Guild Wars 2

Hello all,

I’m an old school vet played GW since 05 played all campaigns and even EOTN expansion pack, I’ve only just picked up GW2 because of the Sylvari, because they are a new race witch Anet could expand upon, they just seem lacking in the roots of where they come from (no pun intentded).

A little about why I’m posting this. I watched POI the other day and Colin smiley face Johnasen said if you haven’t played Sylvari, you should (something along those lines) he said they had hidden bits of lore containing the jungle dragon that was developed since EOTN,the novels which Jeff and Ree was part of and the main story and so on so forth.

What novels are they talking about?

As I’ve read Edge of Destiny,Ghost of Ascalon and Sea of Sorrows and I can’t find no references there; EotN didn’t really help as all I remember from that is Ronan locating a seed, did not say where he got it from just a cave where there was plenty more of them and it was guarded and then the ending of EOTN showed the seed sprouting up.

So if you guys could point me in the right direction regarding Sylvari that would be helpful as the Wiki seems to be fact-less a lot of assumptions regarding them as a race (I know its community driven but no one seems to cite their source which is frustrating).
So I would like to get some concrete lore of them if possible cite sources of where you get them from if you can, if this is not possible why has ANET released a race with improper lore that isn’t fleshed out and if it is fleshed out why haven’t we got these lore facts and if we have gotten them in game why are they hidden like Easter eggs as Easter egg hunting is frustrating regarding a playable race I don’t mind some lore kept back for us to dig through…..?

The Norn,Humans,Charr and Asura all have a full race back story all fleshed out and the full community knows it..
Sylvari is the most compelling of races for me as a role player first as they are new to the world with mysterious beginnings.

So to sum it, I’ve bullet the questions that I’d like some help on.

What novels lay the groundwork for the Sylvari
Why is the Sylvari back ground so scarce to find
Why is everything an Easter egg hunt regarding their lore
Why was the ground work laid such a long time ago

So thanks in advance for your help

Keeper of Da Cookie.8714:

The Norn […] and Asura all have a full race back story all fleshed out and the full community knows it..

What? I mean I agree that human and Charr lore is pretty fleshed out but both Norn and Asura are severely lacking when it comes to backstory. The Asura for example are said to have had an civilization below the surface that easily outshines the current one, whith several cities atleast as big as Rata Sum of today. But that is all we know. Yeah that and they wanted to kill all Skritt at one point but that’s it. We know there ruins of earlier settlements they had above the surface, but so far this wa never expanded upon.
Norn are even worse off, all we know about their history comes from the Jotun and Charr and that is neither much nor incredibly reliable. Though more understandable in their case, as they don’t seem to have a tradition of written history (a problem I know too well as a historian with special interest in the antiquity).

For your questions:
1. GoA and EoD are your go to ressources here, as SoS doesn’t have any Sylvari in it. I think EoD explains a bit more, especially about Caithe and Faolain’s relationship, but GoA has some bits on Sylvari anatomy.
2. Because they are so young, they just don’t have much backstory. Other races are round for thousands of years, the sylvari are a quarter of a century old. Also as the last LS update shows, they hold some secrets they don’t want everyone to know.
3. Almost everything in GW lore is an easteregg hunt, get used to it. I would even say GW1 was the worse offender in this regard. But GW2 has it’s moments (the Orrian scrolls for example)
4. Better ask the writers on that one.

• What novels lay the groundwork for the Sylvari?
  I don’t think you should put too much into that comment from Colin. I presume he’s talking about the relationship between Caithe and Faolain (Dream and Nightmare) in Destiny’s Edge.
  The article Dream and Nightmare is a good example on how they’ve tried to spread doubt about “the true sylvari”.
  It is this type of descriptions you’ll find in the novels and Personal Story. It is there, but always very vague, and open to interpretation.

Dream and Nightmare

These sylvari reject the teachings of Ventari’s tablet and claim that the influence of outside races perverted the true nature of the Pale Tree and the sylvari. They seek the shadow within the Dream, turn away from what they deem false morality, and explore the darker side of their personality. Cold, cruel, and without mercy, they see themselves as true sylvari, untainted by the influence of Ronan, Ventari, and the lessons of the tablet. They consider it to be their noble purpose to bring others of their race away from that forced behavior and into darkness.

With each act of cruelty and evil, they add more nightmares to the tree and hope, one day, to change the balance, turning the Mother to their side. Certainly, as the tree gathers emotions and memories, she draws from the Nightmare Court as well as their kinder brethren, and her pool of memories swells with both dark and light thoughts. The Nightmare Court believe that, if they can propagate more dark emotions, the pool will become more and more touched by nightmare, and new sylvari will tend away from the ethics that were forced upon them by Ventari and his followers.

• Why is the Sylvari back ground so scarce to find? / Why is everything an Easter egg hunt regarding their lore?
  Because it is, like in most games, compiled by small clues (NPC dialouges and the like) here and there. There is no single official document with the whole truth.
  Simultanously, they’ve tried to set up this great mystery. To keep it a mystery, I guess they’ve tried giving just enough away to make players start theorising about the Elder Dragon connection. At the same time, they didn’t want it to be possible to make any conclusions – so there’s a lot of contradictions both ways.
  That has been the cause of the greatest conflict within the lore community: what is the true nature of the sylvari? Evidence vs theory.

