certain settings (including name of channel) will be restricted normally
To make adjustments via moderation, this now requires 2FA/MFA enabling on your Discord account.
Because of this moderation change, the emphasis is being made for our FC members to please avoid any channel names that are suggestive, sexual, crude, lewd, offensive, or outright unsociable. Usernames are exempt from this due to the controls in place to utilize a player’s in-game name as their username on the Celestia Discord server.
The focus of the Free Company is to conduct itself in both a professional and formal manner first. Conversations, messages, content should ideally be moderated with respect & understanding from those who are engaging in it before an Officer gets involved. If you have any questions or concerns, please create a ticket on the Discord server via the #?help channel.
The next item is the promotion of our FC member, Sol Aldrin, to the Artisan position! 🙂 Please make Sol welcome!…before crafting requests are submitted, of course.
One event that unfolded during July was the Lalaball event on July 23rd. Disclaimer: All Lalafells participating have participated of their own volition and consent, and were not harmed beyond professional and sportsmanly level violence. 🙂 Below are some screenshots from the tournament:
Through all of the cries and the screams of competitive Lala-punting, many competitors brought their A-game. Yet the team that would make it to the very end was no other than Ivy Leaf and Gwyn Cinder’sol. The runner up team was Orianne Starshroud and Rynarra Ashton. Third place was Jin Theaceae and Spicy Lady. Please give congratulations to our astute movers of Lalafells! 🙂
Another event that unfolded was the Top Gun PvP Tournament on July 30th. Here, we got to witness our most combative members beat and bash themselves silly for some serious challenge and prizes. Screenshots are below:
Giving us the most glorious of gashings, the sorts of fights that would measure a cinder on the face of Eorzea, many participants have fought their way to the very top of the charts. The winner of the tournament was Kami Kam, with our runner up being Rosalina Hyral. Third place is Zee Zephos. Please congratulate them for their violent tendencies and their hard fought wins! (Wait, which way is it again?)
No upcoming social events for August.
Beyond the Light
So here we are, folks. As promised, we finally have the launch of the Beyond the Light interview section of our Free Company newsletter. The objective in this will be to post one random FC member’s interview for reading in each newsletter that is released. This is purely a means of allowing our FC members to tell the FC about themselves, and moreso their love for Final Fantasy XIV by answering some interview questions.
Below is our first ever interview, brought to you all by our FC member Bugsy Soso.
What is your in-game character’s name? Bugsy Soso.
What race are you currently in-game? Viera.
What drew you into your current choice of race? It was a new race at the time.
When did you first start playing FFXIV? June 2017.
What drew you to pick up and play FFXIV? I just got away from my mmo at the time Lineage 2 and found this appealing with the whole Final fantasy universe.
How far have you gotten into the MSQ (Main Story Questline) of FFXIV? Up to current content.
What was your first (job? class? role?) when you started? Gladiator. (And we don’t mean the movie 🙂 )
What motivated you to pick that first (job? class? role?)? I never pick tank as my first mmo class and wanted a change.
To date, what favorite jobs/roles/classes do you have? Summoner/Dark Knight.
What kind of content do you enjoy? MSQ, Savage Raids, Duties such as dungeons, trials, raids, and expert content; Glamour Collecting, and Collectible getting such as mounts, minions, and housing items.
What would you say is your favorite content type from above to do? And why? Glamour collecting, I just find it calming and fulfilling to make my character look amazing while doing content.
What is one thing you like about FFXIV that distinguishes them from other MMOs? Having one character and belong solely invested in one character.
If you could make at least 1 change to FFXIV based on personal preference, what would you pick and why? Have a better way for casual players to find savage raid player finders.
Tell us about a story of yours from your FFXIV experiences that would make for a fun tale.There was a dungeon back in stormblood when it first came out, I remember playing with two of my friends and we just kept wiping and we did not see it until about 40 minutes of wiping in which I did not repair my gear and they were all broken.
Do you have any favorite visuals of your character you want to share with the FC for the newsletter? None shared.
When did you join Celestia? July 2022.
What drew you to join Celestia? The camaraderie of the FC to help newer players with content but also help older player join savage content.
What do you like about Celestia as a Free Company? Pretty much what drew me in.
What is your favorite weekly event to participate in with Celestia? I have not participated in any weekly events so far but am willing to join soon.
