Guild Wars 2

I was wondering if any mages have ever been referenced or shown to have a mastery outside of the four essential elements, that all mages cycle between normally. Tell me what you know below or even what you think of the idea of uniquely talented mages existing in Tyria.

I’m not sure what you mean but the Zephyrites have actually gone beyond the basic earth/water/fire/air.

I believe it was even stated in the game that their sun magic ( you could use it in the Aspect Arena ) was a derivative fire magic. (I’m not sure though, my memory is shaky)

Also, the idea of wind and lightning being blended into one element. In GW1, air magic focused mainly on lightning with ~2 spells <I can only think of Gust and Gale> dealing with actual wind power. Which the Zephyrites have once again specialized in, the power of wind and splitting it up with lightning.
Same goes for Water Magic, which was mainly ice in the original GW, even Water Trident made ice like projectiles! The only “water” spells that come out of my mind are steam, mist form, blurred vision and maybe Freezing Gust.
edit: I forgot Vapor Blade too

The Aspects are air magic that were fine tuned. So they’re not unique elements, just a unique take on elements.

There have been no spellcasters with unique elements, though unique takes on certain elemental magic is possible (again, Aspects and air magic).

Necromancers and Monks come to mind, mesmers?

Those aren’t really ‘elements’ though.

Unless one considers dark(ness)/shadow, light/holy and chaos elements (see also: http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Damage_type)

I really wouldn’t, as those are more of magic types than elements. Or at least they seem to be by argument of the Tyrian system as far as I can see and tell.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

I really wouldn’t, as those are more of magic types than elements. Or at least they seem to be by argument of the Tyrian system as far as I can see and tell.

then whats the question?

i mean isnt that what he means by uniqe element that a mage would use?

id understand if he was talking elements of the earth but he is talking elements of magic right?

saventis.1485:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

I really wouldn’t, as those are more of magic types than elements. Or at least they seem to be by argument of the Tyrian system as far as I can see and tell.

then whats the question?

i mean isnt that what he means by uniqe element that a mage would use?

id understand if he was talking elements of the earth but he is talking elements of magic right?

I think Op is talking about Elementalist, referring to them as mages, because in many other games that is one of the names for them.

Maybe he was going for cross combo abilities that do not limit themselves to the base elements, but go for a combination?

Many RPG use that feature, though we see the most common combination of elements allready in the game.

usually you could have wind and water to become ice.

Fire and Earth resulted in erruption and explosion techniques.

Earth and Water went for nature and so on…

Other interpretation
Naturally he could be talking about new kind of magic. Like he was talking about an unique magic element .

In that case we mostly got some shifting of abilities, which resulted in some new being born, but no new elements so to speak.

So far the GW2 classes, despite their different playstyle, are still conservative.

I am not really sure which we could tackle this. We got time distortion with the mesmer, who also covers psychic abilities.
Would be cool to have a class going full jedi on the enemy, throwing rocks and chairs depending on his sourounding (just kidding).

I was about to suggest blumage (final fantasy) like abilities, but even that is covered by the copy ability of the mesmer (though I would love to gain skills from enemies… Mordremoth, taste your own medizine. I got it from CoE).
Magic regarding sound? Mesmer again (geez, he has everything? Hail our mesmer masters), though I would love a bard class.

Shadow? well Thief has you covered. Light… Guardian has holy flames and light pillars.

Gravity? Most of the classes have a push or pull and the elementalist is able to use “gravity” in rockform to some degree (always loved a gravity AoE combo in grandia, though)

We got undead and spirit (weapons at least)… Geez, GW2 is covering most bases here.

We even got summoning with several classes and races.

Fortune telling would be something haven`t really touched, though I would guess that it is Mesmer realm again and would be some kind of time travel mumbo jumbo…

saventis.1485:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

I really wouldn’t, as those are more of magic types than elements. Or at least they seem to be by argument of the Tyrian system as far as I can see and tell.

then whats the question?

i mean isnt that what he means by uniqe element that a mage would use?

id understand if he was talking elements of the earth but he is talking elements of magic right?

