Guild Wars 2

In the new instance one of the first things your PC does is name the vines after Mordremoth. When in the game prior to now has the name Mordremoth ever been used? I was under the impression that the name only existed in the combat log from Crucible of Eternity. Where did our PCs learn the name Mordremoth (or go as far as to think the vines in Prosperity are Mordremoth’s doing – it’s obvious to players, but the PC was in the dark).

Am I forgetting something here?

Never.
I was confused as well.

Even if we consider the Inquest knowing its name, because they are using its minions and even if the pact has knowledge, this is a slip up.

I guess they are skipping some things, as they are further in their minds as in game at the moment.

I hope they get their act together

This is unacceptable from a lore perspective, this is worse than anything Scarlet ever did. I hope they hotfix this and have us get the name via a book or note in Scarlets room, that would be bearable, but this? Just unacceptable.

I too thought it was a bit of a oddity.

Then I considered about how everyone knew about the Elder Dragons, and wondered if there was references lore-wise to the Elder Dragon names from the Jotun ancestors to the dwarves…

Maybe it’s just common-knowledge?

Woah, going through the second instance and you’re just bombarded with “Mordremoth” references, everything is like we talk on the forums (as players we figured it out but we knew out NPCs didn’t know this stuff, or thought anyway). The plant dragon and several other things, I feel like I’m reading a book and I’ve missed a giant “reveal” chapter.

The Inquest know who Mordremoth is…… Once the Elder Dragon’s corruption became known they would obviously give out the name publicly since one of their members are on the Arcane Council….

Do you know how closed -minded Asurans are regarding knowledge? Let alone a member of the Inquest?
Why would a Human character, like mine, have insight on the Arcane Council and their discussions?

This feels like I skipped at least 1 major update. I have no idea why my character should know the dragons name.

Sykper.6583:

I too thought it was a bit of a oddity.

Then I considered about how everyone knew about the Elder Dragons, and wondered if there was references lore-wise to the Elder Dragon names from the Jotun ancestors to the dwarves…

Maybe it’s just common-knowledge?

No, it’s not really common-knowledge.
Because when the game begins, the only information about the dragons we have comes from ancient dwarven texts and jotun stalea (information from the dragons previous cycle of awakening over 11,000 years ago).
These dragon recods talk about several dragons, but not all are mentioned by name (for example the sea dragon is mentioned but not named). There is no mention of mordremoth either in these records.

(The Inquest had been conducting experiments structured around six Elder Dragons so they may have a bit of prior knowledge. But they didn’t exactly invite us over to talk about dragons).

And they missed the opportunity to name it “The Dragon that killed…………..(pathetically obvious extra in Red Shirt)”.

Fixed the “spoiler”

Shiren.9532:

I feel like I’m reading a book and I’ve missed a giant “reveal” chapter.

Yes, this and a lot more of this.

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

And they missed the opportunity to name it “The Dragon that killed…………..Belinda”.

Thanks for the spoiler, Teofa.

The way I saw it, Mordremoth’s name was revealed “in-universe” sometime in the last two weeks; it’d be silly if our PC just happened to be present for every major discovery. Still, it was momentarily disconcerting for me as well.

webtoehobbit.4201:

This is unacceptable from a lore perspective, this is worse than anything Scarlet ever did. I hope they hotfix this and have us get the name via a book or note in Scarlets room, that would be bearable, but this? Just unacceptable.

Do you think you might be being a little hyperbolic there?

Maybe the Priory put two and two together.

I can imagine the scene now:
Priory Magister 1: ‘Hey guys! I just finished translating this old dwarven text. It tells us of a sixth Elder Dragon called Mordremoth, who controls plants and giant evil vines!’
Priory Magister 2: ‘Vines? Like the ones that just tore up Prosperity?’
Priory Magister 1: ‘Sweet Dwayna’s dress, you’re right! EVERYONE! ANOTHER DRAGON JUST WOKE UP! WE’RE ALL GOING TO DIE!

If the Priory did, it should be shown.

Regarding the priorys trackrecord of getting info out in time in the LS i highly doubt that

Hope this gets adressed in-game, because it’s clearly a bad choice as it is.

Rhaegar.1203:

If the Priory did, it should be shown.

I agree. If there was a source for where Mordremoth’s name comes from (or even anyone deciding that anything happening these last couple of releases is definitely Mordremoth) then it should have been shown.

