Guild Wars 2

Swords, lasers, same thing. Weapons. Brute force. It does make the elder dragons look quite limited. I mean, these things ended entire civilizations. Maybe even the gods fled before them, who knows.

And then we just blow one up? Come on.

P.S. I would have even preferred it if Zhaitan was stabbity-stabbed with Caladbolg, at least that’s sort of a legendary-legendary weapon with the power of the Pale Tree behind it. A megalaser is just a gizmo with the power of really big batteries behind it. Bleh.

A sylvari weapon used to end Zhaitan? You really want to make the plants even more Mary-Sue-ish than they already are? Besides Caladbolg is a magical weapon and magic is useless against an ED. The megalaser only worked because it was technology and specifically modified to hurt Zhaitan. Please pay attention to the story.

I am paying attention, which is why I bother to comment on this forum. The story sucks. It is just bad.
Sylvari were brought into the world with a very specific mission – to fight the Elder Dragons, as the Pale Tree herself puts it. Whether they are the world’s answer to the dragon threat, sort of like an immune system producing white cells, or whether the Pale Tree is just another Elder Dragon who wants to do the others in (Elder Dragons hate each others guts) and is taking subtlety to epic levels, doesn’t matter.

The Pale Tree is immensely powerful and its self-professed mission is to fight the elder dragons. Nobody knows how powerful exactly, but I would be willing to bet it is more powerful than a kitten mechanical contraption. One would also think a being so powerful would have some means of actually accomplishing its goals and is not in fact full of hot air.
Caladbolg is a leaf from its very boughs. Caladbolg is part the Pale Tree, same as your fist is part of you. All we know about it is that it is also immensely powerful.

So it makes sense. Plus, the megalaser isn’t technology, it is technomancy. Asura tech is part magic, part technology. Charr tech is pure technology, but is still in the steam/gunpowder age. If you want to stick to “magic only makes them stronger”, then that megalaser should have been a real treat for Zhaitan. But of course, they “modified it”.

So who is to say that Caladbolg isn’t “modified” to work against an elder dragon? And why does Trahearne get that sword in the first place? They just sort of forget about it. He hardly even uses the kitten thing!

@BuddhaKeks – The MEGA-LIT cannon is stated to be a mist-cooled tripartate thautmatium energy weapon. Thats technobabble for ‘magic’ laser… so using the ‘right’ magic seems to work against the elder dragons. Lets not forget it was Caladbolg that was used to cleanse Orr so its not such a far fetched to have it as a plot device in ending that particular dragon – pay attention to the story indeed.

The first elder dragon encounter was underwhelming in my opinion but I hope its the last we see of Zhaitan and the risen as the story progresses.

Personally I would have preferred the fight against Zhaitan to be less ‘heroic’ and more tragic – a bitter sweet victory. Have our airship knocked out of the sky early on… then have a game of cat and mouse with the dragon. Pact forces arrive to save the day only to suffer horrendous losses while we salvage the mega-lit miracle cannon. It fires cutting down the ED which it lands on the tower – end cutscene showing the pact forces blasting the dragon into oblivion and then showing the cost, the pact warmachine for now is crippled.

To be fair, the pact is probably out of commission for a while, making all those airships, cannons, forts, tanks, armor, and weapons, along with importing food and water for an army probably bankrupted them (only heroes work for free).

Of course, stories tend to overlook the financial side of things. The pact probably got money from the only ones who have it — humans, and now that Zhaitan is dead, the dragons will take a backseat to politics, and new funding probably won’t be incoming for a while.

Yes magic was used to make the cannon work, that doesn’t mean it fires a bolt of magical energy at Zhaitan. Though as Clarke’s law goes, any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

But you know, if you want the Sylvari and the Pale Tree to handle that, go ahead, lets just scrap the other 4 races, we don’t need them, the Pale Tree alone can handle all the dragons, because she can produce magic dragon-slaying swords out of thin air.

As opposed to Asura who have teleportation, golem armies and huge, elder dragon melting superlasers? Yeah, I totally see why we need other races here.