I had interpreted the OP as meaning mage=elementalist (wizard/mage is usually the term for a generic mage that primarily focuses on elemental based spells in the typical fantasy rpg setup).

And by element, I interpreted the OP as meaning natural elements (the base four in western culture being water, air, fire, and earth; spreading out we have more varieties – metal, crystal, lightning, ice, etc.). This is usually what people mean when talking about elements in such generic usage, and hence the OP saying “four essential elements”.

So I interpreted the question as “do elementalists use unique elements that don’t fall into air/water/earth/fire?”

Which the answer is no. But while elementalists are bound to those four, that doesn’t prevent fine-tuning of those four into uncommon views (e.g., aspects being mostly unique views of air magic – particularly sun aspect; arguably given the Obsidian and magnetic themes of earth magic, that can delve into crystals and metals on top of simple soil and rock). This is typically the reason why the four elements are the four elements – everything else from more or less fall into those four elements.

And besides, if the question was “is there more magic than elemental magic” then… well that seems kind of point blank obvious, doesn’kitten If you’ve looked at all into the game, you’d know about necromancy at the very least. So I’m giving the OP the benefit of the doubt for not being a complete idiot.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

The Aspects are air magic that were fine tuned. So they’re not unique elements, just a unique take on elements.

There have been no spellcasters with unique elements, though unique takes on certain elemental magic is possible (again, Aspects and air magic).

That was the theory that an NPC, I can’t remember which off the top of my head, presented for the nature of Zephyrite magic. It was a pretty good explanation at the time, but we lacked knowledge that we now have that the Aspect magic ultimately came from Glint – and thus, apart from generating similar effects, it’s magic that may never have passed through the Bloodstones and may otherwise have no relation to the magic elementalists normally use. It’s essentially a non-corrupting form of dragon magic.

It may be fundamentally the same type of energy as air magic, or combining air and fire magic, or mixing together all of the energies associated with elementalism but in a different fashion (Wind seems to be a mix of Air and Water, kinda like dervish Wind Prayers was a bit water-like in GW1; Bastion in Sun is reminiscent of either Earth in GW1 (Ward of Stability) or the Guardian (Hallowed Ground)). However, it could also be something different entirely.

Regarding elementalists having a ‘unique’ element – they do appear to have a limited connection to ether as well. Mesmers are better with this, of course, but Ether Renewal and the various arcane spells somewhat constitute a ‘fifth element’.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

And besides, if the question was “is there more magic than elemental magic” then… well that seems kind of point blank obvious, doesn’kitten If you’ve looked at all into the game, you’d know about necromancy at the very least. So I’m giving the OP the benefit of the doubt for not being a complete idiot.

yea but what if hes asking if there is only elemental magic and all other magic is just a combination or is more intense or less intense version of one of the original four
like you could say lightning is just an inteasne version of fire or that a mesmer sound ability is just a controlled wind magic
the clones could be some combination of maybe water and air the refration of light through mist in the shape of the caster or could be control of the electric (superheated fire) impulses in the brain

to be honest we really just need him to clarify

draxynnic.3719:

It may be fundamentally the same type of energy as air magic, or combining air and fire magic, or mixing together all of the energies associated with elementalism but in a different fashion (Wind seems to be a mix of Air and Water, kinda like dervish Wind Prayers was a bit water-like in GW1; Bastion in Sun is reminiscent of either Earth in GW1 (Ward of Stability) or the Guardian (Hallowed Ground)). However, it could also be something different entirely.

Regarding elementalists having a ‘unique’ element – they do appear to have a limited connection to ether as well. Mesmers are better with this, of course, but Ether Renewal and the various arcane spells somewhat constitute a ‘fifth element’.

I think dervish and arcane magic are the best answers so far. Maybe Ranger’s nature magic also has an elemental aspect to it, with Sun spirit causing fire, Storm spirit can create an electric shock and so on.

If s/he meant casters in general with mages, and elements as just different schools of magic, Liadri comes to mind. She seems to be one of the few/only person(s) that we see cast Cosmic spells.

