Guild Wars 2

So as we know from the end of “Out of the Shadows”, Primordus is active. This could mean that is the next target in an expansion. A Primordus themed expansion of course also has to bring something on the table gameplay wise. Now elite specialization are a given, but HoT also gave us a new profession. I however doubt that the next expansion would give us another one, since we reached perfect balance between the armor classes with the last one.
What we could get though is a new playable race. Tengu seem to make the most sense, as they are in high demand by many of players, since the GW2 was in development and they would tie into a Primordus storyline. We know the Elder Dragon of fire has been attacking the Dominion of Winds.

Now I know there are a lot of arguments for and against a new playable race in general and the Tengu specifically. As I honestly don’t know much about coding, I will stick to the lore based problems (hence creating this topic in the lore forum).

Let’s assume a new expansion is released. It is set after LS3 and we now have the means of fighting Primordus. While LS3 was going on we have had heard of new fierce attacks on the Dominion, maybe we had a mission or two taking place over there, or atleast on the outside of it. The Tengu leadership are now for the first time ever in talks with the outside. They are consulting the Pact and the other nations of Tyria and finally decide to join the fight against the EDs at the end of LS3.
With the expansion release they are now playable, Tengu are part of the new storyline and we get to meet quite a few of them. After playing through the new content, we decide to make a Tengu ourselves. Just like the other races we have a tutorial mission with a big flashy boss at the end. We are guided through this mission, not by a member of Destiny’s Edge like the other races but by an elderly Tengu. This character guides us with knowledge, but he does not fight alongside us, instead 2 of his other students take the combat role.
After defeating the first boss we get a letter from our mentor, depending on what questions we answered during character creation we can take part in any of the 3 first storylines. Now here comes the twist, the year is 1325 AE. That’s right, we start at the same time everyone elses PS starts. In fact, when we go on, we will eventually get to join one of the Orders, form the Pact, clense Orr and kill Zhaitan.
So by now you are wondering, how, the Tengu joined the other races in 1330 AE or whenever the next expansion takes place, why would you play the PS from 5 years ago?
Well, while the Tengu as a race in general have not joined forces with the other races yet, some individual Tengu have, for example Izu Steelshrike. This opens the door for us. We are an exception, we are one of the few Tengu who joined the Pact, while the rest of our kind kept hiding behind its high walls and sharp arrows.
And how do we explain that we meet up with DE, if none of them is our mentor? That’s also not a stretch, our old Tengu mentor is friends with atleast one of them (Caithe makes the most sense to me) and has send us to check up with them in LA. So who is our mentor? Well his name is not important (insert any japanese name here) but his title is “The Herald”. Yes it is the same herald that send us all this mail, regarding the dungeon story modes. Bonus points if he has some relation with Master Togo (as in one of his ancestors studied in Shing Jea Monastery or maybe himself, depending on how old Tengu can get).

So what does that mean for the outside world, when you are just running around leveling? Well on the overworld it is the year 1330 AE, so your leveling is done in the present, it’s just that your PS is set 5 years in the past. Is that confusing for new players? Yes maybe, but on the otherhand, this problem already exists in the game (Lion’s Arch, Kessex Hill etc.) and it never appeared to be that big of issue. So why would it be in the case of the Tengu?

So that’s it from the story perspective, you start as an exception. Maybe it is your actions as commander of the Pact that let your race to the decision that outsiders can be trusted in the first place. It would make sense to me at least.

Everything else, like having to create new models, animations, armors, a whole lot of sound recording and line writing. Yes all those are issues, but the common argument that all this work wouldn’t even create “new” content, doesn’t hold up in my opinion. Of course I have played through the PS several times, but everytime, it was different. I have new point of view. So it felt at least in parts like new content. And it would the same with a new race. So yes it is a lot of work but I think it would be worth it. Enough people created a revenant just because it was new, I think just as many people would create a Tengu, just for the novelty of it.

What do you guys think? Could new races like the Tengu be implemented like this?

Right, I adore pretty much everything about that idea. As for models and such, it’s clear work has been going on in the background. Compare Izu’s model in the HoT zones with the Tengu stationed on the wall in old Tyria. His animations are better, his eyes are animated separately from his head, etc. The Tengu in old Tyria are much more wooden, and less animated.

Though I’m biased in all this, I’ve wanted playable Tengu for years. I would even pay seperately just for them.

I like this idea.

Anyone who uses lore as an argument against the implementation of Tengu has not paid attention to how Anet handles the lore. They would likely produce some videos and implement them in the same way they did with the core races, paying no mind to how this or that would not make sense. Any notion of story consistency went out of the window with the introduction of the revenant anyway, and i am pretty sure that after the latest human villain will be vanquished, you will see him walk around where he was from day one.
Just look at how Taimi hid a portal in plain sight from a race full of curious scientists, or how Zhaitan learned absolutely nothing when combating the commander and Trahearne and just threw minion after minion in our direction, or how the nightmare court still works perfectly well without its leader.

Torolan, there’s a huge difference between “story consistency” and “maps stuck in time” and half of your arguments deal with the latter.

Only the Taimi argument has merit – the Zhaitan one almost does, but consider this: what else would Zhaitan do when all he has is minions? At least he throws different kinds of minions every time, and even overwhelming odds sometimes (Battle of Fort Trinity).

And even discounting every time we see the Nightmare Court it’s based in 1325 AE not 1329 AE, the Nightmare Court was always a splintered group, not wholly united. And based on Dragon’s Stand, they already have a new leader (as most organizations do, they get a replacement instead of falling apart entirely).

You can play prophesies and factions story with nightfall character so i dont see problem playing zhaitan story with tengu. Not all gameplay needs to be tied to lore.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Torolan, there’s a huge difference between “story consistency” and “maps stuck in time” and half of your arguments deal with the latter.