The problem with killing Zhaitan with a, basically, a really big gun, is that it turns the elder dragons into pests to be exterminated.
Using Caladbolg, on the other hand, or any other magical or mystical artifact, keeps the aforementioned magic and mystery in the whole ordeal and what is more important is far more tailored for Zhaitan than generic weaponry (and superlasers are generic weaponry no matter how much you “modify” them).

Caladbolg is, like Zhaitan, unique.
Superlaser is something you get from an assembly line.

BuddhaKeks.4857:

A sylvari weapon used to end Zhaitan? You really want to make the plants even more Mary-Sue-ish than they already are? Besides Caladbolg is a magical weapon and magic is useless against an ED. The megalaser only worked because it was technology and specifically modified to hurt Zhaitan. Please pay attention to the story.

Weeeeelllll….

To be fair, Gaudrath has a point with utilizing Caladbolg.

In the sylvari lvl 28 storyline, it is the only weapon able to kill a lich, Mazdak the Accursed (which themselves, as seen via Joko and Khilbron, can only be killed via special means like having their soul ripped out of their body via soul batteries). In The Source of Orr the Soveriegn Eye of Zhaitan denotes how the sword stings against him, showing that Caladbolg is strong against the Risen (if not just simply undead).

The issue comes in that Caladbolg is never seen after it is used in the successful ritual to cleanse Orr. It very well may require to remain in The Artesian Waters to continue cleansing Orr.

Also, there is a second type of magical artifact that is anti-corruption: Forgotten magic. No, not magic that’s been forgotten, but magic of the race known as “forgotten.” In Arah explorable, the forgotten path uncovers magical artifacts from the forgotten which have resisted all corruption, and they developed/discovered a powerful spell to remove Kralkatorrik’s mental corruption on Glint.

Gaudrath.6725:

Plus, the megalaser isn’t technology, it is technomancy. Asura tech is part magic, part technology. Charr tech is pure technology, but is still in the steam/gunpowder age. If you want to stick to “magic only makes them stronger”, then that megalaser should have been a real treat for Zhaitan. But of course, they “modified it”.

Stydracos.2460:

@BuddhaKeks – The MEGA-LIT cannon is stated to be a mist-cooled tripartate thautmatium energy weapon. Thats technobabble for ‘magic’ laser… so using the ‘right’ magic seems to work against the elder dragons.

Not 100% accurate (more inaccurate on Gaudrath’s part).

Firstly, Pact magic seems to be backed by that Blue Orb, which creates an “anti-Risen-making area of effect” around it (you know those thorny vines with blue energy going through it? The generators in Fort Trinity surround where the Blue Orb is placed, and they’re made by mixing asuran and sylvari magic, developed by the Durmand Priory, and repels risen (though not fully)). Pact technology is a combination of magic and technology, true, though it’s more technology than magic – the original laser would be magitech with more “magi” than “tech” but the Pact version is more “tech” than “magi” and the magi part is backed by anti-risen ancient magic.

Expect similar stuff but backed by the forgotten’s magic in the future.

I would also like to note that there’s HEAVY implications that the Blue Orb is tied to the deep sea dragon (Sayeh mentions that there are legends about it known only to those from the ocean depths, and that it “comes with its own dangers” though the dangers are never elaborated – I’m expecting to see some Pact soldiers becoming partially liquified praising <insert DSD’s name here> randomly), so the Pact is basically using Elder Dragon magic to counteract Elder Dragon magic (just like the Inquest, which the megalaser’s modifications was mostly based off of!).

Gaudrath.6725:

As opposed to Asura who have teleportation, golem armies and huge, elder dragon melting superlasers? Yeah, I totally see why we need other races here.

The asura can still be corrupted, as can their magitech (that one megalaser used against Zhaitan was special, and it was destroyed – and no, they don’t come off of assembly lines… not yet, at least), which includes their golems. And their teleportation only works if you have a waypoint/asura gate at the destination – the synergetics storyline’s no-gate teleportation was destroyed and discontinued, sadly.

The asura lack the brute strength seen in norn and charr, or the non-magical reliance of the charr and humans’ technology, or the anti-dragonness of the sylvari.

Gaudrath.6725:

Caladbolg is, like Zhaitan, unique.
Superlaser is something you get from an assembly line.