BuddhaKeks.4857:

Maybe Ranger’s nature magic also has an elemental aspect to it, with Sun spirit causing fire, Storm spirit can create an electric shock and so on.

I think Ranger magic is actually closer to Ritualist magic than to Elementalist magic (I think something along those lines has even been stated at some point).

Diovid.9506:

I think Ranger magic is actually closer to Ritualist magic than to Elementalist magic (I think something along those lines has even been stated at some point).

Yeah true, I didn’t want to dispute this, however there is certainly an elemental twist to it. So it might be a bit of a mixed bag.

When it comes to Elementalists, I’ve noticed only a single trend among their powers:

They don’t seem able to directly manipulate, create or reshape living tissue

If we’re going with what powers are available to the Elementalist in-game, then we have:

• Fire Attunement – Fire, Heat, Magma, Lava
• Water Attunement – Water, Ice, Cold
• Air Attunement – Air, Lightning, Electricity
• Earth Attunement – Rocks, Soil, Sand, Magnetism

There’s no proof however that attuned to Water, they’d be able to control Blood (That’s Necromancy, or rather Blood Magic, another school entirely.) And while attuned to Earth, they show no proof of being able to Control Plants (Which falls under Rangers’ Nature Magic, if one would consider Entangle to be magic, or Sylvari racial skills.)

The elements are earth, air, fire, and water. Most real world ancient cultures used those four elements and sometimes included a fifth, for something like ‘aether’,’ void’, or ‘spirit’, but it was never consistently defined. The four basic elements had widespread meaning because they were easily understood and there is nothing beyond those four that can be understood easily. The same can probably be said for GW2 elements.

There may be other sources of magic in GW2 but those using them might not be elementalists.

draxynnic.3719:

That was the theory that an NPC, I can’t remember which off the top of my head, presented for the nature of Zephyrite magic. It was a pretty good explanation at the time, but we lacked knowledge that we now have that the Aspect magic ultimately came from Glint – and thus, apart from generating similar effects, it’s magic that may never have passed through the Bloodstones and may otherwise have no relation to the magic elementalists normally use. It’s essentially a non-corrupting form of dragon magic.

It may be fundamentally the same type of energy as air magic, or combining air and fire magic, or mixing together all of the energies associated with elementalism but in a different fashion (Wind seems to be a mix of Air and Water, kinda like dervish Wind Prayers was a bit water-like in GW1; Bastion in Sun is reminiscent of either Earth in GW1 (Ward of Stability) or the Guardian (Hallowed Ground)). However, it could also be something different entirely.

You refer to Bethamy. Though I was pretty sure it was stated to be air magic by a Zephyrite sometime in S2…

Unfortunately, I’ve only been seeing continuous reference to sky, which one would attribute to air magic if any pre-existing magic. I’d also be more intent to relate sun to air magic rather than fire magic as the sun aspect is more about light than it is about fire and burning (there is, in fact no fire-relation to Sun beyond the orange beam appearance) – just like Dwayna, the goddess of air and light. Their very name, Zephyrite, is far more akin to air than elementalism in general.

This said, I wouldn’t attribute dervish’s Wind Prayer to being a mixture of Water and Air magic, so much that it takes the aspect of chilling winds part of air magic whereas elementalists take the aspect of lightning; and Zephyrites take all three aspects: wind, light (or rather, sun), and lightning.

In other words, I would argue that the Aspects are simply the full take on Air Magic, whereas Elementalists are a limited view of mostly lightning and a little wind.

Similar to how I’d argue air magic has multiple facets, I’d argue the same for the other elements. Earth, for example, is not just about rocks and soil and mud, but also magnitism and, going off of Earth Prayers, plants (GW1 skills Veil of Thorns, Aura of Thorns) – which would then connect rangers’ plant magic (Grasping Vines, etc.) as earth magic.

Diovid.9506:

I think Ranger magic is actually closer to Ritualist magic than to Elementalist magic (I think something along those lines has even been stated at some point).

The only similarity between rangers and ritualists is the nature rituals and binding rituals, but those spirits seem unrelated. Rangers’ newer magic utilize fire, water, earth, and lightning, and ritualists only ever had ties to lightning.

