Guild Wars 2

Those are the words of Ossa, not the developers.

Belzebu.3912:

Those are the words of Ossa, not the developers.

I’d say more likely the Devs didn’t remember the events of Nightfall and didn’t remember that the Centaurs were slaves.

The book page was just there as sort of an explanation for how Scarlet got some of the most Xenophobic groups on Tyria to form alliances.

Using the Centaurs as an example however is a really bad example.

Belzebu.3912:

Those are the words of Ossa, not the developers.

Bobby Stein said last week that the words of the developers are ‘malleable’ ie ‘subject to change’ ie ‘unreliable’.

Some Ingame book. Even in Tyria books can be used for propaganda. Ingame books shouldn’t be taken as a word from god, because some books can and are made to misinform you.

I saw as it more patch work attempting to fix the horrible mess that is Scarlet. First the retcon on Secondborn ages, now an attempt at explaining Scarlet’s inspiration for forging alliances (Scarlet reeks of this simplistic writing to explain herself – just leave it, she’s done). I’m not entirely certain I know which centaurs that line in the game was talking about me, but it definitely stood out to me as weird because I never would have described the centaurs in the main plot of Nightfall as allied with Ossa or Kourna.

I don’t buy “Ossa’s writing” as an excuse. Firstly, it’s exhausting the “NPC perspective thus unreliable” crutch used to make stories stand up. Secondly I don’t think Varesh would have viewed the relationship between the Kournans and the centaurs as an alliance.

It seems more like a trade agreement at best (I’m thinking of Elonian Leather Squares but artisians in Tyria and Cantha could make them – no-one needed the centaurs to help with that). Alliance seems strange because the centaurs (as best as I can remember) weren’t big fans of the humans. Maybe it’s refering to Varesh’s observations of the centaur/Kournan trader relationship before she enslaved them? My Elonian history is rusty, I can only remember the stuff from the main quest, which never came across to me as an alliance.

Shiren.9532:

I don’t buy “Ossa’s writing” as an excuse. Firstly, it’s exhausting the “NPC perspective thus unreliable” crutch used to make stories stand up.

It’s not really anything we need to buy. Either the NPC’s in game are fallible or they aren’t. We know that they’ve been fallible since the beginning of GW2.

Dustfinger.9510:

Shiren.9532:

I don’t buy “Ossa’s writing” as an excuse. Firstly, it’s exhausting the “NPC perspective thus unreliable” crutch used to make stories stand up.

It’s not really anything we need to buy. Either the NPC’s in game are fallible or they aren’t. We know that they’ve been fallible since the beginning of GW2.

I highly doubt some pixellated sprite named Ossa became self aware and wrote that. So yeah, Dev.

In that case, “NPC perspective” fits perfectly.
Why the slavers would admit they were using slaves?

I read the whole thread where Bobby Stein made that infamous post, but in this case looks fine and that doesn’t involve outside game information so that “argument” doesn’t apply here, the PC know the Mordremoth name is more weird imo.

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

Dustfinger.9510:

Shiren.9532:

I don’t buy “Ossa’s writing” as an excuse. Firstly, it’s exhausting the “NPC perspective thus unreliable” crutch used to make stories stand up.

It’s not really anything we need to buy. Either the NPC’s in game are fallible or they aren’t. We know that they’ve been fallible since the beginning of GW2.

I highly doubt some pixellated sprite named Ossa became self aware and wrote that. So yeah, Dev.

And the devs have always written every dialog that every NPC has. Yet we know that they are still fallible because some of that info is intentionally wrong. So yeah, fallibile NPC’s.

Dustfinger.9510:

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

Dustfinger.9510:

Shiren.9532:

I don’t buy “Ossa’s writing” as an excuse. Firstly, it’s exhausting the “NPC perspective thus unreliable” crutch used to make stories stand up.

It’s not really anything we need to buy. Either the NPC’s in game are fallible or they aren’t. We know that they’ve been fallible since the beginning of GW2.

I highly doubt some pixellated sprite named Ossa became self aware and wrote that. So yeah, Dev.

And the devs have always written every dialog that every NPC has. Yet we know that they are still fallible because some of that info is intentionally wrong. So yeah, fallible NPC’s.

