For those of you who are new to FFXIV or haven't played it at all, Hatching-tide is the in-game Easter celebration and it's almost always eggs, spriggans, shenanigans, and funny little hats. This year was no exception.
The quest itself was fairly short and easy - no grinding involved, and minimal running around. The Hatching-tide eggs have gone missing and they absolutely must be found. You're tasked (by Nonotta) with helping Leih, a rather clever miqo'te, find them and the both of you race around Old Gridania in search of the thief who made off with them. All clues point to a spriggan, and sure enough, the two of you bag one... only to find out that he's a good guy playing for your team! Ooops!
A suspicious miqo'te mender is accompanying this poor fellow, and she explains that his name is Riggy and he's actually been working to steal the eggs back from the bad spriggans who stole them in the first place. She heals him up and you then get to play a fun-enough little mini-game, where you control Riggy (while you're actually controlling him, the story in game is that you're talking him through it via Linkshell) as he dodges danger and captures eggs to bring them back for Hatching-tide. The mini-game is actually fun. I'm terrible at this stuff but I still did my best. I scored 26 with Kikimi, 24 with Rairakku, and a whopping 36 with K'imber. Miqo'te for the win.
You take the eggs back to Nonotta and Jihli the dreamer arrives. As Nonotta shares the good news, Leih takes a good hard look and realizes that Jihli is the suspicious miqo'te mender from earlier! She set the whole thing up! It was all a fun game that came to her in her prophetic dream! The bigger surprise comes afterwards, as Leih and Jihli talk and realize that they're cousins! Happy endings all around.
The quest rewards a minion, and you can also buy spriggan chocolate and a poster from the event seller person.
The rewards for Hatching-tide 2018.
Don't forget to pick up 999 spriggan chocolates.
There is a second repeatable quest that you can do for Hatching-tide fireworks and the little mini-stories out of it are rather cute. I did it once on each character, and got a different story each time. Luck was on my side. All in all, it was a fun event and I'm glad that I took the time to do it. If you're interested in screenshots, or a video run through of the event, continue scrolling down for those. If not, I wish you all a wonderful night (or morning, or afternoon, or whatever it is when you read this post). <3
Rairakku approves of the event.
