Guild Wars 2

Hello,

This will be fairly quick. I’ve been mining a lot in Orr recently for Ascended Armor. While I was in Straits of Devastation it occurred to me I might understand the original construction of Orr. For those interested in Lore this may be interesting. For others it is simply dense.

Overview:
Straights of Devastation is not what it appears. That is, most of it remains under water. This was, by evidence of the ruins, largely the commoner’s residential area. The area on land, Hunter’s Table, Crippled Bridges, the Bloodtrough, Triumph Plaza, etc was originally a public gardens area and amphitheatre. This means we are seeing a formerly elevated portion of Orr. Meaning Orr is mostly still submerged.

Malcor’s Gap would have been the courts and palaces. The nobles’ courts and so forth.

Cursed Shore would have been the high seats of authority, but serving (probably due to some former geological restriction) as the primary docks of Orr’s oceanic trade.

Technologies:
Orichalcum & the Rings
If you’ve been to Orr then you’ve seen the rings. Gigantic rings of what appears to be stone all over the place. Do these function as an Aesthetic or have a greater purpose?
I’ve wondered this for two years. Recently I was swimming under one of these near the Cathedral of Eternal Radiance, Malcor’s Gap – specifically the one at Mirror Bay – when I noticed that there broken sections of the support arch there had Orichalcum inside. You should look this up before continuing to read on. It gets complicated if you don’t have a point of reference.

In modern construction steel is used like this to create support inside large pieces of concrete. Concrete, you might ask? The Romans were the first to develop large scale building with concrete. It’s not far fetched to think the Orrians might have. However, if you look at the the design of the Orichalcum throughout or it is all very wild and irregular. Unless you are looking at it with a modern eye. Then it looks not unlike a circuit board.

So we have these giant arches full of Orichalcum laid out in what appears to be circuitry. However, Orichalcum in real life was some sort of copper-like material or perhaps bronze. Both of these are used in circuits. The orichalcum circuit like mesh we find all over Orr, but where it is extremely common are in the arches, the rings, and the temples.

The rings are puzzling if you aren’t familiar with electricity and magnetic coils. However, if you are then it should be readily apparent what these might be. In order to move energy a current is necessary. One of the best ways to get this sort of motion is a vortex. Modern technology uses exactly this to motivate work force or constrict it to geometries were it can be harnessed by other means. Most often this is done in a ‘ring’ called a torus. Orr is overflowing with these as we all know.

Lastly the stone itself. In communications technology we use Quartz for most everything. That’s been the case since WWII. You have have crystals in your cellphones. However, most people are not commonly aware that in engineering the term Subtle Energy is being used to discuss a not-quite electric like energy you can get from stone and stone like materials. Particularly quartz-dolerite, which is what Orr appears to be.

My hypothesis is then simple… Orr was a giant battery or machine of some kind.
Basically the whole ‘city’ is just a scattering of buildings on top of something much more grand.

…
Side notes:
The machine that is Orr appears to have failed in whatever it was intended for long before it went into the sea.

Malcor’s Leap* – corrected
Yes * – to the ’did you write this to be lore friendly and Priory conspiratorial

Interesting theory. Im leaning toward giving it a firm “Could be the case” nod. Buildings of such scale are normally not built just for decoration, at least in real world. In ancient times such projects had great religious backgrounds, and given that Arah was the City of the Gods, it figures that such would be the case here.

Even though the human gods dont strike me as technologicly advanced. They seemed to have relied much more on magic. Even the orrians themselves were said to be more magic-oriented than any other human kingdoms. Of course this could be Clarke’s third law, “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic”.

As a comment, I’ve actually worked with ceramics that have… interesting electromagnetic properties. Some of those are quite ordinary to look at. I’m not familiar with the term ‘subtle energy’ being used in a serious scientific or engineering context, but I would pretty much guarantee you that it is electromagnetic in nature, probably a result of the distribution of charges in the crystal structure. Either way, I can certainly believe that something that looks like stone could have interesting magical properties.

I think there’s a bit of parallel thinking going on here and in this thread here. Basically, that the toruses were used to direct and harness magical energy. The orichalcum circuitry you observe fits this – apart from the historical hypothesis that orichalcum was an alloy of group 11 metals (that happen to be highly electrically conductive) orichalcum is commonly presented in fantasy sources as a conductor of magic. The orichalcum circuitry you observe, then, could well be part of the magical technology used to create the artificial ley line hub that’s hypothesised in the thread I linked.

