Guild Wars 2

So, I’m a roleplayer on the server Tarnished Coast. One of my characters, Myrthanna, (to make a long story short) was partially raised and partially trained by a Norn warrior. As such, rather than worshipping the Human Gods, she reveres the Norn spirits. Now, while I know that she can’t transform into a Norn Spirit animal or anything, I was looking for people’s opinions on whether the Norn spirits would do ANYTHING for her at all, or if, because she was Human, they would ignore her?

I’m just wondering what people’s thoughts on the matter are.

they rarely do much of anything. their main function, as far as I can see is to give the norn examples to follow. even the Norn NPC’s say, “I pray to the Spirits of the Wild but they rarely answer.”

So for them to do something specifically for one person means the person has to be exceptional and has to be in a situation that concerns the Spirits. Like punching Jormag in the mouth when the entire Norn species is on the verge of extinction.

So a human revering them is no problem, but they probably won’t be intervining in that humans every day life, the way the god used to for humanity.

I play a Norn. I was talking to a human player about kneeling at the spirit shrines for blessings, and he reported that it did indeed work. You can try for yourself at the wolf shrine after leaving Hoelbrak by the south exit.

Just type /kneel before the shrine. The spirit won’t always answer with a blessing (a blast of lighting happens and you get a boon for 3-4 minutes when they do), but you can try around at the various shrines until you get one

So, the short answer would be yes, the spirits of the wild will answer humans.

In Guild Wars 1 the spirits (Bear, Raven and Wolf specifically) would grant their blessings to certain humans who had proven themselves worthy. (aka the player characters after completing relevant parts of the storyline.) There was even a lesser form of the transformation skills – you didn’t change physically but you got a new skill bar.

In Guild Wars 2 human characters can participate in some norn rituals such as turning into a snow leopard and helping around the shrine or leading a pack of sacred wolves to fight the Sons of Svanir. Now obviously that’s partially so everyone can complete the hearts and events, but it can also be considered part of the lore.

If I remember correctly the norn consider the human gods to be ‘just’ another group of spirits, but of emotions or concepts rather than animals. For example Balthazar is the spirit of War (and simply called War).

My take on it is that anyone can worship any of the deities, or anything else they personally consider sacred. It’s just far more common for them to follow the typical beliefs of their race.

But, like the norn, you’d have to do something special and directly significant to that spirit to earn any kind of special reward or regard from them.

A lot comes down to the fact, that there is one major difference between RL religions and a lot of fantasy religions.

RL religions are, no matter whether you’re a believer or not, theoretical concepts. You worship a being or a group of beings that you believe exists. But there is no objecive proof of their existence. There are of course religions that don’t include transcended beings, which in a way makes them similar to the Eternal Alchemy of the Asura.

With large part of fantasy religions, including Human and Norn beliefs in GW2, beings that are being worshiped are objectively real, and usually exist regardless of whether someone worships them or not.

With the Spirits of the Wild that is probably the most visible. Sure, the Spirits contact the Norn, seek help, offer help, accept offerings and above all protect them for some reason. But beyond that they do seem to have lives of their own, their own businesses to mind. In certain ways they slightly resemble Shinto spirits.

And precisely because the Spirits of the Wild are like this, I don’t see why a human can’t revere them. The is of course whole part Human cultural code one has to leave behind and the whole part of Norn cultural code one has to adjust to, but there I don’t see why the Spirits wouldn’t answer your character OP, if they had a reason to do so.

I tend to have a problem with “outsiders” trying to appropriate elements from another culture, but given those lore precedents from GW1 I’d say go with it but keep spirit intervention and communication very rare and subtle. Rarer and more subtle than the norn characters in your RP circle do, so you don’t end up “a better norn than real norn”.

Chadramar.8156:

keep spirit intervention and communication very rare and subtle. Rarer and more subtle than the norn characters in your RP circle do, so you don’t end up “a better norn than real norn”.

This. ^

So much this.

Like the cases we see in lore. Boons at alters – good. Spirit empowerment to punch out another one of Jormags teeth – bad. Wolf Spirit being your personal errand boy and body guard – bad.

Chadramar.8156:

I tend to have a problem with “outsiders” trying to appropriate elements from another culture.

Oh boy, this can translate into so many things but no need to go there.

Culture is never constant some die while other change, that includes its people.
If this is something people can not accept it will spoil them and make them even worse.