Since this sort of info is written in to justify Scarlets gaping plot holes I do not think the intent is for this NPC to be fallible. The intent is to make what we know of Elona from GW fallible. Nothing new.

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

Dustfinger.9510:

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

Dustfinger.9510:

Shiren.9532:

I don’t buy “Ossa’s writing” as an excuse. Firstly, it’s exhausting the “NPC perspective thus unreliable” crutch used to make stories stand up.

It’s not really anything we need to buy. Either the NPC’s in game are fallible or they aren’t. We know that they’ve been fallible since the beginning of GW2.

I highly doubt some pixellated sprite named Ossa became self aware and wrote that. So yeah, Dev.

And the devs have always written every dialog that every NPC has. Yet we know that they are still fallible because some of that info is intentionally wrong. So yeah, fallible NPC’s.

Since this sort of info is written in to justify Scarlets gaping plot holes I do not think the intent is for this NPC to be fallible. The intent is to make what we know of Elona from GW fallible. Nothing new.

What you just described is still making NPC’s fallible. As you said, nothing new.

There was no alliance between centaurs and Kournans, only slavery. In fact, this was the entire plotline between centaurs and Kournans. So it is impossible to allude to it without talking about the slavery aspect.

While there have been problems communicating what is exposition and what is NPC perspectives in the past, this is a clear-cut example of the latter. Why would Varesh admit to slavery herself?

Ulyssean.1709:

Belzebu.3912:

Those are the words of Ossa, not the developers.

Bobby Stein said last week that the words of the developers are ‘malleable’ ie ‘subject to change’ ie ‘unreliable’.

This is a barefaced lie.

We already know that the charr haven’t kept a complete record of event from 250 years ago. Especially of how big of kittens they were. 250 years is a long time to play the ‘telephone game’. For all we know, this may be forshadowing of the latter relationship that eventually developed.

Who said post Nightfall centaurs did not form an alliance with the remaining kournans? Zhed certainly got along well with the player character. He was the coolest horsey!

Archon.6480:

Who said post Nightfall centaurs did not form an alliance with the remaining kournans? Zhed certainly got along well with the player character. He was the coolest horsey!

If, and a really big if, such alliance ever existed, you wouldn’t have a cite from Varesh Ossa about it for sure.

Tamias.7059:

There was no alliance between centaurs and Kournans, only slavery. In fact, this was the entire plotline between centaurs and Kournans. So it is impossible to allude to it without talking about the slavery aspect.

While there have been problems communicating what is exposition and what is NPC perspectives in the past, this is a clear-cut example of the latter. Why would Varesh admit to slavery herself?

Ulyssean.1709:

Belzebu.3912:

Those are the words of Ossa, not the developers.

Bobby Stein said last week that the words of the developers are ‘malleable’ ie ‘subject to change’ ie ‘unreliable’.

This is a barefaced lie.

Any sources of lore not in the game Guild Wars 2 are ‘malleable’. This includes the words of the developers in their interviews, the short stories, the novels and even the game Guild Wars itself. Just saying it is a lie does not make it so, unfortunately for us.

Archon.6480:

Who said post Nightfall centaurs did not form an alliance with the remaining kournans? Zhed certainly got along well with the player character. He was the coolest horsey!

This was Varesh Ossa, not post nightfall. She enslaved them. There was no alliance.

Devildoc.6721:

Cause I mean, correct me if I’m wrong, but I seem to remember that the Elonian Centaurs were ENSLAVED by the Kournans, not persuaded to work under an alliance. In fact, Zhed Shadowhoof blackmails you into staging a prison break for his people and killing the slavemasters. They had a staunch resentment of “two legs” and it took that selfless act to get Zhed to trust you.

Is that what we’re calling slavery now? An “Alliance”? I bet a great many people would object to you referring to the Israelites in Egypt as “Allies”, or the African Americans of the pre-civil war South as “Allies” “convinced” to work under the whip.

This is a 2 fold offense. #1 it’s inaccurate to GW1 events, #2, it’s rather discouraging about how you view a portrayal of slavery in a game.

Shut up, two-legs.

