Guild Wars 2

I posted this on Reddit and thought I could share this here.

It seems like the White Mantle are back and with them maybe the Mursaat. It is mentioned they want to retake what was theirs. Well what did they have? Kryta.

Could we have a Civil War in Kryta for the crown? There are pages and diaries that suggest the White Mantle have agents and spies high in the Krytan hierarchy (Konig mentions this is stated elsewhere as well). As much as I would like to fight Lazarus or even Sual in wing 3 I think what will likely happen is we awaken whatever they are sacrificing to and that will lead the White Mantle to war. Against the five races the White Mantle can’t win, but who’s to say the other races will come to help?

The Sylvari are really weak after Mordys assault, the pale tree is still hurting, Trahearne is dead and Caithe can’t be trusted.
Norns don’t have armies and with Jormag in the North sturing up trouble who’s to say they will come.
Asuras I would presume are safe in Rata Sum. They are not a fighting nation and with Zojja badly injured any hopes of trying to get her to convince the council to aid are over. I suspect they will be caught up in this Rata Novus story.
The White Mantle have agents and spies amongst the human race and who knows how deep it goes. Logan is also badly hurt and Anise is a suspect character.
Out of the races that have a real reason to come and help are the Charr. As much as I Believe the Charr want revenge on the White Mantle they also have many problems. Kralks minions, ghosts in Ascalon and a possible internal power struggle with the arrival or Rytlock and his new found magic and this is just the Iron Legion. Correct me if I am wrong but we don’t know where the Ash Legion are and we have not visited the Blood Legion.

Could we see a Civil War erupting in Kryta? And what do you think about this possible story arc going forward?

I’m not sure they’d do that storyline since it was already done in GW1. The War in Kryta was a civil war, we fought to overthrow the White Mantle and place Salma on the throne. It would feel kind of ridiculously if we got the same storyline reversed. Which isn’t to say it couldn’t happen.

I’m kind of hoping for a coup d’etat situation, but I don’t want it to overshadow the more important (to me) sylvari hatred plot that in all honesty should have been done before Mordremoth’s death (I really feel that HoT Act 3 should have seen us return to LA to deal with a anti-sylvari movement, and Rata Sum to deal with a mordrem assault, before we head into Dragon’s Stand to see the Pact regrouped).

Before – or alongside – any potential expansion and conclusion of the White Mantle plot is done, we really need to wrap up all this sylvari nonsense. Malyck, sylvari hatred, the nature of the Dream, Nightmare Court’s actions post-Mordy/Faolain, and the Pale Tree’s fate. These need to be the #1 Season 3 focus. Whether it’s done before or alongside the White Mantle conclusion, I don’t care so long as it’s done.

And they can easily be done alongside – we got the Sinister Triad which could see an involvement of Nightmare Court’s aftermath + White Mantle actions, we got the Shining Blade openly supporting a sylvari (Canach), and Jennah’s alliance with them that the White Mantle can assault politically to open up the sylvari hatred (or opened up from the sylvari hatred, rather), with the Pale Tree’s status in question the future of the sylvari is in jeopardy and we can see a riot march on the Grove, instigated by the White Mantle; Malyck’s return could be done to help defend their fellow sylvari, but could backfire as a ‘see they’re already spreading to wipe us out!’ far sided proclamation by sylvari haters, etc. etc.

All depends on how it’s done. But if we skip over all sylvari aftermath, I will be highly disappointed. The egg can wait. Rytlock can wait. It won’t make sense for the sylvari plots to keep dangling longer – it’s already going to be awkward to bring in Malyck (who’s plot shouldn’t be left dangling – who shouldn’t have been cut from HoT; they should have cut the Ogre lane instead and put Malyck’s tree there) with the whole ‘where were you when Mordremoth attacked!?’ issue to tackle.

FlamingFoxx.1305:

I’m not sure they’d do that storyline since it was already done in GW1. The War in Kryta was a civil war, we fought to overthrow the White Mantle and place Salma on the throne. It would feel kind of ridiculously if we got the same storyline reversed. Which isn’t to say it couldn’t happen.

But would the citizens of Kryta know this history? I am no lore buff but is there any indication that Krytans know about the White Mantle and Mursaat and this war?

Sird.4536:

FlamingFoxx.1305:

I’m not sure they’d do that storyline since it was already done in GW1. The War in Kryta was a civil war, we fought to overthrow the White Mantle and place Salma on the throne. It would feel kind of ridiculously if we got the same storyline reversed. Which isn’t to say it couldn’t happen.

