Trying to turn Traehern into an action hero just does not work for the story line. A better take would have been to make him more of an Eisenhower figure — not necessarily a great general or strategist, but a good enough leader and politician to keep a fractious and disparate alliance together.
In that line, it would make sense for him to be coming to the Hero to basically say, “Look, I’m not good for much but standing at the back of a fight and whirling away now and then with this sword. But, for this alliance to work, I need to have some street cred. So, what I really need for you to do for me, Mr./Ms. Hero is to carry my sorry asparagus-like carcass through some tight spots. I will make sure you get some swag, and a nice share of the lime-light at the end, but in order to make this war effort work and for me to stay at the lead I really need this favor.”
THAT would be both more realistic and in line with what we actually see going on.
Trahearne it seems like he basically accompanies you on many missions so you won’t gasp have to make any choices without consulting him and to make sure you get through the mission thanks to Neo… I mean Trahearne’s necro-guardian-ranger-mesmer-elementalist abilities.
/sigh where is a woodchipper and a stick to trip over when you need one
That “rep” you want to see develop for Trahearne is already there story wise. Trahearne has a long history with all 3 Orders before GW2 story began but Anet only showed a small part of that long history through dialogues.
What Anet needs to do is to cover this long history that they already have for Trahearne some how. Like they did with Hero Stories back in GW1 when you play as Major Characters in the GW1 Lore so you can learn first hand what made those people important and how they became who they are today.
I don’t care what his ‘history’ is. He is not believable as a heroic figure as presented. That’s OK. In fact, I would applaud that decision, if it was implemented something like what I have put forth above.
If you are going to put in an inspiring, knowledgeable and powerful NPC then you must actually make him inspiring, knowledgeable and powerful when he takes part in game play. Trahearne, in the vast majority of the interactions I had with him, was insipid, indecisive, and weak.
That “rep” you want to see develop for Trahearne is already there story wise. Trahearne has a long history with all 3 Orders before GW2 story began but Anet only showed a small part of that long history through dialogues.
What Anet needs to do is to cover this long history that they already have for Trahearne some how. Like they did with Hero Stories back in GW1 when you play as Major Characters in the GW1 Lore so you can learn first hand what made those people important and how they became who they are today.
I think that if polled, the overwhelming majority of players would offer a big Thumbs Down to more kitten Trahearne stories. We’ve seen enough of the guy. His Wild Hunt is done. We’re gonna go off and do to the other 5 Dragons what we did to this one, hopefully without him riding our coattails. But after having him hijack our personal stories, you want to give him an outright PREQUEL? No. Absolutely not. That ship has sailed, and the best they can do is learn from this mistake and avoid making it again.
Former Guild Wars 2 fan. RIP, ArenaNet’s integrity.
You know those guild wars novels were pretty darned good so perhaps traherne’s backstory could be filled in that way? afterall once the next novel is done we’ll have the origins for a bunch of characters some of whom we dont even meet much beyond a greeting or heart quest(dougal and the norn who runs lions arch) so a story of traherne’s rise to such a lofty status amongst the 3 orders would be a welcome addition to that list imo.
“That “rep” you want to see develop for Trahearne is already there story wise. Trahearne has a long history with all 3 Orders before GW2 story began but Anet only showed a small part of that long history through dialogues.”
When you join the priory he has a brief conversation about some kind of escaped experiment that he apparantly helped with. Which I guess puts the whole order forever in his debt. Now think for a moment how many priory/vigil/whispers you have helped out in your travels, be it through quest hearts or events.
Yeaaaah… suddenly you just gotta wonder why the orders aren’t forever in your debt. (paying you a lousy 2s each time isn’t quite going to cut it I think)
I feel really sad when I compare the GW1 heroes/villains with GW2 ones. The GW2 ones are just not memorable enough. >.<
I have played the same storyline in GW1 multiple times on multiple characters. Nightfall and EOTN were extremely memorable to me. I really enjoyed playing with the following heroes,
1. Koss – who would make you smile with his dance moves on his rescue
2. Margrid – who respected money more than anything else
3. Norgu – whose illusions of grandeur were quite mesmerizing
4. Olias – arguably the best executed necromancer hero * and players would do anything to get him first *
5. Zhed – whose dialogues with “two-legged” creatures were quite interesting
6. Vekk – loved this guy’s teeth, and arguments with his dad “Gadd”
7. Mhenlo – the charming guy everyone wanted to be
8. Jora – whose race and elite hero armor were quite breathtaking dr00ls
9. Gwen – the loveliest hero of all, whose legacy (and Jora’s) continues in GW2
and so many more heroes I did not mention!
And GW1 had some memorable villains,
1. Shiro – who kicked a lot of kitten until people started using clever builds and OP PvE skills to bring him down quickly
2. Abaddon – a god who tortured us dearly in the realm of torment but went down fairly easily
3. Mallyx – a boss 99.9% of the groups could not beat without using the door exploit (in the first few months when DoA was released).