You know, under that argument, the Pale Tree has a lot of bark she can turn into swords. That’s an assembly line potential if I ever know of one.

Though she said she’d never make a weapon herself ever again.

@Gaudrath: Okay, when tell me how cheap you can mass produce lasercannons. You just don’t get the premise of Guild Wars 2 it seems. It’s not standart fantasy “get the biggest magical McGuffin and everything will be fine”. Which I think is good, because that has been done to death. The races however actually putting thought into developing a weapon (which is clearly a process, if you follow the storyline, it’s partly based on Gorr’s research) feels fresher.
Now let me say this, no I’m not happy with the ending we got, I already posted my version in another thread (seriously we have too many of them), but what we got is still better than the Pale Tree just producing weapons that kill a dragon. The laser are a asura invention yes, but building them needs time and money, with only the Charr being able to mass produce anything of that kind. But again the Charr technology works different when asuran technology, meaning mass-production might be logistically impossible, at least for now.

A prototype is always far more expensive than later iterations – simply because there is a lot of problems when building something from scratch. Everything else is a matter of refining the design, which is why I find magitech elder dragon killing weaponry problematic – I don’t find magitech as such a problem, and yes it is refreshing, just not as means to kill an elder dragon.

Why? Because once you got yourself a gun that can do that, there is no stopping you really. It doesn’t matter how expensive it is, unless it uses some weird resource like, dunno, captive souls or somesuch. If it is only a matter of common resources, well – when the need is dire, battleships are built in matter of weeks and tanks in matter of hours. And the more you build something, the easier it gets.

Elder Dragons are unique. Means of killing them should be unique. They could be technomagic, but it must not be just about a machine, no matter how expensive it is. It must be personal, something that is created once and can never be created again. Machines just do not fit that requirement by their very definition.

Ah hell, just build a huge Asura megacannon, shove Trahearne in it, strap a Charr-made protective helmet on him and fire him at Jormag, that should do the trick.

We don’t even know if the weapon work on all EDs. We know they use different means of corruption, which in turn could mean they use different magic and are weak to different things. You have to keep in mind that the weapons used by the Pact were mostly tested on Risen, only in Frostgorge Sound we see them used against Jormag’s Claw. However we don’t know if the weapons used there, are actually like the ones used vs Zhaitan, or if they are more like regular weapons.

BuddhaKeks.4857:

We don’t even know if the weapon work on all EDs. We know they use different means of corruption, which in turn could mean they use different magic and are weak to different things. You have to keep in mind that the weapons used by the Pact were mostly tested on Risen, only in Frostgorge Sound we see them used against Jormag’s Claw. However we don’t know if the weapons used there, are actually like the ones used vs Zhaitan, or if they are more like regular weapons.

Precisely – even Caladbolg may be 100% useless against icebrood and branded – as well as Trahearne’s cleansing ritual. The laser I can easily see being simply reflected by Jormag and Kralkatorrik.

That blue orb may only be anti-Risen, same with just about everything the Pact use in Orr.

And the weapons used on the Claw of Jormag are charr engineered explosives through and through.

See, I’m just pointing out that only because we killed Zhaitan with a laser doesn’t mean we will do it with every dragon. It could be just as unique as using Caladblog.

Well, we will see. Although the Pact cannons used to bring down the Claw are the same as ones we can see all over Orr.
And I wasn’t suggesting that Caladbolg should be used to stab all elder dragons to death, just Zhaitan… that sword is way underused in the story, it looks cool and has a cool background and then is basically used for something you really don’t need a sword for, which is a shame.

Gaudrath.6725:

Well, we will see. Although the Pact cannons used to bring down the Claw are the same as ones we can see all over Orr.
And I wasn’t suggesting that Caladbolg should be used to stab all elder dragons to death, just Zhaitan… that sword is way underused in the story, it looks cool and has a cool background and then is basically used for something you really don’t need a sword for, which is a shame.

It would just make the Sylvari more op than they already are.

Doesn’t matter. Races are clearly not designed to be equals in GW2.