But would the citizens of Kryta know this history? I am no lore buff but is there any indication that Krytans know about the White Mantle and Mursaat and this war?

It seems spotty, but, yes, it is semi-common knowledge. Apparently more a bogeyman story to keep children in check than a part of history taught in schools, but it’s at least widely known that “White Mantle=very, very bad”.

I wouldnt be surprised if the White Mantle try to take LA again (although after scarlet both DR/LA should be ready for a attack)

Deleena.3406:

I wouldnt be surprised if the White Mantle try to take LA again (although after scarlet both DR/LA should be ready for a attack)

I am intrigued, why would the White Mantle be interested in LA?

Lion’s Arch is the historical seat of power for Kryta. It only became independent because it got destroyed by Zhaitan and humans forced to relocate – in said time, pirates rebuilt the place and made a buffer against Zhaitan’s forces. King Baede effectively let them be so that they can deal with the risen threat instead, and the crown prince, Edair, waged war on them when Baede was on his deathbed, but after a massive loss to risen forces during a blockade attempt agreed to give LA its independence officially.

All of this is in the Sea of Sorrows novel – sorry for spoilers! :P

The White Mantle would be interested in taking LA for the same reason they want to take Kryta – they think it is rightfully theirs.

It’d also play into the narrative their (possibly unknowing) allies in the Ministry have been pushing- the monarchy was too weak to claim back the heart of Kryta, letting themselves be shown up by the mongrel pirates of all things, but now that the Mantle are back, the blessings of the Unseen Ones will change things…

That said, I think they’ve missed their window for that attack. Now that Lion’s Arch has been rebuilt with defense in mind, and the indication that they only have a single mursaat left to bring to bear, I don’t think they and their followers would be able to take the city. If they made that ploy, I’d expect they’d be more likely to bring some sort of bloodstone-fueled magic to level the place.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Lion’s Arch is the historical seat of power for Kryta. It only became independent because it got destroyed by Zhaitan and humans forced to relocate – in said time, pirates rebuilt the place and made a buffer against Zhaitan’s forces. King Baede effectively let them be so that they can deal with the risen threat instead, and the crown prince, Edair, waged war on them when Baede was on his deathbed, but after a massive loss to risen forces during a blockade attempt agreed to give LA its independence officially.

All of this is in the Sea of Sorrows novel – sorry for spoilers! :P

The White Mantle would be interested in taking LA for the same reason they want to take Kryta – they think it is rightfully theirs.

ah thanks for the answer all I can really think is that LA is destined to be unlucky. First Zaithan, then Scarlet, and now MAYBE the white mantle, sure the new LA has defenses but Magnus mentions the Lionguard’s numbers are thin.

As not to go way off topic, I really hope we would see this type of story in LW S3, one can only dream, the white mantle story and LA could be great

The political angle could work, though.

We know Caudecus works with the Bandits, who are the white mantle, subsequently he “works” for the possible Mursaat.

We know the people are restless, because the Sylvari are exposed as ED minions, which in turn could make them more cautious against other races, as they could turn out to be the same.
For example Norn and Jormag.
We all know how easy it could be to influence the unthinking majority.

With Queen Jenna in a shaky position and pushing for peace, the weary population and even more the 1% could turn their back and cut off support, getting Caudecus in a favourable position.

And what does our new leader bring with him? His alliance, his helpers, an army to protect, the White Mantle.

250 years have passed and there might be someone who wants to use the name for “good”.

By all means, being a white mantle was a prosperous position. It held power.
Like Clone Troops in Star Wars, which turned into the Storm Trooper.

Its all a matter of perspective and with the right man on the front, things can look different.

Vote Caudecus #MakeTyriaSaveAgain (I actually dont know how that hastagging and Trumping really works, so… please excuse that joke)

Self repost from reddit :

First of all, with the continuation of the living story, I expect them to stop shying away from changing stuff in the 5 races cities. We get it, they can change stuff in Lion’s Arch, or add festival things in the main cities. But what about actually making story changes there ? I want to see Sylvari in the Grove being affected about HoT’s story and what happened to the Pale Tree. I want to see humans in DR talking about being afraid of another attack. I want to see Asura talking about Mordrem studies and Rata Novus. …I just want to feel like the story impacts on the main cities. It’s good what the living story can do with the other maps (looking at you, kessex hills), but I feel like the main towns are bubbles, completely disconnected from the rest, made to evolve through instancied content only.

