Final Fantasy XI - Television Tropes & Idioms

alt title(s): Final Fantasy 11

"THEY SHOULD HAVE CALLED IT FINAL FANTASY ONLINE!"

The eleventh entry in the Nerve wrackingly popular Final Fantasy series, Final Fantasy XI is the first MMORPG created by Square Enix, and the first MMO in the Final Fantasy franchise, released in Japan in May of 2002, with a North American release in October of 2003, followed by a European release in September of 2004. It is also the first MMORPG to be released both for home consoles (Playstation 2 and Xbox 360) and the PC. The game even mixes all these players together, as no world is region or console specific.

While allowing the game to be as open-ended as possible, being a Final Fantasy game, an incredible emphasis on story remains, which is rarely done well in MMOs. There are 10(!!) different main storylines (Missions), one for each of the starting nations (Bastok, San d'Oria, and Windurst), as well as one for each expansion (Rise of the Zilart, Chains of Promathia, Treasures of Aht Urhgan, and Wings of the Goddess), plus three "Mini Expansions". There are also countless side stories that come from smaller quests.

The game also allows a character to change their job class (to any of the 20, provided they are unlocked) at any time without the need to make a new character, as well as set a "Support Job" — a secondary, weaker job, typically chosen to complement the main job — to further enhance your character. With enough time and effort, you can experience everything the game has to offer on only one character! (Whether you can store all your gear on that one character is another thing, entirely... fortunately, due to a per-character fee, FFXI is one of the few MMOs that allows muling.)

There is also a sometimes distressing issue of Player versus Player options. At this time, there are only 4 modes of PvP: Ballista, Brenner, Chocobo Racing, and Pankration (or you can try and get charmed by the Lamia during Besieged so they'll make you attack other players). Brenner and Chocobo Racing are rarely used at all, and Pankration has recently gotten some interest again (thanks to new NMs that can be spawned only though selling photos, when you can only buy photo equipment with Pankration jettons), while the amount of players involved in Ballista is based on the world. It also possesses a definite amount of Level Grinding, like most MMORPGs. Add in a necessity to party for a majority of the game's content, difficult Bonus Bosses (two formerly Nigh Invulnerable, now just impossible to kill before the media-backlash-induced arbitrary time limit), and all sorts of other stuff designed to challenge you, and you've got an MMO that's Nintendo Hard(It's ridiculous. It's not even funny.). And then there's the fact that most things in the game require a time investment of 2 hours or more, so casual players may be a bit put off. The difficulty has been eased through updates, but many people still avoid the game and tend to jump to casual-friendly MMOs.

This does not mean, however, that the game does not enjoy success. Final Fantasy XI has over 500,000 subscribers, with nearly 2 million characters playing.

It should go without saying that making millions a month makes this a sort of Cash Cow.

This game deals in the following tropes:

Absurdly Spacious Sewer: One in San d'Oria, one in Tavnazia, and one in Windurst.
Abusive Precursors: The Zilart seem to fit the bill here, given that the 'Rise of the Zilart' expansion involves you trying to stop two of the surviving members from wiping out all life on Vana'diel.
AI Roulette
The Alliance: The Allied Forces of Altana during the Crystal War. The nations are still allied in the present, but they don't seem to have such a nice name anymore.
All Trolls Are Different: Trolls are big, bad, and on Moblin employ.
All Your Base Are Belong To Us: Besieged, Wings of the Goddess Mission "Nation on the Brink" has a Direct Reference◊ from an NPC
Alt-itis: An interesting case, since you can change class and start over from level 1 without creating a new character.
Always Chaotic Evil: It's certainly seems the beastmen are like this in the game, but then you find out what motivates them, and the world becomes a lot more gray... except the Orcs. They're pretty much just a nasty warrior race.
An Adventurer Is You: Warped somewhat by a heaping dose of theory vs. practice.
Arc Words: Memoria de la S^tona.
Aristocrats Are Evil: Played straight with Archduke Kam'lanaut, although technically he should be a Grand Duke. Averted with most other nobles/royals, although they sometimes tease at it.
Authority Equals Asskicking: The nation storyline missions will have you fighting alongside Captain Volker, Prince Trion, and Minister Ajido-Marujido. Also, generals in Campaign are much more powerful than entire groups of players, and generals in Besieged would easily reach Game Breaker status if they fought normal enemies—a well-geared player getting charmed hits General Rughadjeen for insignificant damage and gets hit for 1/3 to 1/2 of their max HP in return.
- Averted somewhat by the fact that the actual leaders of those countries (President Karst, King Destin, Star Sybil) are generally pacifist weaklings.
- Averted in Volker's case by his defense being comparable to that of a wet paper bag when you actually fight alongside him. Of course he was up against Zeid, who would have Volker's position if he hadn't left Bastok to wander Vana'diel.
- Furthermore, while Ajido-Marujido hits very hard with his magic, he has less survivability than most mages his level.
Awesome But Impractical: Blood Weapon, a Dark Knight's 2-Hour, and a few other 2-Hours, to a lesser degree. When combined with certain equipment and other abilities, it results in flatly obscene amounts of damage... but only once every 2 hours.
