The Grass Is Always Greener, FF14 edition

- I love Lash, but after 6.5 years, I'm just so tired of looking at her no matter how cute she is.

- I briefly fantasia'd her into a cat before Shadowbringers and did some story stuff (end of the Omega plotline, the FF15 quest etc.) with her, but changed her back just before 5.0. She was a cute cat though.

- When I think about "the WoL" in various key moments of the story, I still think of Lash-the-Lala for obvious reasons. I thought playing through the msq again with Temlun would change that but nah.

(Not to mention, if I wanted Temlun to replace Lash as my main, I'd basically "have" to replay everything before 6.0 and I don't think I'd have fun at that pace.) Doesn't work that way.

- Every time I'm not playing one, every time I see a cool roegadame, I think "Wow, I wish I was playing a roegadame!"

- Every time I'm not playing one, whenever I see a cool female xaela, I think "Wow, I wish I was playing a xaela!"

- alts are the obvious answer to a lot of this but it more and more feels like I really just want one character.

- When I'm trying to imagine a roe or xaela as "the WoL," I have an easier time doing so with the xaela, but I'm not sure how much of that is just the expectation of what a female protagonist is "supposed" to look like and how much of it is that I love these lizard girls.

- Fun fact: The very first FF14 character I ever made, back in the last ARR beta where thing's didn't even carry into the full game, was a roe. I watched the opening cutscenes in Ul'dah with her and very specifically thought that

it was super cool that she got to be the protagonist when big buff women don't usually show up in that role much and yet here she was. (and then Lash happened)

- It's also easier for me to see an au ra as "me"/my protagonist compared to a roe, but I also don't know how much of that is my irl issues with visibly taking up space/existing in the world in general carrying over into the game.

- I took the roe that I briefly turned Temlun into and tried Lash's colours out on her, d'aww

- Of course those colours also work on a lizard but there's an even stronger "but Lash is not a xaela??" sentiment in my brain somehow that I can't explain

- There are no easy answers here and I'm frustrated

- This is also a silly thing to be frustrated about but that has never stopped me

- ff14's dev team could've solved at least half the "problems" in this plurk by giving us big buff lizard ladies but nooo

MOOD

Idk if a story skip could help? :/

I don't think it would. Rewatching key WoL cutscenes with a fantasia'd Lash might, but that doesn't solve the problem of what I'd want to fantasia her into

addendum after thinking about it more: it also comes down to these two incompatible facts:

- I want the WoL - the person all these nocs are friends with/admire/have a crush on/are rivals with - to be this big buff awesome roe woman

- I also want to play someone who is non-human in very specific ways (like elf ears, tails, horns, animal ears, scales etc.) and roes are (the only non-hyur race in all of ff14 who are) specifically not that

welp.

Yeah