I just hope they’re going to expand on the Sylvari lore (the other Pale Tree, Malyck, what’s the Dream, is the whole “we’re dragon minions” thing gonna have repercussions on Sylvari as a society ? I can see some of them actually thinking that killing Mordremoth was a bad idea, etc…) and Rata Novus (where are the survivors ? is Taimi going to find something actually useful there ?), while still going forward in the story (next dragon, I guess ?).

I think LS3 should open up with the pact dealing with the last Mordrem forces. Specifically the ones that headed east (seen in Tangled Depths). The siege of Rata Sum could be a nice opening event, with a champion of Mordremoth absorbing some of the dragons power and leading the Mordrem to attack the asuran capital.

Aside from putting a nice bookend on the Mordremoth arc, it would also put the Asura in danger for the first time since Primordus initial attack. Compared to the other races the Asura had it pretty nice in Rata Sum, not too much problems with dragon minions, their designated evil faction, the Inquest, beeing less hostile to them than other villain factions are to their races (e.g. Charr – Flame Legion) and them not having a minor race waging a full out war with them (e.g. humans – centaurs).

I think a devastating attack on Rata Sum could balance things out again between the playable races and also strengthen the Asura vs. Sylvari story line, which is often alluded to, but isn’t played out all that much.

That’s an interesting angle.

I think that feeling of safety is one of the themes behind the asura, however. The other major races take the dragons seriously, but have enough other problems that they can’t afford to focus all their efforts on the dragons. The Arcane Council, on the other hand, has an inflated opinion of their own security that is probably in part prompted by the lack of threats you refer to – they don’t make the contribution to the fight against the dragons that they could because they don’t truly believe that the dragons pose a real threat to Rata Sum.

A credible attack on Rata Sum by Mordrem would shake them out of that complacency, and it would be interesting to see the fallout of that (not to mention resolving the weirdness of all the magic of Rata Sum being so close to Mordremoth but left inviolate). However, it would mean that the complacency will no longer be available as a plot thread for the future.

Well you could still play it, if the Council flees Rata Sum before the attack, but doesn’t organize the evacuation of the city. I think that would really drive home how corrupt the council has become. I mean I had no idea how the Council ticked, I thought that Inquest liaison and Phlunt were the extent of the corruption, but then I played the Asura storyline for the first time and boy did it open my eyes.
That’s why I think it would be interesting if this is brought to the light before the entire Asuran (and player) community. I think such a storyline could have similar impact on the Asura as the dragon minion reveal had on the Sylvari (well it isn’t played out all that much ingame yet, but you catch my drift).

It would take an Elder Dragon to siege Rata Sum. I don’t see how the Mordrem with no real leader could assault a floating city.

Who is Mordremoths lieutenant? Tequatal got stronger after Zhaitans death, Claw of Jormag is still around, The Great Destroyer from GW1 was Primordias, Bubbles we don’t know much about, Shatterer with Kralk. The dragon that assaulted the Pale Tree perhaps? Or the 3 champions in DS who I would guess are dead along with Mordremoth.

if the Mordrem have free will now any one of them can become a leader (also they had no issue moving about in a floating jungle and they still prolly have all their abilities)

Not to mention, if the Mouth of Mordremoth was still alive even though his mind was dead, then likely some of the vines that crept beneath the earth could still be alive as well (no 100% sure of this after the lifeless vine in the raid though). His means they might have the opportunity to attack Rata Sum in a similar fashion to be way they attacked the Pact Fleet, dragging it to the ground.

Sird.4536:

It would take an Elder Dragon to siege Rata Sum. I don’t see how the Mordrem with no real leader could assault a floating city.

Who is Mordremoths lieutenant? Tequatal got stronger after Zhaitans death, Claw of Jormag is still around, The Great Destroyer from GW1 was Primordias, Bubbles we don’t know much about, Shatterer with Kralk. The dragon that assaulted the Pale Tree perhaps? Or the 3 champions in DS who I would guess are dead along with Mordremoth.

I don’t quite agree, there are enough potential dragon champions of Mordremoth we simply might not have meet yet. I mean someone must have lead the army marching east. Could have even been a Mordrem Guard, maybe someone we know. I think of the suspiciously abstent Carys, leader of the Pale Reavers as an example. I mean she could have succumbed to Mordy’s influence.

But even if that is still too unbelievable for you, the villains could be replaced by Destroyers or maybe even Chak that are attracted by the magic in Rata Sum. The important part is the attack on Rata Sum imo, who does it, isn’t that important, though it would solve the small plot whole of what ever happened to those large amounts of Mordrem waltzing through Tangled Deapths.

If they move from HoT story that gave us lots of questions to another dragon – I am going to take a long break of this game. I hate holes in lore. It’s not the way how you make it.

