Guild Wars 2

Fixing the forum bug.

I See No Tomorrow.7302:

If this doesn’t sound familiar I recommend you take a look at the countless Christian missionaries entering “savage” peoples’ land, often with military forces to back them up. (but not always. then again, we have had forced religious conversion for native american tribes and the associated genocide.) That’s the closest real-world analogy.

Note that Christians don’t have a monopoly on violent assertion of their religion. Muslims, Hindus, and even Buddhists have and continue to use violence against members of other religions.

And just to make sure we don’t start to think it’s religion that is to blame, I’ll call attention to atrocities in the name of atheist states in the last century.

People are depraved and violent. They just use ideology to justify it.

Gibson.4036:

I See No Tomorrow.7302:

If this doesn’t sound familiar I recommend you take a look at the countless Christian missionaries entering “savage” peoples’ land, often with military forces to back them up. (but not always. then again, we have had forced religious conversion for native american tribes and the associated genocide.) That’s the closest real-world analogy.

Note that Christians don’t have a monopoly on violent assertion of their religion. Muslims, Hindus, and even Buddhists have and continue to use violence against members of other religions.

And just to make sure we don’t start to think it’s religion that is to blame, I’ll call attention to atrocities in the name of atheist states in the last century.

Generally, the atrocities of the atheist states were committed in order to remove power from anything that wasn’t the government at the time, which included the churches. This was not done for the same reasons that religious theocracies or dictatorships did them, as “atheism” is not a set of beliefs or guiding principles, but merely the lack of a belief in a theocratic religion. It’s a bit of a nuance, but it’s an important distinction none-the-less.

People are depraved and violent. They just use ideology to justify it.

In this case, the ideology for a theocratic dictatorship is to force a particular faith on people to hold power over the people and to keep others from getting that power.

The ideology for an atheistic dictatorship is to force atheism on people to remove power from the religions that hold power over those people, and to transfer it to the dictatorship itself.

Different purposes, but ultimately the same outcome as the people are always at a loss.

Just a flesh wound.3589:

Knighthonor.4061:

MOUNTS?!

DID SOMEBODY SAY “MOUNTS”?!

YES MOUNTS
MOUNTS MOUNTS MOUNTS

This last beta had dinosaur mounts also. Just saying. ^^

Screenshot attached. Although we don’t get any.

Mounts were mentioned as NPC-only and it does not change their speed. It is just a visual thingy.

Fortunately.
#NoMountsInGW2please

MiniEquine.6014:

In this case, the ideology for a theocratic dictatorship is to force a particular faith on people to hold power over the people and to keep others from getting that power.

The ideology for an atheistic dictatorship is to force atheism on people to remove power from the religions that hold power over those people, and to transfer it to the dictatorship itself.

Different purposes, but ultimately the same outcome as the people are always at a loss.

I’m missing the difference there, other than wording. You could just have easily said that atheistic dictators force atheism on people to remove power from the religions that empower people to resist. Either wording depends on how you feel about religion. Secular or religious, it’s about appealing to something other than “we want this people’s money, land, or other resources” in order to justify imprisoning and/or killing and taking it.

My point is that every major religion as well as secular ideology has been used to justify atrocity. Ideology, theist or atheist, is a useful tool, but not really the cause. Economics lie at the root. The Salem witch trials had a heavy land-grab component. Pope Urban initiated the Crusades not out of zeal for his faith, but to reinforce Papal power over Europe, and stop European infighting by giving them a common enemy. Nobility went on the Crusades with the promise of money and land.

From the Communist point of view religion oppressed the people, and they needed to be liberated from it. But really it’s just about doing away with opposing ideologies that might support people in their resistance. No different than Protestants killing Catholics, Hindus killing Christians, Buddhists killing Muslims, or Muslims killing Jews.

Alright so a discussion of which real world ideologies do what to whom isn’t necessarily productive in terms of figuring out whether the Zintl fanatics were wrong to hand the Itzel wyvern eggs then claim that the Itzel’s deity abandoned them when the wyverns attacked. It’s clearly a method of violence and deception, so let’s leave it at that.

