Guild Wars 2

Hello there !

I’m a roleplayer, and God knows how much we love complex issues.

Today, my Lionguard met a seraph, and they discussed about the differences between the two legal systems. I noticed the game gives us so little about how the Lionguard handle with criminals. (To be honest, it even seems the Lionguard structure itself is not well defined, however that is not the topic of this post).

I’d love to hear a dev giving us some infos about how they see the system in Lion’s Arch. But let’s be realistic.
I’m looking for any kind of information, pieces of dialogs between NPCs, and lore text (books, dev interview ?), dealing with the Lionguard and the Lion’s Arch that could help to understand the legal system.

I think there is no court in Lion’s Arch, considering guards tends to rule according to a code (which, I guess, is kinda like those pirates love to write).
Mai Trin was declared culprit and condemned to death by the Council of the city.

Btw, what do you think about the concept of an advocate in GW2 ?

The only thing that comes to mind would be the potential of getting your freedom through gladitorial combat. That’s what happens to Logan, Rytlock and Caithe in EoD. There was no court or judge decision in that case, it was an offer by Magnus, the captain of the Lionguard. It’s implied they do that often with prisoners that show fighting prowess.

I don’t know if that’s relevant, but there have been instances where both Divinity’s Reach and Lion’s Arch policies have led to friction between the two, mainly because of the Centaurs.
The Lionguard tolerates their presence for their trading potential, whereas the Seraph would initiate fight upon sight. Sheriff Sauchaa in Kessex Haven has interesting dialogue concerning this, and if you hang around long enough, I remember seeing a Seraph walking by that was about to fight with a Centaur, and the Lionguard was ready to defend the Centaur if the Seraph attacked.
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Sheriff_Sauchaa

I do not recall there being any sort of court system in Lion’s Arch, though the Captain’s Council fills that position when disputes need judged. I want to say that plays out in Sea of Sorrows, but I’m not 100% on that. The way that the jail scenario seems to work, though is that based on your crime you receive a billet or basically a debt to society that you need to pay off, or that someone could buy. In Edge of Destiny they are able to fight and take the winnings to pay off their billet, with Canach his billet was bought by Anise and he is now basically a slave to her until he has fulfilled his debt to her. There may be more information than this, but I’m at work and don’t have it on hand, I hope it helps though.

Best source for Lion’s Arch is Sea of Sorrows, were the Captain’s Council politics and order forces methods in the “Free City” are hinted here and there.

However, you have to take on account the story of Cobiah Marriner happens a lot of years before the actual Lion’s Arch, and even before the GW2 “Old” one. So the legal and justice systems could have changed a lot in that time…

Also try to not lightly mix Divinity’s Reach, the Consortium and Lion’s Arch. In the game they seems to work inside the same set of rules (Were the human city follow the principles tightly, the ex pirate port intent to be more loose on that, and the Consortium directly want to bend and twist the rules for their gain…) but in the books there isn’t a clear agreement even in the basic values behind the laws…

IMO the peace between humans and charr meant a really really big change across all Tyria, even more relevant for a multicultural hub like LA, a change that the shared fight against the dragons crystallized into a much more stable and solid “Tyrian Society”: the new legal, cultural and somewhat moral “homogeneity” that we can see in-game when playing GW2 is the product of that.

As always, I digress. Just read the novels: they are fun and offer decent lore, and Sea of Sorrows is the best of the three.

The lionguard is pretty straightforward.

They have a commander in chief, and can arrest anyone they deem a criminal. Their policy is closer to ‘guilty until proven innocent’. If a lionguard thinks you’re a criminal, he takes you in, puts you in a cell, and then the talking starts.

Most of the technicalities on the legal system can be drawn from Seas of Sorrow, but remember there’s a bit time gap. And at the time the council was the judge and jury, and by now they propably have a proper jailhouse and courtroom