The merging of ritualists with monks and paragon also indicates to me that ritualist magic was more akin to those two professions.

Erukk.1408:

If s/he meant casters in general with mages, and elements as just different schools of magic, Liadri comes to mind. She seems to be one of the few/only person(s) that we see cast Cosmic spells.

I think Liadri is just an extreme of a specific focus in necromancy, as necromancy also utilized darkness. Similarly, the Facet of Darkness used Liadri’s drop-down skill (in weaker effect), and in GW1, the Facet of Darkness was black.

TheSwede.9512:

When it comes to Elementalists, I’ve noticed only a single trend among their powers:

They don’t seem able to directly manipulate, create or reshape living tissue

You’re forgetting water magic. Healing someone with water is a direct manipulation of the living.

Stooperdale.3560:

The elements are earth, air, fire, and water. Most real world ancient cultures used those four elements and sometimes included a fifth, for something like ‘aether’,’ void’, or ‘spirit’, but it was never consistently defined.

We call it arcana.

And yes, some elementalists (and many mesmer spells) deal with it.

Elementalists use it in a way to establish more control over their elemental mastery (lower cool down times, latent bonuses, lingering effects), in addition to using it raw and offensively.

In it’s raw form it tends to either directly enhance an elementalists spell potency or do critical burst damage.

Mesmers use it indirectly to make clones and generally power their magic based attacks.

Necromancers probably also use it in a more primitive darker kind of form requiring their sacrificing and such, likewise with the guardian, to a much weaker extent.

Elementalists have it down to a science that they can move into it and with it at will, they’re attuned to it naturally.

Mesmers and guardians to a lesser extent actively manipulate it without a heavy understanding of it.

Necromancers with their own kind of ‘formula’, rip out powerful plays from it with their heavy rituals.

Gamora: "I know who you are, Peter Quill, and I am not some starry-eyed waif here to succumb to your... your pelvic sorcery!"

Groot: “I am Groot.”

What about Arcane magic? I doesn’t appear to come under any of the other magic types and it has it’s own mastery line?

I’d assume there would be some Elementalist who’s specialised in Arcane magic, though I’d question if this is still “Unique” and not just “Uncommon”.

mexay.3902:

What about Arcane magic? I doesn’t appear to come under any of the other magic types and it has it’s own mastery line?

I’d assume there would be some Elementalist who’s specialised in Arcane magic, though I’d question if this is still “Unique” and not just “Uncommon”.

I always assumed that the Elementalist’s arcane magic is the same as the Mesmer’s chaos magic. Why? Because in Guild Wars 1 each of the elementalist’s 5 attributes (Guild Wars 1’s equivalent of trait lines) were tied to a god. The attribute Energy Storage (Guild Wars 1’s equivalent of arcane magic) was tied to Lyssa, god of mesmers. Furthermore, (some) weapons tied to energy storage dealt chaos damage (http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Chaos_damage).

Given that arcane magic only does simple things, takes some flavor from whatever the ele is attuned to, and as mentioned may be an elaboration on the energy that fueled (fuels?) their spells, I’d say that it’s probably more accurately unelemented magic, rather than a fifth element of itself.

I’m still lost on the OP.

I assumed he was talking about elemental magic but I guess mage can also be interpreted in different ways. (I usually see other games do Mage = Elementalist, Sorcerer = Necromancer/Mesmer)

I would think GW1 Nature Rituals would be a bit far off the normal elemental magic, but it’s technically not elementalism and rangers weren’t/aren’t considered “Mages”

Looking at some old GW1 spells now, I’m guessing that some skills were in certain attributes [which could technically be in 2 elements accounting realism] for mechanical reasons, but we can never be certain- Freezing Gust, Obsidian Flame, Sandstorm, Bed of Coals and Meteor come to mind.

Perhaps Wards? They were a bit strange, and were mainly placed in Earth Magic besides Ward Against Harm. Ward Against Harm/Melee would be the more odder ones but I can actually see Earth magic protecting against elemental/knockdown and causing weakness.