As far as I was aware, we just heard what we thought was a dragon’s roar and were investigating. It’s arguable that the vines in the area could have been something else (maybe even Nightmare Court – their absence is notable though).

I was actually interested in knowing who decided it’s name would be Mordremoth (or where that name comes from).

Yes, of course. The ED are not out and about flashing their business cards to everyone. That means someone else has to name them; but this “naming” came out of nowhere.

Shiren.9532:

Rhaegar.1203:

If the Priory did, it should be shown.

I agree. If there was a source for where Mordremoth’s name comes from (or even anyone deciding that anything happening these last couple of releases is definitely Mordremoth) then it should have been shown.

As far as I was aware, we just heard what we thought was a dragon’s roar and were investigating. It’s arguable that the vines in the area could have been something else (maybe even Nightmare Court – their absence is notable though).

I was actually interested in knowing who decided it’s name would be Mordremoth (or where that name comes from).

The wind whistling through the vines made the sound mooooooorrdreeeeemooootthhhh…..

I was surprised as well, looks like a major oversight to me. I wonder how long it’ll take for the writers to think up some ‘lore’ again to explain how the name “Mordremoth” was scribbled down on some stuff in Scarlet’s lair or on the walls or something and that our character picked it up there.

According to the wiki:

“Mordremoth’s existence did not become apparent to most Tyrians until early 1327 AE, when it awoke. It was, however, mentioned in ancient dwarven texts and jotun stalea, although no details other than the existence of a sixth Elder Dragon were ever made clear. Additionally, the Inquest had been conducting experiments structured around the presumption of six Elder Dragons for a while, indicating they had some prior knowledge of it.”

This doesn’t describe if the dwarves specifically knew his name, however it was never mentioned that they did know his name. So either the dwarves did know the name and the Priory has records of it but no one decided to give a kitten until now, or the dev’s just did a little nose-dive and will soon make lore up for it with the former example.

Zelkovan.2630:

(…)although no details other than the existence of a sixth Elder Dragon were ever made clear. (…)

I’d say that leaves out the possibility of the name being written in the Jotun/Dwarven texts.

Rhaegar.1203:

Zelkovan.2630:

(…)although no details other than the existence of a sixth Elder Dragon were ever made clear. (…)

I’d say that leaves out the possibility of the name being written in the Jotun/Dwarven texts.

I interpret that quote as more like they could or could not have had the name, but simply the name and nothing more (what the dragon looked like, where it slept, what its corruption looked like, etc). Though yes, one thing it implies is that they didn’t have a name, either. So where is the name our characters keep talking about coming from?

We, the community, knew about the name a long time ago from a skill description but the characters in the game world don’t have a source for its name. Unless Marjory makes the excuse that she decided to name the dragon Mordremoth, another scape-goat for this situation.

This is the only real mistake I see in this release.

Unfortunately, it is the first line of text…

Rhaegar.1203:

If the Priory did, it should be shown.

Like when they told us they would be investigating Ceara’s leyline? Sending two humans and a hylek? That seems like a lot of discussion, I think even Redditors would be angry with pure discussion chapters.

Maybe the PC simply made the name up?
But I suppose that would require us to have a 10 minute story instance where people discuss back and forth with different names?

oh god yes. i was like “did my character just pull that name out of his kitten why is everyone acting like the name is well estabilished? when did the party break the fourth wall and read the lore forums?”

i appreciate the effort to bring in more story and lore into the game and make the lore fans feel appreciated, but be careful with the information dropping. give it a reason for the characters to have such obscure information, don’t just make someone say it out of the blue.

hell, how do we even have a name if, until now, no one in the game (save the master of whispers) was even aware that there were more than three dragons left?

lordkrall.7241:

Maybe the PC simply made the name up?
But I suppose that would require us to have a 10 minute story instance where people discuss back and forth with different names?

oh yeah, plant… dragon… plant… dragon… i think i’ll settle for “MORDREMOTH”. that totally sounds like something a krytan kid would name a dragon made of plant.

and then kasmeer is like (paraphrasing) “you mean… THE mordremoth?” as if that name was something from a kids’ story.

lordkrall.7241:

Maybe the PC simply made the name up?
But I suppose that would require us to have a 10 minute story instance where people discuss back and forth with different names?

Zhaitan’s name was used by several of its minions. Maybe the minions were just using a name they knew we used for the dragon, but I thought that implied dragons aren’t named by us – they have names and we learn them. I don’t think Svanir ever mentioned Jormag but Jormag was asleep when Svanir was corrupted, maybe they never communicated.