Only the Taimi argument has merit – the Zhaitan one almost does, but consider this: what else would Zhaitan do when all he has is minions? At least he throws different kinds of minions every time, and even overwhelming odds sometimes (Battle of Fort Trinity).

And even discounting every time we see the Nightmare Court it’s based in 1325 AE not 1329 AE, the Nightmare Court was always a splintered group, not wholly united. And based on Dragon’s Stand, they already have a new leader (as most organizations do, they get a replacement instead of falling apart entirely).

You can see it this way with the maps stuck in time, but I don´t. If Anet would show that they are still majorly concerned about the consistency, maps stuck in time would be upgraded sometimes and the story would be transfered into a format akin to ls2, the newest story replacing the last one for new players. would also be akin to the idea that the world is really living and dynamic how Anet initially promised but was forced to alredy backpeddle before release. But tihs is probably a pipe dream of me you can only except to see in Eve online.
Kssex Hills is the example of a map well tended over the years in my opinion. It is also stuck now after ls2 was over, but it is miles ahead of Caledon for example where Zhaitans forces still stay in front of the home door.

If I was an evil overlord with an already contested sea border and five other dragons looking to usurp my power, I would have been a lot more interested in the little humans after my minion army was unable to reach my set goal at Claw Island. At the very least I would get more active after minions that carry my name are sent out get vanquished and the enemy literaly appears at my gates where I basically sit on the secret to restoring Orr.
If I am too vain to relocate, I could rally my best people around me in my defense or hatch a contingeny plan like Glint did in case the pesky creatures prove to be a match for me.

Mara.6782:

You can play prophesies and factions story with nightfall character so i dont see problem playing zhaitan story with tengu. Not all gameplay needs to be tied to lore.

There is a way we can play a Tengu while fighting Zhaitan and Mordy and still have it tied to lore. The Tengu in LA said they are waiting to see if the rest of the races are worthy of being allies. In the story the Tengu can send the player character out to see if the other races can be allies.

Torolan.5816:

You can see it this way with the maps stuck in time, but I don´t.

How can you argue this with a straight face when ever release map talks about Zhaitan still being alive, how there are talks of Gaheron being alive in Plains of Ashford, Diessa, and Iron Marches, and how talks of Mordremoth being alive in HoT maps.

The only time we ever have an update to a map’s timeline is where the LW is directly involved, and even then they rarely alter things to fit that so it can’t even be said to be the whole map.

Torolan.5816:

If Anet would show that they are still majorly concerned about the consistency, maps stuck in time would be upgraded sometimes and the story would be transfered into a format akin to ls2, the newest story replacing the last one for new players.

LS2 doesn’t have any new story replacing and old one… so I’m not really sure what you’re talking about.

Anet cannot have the open world change by player progress because it is open world and persistent – it simply would be a technological mess to do that unless you separate playerbase by their story progress. But doing that is something ArenaNet is actively trying to avoid because they don’t want their playerbase to be spread out – or to make their dat so unbelievably large as to have a copy of every map at every timeframe.

Torolan.5816:

would also be akin to the idea that the world is really living and dynamic how Anet initially promised but was forced to alredy backpeddle before release. But tihs is probably a pipe dream of me you can only except to see in Eve online.

Their promised dynamic world was not about the progression of story but the success and failure of events. Which they actually did implement. You’re just taking things out of proportion.

Torolan.5816:

Kssex Hills is the example of a map well tended over the years in my opinion. It is also stuck now after ls2 was over, but it is miles ahead of Caledon for example where Zhaitans forces still stay in front of the home door.

And it would make no sense to a new player about the urgency of Zhaitan to sylvari when they don’t see the risen in the open world.

Torolan.5816:

If I was an evil overlord with an already contested sea border and five other dragons looking to usurp my power, I would have been a lot more interested in the little humans after my minion army was unable to reach my set goal at Claw Island. At the very least I would get more active after minions that carry my name are sent out get vanquished and the enemy literaly appears at my gates where I basically sit on the secret to restoring Orr.
If I am too vain to relocate, I could rally my best people around me in my defense or hatch a contingeny plan like Glint did in case the pesky creatures prove to be a match for me.

Zhaitan did react.

He sent an overwhelming force to Fort Trinity… which got pushed back.

He sent out one of his most powerful minions (Eye of Zhaitan) to trap and separate Trahearne and the Command to kill them… and failed.

He had his most powerful, non-dragon, champion (a dragon wouldn’t fit in there) guard his source of power… which got killed.

He had an army of dragons defending him when the fleet assaulted… and was killed by dues ex machina weapon specifically designed to harm him.

Every time we succeeded, he threw something bigger at us. And we didn’t succeed every time (see Temple of the Forgotten God). And he still kept an ace up his sleeve with his dragon army that was tearing apart the fleet – but then we got the dues ex machina called Glory of Tyria showing up to finish him off.

1. You´re right, it makes sense if you simply refuse to alter your maps piece by piece for the lore. The strange part is that Anet often does alter its maps by implementing for example the new bandit or ley line events, creating maps that are in general stuck for years with new events that are here to stay. By the same method, I think it would be rather easy to replace some(not all) Risen at the front door of Caledon with mushroom or nightmare court people, signaling that Zhaitan´s forces are retreating after his death.
Replace the let´s say first two events in Caledons forest with nightmare court coming out of their base to contest ground where the risen were before and things would be ok. And it would be an advertisement to new players with NPCs proclaiming how the creatures crossed over from HoT and how much more dangerous they are than the risen ever were.
Anet has already done this in Brisban with Vines, I don´t see a reason they should not do that with Caledon too.

2. Yes, it does not replace it, and that is the thing I would like to see changed.
Make fractal(s) out of the Zhaitan story to free yourself from the restrain of having maps stuck in time up to a certain point, Dungeons would then have to be changed too, something many people are demanding anyway.
A new player would then today play the HoT story instead of Zhaitan.
I don´t know if it would be a technological mess, Blizzard at least managed to pull it off with WOW. It would be a better time investment than designing stupid adventures for example.