People are really grasping for straws when it comes to complaining about the game now, aye?

It is extremely unlikely that someone that forced a whole race into cooperation would call it slavery or forced cooperation.

Varesh Ossa said it, not the devs. assuming you played nightfall, you might recall that she was a bit of a kitten.

funny wording too, making two “lesser beings” work for you without any true benefit for themselves. she’s describing slavery in what would be the kournan equivalent of PR.

and yeah, it inspired scarlet to do the same thing. blackmail/force/trick a bunch of people she deemed “lesser” to do the heavy lifting for her, all while they got screwed.

Ulyssean.1709:

Tamias.7059:

There was no alliance between centaurs and Kournans, only slavery. In fact, this was the entire plotline between centaurs and Kournans. So it is impossible to allude to it without talking about the slavery aspect.

While there have been problems communicating what is exposition and what is NPC perspectives in the past, this is a clear-cut example of the latter. Why would Varesh admit to slavery herself?

Ulyssean.1709:

Belzebu.3912:

Those are the words of Ossa, not the developers.

Bobby Stein said last week that the words of the developers are ‘malleable’ ie ‘subject to change’ ie ‘unreliable’.

This is a barefaced lie.

Any sources of lore not in the game Guild Wars 2 are ‘malleable’. This includes the words of the developers in their interviews, the short stories, the novels and even the game Guild Wars itself. Just saying it is a lie does not make it so, unfortunately for us.

Did you continue to follow that thread, or did you just see Bobby Stein’s one comment? Because they added clarification later that pretty much invalidates most of what you just said.

You do realize there’s no exact time stamp on this quote, nor any mention of which “Ossa” it was?

. . . creating controversy over lore where none should exist.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

You do realize there’s no exact time stamp on this quote, nor any mention of which “Ossa” it was?

. . . creating controversy over lore where none should exist.

actually it does call out Varesh Ossa by name on a previous page.

doesn’t change anything though, it’s Varesh being an enslaving dictator and trying to paint it as a pretty thing, like any dictator would.

BrunoBRS.5178:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

You do realize there’s no exact time stamp on this quote, nor any mention of which “Ossa” it was?

. . . creating controversy over lore where none should exist.

actually it does call out Varesh Ossa by name on a previous page.

doesn’t change anything though, it’s Varesh being an enslaving dictator and trying to paint it as a pretty thing, like any dictator would.

Given she was also a madwoman who fancied herself the Prophet of Abaddon . . . it’s a good thing Kormir killed her in that plaza before she could summon up demons. Oh wait, that didn’t happen. Darnit.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

BrunoBRS.5178:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

You do realize there’s no exact time stamp on this quote, nor any mention of which “Ossa” it was?

. . . creating controversy over lore where none should exist.

actually it does call out Varesh Ossa by name on a previous page.

doesn’t change anything though, it’s Varesh being an enslaving dictator and trying to paint it as a pretty thing, like any dictator would.

Given she was also a madwoman who fancied herself the Prophet of Abaddon . . . it’s a good thing Kormir killed her in that plaza before she could summon up demons. Oh wait, that didn’t happen. Darnit.

you’re expecting kormir to be useful, and therein lies your problem. can’t tell how many times i screamed at her when my party wiped against abaddon and she would run on top of my corpse and stay there.

actually chose kormir as the god my human thief worships >.>

Great point!

Perhaps this was post Guild Wars and GW Beyond? Maybe there were a small group of centaurs and humans that worked together in some remote part of the continent.

Zhaneel.9208:

Great point!

Perhaps this was post Guild Wars and GW Beyond? Maybe there were a small group of centaurs and humans that worked together in some remote part of the continent.

Someone said it namechecked to Varesh Ossa.

Which, if so, says this was probably written when she was in power and making the centaurs work via enslavement. And probably before the battle at Gandara.

BrunoBRS.5178:

you’re expecting kormir to be useful, and therein lies your problem. can’t tell how many times i screamed at her when my party wiped against abaddon and she would run on top of my corpse and stay there.

Dunkoro was there too. We really could have pushed, killed her, and only potentially have died horribly. Especially since at that point great-grandpa Tobias had smacked around titans and Shiro’ken . . . he drops everything and runs because some freaky demons show up?

