Guild Wars 2

Jaken.6801:

Okay, i have still not finished through it, but I can really understand all your sentiments, since this is something i somehow expected from this episode (thanks to a bug i was unable to continue, will do so tommorow when i have time)

However, this Season 2`s writing feels more and more like a checklist they are ticking off.

It all sounds like: "And then they go after the roar, the roar is Mordremoth, then they find one of Scarlets lair and a ley line and then they find the big machine of omadd. the PC goes 2001: A Space Odysee. Oh and Belinda dies, since Majory is too kitten and is upstaging the PC, then Mordremoth attacks the Charr,.. but no, we cannot use the pact. We allready did combine the orders, lets go bigger.. Lets go and combine all greater races… yeah that will be the task to fight the next eldar dragon…

Seriously… do they know no pacing? The whole thing rushes through plotpoints like my Great Sword 1 pew pew through enemy lines… (Mesmer naturally, though i never use a GS).
I know we said Season 1 was to slow, but you do not have to go into overdrive now…

They are hyping us with trailers and possible mysteries, only to shrug them off in the next minute.

They jump through the story, skipping very important parts, like a jackrabbit only to push from one “epic” part to the next.

While the art direction and overall event design is great, the writing so far is hard to justify.

There are a lot of things, that you have allready said.
At this point i wish even the biconics gone completly, since I feel they are holding the PC back, then actually helping him (Though the pale tree said that we will do greater things then with Destiny`s Edge… Well nope, i thankfully decline that).

They established that everything happens after we are basicly a seasoned dragon fighting veteran and they still thread us and the whole world as stupid uncaring people…

I do not know, i just feel frustrated at the moment.
Maybe just because S2E1 was great and now the whole thing crumbled in just two episodes and now they are doing a mid season break, which measn we only got three episodes left?

While i do not expect the writers to say anything in that regard (they are only human after all and they have enough on their table allready), i just hope they really take all the crictic here and do something with it.
I mean it becomes hard to keep invested…

There will be one more episode released before the mid-season break, meaning there are 5 episodes left.

BrunoBRS.5178:

i think i know what you mean. the story could definitely earn some points by diving into related story arcs, instead of being so narrowly focused on one single aspect. because it’s so narrow, but still wants to present more lore, it comes off as extremely rushed. you look at the GW1 campaigns, and there were several story arcs, chapters if you will, that were solved one at a time and led the player one step closer to the overarching objective.

it feels like instead of several arcs and an overarching story, there is a single arc, mordremoth, and everything else is just a detail. they went from one extreme (too many mini-arcs that were barely related and not particularly interesting) to the other (just one big arc). the problem with season 1 wasn’t the multiple story arcs, it was how disjointed they felt, and how uninteresting/hit-and-miss they were for the most part.

for example: the dragon’s reach is an excellent opportunity to delve into the lore of the races and their personal struggles, but we brush off sylvari, asura, norn and charr in one stroke, and humans happen off-screen. hell, that whole plot with rytlock trying to cleanse the foefire, failing, and trying to come back from the mists could’ve been a chapter of its own. provided enough context and work, each race could’ve had its own chapter. this isn’t unlike befriending the luxons and kurzicks in factions, it’s only done much faster.

now, of course, for the sake of pacing, it probably would be in the best of interests if these progressions happened simultaneously. so you’re getting a bit of each race at a time, maybe divide and only a few races appear in one chapter, then other races appear on other chapters, or whatever. the point is, all of this was solved incredibly fast, being brushed off in the span of an hour, maybe two, with a single mission per race (hell, not even that for the norns, humans and sylvari).

TL;DR: slow down, guys. you don’t have to slow down to a crawl, but you don’t have to rush through everything because dragons.

Thank you this describes what i was trying to say perfectly

you could have maybe paced it better by doing 1 or 2 of these leaders per patch but obviously flushed out a bit more

the thing with the last two patches is that they were focused on a single task

patch 1: rescuing the zepherite leader

patch 2: discovering scarlet’s left overs
-attack on concordia or w/e

Patch 3: -go to the pale tree and have a chat
-go to the iron marches and help push back the vines
-(now rytlocks bit should have been here)
-go help taimi
-go help bambam
-then go back and help rox

its just so much more disjointed

(if iv missed anything just say)

if dragons can’t corrupt other dragons wouldn’t it make sense that mordremoth would skip the areas that jormag has a lot of control in, if I was mordremoth I’d just skip the norn so they have less reason to fight me so I can more easily dispatch the other races, I likeep that they are also trying to align all the races to, zhaitan was beat by the pact but he never got access to the ley lines so it would make sense that they need a lot more power to fight mordremoth.

ukuni.8745:

if dragons can’t corrupt other dragons wouldn’t it make sense that mordremoth would skip the areas that jormag has a lot of control in, if I was mordremoth I’d just skip the norn so they have less reason to fight me so I can more easily dispatch the other races, I likeep that they are also trying to align all the races to, zhaitan was beat by the pact but he never got access to the ley lines so it would make sense that they need a lot more power to fight mordremoth.

and miss out on all those delicious magic? dwarven magic? the elder dragons aren’t exactly on short supply of minions (or care if they live or die) to pick their fights. all they care about is spreading as much as possible.

saventis.1485:

you could have maybe paced it better by doing 1 or 2 of these leaders per patch but obviously flushed out a bit more

the thing with the last two patches is that they were focused on a single task

patch 1: rescuing the zepherite leader

patch 2: discovering scarlet’s left overs
-attack on concordia or w/e

Patch 3: -go to the pale tree and have a chat
-go to the iron marches and help push back the vines
-(now rytlocks bit should have been here)
-go help taimi
-go help bambam
-then go back and help rox

its just so much more disjointed

(if iv missed anything just say)

nope, that about covers it. taimi and rox are the only ones that get an actual mission though. don’t get me wrong, i liked braham and eir’s awkward bonding, but it was just dialogue. for many people, they didn’t even have to do the event chain in frostgorge.

personally, i’d have put the entire charr plot as a single chapter, and really flesh out on missions. the padding via dynamic events is cool, but does not replace the time spent on instanced missions.

asura and norn seem like they could divide a single chapter, and humans too, if you want a really dense release.

which leaves the sylvari, but honestly they have already gotten tons of exposition, and given the pale tree dialogue, i can’t imagine a decent reason to give them more than one mission, if that (mobilizing the wardens?).

point is, had we split this chapter into 2-3 chapters just of getting the people together, but really fleshing out each of those groups, we could’ve had an amazing story. but instead we rushed through all of them, and didn’t even conclude one of the stories (rytlock?). not only that, but most of the stories were padded by dynamic events but without any meat between the pad. (again: using DEs as padding is totally ok, so long as you don’t treat them as replacement for actual story content. on the crown part i didn’t do a single one of the events)

oh well, what’s done is done, i just hope part 2 pays off.

true
but to be honest i actually kinda liked what they had but i just know it could have been so much more and thats just kinda like … kitten ya know

BrunoBRS.5178:

ukuni.8745:

if dragons can’t corrupt other dragons wouldn’t it make sense that mordremoth would skip the areas that jormag has a lot of control in, if I was mordremoth I’d just skip the norn so they have less reason to fight me so I can more easily dispatch the other races, I likeep that they are also trying to align all the races to, zhaitan was beat by the pact but he never got access to the ley lines so it would make sense that they need a lot more power to fight mordremoth.

and miss out on all those delicious magic? dwarven magic? the elder dragons aren’t exactly on short supply of minions (or care if they live or die) to pick their fights. all they care about is spreading as much as possible.

look what happened when a faction of the races grouped up an elder dragon died, so why would mordremoth risk the same thing happening when he could just eat those artifacts later and have less risk getting killed off, one would think mordremoth ment to disrupt the ley lines so he had enough power to fight the races of tyria since it’s clear they never had this problem on any of there last rises.