3. No, I remember pretty well how Anet was promising even home invasion when maps were not defended by players and how hyped I was. But they had to backpeddle for the sake of keeping the game running, the chain events were installed to keep it as an illusion of the idea.

4. Ok, your arguments with Zhaitan and his defense makes sense. Maybe he should have retreated instead, but as he was the first dragon to be attacked he could assume that he would crush the attackers on his own when his minions failed.

I don’t get why everyone’s go-to answer is fractals. “Make fractals of the rest of Season 1” “make fractals of old events”.

It just doesn’t work that way. They’re completely different formats.

And dungeons wouldn’t have to change at all. They’re instanced! Saying that is like complaining that the personal story still deals with Zhaitan. And why would a new player play HoT story instead of Zhaitan? You’re skipping plots, and it would make no sense for old players to renew their status so that it works for new players, else you’re making two plots one for new folks and one for old while removing content. Why would you do that?

I think ArenaNet has learned that players do not like content being removed. And from a design perspective it makes no sense either – you’re removing playable content from your playerbase, restricting what they can do.

Torolan.5816:

3. No, I remember pretty well how Anet was promising even home invasion when maps were not defended by players and how hyped I was. But they had to backpeddle for the sake of keeping the game running, the chain events were installed to keep it as an illusion of the idea.

I am fairly certain you blew your expectations out of proportion.

Those home invasions when maps were not defended?

Their prime example is in game:

Liberate Shaemoor Garrison from the Tamini invaders

This is an event that only happens if players do not do preceding defense events and the event fails.

The event you linked is one of the compromise events. They were forced to backpeddle a lot of stuff, and that was the one I was most disappointed with. The other thing that scored big with me was that they had a firm no raids philosophy, but that is another story. I can not bring any statements of Anet regarding this as I don´t keep my gaming magazines for years, but I remember reading it for sure.

When you turn something into another format and do not remove it, how has it been removed then? I also have no problem with Dungeons being instanced in general, as long as they are taken out of the actual map like ls2 is, and fractals are very inclined to do that. If there was a better format, I would be all for it.
What irks me is that people are visiting the same place with different results like with Eirs homestead in general and her funeral.

The big catch is you still have to re-record the original GW2 campaign, LS2 and LS3 with tengu VAs (which is going to be… 8 or 10? Male and female for each supported language). That’s expensive – not so expensive that I’d automatically rule it out since they’ll need to record a lot for the following expansion anyway, but it might make them think twice.

Oh, and you might need to do more motion capture for the original campaign’s cinematics – I suspect the cost of those was a good part of the reason they moved away from doing them. Then again, perhaps the tengu skeleton is still close enough to charr that you could just borrow theirs? Though that’s less true than it used to be with the Heart of Thorns tengu model, where they’re standing up straighter than charr do, amongst a few other things.

Technically possible, still, yes; but I wouldn’t be shocked if ANet decided to axe playing through old story with new characters because of it. The cost of voice talent for new races may already be a significant disincentive to add more, never mind if they need to go through the back catalog too.

Everyone that talks about the Tengu seem to neglect 1 very big, very glaring flaw in making them a playable race. The Tengu are as racist as the Centaurs. the entire reason the Tengu are so unknown in GW2 is because the vast majority of them refuse to interact with the outside world, there are a hand full of them that like humans but thats like saying Centaurs should be a playable race because Ventari or the Veldrunners. Zhed and Ventari where allies but Centaurs still hate humans.

The second issue, from a lore standpoint, would be the same as in GW1 when you make a Nightfall character and play early Prophesies missions. you get a text on screen that says “your about to witness events that happened before blah blah blah”. it breaks the lore because now you have Tengu fighting against Zhaitan and Mordremoth when they largely chose to stay out of the matter. it makes much more sense to have Largos or Kodan as new playable races and even then i do not believe ArenaNet will add any new options there.

According to that idea GB, USA and Hungary are racist countries with no redeeming qualities whatsoever. GB because it wants to be left alone from the EU, Hungary and the USA because it build a fence against refugees or mexicans in general.
Scottland probably wants out of the Empire because they want to stay in the EU, something you can easily do with the Tengu too.

Edit: A New character model is obviously already there, so this cost would be already covered.

Nightbringer Tenchi.5794:

it breaks the lore because now you have Tengu fighting against Zhaitan and Mordremoth when they largely chose to stay out of the matter. it makes much more sense to have Largos or Kodan as new playable races

… you mean as much sense as having revenants playing through the launch content? ANet already proved that argument doesn’t hold weight with them.

Sirius.4510:

The big catch is you still have to re-record the original GW2 campaign, LS2 and LS3 with tengu VAs (which is going to be… 8 or 10? Male and female for each supported language). That’s expensive – not so expensive that I’d automatically rule it out since they’ll need to record a lot for the following expansion anyway, but it might make them think twice.

Oh, and you might need to do more motion capture for the original campaign’s cinematics – I suspect the cost of those was a good part of the reason they moved away from doing them. Then again, perhaps the tengu skeleton is still close enough to charr that you could just borrow theirs? Though that’s less true than it used to be with the Heart of Thorns tengu model, where they’re standing up straighter than charr do, amongst a few other things.

Technically possible, still, yes; but I wouldn’t be shocked if ANet decided to axe playing through old story with new characters because of it. The cost of voice talent for new races may already be a significant disincentive to add more, never mind if they need to go through the back catalog too.

I know it is expensive and a lot of work but I never said it wouldn’t. The reason for this thread was tackling the lore issues, not the development problems that come with the idea.
And I think the dialog cutscenes themselves are the smallest problem. They have barely any animation to beginn with. The biggest obstacle is most definitely the voice acting. Still even there you only need lines for the level 1 – 30 storylines of one race and male and female lines for one character for the entire PS. It’s a lot, but I think it would be managable. They probably don’t even have to get new actors, they could just use some of the people that are recording for the next expansion/LS storyline.