- The Dragoon's old 2-Hour, Call Wyvern. As cool as the Wyvern was to look at, it had such low HP that nearly any mob with an Ao E ability would kill it, and the only way of healing it involved resting which got rid of TP for the Dragoon. Waiting 2-Hours for it, even if it died in the first fight after it was summoned made it that much worse. This has since been changed.
- Red Mages are known for being able to solo a ridiculous number of difficult fights, but only if they have top-notch gear, and a whole evening to kill. Some of the novice Red Mage solos are on the order of 2-3 hours long.
Back Stab: A trademark ability of Thieves.
Badass Blink: Opening a door is far too awesome for an Invisible spell.
Bad Moon Rising: A comet can be seen at night during the Crystal War. It's also mentioned a lot, so it's most likely a plot point.
Bag Of Sharing: Averted. Would you want some random person having free access to your junk?
Barbarian Tribe: Orcs, being nothing but Always Chaotic Evil Proud Warrior Race Guys (with a scant few exceptions to "evil"), qualify for this.
Bare Fisted Monk: Sort of averted by the Monk job. They fight with cesti, claws, hooks, katars, and other weapons which attach directly to the hands.
- Well, you *can* fight Monk without weapons—and you will, if you start as one; Monk is the only one of the six starting classes to get no weapon as part of his starting outfit (you get a White Belt instead: +1 Strength). Unless you're getting help, you won't be able to afford a weapon for a few levels.
Beyond The Impossible: Confirmed at VanaFest 2010, from the Developers themselves. Level cap is increasing from 75, to 99! Hold onto your Greatswords, and BRACE FOR GRIND
Big Boos Haunt: Several areas fit this, a few of them a result of the Crystal War.
Big Name Fan: Fred Perry is known to play - and even writes and draws "Level UP!", a web-comic starring his Mithra red mage (as well as some more adult fare starring the same character, generally titled "Level Down").
Bladder Of Steel: Pandemonium Warden in particular, before being nerfed.
Blade On A Stick: Polearms are used by Dragoons, obviously. Sometimes also used by Samurai and Warriors.
Blond Guys Are Evil: Archduke Kam'lanaut and his ~~younger~~ older brother Eald'narche. Shantotto too in A Shantotto Ascension.
Bonus Boss: Notorious Monsters are this, if they aren't related to a storyline.
Boring But Practical: Many items that are extremely useful to a player are actually extremely common.
- Some Red Mage strategies for soloing much harder N Ms revolve around using a weapon that specifically does 0 damage to avoiding giving it TP to use its special attacks. This makes the fights much longer, but lets Red Mage kill some N Ms that would otherwise be impossible.
- And the biggest boost to your performance in the game? Your lunch. Food gives tremendous stat boosts.
Boss In Mook Clothing: Uragnites, which, at around level 30, take nearly 5 minutes to kill by a player at level 75(The player cap).
Boss Room: Burning Circles, as well as many other analogous battlefields in later expansions.
Breakout Character: Shantotto.
Breast Plate: While actual breastplates seem to avoid this, it is almost scientifically impossible for a Mithra to wear actual pants. More to the point, Female characters in general will occasionally find themselves wearing a bikini bottom when the same piece of equipment yields pants for males. However, this is not always the case.
Broken Base: For most players, "Red Mage" and "sensible update" cannot possibly exist in the same sentence. For completely opposing reasons, however. Also, opinions are rabidly split over meleeburns.
- Actually, Square-Enix seems to have hit on a way to keep Red Mages happy while not pissing off the entire rest of the playerbase, if the latest version update is any indication. They gave Red Mages new toys to play with that are useful, but don't actually make the job any more powerful than it already is.
- Meleeburns? How about astral burn is/is not cheating?
Call A Rabbit A Smeerp: Well, calling them Rarabs anyway, among other examples. To be fair, though, they are called rabbits or hares most of the time; Rarab seems to be a Windurstian colloquialism.
Call A Smeerp A Rabbit: The "raptors".
Capture The Flag: Brenner fits this, but like all Pv P here, it's not really used much.
Cast From HP: A Red Mage's Convert ability swaps HP with MP, while a Scholar's Sublimation ability makes you gradually lose HP into a pool you can restore your MP with later, in both cases effectively using one's health to restore your magic. A different take on this trope, for sure.
Cat Girl: One of the playable races are Mithra, the playable portion is entirely made of catgirls. There is precisely one male Mithra shown in the new expansion. There's a hilarious cutscene of whole units of the Mithran Mercenaries swooning over him.
Character Blog: [GM]Dave. Read it. NOW.
Chunky Updraft: BOOOOOOOST!
Combat Tentacles: Many Krakenesque monsters are in the game, one of the most infamous being the Sea Horror.
Compilation Rerelease: Three, each collecting everything published up to Aht Urhgan, Wings, and A Shantotto Ascension, respectively.
Counter Attack: Used by Monks (completely avoiding a physical attack sometimes), Warriors (retaliating after being attacked), and Blue Mages (like monks, if they set a couple of specific high-level spells). Colibri will parrot magic cast on them, as well.
Cute Monster Girl: Again, Mithra, overlapping with Cat Girl.
Dark World: 3 areas fit this trope: The Crystal War era, Dynamis, and Promyvion.
Derelict Graveyard: Arrapago Reef, full of undead. And snake and fish women. Not exactly the pretty kind, either.