Zayd Akira.1942:

There was supposed to be a pretty lengthy event chain that leads to blowing open the doors to the fortress, and a LOT of champion spawns before you can destroy the totem.

From the sounds of it, you got in right as the event finished.

Pretty unfortunate.

Well that explains a lot. I guess that’s one more reason not to tie dynamic event chains to the personal story.

Am i the only one who got an ominous vibe from the Pale Tree suggesting a summit, right there in HER planty place (close to the source of and thematicly similar to Mordremoth), with ALL the world leaders? Last time i checked sylvari were getting a bit of hate and distrust from the others, after Scarlet and now Aerin. Add the feeling that the pale tree is not telling things that she knows. Why didnt anyone raise a brow at this in the story?

Im not beating the dead horse of ‘sylvari=Mordrem’, i dont belive that is the case, but i figured that at least someone in the world would have doubts about this.

Another thing, Jennah seemed to have agreed so easily. To Kasmeer. Through Anise. …Right. 10 golds that its going to be another illusion.

Lastly… Im kinda worried about the placement of all these events. With the massive spread, it is pretty much assured that everyone playing through would use Waypoints.
Now, asura magic aside (that is volatile at its best at times), the whole waypoint system is assaulted by dragonic energies, and Taimi’s recalibrator thingy. If waypoints are such an integral part of the lore, why doesnt anyone seem to be bothered by this?

I just noticed Fort Mariner’s WP has been shattered. While I don’t know when this occurred, I’m curious as to what’s going on or what will go on now that the machine by Taimi is up and running. Are we going to see a reverse of vine population or are things going to get bolstered and roid-out?

I see most of the points I wanted to bring up concerning the failure of this episode had been posted in great detail already. Just my own quick summary before going into the meatier observations.

• Writing is still juvenile (especially in the first half of the episode, as well as the journal entries that seem to have been written by a 13-year-old)
• The dialogues with the Pale Tree are catastrophically lame
• Being referred to as “this one” and “boss” is as cringe-worthy as ever
• Being forced to zerg meta and normal events — again — is not fun
• The addition of the royal crown had great potential — for about a minute — but got turned into another pathetically implemented story element
• That oversight where Rytlock claims Mordremoth can’t get through the Shiverpeaks despite previously acknowledging Mordrem presence in Iron Marches is just… no comment

About Mordremoth and the threat he poses: I think what they’re trying to show is that unlike the other Elder Dragons who needed 40-150 years to begin their invasions Mordremoth is fully awake and already at the height of his power, attacking and feasting all across Tyria simultaneously. (But then compare and contrast with Kralkatorrik who is hungry, still sleepy, was almost killed, and has yet to begin his real war on mortals… but still managed to create a hundreds-of-miles-long swath of twisted land filled with corrupted minions just because he was angry due to a betrayal.) Add to that the facts that he can cripple and exploit the waypoint system and somehow corrupt the sylvari and we can see that he’s really a grave threat to Tyria. However, with this writing it is not shown well at all.

On the other hand, I still cannot wrap my head around the concept that Mordremoth can grow thousands-of-miles-long and several-dozens-of-feet-thick vines from his body, while managing to sprout them through millions upon millions of tons of earth, stone, and whatnot in a matter of weeks. There’s a limit to a healthy suspension of disbelief even in a highly-magical world of godlike draconic entities and things like this certainly cross that line.

> continued in the next post <

About the Ascalonian royal crown: “Shocking” really, but the writers managed to score yet another batch of retcons and lore desecration.

Tribune Rytlock Brimstone: “It is. When Adelbern enacted the ritual with Magdaer, he became a ghost. But the crown was preserved and found by a charr who entered the area later. They toyed with it, and the fragments were lost.”

The ghost of chief courtier Savione: “For many years His Majesty prowled through the city, salvaging armor, weapons, and anything of value. He sealed it in the vault of the royal treasury.”

— Page 336, Ghosts of Ascalon

I don’t think this needs further explanation. Everything of value (one would think a sort of magical crown forged by the gods would be included in that group) was hoarded into the vaults. Every attempt to loot the ruins of Asalon City — both by charr and humans — was foiled by the ghosts up until Dougal Keane’s second break in. Conclusion: either in fragments or in whole, the crown should’ve still been inside the vaults (of which there is a thorough description later in the quoted book). Instead of a cool, instanced mini-dungeon we got three lackluster, random events and three piles of rubble where magical fragments of a very pretty crown were casually dumped.

Rytlock: “It all hinges on Sohothin, my sword. There were originally two of them — Sohothin and another called Magdaer. They were given to the Ascalonians as protection against invasion.”

“Magdaer is a legendary sword of Orrian origin, dating back to a time when the Gods of Tyria walked among the humans and lived in the City of Arah. At some point, Magdaer and its sister, Sohothin, were given as gifts to the Ascalonian royal line to ensure continued peace.”

— http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Magdaer

“Like its “sister”, Magdaer, it is a powerful holy artifact of Orrian origin, given to Ascalonian royalty as a gift of peace."

— http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Sohothin

They were a gift of peace from the Orrian royalty to the Ascalonian, not from the gods to Ascalonians right off the bat to protect them against a supposed invasion.

And last but not least, they managed to make the Six even more imbecile than ever:

Rytlock: “The story began over a thousand years ago, when this ritual was first formulated by the humans’ gods — the Six.”

So instead of giving them mass resurrection relics that revive all the allied fallen on a battlefield, or more idols of Balthazar (which is very dangerous, but still), an artifact capable of massive deceptions of illusions (the sort Koro or Kitah pulled off, but without killing the caster), magic that makes ents out of entire forests, and so on and so on, they gave them cursed swords that would result in the torment of all human souls in an area the size of Ascalon, preventing them peace in the afterlife… Thanks, Six… you were a big help! * mutters under his nose: “bloody jerks!” *

The Foefire so far was established as a curse, the powers of Magdaer corrupted by Adelbern’s madness and hatred. I’m not against it holding the power to invoke a ritual that would actually protect a kingdom without annihilating its human population — or rather, without any sacrifice or casualty required on the side defended by the swords — but I’m indescribably offended by the implication that the Foefire was a legitimate ritual of the Six to begin with. If it turns out what I adumbrated above is actually the truth, and a benign-to-Ascalonians, detrimental-to-invaders Foefire ritual was “hacked” by Adelbern, I’ll take back what I said and am going to say below…

But now we’ve arrived at a point where the Six Gods are not only weak, ignorant, and incompetent, but outright malevolent and cruel with their chosen people… all thanks to the abysmal writing that has taken root in ANet and is ripping the lore of Guild Wars apart from within.

Thalador.4218:

Rytlock: “It all hinges on Sohothin, my sword. There were originally two of them — Sohothin and another called Magdaer. They were given to the Ascalonians as protection against invasion.”

“Magdaer is a legendary sword of Orrian origin, dating back to a time when the Gods of Tyria walked among the humans and lived in the City of Arah. At some point, Magdaer and its sister, Sohothin, were given as gifts to the Ascalonian royal line to ensure continued peace.”

I agree with your points regarding the Crown. Though I thought Rytlock’s comments about Sohothin were a reasonable summary for players who might not know previously. I don’t think there’s a contradiction, ensuring peace vs defense against invasion is pretty similar.

I was surprised that there was no mention of Eir still having the fragments of Magdaer though.

Edit: Regarding the crown, the only explanation I can think of is if Ember Doomforge had returned to the vault and then deliberately tried to hide the crown for some reason.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

In the original ending of Season 1, it was revealed that Rox and Rytlock are half-sisters. This seems like that is still true, even if not revealed. Rytlock and Rox talk a lot about knowing each other for a long time, throughout the final step.

