The tank in one of my recent Drowned City of Skalla runs had the Strife Vest glamoured, a piece of which I’ve always been rather fond, and since I’ve long exhausted most of of my available options for new pieces to work with, I decided to see if I could find a new use for it. I had a couple of initial thoughts: one, I could make a tank glamour of some kind with it, or two, I could do something I’ve not done in ages and put together something new for Dragoon. The latter idea appealed to me quite a bit: I knew the Replica Allagan Gauntlets of Maiming look great in white-and-black glamours, and I figured, as usual, that I’d be dyeing the Strife Vest Pure White for Alahra.

With that basic idea in mind, I set to work. I settled pretty early on using the Direwolf Trousers of Maiming, which I rather like alongside the Vest, and from there, the real challenge proved to be finding a pair of boots. The thing with the Strife Vest is that it looks best, in terms of profile, with either wide pants of some kind or thicker boots because of the sort of half-cape on the front, which meant usual suspects like the Expeditioner’s Thighboots weren’t going to do the trick. I spent an hour or so looking at every pair of Dragoon boots I could think of, and none of them did the trick. The closest fit I could find were the Sharlayan Pathmaker’s Boots, but they were just off enough in terms of texture that I wasn’t happy enough to use them.

I still wanted to use the Vest again just for fun, though, and I swapped over to Lynahra to see if I could make something work on her Dragoon instead, since she often looks fine in things that look weird on Alahra. I was unsuccessful there, too, and came back to Alahra feeling a bit defeated. Still somewhat determined, though, I swapped over to Samurai, since her last glamour was bound to be temporary anyway, and decided that, at the very least, the Vest looked pretty good with various katana animations, which meant it would at least satisfy the itch of wanting to use the Vest again.

Glamour Components (Required Level: MNK/SAM 54)
Weapon: Halonic Friar’s Katana
Head: Reading Glasses (Ul Brown)
Body: Strife Vest (Jet Black)
Hands: Replica Allagan Gauntlets of Striking (Jet Black)
Legs: Ramie Trousers of Striking (Jet Black)
Feet: Songbird Boots

Once I made the swap to Samurai for the look, things were a lot easier, since Samurai has access to the dyeable Ramie Trousers, which work pretty well with the Vest. Dragoon does have a version of that model (the Picaroon’s Trousers of Maiming) but they’re non-dyeable, which means they don’t really work well for a similar look. Since I assumed I’d be using the Allagan Gauntlets still, I did a quick unsynched run of the Vault for a shot at the Halonic Friar’s Katana (and got lucky enough to get it on the first run—if only I could have that kind of luck in Skalla!) for a slightly less ornate black and gold option than the Ala Mhigan Katana.

As is now becoming standard for glamours with pants like this one, I elected to use the Songbird Boots over other options like the High House Halfboots or the Kirimu Sandals of Striking. They simply blend a lot better with most things thanks to being plain and unadorned. I did briefly consider using the Far Eastern Matriarch’s Boots for more color coordination, but they were a little too pointy and looked off to me. With that choice made, just about everything in the look was black and gold, so I went with black on the Vest instead of Pure White for purposes of color coordination. The final touch was, of course, the Reading Glasses in Ul Brown to tie in with the gold bits on the katana, the gauntlets, and the trousers.

This is one of those good, functional looks that isn’t particularly world-shattering to me, but it accomplished what I wanted (well, mostly—I still want to figure something out for Dragoon with the Vest some day!). I’ve now seen the Skallic Striking Jacket drop twice while I’ve been on healer (and naturally lost the roll both times), so maybe now that it’s actually dropping, I’ll have my hands on it soon!