The rules are different for all dragons, but at least Zhaitan’s minions called him by name, I don’t think an ED would let ants name it.

Tamias.7059:

webtoehobbit.4201:

This is unacceptable from a lore perspective, this is worse than anything Scarlet ever did. I hope they hotfix this and have us get the name via a book or note in Scarlets room, that would be bearable, but this? Just unacceptable.

Do you think you might be being a little hyperbolic there?

But isn’t that how complaints are /supposed/ to be on these forums?

ShinjoNaomi.1896:

Tamias.7059:

webtoehobbit.4201:

This is unacceptable from a lore perspective, this is worse than anything Scarlet ever did. I hope they hotfix this and have us get the name via a book or note in Scarlets room, that would be bearable, but this? Just unacceptable.

Do you think you might be being a little hyperbolic there?

But isn’t that how complaints are /supposed/ to be on these forums?

Nah. There’s not enough blame on the Gem Store or certain developers.

I felt like Kasmeer when she ask “Mordremoth?” after Jory first said it. Like “where did you get that from?” To me it’s sloppy story telling. Last chapter they didn’t seem to acknowledge that this was the dragon and were focused on the crash. I thought it was a leap for Jory to say definitively that it was dragon corruption. I am happy that they kept the name Mordremoth though.I was hoping we would learn his name from some big reveal, like from a champion, lieutenant, or from the dragon itself.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

ShinjoNaomi.1896:

Tamias.7059:

webtoehobbit.4201:

This is unacceptable from a lore perspective, this is worse than anything Scarlet ever did. I hope they hotfix this and have us get the name via a book or note in Scarlets room, that would be bearable, but this? Just unacceptable.

Do you think you might be being a little hyperbolic there?

But isn’t that how complaints are /supposed/ to be on these forums?

Nah. There’s not enough blame on the Gem Store or certain developers.

it’s not a true GW2 thread until someone says GW2 has been turned into a pay to win game by nexon.

jhgund.5906:

I was hoping we would learn his name from some big reveal, like from a champion, lieutenant, or from the dragon itself.

that would’ve been so much better. zhaitan and jormag both have sentient liutenants that go “zhaitan/jormag will consume all!”, i’m sure mordy, which seems to have a thing for sylvaris, could get his next victim to say the name, after which the party would discuss it and be like “is that what he’s called then?”

right now, our best explanation is we’re connected to the player character via morphogenetic fields.

/reference

Maybe name Mordremoth was used in some Aerin’s quotes? I personally didn’t really listen to his mid-battle babbling, so I don’t know…

BrunoBRS.5178:

jhgund.5906:

I was hoping we would learn his name from some big reveal, like from a champion, lieutenant, or from the dragon itself.

that would’ve been so much better. zhaitan and jormag both have sentient liutenants that go “zhaitan/jormag will consume all!”, i’m sure mordy, which seems to have a thing for sylvaris, could get his next victim to say the name, after which the party would discuss it and be like “is that what he’s called then?”

right now, our best explanation is we’re connected to the player character via morphogenetic fields.

/reference

Even better, the event in the final instance where Taimi does something monumentally stupid and the PC ends up getting the credit for it? That would have been a perfect time for the PC to learn the dragon’s name…

The obvious answer is that the dragon is now inside our head and has given us his name.

Rhaegar.1203:

Yes, of course. The ED are not out and about flashing their business cards to everyone.

+1 for you dace.8019 that made me lol

draxynnic.3719:

BrunoBRS.5178:

jhgund.5906:

I was hoping we would learn his name from some big reveal, like from a champion, lieutenant, or from the dragon itself.

that would’ve been so much better. zhaitan and jormag both have sentient liutenants that go “zhaitan/jormag will consume all!”, i’m sure mordy, which seems to have a thing for sylvaris, could get his next victim to say the name, after which the party would discuss it and be like “is that what he’s called then?”

right now, our best explanation is we’re connected to the player character via morphogenetic fields.

/reference

Even better, the event in the final instance where Taimi does something monumentally stupid and the PC ends up getting the credit for it? That would have been a perfect time for the PC to learn the dragon’s name…

that would’ve worked as well. like we just namedrop him as soon as we wake up, the NPCs are like “what did you say?” and we explain that it’s the dragon’s name, and yep, it’s definitely a dragon.

but unfortunately, we’re stuck with “the PC reads the lore forums”.