Deal With The Devil: This is part of the ritual in becoming a Blue Mage. Fortunately, the order also takes precautions so that your soul is not lost to the beast including special armor and trying to assassinate you when they believe you have become too powerful.
Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu: In order for a Summoner to be able to summon one of the Celestial Avatars, they have to beat the crap out of that avatar. Usually with the help of other players, but you can even choose to do a version of the battle that makes you face said Avatar solo, with only a radioactive squirrel for help.
- To be fair, it's explained that most of the avatars you fight (and summon) are just fragments of that actual being's power.
- Also, there's the job combo of Red Mage/Ninja. There are videos on You Tube of players with this combination soloing enemies that were intended to be fought by full alliances.
  - It should be noted that while these are possible, they require maximum skill and several hours of not leaving the game for any reason whatsoever, as well as expensive healing items. It's more for E-peen than anything else.
Dis Continuity: Fans of the Final Fantasy series tend to skip this game when talking about the numbered series, due to it being an MMO.
Dual Wielding: Was very much a Game Breaker for awhile. Only the ninja (sub)job allows this, although hand-to-hand attacks involve both hands and occasionally feet.
Duel Boss: There actually are a few fights like this, the best example being the final level cap quest.
Dude Wheres My Respect: NPCs will send you to do mundane tasks even after you've saved the world. Some even act as if you've done nothing for them... even if you did. One NPC specifically tells you that doing random crap is "what adventurers are for."
Elemental Crafting: Fantasy metals do exist, but precious metals like gold are used in alloys if the end result is anything but jewelery.
Eleventh Hour Superpower: 2-Hours are always saved for boss fights.
Elite Mooks: Ever go to Dynamis? Filled with the suckers.
The Empire: Shantotto is set to have one of her own in a new expansion. Also, the Orcish Empire is a state to the north that invaded the San d'Oria region, so all the orcs in the game are just the expeditionary force of a larger empire.
- Not to mention the Empire of Aht Urhgan, although this has some aspects of The Kingdom as well from a trope perspective.
Enemy Summoner: And these guys are the cause of many a wipe in Dynamis. Oddly they're pretty tame elsewhere.
Enough To Go Around: A few hundered thousand wyvern eggs does not equal rare. Let's not even get started on Delkfutt Keys. Or certain job-specific items.
Everythings Better With Dinosaurs: Lightning-spewing raptors.
Everythings Better With Penguins: Apkallu are penguins... from the Middle East.
Eye Of Newt: A Ninjas ninjutsu requires tools to use.
Fantastic Racism: Fairly light in the game itself, and light in the player base compared to Worldof Warcraft, but it exists. Some think Tarutaru are evil little demons hiding behind their cuteness, Elvaan are total jerks, etc.
- Elvaan are total jerks. Except Prince Trion, he's an idiot. Or a shining example of a righteous warrior, depending on how much worth you put on Gameplayand Story Segregation (gold armor as a disguise aside). Ashmea B Greinner, on the other hand...
- Elvaan may act proud, but they don't actively oppress any other races, like the Humes do the Galka. Tarutaru often hide contempt or evil intentions behind cutesy mannerisms and verbal tics.
  - That was in the past though. There's NPC's in Bastok that specifically say something like, "We aren't forced to work in the mines, I'm just big, strong, and stupid, it's what I'm good at." And when we go back into the past, it seems to be more of an upper class versus lower class thing, since the Humes in the mining district are treated just as badly.
- This is also a fairly prevalent theory as to why Mithra and Galka share the lowest Charisma score—they're closer to looking like the beastmen than the other races.
Fan Yay: The muscled-out Stripperiffic Galka are a One Gender Race, all male. With the implications readily apparent, there is a lot of gay-appealing fanart of these guys.
- Galka are actually genderless. They rebirth through reincarnation.
  - They are Word Of God all male. Just because they don't reproduce in bed doesn't mean they can't actually be male.
  - I'd like to see this so called link as Word Of God on the game manual states otherwise.
  - Last time I checked, that's exactly what that means. Even at that, though, it doesn't mean my Galka doesn't have an enormous Reincarnation Unit.
  - What I mean is, they have the necessary characteristics of males.
The Federation: The Federation of Windurst. Also, the enemies during the Crystal War are referred to as the Beastmen Confederate, but they are organized more like a horde or The Empire, bowing to the Shadow Lord's power.
Fetish Fuel: When you get completely stripped of your equipped gear by the not exactly Ariel-like Merrows, you have to wonder if the developers are trying to invoke this trope on purpose. (Note we have actually not referenced the Mithra... wait. Dammit!)
- There was an explosion ofGalka gay fanart as soon as FFXI was released, mainly by furry and Oyaji artists. Much of it wasn't even porn — the Galka are just that incredible the way they already are. The Galka are so hot...
Five Bad Band: The Ark Angels.
Flaming Sword: Red Mages and Summoners can both imbue weapons with magic, while some weapons have a lesser effect on their own.
Floating Continent: The Tu'Lia region. Don't expect it to fall.
Friendly Fireproof: Played straight for the players and enemies, but some enemy attacks either hit you and your party... or absolutely every player near.
Frothy Mugs Of Water: "Grape juice" made by decaying grapes. Wink-wink, nudge-nudge, say no more.
