Quest: The Quadav’s Curse
-Someone in Port Bastok, a (teen?) boy named Corann, is nervous. He can’t leave his home. Tremendous anxiety. He wants me to find an item big enough to hide his whole body in before going out.
-And I really want to help him! This is a legit challenge for the guy, so whatever I can do to help accommodate him, I’m doing. Not sure what the answer will be, but because the quest is called “The Quadav’s Curse,” I’ll guess that it’s an item that drops from one of the Quadav enemies in South or North Gustaberg.
-Actually… I have a cloak in my inventory. A Rambler’s Cloak that covers the body and head. Will this be enough?
-Didn’t work. Tried trading him the cloak, but no go. It has to hide his whole body. Hm.
-Went out to South Gustaberg for about 20 minutes, hunting and killing Quadavs, until I got two items that might work. A shell shield or a Quadav backplate (their turtle shell). Item description says that backplate is far too heavy for people to wear, but I’ll try it anyway.
-It was the Quadav backplace. It worked.
CORANN: “Yes, yes! This is great! Finally, I can sleep in peace! I’m never going out again! Hah hah!”
Well. Not the outcome I was expecting, but not my decision. I hope it helps.
-So that’s the main set of quests I had from Port Bastok. Along the way wandering the rest of Bastok, I picked up other quests (usually by accident). Time to do those as best I can. The solo ones, anyway.
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Quest: The Siren’s Tear
-This quest was from Wahid in the Bastok Mines. He told me to find the Siren’s Tear for him, a rare gem that appears on the Gustaberg River’s shores sometimes.
-But first, he told me there’s a bard in Port Bastok’s restaurant (the Steaming Sheep) who’ll have more info.
-The bard is Carmelo.
“Memories of the deep, like ephemeral dew,/ A flickering light on the shores of dust,/ Sudenly gone in the whispering blue,/ The wrathful hand broke the sirens’ trust.”
-He followed that with what feels like a more solid clue: “Sirens shun the eager warrior.” When I find the gem, I have to not “bear arms with hostile intent.” So not attack whatever comes after me. Perhaps it’s like the Paladin Ordeal in FFIV.
Even more, he says “you must put away all tools of war and show your true self to the sirens of Gustaberg.”
-I arrived at North Gustaberg and see the river that cuts east-west across the zone. But it’s in a deep canyon. Not sure how to get down there.
-The geography of North Gustaberg is a huge pain in the ass to navigate. The zone is separated by a huge north-south cliff. I want to try the east side of the zone, and have to loop down and around to reach the east side.
-I walked all up and down each bank of this river. No luck. There’s a smaller body of water running north-south in the south part of North Gustaberg. Checking there. (I’ve unequipped my shield and weapon just in case.)
-JACKPOT. I’m able to target something called “???” on the bank of this river. Picked it up.
-Victory! It’s the “Siren’s Tear.” So note to self: this little north-south river is the Gustaberg. The Drachenfell must be the longer east-west river with the falls.
-On my way back to Bastok, I played around with my menu options and saw “View all job levels achieved so far.” Warrior, White Mage, Monk, Black Mage, and Thief all at 1. Red Mage at 16. This really makes it seem like the FFX-2 or FFV job system, where I can level up a whole bunch of different jobs. I’m more excited to learn about this system than most other things in game.
-Returned to Wahid.
He gave me 150 gil for my troubles. (That’s practically nothing.)
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Missions vs. Quests
-I’m still figuring this whole “FFXI blind” thing out. I’m not locked into a particular playstyle.
-But as I go, I have a hunch about the direction my play may eventually take. I may lean more towards doing “Missions” than “Quests.” Missions seem (from my very small sample size) to be the core story portions, while quests seem (again, VERY LIMITED SAMPLE SIZE) to be side things.
-And quests have also given me story! They just seem a bit more disposable than the mission I’ve been given, so I want to emphasize that I’m not wedding myself to doing everything possible in the game.
-I think it’s more that I just want Detolilla, my character, to see a good amount of stuff across the world. And if she misses things? That’s okay too. It’s a FRIGGING WORLD. She’ll see her version of things, and miss plenty.
-Anyway. All this is to say that this time I’m spending really diving into Bastok’s missions and quests and people is just my toe dipping into the water of FFXI. I may approach the next region much differently.
-Maybe that means skimming through quests and only noting a brief summary of them, or doing just a few that I come across and seem interesting, or maybe I just will keep doing what I’m doing by seeing as many as I can. We’ll see!
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Quest: Stamp Hunt
-A kid named Arawn has what seems like a passport that (for the sake of collection) he wants stamped by guards across the city.
-Many of the places I have to go to collect stamps are places I’ve been before, but some new ones of interest.
-There’s a “Cannonry” in the Metalworks! Puts me in mind of the Cannoneer job in FFV.
-There’s a statue of “the goddess” and a shrine to her below the Metalworks.
The shrine seems to have wings, and I know there’s an expansion about Wings of the Goddess, so I assume they’re related.
-Oh, and I came across this badass breathing fire in Port Bastok.
-Turned in the stamp sheet to Arawn, and he gave me a reward of a leather gorget.
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Quest: Brygid the Stylist
-Continuing with some of the low-stakes quests in my log, a little girl told me I’d look good in a robe and bronze subligar. So… I have to go dress up for her I guess lol.
-The bronze subligar was easy to find, but it took a whole lot of vendor-hopping to find the robe.
-She’s pretty great, despite me not loving the look she recommends.
“You look maaaarvelous, darling!” Awww.
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Adventurer’s Primer?
Ok. I just made a HUGE discovery when playing with my menus. I found what is essentially an instruction booklet. The “Adventurer’s Primer.” Comparable to the tutorial things in other games, and I just flat-out MISSED it until now.
So I kind of want to stop my session here, and really dive into the Adventurer’s Primer headlong next time. I always read the tutorials the FF games give me, and this is no different. Even more important I’d say, given the depth and breadth and complexity of the game’s systems that have evolved over 15 years.
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Next time: TUTORIAL-PALOOZA!