Losing your hard work hits hard like losing your catalytic converter…
Please ensure that you safeguard your Final Fantasy XIV account, and your Discord account. Below is a copy-and-paste of my prior announcement made on our Discord server:
I am making a general awareness announcement to the FC in regards to security and safety for both your FFXIV accounts and your Discord accounts. With all of the rampant account hijackings occurring in the Discord world, you may have seen other servers stressing to avoid clicking on ‘sus’ (suspicious) links and downloads, especially from fellow server-mates. We are encouraging the same behavior in Discord so nobody has their Discord accounts hijacked and endangers others. If a member from the FC here does provide suspicious links or downloads directly to you, please reach out to one of our Magistrates ASAP. But what of the FFXIV front?
It turns out that ‘Yes’, you CAN have your FFXIV account get hacked. If a hacker gets your SQEX login that has a XIV account and sub attached to it, they could log in and give you a bad day. Do your diligence and safeguard yourself through the glory of 2-Factor Authentication in both Discord AND in FFXIV.
In FFXIV: Go to your Mog Station page (where you can manage your licenses, go to the shop for buying stuff, etc) > Square Enix Account Settings > “One-Time Password” > Select your choice of “token” or authenticator (per the image attached):
Security Token (key ring type, physical token): Retails for $14.99, no software on phone to juggle
Software Token (smartphone app): No cost, and uses Square Enix’s official Software Token app
Software Authenticator (smartphone app): No cost, offers flexibility on choice of authenticator app (Google, Microsoft, IBM, Authy, etc)
As always, be safe and keep yourselves secure for full enjoyment of these wonderful services, everyone!
Conclusion
Yes, we did do a thing. We made it nearly to the end of summer, and we are nearly 3/4ths of the way to the end of Year 1 for Endwalker content. Patch 6.2 is due in a few days, with all of the succeeding 6.2x content due in the coming weeks afterward. There’s going to a tremendous amount of stuff to do, giving us our remaining summer and all of fall outlined for stuff to do. Personally, I am looking forward to the Island Sanctuary content to see what we’re in for. If there is one farming simulator I am going to try to get into, it is certainly going to be FFXIV’s farming simulator.
The next newsletter is slated to appear around this time in September. Until then, see you Space Cowboys Warriors of Light!!!
https://celestiaxiv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CEL_Banner_Contest.png00Scarlette Valanorrhttps://celestiaxiv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CEL_Banner_Contest.pngScarlette Valanorr2022-08-15 00:38:172022-08-16 17:27:57The Celestia Citizen ("Patch My Game" Edition - Part 2: Top Gear...or is it Top Gun?)
Yo, WoL. We heard you wanted more patches in your patches. So we patched the patches in the patches so your patches will get patches.
Hello, fellow Celestians! Welcome to another edition of the Celestia Citizen newsletter! Fresh off of the beginning of summer is the anticipation of the next major patch for the game. However, before such an endeavor could be met, it required one remaining patch to be implemented to complete the 6.1x series. Information on this is available in the next major section of the newsletter.
Now, what is the theme we’re going for this month? With the realization that we were due to not only receive the last of the 6.1x patches this month, with 6.2 slated for late August, and the sheer amount of content we have received, it seemed as if the game was being gradually and continuously ‘pimped’. This is when I had the bright idea to use a classic meme for this month’s theme.
Pimp My Ride is an MTV (Music Television) channel television series that ran for 6 seasons from 2004 to 2007. Starring the rapper Xzibit, the theme was that every episode would deliver a car in poor condition to be restored & customized. The success of the show led to many international series being developed (within the UK, the Baltic States, Brazil, Indonesia, Malaysia, France and others), as well as spinoffs such as Trick my Truck on the CMT (Country Music Television) channel.
Despite the show falling out before the end of the 2000s, it lives on through meme material with the infamous Xzibit meme being commonplace on the internet.
“Yo, dawg”
In addition to discussing the current patch in-game, and the upcoming one, we also have some Free Company specific content to discuss. Let us get to it!
The patch featued mainly PvP action adjustments, addition of a new Japanese data center (Meteor), new worlds within the European Data Center, implementation of the Data Center Travel System, and adjustments to the latest game raid.
The next patch, Patch 6.2, has no official details listed on Lodestone for what is to come. Instead, we will go off of the notes from the prior Live Letter that aired on July 1st. Credit for the capture of notes goes to Harliqyn Mave, as well as Scura and Blessed Darkangel.