Game Mod: DAT mods... and, uh, Windower.
Gangplank Galleon: The ninja-pirate and samurai-pirate town of Norg.
Geo Effects: Magic can be affected by the weather. And the day of the week.
- Scholars can manipulate the weather at higher levels, granting party members favorable weather conditions.
Giant Space Flea From Nowhere: There are a few beasties in this game that pop up in storylines, one of which is the Snoll Tzar.
Glass Cannon: Dark Knights. They can actually kill themselves with Souleater.
- Actually it is impossible to kill yourself with souleater as the biggest chunk of HP you can possibly take from yourself is 80% of your current HP with it, this doesn't mean your target won't then turn around and make quick work of your remaining 20%.
Goddamned Bats: Many areas of the game just toss your normally-used detection-prevention spells out the window. We won't even go into the evil incarnate that are imps.
- Literal, to low level players trying to cross the Valkurm Dunes map to reach their exp party, the Sand Bats in that tunnel. Impossible to avoid and aggressive to any player low level enough that they HAVE to take that route (as opposed to higher levels and travel spells)
Grim Up North: Xarcabard, the ever-cliche hangout of the Shadow Lord.
Guide Dang It: So many quests are insanely difficult to do, or even know about, without using the internet. Quest givers are unlabeled, the steps are vague, the in-game quest log doesn't update with progress beyond initial opening and completion, and the rewards are usually unmentioned. Considering how many of the quests are all but required (Chocobo License, Advanced and Sub Jobs), checking the fan wiki or other guides is required.
- For perspective as to how bad this can be, there is a quest where you are asked to bring an item to the quest giver. To be extra clear he literally asks for an "item," but doesn't elaborate further.
Hammerspace: Players either pull ranged weapons from their leg, like Robocop... or their ass. Not to mention that somehow a bowl of soup and a bed take up the same inventory space.
Hard Work Hardly Works: Subverted by the fact that any challenge you beat is really done by a group of yourself and other players, and horribly averted by the NPC generals in Besieged and Campaign.
- For instance, some generals (I'm looking at you, Valaineral) in campaign can defeat multiple enemy squads singlehandedly, including multiple overpowered enemy commanders that can take dozens of players twice as long to defeat. Cerane I Virgaut can take the collective beating of three or four whole enemy squads and her health will barely budge at all.
Healing Factor: A White Mage's Auto-Regen fits this trope. Also obtainable by Blue Mages with a specific spell combination, earlier than White Mages - but any character can have this in Aht Urgan or past areas with Sanction or Sigil respectively. And the Regen spells.
Helpful Mook: Pixies, if you don't attack them.
Heroic Mime: Your Player Character.
Honest Johns Dealership: Goblins are pretty much entirely like this.
- "Us goblins, we don't like you, but we'll like you for a price."
Hundred Percent Heroism Rating
Idiot Ball: Your Player Character carries this in the Treasures of Aht Urghan plot. The developers apparently did not consider the implications of this.
In A Single Bound: One of the key abilities for a Dragoon is a set of Jump commands, one of which sheds all hate from an enemy.
Instant Death Radius: Most mobs are bad enough, but you do not mess with those Monk monsters.
- Unless you're a Red Mage, who can cut down damage taken on a per-hit basis and also utilize spikes spells to return damage back to the enemy.
  - Paladin/Red Mage can also easily beat the crap out of Monk monsters.
Internet Backdraft: Windower, and whether it's legal or not.
Interspecies Romance: Humes and Elvaan can canonically cross-breed; Mithra crossbreeding is less likely, but it is heavily implied (especially in Fanon) that members of any of the playable races can become involved with any other races. Yes, even Tarutaru.
Invulnerable Civilians: Many, many NPCs are somehow undetectable by monsters... and don't get hurt by area attacks.
- To the point that we adventurers seem to be the weakest folks in the world. Unarmed children and the elderly often get to places by themselves that we need a dozen other players, and many brutal fights against deadly opponents to reach. And they're always there FIRST!
Its All Upstairs From Here: Delkfutt's Tower.
Joke Character: According to some, the Puppetmaster job is either this, a Lethal Joke Character, or an example of Elite Tweak.
Joke Item: A bunch of crafted clothing and fireworks.
- Don't forget the Cheese Sandwich added because a fan asked during a Q&A at FFXI Fan Fest one year..
Killer Rabbit: Pretty much every monster class, no matter how soft and fuzzy, has rather high-level Notorious Monster representatives. Hence the maxim: "No matter how powerful you are, somewhere in the world there is a rabbit that can kick your ass." Related, "There's a crab for every level."
Kiting: Kiting is broken up into normal kiting, where healers can be attacked if the kiters don't keep the mob's attention, and "super-kiting," where due to how the game's enmity system works, a kiter can be healed infinitely without having to do anything other than run. For obvious reasons, the latter doesn't work against many bosses.
The Kingdom: All three of the joinable nations fall under this trope to some extent, although the Kingdom of San d'Oria is probably the straightest example because it's a monarchy as well. The Marquisate of Tavnazia and the Grand Duchy of Jeuno may also fall under this, but have certain mitigating factors what with the former being destroyed except for a hole in the ground and the latter being ruled by a secretly evil Archduke.
