Sightseeing Logs; An Operation Rising Tide Look Back
Hey everyone! It's Maple aka Ettie. I have played Final Fantasy XIV for six years now with a small group of friends but this year has been the first time I've really played as part of a larger community. I had joined just in time to witness Operation Rising Tide and though it seemed like a daunting task when I was so new to the community, I decided to host an event to assist people with doing one of the unique but often overlooked features of the game that I felt qualified to assist with, the sightseeing logs.
“Had a blast with my first time doing sightseeing logs … [The riddles] certainly enhanced the experience beyond anything I had imagined!”
-Bon Elisan
After seeing some people’s interest piqued, and after vetoing the A Realm Reborn Sightseeing logs due to the time constraints of getting perfect conditions for it, I decided it'd be best to start with the Heavensward logs. There I realized I had one big issue, which was stopping this event from being as boring as paint drying? There were plenty of guides online listing the coordinates of each sightseeing log, making it a trivial yet tedious matter of flying to each one and doing the emote. I racked my brain and realized two things. The first was recognizing that the point of these logs was the love of exploration. Finding them organically while exploring was what got me interested in finding them all in the first place. The second realization came as my mind wandered back to the A Realm Reborn logs. They had interesting riddles to help find them, but the conditions, time and locations were so specific as to still be fairly unhelpful. Then all subsequent expansions forgoed unique riddles in favour of marking the locations with bubbles. The bubble marker was an improvement, but the loss of riddles was a let down. It was then I realized, I could write the riddles myself. This was swiftly followed by the second realization that I would need to write SIXTY-TWO of them!
"Seriously fun experience! Took a task that's normally boring and just a "to do" list, and turned it into a super fun scavenger hunt with some fantastic riddles to help us in finding the spots."
-8BitCerberus
Multiple days of writing silly rhymes later, the event was about to begin and I was extremely anxious because I had discarded my pre-written introduction for being as dry as burnt toast and hadn’t replaced it with anything because I had spent up until the last minute finishing the riddles. As I joined the call and started leading the event I kept worrying that it was going to be too dull, or that people would be too impatient to want to spend time figuring out riddles, or that people would be upset we wouldn’t be able to get through them all in the single night if I miscalculated the time needed for each riddle. But in spite of all my worries, I decided that it’d be best to be honest about my lack of intro and to start the event regardless.
To my relief, no one particularly minded the improvised opening and everyone seemed enthusiastic to begin the hunt for the locations. Feeling a little better, I led everyone to the first area, and after a few minutes of exploration I offered to read out the first riddle. Enthusiasm upgraded to excitement once the riddles were introduced and I was shocked that everyone responded so positively to the idea of the sightseeing logs becoming a scavenger hunt. Seeing everyone put their heads together to figure out the clues made me very happy. The only issue was in the midst of all the teamwork, I realized we were taking longer than expected and despite the event being half over we had only done one out of the six maps. With some reservations I admitted to everyone that we probably wouldn’t be able to get their logs done that day. But instead of the response that I feared, what I got was reassurance that we could continue another day as many were excited to hear all the riddles.
With that encouragement I finally let go of my worries and just started enjoying myself. And the fun continued with the second and third sightseeing log event I hosted in the following weeks. It was fun to hang out, read riddles, and get to know people. Rising Tide was about coming together as a community, and even though I was super new to HJP when I ran the event, I already felt like I was a part of it.
Sometimes things don’t go according to plan and sometimes chasing perfection isn’t as important as just getting it done. It’s been a magical journey seeing everything the HeatherJustPlays community has evolved into since then Operation Rising Tide. I just want to say that I am so thankful to not just everyone who attended the sightseeing log events back then, but everyone who’s joined the HJP community since. You guys are what make this place so special. All the love, and I’ll see you at the Stormblood Sightseeing Log event!