Here are some bullet points captured from the July 1st Live Letter:
Buried Memory is the name of the 6.2 Patch
New Main Scenario Quests are coming
Continuation of side quests “Tataru’s Grand Endeavor”
“Somehow Further Hildibrand Adventures” is scheduled for patch 6.25
New Weapon Enhancement Quests are scheduled for patch 6.25 (these will be relevant to the latest Hildibrand content!!!)
New Tribal Questline is scheduled for patch 6.25 (this will focus on Disciples of the Land aka Gathering)
New dungeon – The Fell Court of Troia
New trials (Normal, Extreme, and Unreal) – The Unreal trial will focus on Containment Bay S1T7
New raids (Normal and Savage) – the next wing of Pandaemonium, consisting of four raids. Note that the Savage raid will be delayed by 1 week following 6.2 release, and is subject to change based on developer & community feedback
Job adjustments (PvE, PvP, postponing of targeted adjustments to Dragoon and Astrologian)
Stat adjustments to Critical and Direct Hit stats
PvP content updates (Series Two begins, Season 3 of Crystalline Conflict begins, return of Rival Wings)
MSQ duty adjustmentsfor NPC parties (Snowcloak, The Keeper of the Lake, Sohm Al, The Aery, The Vault)
MSQ quest readjustment to solo duty (The Steps of Faith)
MSQ duty difficulty readjustment (Thornmarch)
Variant Dungeons introduction
Variant Dungeon 1 introduced “The Sil’dihn Subterrane”
Can request repairs from other players IN and OUTSIDE OF duty
Combo Action Map display – This will show action progression to resolve a full combo (i.e. which button to push in order)
Rare materials added to aetherial reductions for Disciples of the Land
Glamour Dresser Capacity increased from 400 to 800
Adjustments to “Return to Ivalice” quests (specifically, “Makin’ Bacon (Bread)” and “Wok on By”)
To read up on the specifics of each major bullet point, please refer to the FC’s Discord server and to the #ffxiv-updates channel for the July 1st notes.
Free Company Updates and Social Events
Gotta get in shape for big changes this summer!
The first topic of discussion is the introduction of new Officers to Celestia. Jerilith Alrin and Rekilic Renatus will now cover PvP Content in a central fashion for the Free Company. Please be sure to welcome them, and defer to them for any PvP related questions.
The second topic of discussion is the introduction of new Artisans to Celestia: Brownie Bites, Elhana Greenwood, and Floki Seidhr. Celestia Artisans provide assistance to all members of the FC for anything crafting or gathering related. Please be sure to welcome them, and use their services for any of your DOL/DOH needs. In addition, we are always interested in recruiting additional Artisans if that aspect of the game appeals to you. For more details, inquire with Simera Yeep, or review the “Becoming an Artisan” post under our #crafting-requests channel.
The next topic of discussion for the Free Company is Officer recruitment advertisements. Currently, the Free Company is seeking interested members willing & wanting to apply for overseeing the following content:
Primal Farming (mount or misc items)
Hunts
Blue Mage Content
All interested parties may apply on the FC Discord server via the Officer Application in #officer-directory channel.
The next topic of discussion is adjustment to the Primal Learning channel on the FC Discord server. It has been revised to Endgame Learning, and will now include learning for all endgame-related content (including Primals). There is also a demand for new recruits wanting & willing to participate in this content when scheduled.
On the Social Event front, there are two upcoming Social Events occurring during the month of July.
On Saturday, July 23rd, there will be a Lalaball tournament. It will involve a bracket based roster, with teams participating in a Best of 3 format. Requirements for this social event are to have a Blue Mage leveled to 70, and to have the Blue Mage spell “Malediction of Water” unlocked (it is spell #98, and acquired from the Swallow’s Compass duty). The FC will provide assistance to interested members in powerleveling Blue Mages, and in procuring the required spell. Please refer to the #social-events channel for details & sign up.
On Saturday, July 30th, there will be a PvP tournament. It will be a one-on-one format, and further details will be made available as the deadline approaches. Please refer to the #pvp-events channel for details & sign up.
On the Miscellaneous Business front, please keep the following in mind for FC business.
If there is a general issue that arises, requiring an Officer or Officers to intervene and assist, please be sure to capture evidence (including screenshots) and document it on a ticket that can be opened in the FC Discord server. Proceed to the #?help channel to create a ticket when needed.
Celestia also has a streaming platform available for all interested FC members. If you wish to advertise your streaming platform & channel for the Free Company, reach out to Kaladin Stormblessed to have specifics added to the FC site for your platform.
Beyond the Light
Who will be the next one on the interview block?