Large And In Charge: While beastmen leaders can be larger than the others, any boss that isn't a monster or beastman will be only as big as a tall Galka, at best.
Level Grinding: Quite a lot... a while back, though, it was worse.
Limit Break: Called Weaponskills in-game.
- There are quests actually called limit breaks in the game, they raise your character's maximum level and make them subsequently much more powerful.
Little People: The Tarutaru fit the cute factor to a T, perhaps a teeny-tiny, itty-bitty too much.
Lost Forever: If you see a Paladin ranting about Bibiki Seashells, this is why.
Magic Dance: Dancers can debuff, drain HP or MP, and even heal.
Magic Knight: Four job classes fit this trope: Paladins, Red Mages, Blue Mages, and Dark Knights, although Dark Knights normally forget they qualify for this.
Mega Manning: Blue Mages.
- In order to learn a summon, the Summoner must defeat the creature before he or she may summon it.
Metal Slime: You know this trope counts if you've ever seen Cactrot Rapido. There's a quest Notorious Monster with this name too.
- A character is lucky if they can mod up to 2000 HP. Cactrot Rapido can use 10000 Needles, as opposed to normal cactaurs being limited to 1000 Needles.
Most Annoying Sound: Haste Samba. And Boost. Which you will hear Every. 15. Seconds. And Bard songs.
Nerf: There's a reason for the lolDRG joke. And what exactly did Sambas on pets do to you, Square Enix?
- That said, there haven't been any real job-related nerfs for a while, and dragoon specifically has gotten quite some buffs in its own right. Lately, the nerfs seem more towards easy was to make money to discourage RM Ts, but which often just makes things harder for more casual players, and may actually drive business for RM Ts. Of course, Your Mileage May Vary on whether the nerfs are good or not.
- Tends to be rarer than many MMOs because SE usually increases the strength of weaker classes to balance them rather than reduce stronger classes. Even the original Dragoon nerf was only indirect because it was a change to Weaponskill TP gain rather than any effect on the class itself.
  - While Dragoons feel they were the most hurt by this change it was actually Monks who with the Asuran Fists weapon skill would have an 80tp return and with 1 attack round simply weapon skill again resulting in the dominance of the Monk class before this patch because parties at high level became get the Monk 100tp and then just keep them alive because the weaponskills never stopped.
Never Live It Down: Pandemonium Warden made headlines when a group stubbornly sat for eighteen hours while fighting it. The boss has been killed relatively quickly (that is to say, with a bit of time left on the two hour timer) multiple times since it was nerfed, but journalists (and this very wiki) continue to report on the evil online game that makes you sit at the computer until you're physically sick.
Nice Hat: As the Artifact Armor is the iconic look of each job class, many of them have a Nice Hat. Black Mage and Red Mage in particular. Beyond that Your Mileage May Vary. This troper particularly likes the Drachen Armet (Dragoon AF), the Optical Hat and the beret style helms.
Ninja Looting: Being an MMORPG, there's always a chance for this. Linkshells normally deal with this quickly, however.
Noblewomans Laugh: Shantotto - you never get to actually hear it in-game though. Final Fantasy Dissidia took care of that, including her as a bonus character to represent the whole game.
- Voiced by Megumi Hayashibara, no less!
Old Master: Maat. Don't let the age fool you. He mastered most jobs in the game - but sticks to Monk when fighting in the past. He goes about as easily on the beastmen as he goes on players.
- His good taste extends beyond his choice in caps and to his job class, it seems.
- Oggbi also counts, as he's the man who teaches Monks the dreaded Asuran Fists weapon skill, and does not play around in Campaign battles.
One Gender Race: The Mithra are a playable One Gender Race of catgirls. Word Of God says that male Mithra do exist, but only one has been seen in the game because males pretty much never leave their home villages, which are located in another part of the world. And Lehko was apparently only brought to Windurst because the Tarutaru thought the all-female Mithra Mercenaries would follow orders better if the orders came from a man. Galkas themselves are a better example.
One Hit Kill: Some monsters have Death spells, as well as Doom, not to mention horribly broken based on HP area attacks.
One Size Fits All: How can a 7-foot Galka wear gear from a 2-and-a-half-foot Tarutaru? The world may never know.
- Vana'diel is also one size fits all, in a manner of speaking. For instance, no "river" in the world is deeper than a few inches, because otherwise Tarutarus would be walking totally submerged.
Our Demons Are Different: The Dark Kindred that serve the Shadowlord are of the summon-and-serve variety.
- There are classic summon and kill everything demons, though only 3 of them exist of the Dvergr class.
Our Elves Are Better: FFXI's version are the Elvaan, which seem to be a subversion of most elves. They're very tall with somewhat awkwardly long necks and large hands, very strong (stronger than the 8 foot tall wall of muscle that Galka are), and fairly poor with magic. However, they are ostensibly better at healing magic than other schools. They're terrible with bows though. Legolas they ain't.
- On top of that, they are objectively the dumbest of the races, having the lowest average INT. Probably due to all the inbreeding that their pretenses of nobility brings.
Our Ghosts Are Different: The Fomors are restless spirits of the dead, some of which can be appeased.
Our Giants Are Bigger
Our Goblins Are Different Cute actually. There're goblin plushies!