That scene seemed all right and sweet for me, because I took it for granted that they are siblings. It also explains better why Rytlock makes a point out of it to give Rox grief “when she needs it”.

However, like you said, it was never revealed. Yet, the story is written out as if we are supposed to know. This is becoming a habit isn’kitten

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Well that explains a lot. I guess that’s one more reason not to tie dynamic event chains to the personal story.

The same thing happened for me on the Bria chain, and I showed up at the Temple of Serenity one with only 30 seconds left for the event to finish.

Makes me feel so heroic when I walk up and loot a pile of rubble.

Well, Rythlock’s ritual didnt work as intended. I say he based his research on faulty material. So practicly whatever he thinks he knows is either fabrication or mistaken.

lakdav.3694:

Am i the only one who got an ominous vibe from the Pale Tree suggesting a summit, right there in HER planty place (close to the source of and thematicly similar to Mordremoth), with ALL the world leaders?

Yes, you are not alone. The npc’s were like: “That’s a great idea”, and I immediately said to my ranger companion “That sounds like a terrible idea!”. Gathering all the leaders in one place, at the Pale Tree, who already knew about Mordremoth and didn’t tell anyone?

How about we meet somewhere safe, far away from the Pale Tree and Mordremoth, and gather all the leaders there? That sounds like a much better idea!

lakdav.3694:

Well, Rythlock’s ritual didnt work as intended. I say he based his research on faulty material. So practicly whatever he thinks he knows is either fabrication or mistaken.

That’s a good point, it could turn out that part of bringing him back or Rytlock coming back from the Mists reveals where he got his information from and the truth behind how to cleanse the Foefire.

Tricky to know, if Rytlock’s theories completely contradicted prior knowledge we’d (presumably) have been trying to convince him not to perform the ritual.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

lakdav.3694:

Am i the only one who got an ominous vibe from the Pale Tree suggesting a summit, right there in HER planty place (close to the source of and thematicly similar to Mordremoth), with ALL the world leaders?

Yes, you are not alone. The npc’s were like: “That’s a great idea”, and I immediately said to my ranger companion “That sounds like a terrible idea!”. Gathering all the leaders in one place, at the Pale Tree, who already knew about Mordremoth and didn’t tell anyone?

How about we meet somewhere safe, far away from the Pale Tree and Mordremoth, and gather all the leaders there? That sounds like a much better idea!

You do expect any reasonable decissions by anyone?
Right now we are just jumping from “epic” moment to “epic” moment. Where we are going we don`t need any logic or safety.

A “How it shoud have ended” of this episode would be:

pale tree: “we should gather the leader”
PC: “Done, i just send a mail at all my friends, this should not take long.”
PT: “But what if they refuse.”
PC: “Giant plant dragon….attacking… now… but to be honest, we could just use a holographic meeting to be honest.. yeah.. i think send a second letter to Zojja or Taimi, she will rig something up.”
PT: “But…”
PC: “Dont worry, even if you are an avatar they are Asura, they fiddle something together to make your voice heard over their magitech”
PT: “But..”
PC: “You know… why do we even need to form a big alliance? There is just one more dragon there.. sure he is more active then the others at the moment, but we defeated Zaithan. I bet the Pact is able to provide assistance with everything.”
PT: “Mordremoth is a much bigger thread then the others.”
PC: “Oh, is it so? Why? As far as i know he odes more or less the same then the others… just with not so much rumbling… okay, beside the giant vines. Or do you know more?”
PT: “Me, knowing more? No, how should I? I didn`t even know the reach of his vines.”
PC: “If that is really the case suspicious stare , then you are not really capable to lead us anyway.”
PT: “But…”
PC: “Enough with the buts… let me do my job and get the pact here as well as some help from my comrads in arms.”

Hm.. would have been a very short episode though…

For the first hour of playing this episode, I was endlessly yawning and taking breaks because I just couldn’t really handle it. Such a boredom.

“Yo, get people so we can discuss, again! We won’t do anything on our own and we all agree on coming to once place, where we’re just totally safe from threats. No evil force will ever guess to kill us all, for sure!”

“Oh, and to earn our reputation go kill couple wolves, escort NPC and bring some stuff. No, it’s totally not questing, it’s soo dynamic”

So after like two days I’ve finally forced myself to play through it and get to the “fun stuff” with Rytlock.

Turned out to be okay, ending cutscene, Rytlock’s leap of faith, bam, loot and now you can grind for another ugly backpiece or transform yourself into monkey.

As for the story – knowing ANet’s writing everybody will attend, someone unexpected will be there and we’ll have to deal with even more vines with the help of magitech and leylines.

I think about taking some serious break from it. Then, after another 2 years I’ll have couple more armor pieces and content to play for month or so. And no dungeon, because that would be a shame to make one.

My opinion would be that the content, in terms of things to do, was sort of ok and there was something happening. I liked the Mordrem stuff. I don’t think it was bad to mix the new storyline with old missions but it wasn’t great either. The writing was desperately poor in parts though. The stuff with the crown and killing off some Svarnir so that Knut has a day off? Just cheap excuses really.

At the end of the last episode we were all expecting to go to the Pale Tree and get some answers. Instead we go to the Pale Tree and she tells us nothing. The problem here is that the dialog and writing is generally poor and we can’t tell if this is a writing error or deliberate evasion on the part of the Pale Tree. It could be as bad as nobody bothering to tell Rytlock and Smodur about the supersized fauna in the Iron Marches. We just don’t know!

Since players only have one option when choosing dialog and actions, any flaws in the story are even more exposed as players are forced to choose a poor option. Our character is being rather dumb, giving all our information to the Pale Tree without getting answers in return, but we have to follow it. Combined with our characters seeming to know more than the players, and explaining the plot to us as we go along, it really breaks the role playing in an MMO RPG.

Thalador.4218:

Rytlock: “It all hinges on Sohothin, my sword. There were originally two of them — Sohothin and another called Magdaer. They were given to the Ascalonians as protection against invasion.”

“Magdaer is a legendary sword of Orrian origin, dating back to a time when the Gods of Tyria walked among the humans and lived in the City of Arah. At some point, Magdaer and its sister, Sohothin, were given as gifts to the Ascalonian royal line to ensure continued peace.”

— http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Magdaer

“Like its “sister”, Magdaer, it is a powerful holy artifact of Orrian origin, given to Ascalonian royalty as a gift of peace."

— http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Sohothin

They were a gift of peace from the Orrian royalty to the Ascalonian, not from the gods to Ascalonians right off the bat to protect them against a supposed invasion.

I’m not sure, but I think GW2 ANet thinks Orr = Arah. At the time the twin swords were made, Orr, Ascalon, and Lion’s Arch were all basically considered continental Tyrians…meaning they were all part of the same human nation(most of Kryta was colonized by Elona later). Arah, the City of the Gods, was a separate place of divine making, not human. Granted it was right next to the humans living on the Orrian peninsula, but they weren’t the same thing. Orr didn’t even become its own distinct nation until 2AE. The twin blades were likely gifts to the humans living in Orr from the gods living in Arah well before the exodus. Later, after the Guild Wars, the Orrians gave them to Ascalon as a peace offering, like Thalador states here.

ukuni.8745:

BrunoBRS.5178:

ukuni.8745:

if dragons can’t corrupt other dragons wouldn’t it make sense that mordremoth would skip the areas that jormag has a lot of control in, if I was mordremoth I’d just skip the norn so they have less reason to fight me so I can more easily dispatch the other races, I likeep that they are also trying to align all the races to, zhaitan was beat by the pact but he never got access to the ley lines so it would make sense that they need a lot more power to fight mordremoth.

and miss out on all those delicious magic? dwarven magic? the elder dragons aren’t exactly on short supply of minions (or care if they live or die) to pick their fights. all they care about is spreading as much as possible.

look what happened when a faction of the races grouped up an elder dragon died, so why would mordremoth risk the same thing happening when he could just eat those artifacts later and have less risk getting killed off, one would think mordremoth ment to disrupt the ley lines so he had enough power to fight the races of tyria since it’s clear they never had this problem on any of there last rises.

and half those races weren’t even directly affected by zhaitan. the attacks don’t lose intensity when mordremoth spreads out, because he has virtually unlimited resources. he’s better off spreading as much as possible so he can gather as much magic as possible and, in turn, become as powerful as possible when the pact inevitably comes. you’re expecting a dragon to cower and hide behind a wall of minions. that isn’t happening.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

Zayd Akira.1942:

There was supposed to be a pretty lengthy event chain that leads to blowing open the doors to the fortress, and a LOT of champion spawns before you can destroy the totem.