Regarding rangers and ritualists:

Spirit-binding has always been outside of the four schools of magic, although the exact effect is flavoured by what form of bloodstone magic the wielder has (whether this is because this influences which spirits respond to the call, or because the magic grants the spirits associated powers, is unclear). So as well as the ranger’s elemental spirits, we have elementalists conjuring elementals (which is probably a similar process except that the elementalist also provides a physical body), necromancers calling shades, guardians summoning ‘spirit weapons’ (although they may simply be fields of force. Note that I say ‘may’ before anyone jumps down my throat on that), and even mesmer illusions may in fact invoke spirits in order to provide them with some basic intelligence and substance.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

This said, I wouldn’t attribute dervish’s Wind Prayer to being a mixture of Water and Air magic, so much that it takes the aspect of chilling winds part of air magic whereas elementalists take the aspect of lightning; and Zephyrites take all three aspects: wind, light (or rather, sun), and lightning.

In other words, I would argue that the Aspects are simply the full take on Air Magic, whereas Elementalists are a limited view of mostly lightning and a little wind.

You’ll note that I threw out a few possibilities, without making much comment on which I thought was most likely. On the whole, my thoughts are similar to yours that they’re probably most likely different aspects of a single element rather than combinations, but the possibility does need to be considered.

And I don’t recall anything from S2. I’ll try going through the screenshot archive when I get time in case it’s my memory that’s faulty, but AFAIK that theory is the only link we have (apart from similar effects). As I said, since this is magic that’s coming from a dragon, it may be very different ‘under the hood’ to air magic or any other mortal magic even if it has similar effects.

CETheLucid.3964:

Elementalists have it down to a science that they can move into it and with it at will, they’re attuned to it naturally.

Mesmers and guardians to a lesser extent actively manipulate it without a heavy understanding of it.

Of the four, I think it’s actually mesmers that have the most understanding of it – nearly all of their spells appear to manipulate ether directly, and the journals in Gwen’s Story suggests that they know what they’re doing. Elementalists, however, are relatively crude, simply blasting away rather than wielding it with the finesse of mesmers. The exception is…

Diovid.9506:

mexay.3902:

What about Arcane magic? I doesn’t appear to come under any of the other magic types and it has it’s own mastery line?

I’d assume there would be some Elementalist who’s specialised in Arcane magic, though I’d question if this is still “Unique” and not just “Uncommon”.

I always assumed that the Elementalist’s arcane magic is the same as the Mesmer’s chaos magic. Why? Because in Guild Wars 1 each of the elementalist’s 5 attributes (Guild Wars 1’s equivalent of trait lines) were tied to a god. The attribute Energy Storage (Guild Wars 1’s equivalent of arcane magic) was tied to Lyssa, god of mesmers. Furthermore, (some) weapons tied to energy storage dealt chaos damage (http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Chaos_damage).

Another similarity is that chaos magic generates random conditions on foes, while arcane spells can, if appropriately traited, generate conditions – except that the elementalist can choose the condition based on what element they’re attuned to.

This element of choice may indicate a greater understanding, but mesmers still have a more potent ability to generate conditions through their natural chaos magic. I suspect what is actually happening is that the elementalist is not actually using pure ether when these traits apply, but ‘seeding’ it with the element they’re attuned to in order to generate a result specific to that element.

draxynnic.3719:

Of the four, I think it’s actually mesmers that have the most understanding of it

We disagree. Mesmers don’t even actively acknowledge it, choosing instead to call it ‘chaos’, illusion, etc. That’s a misnomer.

They certainly deal with it and manipulate it, but they don’t have an intellectual or ritualistic understanding of it like the elementalist or the necromancer.

Guardians are kind of the same as mesmers in this regard. They don’t have a strong understanding of it, but their faith and devotion manipulates it.

Some might argue it’s more a ritualistic thing like necromancers, but their spells/rituals aren’t nearly as elaborate or powerful.

Mesmers are much more potent at manipulating arcana without understanding it.