What confuses me is that your main issue with the laser cannon is that it makes killing dragons too easy – once you have a gun, you can make more guns, that sort of thing.

But then you want to use Caladbolg, a sword made by the Pale Tree. How’s that any different? You could just as well assume we’ll have everyone armed with Caladbolg’s by next week – it’s the same argument as having lasers off an assembly line, as Konig pointed out.

Son of Elias.5420:

What confuses me is that your main issue with the laser cannon is that it makes killing dragons too easy – once you have a gun, you can make more guns, that sort of thing.

But then you want to use Caladbolg, a sword made by the Pale Tree. How’s that any different? You could just as well assume we’ll have everyone armed with Caladbolg’s by next week – it’s the same argument as having lasers off an assembly line, as Konig pointed out.

That’s the same as assuming Jesus could mass-produce Holy Grails.

Not wanting to start a religious debate here, but how do you know he couldn’t if he wanted to? How can you know the Pale Tree can’t make more magic swords or other artifacts?

BuddhaKeks.4857:

Not wanting to start a religious debate here, but how do you know he couldn’t if he wanted to? How can you know the Pale Tree can’t make more magic swords or other artifacts?

I don’t. However, I do now for sure that once you make one machine you can make a ton of copies. Because it is a machine. It has a blueprint, it has resource requirements, and that’s it.

Mystical artifacts are mystical. They are unique. They are all about a special set of circumstances, alignment of stars, fate, what have you. You can’t mass produce Excaliburs, even though obviously someone had to make the one.

And Pale Tree herself says she will never make another Caladbolg. So there’s that.

And finally, mystical artifacts are powerful symbols. Huge laser cannons are not.

What makes you think those lasers can easily be mass produced? “Oh it’s technology and everyone can mass produce technology!” No they can’t. Look at the Pride of Tyria, the flagship of the Pact, the NPCs say about it, that they can’t build another ship of that size because it’s too expensive. You are willing to believe that is impossible to create more than one magic artifact (even though Tyria has houndreds of those) but a highly technological laser is an off-the-peg product? The races of Tyria (except Charr and possbily Asura) have for the most part an economy based on the middle ages, what makes you think they have enough money and resources to build many of those lasers? Yes I know a proto-type is more expensive than the later models, but that doesn’t mean mass-producing is logistically possible.
And again, nothing says that lasers are the solution to every dragon, I mean Primordus for example crawls around in the depths of Tyria, how do bring a giant laser down there? Or what about the Deep Sea Dragon? Do these lasers even work underwater? And the modifications for every dragon could be entirely different, we need to find out about their weaknesses first.

And last but not least, Caladbolg might be underused in the story, but killing a dragon with a magical sword is not unique. Killing a dragon with a giant freaking laser mounted on an airship, I certainly never heard that before.

“Too expensive” never was anything but an artificial, non-existent limitation. The only limitation is resources. So unless that airship is made of diamonds and there simply physically isn’t enough of them to build another one, stating money as a problem is like saying there is no problem at all.

When you’re up to your neck in world-destroying dragons, finance tends to take a back seat to survival.

And last but not least, Caladbolg might be underused in the story, but killing a dragon with a magical sword is not unique. Killing a dragon with a giant freaking laser mounted on an airship, I certainly never heard that before.

Yeah, because it’s boring. What, you think nobody thought of something like that before. They did but correctly concluded that killing a world destroying creature with oversized conventional weapons can be summarized with one word: “meh”.

Besides, Zhaitan wans’t even killed by the laser, he got his appendages trimmed by it. Then he was killed by the dozen or so side cannons.

So they already have a dozen of those elder dragon killing cannons. Why not make a ton more, mount them on appropriated Dredge sonic burrowing things and go Primordious hunting? Hey, we could also mount those shells or energy charges or whatever is flying out of those cannons on Pact submarines for Bubbles?

So that we can just shoot the big boys because that is so much fun and doesn’t completely destroy their image as a world threat in the slightest!

The exectution was meh, but the idea is good. You don’t really seem to get the premise of the game. It’s that you need all races of Tyria to fight an ED. If Caladbold was the answer to the ED threat, why would you even need the other races, just let the Sylvari roll in and tickle Zhaitans feed with their magical sword of friendship. Done!