Nightbringer Tenchi.5794:

Everyone that talks about the Tengu seem to neglect 1 very big, very glaring flaw in making them a playable race. The Tengu are as racist as the Centaurs. the entire reason the Tengu are so unknown in GW2 is because the vast majority of them refuse to interact with the outside world, there are a hand full of them that like humans but thats like saying Centaurs should be a playable race because Ventari or the Veldrunners. Zhed and Ventari where allies but Centaurs still hate humans.

The second issue, from a lore standpoint, would be the same as in GW1 when you make a Nightfall character and play early Prophesies missions. you get a text on screen that says “your about to witness events that happened before blah blah blah”. it breaks the lore because now you have Tengu fighting against Zhaitan and Mordremoth when they largely chose to stay out of the matter. it makes much more sense to have Largos or Kodan as new playable races and even then i do not believe ArenaNet will add any new options there.

You haven’t read my OP have you? I addressed all of these problems…

Aaron Ansari.1604:

Nightbringer Tenchi.5794:

it breaks the lore because now you have Tengu fighting against Zhaitan and Mordremoth when they largely chose to stay out of the matter. it makes much more sense to have Largos or Kodan as new playable races

… you mean as much sense as having revenants playing through the launch content? ANet already proved that argument doesn’t hold weight with them.

Yeah, I don’t see a problem. For all we know, there could be rogue Tengu that chose to explore the world at their own volition (becoming the player character). I don’t see the problem here and if it ever does become a issue, should it be an expansion pack, force the player to be level 80 when making a new Tengu character and their story picks up in that. At the same time however, I don’t see it being that big of an issue to warrant so much micromanagement.

Wouldn’t need to be “rogue” at all, given that tengu are 100% allowed to go out on their own into the world. It’s that the tengu government has decided not to help out – they don’t ban their people from leaving.

In the personal story we meet 3 or so tengu who left the Dominion in order to help fight the Elder Dragons, and any one of them can function as our mentor figure. And we meet almost thrice as many who work as traders.

Nightbringer Tenchi.5794:

Everyone that talks about the Tengu seem to neglect 1 very big, very glaring flaw in making them a playable race. The Tengu are as racist as the Centaurs. the entire reason the Tengu are so unknown in GW2 is because the vast majority of them refuse to interact with the outside world, there are a hand full of them that like humans but thats like saying Centaurs should be a playable race because Ventari or the Veldrunners. Zhed and Ventari where allies but Centaurs still hate humans.

The second issue, from a lore standpoint, would be the same as in GW1 when you make a Nightfall character and play early Prophesies missions. you get a text on screen that says “your about to witness events that happened before blah blah blah”. it breaks the lore because now you have Tengu fighting against Zhaitan and Mordremoth when they largely chose to stay out of the matter. it makes much more sense to have Largos or Kodan as new playable races and even then i do not believe ArenaNet will add any new options there.

1. If you haven’t noticed, all the races save Norn and Sylvari could be considered racist in a way. Asura think the other races are stupider than them and that Asura are superior, Humans outright despise Charr and Centaurs, and the Charr have been pretty aggressive against Humans, Ogres, etc. All of these, however, have fallen apart with the current generation of each race, if you’ve noticed.

Our Human character is pretty okay with being friendly to Charr and Centaurs, our Asura doesn’t treat anybody as lesser than them, and our Charr are pretty chummy regardless of race. Our Tengu character would be the same, open to the other races and to the world at large. So that argument that the Tengu are racist prevents it falls flat.

2. Some Tengu actually fought against Zhaitan and Mordremoth, so it doesn’t break the lore in any way, our characters would be some of them that did fight. That argument is fault too.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Wouldn’t need to be “rogue” at all, given that tengu are 100% allowed to go out on their own into the world. It’s that the tengu government has decided not to help out – they don’t ban their people from leaving.

In the personal story we meet 3 or so tengu who left the Dominion in order to help fight the Elder Dragons, and any one of them can function as our mentor figure. And we meet almost thrice as many who work as traders.

Actually, I think there was an indication from one of the traders outside the gate in Lion’s Arch pre-Scarlet that the leaders do look down on tengu leaving the Dominion – enough that they won’t necessarily be allowed back in.

The official trading posts and other tasks beyond the Wall that are approved by the Dominion are exceptions, but a tengu just up and leaving might be forfeiting his or her citizenship of the Dominion.

draxynnic.3719:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Wouldn’t need to be “rogue” at all, given that tengu are 100% allowed to go out on their own into the world. It’s that the tengu government has decided not to help out – they don’t ban their people from leaving.

In the personal story we meet 3 or so tengu who left the Dominion in order to help fight the Elder Dragons, and any one of them can function as our mentor figure. And we meet almost thrice as many who work as traders.

Actually, I think there was an indication from one of the traders outside the gate in Lion’s Arch pre-Scarlet that the leaders do look down on tengu leaving the Dominion – enough that they won’t necessarily be allowed back in.

The official trading posts and other tasks beyond the Wall that are approved by the Dominion are exceptions, but a tengu just up and leaving might be forfeiting his or her citizenship of the Dominion.

That was a self-professed ‘lapsed’ tengu, though- he even admits that he doesn’t speak the same language as them. I don’t think we can read anything into it beyond that the Dominion tengu identify as something more than only a race.

They could also let you start at level 30 in Gandarren’s field after Scarlet’s destruction of L.A and have you as a refugee in one of the camps located right next to the three orders.

I just hope they nail the Dominion Tengu’s feeling of mistrust towards the other races, humans in particular.
Having them open the gates out of necessity and have them be best friends with the Human or Charr (for exemple) would be kinda lame.
I wouldn’t mind having a prime race that works out of main choire and walks its own road.
I’m talking of the race itself and it’s leader, the main tengu character can be as acceptive as any other.

draxynnic.3719:

Actually, I think there was an indication from one of the traders outside the gate in Lion’s Arch pre-Scarlet that the leaders do look down on tengu leaving the Dominion – enough that they won’t necessarily be allowed back in.