Anyway Gw1 showed humans could become one of the spirits, outside the usual “physical” transformation.

As long as your willing to revere that spirit and respect it, It would grant you a boon.

Dustfinger.9510:

Like the cases we see in lore. Boons at alters – good. Spirit empowerment to punch out another one of Jormags teeth – bad. Wolf Spirit being your personal errand boy and body guard – bad.

Heh, reminds me of the days when I used to freeform RP on IRC. Oh, the sheer hilarity of what some players will take one-upping their character’s power levels to… XD

Lol. yeah. But if i’m going to be honest, I’m sure we have all been guilty of being a munchkin atleast early on. I know I have.

I think the issue is that we get these archtypes in out head inspired from great books and stories we have seen growing up. But then we don’t take into account that no one else is going to want to be our personal sidekick to propel us to glory :P

Wait… Does that mean that we all secretly want to be Trahearne?? :O

Dustfinger.9510:

they rarely do much of anything. their main function, as far as I can see is to give the norn examples to follow. even the Norn NPC’s say, “I pray to the Spirits of the Wild but they rarely answer.”

This

They don’t often act directly, and if they don’t answer, like many Norn NPC’s insist on telling us over and over, then their help isn’t necessary.

I agree with most people in this thread; subtle aid from the spirits seem the best option.

Also on TC here, and I play a charr necromancer that follows Raven, and a human that was raised near Hoelbrak that honors (but not worships) all the spirits. I honestly see no reason why they wouldn’t do things for those that are worthy.

In fact, I consider some of the things you can get from the heart vendors to be “blessings of the spirits”. Potions that turn you into a wolf, or feathers that turn you into an owl seem to be clear indications that they’ll give their blessings to those they consider worthy. It may not be the norn beast forms, but perhaps THAT change would be too much strain on someone that’s not born into it.

Okay I’ve been seeing this thread for a long time and now I’m ready to give my two cents on the whole “different race” and the spirits things…

First of all, I am agreeing with those who say it might be okay in small doses. Obviously we know non-norn can’t transform, but I still don’t think they should get much from the spirits. I can’t recall the source but I remember reading way back that the four main spirits really love the norn. I mean yeah, duh. But “like family” love the norn. Why else would four of them help the norn flee and form a new home, and three stay back to fight a dragon (one completely consumed) to save their beloved race?

I just want to point out to those of us who play norn… while sure, we may sometimes hear that “I pray to the spirits of the wild, but they rarely answer” spam, but remember that OUR character was in fact blessed by our totem spirit. Not, “people say I am blessed by…” Nope. We were chosen by the spirit personally. I imagine this is not the case for all norn, but it is for the playable character.

“When I was still a kid, I had a vision. A Spirit of the Wild spoke to me and offered its guardianship. That Spirit was _.”

Bear — Bear is the most powerful among the Spirits of the Wild. She is a symbol of fortitude and self-reliance. She roared over me when I was a babe, and ever since, I’ve had Bear’s courage in my heart.

Snow Leopard — Snow Leopard is a stealthy, smiling spirit. She teaches us independence, strategy, and laughter in the face of danger. To this day, her wisdom guides me, and my memory of her visit comforts me on dark nights.

Wolf — Wolf has the cunning of the pack behind him. He imparts the virtues of loyalty, ferocity, and strength in numbers. When he came to me, he whispered of my heroic future and told me I would never be alone.

Raven — Raven, clever and wise, guides us with truths that others fear. He bestows a far-seeing clarity of mind. In my vision, he spoke of riddles and opened my eyes to secrets that few others can see.

So for instance, my main character’s totem is Wolf. If I was an RPer, I would like to think of myself as a “champion” of wolf of sorts. Definitely not THE champion, but if Wolf came to me personally, I would think myself more blessed by wolf than non-norn, or norn who were blessed by a different spirit.

I’m not saying the spirits don’t care about the other races, I just think (in my own opinion of course) that they are always going to favor norn before the other races. Perhaps this is already obvious to everyone, I don’t know, just have to say it. But as stated in another post, it would be kind of crappy in an RP environment to have a human who is not only favored by their gods, but by the norn’s spirits of the wild. Perhaps they can also pull a Scarlet and have graduated from Asura colleges? Let’s also make them an honorary member of the Blood Legion…. see where I am going with this?

tl:dr – I also vote “light touch”, but let the norn have their bigger blessings.