Good news, everyone! This month, Beyond the Light will be finalized for capturing interviews from our various FC members. Expect the form to be available with a formal announcement made on the FC Discord server as early as mid July. The objective will be for all interested FC members to participate in the form, answer some fundamental questions about themselves and their FFXIV experience, provide pictures if desired, and to be entered in for a raffle. This raffle will result in one random member having their interview picked and given a dedicated section for the monthly newsletter. More details to come.
The “Coming Soon” Section
This is a bit of an informal section. I have tapped into my profound love for video games, but moreso into the upcoming games that others may be interested in that are not of a FFXIV nature.
Here are upcoming major games that may interest you (for these are also ones I myself am interested in):
The DioField Chronicle (Nintendo Switch, Playstation, Xbox, PC) – September 22, 2022
Valkyrie Elysium (Playstation 4 & 5) – September 29, 2022; (PC) – November 11, 2022
Persona 5 Royal (Nintendo Switch, Xbox, PC) – October 21, 2022
Star Ocean: The Divine Force (Playstation, Xbox, PC) – October 27, 2022
Harvestella (Nintendo Switch, PC) – November 4, 2022
God of War: Ragnarok (Playstation 4 & 5) – November 9, 2022
Pokemon Scarlet and Pokemon Violet (Nintendo Switch) – November 18, 2022
The Callisto Protocol (Playstation, Xbox, PC) – December 2, 2022
Dragon Quest Treasures (Nintendo Switch) – December 9, 2022
Crisis Core – Final Fantasy VII – Reunion (Playstation, Nintendo Switch, Xbox, PC) – “Winter 2022/2023”
Forspoken (Playstation 5, PC) – “2023”
Discord Server “Community” Update & 2 Factor Authentication/Multi Factor Authentication
Don’t let hackers into your account, or they will find something magnificent or cool to take…
As of July 8th, the Free Company’s Discord Server switched to a Community format. A couple of benefits therein:
Channels are moderated automatically – If a channel is created, certain settings (including name of channel) will be restricted normally
To make adjustments via moderation, this now requires 2FA/MFA enabling on your Discord account.
Please ensure that you safeguard your Final Fantasy XIV account, and your Discord account. Below is a copy-and-paste of my prior announcement made on our Discord server:
I am making a general awareness announcement to the FC in regards to security and safety for both your FFXIV accounts and your Discord accounts. With all of the rampant account hijackings occurring in the Discord world, you may have seen other servers stressing to avoid clicking on ‘sus’ (suspicious) links and downloads, especially from fellow server-mates. We are encouraging the same behavior in Discord so nobody has their Discord accounts hijacked and endangers others. If a member from the FC here does provide suspicious links or downloads directly to you, please reach out to one of our Magistrates ASAP. But what of the FFXIV front?
It turns out that ‘Yes’, you CAN have your FFXIV account get hacked. If a hacker gets your SQEX login that has a XIV account and sub attached to it, they could log in and give you a bad day. Do your diligence and safeguard yourself through the glory of 2-Factor Authentication in both Discord AND in FFXIV.
In FFXIV: Go to your Mog Station page (where you can manage your licenses, go to the shop for buying stuff, etc) > Square Enix Account Settings > “One-Time Password” > Select your choice of “token” or authenticator (per the image attached):
Security Token (key ring type, physical token): Retails for $14.99, no software on phone to juggle
Software Token (smartphone app): No cost, and uses Square Enix’s official Software Token app
Software Authenticator (smartphone app): No cost, offers flexibility on choice of authenticator app (Google, Microsoft, IBM, Authy, etc)
As always, be safe and keep yourselves secure for full enjoyment of these wonderful services, everyone!
Conclusion
So, here we are. At the beginning of yet another month, where we have peaked into summer for the year, we look onward to the next half of the year with great anticipation. Anticipation on what, you may ask? The anticipation that things will get better in the world. That as we continue to improve our living, our happiness, and our love, that we realize that we have overcome trials to get here. Those who have been anticipating major content from Square Enix for Final Fantasy XIV have it to look forward to in the coming weeks. There is a saying: All good things to those who wait. The knowledge that a feature is coming, or a new piece of content is coming, always plants that little seed in one’s mind and thoughts. As it germinates, and grows, we look to it to fully blossom when it has reached its peak. We want it to come quick, and we want it to come when our anticipation is at its greatest. Anticipation can diminish, but the time to reach the end of waiting can too.