The official trading posts and other tasks beyond the Wall that are approved by the Dominion are exceptions, but a tengu just up and leaving might be forfeiting his or her citizenship of the Dominion.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Yuki_Honestcrest

There was no such indication from tengu in LA.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

draxynnic.3719:

Actually, I think there was an indication from one of the traders outside the gate in Lion’s Arch pre-Scarlet that the leaders do look down on tengu leaving the Dominion – enough that they won’t necessarily be allowed back in.

The official trading posts and other tasks beyond the Wall that are approved by the Dominion are exceptions, but a tengu just up and leaving might be forfeiting his or her citizenship of the Dominion.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Yuki_Honestcrest

There was no such indication from tengu in LA.

Unless I’m way off base, drax was referring to Kae Mayumi.

I think that’s the one, yes. Since Yuki obviously did speak Krytan, though, there seems to be more to them not being let in than not speaking the language.

My impression from that setup is kind of like an Englishman walking into a pub in Wales and suddenly everyone there is speaking Welsh and not acknowledging anything in English. You know that they must understand English too in this day and age – they’re doing it to make a point.

I am not a lore expert, and will never claim to be. I’ve only played Guild Wars 2 for a year now, and my understanding of the community responses to certain implimentations is very general. So please, take my idea with several thousand grains of salt.

However, in my opinion, there is another solution which I haven’t seen touched on at all, and that would be, “what if a Tengu player never kills zhaitan?”
Now that isn’t to say that your Tengu player couldn’t go to the Arah dungeon and participate in the story there, ANet would never take that aproach. However, I believe it would be fascinating if a Tengu story could be based in Cantha, where the story would be that you kill a different elder dragon, say the DSD, instead of zhaitan. Now I have no idea why a Tengu player from Tyria would go to Cantha, presumably a pilgrimage from the Doninion of Winds that we haven’t heard of yet. Cantha could then be organized as a new starter zone, with Dominion of Winds still as its capitol, and this all would take place while the other races were destroying Zhaitan. The last few instances of Tengu story would be destroying the Elder Dragon, and then the Tengu player might have extra maps in Cantha to progress story, before returning to Tyria. Regular players would also be able to visit Cantha by boat presumably, and a similar nightfall warning might appear telling that this is nonlinear.

I have many ideas in my head on how this would be implemented, but that’s the general premise. Any criticism to this theory is very much welcomed, I’d love to hear why this could or couldn’t happen, that’s how I like to learn.

Drewbawb, that is pretty much the solution that was assumed by many people at launch, because that is exactly how it was done in the first game. The problem is that Anet pretty much said they wouldn’t do this, since it was such an large amount of work to design new level areas and a new story.
That is why I came up with my solution, since you wouldn’t need new level areas, Tengu could start in Caldeon. And the new story would “just” be the first paths that lead to the Order plotlines.

let’s say since the tengu closed off they dont need the zhaitan personal story or ls1 and 2 becuase they werent there they could just give them a small personal story and then have them implented in the future ls , according to lore primordus minions are digging under the walls of the dominion and they are having some problems now , i think sooner or later the tengu will have to call the other races ie the pact to help becuase they wont be able to deal with that problem alone.

If Primordus is becoming more active, there’s a pretty good chance we’ll be hearing about it as soon as next episode of LWS3.

On that subject, there was an interesting map linked in another thread – not sure exactly how they got it but I presume from some pre-release content that was cut: http://imgur.com/bOwDeHt
Now, obviously, this whole map could have been thrown away. But the “Heart of Primordus” intrigues me. Merely idle speculation and possibly wishful thinking, but perhaps we’ll be visiting that in the near future? I note that this map isn’t actually geographically connected to the core Dominion of Winds (even if they throw it away and redo it, that won’t change, since Garrenhoff’s port precludes that) so it wouldn’t necessarily break anything in the event that they wanted to use the DoW for a capital in a subsequent expansion.

That looks like how the beta map probably was Sirius. Notice how Lion’s Arch has that original look, and not the newer one for the map?

Wow what, that map? How come it’s filled in? Was it in beta but removed?

Sirius.4510:

If Primordus is becoming more active, there’s a pretty good chance we’ll be hearing about it as soon as next episode of LWS3.

On that subject, there was an interesting map linked in another thread – not sure exactly how they got it but I presume from some pre-release content that was cut: http://imgur.com/bOwDeHt

Poking around on google, apparently that map was part of a ‘tengu confirmed!’ April Fool’s joke in 2014. To quote the story blurb that accompanied the image:

“The Quaggan have shown their true face, cast aside by the human gods over a thousand years ago they’ve sworn to take revenge on them and their worshipers. With the recent outburst of dragon magic they’ve started to summon their saviors back into the world of Tyria once and for all.
Join up with the proud Tengu and stop the bloodthirsty Quaggan from sacrificing more innocent civilians. Are you in time to stop the White Mantle and Mursaat from taking over Tyria once and for all?”

Nothing at all official there.

Sirius.4510:

If Primordus is becoming more active, there’s a pretty good chance we’ll be hearing about it as soon as next episode of LWS3.

On that subject, there was an interesting map linked in another thread – not sure exactly how they got it but I presume from some pre-release content that was cut: http://imgur.com/bOwDeHt
Now, obviously, this whole map could have been thrown away. But the “Heart of Primordus” intrigues me. Merely idle speculation and possibly wishful thinking, but perhaps we’ll be visiting that in the near future? I note that this map isn’t actually geographically connected to the core Dominion of Winds (even if they throw it away and redo it, that won’t change, since Garrenhoff’s port precludes that) so it wouldn’t necessarily break anything in the event that they wanted to use the DoW for a capital in a subsequent expansion.