Our Orcs Are Different: The game's Orcs are of the Tolkienian variety.
- They are fat and have tails. And no noses or ears.
Pay Evil Unto Evil: Do you really think most players would care about this?
Perpetually Static: The developers try and spice it up, but it's still the same if you defeat any Big Bad or not. They do make continuity quite convenient, for example having "Duke Vicarious" Esha'ntarl take what would be Kam'lanaut's role in the Chains of Promathia story, because of what happens during Rise of the Zilart.
Pick Up Group: Normally, these work out... On the other hand...
Poisoned Weapons: Yes, they exist, but having a 1 HP every 3 seconds lost status effect from a melee attack, that doesn't always proc, let alone stay on long enough? Not so useful.
Power Fist: Both Monks and Puppetmasters use hand-to-hand weapons the most.
Power Up Food: Food is powerful enough that it can equal the effect of several expensive pieces of equipment. For instance, many melee characters use equipment that boosts strength and attack, but leave most of the accuracy buffs to sushi.
Praetorian Guard: Several of them. The most visible ones are in San d'Oria (the Royal Guard for the d'Oraguilles and the Temple Knights under the Church), Jueno's Ducal Guard, and Aht Urhgan's Immortals. Windurst also has two divisions: The Patriarch Protectors guard the Parliament of Patriarchs while the Sibyl Guards were formed from war orphans and protect the Star Sibyl. Bastok's Gold Musketeers may qualify as well, and all of these squads can be seen in actual combat except for the Sibyl and Ducal Guards, and they tend to kick butt compared to other units.
Primal Stance: With Orcs being evil and whatnot, this was inevitable.
Proud Warrior Race Guy: While Orcs are less honorable and more crazy, and still fit the trope, a better example would be every other beastman in existance, who just as frequently are Warrior Poets. Even the demonic-seeming Kindred are an extremely honorable race who really would be just as fine living in peace. Tenzen also counts, from the heroes' side.
Punctuation Shaker: Everything related to the Zilart has an apostrophe thrown in somewhere: Zi'Tah, Ru'Avitau, Al'Taieu, Archduke Kam'lanaut, Archduke Vicarious Esha'ntarl, etc.
- Quadav names (Gu'Dha, Za'Dha, Di'Dha, De'Vyu, etc.) and some Elvaan family names (such as d'Oraguille), too.
- With Lumorians, this actually serves some purpose. Ul prefaces the weakest in a family (such as Ul'Phuabo), Om the next tier up, and so on.
Punch Clock Villain: Again, most beastmen fit this trope, but Goblins and Trolls especially.
Rainbow Pimp Gear: While FFXI is somewhat less prone to this than many MMOs, the page illustration used to be from it.
Real After All: A quest in Wings of The Goddess results in The Reveal of a ghost.
Really Seven Hundred Years Old: Prishe and Eald'narche both qualify — the former due to an encounter with a certain mysterious object that left her fixed at the age she was at during the encounter, and the latter because not only is he one of the last surviving Zilart, but he is actually older than his brother Kam'lanaut. Esha'ntarl for the same reasons as Eald'narche, too.
The Republic: The Republic of Bastok.
Rhymes On A Dime: Professor Shantotto.
- And far, far too many other Tarutaru.
  - She also only rhymes in the North American localization.
Rings Of Death: Chakrams are standard throwing weapons.
Robot Buddy: Both Automatons and Cardians fit here, Cardians moreso, being capable of handling tasks a bit more independently (Although Aht Urhgan doesn't have an Automaton tutor...).
Rule Thirty Four: If you combine the loads of this that Final Fantasy titles tend to spawn with the longevity of an MMO, you end up with a disturbingly large amount of it floating around.
Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness: Often seen in dialogue with more formal speakers, especially Elvaan. This is presumably an artifact of translating very formal Japanese (Keigo) that a normal Japanese person would understand, but often comes out like an SAT vocabulary test in more severe cases on the English side of things.
Scratch Damage: The Status Buff Phalanx allows a full aversion of this trope.
Shoot The Medic First: Averted. Due to the fact that groups of enemies are fought by putting the entire group to sleep and ganging up on one at a time, enemy White Mages are often targetted last because Benediction would wake up and fully heal every other enemy.
Shout Out: The Ninja's Two Hour Ability of Mijin Gakure.
Sound Coded For Your Convenience: Many, many enemies make a noise when they aggro you... except Fomors, which makes them even creepier than they already are, as they're undead versions of the player races. This can also lead to an ugly massacre if someone is depending on the sound of aggro to know when to stop running.
Space Compression: The Vana'diel players have access to is only a portion of the entire planet, as only a quarter of the planet is currently accessible. Still, that would make the planet maybe the same size as Earth's Moon, if that, so the trope still applies.
Stalking Mission: "All by Myself", even though it's stupidly hard to do it that way...
Status Buff: The combat system has a very large amount of buffs. Mages can spend several minutes straight doing nothing but buffing before a fight.
Stealth Run: Try walking around in a high-level dungeon without Invisible and Sneak, and not get aggro... I DARE you. We'll just clean up the fine paste that is your corpse afterwards.
- It's actually quite easy in many areas, as anything that will aggro you ignores Sneak and Invisible. This only changes the type of stealth required.