As we get closer to the next major patch, it is all a question of what else could come to our favorite MMORPG to encourage us to continue sticking with it for the foreseeable future. Personally, I just want to live out my Harvest Moon fantasies and see what Island Sanctuary has to offer.
Until the patch comes in late August, please keep your patience and your wits about you. And stay safe, healthy, and happy in the meantime. Until next time, see you space cowboys Warriors of Light!
As we ride again, to another end, where it all begins, forge ahead!
https://celestiaxiv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CEL_Banner_Contest.png00Scarlette Valanorrhttps://celestiaxiv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CEL_Banner_Contest.pngScarlette Valanorr2022-07-10 01:06:302022-07-13 23:28:54The Celestia Citizen ("Patch My Game" Edition - Part 1)
When you meme a phrase that isn’t in the movie…or game.
Hello, fellow Celestians! Welcome to yet another edition of the Celestia Citizen newsletter! We are now back on track to a monthly schedule with the newsletter, following technical difficulties. With this month, we have received two significant bits of news. The first is the release of Patch 6.15, bringing in many pieces of new content. The other is the return to theaters of the most spoopy Marvel release to date: Morbius.
Morbius is not a Marvel movie except in character and origin. It is a Sony production that was done in association with Marvel, reflecting the third movie of Sony’s “Spider-Man Universe”. The first two movies were Venom in 2018, and the Venom: Let There Be Carnage sequel in 2021. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony%27s_Spider-Man_Universe
Morbius finally saw release on April 1, 2022. In a matter of weeks, the movie saw a dramatic drop in revenue that led it to be pulled from theaters. Yet thanks to the power of the Internet and of meme culture, the movie gravitated to becoming an overnight sensation among folks. Numerous posts ‘dumping’ on the movie, comedy, and sarcasm all led to the online community giving the movie such attention that a faux catchphrase emerged from it: “It’s Morbin’ Time”.
On June 3, 2022, Sony announced the movie would re-release into 1,000 theaters. When it released, the movie failed to generate any significant income (earning only $85,000 on re-release day, and around $300,000 during re-release weekend), and was again pulled from theaters. In the aftermath of this, the infamy of meme culture persisted, even having people express the hope that a second re-release would encourage people to the theaters better than the first.
Therefore, in the spirit of capitalizing on a good meme, and on the release of both a long-waited patch, Morbius’s failure and Patch 6.15’s success served as this month’s theme.
When Sony thinks all the “positive buzz” is positive buzz…
Final Fantasy XIV News
Should we go see Morbius or play new patch? We *did* promise Sony we would see it…
Firstly, the news on the newest patch. Patch 6.15 went live on Tuesday, June 7th, 2022.
Some of the big points with the content stem purely in the playable sense:
Tataru brings a new questline for herself this expansion. Hildibrand finally gets new story content to enjoy! There’s also new Custom Deliveries content (Ameliance, aka Mommy Leveilleur). Tribal Quests have also revamped in name from “Beast Tribes”, and given us a new combat-based questline with the Arkasodara. There are also many smaller pieces of content added, such as new housing items, collectibles, skill adjustments, and so on.
One important note with this patch: Due to security improvements on Square Enix’s side, one change with this patch is the retirement of Windows 7 and Mac OS’s “32-bit” platforms as supported for the game.
What is 32-Bit?: 32-Bit is simply a computer that cannot use large quantities of RAM or Memory. Within the last decade, computers running large quantities of RAM or memory have used 64-Bit versions of Windows OS or Mac OS.
How do I know if my computer is 32-Bit and Incompatible With Final Fantasy XIV?
In order to check if you are on one of those impacted by this change, you will need to look up your version of Windows or Mac OS. The instructions below will help you, OR have someone you know who knows computers do this check for you.
If you are impacted by this change, and cannot connect in successfully, please open a Ticket, and provide details/screenshots/evidence, via our Free Company Discord: https://discord.gg/eZf4XhsQsM
This will culminate into a 50% increase on MGP (Gold Saucer currency). There will also be discounts on various prizes offered within the Gold Saucer. Be sure to use this time to chase your Mini Cactpot tickets daily, play games with boosted MGP drops, and more!
What is one to do when a murder unfolds and the resident investigator has been MIA for a couple of…expansions?
This past month has been quiet for the FC, save for a dastardly doing that brought such misfortune down upon our resident Map Leader, Harliqyn Mave! And so began Celestia’s Murder Mystery event!!!