RyuDragnier.9476:

That looks like how the beta map probably was Sirius. Notice how Lion’s Arch has that original look, and not the newer one for the map?

Icdan Sevaen.4628:

Wow what, that map? How come it’s filled in? Was it in beta but removed?

That map was a fan-made April Fool’s map done for 2014.

That region actually did have a half-made map from pre-beta era, but it was nowhere near that completed. that_shaman and WoodenPotatoes and the guy who made Tyria3d did stuff about that map.

EDIT: Didn’t see Aaron’s post.

Nightbringer Tenchi.5794:

it makes much more sense to have Largos or Kodan as new playable races and even then i do not believe ArenaNet will add any new options there.

How? It’s not like the Kodan or Largos are more prevalent in the current story line than the Tengu (actually, I’d argue less so). I also don’t think it’s said that either Kodan or Largos are more eager to provide soldiers into this war.

However, lore can be told to explain ANY of the three options. Easily.

Arathor.7419:

let’s say since the tengu closed off they dont need the zhaitan personal story or ls1 and 2 becuase they werent there they could just give them a small personal story and then have them implented in the future ls , according to lore primordus minions are digging under the walls of the dominion and they are having some problems now , i think sooner or later the tengu will have to call the other races ie the pact to help becuase they wont be able to deal with that problem alone.

Why can’t Tengu just skip the whole Zhaitan story and part of the Mordremoth story? Simply implement that, if you want to roll a Tengu character, you must have [enter achievements for main story + HoT up to [x] point]. At that point, just completely skip the whole risen portion; instead, the story revolves around WHY the Tengu took whatever stance they did. Then roll them into Mordremoth story, leading up to current and then roll the into the newest story with all races.

This isn’t that difficult, people.

Because, Leo, that means that ArenaNet will have to make an entirely unique level 1-80 personal story for tengu.

If they slap the tengu PC into the old plots, it’s just levels 1-30 that’s unique and just new voice overs for everything else.

In other words, it is a LOT less work for ArenaNet to reuse the Order and Pact storyline of the Personal Story than it would be to create a series of new plots for the tengu to cover all 80 levels before they’d be joining in the level 80 content of Season 3.

Furthermore, if the tengu just suddenly appear in Season 3, you have to explain why the hell they’re part of this sadly-named “Dragon’s Watch”, why they lead it, why all the NPCs know the tengu PC and trust the tengu PC, and alter every single reference to Commander (because the Tengu PC would not have been a Commander of the Pact) and references to killing Zhaitan and Mordremoth, knowing the old Destiny’s Edge, and so forth.

Ultimately, it’s a ton less work to hire two new voice actors to read off already written or slightly altered lines, and to create seven short plots unique to tengu (3 @ lvl 10, 3 @ lvl 20, 1 @ lvl 30).

Furthermore, due to how the Story Journal works, you’d either be restricting tengu players from doing S2 and HoT – which they would have paid for – and possibly S3, or having to do the VA work for them anyways. At which point, why only cut the Zhaitan story when doing such is more work than just more VA recording?

TL;DR

Yes, it is that difficult, Leo G.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Because, Leo, that means that ArenaNet will have to make an entirely unique level 1-80 personal story for tengu.

That’s a given and likely desired since that’s the point of introducing new races: to introduce more story.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

If they slap the tengu PC into the old plots, it’s just levels 1-30 that’s unique and just new voice overs for everything else.

In other words, it is a LOT less work for ArenaNet to reuse the Order and Pact storyline of the Personal Story than it would be to create a series of new plots for the tengu to cover all 80 levels before they’d be joining in the level 80 content of Season 3.

Furthermore, if the tengu just suddenly appear in Season 3, you have to explain why the hell they’re part of this sadly-named “Dragon’s Watch”, why they lead it, why all the NPCs know the tengu PC and trust the tengu PC, and alter every single reference to Commander (because the Tengu PC would not have been a Commander of the Pact) and references to killing Zhaitan and Mordremoth, knowing the old Destiny’s Edge, and so forth.

Ultimately, it’s a ton less work to hire two new voice actors to read off already written or slightly altered lines, and to create seven short plots unique to tengu (3 @ lvl 10, 3 @ lvl 20, 1 @ lvl 30).

Furthermore, due to how the Story Journal works, you’d either be restricting tengu players from doing S2 and HoT – which they would have paid for – and possibly S3, or having to do the VA work for them anyways. At which point, why only cut the Zhaitan story when doing such is more work than just more VA recording?

Not sure exactly what you’re trying to get at with this. You’re explaining ways to reuse and make implementation simpler to integrate them into the old plot…then make an example of trying to explain Tengu appearing in the newest season….when you JUST described of retroactively fitting them in. To clarify, you won’t have to explain why the tengu suddenly appear IF you add the tengu to the old content.

But one huge consideration you’re overlooking is that there is no reason that Anet MUST implement a new race in the exact same manner that the other races were introduced at launch. You don’t have to have content from level 1-80 at all; you can just start a tengu character at level 30…or at level 60 or 80. Or you can just let the player decide how or where you want to start (there are consumables that instantly put you at certain levels, which didn’t exist at launch).

Ultimately, it’s up to how much effort the devs want to put forth which will decide how difficult it would be.

Also, I would LOVE if the devs alter all references to the Pact commander. Either that or you can just admit that your character, as a Pact commander, could not function very well as a commander doing what they do. You can’t lead an army properly from the front lines. You’d need other commanders of other branches overseeing each section of your fleet. This would mean that there are multiple Pact commanders (which makes sense, since all my characters are referred to by that title) thus a simple job title. So it wouldn’t matter that much that a Tengu is a commander. Or a Skritt, or a Largos; as long as they can function properly as a leader, the soldiers are obligated to follow. That’s just how organized military works.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

TL;DR

Yes, it is that difficult, Leo G.

We shall see.

tl;dr tho

Not really.

Leo G.4501:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Because, Leo, that means that ArenaNet will have to make an entirely unique level 1-80 personal story for tengu.