The story of the creation of Orr stroke me a little bit odd. The gods came to Tyria and their prior task was the building of Arah. If I assume that the gods do anything for a reason, then I couldn’t get why it’s so important (especially with everyone having his own mist in the back). It wasn’t simply made for worshipping, because then it would have looked different.

Now assembling that the ley lines could get redirected, there is a giant bloodstone below Arah and the river of magic. It gives a creepy picture about things we don’t know.

life = magic, magic flows in natural currents, river + life (magic) = ?river of souls? (ley lines)

While the gods didn’t create Tyria, it is still canon that they did enough transformation and terraforming of the land that it wasn’t just human legends that credited them with the act of creation. So they may have needed magic for that.

Said magic, though, probably came mostly from the proto-bloodstone made by the Seers. What this may have been was a system of directing what energy wasn’t locked up in the bloodstone for the process of unlocking the bloodstone for wider use – or for more efficiently dispersing that energy after it was unlocked and before the bloodstones were split and (supposedly) dropped in a volcano.

You have all made me realize that there is probably more that is obvious now that Living Story has shown us Ley Lines and what they do to geology.

Scavenger’s Chasm – the Jumping Puzzle – appears to be a dead ley line hub.

Combined with the discussion below, it make sense:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/lore/lore/Is-it-me-or-does-Arah-resemble/first#post4262389

Was Orr some sort of machine?

We know that in Arah you have to stand in light that passes through one of the rings to defeat some creatures. So the holes in the rings are definitely serving a mechanical purpose.

Another thing, ley line effects on geology look like water corrosion apparently.

Are there other areas around the globe with such?

TLDR; The construction methods of Orr could be a clue into the nature of the human gods in relation to the Eternal Alchemy. My Theories are Mid-Way.

Gotta say this is really cool info and the ideas from it are awesome. This made me think on a slightly larger scale.

We know that currently the events of the world are all related to a system called “The Eternal Alchemy” We also know that the human gods (The creator’s of Orr) dissapeared conveniently RIGHT BEFORE the majority of the dragons became active. I.E. they zonked out as the dragon phase of the eternal alchemy began.

I have had my own suspicions about the nature of the gods in general and the concept of “techno magic in relation to the universes overiding system” appeals to me. Now its believed by some that the gods brought humanity to the world WITH them from wherever they came from. Now this im a bit iffy on because im missing alot of information and I havnt had the time to do the proper research into the lore.

But bear with me. Ill stop rambling and get on with my two theories. Theory one. The human gods are remnants of another or previous “system” like the eternal alchemy (I.E. THAT systems Elder Dragons). However something happened to there “tyria equivalent” which forced them to bring there dominant species to tyria along with enough of there by then extremely advanced knowledge SPECIFICALLY the knowledge of accessing an energy source that exists in the universe that all living beings tap into naturally but couldn’t gain full access to till “relatively speaking” recently. (HELLOOOO MAGIC)

OR (Theory Two) The Eternal Alchemy as a Universal System is comprised of seperate phases. Sometimes acting in parallel and sometimes in series. The “GODs” phase has ended with the start of the “Dragon Phase” causing them the be withdrawn until such a time as its triggered again by methods we don’t understand.

This could mean that all the events of the games so far (Even the fall and replacement of Abbadon much in the manner of replacing an worn out part) have been leading up to a specific conclusion with a hoped for outcome. And the previous elder dragon rises have all been the testing phase of an experiment in the hopes of creating a specific event. The falls of the previous civilizations have meant that there “God” or “Growth” phases were….insufficient for the eternal alchemy’s purpose.

This could explain how the gods were able to grant magic to races as a form of “fertilizer” to speed up there growth and development in the hope of having them ready for the upcoming “tests” Of course this would mean that Magic is closer to Technology in the sense that Tech is “Practical Application of science” I.E. Magic in arah is Science in New York. We just dont know enough about it so we slap the M word on it.