I See No Tomorrow.7302:

Alright so a discussion of which real world ideologies do what to whom isn’t necessarily productive in terms of figuring out whether the Zintl fanatics were wrong to hand the Itzel wyvern eggs then claim that the Itzel’s deity abandoned them when the wyverns attacked. It’s clearly a method of violence and deception, so let’s leave it at that.

This coming from the person who piped in with a real world analogy. Really, you could have left out your entire first paragraph in your original post and the rest would have made sense. Don’t add to the fire when you don’t want it to burn.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

In a game where you’ve killed 10,000’s if not 100,000 sentient beings/animals I find your false sense of offendidness a little hard to believe… Your character is literally the biggest mass murderer in all of history, killing a few frogs is the least of your worries.

Heck if you’ve completed the ambient killer achievement you’ve killed enough bunnies to have been committed in real life.

I’ll have you know I’m eating those ambients to survive! And committed by who, PETA?

“False offendidness”? How do you know if someone is truly offended or not? Also, aside from the targeting awkwardly making me shoot moas when I mean to hit the bear trying to maul me, some of us don’t kill things in the game unless they try to kill us first. Actually, what can you kill that isn’t aggressive towards you besides woodland critters? Not saying there isn’t anything in game, but I can’t think of anything of the top of my head.

DragonflyDusk.6582:

This coming from the person who piped in with a real world analogy. Really, you could have left out your entire first paragraph in your original post and the rest would have made sense. Don’t add to the fire when you don’t want it to burn.

I was adding that in as a more accurate analogy to the one the first post used, not in an attempt to start a conversation where people move entirely away from the topic of this thread.

MiniEquine.6014:

This was not done for the same reasons that religious theocracies or dictatorships did them, as “atheism” is not a set of beliefs or guiding principles, but merely the lack of a belief in a theocratic religion. It’s a bit of a nuance, but it’s an important distinction none-the-less.

The lack of a belief in a theocratic religion is not atheism.

Atheism is the belief that there are no deities (in a broader sense: it is the rejection of theism).

As long as there is no scientific proof, that no deities exists, atheism is a form of belief.

Oh grow up guys. There are plenty of games out there with frowned upon themes like punching prostitutes or sacrificing a team to blow up a few boxes in a desert. But no one says anything about that, but as soon as a religious theme comes up everyone is up on arms about it. They are trying hard to give these npcs character by drawing from what we experience IRL or can relate to. How is killing a few frogs for a fictional religious motive somehow different to killing them just because they are in the way of your adventuring. None of this content is forced upon you, you can choose to do it or just do something else. If this is what disturbs you than you haven’t played half the games I have played or seen.

Me and my guild mates had a long talk about how dark HoT story might get. We all really enjoy dark stories so we support that. It makes them feel more realisitc.

Zok.4956:

MiniEquine.6014:

This was not done for the same reasons that religious theocracies or dictatorships did them, as “atheism” is not a set of beliefs or guiding principles, but merely the lack of a belief in a theocratic religion. It’s a bit of a nuance, but it’s an important distinction none-the-less.

The lack of a belief in a theocratic religion is not atheism.

Atheism is the belief that there are no deities (in a broader sense: it is the rejection of theism).

As long as there is no scientific proof, that no deities exists, atheism is a form of belief.

I’m sorry, but this is simply not the case. If theism is the belief in a god, then atheism is the negation of that. There are, however, two types of atheism:

A strong (or gnostic) atheist would make claims that no gods exist, therefore a belief in no gods.

A weak (or agnostic) atheist does not believe in gods, but also does not believe that they do not exist (like the strong atheist would).

Gnostic atheism is a belief because it makes a claim. Agnostic atheism is not a belief because it does not make a claim. Also, faith-based religions are non-falsifiable by nature, so there will never be “scientific proof” for or against them. If there were, then they would not be faiths.