This would make the dragons seem lame, imo. However what we have is a team effort, of all races, throwing everything they can at the dragon and building weapons designed to kill them, instead of trusting in magical McGuffin #34 they happened to find in the Pale Tree’s butt.

And of course, delivering the killing blow with Caladbolg couldn’t possibly be the result of a team effort?

Gaudrath.6725:

I don’t. However, I do now for sure that once you make one machine you can make a ton of copies. Because it is a machine. It has a blueprint, it has resource requirements, and that’s it.

Mystical artifacts are mystical. They are unique. They are all about a special set of circumstances, alignment of stars, fate, what have you. You can’t mass produce Excaliburs, even though obviously someone had to make the one.

And Pale Tree herself says she will never make another Caladbolg. So there’s that.

And finally, mystical artifacts are powerful symbols. Huge laser cannons are not.

You make one fatal flaw in your argument:

Caladbolg was a piece of bark from the Pale Tree.

The Pale Tree has a lot of bark. And can grow more.

It’s not some religiously holy one-of-a-kind-can-never-be-reproduced relic (though Buddhakeks’ point remains nonetheless). The only reason why there’s one Caladbolg is because the Pale Tree chooses not to make more – she outright states that she can during the sylvari storyline in fact! And if she saw it destroy an Elder Dragon. especially at the cost of Caladbolg (to make it truly unique), I think she’d be inclined to make a couple more.

And bam, you got an assembly line of Caladbolgs.

There, I just proved that your “unique” mystical artifact is as unique as the skin flakes on your body (because in comparison, that’s what Caladbolg is – a skin flake from the Pale Tree’s body).

While you’re at it, why don’t you tell us what Jormag thinks as well, since you are so sure what Pale Tree would do.

Just because something can be done doesn’t mean it must be done. So you proved nothing.

She said she will not make another Caladbolg. Why? Who knows. Doesn’t matter. Caladbolg is unique. And good luck making the Pale Tree do something she doesn’t want to do.

While all you need to do with big guns is get your paws on them blueprints, get yourself a labor force and resources and off you go, no questions asked no permission needed.

On the topic of Zhaitan being undead and possibly rising again. I haven’t done multiple personal story paths and haven’t even completely finished my own yet, so I could be mistaken on some parts that haven’t been revealed to me yet…. but during the battle for For Trinity, I do remember that we have a Krait water orb that somehow prevents the Risen from…. rising again. Assuming Zhaitan ever had the power to reanimate himself, then wouldn’t this orb prevent it from happening at all? If it can stop him from rising minions then it’s not a big leap to assume it would stop him from rising himself.

Risen don’t rise a second time. What’s meant by the Blue Orb preventing a “rise again” is when the corpses become risen.

Though, yes, it may be possible to use the Blue Orb to prevent Zhaitan’s return if he can rise himself – though I can’t think of anything possible of doing such proactively.

@Gaudrath: “Just because something can be done doesn’t mean it must be done. So you proved nothing.” Same can be said to you about your “mass producing lasers” concept.

And she also explains why she would not make another Caladbolg – because it was lost when Riannoc died. Though this is before its fate (that Waine stole it) was discovered and it was retrieved. With the reason why she wouldn’t make another (that it went missing and could bring harm) gone, and if it proved to be instrumental in fighting Elder Dragons, she could (note the fact that I never used an absolute in what the Pale Tree would do in my previous post) decide to make more – even moreso if Caladbolg becomes unusable due to the fight with Zhaitan.

Point is: Caladbolg is no more unique than the laser used to fight Zhaitan (which was destroyed).

I’m throwing my 2 cents in real quick, Anet devs have said pre launch he is composed of dead dragons, and the whole “maybe all the dragons are made up of their element” theory is quite possible.

In the Edge of Destiny book (which is cannon) Caithe picks up drops of crystal blood from their fight with Kralk, which would imply he was bleeding crystal, this could explain why despite being defeated in the past by MUCH stronger races than now that they were still capable of returning.