From the sounds of it, you got in right as the event finished.

Pretty unfortunate.

Well that explains a lot. I guess that’s one more reason not to tie dynamic event chains to the personal story.

you can tie them, so long as they check if you did the kitten thing before allowing to progress.

Obsidian.1328:

Thalador.4218:

Rytlock: “It all hinges on Sohothin, my sword. There were originally two of them — Sohothin and another called Magdaer. They were given to the Ascalonians as protection against invasion.”

“Magdaer is a legendary sword of Orrian origin, dating back to a time when the Gods of Tyria walked among the humans and lived in the City of Arah. At some point, Magdaer and its sister, Sohothin, were given as gifts to the Ascalonian royal line to ensure continued peace.”

— http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Magdaer

“Like its “sister”, Magdaer, it is a powerful holy artifact of Orrian origin, given to Ascalonian royalty as a gift of peace."

— http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Sohothin

They were a gift of peace from the Orrian royalty to the Ascalonian, not from the gods to Ascalonians right off the bat to protect them against a supposed invasion.

I’m not sure, but I think GW2 ANet thinks Orr = Arah. At the time the twin swords were made, Orr, Ascalon, and Lion’s Arch were all basically considered continental Tyrians…meaning they were all part of the same human nation(most of Kryta was colonized by Elona later). Arah, the City of the Gods, was a separate place of divine making, not human. Granted it was right next to the humans living on the Orrian peninsula, but they weren’t the same thing. Orr didn’t even become its own distinct nation until 2AE. The twin blades were likely gifts to the humans living in Orr from the gods living in Arah well before the exodus. Later, after the Guild Wars, the Orrians gave them to Ascalon as a peace offering, like Thalador states here.

it’s like how we treat ancient greek city-states as parts of a single thing. if GW2 ANet is guilty of it, then so are we.

and nothing rytlock said contradicts previous lore of the swords. he never mentioned the gods giving it to the ascalonians. what kept the gods from giving it to orrians, and then the orrians later gave them to ascalon? i mean, it’s not like we didn’t have a unified kingdom at some point, right?

—

and at the people complaining the gathering has to be at the pale tree… where else? they can’t move the pale tree around, you know. it’s part of being a kittening tree.

BrunoBRS.5178:

…and nothing rytlock said contradicts previous lore of the swords

Yet: Rytlock: “They were given to the Ascalonians as protection against invasion.”

That’s new. Technically it doesn’t contradict anything because it never really states what the swords functions are besides a peace token. But it still adds to it.

Jaken.6801:

So, episode 3 starts today, lets get the discussion going

Obviously spoiler

Beware, i feel like a lot i will be writing will sound harsh, but believe me, i am mostly positive in my opinion

- Kasmeer gets pushed in the center again as the unvailer of the nightmare tower

- taimi is back to school… What about the whole Mordremoth etc.? urgency please…

- So Majory is just away for a short while… what was the point then… (well, we will see)

- The pale tree knew about Mordremoth since the roar… How about giving us a call?
Then the pale tree does not know how far it spreads… so she is only aware of his awakening and nothing more? Is her Mordremoth sense tingeling?

- So a summit now? I know that we have talked about it, but how about getting the pact more involved first. You know, the fighting force designed to fight eldar dragons?
I know it is urgent, but this Season beginns to feel like a rushed job…

A: I don’t see how it’s “Pushed into the center”, the Warden was, IIRC, merely commentating on feats he had been told about from your group. Kasmeer and You hold that.
B: You really expect the colleges and/or Zojja to let Taimi run about freely for months on end instead of attending her coursework?
C: Um, Marjory left for the funeral and to grieve, that’s not something that might take forever….
D: Frankly, we heard the roar in LA. A lot of people knew something was up.
E: Note Trahearne sends you a letter and comments that if the five races unite, them + the Pact could fight the dragon and possibly loose a LOT less people then the Pact did against Zhaitan. Basically, “The extra firepower and numbers can REALLY help out.”

RedStar.4218:

And what the hell is the point of a summit ? The orders and now the Pact are in charge of fighting the dragons. That’s their mission, and up to now, they have one success

And they took quite a beating taking out Zhaitan.

Trahearne sends you a letter saying that the five races united and fighting a dragon together with the Pact could mean victory with a LOT less fallen soldiers. A lot less blood on the ground.

Erukk.1408:

• Asuran bureaucracy I can understand, and its horribly sad that I have to agree with Phlunt of all people. Two weeks!? I know they are trying to sync it up with real time, but my character didn’t seem to bat an eyelash at that. Two weeks was enough time for Mordy to cross most of Tyria and ripe apart two forts, and add two weeks more, he seems to be doing a hostile invasion of the Iron Marches now. Two weeks is a long time, and my character should be deeply frustrated when hearing that.

They never said two weeks. Though this is one of the first times we get explicit in lore time matching real time.

A lot of the other updates and events were NOT two weeks apart. Infact, I’d say two weeks (in canon) didn’t pass between episode 1 and 2 for season 2, like two weeks didn’t pass between the escape from LA and the battle for LA.

BrunoBRS.5178:

lordkrall.7241:

RedStar.4218:

Each time a dragon woke up, it did something incredibly huge and terrible.

More than a few months after waking up, all Mordremoth has done is destroy a few forts and kill a few dozen of people. That’s not big.

Do not confuse in-game time with real-world time.

For all we know it has only been two weeks since the defeat of Scarlet.

they went through the trouble of syncing the calendar to disprove that kind of argument.

They also explicitly said events such as the Marionette happened ONCE TOTAL in canon, and was a success.

There was no two weeks of fighting the Marionette in canon, it happened a single time.

edit: Also, Jennah agreeing makes sense. She was the force behind the human-charr treaty, EXACTLY for the reason of the dragons.

Also, IIRC, Kasmeer name-drops you to Anise as well.

As for “Why don’t I just meet with EVERYBODY!” Well, you can be in one place at one time. Meanwhile, you got four other people here who can easily drop by and deliver your message for you…

Also the fact various leaders ARE busy, so you barging into an Arcane Council meeting to demand they come to a summit wouldn’t work at all. Also the fact if you are say, a Norn or human, they might ignore you entirely.

Kalavier.1097:

- snip-

A: Kasmeer appears two times throughout the story only to exposite on things and we get furthermore “reminded” of her feats.
Furthermore it is her talking to Anise and subsequently to the Queen that gets the humans on our side (however i let it slide, due to the fact that it is a solution for people who are not human. though, even then our Character would have been able to talk to Logan or even the Queen directly, since he is actually a well known figure in the world at this point in time. He does not really need the others. He can just write a letter)

B: Giant Plant Dragon Attacking Tyria… I think they are a bit more linient if her adventuring is able to solve that little problem…
btw. a better “excuse” would habe simply been: “Taimi is back to Rata Sum to check some archives for her machine that will save the waypoints”
The school stuff just makes the whole thing not urgent but the opposite.