I was under the impression being agnostic was entirely different to being an athiest. And if you are an athiest you dont believe in deities. You are not an athiest if you are agnostic.

spoj.9672:

I was under the impression being agnostic was entirely different to being an athiest. And if you are an athiest you dont believe in deities. You are not an athiest if you are agnostic.

Agnostic is an adjective, not a noun. You have four types of “believers”:

Gnostic Theist – Those who claim a deity exists and they know it does.
Agnostic Theist – Those who do not claim a deity exists but they believe anyway.
Agnostic Atheist – Those who do not claim a deity exists and they do not believe.
Gnostic Atheist – Those who claim a deity does not exist and they know it does not.

Agnostic Theists are rare, because it is difficult to justify believing in a god if you can’t say it exists in the first place. Most Theists range from hard gnostic to somewhere in the middle.

Gnostic Atheists exist, but they have to confront the issue that they are making an absolute counter-claim about a non-falsifiable theistic claim. This is why many atheists are agnostic atheists.

There are some other small branches of nuanced beliefs within these four groups, but these are the primary ones.

Edit: In looking up the definition of “agnostic”, you will see a noun definition for it. By default, since agnostic theists are so rare, an agnostic is an agnostic atheist, since they do not make a claim about a god existing, merely that we cannot know such things.

Going back and reading the OP, religion wasn’t the cause of concern. It was attacking beings who weren’t in the process of attacking anyone themselves. People have provided the context for why it wasn’t provoked.

Religion is just the surface, which is kinda the point I was trying to make about historical violence.

Zok.4956:

MiniEquine.6014:

This was not done for the same reasons that religious theocracies or dictatorships did them, as “atheism” is not a set of beliefs or guiding principles, but merely the lack of a belief in a theocratic religion. It’s a bit of a nuance, but it’s an important distinction none-the-less.

The lack of a belief in a theocratic religion is not atheism.

Atheism is the belief that there are no deities (in a broader sense: it is the rejection of theism).

As long as there is no scientific proof, that no deities exists, atheism is a form of belief.

That form of thinking wouldn’t get too far, that’s like saying as long as there’s no scientific proof that I have fairies in my garden, you saying that they dont is a matter of belief.

The burden of proof falls on the religious side, so as long as there’s no scientific proof that deities exist, they don’t from an evidence-based stand point. Everyone’s free to believe they do and give’em whatever attributes they want, but remember that’s based on faith, when you cross to the evidence side you have to provide some. Unless you’re talking about gnostic atheism (claiming with 100% certainty that there’re no deities, you see making that claim gives you the same problem the religious side has; the burden of proof) which is rare and wouldn’t sum up the majority of atheists.

That’s why summing up atrocities by different atheistic states and comparing’em to theistic ones makes no sense, not adhering to a belief isn’t by itself one, it’s a part of the ideology but it’s not the defining one.

Claiming otherwise is like saying non-gamers have a habit of not-playing games, non-smokers have a habit of not smoking and non surfers have the awfully boring habit of not surfing and those habits of not-doing-stuff is what defines them.

The motive for red hylek to do what they’re doing is their extreme belief in the sun god and what they can gain from it (followers, power, money, etc.), it’s a defining part of their ideology just like countless religious expeditions in human history.
The motive for many atheistic totalitarian states was power, religion was simply taking away power and had to be removed. Lack of belief in a deity was part of the ideology and it was useful, but it was not the defining core part. In the end they’re just as sick, but for different reasons.

Raziel.4216:

That’s why summing up atrocities by different atheistic states and comparing’em to theistic ones makes no sense, not adhering to a belief isn’t by itself one, it’s a part of the ideology but it’s not the defining one.

No it´s actual makes sense. People who instumentalize ideologies to gain power and surpress other ideologies are normally more interessed in “how do I use this ideology to make a group of people do what I want” then acting “good” in the sense the ideology understands it.

In the end it all comes down to create a majority of the “good guys” and a precise picture of some “enemy” which you can hate/kill/surpress as you want and any ideology which can provide something like that will be used to achieve that goal.

Therefore, I dont see the difference between “We are Christians/Muslimes/whatever and they are not, so we have to kill them” or “We are Communists/Germans/whatever and they are not, so we have to kill them”.