Edit-Added information and detracted some useless information “left others as food for thought”

I was also thinking about what you have as your 1st theory, actually. The origin of humanity and their gods is a mistery beyond the myths that they arrived to Tyria through the Mists. But unless the original humans were actually formed from the mists like demonic creatures, then they had a world of origin, and they depended on highly powerfull (though seemingly/mostly benevolent) beings they considered gods.

The occasional comparison between human gods and the tyrian Elder Dragons usually either say that the gods are the elder dragons, or totally denies the possibility of any relation. I consider this “Human gods are an other, long gone world’s equivalent of the tyrian EDs” idea as a middle ground.

Of course, no proof of any of this.

Something else to consider, why do almost all the other elder races have devices and remnants of their history scattered in Arah? I mean the paths in the dungeon. Maybe its mentioned in the game (havent played the explorable dungeon but two paths a year ago) that the gods collected them into Arah, but if not… Why are they there, and what does their presence mean in relation to the theory of Arah/Orr being a machine of some kind?

well Lakdav one idea is that the city of Arah may actually be point where the Human gods first entered Tyria. Possibly with the aid of the at the time primary races of the world. Another theory in relation to that is that there was some kind of rift between the gods realms and humanities original realm and tyria located there. The entirety of hte structure of the city could have been made to sustain or conceal that rift. It would explain why the gods insisted on humanities most powerful city and there high temples being located there RIGHT ONTOP OF ZAITAN which i highly doubt they didnt notice. It could easily have been “well we dont really have any choice BUT to build it here and hope for the best”

However thats ALOOOOOT of whatifs stacked ontop of eachother and were reaching the more unlikely stretches of speculation :P

It’s and idea, but…

Let me suggest you google “Guild Wars Utopia Chronomancer”.
The weird circuit-appearance of the orichalcum inside the buildings derives from the aztec-theme they wanted to create Utopia with. It was the expansion for GW1 after EotN that got cancelled in favor of GW2.
You can find a guildwars wiki article where you will find some other artwork that has been recycled for Orr.

With the whole city being depicted as multiple giant gears, the idea of a whole city being a machine isn’t that farfetched.

Would be funny to see the concept of the OP being put into Orr, but I fear it might just be that they found the Utopia-concepts too good to just trash them away.

There are actually a few pieces of justification for elder race stuff being in Arah. First, Arah was a place of the Forgotten before it became the city of the gods. Second, I think – although I don’t recall off the top of my head where the reference is – that it is mentioned that the gods did stockpile important artifacts in Orr.

It may have been an out-of-game source.

That said, Arah isn’t the only place you can find artifacts of the elder races. Dwarf and jotun artifacts are scattered through the Shiverpeaks, and we saw plenty of forgotten and mursaat stuff in GW1 – we just don’t have access to the most relevant locations in GW2.

Its not the only place for sure, but incidently the place where we can find the artifacts of all elder races who were allied at the time of the previous Dragonrise in very close proximity. My thought was that the elder races used the Orrian Peninsula as their last sanctuary. If they were allied as we are let to believe, it would make sense that they had one such place where they worked together. Orr being an island/peninsula would make it fairly more defendable against most ground-based dragon minions.

I figure Orr could have been where all the last ditch efforts against the Elder Dragons took place. The giant machine of Arah being either part of one of them (most possibly the Seer’s bloodstone project), or possibly the channel of magical power for all of the projects, including that of the mursaat phase-out technology. Given that magic must have been scarce at that point, its fair to assume that all the other races would consider the draining and usage of the last magics to help only one race escape as an outright betrayal.

EDIT: I have no idea how Zhaitan got below the peninsula in that case though.

It’s stated that Glint helped the races hide… and the site of the ritual that converted her was definitely at Arah (in that case, it is actually the location that’s significant, not just an artifact that happens to be in Arah). What I suspect might have happened is that Zhaitan sensed there was magic concentrated at Orr, but between the various projects it had all been rendered undetectable to Zhaitan when it arrived and, not sensing any other magic nearby, Zhaitan decided it was time to hibernate.

Oohh… o.O (This will be a little off-topic… just a little.)

What if Zhaitan moved into Orr from beneath? I see several directions he could’ve entered from, like a cavern system from the Scavenger’s Causeway leading to his eventual tomb in the southeastern quadrant of future Arah.

