Guild Wars 2

I’ve totally shipped Braham and Rox since F&F, but its got me wondering how interracial reproduction would work in GW2.

I’d assume two races would need to have a similar-ish anatomy and biological makeup in order to create a child. For example, I doubt a Norn and Charr would be able to reproduce. If this is true though, what races do you think are similar enough to possibly be compatible?

Subterranean races:
- Asura
- Dredge
- Skritt
- Dwarfs (when they were alive)

“Humanoid” races:
- Humans
- Norn

“Half-giant” races:
- Norn
- Jotun
- Ogres
- Ettin
- Troll

I can see these being the result of Giants breeding with different (unknown) races or maybe a mutation that developed over generations.

“Bestial” races:
- Charr
- Kodan
- Harpies?
- Grawl?
- Tengu?

Aquatic races:
- Largos
- Krait
- Hylek?

“Magical” races:
- Mursaat
- Seers

That’s just a quick, theoretical list I thought up. However, it doesn’t seem like any races would be compatible with Quaggans or Centaurs.

What do yall think? :3 Lets get a discussion going.

I am rather sure it was said somewhere that a human and a Norn cannot reproduce.

Interracial would be Canthans and Krytans, but both would still be human. You are thinking of different species mating and that can’t happen. Why do I say that? Because there isn’t a single example of it happening in any of the games and there is no lore for it. If it had ever happened it would have been detailed.

I believe the devs said on GW2Guru that interracial breeding is impossible. I don’t have the quote, but I’m sure someone who’s been around longer will chime in with the link.

@Iason in the real world, yes. In Tyria though they use the term race for species (if only the intelligent ones), not ethnicity, so interracial would still be accurate.

There was an old interview by Jeff Grubb done by the former RP guild Ashenfold Cartel (unfortunately their site went down and web-archives doesn’t have a copy) stating that no playable races can reproduce with each other – even human and norn are too different.

This does not exempt playable with non-playable or non-playable with non-playable. But when considering such, look at biology. The reason given for playable races being unable to inseminate each other was given as genetics.

So the chances of a skritt, asura, and dredge (any combination of two) having a child together is highly unlikely, for example. Despite shared locational region.

Chances are, the only interracial relationships to produce offspring would be norn-ogre-jotun, heket-hylek, and potentially harpy-largos-human (the last depending on one’s theory if largos history and taking harpy origin legends as factual), as those groups either are or possibly may be cousin races (like a horse and donkey). Such offspring would be hybrids and as such infertile.

I’d like to note that the term “half-giant” is only used for norn and the term refers to the race’s size not genetics. They are taller than non-giant races, but shorter than giant races, thus half-giants.

Edit: Naga and Krait is another possible compatible two races. Not Forgotten as they came from the Mists though.

Not at normal terms. However with the “help” of a crazy aszran scientist it would be possible. But its not going to look good for sure.

Anything is possible with enough Inquest experimentation!

Maybe that’s what Scarlet had the Inquest on for. Why stop with alliances, when your
unusual pairings could be so much more permanent?

Well, duh. That’s what the Toxic Hybrid was!

Could be why we haven’t seen Faolain in so long. She doesn’t need Caithe anymore, because Scarlet set her up with a nice Oratuss boy.

Given Faolain’s tastes of going from Caithe to Sariel, more likely to be a nice Oratuss gal. :P

To answer the opening:
Not.

Why?
two species be nice neighbors, they do not make them identical making it impossible to reproduce (without any ethical and moral considerations). If tigers and lions, horses and donkeys arrive to give birth hybrids, note the impossibility for them to breed in their turn.
the genetic code is universal. It is the same whatever the living being (animal, plant, bacterial …) and even viruses (we still do not know whether they are “living”). What is different is the order of the nitrogenous bases of ADN (the contents of the instruction guide, wholesale).
the pairs of chromosomes do not match, no possibility of reproduction.

Finally, it must be of the same species to reproduce even between different races.

Harpies are compatible with humans, norn, sylvari, asura, AND charr!

Not down here in the south they can’t! (Not sure you can tell, but I typed that in my most southern accent)
But one would think the Norn and humans would be the most likely to have offspring, even if it was just a one-off thing, like crossbreeding tigers and lions to make a sterile liger or whatever. Unless what the Kodan say is true, and norn are just degenerated Koda. Then I guess humans and norn are as compatible as humans and polar bears :/

Iason Evan.3806:

Interracial would be Canthans and Krytans, but both would still be human. You are thinking of different species mating and that can’t happen. Why do I say that? Because there isn’t a single example of it happening in any of the games and there is no lore for it. If it had ever happened it would have been detailed.

Actually you’re wrong. Canthans and Krytans aren’t of a different ‘race’. People use the word ‘race’ rather incorrectly to refer to a mix of apparent physical differences and ethnicity. Canthans and Krytans are of different ethnicities, but they are the same race – they’re both humans. There is only the human race… The Charr are a race, the Sylvari are a race, etc.

“Could an interracial couple reproduce?”

I really hope so. I think the combinations would be incredible. Especially if a player could purchase a “lesser-race / cross-race” pack and play from their perspective.

Prophet.6257:

“Could an interracial couple reproduce?”

I really hope so. I think the combinations would be incredible. Especially if a player could purchase a “lesser-race / cross-race” pack and play from their perspective.

Really?

I always thought that an Asura/Charr hybrid would look something like a furry more muscular Xenomorph.

Iason Evan.3806:

You are thinking of different species mating and that can’t happen. Why do I say that? Because there isn’t a single example of it happening in any of the games and there is no lore for it. If it had ever happened it would have been detailed.

