Evon voter here; I’ll remain as civil as possible whilst posting during this frustrating time.
As a fan of ArenaNet, I have near no doubt in my mind they will do a impressive job with the Thaumanova Fractal but the Abaddon Fractal could have been SO MUCH MORE. I’ll attempt to explain why shortly after this point.
There are a number of theories as to why Kiel or Evon were favored to win, be it the clearly populous friendly waypoint costs from Kiel, the imminent BLTC tax increase (if) now Evon lost, the ‘saintly’ hero Ellen or the dastardly fat cat Gnashblade, as the ordeal is over, I’m not willing to entertain them, but I am willing to think that not all players knew the whole political agenda and manifesto of each candidate, and through that, a bad (in my own and assuredly many others opinion) decision has been made.
Now that’s out of the way – innovation; both prospective fractals seemingly had equal amounts of, but that is not the case if I may say – yes we know the outcome of both events, we’ve been to the locations where the events took place and seen the aftermath first hand, yet we could do with experiencing exactly how they came to be rather than told by a third party. With everything stated it seems equal right? No; quite simply, it’s not.
The Thaumanova Reactor incident happened fairly recently in terms of the lore, the Asura (and even us ourselves!) have already launched expeditions into the site and if they are as smart as they believe, I’m sure they have a near full account as to what exactly happened within the structure, yet, the Fall of Abaddon, happened in a place which we know nothing of what has happened to it, for at least 250 years, furthermore, the premise of where the fractal would have been set suggests in happened in a time which no one but the developers have even seen, in addition to which in the events that transpired, turned a sea into a desert, who can say they’ve seen that happen?
The architecture also has a prominent tie to innovation, we’ve all become very acquainted with Asuran architecture, the giant floating cubes bound by magic, the illumination from the magical energies creating a mystical feel, heck, we know how big the reactor is, we’ve been there, but, what about the Mouth of Torment prior to the Fall of Abaddon, he would have had followers, maybe they would have had unique homes, maybe he only had Margonite followers close to him and they spawned out of ( now truly :[ ) incomprehensible magical aether of which surrounds the god and looks truly terrifying to the small seemingly insignificant player?
What about the new enemies and allies we could face or fight, sure, we might see a Grand Magister of the Inquest do a unique (and probably annoying) mechanic amongst a number of his already troublesome peers, or some snotty stuck up Asura telling us we’re somehow doing something we know works well wrong, and that for missing a chance to interact with races we haven’t fought for a long time such as the Margonites, the once enemy now allied Forgotten, we could have even talked to the five Gods first hand or see the full power of Abaddon before his incarceration.
What about being at the event itself at the time too, we could embody the Inquest seeing what they did wrong which caused the catastrophe or be a sect of anti-Inquest adventures attempting to stop what will be a(nother) Asuran disaster, compared to fighting as the Gods chosen against Margonites and Abaddon or even be the Five Gods themselves (see how that perfectly fit into a party dynamic?) assuming archetypal roles which a number of people still wish to see how ArenaNet could integrate it into GW2?
There is little truly innovative with this Thaumanova Fractal, I know ArenaNet will make it spectacular , but it will be nothing compared to that of which the Fall of Abaddon could have been.
Save my heart tomorrow.