C: Yes, she is gone for a while. That is a good move (and btw. i wrote that segment before i finished the story), which i apreciate.
It is great that she is not back in this episode. I really applaude them for that.
However as you were saying. She was gone to grieve and here i do not care how “time” works.
Having Kasmeer just come in and say: “oh, she took care of everything and will be joining us in a bit.” Is not something fitting.
I do not care about how composed the character in question is. Majory was definetly hit by Belindas death and that is something that should be reflected in some way.
Kasmeer giving us that information in that way implies that it was nothing more then a formality and everything will be fine.
The problem here is basicly he lack of emotion and information we got regarding that matter.
All we got was “her buisness has been dealt with and she will join us later”.

D: Here comes the whole “Everyone suddenly knows Mordremoth” into play.
Suddenly everyone knows now who Mordremoth is.
The Pale Tree even stated that she knew it the moment she heard the Roar, which implies that allready had a hunch.
I do not really know how to feel about her, since she should be able to give us much more answers then she is ready to at the moment.

E: Okay, getting all races together is the logical reaction you come to? That is no proper escalation in my book. Sorry.
We had a problem. Zaithan.
We defeated the problem through the pact. Which means we have a fighting force which is able to fight toe to toe with Eldar dragons and his minions.
A force which has machinery which uses the ideas of all greater races and the secret orders.
A force which uses and collects all information about eldar Dragons.
A force which had over a year (since it did not help out against Scarlet) to reinforce it`s ranks (which should be easy, sicne they have shown that they are not fighting a lost cause), upgrade their technology through experience and maybe some of Scarlets scrap (Aetherblade magitech weapons and armor sound sweet on pact stormtrooper in my opinion).
A force whose whole purpose is to fight and defend against all eldar dragons.

Even if they are occupied on the Kalkratorik and the Jormag front (which they aren`t at this point, since we have no update on anything they do.) They should still have forces left, to work against an imidiate thread.
That thread is Mordremoth.

So the way to escalate here would have been:
- Investigate the roar
- deduce that it is an eldar dragon
- warn the people who are in danger
- Call the pact
- Try to fight the dragon with the people who are trained to do so, while simultaniously study him
- Call the leaders for help if everything else fails…

Right now the story is just skipping simple logical steps.

Yes, Trahearn would love the “extra firepower”, which general would not.
However, the question her is: Why is he not fighting already?

Why is the pact nowhere to be seen?
We were told they did not engage Scarlet, because “she was no eldar dragon”.

Now they tell us everyone knew it was Mordremoth and the Pact is still not moving or sending scouts or whatever.

I am sorry, this right now is just trying to top the PS in terms of scale and while the scenario fit and i get the idea they are going for, the whole thing seriously breaks down if we go into pacing and structure.
This thing has more holes then the cheese i had for breakfast and i seriously doubt that there will be a good explanation coming for anything that happens.

Obsidian.1328:

BrunoBRS.5178:

…and nothing rytlock said contradicts previous lore of the swords

Yet: Rytlock: “They were given to the Ascalonians as protection against invasion.”

That’s new. Technically it doesn’t contradict anything because it never really states what the swords functions are besides a peace token. But it still adds to it.

i thought he said given to the humans, though as you pointed out, nothing about it contradicts estabilished information. nothing says a peace token can’t come with a letter and the words “for safekeeping”.

BrunoBRS.5178:

Obsidian.1328:

BrunoBRS.5178:

…and nothing rytlock said contradicts previous lore of the swords

Yet: Rytlock: “They were given to the Ascalonians as protection against invasion.”

That’s new. Technically it doesn’t contradict anything because it never really states what the swords functions are besides a peace token. But it still adds to it.

i thought he said given to the humans, though as you pointed out, nothing about it contradicts estabilished information. nothing says a peace token can’t come with a letter and the words “for safekeeping”.

Absence is the mother of Invention.

Obsidian.1328:

Absence is the mother of Invention.

Actually, I rather thought that was something else entirely but sure, let’s go with that

Something about the Pale Tree’s dialogue seem weird. I don’t think you get that part if you’re a human :
“-I didn’t understand much of the vision but you were at the center.
-Well my child, the one thing you must not forget is that I stand between you and the greatest darkness you’ll ever face”.

So why did every other race also saw that her ? She isn’t protecting humans or Charr.

And what’s so poweful about Mordremoth’s corruption ? Don’t tell me they are actually writting him as the biggest and baddest ED…
The Pale Tree says she doesn’t shield the soundless and (maybe) the NC, yet Zhaitan can’t even corrupt them. And why is Mordremoth only attacking Sylvari is Zhaitan, who couldn’t even corrupt hem, could corrupt everything else ?
Sure Scarlet was a genius. But Aerin wasn’t anything special.

Things are starting more and more to be written in a completely convenient way where the reader (because “player” is a big word for what we’ve been doing in this episode) shouldn’t start even trying to poke holes in the plot.

RedStar.4218:

Something about the Pale Tree’s dialogue seem weird. I don’t think you get that part if you’re a human :
“-I didn’t understand much of the vision but you were at the center.
-Well my child, the one thing you must not forget is that I stand between you and the greatest darkness you’ll ever face”.

So why did every other race also saw that her ? She isn’t protecting humans or Charr.

And what’s so poweful about Mordremoth’s corruption ? Don’t tell me they are actually writting him as the biggest and baddest ED…
The Pale Tree says she doesn’t shield the soundless and (maybe) the NC, yet Zhaitan can’t even corrupt them. And why is Mordremoth only attacking Sylvari is Zhaitan, who couldn’t even corrupt hem, could corrupt everything else ?
Sure Scarlet was a genius. But Aerin wasn’t anything special.

Things are starting more and more to be written in a completely convenient way where the reader (because “player” is a big word for what we’ve been doing in this episode) shouldn’t start even trying to poke holes in the plot.

she doesn’t say that line to anyone but the sylvari. if she did, it flew right over me.

she stands between the sylvari and mordremoth. it’s kinda implied that she immunizes against all dragons period, but i think that might have been sloppy writing. i don’t know. that scene was in dire need of a rewrite.

BrunoBRS.5178:

she doesn’t say that line to anyone but the sylvari. if she did, it flew right over me.

she stands between the sylvari and mordremoth. it’s kinda implied that she immunizes against all dragons period, but i think that might have been sloppy writing. i don’t know. that scene was in dire need of a rewrite.

Yeah she only says that line to Sylvari, yet every other race also saw her at the center of the Eternal Alchemy and she isn’t protecting them.

That entire scene wasn’t too good. But the “(gasp) no !” is still priceless.

Jaken.6801:

D: Here comes the whole “Everyone suddenly knows Mordremoth” into play.
Suddenly everyone knows now who Mordremoth is.
The Pale Tree even stated that she knew it the moment she heard the Roar, which implies that allready had a hunch.
I do not really know how to feel about her, since she should be able to give us much more answers then she is ready to at the moment.

But not everybody knows instantly who it is. The people we talk to are Destiny’s edge, or nation leaders… It’s not like some peasant is screaming it.

E: Okay, getting all races together is the logical reaction you come to? That is no proper escalation in my book. Sorry.
We had a problem. Zaithan.
We defeated the problem through the pact. Which means we have a fighting force which is able to fight toe to toe with Eldar dragons and his minions.

A fighting force that got bloodied fighting in Orr, and Orr still is dangerous. We aren’t talking about taking a single fort, we are talking about marching through a nation filled to the brim with undead, and every fallen possibly adding to the enemy ranks. As Commander (former) of the Pact, we know EXACTLY how bloodied the Pact was (Or logically should). Given how the attacks are, it’s also a good idea to get the nation armies united and alert, as the vines are attacking all over. We don’t have a pretty front line like with the Risen.