Well that and we define species as being unable to reproduce with other species. It’s like how Pluto isn’t a planet, cause we defined it as not being a planet.

Zaxares.5419:

Well, duh. That’s what the Toxic Hybrid was!

Didn’t we get an official word on what the Hybrid was? Either it was a krait-shaped plant or a krait that got a lot of poison pumped into him. Although I don’t think it was a true hybrid.

CureForLiving.5360:

Zaxares.5419:

Well, duh. That’s what the Toxic Hybrid was!

Didn’t we get an official word on what the Hybrid was? Either it was a krait-shaped plant or a krait that got a lot of poison pumped into him. Although I don’t think it was a true hybrid.

The later- an apparently average krait that was infused with the towers toxins and “nightmare”, iirc, which is where the hybrid joke actually gets a bit of fact to it.

One could argue that harpies might be able to breed with anything male, as they don’t really seem to have males. Except maybe the griffons we see hanging around with them in Nightfall and I think in Ascalon (GW2) too.
Also there is an event in Fireheart Rise which involves harpies seducing Grawl, though I think it’s never clear if they want to breed with them or just feed them to their young.

Aaron Ansari.1604:

CureForLiving.5360:

Zaxares.5419:

Well, duh. That’s what the Toxic Hybrid was!

Didn’t we get an official word on what the Hybrid was? Either it was a krait-shaped plant or a krait that got a lot of poison pumped into him. Although I don’t think it was a true hybrid.

The later- an apparently average krait that was infused with the towers toxins and “nightmare”, iirc, which is where the hybrid joke actually gets a bit of fact to it.

Technically, what was said is that the hybrid is really just the krait’s transformation abilities that are seemingly lost in GW2 actually being shown – and that its transformation took a plant-like appearance due to being in that pod (any more specifics – like toxins/nightmare being infused into it – was never specified afaik).

Though it’s known that the Toxic Alliance (both krait and NC) had their minds messed with by Scarlet. Which is likely what the lime green glow is about.

BuddhaKeks.4857:

One could argue that harpies might be able to breed with anything male, as they don’t really seem to have males. Except maybe the griffons we see hanging around with them in Nightfall and I think in Ascalon (GW2) too.
Also there is an event in Fireheart Rise which involves harpies seducing Grawl, though I think it’s never clear if they want to breed with them or just feed them to their young.

Skree Griffons were said to be harpy young (according to Dunkoro), though this seems to have been retconned out – and probably for good reason, given that there were elder skree griffons in Nightfall (how do you have an elder youngling?).

Harpies are outright called a female-only race, iirc, and have nicknames like shebeasts.

Chances are the race is asexual in terms of reproduction, or they are able to mate with any other race’s males given that they have natural hormones that increase others’ sexual desires (Blazeridge Steppes event chain and heart).

Personally, I argued for human/largos/harpy compatibility because Elonians have a legend that harpies are former servants of Dwayna that fell from grace – being humanoid, this legend may have solidarity in the notion that they too came from the human homeworld. Largos is equally (if not more) humanoid, and share Orrian styled naming and even know Orrian syllabary, hinting to a tied origin to the first place humanity stepped on Tyria. It wouldn’t be impossible to think the three races – with perhaps harpies being ‘devolved’ from their past times – come from the same homeworld, and perhaps even be cousin races.

“[Scarlet] has created this hybrid of krait and nightmare that, that is really nightmarish, if you’ll pardon my using the same word again. Um, so, she’s telling everyone that this is, this is the prophet. The krait believe her. She’s basically incubated a normal krait inside the, a pod on the, on the plant, and as it has become infused with the toxins from this plant, uh, in, in great quantity, it has evolved, and it comes out, and, um, you fight it.”

That’s the quote from Angel on the TowerTalk interview.

GuildMag: What, exactly, is the Toxic Hybrid? Also on the Toxic Hybrid – during the fight, the Hybrid says “No! I cannot be the last of my kind” and yet by all appearances, it is the first. What exactly did he mean?

The Toxic Hybrid started out as a regular krait that was transformed while inside the tower. It thought it was being transformed into a Prophet. Perhaps it was. Perhaps it wasn’t. We may never know, but the krait believed it was. Not only did players stop them from creating any more of these monsters, but they killed the one that had been made.

The Toxic Hybrid spoke those words because it is the first and last of its kind. It’s expressing shock and dismay as it dies, as it expected to be the first of many such monsters to emerge from the tower.

http://guildmag.com/magazine/issue11/season_one_lore_interview.htm

This is what I was remembering. A regular krait that was transformed.

IIRC, there was another that I cannot find, which basically said it was able to become the hybrid due to the krait’s natural transformation abilities seen in GW1.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

GuildMag: What, exactly, is the Toxic Hybrid? Also on the Toxic Hybrid – during the fight, the Hybrid says “No! I cannot be the last of my kind” and yet by all appearances, it is the first. What exactly did he mean?

The Toxic Hybrid started out as a regular krait that was transformed while inside the tower. It thought it was being transformed into a Prophet. Perhaps it was. Perhaps it wasn’t. We may never know, but the krait believed it was. Not only did players stop them from creating any more of these monsters, but they killed the one that had been made.

The Toxic Hybrid spoke those words because it is the first and last of its kind. It’s expressing shock and dismay as it dies, as it expected to be the first of many such monsters to emerge from the tower.

http://guildmag.com/magazine/issue11/season_one_lore_interview.htm

This is what I was remembering. A regular krait that was transformed.

IIRC, there was another that I cannot find, which basically said it was able to become the hybrid due to the krait’s natural transformation abilities seen in GW1.

Might have been part of the TowerTalk interview I quoted. I didn’t listen through again, just dug up my post on it from several months back.