To quote a quirky sergeant: “We don’t run from the end of the world. We charge!”

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

You do realize there’s no exact time stamp on this quote, nor any mention of which “Ossa” it was?

. . . creating controversy over lore where none should exist.

Okay it’s not in the screenshot, but prior pages of the book explicitly state it was Varesh.

As it was, during Turai’s time, the centaurs were enslaved by Palawa Joko.

Zhaneel.9208:

Great point!

Perhaps this was post Guild Wars and GW Beyond? Maybe there were a small group of centaurs and humans that worked together in some remote part of the continent.

THE BOOK SAYS VARESH (meaning it was DURING the Nightfall crisis, not after), WOW, HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE TO REPEAT THAT?

Devildoc.6721:

Zhaneel.9208:

Great point!

Perhaps this was post Guild Wars and GW Beyond? Maybe there were a small group of centaurs and humans that worked together in some remote part of the continent.

THE BOOK SAYS VARESH (meaning it was DURING the Nightfall crisis, not after), WOW, HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE TO REPEAT THAT?

Once more, with feeling.

Having hit that point myself right now, meh, it’s really possible the writers did play Nightfall and remembered how things went down.

Walhalla.5473:

Some Ingame book. Even in Tyria books can be used for propaganda. Ingame books shouldn’t be taken as a word from god, because some books can and are made to misinform you.

Because this needs repeating.

Remember the words of that one asura lady in the game…“History doesn’t lie, but authors do.”

Varesh was a lunatic just like Scarlet. Scarlet didn’t procure a partnership or Alliance truly either. She just scared the Aetherblades spineless, promised the Flame Legion power, and the dredge more technology, probably just convinced the Nightmare court that she’s tots one of them and she has a plan, and we all know what happened with the Krait.

Scarlet enslaved those races without them realizing it and Varesh probably did the same thing.

Zhaneel.9208:

Great point!

Perhaps this was post Guild Wars and GW Beyond? Maybe there were a small group of centaurs and humans that worked together in some remote part of the continent.

While I think that “book” is written as propaganda by Varesh, it also couldn’t have happened after because she was dead.

Sorry OP. It’s written from the perspective of a character. It isn’t some faux paus of the writers. When you enslave someone you can call it whatever you want. Doesn’t make it right though.

So in this case, both parties are wrong. Varesh said it how she wanted to say it and it couldn’t happen afterwards because I personally killed her and the devs aren’t retconning stuff. It’s a book written from the perspective of Varesh Ossa.

Well. It’s as poorly done as the original problems the writer is trying to fix.

There is no ingame evidence of a Kournan/Centaur alliance in GW.

If the writer so desperately needs repair of LS1 holes, Khibron would have been the model NPC for a treatise on duping people to do bidding. Togo would have been one regarding alliances. Instead of choosing an aspect of GW lore that supports the idea of duping, using people, or making alliances, the choice was made to fabricate an unsupportable and out of character reference to Varesh Ossa.

Because Varesh was simply a better villain.

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

Well. It’s as poorly done as the original problems the writer is trying to fix.

There is no ingame evidence of a Kournan/Centaur alliance in GW.

That may actually be the point.

I think you’re misinterpeting it. Its not about the centaurs working with the Kournans.

It’s the fact that Varesh manipulated her people by making the majority think the centaurs weren’t slaves, and in that way prevented major protests.

The decieved lesser beings are in fact, her people, who think that the centaur-forged blade they’re adding a hilt to came from a freewillingly coöperating centaur smith.

ThiBash.5634:

I think you’re misinterpeting it. Its not about the centaurs working with the Kournans.

It’s the fact that Varesh manipulated her people by making the majority think the centaurs weren’t slaves, and in that way prevented major protests.

The decieved lesser beings are in fact, her people, who think that the centaur-forged blade they’re adding a hilt to came from a freewillingly coöperating centaur smith.

Or the lesser beings are anyone NOT following Abaddon, depending on when it was written . . . before or after Varesh made it obvious she had gone well over the Chosen One dive and into “Don’t care, evil”.