- Avoiding things that aggro by sight tends to be easy, as all you need is for them to turn and leave some room behind them. Sound aggro memories basically run after anything within their radius, so sneaking past undead, bats, or slimes in tight passages without the use of the enchantment tends to be...[[Understatement difficult]].
Steam Punk: Bastok and Movalpolos.
Sticks To The Back: Played iconically straight.
Stone Wall: Paladins play it straight, while Ninjas are a hybrid of this and Fragile Speedster.
Stop Having Fun Guys: Meleeburns. Dear Altana, meleeburns. And that's not the end of it. God forbid you aren't one of a handful of job/subjob combinations, or you have a subjob that's slightly underleveled, or have gear a level or two out of date. The game is basically designed for the SHFG mentality. While the norms aren't too ridiculous, lord have mercy if you don't follow them, much to the resentment of many players. One popular endgame-oriented forum, has 15 fifty-page threads devoted to nothing but "gimped" players (to varying degrees).
- Considering it is a group game and the way the subjob system works, a bad subjob combination is usually an indication of incompetence (aka PLD/BLM thinking they are nukers now). Even GOOD job/subjob combinations are bad signs when used too low (WAR/NIN before level 24, where they actually get a useful ability from the subjob).
  - This mentality was actually brought on by the Black Mage community who started the burn mentality with the mana burn and followed shortly by Monks who started the bone burn back in original and zilart areas, expanded on with the arrow burn for Rangers only with Lufaise Meadows in Promathia. The melee burn was only the next logical step with the release of Treasures of Aht Urugan. The difference is that while the enemies in question are squishy to everyone they are commonly deadly to casters because of spell reflection and thus best suited to melee.
  - It's got more to do with the massive amounts of grinding required, the massive amounts of time that grinding takes, and the massive amount of time it takes to do any event to get gear to grind with. Someone being "special" or "unique" slows the other 5 party members down. With so much grinding to do, we want it done as quickly as possible.
  - An example of "Special" and "unique", this troper spoke to someone recently who quit after not being able to play MONK/summoner because they wanted to heal. That is the bash it until it's dead class, one that starts with no mp, taking on half the abilities of a class that is wholly dependant on mp for calling a pet to do the healing. Some special combinations, while interesting, simply do not work in game system.
Strange Salute: Windurstians have a rather odd salute, and people in Aht Urghan seem to draw moons with their hands a lot. Crescent moons, at least.
Stripperiffic: Sadly, Subligar can do this for everyone.
- That the Galka are this too is a potent Fetish Fuel for Fan Yay.
- Of course, it's worst for Mithra - the quest for pants is a long and arduous one.
Tear Jerker: Some of the quests and missions.
That One Boss: Depends on who you ask, but everybody has a horror story about at least one Chains of Promathia boss, most aggravatingly the 45-minute airship fight where dying to any one of three stages of the fight meant you needed to fight all three again, but not before reacquiring special items needed to win. The Pandemonium Warden deserved this title once, on account of literally beating a linkshell into submission courtesy of a nineteen hour fight that ended when the leaders started realizing people were sacrificing their actual health and called it off. Due to the negative press, they nerfed both it and the similarly maddening Absolute Virtue while also going to the extreme Anti Poop Socking measure of a two-hour time limit on both fights.
- If the developers are to be trusted, the fight was always intended to take less than two hours and the nineteen-hour group was doing it wrong.
- Interviews have revealed that Absolute Virtue was never meant to be beaten and that he was supposed to be the risk for killing the last boss of the Sea region. After players figured out how to kill him through exploits they made him a guaranteed pop and gave him a loot table which he did not have the first time he was killed.
The Beastmaster: Another Trope Namer, this game has four different pet job types, ranging from rabbits to Robots.
The Computer Is A Cheating Bastard: *Insert horror story about Maat/mammets/Diabolos/Absolute Virtue/Pandemonium Warden here*
- And the random number generator cheats as well. Spend 12 hours spawning something, 2 hours fighting it, and not get the drop? Fine. Repeat that 15 times more and still not have it drop? That's insane! Heck, I personally killed one NM over 300 times before it dropped the item I wanted, thought thankfully it wasn't a 12 hour one.
  - Screw you, Leaping Lizzy! SCREW YOOOOU!
  - Fun fact, for some bosses, going 0/20+ on the drop is about the same probability as getting the drop first time. So you're very lucky, just in the wrong direction.
  - ...I hate you, Jaggedy-eared Jack. I hate you so very very much...
The End Of The World As We Know It: Preventing this is the goal in every expansion thus far.
The Gambler: Corsairs are gambler pirates who boost specific stats by random amounts, and use a blackjack-like mechanic to improve the results.
- Also an example of Four Is Death — the "unlucky number" which gives the worst version of each Corsair buff is always exactly four more than the "lucky number" that gives the second best (11 always being the best — any higher and you "go bust", with predictable results).
The Goomba: Considering the look of Mario's first foe, it's not actually that odd to fight a walking, punching onion (Or flower, or whatever).
- Mandragoras? They're only the 1st mob if you start in Windurst. Black mandragoras (called korrigans) are death on legs.
