Celebrating the North American FINAL FANTASY XI 8th Year Anniversary!

[Darkmagi]

So much nostalgia, makes me sad looking back and remembering when the excitement this game brought exploring new areas and unlocking new content.

[Laude]

One of my favorite memories was during CoP, doing U/O, me and my linkshell mates were doing a dry run to see how it goes. We were doing surprisingly well against Omega, so I go "Hey guys, this is going pretty good, wanna just try to win it?" and then I immediately get missile'd and keel over. Good times.

[vagus]

-Mnk/Sam with relic hands and Asuran Fists.
-Drg/sam with Penta Thrust?
-Warrior? What's that?
-Distortion SC or GTFO
-Rusty Items

[Trigun]

Fighting Ark Angel EV 30+ times on first run through Ark Angels.
Being the only person to invite PLD's and DRG's to PT's.
Half the people on Friend List leaving when WoW came out.
Not believing there was a desert past East Sarutabaruta.
Throwing away stacks of Beastmen Seals cause of low inventory and not knowing what they were for.

[Charismatic]

Damn son, I remember back in the day people used to do Eco-Warrior? Remember that shit? Was baller as fuck too.
People cared about campaign too. I definitely remember folks really trying hard to take over various zones, now no one besides that one random JP guy (every server has one) gives a shit. Just watch, early Sunday morning he'll be somewhere trading gear to an NPC.

I also remember leveling BST so I could MPK people only to find that they patched that shit right before I was actually going to try it. Ain't that a bitch?
Then I never used BST again. (aside from doing the peacock charm BCNM)

[Kaisha]

-Distortion SC or GTFO

Don't forget the 20 second prep for the BLM to AM1 nuke it.

-Rusty Items

Fishbots everywhere in Rabao and SE didn't blink an eye......


-When 5k gil and shitty XP scroll from Eco-War was enough to justify doing it on a weekly basis

[drwaffles]

I think a lot of people would agree with me when I say that FFXI has been both a wonderful experience and often an incredibly destructive one in terms of real life matters. That said, some of my best memories come from this game, and I essentially grew up in Vana'diel. Although I don't really play any more and am well aware that other facets of my life have improved significantly as a result, there's this seemingly permanent twang of sadness and emptiness that appears every time I think about the game. It really was my whole life for many years. I think I'd cry if I watched 'Meeting Again' right now.

Cheers, FFXI and BG. You'll both always have a special place in my memory.

[LinktheDeme]

Reading these threads always make me want to play the game again, but then I realize that the game I knew isn't there anymore. It doesn't have that same "feel" to it like when you first started making friends and building up your community. The game is just a formula to me now, which is kind of meh to have that point of view and my character is near the end of the formula so all there is left for me to do is grind, which is not so much fun :/

[shepardG]

Panda, do you remember staying up all fucking day and night with those up LS's killing demons in campaign just to unlock the BCNM by winning the north lands in the past... that was one of the more recent fun as fuck memories I'll have...

[Darkmagi]

I did that all day/night with some JPs and never got any drops from the BC. One of my biggest rage moments, fuck wotg and fuck that bcnm.

[Rocl]

Panda, do you remember staying up all fucking day and night with those up LS's killing demons in campaign just to unlock the BCNM by winning the north lands in the past... that was one of the more recent fun as fuck memories I'll have...

I remember doing that, so many good memories associated with it. Makes me so sad my Nocturnus Mail is worthless, but my god if it wasn't worth it for those two weeks or w/e it was good.

I FUCKING LOVED CAMPAIGN, MOTHERFUCKERS. Stealing Freelances, taking over La Vaule, making money off Cuchulain's, keeping Cuchulain's, taking over the Northlands, all sorts of good shit. I also fucking loved Sandworm.

God, WoTG you were so cool in theory, why you'd have to be so lame in practice?

[Not Kuno]

taking over La Vaule

Taking over La Vaule and then not being able to enter the BCNM because the entire server is too cool to do campaign to unlock it, but cool enough to do the BC 24/7. Especially those JP. Fucking JP.

[thetruepandagod]

Panda, do you remember staying up all fucking day and night with those up LS's killing demons in campaign just to unlock the BCNM by winning the north lands in the past... that was one of the more recent fun as fuck memories I'll have...

helll yea, nothing like busting my ass for 15 hours straight to open up a bcnm i didn't even have access to

[shepardG]

True..if only we knew fail SE would let three instances only at a time.... shit was fail

[Rocl]

Taking over La Vaule and then not being able to enter the BCNM because the entire server is too cool to do campaign to unlock it, but cool enough to do the BC 24/7. Especially those JP. Fucking JP.