• Why was the ground work laid such a long time ago?
  Why wasn’t more? Quite an ambigous question you got there :P

Keeper of Da Cookie.8714:

the Wiki seems to be fact-less a lot of assumptions regarding them as a race (I know its community driven but no one seems to cite their source which is frustrating).

I assure you, the wiki community is very fact based. If anyone starts speculating there, it is usually corrected immediately. However, it is true that you won’t find many references. This is because we don’t use “inter-wiki references”.
Only external sources: novels, interviews, forums, etc. are referenced. This is due to the mess we’d create if every single sentence needs to have a source tag. I do agree though that this creates another set of problems.
I will bring it up with the rest of the wiki community to see if we can make improvements to our policy.

thanks guys for your input

BuddhaKeks.4857:

Keeper of Da Cookie.8714:

The Norn […] and Asura all have a full race back story all fleshed out and the full community knows it..

What? I mean I agree that human and Charr lore is pretty fleshed out but both Norn and Asura are severely lacking when it comes to backstory.

We saw a lot of the Norn and Asura in Guild Wars we learnt a fair amount of info regarding their cultures etc granted not as much as human and charr. But the Sylvari’s seems spotty at best with a ton of contradiction lobbed in for good measure.

Titus.4285:

• What novels lay the groundwork for the Sylvari?
  I don’t think you should put too much into that comment from Colin. I presume he’s talking about the relationship between Caithe and Faolain (Dream and Nightmare) in Destiny’s Edge.
  The article Dream and Nightmare is a good example on how they’ve tried to spread doubt about “the true sylvari”.
  It is this type of descriptions you’ll find in the novels and Personal Story. It is there, but always very vague, and open to interpretation.

Dream and Nightmare

These sylvari reject the teachings of Ventari’s tablet and claim that the influence of outside races perverted the true nature of the Pale Tree and the sylvari. They seek the shadow within the Dream, turn away from what they deem false morality, and explore the darker side of their personality. Cold, cruel, and without mercy, they see themselves as true sylvari, untainted by the influence of Ronan, Ventari, and the lessons of the tablet. They consider it to be their noble purpose to bring others of their race away from that forced behavior and into darkness.

With each act of cruelty and evil, they add more nightmares to the tree and hope, one day, to change the balance, turning the Mother to their side. Certainly, as the tree gathers emotions and memories, she draws from the Nightmare Court as well as their kinder brethren, and her pool of memories swells with both dark and light thoughts. The Nightmare Court believe that, if they can propagate more dark emotions, the pool will become more and more touched by nightmare, and new sylvari will tend away from the ethics that were forced upon them by Ventari and his followers.

• Why is the Sylvari back ground so scarce to find? / Why is everything an Easter egg hunt regarding their lore?
  Because it is, like in most games, compiled by small clues (NPC dialouges and the like) here and there. There is no single official document with the whole truth.
  Simultanously, they’ve tried to set up this great mystery. To keep it a mystery, I guess they’ve tried giving just enough away to make players start theorising about the Elder Dragon connection. At the same time, they didn’t want it to be possible to make any conclusions – so there’s a lot of contradictions both ways.
  That has been the cause of the greatest conflict within the lore community: what is the true nature of the sylvari? Evidence vs theory.

• Why was the ground work laid such a long time ago?
  Why wasn’t more? Quite an ambigous question you got there :P

Keeper of Da Cookie.8714:

the Wiki seems to be fact-less a lot of assumptions regarding them as a race (I know its community driven but no one seems to cite their source which is frustrating).

I assure you, the wiki community is very fact based. If anyone starts speculating there, it is usually corrected immediately. However, it is true that you won’t find many references. This is because we don’t use “inter-wiki references”.
Only external sources: novels, interviews, forums, etc. are referenced. This is due to the mess we’d create if every single sentence needs to have a source tag. I do agree though that this creates another set of problems.
I will bring it up with the rest of the wiki community to see if we can make improvements to our policy.

I read all the wiki articals regarding the Sylvari but its seems to leave me with more questions then answers..
Most RPG type games I’ve played over the years have a roughly fleshed out back story that leaves no question where as the Sylvaris just has huge holes.

Could’nt the wiki have a section in the disscussion section of where you/we could cite the source? For example “white stag this this happens, the toon was cycle of night and where life goes so should you.” That way players could check it for them selfs. I know that possibly isn’t feasible.

Keeper of Da Cookie.8714:

I read all the wiki articals regarding the Sylvari but its seems to leave me with more questions then answers..
Most RPG type games I’ve played over the years have a roughly fleshed out back story that leaves no question where as the Sylvaris just has huge holes.

Could’nt the wiki have a section in the disscussion section of where you/we could cite the source? For example “white stag this this happens, the toon was cycle of night and where life goes so should you.” That way players could check it for them selfs. I know that possibly isn’t feasible.

1. I guess that is what happens when you try to put up a “great mystery”.
2. Well, I’ve raised the topic for discussion, so we’ll see what the rest says. I think the best idea though would simply be to use the reference tag system we have today. Any historical article on Wikipedia.org extensively uses reference tags, and it doesn’t seem to create too many problems there.