I mean for kittens sake, Mursaat were believed to be gods and were only eliminated due to the Titans, Seers were just as strong as Mursaat (well weaker but close) Jotun were so strong that the human gods feared they might be outmatched so the sent them back to the Stone Age, and then the Dwarves and Forgotten were nothing to scoff at either.

I’d be surprised if Zhaitan is truly dead, I mean kitten… He ate through his minions and only ate magic!

The old races did not defeat the dragons, the Mursaat fled Tyria and the other races were hidden by Glint. We don’t know who injured Kralk and made him bleed.

Gaudrath.6725:

She said she will not make another Caladbolg. Why? Who knows. Doesn’t matter. Caladbolg is unique. And good luck making the Pale Tree do something she doesn’t want to do.

But that’s just an artificial limitation. It’s as though the inventor of the laser cannon and the only one with the blueprints burned them and said he doesn’t want to make a new one. The fact remains that it would be just as easy, if not easier, to mass produce Caladbolgs as it would be to mass produce laser cannons.

Son of Elias.5420:

Gaudrath.6725:

She said she will not make another Caladbolg. Why? Who knows. Doesn’t matter. Caladbolg is unique. And good luck making the Pale Tree do something she doesn’t want to do.

But that’s just an artificial limitation. It’s as though the inventor of the laser cannon and the only one with the blueprints burned them and said he doesn’t want to make a new one. The fact remains that it would be just as easy, if not easier, to mass produce Caladbolgs as it would be to mass produce laser cannons.

Except where as with laser canons anyone could build them Caladbolg can be made by only one being in the world, and no matter how you imitate said action of making one you will never have a second.

BuddhaKeks.4857:

The old races did not defeat the dragons, the Mursaat fled Tyria and the other races were hidden by Glint. We don’t know who injured Kralk and made him bleed.

Says who? Because the Priory Scholars say different, and if the Mursaat fled, why did they come back?

I don’t think Zhaitan is dead.

There’s got to be something more to the origin and purpose of these dragon’s, but the question is what?

I’d love answers to that

Durzlla.6295:

I’m throwing my 2 cents in real quick, Anet devs have said pre launch he is composed of dead dragons, and the whole “maybe all the dragons are made up of their element” theory is quite possible.

In the Edge of Destiny book (which is cannon) Caithe picks up drops of crystal blood from their fight with Kralk, which would imply he was bleeding crystal, this could explain why despite being defeated in the past by MUCH stronger races than now that they were still capable of returning.

I mean for kittens sake, Mursaat were believed to be gods and were only eliminated due to the Titans, Seers were just as strong as Mursaat (well weaker but close) Jotun were so strong that the human gods feared they might be outmatched so the sent them back to the Stone Age, and then the Dwarves and Forgotten were nothing to scoff at either.

I’d be surprised if Zhaitan is truly dead, I mean kitten… He ate through his minions and only ate magic!

They said the concept art for Zhaitan had him comprised of dragons. The word “dead” is never used. And it was about concept art.

Also, you’re wrong on the elder races’ cases: the strength of the seers was never said – they were wiped out by the mursaat, in fact. That bit on the jotun comes from Thruln the Lost whom is wrong on quite a few accounts, and by every other source in the Guild Wars series, is wrong on that account too – in that they took magic away from them specifically.

And the Elder Dragons eating magic is precisely why those elder races lost so hard to the Elder Dragons – because those races were all about magic back then. They were using what Elder Dragons eat against them.

Durzlla.6295:

BuddhaKeks.4857:

The old races did not defeat the dragons, the Mursaat fled Tyria and the other races were hidden by Glint. We don’t know who injured Kralk and made him bleed.

Says who? Because the Priory Scholars say different, and if the Mursaat fled, why did they come back?

I don’t know what Priory scholars you talked to, but none say that they defeated the Elder Dragons – just that they survived. And those in Arah explorable elaborate on that, telling us that they survived because Glint hide them after the forgotten freed her from Kralkatorrik’s control, and that the mursaat fled the world after betraying the other races.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Durzlla.6295:

BuddhaKeks.4857:

The old races did not defeat the dragons, the Mursaat fled Tyria and the other races were hidden by Glint. We don’t know who injured Kralk and made him bleed.