1) MALYCK – Where is he? What happened? Where are other trees? Players should reunite with this character or get to know him as well as other Sylvaris and other Tree. I heard that you dropped this content because you had no time to complete HoT and that was the HUGE mistake. If you don’t have time to make complete expansion then why to do it anyway? Everything or nothing. I bought HoT with hope that I’ll meet MALYCK again and other salads and we’ll fight against MORDREMOTH. Instead of that you killed TREHEARNE, and gave us fully remade psycho – I mean – CANACH. If you can remake CANACH then you can remake MALYCK as well. If you can listen to the players and kill TREHEARNE then why can’t you listen to players once again and make MALYCK come back! I am also going to riot if in LS3 we’ll find that MALYCK and others are dead. It’s not Game of Thrones. Kitten. It’s Guild Wars 2! Please, complete that puzzles you made from lore!

2) Behind closed doors in Rata Novus. What’s there? We need to know about what happened with Asuras that were living in this underground city. They had huge problems with Chaks and they planned lots of things. They also collected data about dragons. Did they teleport somewhere? Are they alive or is it another post HoT Game of Thrones episode? -.- My lovely TAIMI, I count on you here!

3) PALE TREE – She was weak, actually like dying. We did not get to talk with her or anything. Will she recover? Will she die? Will she tell us about MALYCK? Will all Sylvaris of all the trees unite because they will know that dragons are real threat? That would be great because Pact’s status is – destroyed/weak.

Arenanet, please. Don’t make holes in the story, you’ll lose players that would buy all of your expansions.

That’s not even all of the plot holes, just three of the major ones not brought up in the S3 preview summary. Others not included are:

• The Dream and Nightmare – with Mordremoth out of the way, the primary reason to explore this mystery has effectively vanished, and we still have no further clue on what ties the Nightmare and Mordremoth had (and there had to be some connection given that the Shadow of the Dragon was caused by the Nightmare, supposedly, and given the existence of Nightmare chests in the Silverwastes’ maze, and given the Toxic Court – subliminally tied to Mordremoth but still furthering Nightmare).
• Toxic Court – as mentioned, they were subliminally tied to Mordremoth. Especially the krait side of it, which were mentioned out of game to have been mentally altered. HoT would have been the perfect time to turn them into a Son of Svanir-like group, seeing Mordremoth as the power to bring their prophet openly, but also show in the game what was told to us out of the game. With the statement from the interview with Ree about dragon magic spreading to the Elder Dragons’ remaining minions, they may even be included in this ‘spreading’ (the courtier side definitely could, I imagine).

And more. Many more.

HoT wasn’t even quarter of the size it had the potential to be, and wasn’t even half the size it should have been.

And I’ve noticed something over the years. ArenaNet has two huge problems when it comes to storytelling in GW2. First off is that if they don’t feel they can do a story justice, they won’t do it at all; which is a very bad view to always take because sometimes not telling at all is worse than telling less than perfect. Second, and far more important, is that they’re viewing GW2 as a singular story, with every LW Season and every release as just another chapter, instead of how it should be: each season and each release being its own story that ties into one another (like Prophecies, Factions, and Nightfall were).

Some sort of Krytan Civil War actually seems likely. For me, it’s not because the White Mantle, but because of Jennah and Anise. Something is really, really suspicious about them. And then the Living Story decided to bring up the Krytan heir for no apparent reason.

A Civil War would become quite complex if we initially see the White Mantle as bad guys trying to overthrow the rightful ruler, only to find out that Jennah isn’t. Not that it would make the White Mantle good, but that the solution wouldn’t be as simple as just defeating them.

Devs said that LS3 is about glint’s egg and “North of Maguuma” (bloodstone fen?)

That’s not entirely true rebellion. What was said about Season 3 is:

With the recent death of Mordremoth, the Pact and its armies are in disarray with the vast majority of its troops dead or missing. Survivors have begun to regroup or gone home to mourn the dead while the heroes of the great invasion into the jungle investigate a strange disturbance to the north. Within the golden city of Tarir, the last known dragon egg rests protected by the Exalted—but the egg begins to crack. What creature lies within the egg? An enemy or an ally? In other corners of Tyria, the remaining powerful elder dragons continue to expand their control—but what impact will the death of the two of the elder dragons have on them and on Tyria itself? What impact will being held by Mordremoth have on Zojja and Logan? What research will Taimi uncover at Rata Novus? What plans do Anise and the Shining Blade have for Canach? How will the Black Citadel react when they learn of the return of Rytlock? These questions and more await you in season three of Living World! We’ll give you more details as we get closer to its launch.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/state-of-the-game-update-q1-2016/

The ‘north of the Maguuma’ part seems to hint more towards the raids and the ‘establishment for the beginning of S3’ or rather, pre-S3 stuff. And we have more than just the egg and north of Maguuma – we have mention of Destiny’s Edge, Krytan politics, and Rata Novus.