That’s a given and likely desired since that’s the point of introducing new races: to introduce more story.

Except for the fact that ArenaNet explicitly stated that they weren’t going to do akin to what they did with GW1 – which is what you’re suggesting – and honestly you still get more story introduced by having wholly new 1-30 PS story steps and two low level zones.

Leo G.4501:

Not sure exactly what you’re trying to get at with this. You’re explaining ways to reuse and make implementation simpler to integrate them into the old plot…then make an example of trying to explain Tengu appearing in the newest season….when you JUST described of retroactively fitting them in. To clarify, you won’t have to explain why the tengu suddenly appear IF you add the tengu to the old content.

Exactly, IF you add them to the old content, you don’t have to explain why they suddenly appear.

But if you DON’T, then you have to explain why suddenly the tengu is being called Pact Commander and is buddy-buddy with everyone else. And if you make it so that the tengu isn’t called that, then you’re altering all of S2, HoT, and S3 story for every single character out there, in addition to just having tengu voice acting to the old stuff.

Leo G.4501:

But one huge consideration you’re overlooking is that there is no reason that Anet MUST implement a new race in the exact same manner that the other races were introduced at launch. You don’t have to have content from level 1-80 at all; you can just start a tengu character at level 30…or at level 60 or 80. Or you can just let the player decide how or where you want to start (there are consumables that instantly put you at certain levels, which didn’t exist at launch).

Except that isn’t how the story journal is functioned to work, and would require a lot of work to get that to function that way.

Furthermore, you still run into the issue of why the kitten would a tengu be the Pact Commander and be friends with DE and DE 2.0.

Leo G.4501:

Also, I would LOVE if the devs alter all references to the Pact commander.

Which would be so much work for so little gain from ArenaNet that they would never even consider such a thing seriously.

Leo G.4501:

This would mean that there are multiple Pact commanders (which makes sense, since all my characters are referred to by that title) thus a simple job title.

Which is outright stated to be the case in S2 and we even see some Commanders in CoF and Frostgorge…

Leo G.4501:

So it wouldn’t matter that much that a Tengu is a commander. Or a Skritt, or a Largos; as long as they can function properly as a leader, the soldiers are obligated to follow. That’s just how organized military works.

“A” commander? No.

“The” commander? Yes.

The PC is repeatedly being called the one who killed Zhaitan from S2 to S3. As well as being best buds with DE and DE 2.0. But if you just take the tengu PC out of the plots that take place before the tengu open their borders (aka PS→S3) then… that makes no sense.

Not necessary to reply to every point since most of your replies are basically “No, the way things are is how I say them and you should accept that as fact” which I don’t have the time to argue nor the data. But I will reply to one point.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

“A” commander? No.

“The” commander? Yes.

The PC is repeatedly being called the one who killed Zhaitan from S2 to S3. As well as being best buds with DE and DE 2.0. But if you just take the tengu PC out of the plots that take place before the tengu open their borders (aka PS->S3) then… that makes no sense.

And? I have a total of 2 characters who completed the entire Zhaitan story, 1 that completed S2 and S3 but DIDN’T complete the Zhaitan story and none who’ve completed all these stories as a complete continuum story. So you can either take that at face value and consider characters perceived as “The Commander” as a part of a group of commanders who all accept responsibility for their victories and failures or just man up and dismiss the title wholesale as a title for the player as a protagonist and not the voice/pixels of the character themselves.

Or the third option (the one I take) and mold the NPC responses into what they’re suppose to be for my individual preference instead of expecting a game to do all the legwork creating a narrative for me. So the NPCs aren’t calling my 2nd Warrior “The Pact Commander” when he is, in fact, a close friend and intellectual rival of the actual “THE Pact Commander”. Those NPCs are just calling my 2nd Warrior “Commander” and nothing more.

And one may say, “well that’s dumb and completely immersion breaking!” but if a small quips about the game’s protagonist are enough to break your immersion, you likely weren’t that immersed to begin with. I can accept a few NPCs talking to the character in the context of what the protagonist actually accomplished as a by-product of the gift of voice-over work added to the game. You could kitten it for all its mistakes but then you’d have to ignore all the good it adds to the game and immersive world.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

That region actually did have a half-made map from pre-beta era, but it was nowhere near that completed. that_shaman and WoodenPotatoes and the guy who made Tyria3d did stuff about that map.

Oh, they Photoshopped the whole map up? I’d assumed they repurposed something they found somewhere for the gag. Pretty nice work in that case – it follows the style of the rest of the map really well.

Leo G, it’s nice that you have your own headcanon and all but has nothing to do with the topic. Konig and I are proposing solutions to the Tengu problem based on how Arena-Net designed the story so far and what is feasible within their resources. In other words, the only one here who believes “the way things are is how I say them and you should accept that as fact” is you, since you are basing you argument on you own headcanon, not how they are presented in the game.

Leo G.4501:

Not necessary to reply to every point since most of your replies are basically “No, the way things are is how I say them and you should accept that as fact” which I don’t have the time to argue nor the data. But I will reply to one point.

Funny that the same can be said for your own posts too. :P

Leo G.4501:

And? I have a total of 2 characters who completed the entire Zhaitan story, 1 that completed S2 and S3 but DIDN’T complete the Zhaitan story and none who’ve completed all these stories as a complete continuum story. So you can either take that at face value and consider characters perceived as “The Commander” as a part of a group of commanders who all accept responsibility for their victories and failures or just man up and dismiss the title wholesale as a title for the player as a protagonist and not the voice/pixels of the character themselves.

The difference between this situation and the tengu PC never being the one to take down Zhaitan in story is that S2 presumes that the PS is completed.

Leo G.4501:

And one may say, “well that’s dumb and completely immersion breaking!” but if a small quips about the game’s protagonist are enough to break your immersion, you likely weren’t that immersed to begin with. I can accept a few NPCs talking to the character in the context of what the protagonist actually accomplished as a by-product of the gift of voice-over work added to the game. You could kitten it for all its mistakes but then you’d have to ignore all the good it adds to the game and immersive world.