To come back to the original topic. I find the idea of factions that are trying to fight smarter than just your normal raider really interesting. Fighting from the shadows and trying to get the hearts and minds of the people (or äh … frogs) makes an much more interesting enemy than youre standard undead or bandit.

I also would like to see a little bit more grey factions. Like the Mursaat from GW1 (before War in Kryta) – factions which are doing bad things to prevent even worser things from happening for example.

I would also really like if the player (and the pact) also are trying to act a little smarter. Everything they are doing right now is punching everyone in the face who look suspicious. Give at least us whisperes the opportunity to solve the problems with brain (like starting a revolt so that more liberal leaders come to power (dregde) or something like that) than just brute force.

Gomes.5643:

That’s why summing up atrocities by different atheistic states and comparing’em to theistic ones makes no sense, not adhering to a belief isn’t by itself one, it’s a part of the ideology but it’s not the defining one.

No it´s actual makes sense. People who instumentalize ideologies to gain power and surpress other ideologies are normally more interessed in “how do I use this ideology to make a group of people do what I want” then acting “good” in the sense the ideology understands it.

In the end it all comes down to create a majority of the “good guys” and a precise picture of some “enemy” which you can hate/kill/surpress as you want and any ideology which can provide something like that will be used to achieve that goal.

Therefore, I dont see the difference between “We are Christians/Muslimes/whatever and they are not, so we have to kill them” or “We are Communists/Germans/whatever and they are not, so we have to kill them”.

No it doesn’t, the defining characteristic of theistic states is their religion; a set of well defined principles. Atheism is simply the lack of faith, it doesnt provide any sort of guidelines. They will both instrumentalize ideologies but that’s an important distinction.
One pulls it’s power from adivine being that just happens to favor’em and support’em in their search for power while the other one usually makes a cult of personality around it’s leader.

This doesn’t create a group of good guys or bad guys, but theistic and atheistic states use their ideologies in very different ways.

Raziel.4216:

Zok.4956:

As long as there is no scientific proof, that no deities exists, atheism is a form of belief.

That form of thinking wouldn’t get too far, that’s like saying as long as there’s no scientific proof that I have fairies in my garden, you saying that they dont is a matter of belief.

Do you believe that the universe was created by some form of “deity” or do you believe that the universe created itself or do you believe that the universe was “always there” and was never created or do you believe nothing of the above?

(and with “universe” I mean the universe including the moment of the “big bang”).

Science can not answer why there was a “big bang” and what was before the “big bang”. So the answer to the above question depends not on scientific evidence or proof, but on your belief.

Thats what I meant originally. And it was not about the kids that are playing halloween in your garden.

Zok.4956:

Raziel.4216:

Zok.4956:

As long as there is no scientific proof, that no deities exists, atheism is a form of belief.

That form of thinking wouldn’t get too far, that’s like saying as long as there’s no scientific proof that I have fairies in my garden, you saying that they dont is a matter of belief.

Do you believe that the universe was created by some form of “deity” or do you believe that the universe created itself or do you believe that the universe was “always there” and was never created or do you believe nothing of the above?

(and with “universe” I mean the universe including the moment of the “big bang”).

Science can not answer why there was a “big bang” and what was before the “big bang”. So the answer to the above question depends not on scientific evidence or proof, but on your belief.

Thats what I meant originally. And it was not about the kids that are playing halloween in your garden.

That seems pretty speculative saying that science cannot answer those questions. Just because it hasn’t yet been answered doesn’t mean it is unanswerable. A fair way to state it would be that, given the information we have at the moment, science has not come to a working conclusion about the origins of the universe (or potentially lack thereof).

In fact, in many situations, I think it’s personally reasonable to not have any opinion or belief about what there isn’t enough evidence for. What is the point of merely speculating about before the 1×10^-36 seconds after the universe’s “beginning” as we know it, when there isn’t even any data for it? It’s sort of like considering all fan-fiction for a particular work to be valid so long as it takes place outside of the source story.