The only thing north is the raid which we know is following the White mantle storyline. It is possible they bring in a new map in the north but I don’t have a map here at work to view to see what other locations are north.

North of the raid is brand new territory. There’s the lake that in GW1 looked like a face (less so in GW2), beyond that it’s fully unknown places that on the map looks like more Maguuma Wastes.

Yep,north is gonna be new area,as they said LS3 comes after wing 3

PetboyJoshua.3108:

Self repost from reddit :

First of all, with the continuation of the living story, I expect them to stop shying away from changing stuff in the 5 races cities. We get it, they can change stuff in Lion’s Arch, or add festival things in the main cities. But what about actually making story changes there ? I want to see Sylvari in the Grove being affected about HoT’s story and what happened to the Pale Tree. I want to see humans in DR talking about being afraid of another attack. I want to see Asura talking about Mordrem studies and Rata Novus. …I just want to feel like the story impacts on the main cities. It’s good what the living story can do with the other maps (looking at you, kessex hills), but I feel like the main towns are bubbles, completely disconnected from the rest, made to evolve through instancied content only.

I just hope they’re going to expand on the Sylvari lore (the other Pale Tree, Malyck, what’s the Dream, is the whole “we’re dragon minions” thing gonna have repercussions on Sylvari as a society ? I can see some of them actually thinking that killing Mordremoth was a bad idea, etc…) and Rata Novus (where are the survivors ? is Taimi going to find something actually useful there ?), while still going forward in the story (next dragon, I guess ?).

Home city’s are “locked in tine” be weird starting out to go kill zhitan when everyone is talking about what happened in HoT. Yes it’s a bit jarring, but look at I from a new players point of view. They have a lot of catching up to do. And do we really want to out spoilers of current story in to home cities?

BrotherBelial.3094:

PetboyJoshua.3108:

Self repost from reddit :

First of all, with the continuation of the living story, I expect them to stop shying away from changing stuff in the 5 races cities. We get it, they can change stuff in Lion’s Arch, or add festival things in the main cities. But what about actually making story changes there ? I want to see Sylvari in the Grove being affected about HoT’s story and what happened to the Pale Tree. I want to see humans in DR talking about being afraid of another attack. I want to see Asura talking about Mordrem studies and Rata Novus. …I just want to feel like the story impacts on the main cities. It’s good what the living story can do with the other maps (looking at you, kessex hills), but I feel like the main towns are bubbles, completely disconnected from the rest, made to evolve through instancied content only.

I just hope they’re going to expand on the Sylvari lore (the other Pale Tree, Malyck, what’s the Dream, is the whole “we’re dragon minions” thing gonna have repercussions on Sylvari as a society ? I can see some of them actually thinking that killing Mordremoth was a bad idea, etc…) and Rata Novus (where are the survivors ? is Taimi going to find something actually useful there ?), while still going forward in the story (next dragon, I guess ?).

Home city’s are “locked in tine” be weird starting out to go kill zhitan when everyone is talking about what happened in HoT. Yes it’s a bit jarring, but look at I from a new players point of view. They have a lot of catching up to do. And do we really want to out spoilers of current story in to home cities?

Anet has to make a decision here and stick with it. Leveling a new character now is confusing as heck, and I am someone that did it while everything went live and made sense. Cities are stuck at the beginning – but not lions arch, unless you are doing the PS, then you get a flashback to old lions arch for that segment of the story. But as a new player how the heck are they supposed to know what that is what is going on? All they see is suddenly a different version of lions arch for the mission.
Same deal with the maps- they are locked to the point of the story you would be for the level of the map, unless it is the maps used for the toxic tower in LS2. In that case you are solving problems that haven’t even happened yet, but again, as a new player how would you know this?

ArenaNet always – ever since Flame and Frost – tried to avoid the 1-15 and home cities when it comes to updates. When they don’t avoid them, it’s only a rather minor or festival-feeling situation (toxic offshoots or queen’s jubilee events or halloween doors/wintersday presents for example). The “mix of past and present” begins with the 15-25 zones. So they do have a realm of consistency.

Sorry for bringing this back up but more than ever I hope something like this happens. Did we hear caudecus in the trailor?