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Taking the Red
-I’m excited. I dig the red mage fashion and any fantasy class that uses a rapier.
-Red mages are often jacks-of-all-trades with a kick. Like, in FFV they got doublecast. In FFXI, they got unique buffs. I wonder how they’ll work in XIV.
-The job unlock quest starts in Ul’dah. A girl asks me to track down her kidnapped sister.
-I find the girl in the desert. Three mages attack her. A red mage stands between, protecting her.
-HOLY FUCK THAT’S COOL! The red mage turns his rapier upside down to use as a staff, blasting magic at the mages. Then he jumps into melee range and finishes with fast rapier attack. It’s visually stunning.
-The red mage introduces himself as X’rhun Tia.
-We reunite the sisters. They recognize this dude as a “Crimson Duelist,” some Ala Mhigan legend. (Ala Mhigo is a city the Empire conquered. Raubahn’s home.)
-X’rhun (I’m pronouncing this “zuh-ROON”) and I grab a drink afterwards. He wants to train me as a red mage, to journey with him and help folks out. Walk the earth like Caine in Kung Fu.
-He hands me the job soul crystal. It contains the memories of red mages past. And… I have a new job!
Ququshu the red mage.
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The Job
-The XIV red mage mechanic is really cool! They mix white and black magic, but they use XIV’s unique definition of white magic. Conjurers and white mages use air, earth, and water. So do red mages.
-Red mages have two phases to their regular damaging cycle.
1) Phase 1: Build mana with magic!
The first goal is to build up two casting resources, black and white mana. You build black mana by casting “black” spells – thunder and fire magic – and you build white mana by casting “white” spells – air and stone spells.
Once you build enough of each type, it’s time for…
2) Phase 2: Spend mana with your rapier!
My melee abilities include beautiful slashes and thrusts. They cost mana. Once I have enough white and black mana, I dive into melee range for a quick burst of melee damage.
And then it’s back to phase 1 to rebuild mana.
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The Crimson Duelist
-Red magic began about 1,500 years ago. Two sorcerous civilizations – Mhach and Ampador - warred and brought about the Sixth Umbral Calamity.
-In the aftermath, wizards were shunned and sought to reinvent themselves.
-More of this history will have to wait. X’rhun wants to learn more about the kidnapping. Who sent kidnappers after those two girls?
-Our search takes us to a small church in Ul’dah, where Father Iliud has heard of these guys.
-The kidnappers were silent the whole fight, and also had some sort of weird arcane tattoo. X’rhun notes that the tattoos indicate that they were used as puppets against their will.
-We leave the church and the cultists spring an ambush. They followed us.
-We take down a swarm of these dudes and return to the church.
Fighting off the assassins’ pet.
More history time. Red magic was conceived to fight the destruction of the Umbral Calamities, to fight an age “when the abuse of sorcery flooded the world with death.”
-FFXIV often draws on games for history, characters, inspiration. This history echoes FFVI’s destructive War of the Magi.
-Black and white mages draw upon aether. Red mages however only use “the reserves of mana which which she was born.” So… it’s, like, sustainable magic? We use our own spirits as arcane generators.
-Twenty years ago, X’rhun Tia joined revolutionaries in Ala Mhigo. They learned red magic together and called themselves the Crimson Duelists.
-The Duelists rebelled against King Theodoric, a tyrant at the time. He must’ve been the last king before the Empire took Ala Mhigo. Theodoric crushed the rebellion.
-He’s worked recently with Sharlayan scholars, folks like Krile. And yet still they couldn’t stop Bahamut’s Calamity.
X’RHUN: “But never once in all these years have I betrayed the oath the Duelists swore to champion the weak with heart and steal.”
“Every generation of red mage is part of an unending battle. We are soldiers who fight for those enduring violence and subjugation, the bulwark against the unkind vagaries of fate.”
Red mages are noble folks.
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A Rewarding Struggle
-Father Iliud tells us that a merchant’s son was kidnapped in Ul’dah months ago. The merchant tried to pay the ransom, but both father and child were murdered. Evidence suggested death by thaumaturgy, which aligns with the assassins being mages.
-The merchant was an Ala Mhigan. So was the father of the girls we rescued, Master Wilkin.
-We find Master Wilkin at the Gold Saucer. We come upon him talking to an Ala Mhigan Resistance fighter.
Funding the resistance.
It’s looking more and more like the Imperials are behind these plots.
-Wilkin has business in Vesper Bay soon. The attackers will probably try again there.
-X’rhun and I head to Vesper Bay and take out the would-be assassins in advance. One escapes on a ship. Perhaps we can track him.
-Wilkins writes X’rhun a note thanking him:
“Mayhap you remember the day, twenty years ago, when the Crimson Duelists fought to save the life of a child. I remember you, Master X’rhun, for your scarlet garb was forever etched into my memory.”
AWWW!!! Twenty years apart, and still Good Guy X’rhun.
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Tracking the Cabal
-The assassin’s ship was spotted pulling into Aleport.
-Aleport’s sailors never heard the ship’s crew speak. Seems like it’s just a floating base for the silent puppet assassins.
-X’rhun and I investigate their cargo. We find tons of Imperial military supplies, and… a girl. Locked in a cargo container, with no memory of how she got there.
Lololol – I ask, literally, “Does a girl have a name?” And of course, her name is Arya. I’m not super familiar with Game of Thrones, but definitely recognize this.
I’ve been through the desert to meet a girl with no name.
-Okay. I’m nervous now. At first I thought she was kidnapped, but the references make me wonder whether she’s really an assassin.
She acts afraid, timid. Is this trauma, or is she acting?
-The local guards went to seize the ship from X’rhun’s report but they sailed away first. I’m really, really worried that they successfully offloaded this sleeper assassin.
-X’rhun thinks otherwise. He smells something on her breath, an herb that he believes caused the memory loss and was a preliminary step before she got turned into a mindless Imperial thrall. I hope so.
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Next time: concluding the 50-60 red mage storyline.
