Guild Wars 2

I stayed up today to watch the eclipse. While waiting for it to really settle on I spent some time talking with friends about what we’d be doing in Heart of the Thorns. One topic that came up is whether or not this is another Princess Mononoke situation: humanity ‘wins’ at the cost of killing the great Forest Spirit.

The question I would ask is, “Do we really want to win?” Said differently, “Is ‘victory’ the correct choice here?”

The American style of story telling is “Brawn before brains!”. It tends to be the MMOs from there progressively shift toward this message. Guild Wars 2 has tended toward not doing that so far. We’ve seen Scarlet’s desperate ploy to wake the dragons up early so there is actually hope of combating them. Before that was her attempt to move covertly; thought we’ve hardly seen a 007 intellectual journey yet. So here’s the thing, “What if killing the Elder Dragons is really destroying magic at the same time?”

Why is it so many stories end with “humanity wins!” ? What’s so good about humanity winning? That’s only a story worth reading when it goes something like, “Despite the Searing, Prince Rurik and King Adelbern were able to out maneuver the Charr in a brilliant ploy in the blasted lands below Serenity Temple. This victory was the turning point in the Searing wherein the Ascalonians were able to consolidate their forces. In the years that followed King Rurik, following the death of his father at Rin, was able to retake much of their shattered former territories pushing the Charr out of Ascalon once more. Years later Queen Gwen, a survivor the Charr’s genocide, joined her Ebon Vanguard with the Ascalonians (not yet again unified people) in driving the Charr into wilds beyond the eastern boarders of Ascalon to this day. From that day forward Ascalon saw many more Charr incursions, but it’s lands were held and healed in time.”

That’s a story that actually is about something getting accomplished.

So far, all of our characters and their host nations really have suffered no threat to the dragons save where we’ve been in proximity to their influenced areas.

I’m just not sure we understand anything we’re doing in all of this. Are these Dragons really a threat or just some kind of Japanese Shinto spirit we need to learn to respect (and endure) rather than ‘defeat’? If we ‘defeat’ Mordremoth will we suddenly discover nature begins to transform into desert? I mean, we didn’t exactly give pause to killing Scarlet when we could have taken her captive. So, I’m not too sure our band of would-be heroes isn’t somehow quietly becoming the villains in all this.

Eirdyne.9843:

I stayed up today to watch the eclipse. While waiting for it to really settle on I spent some time talking with friends about what we’d be doing in Heart of the Thorns. One topic that came up is whether or not this is another Princess Mononoke situation: humanity ‘wins’ at the cost of killing the great Forest Spirit.

This has already been hinted at all throughout LSs2. That’s why the player is searching for Glint’s egg to such a frantic degree, since it might hold the secrets to doing away with the Elder Dragon, and if the different theories hold up, replacing them with suitable successors.

Though, the very key thing to remember about in this scenario is that while the Elder Dragons play a vital role in keeping Tyria stable by acting as a balancing force for its magics, that doesn’t make them (the Elder Dragons) good, nice, innocent, or benign beings by any extent. They all want to destroy the world and rebuild it in their own imagine, and the only thing that seemingly stopped them so far is the different alliances of mortal races and their own natural limitations.

The question I would ask is, “Do we really want to win?” Said differently, “Is ‘victory’ the correct choice here?”

Considering that us not achieving a victory/win means the Elder Dragons wipes out our civilizations and destroys/corrupts everything we know and love, I would say that the answer from the mortal and possibly the immortal races is “yes”.

The American style of story telling is “Brawn before brains!”. It tends to be the MMOs from there progressively shift toward this message. Guild Wars 2 has tended toward not doing that so far. We’ve seen Scarlet’s desperate ploy to wake the dragons up early so there is actually hope of combating them. Before that was her attempt to move covertly; thought we’ve hardly seen a 007 intellectual journey yet. So here’s the thing, “What if killing the Elder Dragons is really destroying magic at the same time?”

I think the “Hero Kills Bad Guy Unknowing of the Consequences” trope is pretty common in every cultures’ storytelling.

That and, Scarlet wasn’t trying to wake up the Elder Dragons early to make them easier to combat for everyone else. The reveal at the end of LSs1, and what was explored more deeply in LSs2, was that Scarlet was revealed to be (and what could be considered) Mordremoth’s champion. She redirected the leyline magic to Mordremoth to fully awaken him early, but it was also the huge benefit of feeding Mordremoth a ton of magic to strengthen it so it could quickly launch assaults and spread across Tyria to gather more.

Also, magic is kinda like energy. It can’t be created or destroyed, but it can be controlled, and it’s been the Elder Dragons that have been controlling it since time untold in Tyria. Their way of controlling it, whether they do it intentionally or not, is horribly destructed to everyone and thing involved.

So far, all of our characters and their host nations really have suffered no threat to the dragons save where we’ve been in proximity to their influenced areas.

And the Elder Dragons’ “influenced areas” spread over time.

• Zhaitan was only in Orr when it awoke, but was using it’s navy to quickly take control of the surrounding seas to launch assaults on coastal towns, and its corruption was slowly working its way up Sparkfly Fen, Bloodtide Coast, and surrounding areas.
• When Kralk woke up, he literally did a fly over of Ascalon and simply breathed on it, and that left an ever growing Brand on the land stretching across all of Ascalon.
• Jormag woke up north of the Far Shiverpeaks. Landmass wise, he and his influence as quickly worked their way across the land, drove the Norn south, and now he’s caught up and once again on their doorstep.
• Primordus has mostly kept to the Depths of Tyria. His minions alone drove the Asura to the surface without his help, but even with an entire race giving themselves up to fight him, blistering pockets of Destroyers have worked their way up to the surface to wreck havoc wherever they up pop up.
• Mordremoth has been up the least amount of time, and even with that short amount of him, it has been able to extent and run his vines from one edge of Tyria to another to launch assaults on anything of high magical value or it see as enemies.

I’m just not sure we understand anything we’re doing in all of this. Are these Dragons really a threat or just some kind of Japanese Shinto spirit we need to learn to respect (and endure) rather than ‘defeat’? If we ‘defeat’ Mordremoth will we suddenly discover nature begins to transform into desert? I mean, we didn’t exactly give pause to killing Scarlet when we could have taken her captive. So, I’m not too sure our band of would-be heroes isn’t somehow quietly becoming the villains in all this.

They’re a threat. They way act as a balancing force for Tyria’s magic level, but they only do the things they do for themselves and no one else. And while some crazy few could possibly learn to “respect and endure” them, it would be a bit laughable in the end since they want to either kill or corrupt everyone and thing to turn them into servant or harvest the magic in their body and soul.

Considering that the Breachmaker got destroyed when it hit the leyline nexus, Scarlet was either planning to escape before then or she knew the whole thing was a suicide mission, and she only did it because she was ordered to by the Mysterious Voice/Mordremoth. With the amount of explosives she had on hand, and her mind state at that point, I seriously doubt she would have allowed herself to be taken alive even if the Breachmaker didn’t explode.

Thanks for the post! I had no idea it was so thoroughly set out. I’d thought that the Dragons were something like this, but less developed.

I mean it! It’s so rare someone really replies with anything genuine! Thank you!

Since dragons are keeping the balance in the world, no, it shouldn’t be. But since it’s a game and you want their loot, it will be