It doesnt bother me as much as the PC knowing the name Mordremoth out of nothing.

If anything, i consider this a missed opportunity.

We as players know that the information in that book is false. There was no alliance between centaur and kournans. It wasnt even PR-d as such, outside of that book. Scarlet doesnt know the truth, only taking inspiration from this book for her match-up alliances.

An inspiration, an idea that should not have worked as well as it did (since the only reference of it working perfectly, the book we are discussing is false information). If her alliances would have failed as many would have liked to see before her end, we would not only have the In-Character knowledge of where she got the inspiration for the alliances, but also the Out-Of-Character knowledge of why they failed: The inspiring source was wrong. Double the satisfaction for the player.

Alas, we didnt see the alliances break apart, She didnt see them break apart. The tactic worked, even if it was based on a false reference. A missed opportunity in writing, and thus has the ugly feeling of being a band-aid on her character again.

ThiBash.5634:

I think you’re misinterpeting it. Its not about the centaurs working with the Kournans.

It’s the fact that Varesh manipulated her people by making the majority think the centaurs weren’t slaves, and in that way prevented major protests.

The decieved lesser beings are in fact, her people, who think that the centaur-forged blade they’re adding a hilt to came from a freewillingly coöperating centaur smith.

How do you get that “fact” from the page linked. Nothing we know of Varesh Ossa suggests she would bother. Instead, ample evidence that she did not care and simply expected compliance.. backed by Military power. Conscription, Seizure of lands, appropriation of produce, etc etc are not indicative of a Warmarshal concerned with “protests”.

The book is junk. Better that Scarlets alliances remain a mystery than do this. Why make up stuff like this when, for another example, the Mursatt, through the White Mantle, duped and manipulated the entire Krytan nation, a story well known and supported by lore.

As the OP suggested this seems to be done with either no knowledge of GW, or worse, with disdain for it.

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

ThiBash.5634:

I think you’re misinterpeting it. Its not about the centaurs working with the Kournans.

It’s the fact that Varesh manipulated her people by making the majority think the centaurs weren’t slaves, and in that way prevented major protests.

The decieved lesser beings are in fact, her people, who think that the centaur-forged blade they’re adding a hilt to came from a freewillingly coöperating centaur smith.

How do you get that “fact” from the page linked. Nothing we know of Varesh Ossa suggests she would bother. Instead, ample evidence that she did not care and simply expected compliance.. backed by Military power. Conscription, Seizure of lands, appropriation of produce, etc etc are not indicative of a Warmarshal concerned with “protests”.

The book is junk. Better that Scarlets alliances remain a mystery than do this. Why make up stuff like this when, for another example, the Mursatt, through the White Mantle, duped and manipulated the entire Krytan nation, a story well known and supported by lore.

As the OP suggested this seems to be done with either no knowledge of GW, or worse, with disdain for it.

Make what up? Kournas were involved with centaurs. How are you not understanding this? Do you remember the mission with Zhed Shadowhoof, where you’re captured and he procures a key and you liberate the other centaurs? That was in Kourna.
Remember that one subordinate of Varesh, he tried to shove his weight with that demon, and the demon told him what’s what? That guy was clearly not on the same page as Varesh, it’s not a stretch that she tells Kournans one thing, and history another.

How did we learn of the Mursaat? I only remember them being brought up as the actual bad guys when talking to that Seer. There’s some things I’ve been looking to get answered about them, too, if you would happen to know. I think it’s still a mystery, but where is their homeland? And why did they kill those White Mantle at the Charr warcamp, they had a pretty solid religious following already, why the culling? D’Alessio(?) was never heard of again after they took him?

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

How do you get that “fact” from the page linked. Nothing we know of Varesh Ossa suggests she would bother. Instead, ample evidence that she did not care and simply expected compliance.. backed by Military power. Conscription, Seizure of lands, appropriation of produce, etc etc are not indicative of a Warmarshal concerned with “protests”.

You are correct, however.

The book is junk. Better that Scarlets alliances remain a mystery than do this. Why make up stuff like this when, for another example, the Mursatt, through the White Mantle, duped and manipulated the entire Krytan nation, a story well known and supported by lore.