Guardians used to be much more potent in magic, but they’ve begun to devote themselves to physical training with magic being a vestige of those days (monks).

In terms of potency, it goes:
Elementalists (glorious arcana master users)
Necromancers
Mesmers
Guardians

I don’t see mesmers calling ether as chaos. There are a lot of ether skills but few chaos skills in comparison.

I’m really not understanding your reasoning for the different professions’ understanding of ether.

That said, arcana and ether are different. Ether was explained to be the basis of magical form – raw magical energies as I understand it. Arcana/Arcane by all appearances seem to be a step between that and the elemental magics. Mesmers however seem to use ether more directly, primarily going off of their skill names and ability to bend reality, and when giving it a unique form it enters the domain of chaos magic.

I am curious, does the wiki has a list and discription of the nature of known magic?

Jaken.6801:

I am curious, does the wiki has a list and discription of the nature of known magic?

If it did, it wouldn’t be much more definitive than what we’ve already got here. There’s not really anything official on the topic- as far as I know, there’s just one interview question about ether, and the rest is us fans wildly extrapolating based on skill names and damage types.

CETheLucid.3964:

draxynnic.3719:

Of the four, I think it’s actually mesmers that have the most understanding of it

We disagree. Mesmers don’t even actively acknowledge it, choosing instead to call it ‘chaos’, illusion, etc. That’s a misnomer.

They certainly deal with it and manipulate it, but they don’t have an intellectual or ritualistic understanding of it like the elementalist or the necromancer.

Research Journals

Reports of Charr attacks arrive daily, so I have begun researching ways to protect us from these beasts. By focusing the ether around my body, I can create a barrier. It is almost as though the air itself hardens, stopping arrows and deflecting blades. I need more time to perfect the spell, though. It requires an immense amount of concentration to maintain, and lapses in focus allow attacks to slip through. A bigger drawback is the Energy loss from exertion. Perhaps I can find some way to compensate for this…

I encountered my first Charr today, and my hopes of slowing their assault were quickly dashed. If not for a spell I devised on the spot, I would not have survived this brutal attack. As a horde bore down to me, I manipulated the ether to imbue myself with the vigor of my youth. Thus, for a short time, I moved with the sure-footed speed of a child. However, illusions seldom last, and the body must eventually pay for the follies of the mind. After my narrow escape, I suffered much physical strain. And yet, better than the unthinkable alternatives.

The Charr move through the land with the speed and primal fury of a wildfire. I have begun to realize that simple defenses are not enough to slow this onslaught, so I have devised a new spell. It is actually a relatively simple matter to use the ether to alter the perception of an enemy, especially one so primitive as the Charr. In their minds, they believe themselves fatigued…atrophied, even…thus slowing their relentless assault. I only hope it is enough.

The Charr have come to us. All I can do is try to save my research in the hope that someone can use it to forge a better future for mankind. It was this overwhelming desire to stem the tide that inspired my last spell. I have found a way to use the ether to directly inhibit a foe’s mind. The weave is complex, but when properly crafted the spell slows a foe’s actions. It is as if he is moving through molasses. If only this could slow the wave of inevitability about to wash over us. Perhaps some might escape…

Looks like mesmers not only actively acknowledge it but know how to employ it with a high degree of subtlety to me.

Now, we don’t have any similar sources as to how elementalists view it, but from that sample it looks like basically everything mesmers do is based on ether to some extent, while elementalists have just a handful of arcane skills that are fairly bruteforceish – mostly direct damage in GW2 – compared to the range of effects that a mesmer can pull off.

Mesmers using additional terms for it is because they understand it better, not worse. Everything mesmers do is ‘arcane’, so it’s redundant to describe anything as such, instead they use more finely differentiated terms that establish exactly which flavour of ether magic they’re talking about. It’s like hearing two conversations about things that go boom, where in one conversation they’re simply using the term ‘explosives’ while in the other they’re differentiating between C-4, dynamite, nitroglycerine, octonitrocubane and others and discussing the different properties of each. Yes, they’re all still explosives, but I know which group of people I’d expect to be more knowledgeable about the subject.

