Guild Wars 2

Why didn’t the Pact help save Lions Arch?
A new NPC in LA answers:
http://imgur.com/a/j07cE

They thought Scarlet were negligible and now they have another Dragon to face….

Apparently it’s a sound military strategy to have your troops on the front lines while your city burns behind you. Before you say they didn’t know that would happen (which isn’t the defense Laranthir offers btw) the Pact knew what was happening and how big a threat Scarlet was. Not just from the three Orders but from one of their own commanders – the player character. Between the Priory and the Order of Whispers does it even make sense the Pact had no idea that Scarlet might be linked to an Elder Dragon? I mean players figured it out pretty early on.

Shiren.9532:

Before you say they didn’t know that would happen (which isn’t the defense Laranthir offers btw) the Pact knew what was happening and how big a threat Scarlet was.

But, as was said, she wasn’t a dragon and it wasn’t even considered until after it was all done except the grieving. It kind of looks weird if the Pact shows up and bunks down somewhere to fight when it’s not clear a dragon or its minions are involved . . . especially in Lion’s Arch where their freedom is sort of important to them.

Not just from the three Orders but from one of their own commanders – the player character. Between the Priory and the Order of Whispers does it even make sense the Pact had no idea that Scarlet might be linked to an Elder Dragon? I mean players figured it out pretty early on.

Bear in mind, some subsections of the players have also floated the following:

- It was Primordius she was drilling for, and the Destroyers would be involved.

- Captain Kiel/Captain Gnashblade was a traitor and would turncoat so the other could kill them.

- Asura are, in fact, the most awesome thing ever.

My point is that it doesn’t matter it wasn’t a dragon – Lion’s Arch is important enough to defend. The Pact isn’t killing dragons because it’s fun, they are protecting Tyria. It doesn’t make sense to take on dragons if there’s nothing left of Tyria to protect because “not a dragon, not our problem” destroyed it all.

It also raises questions about how little valued or respected the player commander is. We were the ones who “figured out” (with lots of hand holding) the attack was taking place. We knew the city needed to be defended. Why didn’t we, as commanders in the Pact, try to get some kind of reinforcements for the city when we knew the Captain’s Council wasn’t going to do it? What about after the initial attack. Laranthir shows up once the fight is over, even if the Pact wasn’t involved in the initial evacuation/failed defense of the city, they could have showed up to help retake it.

I agree there were several fan theories which weren’t correct. My point is the three Orders are very well informed and if players can correctly guess/predict the dragon connection, it stands to reason that some people within the Orders had similar thoughts.

Shiren.9532:

It also raises questions about how little valued or respected the player commander is. We were the ones who “figured out” (with lots of hand holding) the attack was taking place. We knew the city needed to be defended. Why didn’t we, as commanders in the Pact, try to get some kind of reinforcements for the city when we knew the Captain’s Council wasn’t going to do it?

Don’t know what you’re talking about, Commander of the Pact,my charr warrior is a well-respected new recruit of the Vigil and running around supporting his squad in trying to hold Fort Marriner.

I think what it comes down to is the Pact believed that other forces would suffice to defeat Scarlet, while every Pact soldier who died in the fight would’ve been a Pact soldier unable to fight the Elder Dragons- and with five to go, the Pact might figure they’ll need every soldier they can get a hold of. The only way the decision wouldn’t make sense is if they had a reason to believe whatever other force wasn’t up to the task- and all indications are that the Lionguard and their allies would’ve done well, had the plot not passed them the Idiot Ball.

This makes me wish we had a better handling of what the logistics of the pact are. Like, since we are commanders, can’t we go down to Fort Trinity and be like “how many cannons do I got?”, “how many airships do we have where?”, “status report?”.

Aaron Ansari.1604:

I think what it comes down to is the Pact believed that other forces would suffice to defeat Scarlet, while every Pact soldier who died in the fight would’ve been a Pact soldier unable to fight the Elder Dragons- and with five to go, the Pact might figure they’ll need every soldier they can get a hold of. The only way the decision wouldn’t make sense is if they had a reason to believe whatever other force wasn’t up to the task- and all indications are that the Lionguard and their allies would’ve done well, had the plot not passed them the Idiot Ball.