However, what I’d find a significantly more intriguing prospect is if he came through the ancient tunnels that would later be called the Shards of Orr… which would also imply that at one point in his activity during the last dragon cycle he resided in the Depths of Tyria. And actually, such concept would present a viable explanation for pretty grim mystery at last: the real origins of the Fleshreavers.

Behind a door overlooked by the unnerving Dracon Steles an Ancient Creature is entombed. It is a Fleshreaver, more than likely as old as the Steles themselves, capable of “replicating” itself (after it is first defeated, it recuperates but spawns hosts of veteran Fleshreavers that seemingly come out of nowhere). When Konig and I did those events quite some time ago, I was wondering why would the dwarves lock a Fleshreaver behind a mechanism that is shaped after menacing, roaring dragons. His answer was most compelling: Fleshreavers might have been a Zhaitan-corrupted species from eons ago (or simply his creations by molding bones and rotting flesh). Which would make sense, given how undead-like and twisted these creatures are. The one captured and held by Steles (an enormous warning sign) could not be killed for some reason, while the rest of its kin (the Fleshreavers in general) continued to spread in the Depths… until either the Destroyers (the Depths are primarily Primordus’ turf) or the dwarves — after their return from Glint’s concealment — exterminated most of them.

Otherwise, I completely agree with Lakdav and Drax. Orr and Arah was the last stand of the elder races, and thus Zhaitan easily smelled out one of last concentrations of sweet, unconsumed magic hoarded there. He approached Orr from beneath, stalking through the Depths, but by the time he arrived on the peninsula/island, all of it was simply gone… everything and everyone just vanished.

Those would have to be some big caves….

okay so this may be crazy

so this may sound like a comment on the gods but it may help over all understanding (still a theory tho)

what if this cycle is a little different to what we think.
Now we know the gods arrived in tyria from the mists bringing with them the human race.
what if when they were coming from the mists they were coming to tyria from tyria
im meaning perhaps this tyria is some sort of fractal in a way (giant arah machine used to stabalize a fractal to the point were it is almost reality itself) esentially going back in time to a point where the dragons were dormant (terraforming could be changing the land to look like it once did so the transition to this new tyria is easier on the humans, or perhaps inhance the flow of magical energies in the lay lines)

(what if the cycle was happening now so this is when they rise
all the races freak out and find there own ways of dealing with the problem
humans decide fractal or time travel or w/e and chooses its champions
they go back and then now they have longer to try and figure out a way to deal with the problem of the elder dragons)

what im trying to say is what if the cycle isnt as linear as we think what if it weaves through the mists and time itself.

(also could be an out of phase device thing like the seers and instead its just another part in the cycle without time travel or the fractal theory heh)

or alternitively all the races gave there magic to there six champions (gods)
and in return they lead them to the “saftey” of a new world and proceeded to return the magic given to them by building orr and releasing the blood stone.
kinda puts a new spin on whos evil and good.
the selfish champions coveted the magic for themselves and the wise and kind gods wished to spread it equally among the races?

just an idea
i think theres more but i cant think of what i wanted to say.

Ronin.7381:

Those would have to be some big caves….

Canonically, there were some pretty big caves in EOTN, and the entire asura and skritt races once lives under there. Asura gates muddy things a bit in EOTN, but I suspect you can get pretty much anywhere through the Depths you could above ground, particularly if you were willing to do a bit of digging.

We have ingame confirmation that the gods knew about the dragons and the general behaviour for the dragon rising times seem to hide away from them and wait until they are asleep. This is something that’s odd, because if the gods know about the dragons, why did they let them proceed. Either the gods aren’t strong enough to counter them or they are so important for the eternal alchemy that even the gods won’t take them out or (that make the most sense in my eyes) they are established from the gods as a mechanic (if the gods really created Tyria).

Arah seemed to have a high importance the moment were the gods came to Tyria and the size of that possible machine is huge enough to influence the eternal alchemy. One of the six dragons slept below Orr at the time were the gods still were around. It’s not delivered when they put their first steps on Tyria, when Arah was built or where they were during the last rise, but it pretty unlikely that they didn’t know about the dragon below Orr who built his nest in the city of Arah.

The orrian dragon is either part of the machine Arah or just happens to sleep there (both possible).