That book doesn’t handle much to explain how Scarlet made her stuff work, and towards the end when we saw little things? This book and its passage didn’t even matter because she wasn’t doing things that way. She made the Toxic Alliance by saying “hey krait, I have your obelisks and if you ever want to use them properly you better get with the program”.

We know she had the Aetherblades basically working for her under fear of failing her and the potential spoils if they pulled it off.

And now we know the steam creatures the watchworks were based on were her work so that’s no mystery how she had root user access.

The last mystery we have is how she convinced the Molten Alliance. And it’s not even much of one.

The book is junk for explaining those alliances, but it shows more significantly how she thought about them as “lesser races” to be manipulated and used from the start.

As the OP suggested this seems to be done with either no knowledge of GW, or worse, with disdain for it.

I still don’t see where you get that from.

tl:dr
I think they skimmed through. If they played more attentively they wouldn’t use nearly same graphic for Realm of Torment and “Pale Tree + six Elder Dragons”/“Eternal alchemy”.

sAdam.5876:

tl:dr
I think they skimmed through. If they played more attentively they wouldn’t use nearly same graphic for Realm of Torment and “Pale Tree + six Elder Dragons”/“Eternal alchemy”.

Why not?
Maybe it is actually done on purpose?

sAdam.5876:

tl:dr
I think they skimmed through. If they played more attentively they wouldn’t use nearly same graphic for Realm of Torment and “Pale Tree + six Elder Dragons”/“Eternal alchemy”.

Well, there are only so many ways you can do orbs circling one greater orb without drawing the conclusion to be planetary orbits.

What gets me is how the Realm of Torment map barely worked in the first place as it seemed unbalanced and just . . . not considered very well. I mean, aside from trying to justify it lore-wise, why did “Gate of the Nightfallen Lands” even exist? It looked like it was there to balance the diagram on the background. Cut that, and then the Domain of Anguish, then it balances out fine into seven spheres instead of ten.

lordkrall.7241:

sAdam.5876:

tl:dr
I think they skimmed through. If they played more attentively they wouldn’t use nearly same graphic for Realm of Torment and “Pale Tree + six Elder Dragons”/“Eternal alchemy”.

Why not?
Maybe it is actually done on purpose?

I’m thinking if it was, it was something they dropped into Nightfall as the background to plan ahead, as Abaddon was the “God of Secrets” and probably had quite a few about the Elder Dragons . . . it’d make sense this was set there as something important which had no specific meaning to us then but now it does.

Sort of like they never used the Wizard’s Tower. At all. Or whatever the heck was in the cave with Ice Imps in the Mineral Springs. Or that structure in Wizard’s Folly . . .

Yeah, I really didn’t see this as amounting to much of anything. There are possibly several ways to interpret it, but considering the context (making people think they’re getting a good deal when you’re just bending them to your whims), what it really seems to be describing is how Varesh set the centaurs up for an arrangement that she later turned into their slavery. This was merely the reason they weren’t in a position to fight back.

Regardless of exactly what happened, considering the context of that statement, it’s absolutely not trying to say that Kourna’s treatment of centaurs under Varesh Ossa was benign.

Ulyssean.1709:

Any sources of lore not in the game Guild Wars 2 are ‘malleable’. This includes the words of the developers in their interviews, the short stories, the novels and even the game Guild Wars itself.

That bolded part is pretty much standard fodder for the devs.

I don’t see why it’s difficult to view it as being written by a Kournan/Ossan historian. It’s a part of the game world and is therefore meant to be perceived as being written by a member of that world, not a member of ours (even though it is). Just like any other game, fictional novel, or other story-based medium.

Edit: Plus, it probably really did start out like a peaceful “partnership” before Varesh went loony. There were other Ossas before her, after all.

I took this line as saying that at first it was an alliance that benefited the Kournans more, but over time they became more ruthless until the point of blatant slavery.

Basically that under the premise of an alliance and working together, the centaurs “accepted” slavery.

I don’t see this as contradicting GW1 lore, just not telling the full story – only the bit of the story we never heard in GW1.

Honestly, Mordremoth’s name coming out of thin air is far more annoying to me than this line.