Who has two thumbs and stayed up all fucking night or slept for two hours max in order to get fucking every BCNM possible just to spend hours waiting to get in and barely using my Op Credits in time especially because no one wanted to go mid-week when no other fags were because that's precisely why no one was there LISTEN IT'S ME OKAY

[Not Kuno]

Hey I was always down for some La Vaule shenanigans. >(

[Rocl]

There was one weekend, one of the very first times, (hell I think the first time San d'Oria took La Vaule on Bahamut?) where I was the only person in the zone for hours man

[buddha_masta]

Wow it was around this time EIGHT freakin years ago that I experienced my first fully immersive MMO adventures. It was awesome being one of only a handful of Galkas wandering aimlessly through Windurst's woods amongst the cutest little-wittle MMO characters I had ever seen.

The Halloween event that took place as I started the game was icing on the cake. I thought it was sooo neat. It really made me fall in love with all the seasonal events.

The journey that a couple of other NAs and I took alongside a helpful higher lv JP within one of the first days into far and foreign lands, across a whole continent from quaint little Windy to the metropolis of San dOria gave me my first taste of online camaraderie that I would soon come to love about the game.

The first time I discovered a snowy subterranean world under the hub that was Jeuni was CRAZY! This is where u spent my first 48 hr binge lol. And made my first nonEnglish speaking friend in this game who made a great effort to teach me that I should start eating meat mithkabobs, even if they are costly.

I miss these feelings! It's been about 2 yrs since I last played FF11 with a purpose but I am always wishing I could scrounge up the motivation and devotion and passion to play again like I did during my glory days. One day, I think! One day. FFXI, I regret nothing!!

DrWaffles up there hit it spot on for me :D

---
I am here: http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=33.748709,-117.948814

[Ghostsix.Midgard]

One of my earliest memories was a short time after NA launch this lvl50 RDM named Soniti helping me get my skull.. I thought he was the coolest dude ever running up into Gusgen fearless and soloing everything while keeping me alive. After that day I took up RDM and made sure to help people get their skulls whenever I would hear the familiar story in LS chat.. 0/999999 on Skull!

I also remember the first time I saw the Elvaan M RSE, there was this RDM/NIN soloing things in Jugner forest, I thought it was the most futuristic looking gear in the game at the time. I think this started my love affair with RDM/NIN..

Seeing the Giant rams in Kon and La Thiene was awesome, back then they were actually feared and not something on farm status. The way they shook the ground just added to it.

I remember running to Crawlers nest and seeing a crowd of people in various high and mid level gear gathered around the entrance.. wondering to myself "what's going on"? Then zoning into CN only to get killed before I can even move by a crowd of countless Crawlers.. Then laying there on the floor loling because every 5 minutes or so someone else like me would wonder in and get gangraped and this would continue for some time..

Also the various gob trains outside Selbina.. I don't know what was more funny, the shouts of "GOBS INCOMING TO SELB!!" or counting the amount of different mobs some people managed to train to the entrance. The mental image of 2 Bogys, a Ghoul, Gobs and a rabbit chasing a Taru running for his life always makes me chuckle.

[Therin]

You guys with your reminiscing from 4-5 years ago.

How about when no one else had Kazham keys and the areas where they dropped were packed beyond belief? Or the first time your LS took down Kirin (that was a big deal for us on Fairy) or another big NM like that?

Or, even better - the first time you actually downed a big-time HNM. For us it was Behemoth. We were camping Alkyoneus when someone noted they had the ToD. So we went out there, claimed it and killed it. Ryko had just previously told the entire LS (ThoseGuys on Fairy) that there was no chance we'd ever be capable of taking the HNMs from the JP linkshells that were monopolizing them (FairyNetwork for Behemoth and BloodFavor for Fafnir). I was planning to level SAM or DRK, and he suggested I play SAM because "getting E.Body is impossible."

My favorite memory was when we first ganked Fafnir from BF. BF had such a monopoly on Fafnir/Nidhogg they didn't bother to stay in the pit. Instead, they had a scout at the ledge and the rest of the linkshell stayed in Boyahda skilling up or whatever. Our plan was a "sneak attack." We got the ToD because one of our members (Emblim) offered to buy an Aegishjalmr from them. I logged out a level 5 WAR mule in the pit and logged in once every 5-10 minutes to check to see if Fafnir was up. The rest of the linkshell had logged out on the ledge and was sitting on Ventrilo.

The ToD started at about 3:00 AM. We were all hanging out on Vent until finally, about halfway through the window, I logged in and my mule was dead. I immediately began shouting on Vent for everyone to log on. We gathered, built the alliance, and claimed it before BF could arrive in the zone.

What followed was an epic fight that got most of us killed, multiple times. We managed to kill it, but probably went through two or three hours (this was before rage) and fifteen tanks (I don't think we even knew to stand on the legs, back then). I don't remember the drops, but I doubt it was anything worthwhile. The important thing though was that it was what got ThoseGuys into the HNM scene, and after that fight we actually started claiming. There were some pretty epic fights after that too.. like the Nidhogg we downed in something like 23 minutes, right before server maintenance (the loot barely had time to get out of the pool before the servers went down).

Ah... FFXI of yore, how I miss thee.