Guild Wars 2

I was wondering about what happens when a Charr graduates from its fahrar. Do they start a warband with the other Charr graduates in their fahrar? Or do they go into a warband with other Charr? Also, what happens if a Charr fails to graduate, if that is even possible?

I’d love to hear a response from Jeff or Ree on this.

My take on it was simply that the warband is formed while in the fahrar among that graduating “class.” Upon graduation, they would be inducted into the Legion under which they studied (an Iron Fahrar produces Iron warbands). They would be given a place within the hierarchy and placed under a Centurion, possibly one who has had a warband killed off and as such, are placed where there is need.

I assume there are those who don’t make the cut, but from what I’ve heard in the past and through NPCs, it seems those who aren’t fit for soldier’s work are placed on ranches, as merchants, crafters, etc. It is not known for sure if one could be “held back,” graduate later, and then join up with the warband of their former class.

From what I’ve observed, your Fahrar “class” will end up as your warband once the Primus deems them fit for active duty, hence why they’re a Charr’s family, so to speak.

If you can’t fight, there’s non-combat vocations, like storemen, farmers, and other logistical things that need doing.

One thing’s for sure; your average Charr is still going to be able to defend himself significantly better than an average member of the other races.

That pretty much sums it up as I understand it too, the graduating class pass out as a new warband. Though I suspect the legionnaire in charge may well be a more senior charr, maybe a survivor from a warband that has taken too many casualties to be effective. At least until such time as one of the nubs gets promoted to the role.
As far as what happens if a charr fails their final exam, whatever form that takes. The idea of the Fahrar seems to be they’d be matched with other charr of similar aptitudes so failing would mean they were unacceptably bad even at the thing they were best at doing. So a failed charr would probably become a gladium.

Aryto.5873:

I assume there are those who don’t make the cut, but from what I’ve heard in the past and through NPCs, it seems those who aren’t fit for soldier’s work are placed on ranches, as merchants, crafters, etc. It is not known for sure if one could be “held back,” graduate later, and then join up with the warband of their former class.

I’m not so sure about that part of it. A lot of the ranches, quarries and mills in Diessa Plateau are manned by charr that share warband names. That suggests to me that warbands are as much work groups as they are military units and can be assigned to “civilian work” like running a ranch.

I think the Primus actually instructs several “classes” and will sort the cubs as required to get them into their proper occupations, and from there the cubs form their warbands (there may even be, and most likely is, multiple Primus’ and that would further allow for separating the cubs into more clearly defined professions). This would be their starting warband, and ideally it would be the one they are with until death, but sometimes situation dictates otherwise (unit transfers by the centurion, death of the majority of your warband, ect). In the case of the non-combat ‘bands, I assume it would be easy to keep them together as a “warband” because they could just be sent to whatever ranch or worksite required them. Keep in mind though, those ranchers and workers are still trained in combat, and can, in extreme situations, be called into active duty, so keeping a warband together for the purpose of a “reserve” unit would be ideal as well because they are already proficient at working together. This isn’t blind speculation on my part, if you talk with the Primus’ wandering around with cubs, the ranchers/workers, and other citizens you can pick this stuff up as you go along. It’s a bit of piecing it all together because they all just give little bits of information here and there.

Riot Inducer.8964:

I’m not so sure about that part of it. A lot of the ranches, quarries and mills in Diessa Plateau are manned by charr that share warband names. That suggests to me that warbands are as much work groups as they are military units and can be assigned to “civilian work” like running a ranch.

I agree with your assessment. My thought was that they are put with other Charr like themselves and end up becoming a “laborer” warband, or possibly they are dropped into one such warband and thus take on their name. It seems that no matter what, Charr are either A- In a warband regardless of what you do, or B- A Gladium.

I think from what I’ve read, "war"band is something of a misleading name since all; charr consider themselves part of the war effort even if they’re not running around with guns.

In my head canon, Fahrar training is broken into two sections; the first half is typically what we think of as being a fahrar— ie young cubs. Here the cub learns the basics of almost every skill he or she might ever need, like reading, writing, sharpshooting, gun maintenance, math and so on. At this point the primus is observing the cubs and, at some point (probably when the cubs are old enough to be worth the effort to put them in a ‘war’ situation) the cubs are divided according to talents and interests into a warband, but they don’t actually spend much time together at first. Rather, the individual cubs are off being mentoring by older warbands and individuals to teach them the individual skills he or she will need to handle their chosen profession.

I’m not sure the education can be handled any other way. Teaching someone to swing a sword around (like a warrior) isn’t no where as complex as teaching someone the basics of engineering or magic. Engineering in particular, Charr’s specialty, probably takes years and years to learn even if we assume the profession we play in game is more of a combat engineer who doesn’t actually know how to build their own gear. And that’s not supported in game.

Plus, as others have noted, there’s the problem of farmers and merchants warbands.

and it’d explain why there’s no teenaged charr at all in the game

Glad you fixed that, there’s lots of teenage charr lol

Nay of the Ether.8913:

Glad you fixed that, there’s lots of teenage charr lol

Is there? I’ve never seen them.

Xomic.5792:

Nay of the Ether.8913:

Glad you fixed that, there’s lots of teenage charr lol

Is there? I’ve never seen them.

You’re probably mistaking them for cubs, I think the devs wanted to portray them so small so that we could see the difference between the adults and youth, but they are still bigger than the cubs that follow the Primus around. The majority you’ll see are in Diessa, with (I think they’re still there) a few in the gladium canton.