How is it that in the prime of life, this raven-colored runner of the deepest recesses of Eorzea’s treasure troves…
…was suddenly struck down at the most unfortunate of times? Could it have been a jilted ex? A jealous fellow officer? Someone who didn’t roll high enough on some precious loot? In any case, our rag-tag group of Free Company members were on the case!
Despite this mish-mash of talent, thought, and training, none would rest until the fatale that befell the femme Harliqyn was solved!
The most opportune of witnesses were questioned, picked apart more thoroughly than the logistics on whether to sell loot to vendors or Market Board it.
Through more trials and tribulations than a Phoenix Wright game, our members persisted until the culprit was captured, their means, motive, and opportunity laid bare for all to see.
The Free Company detectives that had managed to succeed in their endeavors to bring this tragic tale to a quick conclusion were:
Joran Dax
Coconu Coco
Urbosa Vah’naboris
Be sure to extend congratulations to them for their efforts!
On Saturday, June 18th, Celestia will be holding a Hide-and-Seek Event. If you are interested, be sure to go to the Discord and sign up via the #social-event channel!!!
Beyond the Light
The Beyond the Light interview section will be reviewed sometime in the coming weeks. The current interview form is being refined, and test-driven to ensure that we present a balanced and well-packed series of questions for our Free Company members. Such things being evaluated are when an Officer will be interviewed versus when a regular member will be. The goal will still be to do a random draw on one of our FC members that have submitted to the final form, and use their answers & screenshots of their character to promote them for one of our newsletters.
Expect details on this to come sometime this summer. And speaking of summer…
Summer 2022
On Tuesday, June 21st, Summer will officially begin with the Summer Solstice at 5:14 A.M. Eastern Time.
During this time, expect the same ol’ circumstances as in previous years: Heat, sunshine, arid or humid conditions, and the need for reprieve from the elements.
The Farmer’s Almanac expects the summer forecast for respective regions to be the following:
Be sure to use this opportunity to dress in light colored clothes, drink plenty of water (especially cold!), put on sunblock for those long outside sessions, and keep the Air Conditioning maintained & running where necessary (or seek out a good sized, speedy fan to move air with).
You can also save energy in the summer by taking cooler showers instead of warm or hot showers.
In the off chance you are also gaming with your high end gaming PC and notice things getting warmer in your room, look into ensuring the cooling fans in your PC are cleaned and running at a reasonable speed. And consider running less intensive graphics, if that is an option 🙂 . Thankfully, Final Fantasy XIV offers a tremendous range of graphics quality to enjoy for those who favor detail or performance.
When you see the pool open and need to cool off now…
Don’t let hackers into your account, or they will find something magnificent or cool to take…
This is being revisited in another newsletter. And it will be vital for us to keep beating our FC members over the head with this critical news, for it is for their security that this is being done.
Please ensure that you safeguard your Final Fantasy XIV account, and your Discord account. Below is a copy-and-paste of my prior announcement made on our Discord server:
I am making a general awareness announcement to the FC in regards to security and safety for both your FFXIV accounts and your Discord accounts. With all of the rampant account hijackings occurring in the Discord world, you may have seen other servers stressing to avoid clicking on ‘sus’ (suspicious) links and downloads, especially from fellow server-mates. We are encouraging the same behavior in Discord so nobody has their Discord accounts hijacked and endangers others. If a member from the FC here does provide suspicious links or downloads directly to you, please reach out to one of our Magistrates ASAP. But what of the FFXIV front?
It turns out that ‘Yes’, you CAN have your FFXIV account get hacked. If a hacker gets your SQEX login that has a XIV account and sub attached to it, they could log in and give you a bad day. Do your diligence and safeguard yourself through the glory of 2-Factor Authentication in both Discord AND in FFXIV.
In FFXIV: Go to your Mog Station page (where you can manage your licenses, go to the shop for buying stuff, etc) > Square Enix Account Settings > “One-Time Password” > Select your choice of “token” or authenticator (per the image attached):
Security Token (key ring type, physical token): Retails for $14.99, no software on phone to juggle
Software Token (smartphone app): No cost, and uses Square Enix’s official Software Token app
Software Authenticator (smartphone app): No cost, offers flexibility on choice of authenticator app (Google, Microsoft, IBM, Authy, etc)
As always, be safe and keep yourselves secure for full enjoyment of these wonderful services, everyone!
Conclusion
And so dawns a new summer on the horizon…be sure to wear lots of sunblock, and hydrate regularly.