Yes, Trahearn would love the “extra firepower”, which general would not.
However, the question her is: Why is he not fighting already?

Why is the pact nowhere to be seen?
We were told they did not engage Scarlet, because “she was no eldar dragon”.

Now they tell us everyone knew it was Mordremoth and the Pact is still not moving or sending scouts or whatever.

I am sorry, this right now is just trying to top the PS in terms of scale and while the scenario fit and i get the idea they are going for, the whole thing seriously breaks down if we go into pacing and structure.

When do they say “Everybody knew it was Mordremoth”

Seriously, I did run it once truthfully, and fast, but the only real mention I got of that was “The Pale tree knew it was Mordremoth, and was working to make sure the grove security got buffed.” Not “Every peasant, militiaman, and farmer knows it was Mordremoth.” Maybe you mean something else, but I didn’t really get that feeling from the update. Or if it appeared, it’s more of “OH, so that roar is linked to these vines trying to kill us, OKAY!”

Who says the Pact isn’t planning, moving, or sending scouts out?

Also consider Trahearnes letter to YOU. In which he says he wants to meet you before the summit so he can get you up to speed on what the pact has been doing. ALSO that he wants to tell you some things about the Pact and it’s plans for mordremoth

He also explicitly mentions “Maybe we’ll loose fewer people then we did fighting Zhaitan.” This points to me the obvious fact, the Pact’s victory over Zhaitan cost a LOT. Sure, it didn’t break the Pact manpower wise, but it wasn’t easy.

RedStar.4218:

Yeah she only says that line to Sylvari, yet every other race also saw her at the center of the Eternal Alchemy and she isn’t protecting them.

That entire scene wasn’t too good. But the “(gasp) no !” is still priceless.

This was kinda answered in the “not Sylvari” dialogue…

Pale Tree: What dangers have you been toying with? Such things were not meant to be seen. They will crack your mind.
Player: I didn’t understand much of the vision, but you were at the center.
Pale Tree: If this was the device that Ceara used, then it must have maintained some of her touch upon it. But, I do not know what it could mean. Only you can know that.

It could be taken a number of ways, but I’m guessing it might just boil down to, “We might have seen a part of the Eternal Alchemy, but more importantly, we saw Scarlet’s version of it.”

Though, it does seem the Sylvari players got most of the good hints and info. And thank you to whoever put up all the dialogue on the wiki.

Pale Tree: Yes. In the past, my children have been immune. But Mordremoth’s corruption is powerful, and just as Zhaitan created the undead from so many creatures, so Mordremoth’s corruption can change you.

Something we already knew, but more proof that the Sylvari are more susceptible to Mordy’s corruption because they are plants.

Pale Tree: I believe she opened herself to it when she let down the wall of her mind. Mordremoth’s corruption seeps in through the cracks in our willpower. Do not follow in her footsteps.
Sylvari Player: I have no plan to do so, Mother. I’m strong willed.

More information regarding Mordy’s corruption style. Pale Tree acts as a shield against corruption, but hints that strong willed individuals might be able to resist it? Obvious mental aspect is obvious.

Possible connection to the Nightmare Court conversion style as well?

lakdav.3694:

Am i the only one who got an ominous vibe from the Pale Tree suggesting a summit, right there in HER planty place (close to the source of and thematicly similar to Mordremoth), with ALL the world leaders? Last time i checked sylvari were getting a bit of hate and distrust from the others, after Scarlet and now Aerin. Add the feeling that the pale tree is not telling things that she knows. Why didnt anyone raise a brow at this in the story?

Im not beating the dead horse of ‘sylvari=Mordrem’, i dont belive that is the case, but i figured that at least someone in the world would have doubts about this.

Another thing, Jennah seemed to have agreed so easily. To Kasmeer. Through Anise. …Right. 10 golds that its going to be another illusion.

Lastly… Im kinda worried about the placement of all these events. With the massive spread, it is pretty much assured that everyone playing through would use Waypoints.
Now, asura magic aside (that is volatile at its best at times), the whole waypoint system is assaulted by dragonic energies, and Taimi’s recalibrator thingy. If waypoints are such an integral part of the lore, why doesnt anyone seem to be bothered by this?

The pale tree is… well… a tree. The white flower we all talk to is just her Avatar, and as far as we’ve seen, her avatar cant move from that place she is at in the omphalos chamber. The only time we’ve seen the pale tree move at all was in the personal story when she took us to Orr, but that was in a vision, and she wasn’t really there. She hadnt really left her spot in the omphalos chamber.

How do you expect her to talk to all the leaders of the races without the ability to move, if she cant invite everyone to come see her?

With that wonderful invention called “ambassadors”, im quite sure that a number of firstborn would be up for it. Or there is a number of asuran technologies that could be used, already established to be working.

But my point mainly is that everyone thinks that collecting every national leader on one place so close to the source of the threat is a great idea. At least the human queen or her bodyguards could be suspicious. Hell, I wouldnt put it past Caudecus to advise eagerly for or against the queen going (depending on his intentions). Alas we must take Kasmeers word for it that the queen is coming. With all we have seen of the actual queen since the end of the human Orders missions, i dont believe for a second that its the queen who will be there.

Kalavier.1097:

-snip-

Everyone knows Mordremoth
Here is the deal.
The problem with naming Mordremoth in general was: “Nobody knew it`s name beside the players.”

Now it is suddenly canon that the pact and subsequently the great leaders of the world have knowledge about every eldar dragon out there. That might even include the big mystery dragon bubbles at the moment.

Yes, when I say “everyone”, I mean simply the fact this is suddenly apeaers to be common knowledge, not only to the people who are fighting the Mordrem (though they shouldn`t even know their name, since they do not talk like Zaithans minions).

Everyone by now is refering to Mordremoth and not only the “leaders”. The warden at the beginning talks about him, Charr in the iron marches call their enemies “Mordrem” (I like my Mordrems extra crispy) and Rythlock and the Asura are knowing the same amount.

Mordremoth is nothing “new” to them and the writing suggests that that was never the case. No one is suprised and just goes with the flow.

The only thing suprised is “maybe” when the vines suddenly pop up, since this is something that can happen everywhere, but not about who is behind it.

The Pact
Yes he Pact was crippled, i never said it wasn`t.
We have seen the loss of life first hand.
I never said he would not want the help from five whole nations…

However, again, it has been over one and a half year since the fight against Zaithan.
They had ample time to regroup, recruit and rebuild their forces, even if they are still dealing with orr, gathering intel on the other dragons and morun their losses.

The roar was about three months ago, coming from the maguma jungle and if the pact and all leader knew from that roar that it has to be an eldar dragon, no that it has to be Mordremoth, then the pact, who is the go to group in regards of fighting dragon did nothing in the last three months.

We do not see a single pact member in dry top. The only thing close to it are three members of the priory who do not even have a clue about what is going on. Who do not even think it is an eldar dragon.

There was ample reaction time and I do not care about how crippled or slow the pact as a military force is.
There is always someone there to scout.

We see no scouts, we do not even see an airship.
In this last three months, where it was apearently clear that it has to be a dragon the pact did nothing. (and even if it was so obviously Mordremoth, they still need to send people there. Allt hey did know from Mordremoth has been from old texts and the Inquest in CoE. So the simple idea of “know your enemy” dictates to get intel on him as fast as possible, to update your information)

Saying that they are “planning” to do something, is way too late at this point, since we as a player are already too late.

The pact is allready the best Army against the eldar dragons, since they already combine all races to a single cause.
So it should be the pact that is calling for help and not the Comander who hasn`t been in touch with them for over one and a half year.
You said it yourself: “Trahearn send a letter to get the PC up to speed on the pact” which clearly indicates the PC has no clue about the possible status of this fighing force.

