Memories

I've been very lucky to get to play this game alongside wonderful friends, many of whom I met through this game. As mentioned over here I joined my FC in March 2020, so a lot of us had plenty of time to play in the following months. It made things much more bearable.

Our FC, which is on Siren, started out in a tiny little house in the Goblet, back in the days when you had to spam-click a placard for hours on end in hopes of winning. Some months later, a gorgeous spot in the Lavender Beds happened to open up, and the wonders of instant relocation snagged it for us. In those early days the FC house was very much a communal gathering spot, and while a lot of our founding members have since moved on from the game, I continue to treasure the time we spent together.

From there, timezones worked in our favor for once and allowed our New Zealander to grab us a medium house up the street with a ward expansion. We spent most of Shadowbringers there, until at last Empyreum opened in early Endwalker and we put in a few lottery tickets for one of the new larges. While many people encountered a notable bug that first lottery period, we were lucky enough to move right in, and we've been there ever since.

It's been very fun to play the game alongside dear friends, and on my own when things don't line up. Here are a few stories of notable encounters that have left an imprint on me.

One of our FC mates needed to run the Copied Factory, the first Nier raid. We had seven players available, so the eighth was filled by a random player, a dragoon by the name of Bikram. The raid started off fine, with the first two bosses proceeding as normal, but all hell broke loose on the third boss: the other two tanks in the raid were not tanking, and did not pick up their designated adds, leading to a wipe and quite a bit of salt in chat. (This was during Shadowbringers, when the raid tended to take longer.)

Nevertheless, we went again, and though it was dicey, we managed to clear the fight and move onto the next. Some sort of kerfluffle was happening in one of the other parties, and when adds spawned on the final boss fight, the other tanks again neglected to pick them up, causing another wipe... and then a third wipe when it happened again.

As we were running back to the boss to try again, Bikram pipes up in our party chat and reveals that he doesn't have shoes equipped. At all. He has just realized this, a solid 80 minutes into the duty.

He was instantly immortalized and walked out with seven commendations. We will never forget you, Bikram.

Eureka is side content for Stormblood and encompasses four zones to explore as you work on your relic for the expansion. It is an homage to old-school MMOs, and unlike the rest of the game, you lose EXP if you die, and you gain no EXP if you're partied with someone who's a much higher level than you.

Because of this, it's easiest to do it solo, unless you happen to have a friend who's willing to do literally the entire 60-hour grind with you. Shout out to my friend Ty, who did just that. I had some familiarity with Eureka from doing it on Reis, but I had a grand time going through the entire thing with Ty on Cálei. We farmed out our relics and full sets of elemental armor, then finally tackled the 56-player raid, Baldesion Arsenal. And while we didn't end up clearing together, that time spent hanging out and doing Eureka remains a cherished meory.

I had been working on mentor roulette for just shy of two years, and by early May 2023, I was almost done. I had just a handful of roulettes left to complete. Most of them were uneventful, but I did run into a very pleasant monk player, a fellow mentor likewise working on their roulettes. We got to talking and wished each other well at the close of the dungeon.

Finally, I reached roulette 2,000. What would it be? Oh, that nice monk is there! Wait—

Oh you have got to be fucking kidding me.

ARR EX trials are common in mentor roulette, and while they are mechanically simple, having a successful run is not guaranteed. Ramuh EX is notable for this, as both tanks must know to watch the other tank's debuff and switch places throughout the fight. Meanwhile, the rest of the party must cleanse frightened players and mow down adds quickly.

We did thankfully clear after about 35 minutes. But come on, that was the last one I had to do? Really?

The first ultimate I attempted was Ultima Weapon Utimate (UWU), in 2021, during the last few months before Endwalker. While we got to the last phase of the fight, I was getting increasingly burned out of raiding, and ended up leaving the group before we cleared. I don't regret this at all; I don't think it would have been worth it to me to clear back then.

It wasn't until spring 2024 that I lucked into a group doing the Unending Coil of Bahamut (UCoB). Despite having only a few hours per week we could meet, we made incredible progress in a short period. Which was good, because we had a very hard deadline: the group would disband when Dawntrail came out, clear or no clear. As the last few days approached, I spent time with whoever could make it in party finder, struggling to reach the finish line. Finally, on our second-to-last raid day before DT, we managed to eke out a clear.

We didn't end up getting a second clear as a group, so I only have the one weapon. But I enjoyed UCoB so much that I'd honestly be happy to do it all over again. UWU is fine, but not as mechanically enjoyable to me as UCoB was. Nael memes aside, Bahamut phase felt very satisfying to execute.

Much of the same group got together in late 2024 to work on another ultimate fight, The Epic of Alexander (TEA). Though we could only meet at terrible hours, we progressed through the fight swiftly, and cleared early in 2025.

TEA is, hands down, my favorite fight in the game. I've never had as much fun working on a fight as I did with TEA. It's exceptionally well designed and incredibly satisfying to do each phases's mechanics. We got several clears, but I'm hoping to go back and get the rest of the weapons when I have some free time, because TEA was just that much fun.

And I did end up finally clearing UWU a few months after that! Now we'll have to see if I can tackle the rest of the ultimates...

housing ➞