The Lost Woods: Jugner Forest, though there is a clear if winding path through it in the present. For very old growth style forest, there is The Sanctuary of Zi'Tah, filled with trees that reach beyond the draw distance, numerous roaving plantoids, bugs, walking mushrooms and tree tending creatures. There is also a dungeon within that zone called the Boyhada Tree.
- For getting lost, The Great War era version of Jugner Forest has barricades blocking the usual routes, leading to new detours. Yhoator and Yuhtunga Jungle are better applications as the map only shows the aboveground paths, and it's up to the player to figure out which undergound paths link them. Caederva Mire can also apply as the player doesn't even get a map to this place before jumping through a few hoops.
The Medic: Many job classes fit this, primarily White Mages, but Red Mages get preferred a lot more at higher levels, much to the dismay of quite a few of them(And all of the other jobs that normally heal.)
The Ridill: Trope Namer. Other items that have similar effects but at a reduced rate include Defending Ring, Hauteclaire, and anything from Absolute Virtue.
The Scrappy: Naja Salaheem. Ooooh, Naja Salaheem. Prishe is a combination of this and Canon Sue.
Smash Mook: Acroliths. They tend to fall apart a bit, but they do nothing but smack things.
The Very Definitely Final Dungeon: Being an MMO with actual storylines, the game actually has several of these.
Third Person Seductress: Most female player models fit here... except ~~Tarutaru~~. Of course opinions vary on the other races (not EVERYONE has a catgirl fetish, for instance).
Trippy Finale Syndrome: Chains of Promathia goes all the way to another dimension.
Time Travel: How else are we supposed to go back to the Crystal War in Wings of the Goddess?
Timed Mission: Assault, Salvage, Dynamis, BCN Ms, escort quests, and several Campaign Ops are timed.
Tomato Surprise: Let's just say there's more to Promathia than meets the eye. And no, he's not Unicron.
Too Awesome To Use: Again, 2-hours. Even when it's use would be justified, some people save them anyways.
Underground Level: This game has a lot of underground tunnels.
Video Game Stealing: Well, there is a Thief job. Thankfully, the things you can steal are things you can expect from that enemy... such as stealing a slice of hare meat from a rarab (hare) before it's dead.
Wall Banger: See Never Live It Down above.
Weapon Of Choice: Each job has one or two weapons ~~that they are best at~~ YOU MUST USE AT ALL TIMES, OR NOBODY WILL EVER EVER PARTY WITH YOU, EVER.
- Considering melee damage dealers using A+ weapons need to equip +accuracy gear just to hit mobs reliably and the job weapon restrictions on the better weapons in any group, it is more a practical than elitism issue. Yes, Dragoon can use a sword, but they are barely going to hit anything, and are restricted to using weaker swords, which isn't really a great combination for a melee damage dealer.
- This also doesn't preclude nonstandard weapons for specialized purposes, such as Samurai using daggers for the Saving Private Ryaaf assault.
What Measure Is A Mook: This goes for all beastmen, but especially Quadav, Goblins, Sahagin, and Qiqirn.
What Measure Is A Non Human: Moogles, Goblins, and Qiqirn are allowed to live with "people" and even start their own business or host a large-scale event. Everyone else? Killed on sight.
- Sort of. When you consider how many allied Yagudo there are, it comes off like the Altana races are merely collectively racist. Also supporting this, the reason Galkas and Mithras have a lower charisma score than the other player races is that they look more like beastmen than the other races.
  - Actually it's to balance their other high aptitudes With Mithra being high dexterity, high agility, and competent casters, something had to be lower which is where strength and charisma come in. In the case of Galka they are strong, high vitality and fairly dexterous/agile thus they are terrible casters and beastmasters.
- The beastmen races are not all evil. Originally the Quadav were allies of the Elvaan and the Yagudo were peaceful people who were invaded by the tarutaru with no real opinion on the other races. The Quadav only become enemies because the Bastokans destroyed the Quadav nesting grounds to mine ore.
  - Though the Aht Urghan beastmen are just evil. "Hey guys, they have a shiny thing! Let's kill them and take it!"
  - Actually, it's more like "Hey guys, they have the shiny thing that powered a massive doomsday machine that was used to subjugate almost an entire continent. Lets take it so they don't do that shit again. Give 'em some of their own medicine while we're at it." If Lamia/Merrow, add revenge for being created beings. If Trolls, add being mercs.
- Tarutaru used to be evil little bastards. In the game's backstory, they invaded and occupied San d'Oria, subjugating the Elvaan for a very long time. They see themselves as having done nothing wrong despite being clear aggressors and conquerors no different from the beastmen.
You No Take Candle: The beastmen races speak mostly this to the players when understandable, although Lamia and Goblins have no problems speaking to the player. It's also messed around with in Wings of The Goddess. Badly.
- Though the Lamia make sense when you find out they were created by the empire as biological weapons. They'd need to understand their orders.
You Will Not Evade Me: Certain boss monsters, as well as the inevitable Chest Monster.
Zerg Rush: Actually done by the players, in most cases. There are a fair number of quests and missions where massive numbers of mobs will attack players.
Zombie Apocalypse: The Qutrub are a nasty bunch, actually turning themselves into zombies willingly.
- Also, Fomors are undead versions of player character races, although they look less like zombies and more like shadowy versions of players with orange glowy eyes.

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