4. Vizier Khilbron – a guy who looked more wicked than anyone else
I find Trahearne of GW2 similar to Kormir from Nighfall. Both.are.useless.
My problem with Trahearne is that he seems to take the story over. Personal story stop being personal once the whole Destiny’s edge and Order picking comes along. Personally, I dislike all the members of destiny’s edge, for a bunch of epic heroes they sound more like a bunch of kinder garden kids. Now the fact that every dungeon is you helping them makes things even less enjoyable for me. Then there is Trahearne, he gets an epic sword, a central story figure position and eventually becomes a sponge of epicness. He does nothing, yet he gets everything. Leaving the hero, eh you, as another dude who made him succeed from the shadows.
Uniting the races was good, but it should have been done in a whole different way, same goes with the orders. If anything I had made the personal story a path oriented ever changing quest rather than a Pick this or this and either way it will lead to this with a different npc.
They did great work with several of the characters in this storyline, unfortunately they just abandon them or kill them off wily nily in a very failed effort to create drama in the storyline. Their hope was to try to give a sense of struggle and loss but instead just created disconnect and distance.
Characters you were introduced in your early story are just left to rot, people in the middle are just killed off, the person you have absolutely no connection or care about steals the show and you become his go fetch guy.
Even down the road in my storyline when I gave up hope on it… I stumbled on these two asurans that have a kindling love and a smart reporte together. I finally get interested in the story because they have interesting characters again…. then one gets killed. Just when the interest was starting to build and I actually started to like who was around. What is Traehern’s reaction…. so wooden so emotionless… Why can’t I tell you the character names? They get killed too quickly to care.
You guys just don’t understand the writing of Traehern and his voice over. He is a physical representation of the player. He doesn’t care and we don’t care? See? Were a perfect match together. He is destined for greatness and you are destined for greatness. A match made I suppose.
When he reacted to the death of his friends in a motionless and definite nonchalant way I too acted in the same manner.
See were not all that different! We can get along with him.
You guys just don’t understand the writing of Traehern and his voice over. He is a physical representation of the player. He doesn’t care and we don’t care? See? Were a perfect match together. He is destined for greatness and you are destined for greatness. A match made I suppose.
When he reacted to the death of his friends in a motionless and definite nonchalant way I too acted in the same manner.
See were not all that different! We can get along with him.
He is only destined to greatness, because the game won’t allow you to ditch him.
Without you, he would die in the sight of the first disgruntled Moa bird and even if he was dead, the entire campaign could still have been a success.
Trahearne’s leadership could easily have been done by making the 3 factions be lead by a council that largely function autonomously.
The whole magic sword into heart of Orr thing… Well, can you quess which group happens to have an extra holy human sword charged with divine power? (hint: you helped them fetch it)
It would also make more sense that the human holy land would be cleansed with the power of human gods instead with saladbolg.
Logan Thackery suffers from the same problems. He hijacks your personal story, and keeps following you around and sending annoying emails despite your best attempts to get rid of him.
When we did Caudecus Manor storymode, I kept doing the voiceovers for Queen Jenna. About how Logan should be cleaning her royal toilets and such, as she chose the ministers side. And the whole party had more fun that way.
How could they make such a boring character as Trahearne be so important while we lose so many good characters like (Tybalt, Tonn... even Forgal). I hate that Saladman.
What made trahearne worse was after he got his sword he actually got worse in combat than beforehand and he was cack then! why give a necro a sword anyway it’s not like he’d be able to use it properly without fatigue, dont get me started on Logan though that guy was cool in the book yet a useless waste of time in the storyline missions he took part in with me(it’s like in the 5 years since the noval ended he’s forgotten how be be a guardian).
My guild have got quite used to me bad-mouthing Logan at every opportunity in dungeons, which made it all the sweeter for them when he suddenly became competent in the Citadel of Flame story and I was forced to acknowledge this but then they are all extremely cruel people.
What made trahearne worse was after he got his sword he actually got worse in combat than beforehand and he was cack then! why give a necro a sword anyway it’s not like he’d be able to use it properly without fatigue, dont get me started on Logan though that guy was cool in the book yet a useless waste of time in the storyline missions he took part in with me(it’s like in the 5 years since the noval ended he’s forgotten how be be a guardian).
Twohanded sword is a possible weapon for Necro in the Future. A lot of NPCs now uses weapon combos our character can’t uses yet because Anet has not gotten to them before release. Such as how Warrior type Vigil NPCs can use Pistols/warhorn weapon combo.
We may even see Guardians obtaining Rifle in the future and Engineers obtaining Two-handed Hammers.
I even like Seiren the insane Tree person from the priory but Trahearn seriously if he died i’d feel nothing, literally nothing….
I just totally lost interest in “my” “personal” story its not mine its trahearns and i’m told it frequently “oh your trahearns new right hand” “oh you do not have the rank to enter here” “i’d follow trahearn into bla bla bla”
This was badly written for a personal story..and its far from about me..
I wont even get into the pitiful rewards we get as we do our personal story too, and the end…
