After all the work I put in to get Lynahra to 50, unlock Dark Knight, and then catch Dark Knight up to the Main Scenario for Heavensward, I’ve had a nagging feeling in the back of my mind that I wasn’t able to properly identify until recently. After some discussion this weekend, I finally admitted to myself that Lynahra isn’t supposed to be a Dark Knight, canonically. As a character (in a roleplaying sense, and just, in general), Lynahra has far less development than Alahra does. Alahra’s origins stretch back almost fifteen years now, and for most of that time I’ve been playing her in an MMO (as a mithra in FFXI, a Night Elf in World of Warcraft, and of course, a miqo’te in FFXIV).

Lynahra, though, started out as a joke. When WoW added the Death Knight class, I really wanted to try it out, and so, based on some inside jokes with some old friends of mine, I made Alahralyn, who was supposed to be Alahra’s evil twin, more or less. I ended up really taking to Death Knight’s original playstyle, and as I normally do, I started filling in details about this new character’s backstory: why does she share Alahra’s name? How are they related? and so on. After at time, I wanted to get rid of the “joke” name and renamed her. Changes to Death Knight in WoW’s Cataclysm expansion sent me back to Rogue, though (and Alahra), and the newly-christened Lynahra was mostly forgotten, especially once I left WoW to return to FFXI.

History rhymed with itself in FFXIV, though—once Dark Knight was announced, and I thought its playstyle looked interesting (I’ve always been interested in parry/evasion tanks, which was one of the bullet points we got for Dark Knight originally), I remade Lynahra as miqo’te Alahra’s sister, under the assumption that, as a Death Knight, her closet analogue in FFXIV would be Dark Knight. As I mentioned before, though, I hadn’t ever really developed Lynahra as a character, and more lately that’s something I’ve spent more time on. The result has been that nothing about Dark Knight’s playstyle and animations really fit her, now that I have a better sense of who she is.

So, for the third time, I’m leveling Lynahra to 50 again before continuing on with the Heavensward story, this time as Warrior. Thankfully, this time she has access to glamour, though, and once I hit 35, I got to play around with a new look for her.

Glamour Components
Head: (none) | Body: Linen Shirt (Jet Black) | Hands: Iron Vambraces (Jet Black) | Legs: Guardian Corps Skirt | Feet: Expeditioner’s Thighboots (Jet Black)

In a way, I wanted to capture a lower-level version of the look Lynahra’s currently using for Dark Knight (which may still see some play, if I work on the Main Scenario at all before Warrior’s caught up). Along with Dark Knight’s animations (most especially Unmend) feeling wrong for Lynahra, her glamour also felt off, at least for Dark Knight. The overall look was very fitting for her, but, to me at least, it really didn’t work with Dark Knight’s weapons and animations.

I think that was what finally prompted me to think about Lynahra’s class, and I’m  happy to say after about 15 levels with it in Palace of the Dead (her Marauder was only level 19!), I feel much better about the choice. With this glamour in place, temporarily, I’m even more convinced I should have just leveled Warrior to begin with (the reason I didn’t was because I honestly don’t care for it much—but if it fits the character I can get around that).

There’s nothing too spectacular here, though it marks a few firsts on Fashion Ninjutsu. I think it’s the first time I’ve ever used a body piece that’s just a regular old piece of leveling gear for a glamour here (though I’ve used this model in a few older Bard glamours that I might show off some day). There’s also a bit of an interesting thing going on, in that I don’t mind the baggy sleeves on the Linen Shirt on Lynahra. She is noticeably taller than Alahra, but I can’t imagine that makes all of the difference. I suppose it’s also due in part to how I imagine her dressing, compared to her sister who is a lot more fussy about these things.

This glamour is only temporary, though—I’m already looking forward to hitting 50 and getting to play around with Warrior Artifact Armor, which is easily my favorite of the original AF sets. I’ve also got some ideas in mind playing around with the Holy Rainbow Shirt once I get her caught up to that point again, so I’d imagine I’ll be revisiting her tank glamour a couple times over the next month or so (probably sooner than that, if I can keep up with my current pace with Palace of the Dead leveling).