Little does anyone know that Mordremoth HAS been seen before. He played the role of Audrey 2 in Little Shop of Horrors.

originally scarlet was going to mention the name ‘mordremoth’ just before she died.

a data-mined alternate version of scarlet’s death she dropped the name and after she died braham and i think rox were talking about “who is this ‘mordremoth’ and what danger do they pose?”

also marjory died in that version.

my guess is they forgot to bring back the mention of mordremoth’s name when they changed the scene, creating this plot-hole.

Akbaroth.2861:

originally scarlet was going to mention the name ‘mordremoth’ just before she died.

a data-mined alternate version of scarlet’s death she dropped the name and after she died braham and i think rox were talking about “who is this ‘mordremoth’ and what danger do they pose?”

also marjory died in that version.

my guess is they forgot to bring back the mention of mordremoth’s name when they changed the scene, creating this plot-hole.

That’s been my assumption – proofreading being done by people too close to the project and thus steeped in this enough to not think twice about it.

They really need to have someone on hand who doesn’t keep all the lore in their head to run this by.

Well last week there was a continuity issue because the english wiki article about secondborn had no reference for the date. That drove Angel to the conclusion it must have been fan speculation and she “changed” it.
This week we have the reverse issue since the name is everywhere in the wiki, still without reference (from what I understood this was a huge drama on the wiki) …I assume she didn’t want to make the same mistake twice…..

Ranael.6423:

Well last week there was a continuity issue because the english wiki article about secondborn had no reference for the date. That drove Angel to the conclusion it must have been fan speculation and she “changed” it.
This week we have the reverse issue since the name is everywhere in the wiki, still without reference (from what I understood this was a huge drama on the wiki) …I assume she didn’t want to make the same mistake twice…..

if she “didn’t want to make the same mistake twice”, all she’d have to do is make the name official. i’m pretty sure not even the wiki states that mordy’s name was known by characters in-game.

that’s assuming it was her mistake (which it really isn’t, i expect the whole team to have gone through the text multiple times and not noticing it), and assuming that was the reason. lots of assumptions.

BrunoBRS.5178:

if she “didn’t want to make the same mistake twice”, all she’d have to do is make the name official. i’m pretty sure not even the wiki states that mordy’s name was known by characters in-game.

that’s assuming it was her mistake (which it really isn’t, i expect the whole team to have gone through the text multiple times and not noticing it), and assuming that was the reason. lots of assumptions.

My post was to be taken with some irony… I strongly hope it is not what happened … and yes I don’t want to blame Angel specifically for this, they are a whole team of dev and QA ( and also some external testers probably). I just find it sad when you try to be invested in the story to see such huge things happen (that and 2 chapters after discovering that the big thing behind Scarlet’s moves was to awaken a dragon…to which we already gave a name…)

i can understand why they dropped the name so early (no point in trying to create a mystery that all the community already knows the answer to), the problem was in how they did it.

this might sound silly, but i would really like it if a dev stepped up and apologized. no need to explain it, or point fingers, just “guys, sorry, that was a slip up”.

to be honest until yesterday I was secretly hoping for the name to have changed (even the attack of subject alpha) just as they would have said “hey guys don’t mess too much with the .dat file”

Ranael.6423:

to be honest until yesterday I was secretly hoping for the name to have changed (even the attack of subject alpha) just as they would have said “hey guys don’t mess too much with the .dat file”

and then people would spend years speculating that “mordremoth” is actually a 7th, earth-themed dragon.

Akbaroth.2861:

originally scarlet was going to mention the name ‘mordremoth’ just before she died.

a data-mined alternate version of scarlet’s death she dropped the name and after she died braham and i think rox were talking about “who is this ‘mordremoth’ and what danger do they pose?”

also marjory died in that version.

my guess is they forgot to bring back the mention of mordremoth’s name when they changed the scene, creating this plot-hole.

That’s a massive oversite.

They are actively writing the new NPCs in Maguuma to indicate they don’t know about Mordremoth. Not only does E’s letter to the PC not mention the name (E is well connected, if someone knew the name E probably would know), the Story Journal doesn’t mention the name and still didn’t list the vines as Mordremoth or even the work of an Elder Dragon.