For necromancers and guardians, off the top of my head it’s unclear if they even recognise that ether is part of their magic at all… and it might very well not be, with their magic working through a different medium altogether. After all, while mesmer wands/staves and Energy Storage elementalist wands/staves used the chaos damage channel in GW1, monks and necromancers had their own channels and may well be something else entirely.

I does not equal we. Your premise that mesmers have a greater understanding because of an extraordinary individual does not follow.

Neither mechanic wise with regards to what players have access to or to how mesmers label their magic VS what is arcana per the elementalist/“mage”, which is what the OP is asking.

If you want to argue the nature of it and/or move goal posts with regards to ether VS arcana, by all means.

I stand by my opinions in that regard. But arcana remains an exclusive trait of the elementalist. The elementalist is the undisputed master of it.

That’s a fact.

Nothing says those journals came from an extraordinary individual.

And you STILL have zero evidence backing your claim.

Arcana is a trait for elementalist… but what is arcana? The short answer? We don’t know. It’s just a term for a fifth trait of elementalists that deals with magic that can effect all four attunements. A pre-attunement magic is the best description we can apply to it.

But nothing even hints at the notion that arcana = ether. Nothing at all.

I kinda feel that you’re arguing for the sake of arguing here (and that’s putting it in polite terms). We have quotations direct from the game, you have… your own unsupported suppositions and attempts to disqualify any evidence that opposes that supposition?

As Konig points out, we don’t even know for certain what arcane is. The link is that in GW1, there are ether-related skills (Ether Prism, Ether Prodigy, and Ether Renewal) in Energy Storage, the same attribute that the untyped Energy Blast, which is linked to Arcane Blast through being a blast spell that isn’t linked to an elemental attribute. However, the connection of arcane to ether may not actually follow – the one elementalist skill with ‘ether’ in the name is not actually an arcane skill. It’s possible that arcane is, instead, actually some sort of blending of the four elements.

In both games, mesmers have more skills with ‘ether’ in the name than elementalists, and the quoted material above indicates that pretty much everything mesmers do (in the illusion branch, at least) is based on subtle manipulations of the ether. So even if we took your supposition that proficiency with ether is proportional to usage of the term, mesmers come out ahead: they have more skills that use the term ‘ether’ in their skill names than elementalists do in both games, and outside of the context of mesmers and elementalists I’ve only been able to find two references and those are fairly weak (monks in GW1 have an Ethereal Light spell, and the exotic weapon that looks like a guardian’s Bow of Truth is called Aether). Meanwhile, every GW1 monster with ‘ether’ in it’s name is, guess what, a mesmer.

I think it’s fairly clear that mesmers are the experts when it comes to manipulating ether. Elementalists are dabblers in comparison. Other professions… well, they may or may not be using it, but to our knowledge they don’t acknowledge it.

We can’t have an honest conversation if you’re going to do that sort of thing.

I mean I called it already and I accept it, but to see both of you run headlong into it like that is pretty impressive.

I would have thought you’d at least try to pretend you’re not putting words in my mouth. But hey, alright. No more arguments from me.

Carry on.

Sometimes, the means to identify if something is bait is to grit your teeth, take a bite, and see if you find a hook inside.

The experiment has been completed, and the conclusion reached.

draxynnic.3719:

Sometimes, the means to identify if something is bait is to grit your teeth, take a bite, and see if you find a hook inside.

The experiment has been completed, and the conclusion reached.

> Present logical argument
> Attempt honest discussion
> Goal posts moved, arcana is now ether for all intents and purposes because you say so
> Attempt to correct this fallacy, point out I’ve been talking arcana not ether
> “u must be trolling”

Oh. Okay. I guess from that over the top melodramatic kind of expression, you make me sound like a pretty good one at least? Got you hooked and everything!

Sorry for getting all ‘reason and logic’ on you there. Take it easy.

I don’t think I ever put words into your mouth. I actually requested words from your mouth. Those words being your support for your argument.

You presented your theory, but no support for said theory.

I never said you were trolling, but now with those two attachments, I do think you are trolling.