In all honesty, it’s the small quips here and there that break immersion the most, because huge things are often taken as gags and jokes by the writers – and are often consistently provided throughout or are usually made apparent to be gags that they don’t break immersion but further immersion.

BuddhaKeks.4857:

Leo G, it’s nice that you have your own headcanon and all but has nothing to do with the topic. Konig and I are proposing solutions to the Tengu problem based on how Arena-Net designed the story so far and what is feasible within their resources. In other words, the only one here who believes “the way things are is how I say them and you should accept that as fact” is you, since you are basing you argument on you own headcanon, not how they are presented in the game.

I’m not basing anything on my own “headcanon”, I’m saying your apprehensions against adding a new race already exists with the existing races. To dismiss a new addition on a problem unrelated to said addition seems short sighted.

And the reason I even brought up my perspective is to expand on further possible solutions. So don’t jump to conclusions here. At the very least, it’d be much easier to form a story without applying hard titles to characters going forward, as it can create inconsistencies and conflicts.

The problem is that Titles are the best way Arenanet currently has to speak towards the main character without having the capability to actually say names. If we remove titles like Commander and Pooh Bah what are they are going to call us? “Hey you?”

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Funny that the same can be said for your own posts too. :P

But at least I admit it. Like I said, I don’t have all the data or time to argue every point but some people will consider their opinion as fact.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

The difference between this situation and the tengu PC never being the one to take down Zhaitan in story is that S2 presumes that the PS is completed.
…

In all honesty, it’s the small quips here and there that break immersion the most, because huge things are often taken as gags and jokes by the writers – and are often consistently provided throughout or are usually made apparent to be gags that they don’t break immersion but further immersion.

So then we’re pretty much complaining about nit picks?

Granted, I can see, from a quality stand-point, why the apprehension exists for adding further races. From a story stand-point, though, so long as the PLAYER has experienced theses events, that’s all that must be necessitated within gameplay limitations.

Narcemus.1348:

The problem is that Titles are the best way Arenanet currently has to speak towards the main character without having the capability to actually say names. If we remove titles like Commander and Pooh Bah what are they are going to call us? “Hey you?”

You can’t be that uncreative, can you?

Leo G.4501:

I’m not basing anything on my own “headcanon”, I’m saying your apprehensions against adding a new race already exists with the existing races. To dismiss a new addition on a problem unrelated to said addition seems short sighted.

And the reason I even brought up my perspective is to expand on further possible solutions. So don’t jump to conclusions here. At the very least, it’d be much easier to form a story without applying hard titles to characters going forward, as it can create inconsistencies and conflicts.

The way it is done in the game is, that if you play LS2 or LS3 or the HoT campaign the game will assume you are the Pact Commander who killed Zhaitan in the PS. That is a fact. So no matter how much you roleplay your characters to be friendly rivals of the the Commander, the fact that it is not presented that way in the game will not change. Hence I said you used your headcanon as an explanation and even more so accuse others of doing so. Don’t you see how incredible hypocritical that is?
Yes Anet could go with your route but they will never do so. It is simply too much work. They would have to design an entirely new campaign, hundreds if not thousands of new voice lines and a Tengu player would be excluded from a ton of content. No sane developer would ever do that. Not only would they have to pour tones of resources into a tiny fragment of the game, they would also create no endgame content for exsiting players.

This is the very reason I made this thread. To create an template for the addition of new playable races that is both inclusive too all sorts of players, doesn’t break the lore and is comparatively little work (though still a lot admittedly).

I also don’t think that taking away the hard titles or adding more would make storytelling easier, in fact it is quite the opposite. GW1 for the most part never gave the player a title, so now in GW2 the players of the first game can’t be referenced at all. Without a well known universal title like “Champions of Ascalon” (or whatever) the game has to be more specific in who it references. However the more specific you get the more you exclude players, because they stop identifying with certain descriptions. So now, since Prophecies never gave it’s players a title, GW2 doesn’t reference them at all, since there is no way to do so, without getting descriptive (even saying if it was a man or woman would already be too much).

GW2 avoided this problem with naming the player the Pact Commander. It is both unisex and doesn’t mention your race or your previous Order. It is convienent and makes it easy to reference the player. Of course it is a bit weird being called Commander or even Boss (which would be the title within the “Dragon Watch”) all the time, but is better than the alternative.

No player would have to pass on the Zhaitan campaign if Anet would let the Tengu enter at a later point, like with the introduction of the Primordus arc in the future, there are still the other races you can bore your way through the Zhaitan campaign if you want.

If Anet wants to cut costs with the production, do for example not ask people who are expensive to get just because they have fans. I don´t know who voices any of my characters, and I also am not interested who that is. So what if Mark Hamil voiced the Joker in Arkham asylum? I am pretty sure that there are many other men who have a raunchy voice and can laugh manically, come fresh from art schools and would be glad to break into the industry.
Yes, a cut scene costs money. But designing other stuff I would not touch with a ten foot pole like adventures or raids also cost money and have many people raging over them.

Leo G.4501:

Narcemus.1348:

The problem is that Titles are the best way Arenanet currently has to speak towards the main character without having the capability to actually say names. If we remove titles like Commander and Pooh Bah what are they are going to call us? “Hey you?”

You can’t be that uncreative, can you?

You call me uncreative get include no “creative” input of your own as to how you get around the scenario of naming the character with voice actors without giving them a title of some sort. The only thing I could think of when removing the title Pact Commander would be using some of the personal titles, but even that includes a ton of extra voice acting…

Please just make use of them as an option, no need to make a new story line aside from vocalization, they’ve been part of Tyria since the beginning and it’ll be much more appreciated if i can buy them thru gemstore as a Character skin to be unlock. Thanks in advance.