Horst, see that doesn’t make sense in my opinion. If the gods are not powerful enough to take on the dragons yet mortals with a medium size rag tag army are able to take on the dragons then I find it hard to believe that the gods would turn tail and run. When the gods were around the humans pretty much controlled everything and the combined forces of Ascalon, Kyrta, Elona, Cantha, and the gods would have easily overwhelmed any of the dragons. So to me it seems as if the gods were literally not allowed to interfere with the dragons by some higher power.

And something else you said if the dragons are part of the eternal alchemy then killing them may have some dire consequence. During our glimpse of the eternal alchemy we have six orbs and one green orb that attacks the main orb which likely signifies the jungle dragon. Yet there is no representation of the gods. This to me points that the gods have nothing to do with the eternal alchemy and that they are something else.

The gods could have fought the dragons and would have had a huge advantage with the human army considering the dragons wake one at a time and do not seem to interfere with each other. Yet the gods so far have chosen not to interfere with the human wars or the events of the dragons. Why?

It seems like there is something more powerful than the dragons and the humans that is really pulling the strings.

I mean gods not humans lol.

BlackGhostz.2483:

Horst, see that doesn’t make sense in my opinion. If the gods are not powerful enough to take on the dragons yet mortals with a medium size rag tag army are able to take on the dragons then I find it hard to believe that the gods would turn tail and run. When the gods were around the humans pretty much controlled everything and the combined forces of Ascalon, Kyrta, Elona, Cantha, and the gods would have easily overwhelmed any of the dragons. So to me it seems as if the gods were literally not allowed to interfere with the dragons by some higher power.

And something else you said if the dragons are part of the eternal alchemy then killing them may have some dire consequence. During our glimpse of the eternal alchemy we have six orbs and one green orb that attacks the main orb which likely signifies the jungle dragon. Yet there is no representation of the gods. This to me points that the gods have nothing to do with the eternal alchemy and that they are something else.

If the human gods really created Tyria, then they created the dragons too. We sadly don’t get the information what the gods wrote about the dragons, but if they have created them then they are godly creations and part of Tyria. The mortals either hide away from the dragons or die, but not all can hide away. The reason for the domination of the dragon could have been the Mursaat which hid away and betrayed the gods which “just” want to reclaim the magic with the help of the dragons. Even the Zephyrites talked on their ship about hiding away. A lot knowledge is lost and the dragons might be more important than we think.

We don’t know enough about the eternal alchemy to say things for sure. We have the ingame log which tells that they represent dragons and we have the out of game source telling that Scarlet actually didn’t see what she thought she sees. For me it’s not the green orb is attacking the central orb, it’s the central orb which is eating the green orb finally unleashing what’s hidden.

BlackGhostz.2483:

The gods could have fought the dragons and would have had a huge advantage with the human army considering the dragons wake one at a time and do not seem to interfere with each other. Yet the gods so far have chosen not to interfere with the human wars or the events of the dragons. Why?

It seems like there is something more powerful than the dragons and the gods that is really pulling the strings.

If they are real gods, they probably have a strong schedule. In GW1 mortals killed a god that shows well that they are not untouchable. There are a lot influences around and most origins are unknown. That the gods haven’t shown up may have a certain reason and those who are behind all this may just be mortals with a plan or whatever. If you set a story and have already defined the highest entity in the universe then it’s just lazy writing to introduce a higher power in the sequel just to set a competition for the overpowered heroes.

I try to work with things that are known and are represented (or at least named) in GW2, but that’s hard. Since Mordremoth name drop it feels a little bit like every bad detective story where you just can’t know the reason for the murder until the detective which you followed the whole story pulls some reason out of the pocket which he knew from the beginning, but never told the viewer until the murder gets unmasked.

While Abaddon was in a chained and weakened state, the fact that he was killed by eight powerful heroes (probably more in lore, but whatevs) is significant. Zhaitan was in a less weakened state, but it took a powerful airship and ten powerful heroes (the PCs plus DE) to take him down. The gods and dragons seem to be on at least a roughly similar power level.

This means, from the perspective of the gods, fighting the dragons directly is risky. We saw from Kormir’s ascension that the gods are a massive reservoir of power that can be absorbed by another if a god is slain – now imagine if a god was to take on a dragon and lose. The dragon eats the god-power, and has now added the god’s power to its own and become even stronger.