And so concludes another of our wonderful newsletters. Summer
https://celestiaxiv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CEL_Banner_Contest.png00Scarlette Valanorrhttps://celestiaxiv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/CEL_Banner_Contest.pngScarlette Valanorr2022-06-12 00:09:502022-06-12 21:42:20The Celestia Citizen (Is it Morbin Time? Or Patchin Time? Edition)
Time for new homes, new wards, new locales, and to party like it’s the 90s again!!!
Hello, fellow Celestians! Welcome to yet another edition of the Celestia Citizen newsletter! Apologies for the delay on this latest newsletter. Circumstances beyond my control kicked in. To make up for it, we are going for a double whammy, a double newsletter to cover for the last month, and for this month.
This will cover significant news and updates in the last several weeks, to ensure there is no missed content covered!
In wrestling around with this month’s theme, I found my inspiration per the Housing changes that had dropped. Given the celebrations at play, and the big changes coming, it seems fitting that a House Party is to be had. And that is what drew me to this niche comedy movie series from the 90s: House Party.
This movie series was a teen-aged comedy set with a simple premise: A house party. It was also a who’s-who of many prominent African-American performers in the 90s. Cameos ranged from Martin Lawrence, Tisha Campbell (both she and Martin would go on to star in the TV series Martin soon after), Robin Harris (who inspired the animated movie Bebe’s Kids with his comedy sketches), Daryl Mitchell, George Clinton (musician), and others. One big detail about this movie was that it was originally written as a vehicle for Will “The Fresh Prince” Smith and DJ Jazzy Jeff (when both were a musical duo from the late 80s to early 90s). The movie became a cult classic in the years since it premiered in 1990, originally seeing critical acclaim and a box office return of 10x its production budget ($26 million revenue vs $2.5 million budget). The movie then saw two sequels made with the same starring duo, Kid & Play (another musical duo), and then two standalone sequels many years later with different stories and characters. A reboot of the series is aimed for 2022.
Anyway, here’s the news!
Final Fantasy XIV News
Off to find more story mode and more houses.
First off, the big news. Patch 6.1, the coveted “Housing Update”, released Tuesday, April 12th, 2022.
Additional updates to 6.1, the 6.1x updates, are slated to occur in the next 2+ months with major content drops occurring in individual segments (such as the following):
A new custom deliveries client (Ameliance), Arkasodara tribal quests, Tataru’s Grand Endeavor sidequests, and Somehow Further Hildibrand Adventures sidequests are scheduled to be released in Patch 6.15. Data Center Travel is scheduled to be implemented in Patch 6.18.
Next, we need to bring up Housing again. Because of the ‘lottery’ system being impacted by unforseen issues, fixes are on the way to address the current issues. There were many details provided on the state of the fixes, resulting in multiple “Follow-Up” posts on Lodestone. The latest Follow-Up regarding the fixes are detailed here: https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/a04aa2f766072f369cd5db272b325a133ef8216a
As for in-game events, this last month or two had been jampacked with content.
A collaboration also had returned, thought to never come back. The Garo Collaboration event, originally released during patch 3.5 in January 2017 and running until patch 5.1 in October 2019 (over 2 and a half years!!!), has now seen a return to Eorzea! Currently, the ETA on the Garo Collaboration “Redux” is TBD. However, if you are looking for details into the sweet mounts and armor sets that you can get, refer to this post here: https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/181c211c4f26a40b0e1af3b31a5fdaf0ea5dae82
That is everything for now on the FFXIV news front.
Free Company Updates and Social Events
When the party never stops but keeps on…
First, some big news! Celestia is NOW situated in Ishgard as of the new Housing patch!!!
Here are some sunny shots from our ward in Ishgard and the Empyreum area!
Our plot of territory in Empyreum
Front view of the FC main estate
An angled view of the Celestia “After Dark” residence
An angled view of the FC main house
The view from the high area where FC’s residences are located
Next, we have some coverage on one of our social events, occurred March 19th, is to be covered: The FC Bingo!!!
The winners of this previous event are: Jean Cardona, Elyn Softflame, Blood Spark (from left to right)
Be sure to give all 3 a round of congratulations for their success on this special event!!!
The next social event occurred April 30th, focusing on a House Decorating/Tours contest! Here are the winners:
1st Place = Jin Theaceae
2nd Place = FenFen Kittenpaws
3rd Place = Taryn Stormfall
Also in 3rd Place was Ivy Leaf
Honorable Mentions, and Tied for 4th Place goes to Sadie Black & Z’attania Tsu (No pictures available at this time).