Says who? Because the Priory Scholars say different, and if the Mursaat fled, why did they come back?

I don’t know what Priory scholars you talked to, but none say that they defeated the Elder Dragons – just that they survived. And those in Arah explorable elaborate on that, telling us that they survived because Glint hide them after the forgotten freed her from Kralkatorrik’s control, and that the mursaat fled the world after betraying the other races.

There’s some scholars in the Priory HQ that if you talk to talk about how “It’s unfair, that it’s 5 against 6 and that if the ancient races could band together and defeat them we’ll find a way too!”

I have not done the explorable yet for Arah (i have a few explos i still need to do, i dislike pugs due to their constant skipping of everything), so if they say otherwise in Arah i’d imagine that is a more accurate and truthful lore source than a random Named Priory Member that is never doing anything of importance during the entire personal story.

@Konig (cont), yeah that’s where i learned that bit about Jotun from, i haven’t done my norn storylines at all yet (where i’m assuming Jotun are talked about) so i have no idea how truthful he was, i was just assuming that it -was- truthful. And they had to be fairly close to Mursaat strength (at least with their infusions) due to how long they held them off.

And that is a VERY valid point as to why the Dragons would just WTFPWN the ancient races.

You remember wrong. The scholar you refer to is Scholar Trueclaw and what she says is “It’s accepted that there were five sentient races who fought the Elder Dragons the first time and survived.” and “I found out that there were five sentient races that fought the Elder Dragons the first time around… and survived to tell about it.”

Not once does she say the word “defeat” – only survived. The other scholars don’t talk about the races, but other aspects of the ED.

The norn storyline for “Defeat our Ancient Foes” only repeats what was told to us in the jotun blog post, transcribed onto the GW2W here. Furthermore, what he’s more wrong about his human history – specifically the relation between humans and gods. There is that bit about the Six Gods’ relation to the jotun which is dubious, but not outright false (yet) even if unlikely. Though there’s no (other) indications that the Six Gods gave and took magic from any specific race, thus any specific reason of disliking or fearing jotun would be wrong. Given what we know, it’s likely that Thruln the Lost’s dialogue on that is actually about when the seers created the Bloodstone (something else learned from Arah explorable – the gods only found the original bloodstone and tampered with it to gift magic).

And we’re never told how long the seer lasted against the mursaat, actually. And infusion was developed late into the war – when they’ve already had significant losses.

Well we know Seers (around 4 or 5 of them) were still present during GW1, which means as a race they held out for quite sometime, and seeing as how we didn’t go to all of Tyria there are likely more!

And I REALLY need to do those explorables….

4 or 5? I think not even that. We only know of a seer, an ancient seer and a seer corpse during the War in Kryta. That’s 3 at best, if the corpse did not belong to one of the afore mentioned other two. They could have been different seers of course, maybe they look just all the same to us (that’s so racist! xD), but I don’t think so. At the same time, the seer and ancient seer could have been the same, I think the ancient says something like “We meet again” on the fire isles.

BuddhaKeks.4857:

4 or 5? I think not even that. We only know of a seer, an ancient seer and a seer corpse during the War in Kryta. That’s 3 at best, if the corpse did not belong to one of the afore mentioned other two. They could have been different seers of course, maybe they look just all the same to us (that’s so racist! xD), but I don’t think so. At the same time, the seer and ancient seer could have been the same, I think the ancient says something like “We meet again” on the fire isles.

xD were all those Seers the same one? I coulda sworn that we were finding a new one each time!! I know there was one in the zone outside of Manhans Grotto (or wherever that place is that you get your lv 20 armor). And in all Fairness, all the Mursaat look the same to us as well, so it wouldn’t be any different if Seers all looked the same to us too…

PS: this is REALLY off topic but i’m going to be scared when we finally encounter the Mursaat in GW2.

The seer met in Ring of Fire mission was the same one as the one seen in the Shiverpeak Mountains – it outright tells us that it met us in the Shiverpeaks there – and presumably the same as seen in Abaddon’s Mouth and Hell’s Precipice (if it followed players to the ring of fire islands, why not all the way through?).