The three Priory NPCs that were near the quicksand river outside Prosperity have moved just near the centaur camp. The Priory are the researchers of Tyria, if any organisation knew Mordremoth’s name, they would be likely candidates. One of the Priory members was even specifically researching Maguuma and the three of them were sent on a mission from Gixx to make it to the jungle part of Maguuma (where we, the forum posters not the PC, think Mordremoth is). You can actually ask the Priory NPCs about the vines that attacked Prosperity and none of them mention Mordremoth or an Elder Dragon in their guess as to what happened. The hylek actually suggests it could be Nightmare Court (she’s from Caledon and mentions similarities) but also mentions no court members had been seen. Also note she calls you a commander so she is familiar in some way with your role in the Pact. So considering that, it would seem the Priory didn’t know anything about Mordremoth.

BrunoBRS.5178:

i can understand why they dropped the name so early (no point in trying to create a mystery that all the community already knows the answer to), the problem was in how they did it.

Yeah I was actually going to make a post about that. It was silly running around Maguuma in a story where our PCs were so ignorant of something so big that was so obvious to us. It was hard to engage in parts of the story when, as players, we knew what was going on. Still, it should have been done better.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

That’s been my assumption – proofreading being done by people too close to the project and thus steeped in this enough to not think twice about it.

They really need to have someone on hand who doesn’t keep all the lore in their head to run this by.

I don’t know much about writing stories, but as a consumer of stories you can usually break down a story into big moments which change the momentum of things. In the timeline of this story, the discovery/reveal of a sixth dragon is not only a big moment for the season two story, it’s a big moment in GW2’s story. I am a little surprised the reveal of Mordremoth (to the PC, not the player) wasn’t the sole focus of an entire episode, it was a big enough deal that when looking at “what needs to happen in episode two of season two” there should have been a primary bullet point saying “PC confirms sixth Elder Dragon, name revealed to be Mordremoth”. As far as the flow of the story goes, that’s a moment that changes everything, if they can find time to talk about Marjory’s ribs, Kasmeer becoming the most special of snowflakes, Braham’s leg (again), then they have time to make sure the Mordremoth plot is pieced together properly.

I suspect what happened is either a conveniently placed exposition book was not placed in Scarlet’s lab, or one of the devs working on that first instance got caught up in the discussion about Mordremoth on forums and didn’t actually know where that information came from because they weren’t one of the senior writers. How the rest of the team didn’t catch the mistake though, maybe it’s a consequence of pushing out so much content in such a short cycle?

Shiren.9532:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

That’s been my assumption – proofreading being done by people too close to the project and thus steeped in this enough to not think twice about it.

They really need to have someone on hand who doesn’t keep all the lore in their head to run this by.

I don’t know much about writing stories, but as a consumer of stories you can usually break down a story into big moments which change the momentum of things. In the timeline of this story, the discovery/reveal of a sixth dragon is not only a big moment for the season two story, it’s a big moment in GW2’s story. I am a little surprised the reveal of Mordremoth (to the PC, not the player) wasn’t the sole focus of an entire episode, it was a big enough deal that when looking at “what needs to happen in episode two of season two” there should have been a primary bullet point saying “PC confirms sixth Elder Dragon, name revealed to be Mordremoth”. As far as the flow of the story goes, that’s a moment that changes everything, if they can find time to talk about Marjory’s ribs, Kasmeer becoming the most special of snowflakes, Braham’s leg (again), then they have time to make sure the Mordremoth plot is pieced together properly.

Not going to argue too much on this point, because I don’t know what’s coming up – this plot point may not be as impactful as something later.

But I do agree it needed a bit more polish and work. Alas . . . once more, it’s obvious ANet didn’t leave themselves time to do that when they set out on working LS2 up. Which makes me sad.

I suspect what happened is either a conveniently placed exposition book was not placed in Scarlet’s lab, or one of the devs working on that first instance got caught up in the discussion about Mordremoth on forums and didn’t actually know where that information came from because they weren’t one of the senior writers. How the rest of the team didn’t catch the mistake though, maybe it’s a consequence of pushing out so much content in such a short cycle?

Pretty much what I said in another thread . . . and exactly what I mean by “they didn’t proofread effectively”.

To reiterate – you can read over an essay a thousand times while writing it and catching grammar errors . . . and then the actual content of the essay gets lost as you “know” what it says without actually reading it. This is why I had a writing professor tell everyone doing novella work to pass their story to the left one week . . . then to the right the other week and make sure it was a different person each time. They’ll catch things you didn’t.

And when I had to do oral reports in school, proofreading those was done by sitting in my room and reading it all aloud . . . in backwards order. Because then you’ll catch some things you might have missed.

This is why I just sigh and smile when people pull out “guys, writing is hard” as sarcasm. It really is.