While it may not have been deliberately planned as such, the death of Abaddon meant that humans had passed a test – they were powerful enough now that they could take on beings of the same power level as an elder dragon or god and succeed. With that being the case, the gods probably figured it was better to let humans and their allies do so than to get involved directly, and risk inadvertantly creating a superpowered dragon that genuinely is too powerful to beat.

Canonically, I’d say that Abaddon was killed by Ascalon’s Chosen (Devona, Mhenlo, Cynn, Aidan and Eve) and the primary Nightfall heroes (Koss, Melonni, Dunkoro, Tahlkora, Zhed and General Morgahn. I’d also add Jurah to that list because he seems like the kind of guy who would definitely take a role in this. Margrid, Goren and Norgu seem more like secondary supporters).

draxynnic.3719:

While Abaddon was in a chained and weakened state, the fact that he was killed by eight powerful heroes (probably more in lore, but whatevs) is significant. Zhaitan was in a less weakened state, but it took a powerful airship and ten powerful heroes (the PCs plus DE) to take him down. The gods and dragons seem to be on at least a roughly similar power level.

This means, from the perspective of the gods, fighting the dragons directly is risky. We saw from Kormir’s ascension that the gods are a massive reservoir of power that can be absorbed by another if a god is slain – now imagine if a god was to take on a dragon and lose. The dragon eats the god-power, and has now added the god’s power to its own and become even stronger.

While it may not have been deliberately planned as such, the death of Abaddon meant that humans had passed a test – they were powerful enough now that they could take on beings of the same power level as an elder dragon or god and succeed. With that being the case, the gods probably figured it was better to let humans and their allies do so than to get involved directly, and risk inadvertantly creating a superpowered dragon that genuinely is too powerful to beat.

That is a good point explaining their disappearence and isolation from these events. However there is one thing, that has been touched upon in other threads. The power unleashed at Abaddon’s death was absorbed by Kormir who could only do that because the avatars of the other 5 gods gave her that ability. The gods did not leave Tyria in the knowledge that we are fully prepared to take on powers equal or stronger than divines, because we needed their direct intervention to contain such power once released. Tyrians might be able to take down a dragon, but as it was the case with Zhaitan, in-character we have no idea what happened to that power, or how we would contain it.

And this concept was not forgotten by the writers either, given the hint in Nochtli’s story.

Although, if we count in the fact/speculation that human gods are alien to Tyria’s original system, coming from the Mists with humanity as they did, it can be assumed that releasing an alien god’s power (as maddened and wild as it was) into a world’s magical ecosystem has different consequences as releasing a dragon’s power, that is part of that ecosystem. So maybe we do not need that knowledge, and it was a unique occasion to Abaddon’s case. The gods either know that releasing the dragon’s power back into the world via its death is a natural thing for Tyria, or they have no idea how it would work out, and left us to figure it out by ourselves instead of risking complicating the situation with the innate risk of their presence in this conflict.

Kormir could only absorb it because the gods gave her that ability, but the dragons that are natural thaumovores probably don’t need such a blessing…

Regarding Nochtli’s story – Zhaitan’s death certainly seems to have been a lot less catastrophic than Abaddon’s. I think the distinction is that when a dragon dies, the power still remains tied up in their corpse, as shown with the Aspect crystals having originally come from Glint’s power – a dead dragon may radiate magic like a sleeping dragon does, but they don’t explode.

Personally, I think the moral of Nochtli’s story, when applied to the dragons, is simply that their deaths will result in an increase in the amount of magic in the world, possibly beyond what is healthy. However, this doesn’t mean that the elder dragons shouldn’t be destroyed, just that an alternative means of soaking up extra magic should be secured. This could include regulating magic with the Bloodstones (either finding and repurposing the existing ones, or starting afresh) or following the example of Glint and raising up some less destructive dragons to replace the elders (likely a project of the Zephyrites, if they do have one or more of Glint’s children as often speculated).

are the gods simply regular creatures who have defeated another elder dragon and were forced to take its place?(assuming that there can be more elder dragons, cause really? only 6? all of which seem to be in the same continent. i dont think so)