Be sure to give congratulations to our winners and all participants for their imaginations, investment, and interest in showing off their lavish homes!
Now it is time to take a segue from social events to bring up a point cited at the previous FC meeting.
The usage of bots or botting is NOT allowed within the FC. As Final Fantasy 14 is an MMORPG, it is essentially a game (like others) that thrives on the participation of a player in investing both time and money into it. This applies not just to participation in combat, but also in participation in non-combat activities (gathering, crafting, exploration, etc). It is a Terms of Service (ToS) issue, and it also reflects upon the FC badly. If an FC member is confirmed in any form to have evidence of botting or using bots, they will be punished up to and including removal from the FC. If an FC member believes another member is botting or using bots, please notify an Officer ASAP and provide as much evidence as possible.
Here is also another reminder, as brought up in the previous newsletter: Because of the existence of all manner of perspectives, it is being emphasized to ensure that all FC members are being both respectful and considerate of other FC members. As Final Fantasy 14 is a game that prides itself on a wide-reaching scope to encompass all folks of shapes and sizes, beliefs and thoughts, backgrounds and histories, it is eventual that a player may meet someone else they are inclined to agree or disagree with. We must observe being the best we can be not just as a Free Company in performance, but also in observation. The goal in Final Fantasy 14 is to have fun, support others, and be kind and excellent to each other.
Rock on!
Beyond the Light
Now, we are trying something new here for this newsletter. Near the end of March, I created an interview form for a new section of the newsletter that would give social reach to the FC regarding its members.
The social reach would be in the form of getting to know more about members of the FC, whether it was an Officer or a regular member.
To test drive this, a couple of our guinea pigs Officers volunteered was blackmailed for the task.
There will be some finishing touches on the interview form coming soon. Once it is done, we will move forward to give the FC access to it. From there, one drawing of the lucky member will be conducted and their interview posted here. Be sure to also get some amazing snapshots of your character, as these will also be featured in this section too!
Refer to the next newsletter for further details on this coming soon feature!
Don’t let hackers into your account, or they will find something magnificent or cool to take…
This is being revisited in another newsletter. And it will be vital for us to keep beating our FC members over the head with this critical news, for it is for their security that this is being done.
Please ensure that you safeguard your Final Fantasy XIV account, and your Discord account. Below is a copy-and-paste of my prior announcement made on our Discord server:
I am making a general awareness announcement to the FC in regards to security and safety for both your FFXIV accounts and your Discord accounts. With all of the rampant account hijackings occurring in the Discord world, you may have seen other servers stressing to avoid clicking on ‘sus’ (suspicious) links and downloads, especially from fellow server-mates. We are encouraging the same behavior in Discord so nobody has their Discord accounts hijacked and endangers others. If a member from the FC here does provide suspicious links or downloads directly to you, please reach out to one of our Magistrates ASAP. But what of the FFXIV front?
It turns out that ‘Yes’, you CAN have your FFXIV account get hacked. If a hacker gets your SQEX login that has a XIV account and sub attached to it, they could log in and give you a bad day. Do your diligence and safeguard yourself through the glory of 2-Factor Authentication in both Discord AND in FFXIV.
In FFXIV: Go to your Mog Station page (where you can manage your licenses, go to the shop for buying stuff, etc) > Square Enix Account Settings > “One-Time Password” > Select your choice of “token” or authenticator (per the image attached):
Security Token (key ring type, physical token): Retails for $14.99, no software on phone to juggle
Software Token (smartphone app): No cost, and uses Square Enix’s official Software Token app
Software Authenticator (smartphone app): No cost, offers flexibility on choice of authenticator app (Google, Microsoft, IBM, Authy, etc)
As always, be safe and keep yourselves secure for full enjoyment of these wonderful services, everyone!
Conclusion
Well, here we are. At the end of yet another fun newsletter. As we go into May, looking forward to the coming of the next patch, the next events, and warmer weather, we are reminded fully of how important this year is to get back to normalcy. People are meeting up with each other again, looking forward to celebrating and having good times again. One may be inclined to wonder where to go from here. Believe in the idea that as long as you are kind and excellent to people, that you carry hope and love in your heart, that you look beyond the worst to appreciate the best, then you will come out of top. And people will celebrate you for that in the days to come. Be sure to party responsibly, drink moderately, and have a pleasant time this year. See you next month, space Warriors of Light!
