Guild Wars 2

So I, like many players of GW2 , wish for Tengu to be playable as a race in this game. I however am not surprised that this has not come to pass. Producing a new race is a challenging thing for a MMO to accomplish as there are hundreds of skins to make fit this new race, then there are the animations, and so forth.

However I am more concerned with the lore. Given the events of Scarlet’s assault on LA and the rise of Mordemoth I would think that the Tengu would recognize this tremendous and immanent threat to the world and come out of the city. I would not be surprised if this did not coincide with them being playable, I just want to know what in Dwayna’s name is going on in the minds of their government.

I feel like based on the events of GW2 since launch, from the death of Zaihtan, Scarlets war and the rise of Mordy that the Tengu would see that the major races of Tyria are allied for the greater good of all those who call Tyria home.

So what I want to know is if there is any lore to support the fact that the Tengu have yet to come out from hiding or seemingly even acknowledge the events of recent years?

TL;DR : Why are Tengu still hiding ? What more proof could they possibly need that the allied races of Tyria can be trusted to work for their better interests ?

Historically, they have been shafted many times by other races, especially allied ones.

Look at the “Winds of Change” arch, were the peaceful tribe ended up actively targeted and hunted down by the Purity goons.

We also must consider the fact that being isolationist with semi-limited trade to select people/areas, they may be dark about many things. It’s implied ingame they are dealing with increasing destroyer attacks as well.

I think it’s less of a “Yes, we can trust them to fight the dragons alongside of us.” and more of “Can we trust them to not stab us in the back like we’ve seen in the past?”

They recognized all of the Elder Dragons, even Zhaitan. It’s why they built the wall – as well as their well reasoned distancing from other races.

The tengu seem to have a “run and hide” rather than a “stay and fight” mentality when it comes to the Elder Dragons as evident in the book in Hidden Arcana: Riding the Wind: The Tengu Exodus. The particular line to note is:

Now we see the world ripped by dragon’s teeth and send a message of survival to all the races. We believe in taking flight.

What I’ve gathered from various NPCs and my own knowledge.

They were pushed out of cantha, and become distrustful. They eventually left the wall for only trade, but have recently been scouting around. According to the tengu in lions arch they’re watching the other races to see who they will help.

I have a tinfoil hat theory, one of the tengu says they remember things other races have forgotten. What if tengu were around during the last dragon rise(and heres where the real tinfoil hat stuff comes in) what if the tengu and the mursaat are related. Possibly even mursaat are to tengu what exalted are to humans

Tengu and mursaat look nothing alike. How would they be related?

Tengu are clearly avian, while mursaat are clearly humanoids.

Humans and exalted look nothing alike and are the same being. And mursaat have feather like tendrels coming from their back. I highly doubt they are the same or even related (aside from them both seeming to prefer fleeing the dragons than fighting) its just an idea

Exalted are magical and still hominid in shape. Tengu and mursaat are both fleshy, but tengu have feathers, mursaat don’t; tengu have claws for hands and feet, mursaat while armored have more humanoid hands and feet; tengu have long beaks, mursaat, while masked, have flat faces. Tengu have no wings, mursaat do.

Exalted to human comparison can be different because exalted are not fleshy. And they’re still hominid, just like Margonites were.

There were data mining of new tengu npcs. So in hot they might make an presence

Whatever way they planned to introduce tengu as playable and made tengu to interfere with world, races and EDs they planned it long time ago like living world that was all set up for HoT. Probably they didn’t change their minds cuz tengus in LA have the same dialogue lines like before they hide during LA was attacked and destroyed.