The plot did pass them the idiot ball and player knew that. We knew the Captain’s Council was doing nothing to defend the city and we knew Scarlet was dangerous.

It makes sense the Pact would want to conserve their strength but that thinking is very short sighted. The Pact draws its member from the three Orders. Every Order member lost in Lion’s Arch is one less member they can assign to the Pact. They are already losing potential recruits, they may even lose current recruits if the Orders feel the need to reassign Pact members to cover the work load of members lost in the fight.

Then look at Tyria’s resources in general. Lion’s Arch (or an equivalent city) will need to be rebuilt/built. Food and building supplies will need to go into recovering from this disaster. When there is a natural disaster, the areas impacted can take more than ten years to recover and repair from all the damage and the cost is incredible. Lion’s Arch is now draining resources from the three Orders to house and feed the refugees, from the different races (presumably) and the trade routes which the Pact benefits from (either directly in the form of using them themselves or indirectly in the form of not having to compete with others who can use them) are less protected because the Lionguard are severely weakened.

The price of food will likely rise, the price of building supplies will likely rise, the trade routes will become more dangerous and the access to man power will be stretched thin. The Pack should be greatly impacted on by this attack. They may have held the line in Orr or the Northern Shiverpeaks but they lost a lot by not intervening.

End of the day, the pact is not your personal army to point and raze this area in particular. It was a hard enough alliance to forge and even then it’s likely made with clauses like “The army cannot be fielded for the benefits of any one nation” which this would have been.

Secondly, most of scarlet’s strategy was “Field something deadly, use the chaos to test something else, don’t care when it all falls apart”. To the pact and most of the world, scarlet might have seemed dangerous but she also kept losing. Her queen’s Jubilee invasion foiled, The nightmare tower was destroyed, and the marionette reduced to pieces. These are not the actions of an immediate threat worthy of breaking one of the pacts founding clauses.

Completely agree, Shiren. Their excuses for not getting involved ring hollow for me. Defending a city falls outside of their charter? Their charter with who? Does Anet even know what that word means? I didn’t realize that the Pact received their authority and mission from some higher governing body. They were founded as an independent alliance; they have no charter.

Who, had the Pact intervened, would have said “Sorry guys, you overstepped the terms of your charter by defending the city.” Especially given that all three orders were involved in the defense, the fact that the Pact couldn’t even send one airship (until after the fact) is just silly.

thats sad the pact actually works in living story, after the personal one, but orr is still dead

if anet is not afraid of changing the maps, and let’s everyone do the old PS even if the map is ruined, then why?

Sublimatio.6981:

thats sad the pact actually works in living story, after the personal one, but orr is still dead

if anet is not afraid of changing the maps, and let’s everyone do the old PS even if the map is ruined, then why?

Based on a few slips the devs made on the forums I believe they are making a game system whereby areas or the world can have a timeline… To allow drastic changes.

The Pact is not an independent organization. Hell, you can’t really call it an organization. It’s an alliance of multiple organizations.

And the individual organizations did fight Scarlet.

Think of the Pact like this: You have 9 major groups (three Orders, LA, five major races), and in these 9 major groups, you have a portion of each major group dedicated to fighting a massive threat to all major groups (the Elder Dragons). Those individual portions make up the Pact.

The Pact is just a vanguard unit against the Elder Dragons. If you include the full of all 9 major groups, then the Pact is very small in comparison – and the non-Pact parts of the major groups deal with non-dragon threats.

To say the Pact should go deal with non-dragon local threats such as Scarlet is to say the Fallen Angels (a unit of the Seraph sent to Ebonhawke) should be fighting the centaurs because if DR falls to centaurs it’s all pointless. Fighting centaurs isn’t their job, it isn’t their duty. They’re there to protect Ebonhawke.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

To say the Pact should go deal with non-dragon local threats such as Scarlet is to say the Fallen Angels (a unit of the Seraph sent to Ebonhawke) should be fighting the centaurs because if DR falls to centaurs it’s all pointless. Fighting centaurs isn’t their job, it isn’t their duty. They’re there to protect Ebonhawke.