(The things the other nations could bring of course is manpower and “secret” powers, normal people who joined the pact do not have access to… though these things shouldn`t be so hidden, considering the pact has the priory and the order of whipsers in their ranks who should be knowledgeable about all of the strenghts…)

Mordemoths danger
He is as dangerous as primordus. The only difference is that he just woke up and is marking his territory or is “attacking directly” (or in my opinion everything is coleteral damage, since he is just expanding to food sources like a plant turns to the sun).
Primordus, the first to awake is living under the earths crusts. Even if he is fighting the dwars down there, he is still theoretical able to pup up everyhwere. So yeah. nothing new here.
Though the only “difference” might be that the vines itself are really Mordremoth, so we ahve the main body in plain sight… (didn`t majory made some poison against plants? why don`t we try injecting some of it in there and see how it works).
However, we do not know the nature of Primordus body, which could be a living being out of lava if we go by the other dragons (plant dragon made out of plants and the death dragon made out of dead bodies. having a fire dragon made of lava sounds reasonable) design.

lakdav.3694:

With that wonderful invention called “ambassadors”, im quite sure that a number of firstborn would be up for it. Or there is a number of asuran technologies that could be used, already established to be working.

But my point mainly is that everyone thinks that collecting every national leader on one place so close to the source of the threat is a great idea. At least the human queen or her bodyguards could be suspicious. Hell, I wouldnt put it past Caudecus to advise eagerly for or against the queen going (depending on his intentions). Alas we must take Kasmeers word for it that the queen is coming. With all we have seen of the actual queen since the end of the human Orders missions, i dont believe for a second that its the queen who will be there.

Well, as we know she is part of the Mesmer Overlords, we can always count on an illusion to keep the Queen save.
Hey, we can even go so far as have an Asura-Ex-Machina save everyone

Don`t worry. I am sure nothing will happen anyway. I mean a great leader allready went to “hell” (Rythlock kitten moment), there should not be more happening, right?

A: When do they say all world leaders have great knowledge about all the dragons?

Infact, I think the point in the Norn and Charr parts is basically informing them about how they could very easily be at risk.

B: WE ARE A SINGLE PERSON. You expect us to see every tiny thing? Every scout? Order of Whispers are VERY good at being unseen when they want to be. As a single person, in a lore standpoint, we’d see what’s directly around us. We wouldn’t know if the Pact sent an airship over the falls (they very well could’ve!). We wouldn’t know if Trahearne sent a series of scouts across the Maguuma wastes region…

Moving armies takes TIME. If Trahearne was mobilizing the Pact to march toward the wastes, it wouldn’t be instant travel and done deal.

Also the very, very clear fact that sometimes in universe time does NOT MATCH REAL TIME. Battle for LA (including Escape) did not take months. Those events happened a single time. Marionette fight? Didn’t last two weeks, it happened a single time.

Episode 2 could’ve easily been within days of episode 1. Episode 3 possibly a week from episode 2.

Recall for example, we went into Dry Top investigating strange things and a bandit smuggling operation. We walked into Dry top as the Sanctum crashed. We had no idea the Sanctum was overhead (in character), or that it was sabotaged and crashing. We literally walked into the event. So how would we know if there isn’t a Pact airship over the falls?

Let’s say the pact was still in rebuilding/organizing/stand by mode when Episode 1 happens (which doesn’t clearly have any dragon hints at all, it’s just some vines at that point). Episode 2 happens, suddenly the vines strike out (we’ll assume a few days after episode 1 in this situation). Pact suddenly is alerted to this because of Concordia.

Then we have.. probably a week before episode 3 events in this situation/assumption.

So going with… 2-3 weeks, based out of Fort Trinity (Pact HQ remember?) Scouts could still be on the field, or just now reporting back.

“Plans” could mean simply large scale troop movements. Not “We are planning to scout.” People here like to think it’s easy to instantly move entire armies and their supplies, siege weapons, support lines, etc… it’s not.

djsarcher.9263:

Thalador.4218:

Rytlock: “It all hinges on Sohothin, my sword. There were originally two of them — Sohothin and another called Magdaer. They were given to the Ascalonians as protection against invasion.”

“Magdaer is a legendary sword of Orrian origin, dating back to a time when the Gods of Tyria walked among the humans and lived in the City of Arah. At some point, Magdaer and its sister, Sohothin, were given as gifts to the Ascalonian royal line to ensure continued peace.”

I agree with your points regarding the Crown. Though I thought Rytlock’s comments about Sohothin were a reasonable summary for players who might not know previously. I don’t think there’s a contradiction, ensuring peace vs defense against invasion is pretty similar.

I was surprised that there was no mention of Eir still having the fragments of Magdaer though.

Edit: Regarding the crown, the only explanation I can think of is if Ember Doomforge had returned to the vault and then deliberately tried to hide the crown for some reason.

Being devil’s advocate for a moment, the Charr are likely under the impression that the sister swords were created for specifically malicious purposes and don’t know the exact history. After all, they spent so much time just destroying anything human in Ascalon. Remember, these are words coming from a Charr – the race in which was robbed. That’s a decent reason to be sour over, making the events subjective based on its effects to an audience.

While the Charr see it as weapons of mass destruction, I’d hazard a guess that someone like Logan would just as easily say it was purely Adelbern’s doing as he took the final leap to insanity.

BrunoBRS.5178:

she doesn’t say that line to anyone but the sylvari. if she did, it flew right over me.

she stands between the sylvari and mordremoth. it’s kinda implied that she immunizes against all dragons period, but i think that might have been sloppy writing. i don’t know. that scene was in dire need of a rewrite.

I don’t think it implies that at all. She seems pretty direct when she tries to explain the similarities between Mord’s corruption on sylvari and how Zhaitan’s corruption affected the dead. While yes it’s sloppy, I think it was more so direct that because of their fauna-like nature, the Sylvari are incredibly susceptible where as we haven’t gotten any detailed accounts of non-sylvari being corrupted by Mord.

Kalavier.1097:

- snip-

A: Nobody bats an eye after you mention Mordremoth to either Eir, Rythlock or their supperiors.
They all accept it.
They might not know the danger they are in, since they are occupied with other things and have to move their ressources acordingly (thats what this episode was about), however them knowing about the EDs seems to be the case.
I never said they know a great deal about them anyway. Just the fact that they know it`s name and nature. Maybe Trahearn send a message to all.

B: Yes we are one person and I do not expect us to see everything. However:
- We are/were a pact comander, subsequently we should have been informed, simply because we are a veteran eldar dragon fighter who has/had a leading position.

- The pact can easily move several scouts and even troops at the moment. They got airships and the waypoints. Not all of them are corrupted and the fact that there was an airship over lions arch after Scarlets defeat, just to give us the message “yeah the pact still exists, they just did not interfered because there was no dragon.”

btw. Shortest route: Trinity —> OoW Headquarters —> L.A. —> Rata Sum —> Dry Top

Shortest way to comunicate? The world has pidgeons, radio and magic… I do not see any reason for them not to use it.

In the wake of globalisation, transporting small troups should really not be the concern.

- “We do not see everything” is just a cheap way out. Yes normaly we would not see everything, however this is an open world and subsequently we should be able to get an angle in certain things if we want to (given that we do not have a clear timeframe and thus we should be able to have some time to explore and get that angle).
We are able to climb the wreckage and get over the clouds of Dry Top, which would allow us to see a potential Airship.

We are members of certain Orders. As a OoW operative, a high ranking furthermore, I should be able to see/be aproached by my subordinates, since they should not have these secrets in front of me. Most importantly I could be an asset and not a danger to their cause.