There are, at most, four seers (Shiverpeaks/RoF mish; Abaddon’s Mouth mish; Hell’s Precipice mish; WiK), but more likely to be only one or two (Proph; WiK).

Konig Des Todes.2086:

The seer met in Ring of Fire mission was the same one as the one seen in the Shiverpeak Mountains – it outright tells us that it met us in the Shiverpeaks there – and presumably the same as seen in Abaddon’s Mouth and Hell’s Precipice (if it followed players to the ring of fire islands, why not all the way through?).

There are, at most, four seers (Shiverpeaks/RoF mish; Abaddon’s Mouth mish; Hell’s Precipice mish; WiK), but more likely to be only one or two (Proph; WiK).

Do we know if the “second” Seer in the Shiverpeaks is the same one that infused our armor to begin with? And i knew that the “last” seer we talked to was also the first one we saw, i wasn’t sure about the others ones though.

Both Shiverpeak encounters happen next to each other, so it’s a pretty safe bet. But there’s nothing that outright states it.

Son of Elias.5420:

Gaudrath.6725:

She said she will not make another Caladbolg. Why? Who knows. Doesn’t matter. Caladbolg is unique. And good luck making the Pale Tree do something she doesn’t want to do.

But that’s just an artificial limitation. It’s as though the inventor of the laser cannon and the only one with the blueprints burned them and said he doesn’t want to make a new one. The fact remains that it would be just as easy, if not easier, to mass produce Caladbolgs as it would be to mass produce laser cannons.

Except that making another Caladbolg would be pointless. Caladbolg as a weapon had a unique advantage against the risen and Zhaitan being made from the Pale Tree herself. So if they were to move forward with the belief that all Sylvari are immune to dragon corruption then I believe the Pale Tree would have to make a new and unique magic weapon for each type of ED corruption. I’m also not sure if that whole anti corruption thing is true, because of Mordremoth. Its possible that this dragon is responsible for the nightmare or spiritual corruption. I just hope not because that would be too WoW like. Which could be supported by the Sylvari intro, maybe the wyld hunt wasn’t just Zhaitan but all the elder dragons and the shadow of the dragon was a direct representation of Mordremoth’s power.

Oglaf.1074:

How would Zhaitan survive?

Simple.

He wasn’t alive to begin with.

I can’t believe the Pact didn’t even send someone down to go look and see if he was still squirming.

how do you know they didn’t they may have later on we don’t know

Zhaitan’s body was supposed to appear at the 4th explorable path of The Ruined City of Arah, the one about the bloodstones.

In older datamined maps, the body was visible where The Wreck of the Scorchrazor point of interest is located now. Also, next to it, there’s another point of interest named Zhaitan’s Rest.

The shape of Zhaitan’s corpse on the minimap matches that of a dead dragon we saw on the first trailers.

So I think it’s pretty certain his corpse was supposed to be there. But now, it isn’t. Why would they remove his corpse, with all the model-work behind it?

I really hope we get to go down into his lair and search his corpse, in some kind of personal story revision.

joko’s undead army was fighting zhaitan his undead army we never know what happens , will we aid joko in the future against kralkatorik or will he betray us and re awake zhaitan as his own minion? , we never know how the story will work out

We killed him with fireworks, he’s dead,

Get over it,

Never!

Interesting: http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/1irtvc/where_is_this_located_in_the_game/

I’ll just have to be the picky one of the bunch and will hold my belief that Zhaitan is still alive until I see an actual corpse because:

1. It’s been how long since the defeat of Zhaitan and Risen are still everywhere? You would think the developers would have replaced ’em with other enemies by now if Zhaitan is truly no more.

2. Even though the developers stated that he is dead in terms of canon, again, the Risen are still all over the place. And the developers technically contradicted themselves when they also stated that “nothing is off the table” in terms of future content which leads to….

3. Something as “cheap” as a good ol’ questionable plunge into a dark mist can easily lead to a comeback so, again, if there’s no body, then as far as I’m concerned, he’s still alive. He might be a tad bit shook-up or severely injured and is maybe recovering but until I see that body (or maybe a tooth like Jormag’s in Hoelbrak?) I can only assume that he’s still alive.