The same goes for every other order that could possibly scouting there, since they have no reason to do any secret stuff. Be it Vigil or Priory.

- Even if you consider it a “lore standpoint” we are still able to explore in the time between. Right now as nothing has been shown or told to us that there is any kind of pact movement in any way, it is simply not happening.

- Even considering the time anomaly throughout the whole story segments, as they will never sync up with anything, there is still the simple fact:
We hear Roar —> knowledgable people know it is an eldar dragon —> go investigate/intercept/do something —> call the army —> call for help

As far as we now, there was not really a “do something” on anyones part (Aside Mister E, who send us there… oh and some little priory team). More so, we got a little fesival to participate in etc…

- I never expect anykind of big army movement, only for the pact or at least the order members to actively help against the eldar dragon activities.
This is not the case.
In the PS every order was quick on their feet to go against the forces of Zaithan.
All of them are couriously absent so far (except three priory members with no clue)

At this point the time does not even matter so much as the order in which things are being presented to us.
Remember this is a visual medium which also means: “show, don`t tell.”

Even if they get Trahearn to tell us anything he has been doing, it should have been able for us to at least see something there.
Which is ironic. They put in so many details here and there to hint at certain things (which might never be explained) and then miss these things.

PS: There is no official Pact HQ at the moment. Fort Trinity is nothing more then that. a forward comand center against Zaithan.
So far there has been not any update on the Pact movements in any way and thus we can only asume things.
As far as I am concerned, they left some back at cleaning up Orr, using FT as their base of operation and went back inland to regroup, rebuild, recruit and upgrade their infrastructure, while looking for the next target.
This would include a headquarter which is more centred in Tyria, to allow better distribution of their forces to all possible fronts, as they lick their wounds and heal.

“And what’s so poweful about Mordremoth’s corruption ? Don’t tell me they are actually writting him as the biggest and baddest ED…”
There’s even an event that makes him a bit trivial. The one in the Iron Marches where you have to cover yourself up in Mordrem spores. I mean, come on, apparently we have jackals infested with Mordrem plants everywhere, but yeeaaah let’s roll into the spores, they can’t be that bad, it’s just a Dragon after all !

“Possible connection to the Nightmare Court conversion style as well?”
Actually, I think the Nightmare Courtiers are as much protected as the other Sylvari. The shield seems to be the Dream, or the influence the Pale Tree has on the Dream, at least. The Nightmare is a part of the Dream, hence why it’s not the Courtiers that are the most sensitive to corruption, but the Soundless, who try to isolate themselves from the Dream. I see a lot of people linking the Court to the Dragon Corruption, but I think that’s the contrary : they’re protected, as much as the Dreamers, they’re in the Pale Tree’s “grand design”.

“Scarlet giggled as she raised her hand to her face and watched the red thorn vine chase itself between her fingers. “So much makes sense now. The Pale Tree, the Nightmare Court, Caithe and Faolain…it’s all part of a grand design.”
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/short-story-what-scarlet-saw/

“The whole premise here was so sloppy – the audience with the Pale Tree was done via Kasmeer (despite it not making sense) because there isn’t a single biconic from the sylvari race (it even happens if your PC is sylvari).”
I agree. Even if the PC isn’t Sylvari, it makes no sense to me that Kasmeer is the one organizing the audience. I only play Sylvari, but if I’m not wrong, every race meet the Pale Tree in the personnal story, right ?
I’m a bit annoyed by the fact that they try to use the biconics even where it makes no sense at all. They could have used a firstborn, if they really wanted to make someone else than the player ask for an audience, at least it would have made more sense to me.

BTW, why are we sending Kasmeer to talk to Queen Jennah? The player is far more familiar with the Queen, and since I play a human noble it would make even more sense for me to go there personally. The writers have made way points a part of the world and the story, but conveniently forget they exist when ever it suits the plot. We could instantly be in Divinity’s Reach, or any other capital for that matter, and ask each leader personally to join us at the summit. We don’t need to send anyone to do that for us.

I feel that Waypoints being threatened are only a thing to make it feel personal. EVERY player uses waypoints, and waypoints are everywhere. Alas, its not a weighted companion cube in the middle of an isolated test marathon, so that intended part falls flat.

NPCs continue to ignore the possibilities provided by waypoints. They are only like “Oh, our waypoints are in danger! We cant have that!” while they would rather lay down and die, hoping for an adventurer to revive them, before they actually use WPs.

Lore-wise, the WPs being under assault is only bad for the asuras and the players. Even this should be remedied by the time Taimi’s device maps the network. The whole arc missed its own point.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

BTW, why are we sending Kasmeer to talk to Queen Jennah? The player is far more familiar with the Queen, and since I play a human noble it would make even more sense for me to go there personally. The writers have made way points a part of the world and the story, but conveniently forget they exist when ever it suits the plot. We could instantly be in Divinity’s Reach, or any other capital for that matter, and ask each leader personally to join us at the summit. We don’t need to send anyone to do that for us.

I am rather sure that my Charr have never really met with the Queen in any organized form.

Kasmeer on the other hand is (or at least was) part of the nobility of Kryta, and as such she have most likely way more contacts with the Krytan Court than my Charr ever would.

I suppose they could write the story specifically for each race (humans go to DR, Sylvari go and talk to Tree, Charr goes to BD, Norn to Hoelbrek and Asura to Rata sum) but that would most likely require a massive amount of work, and would also create the issue with forcing people into playing all races in order to get all parts of the story, which I doubt anyone would like.

lordkrall.7241:

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

BTW, why are we sending Kasmeer to talk to Queen Jennah? The player is far more familiar with the Queen, and since I play a human noble it would make even more sense for me to go there personally. The writers have made way points a part of the world and the story, but conveniently forget they exist when ever it suits the plot. We could instantly be in Divinity’s Reach, or any other capital for that matter, and ask each leader personally to join us at the summit. We don’t need to send anyone to do that for us.

I am rather sure that my Charr have never really met with the Queen in any organized form.

Kasmeer on the other hand is (or at least was) part of the nobility of Kryta, and as such she have most likely way more contacts with the Krytan Court than my Charr ever would.

And Kasmeer probably is the one in the locket (can’t remember, did the priory person say its never been opened/looked at?). Didn’t Angel say that Kasmeer will have a large part to play (or something to that effect)? That could be also why she was able to get the queen to easily agree.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

BTW, why are we sending Kasmeer to talk to Queen Jennah? The player is far more familiar with the Queen, and since I play a human noble it would make even more sense for me to go there personally. The writers have made way points a part of the world and the story, but conveniently forget they exist when ever it suits the plot. We could instantly be in Divinity’s Reach, or any other capital for that matter, and ask each leader personally to join us at the summit. We don’t need to send anyone to do that for us.

good point.
because if your character is not human nobble, it is still commander of the pact and also assuming they did CM story, the queen became to know the player. all npc heroes from kasmeer to rox and braham are less known and respected in compare with the player. again as commander of pact you are known to all races leaders.
it is specially feels stupid when you are sylvari and need kasmeer to set up meeting with pale tree.

Kasmeer went to go get the Queen to agree to attend the summit, but she was never send to go talk to her. She herself admitted that would probably be impossible.

Kasmeer: I think our best shot is to talk to Countess Anise. If anyone can get the queen’s ear, it’s her. I just hope she has time to hear us out.
Player: So you don’t think the queen will talk to you?
Kasmeer: Even when my family was in good standing, it was tough to get an audience with her. And now? Well…she’s very busy, you know?

And as much as players like to think being Commander of the Pact gives them special status everywhere, it still don’t allow them to instantly gain audiences and access to the leadership of every nation. They can probably request a meeting, and possibly get priority given their rank, but they have to go through the channels like everyone else.