Are you arguing that if the centaurs had a massive force inside Divinity’s Reach and a good chunk of the population of the city was killed and the buildings destroyed, it would make sense for the Fallen Angels to prioritise Ebonhawke over Divinity’s Reach? If there was a choice between Ebonhawke and Divinity’s Reach, it makes sense to choose the former? What happens to Ebonhawke if Divinity’s Reach falls? Where will they get their supplies and reinforcements? How are they going to handle the influx of refugees?

It’s fine for the Fallen Angels to remain in Ebonhawke when the centaurs aren’t ransacking the city and only small groups are roaming Queensdale, but if for some reason the centaurs made it into the city with a sizable force and it looked like they might take the city (Scarlet did take Lion’s Arch) I would definitely expect the Fallen Angels to reinforce Divinity’s Reach (if you pretend they wouldn’t be evacuating the citizens to Ebonhawke instead).

Shiren.9532:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

To say the Pact should go deal with non-dragon local threats such as Scarlet is to say the Fallen Angels (a unit of the Seraph sent to Ebonhawke) should be fighting the centaurs because if DR falls to centaurs it’s all pointless. Fighting centaurs isn’t their job, it isn’t their duty. They’re there to protect Ebonhawke.

Are you arguing that if the centaurs had a massive force inside Divinity’s Reach and a good chunk of the population of the city was killed and the buildings destroyed, it would make sense for the Fallen Angels to prioritise Ebonhawke over Divinity’s Reach? If there was a choice between Ebonhawke and Divinity’s Reach, it makes sense to choose the former? What happens to Ebonhawke if Divinity’s Reach falls? Where will they get their supplies and reinforcements? How are they going to handle the influx of refugees?.

Sure but now you are trying to compare a unit of an army of a nation and it’s placements regarding that nation. To a neutral city of pirates and an army comprised of units from 8 different groups with a singular vision. These are not in any way comparable circumstances. The pact is not lion’s arch’s army.

This really is quite silly… I mean the reasoning behind the pact’s absence is pretty much sound. They wouldn’t intervene, it’s not their mission to go around waging war on every petty villain that arises. To them, they have bigger birds to fry and the death of the dragons is their sole mission and vision.

The fact that scarlet was planning to raise a dragon was guessed by players but not by their characters. This was meta knowledge outside the game and you cannot impose that upon the actions of your character.

As I have said before, I’ll say it again. The pact is not your personal army to point at a location and raze it. The story would cease to be believable if it were.

Theres an entire island of undead that cannot just sit there, not to mention 5 dragons off on their own little missions of world domination. The pact has a daunting job and it’s hands are way too full for excursions into vigilante justice.

Alice.8694:

Theres an entire island of undead that cannot just sit there, not to mention 5 dragons off on their own little missions of world domination. The pact has a daunting job and it’s hands are way too full for excursions into vigilante justice.

Not to mention they had grievous damage to their air forces while fighting Zhaitan, including their flagship. I count that as one airship heavily damaged, one which had to be scuttled, and some number quietly nicked by Aetherblades (probably from repair drydocks).

And there were intense losses during the campaign through Orr. An armor unit was devastated trying to march through Malchor’s Leap, some others were lost during even the initial scouting phase, and there were still more who fought and died pushing to Arah.

Depending on how long game-time has passed between Zhaitan’s demise and current, it’s really questionable how close to being ready they are to mobilize.

And last I heard, ArenaNet was still holding to the fiction that the Living Story and Personal Story were simultaneous, regardless of how increasingly ridiculous that’s becoming. Hopefully, with Lion’s Arch trashed, they’ve realised that’s a conceit they really can’t hold on to.

In this case… I think the issue isn’t that the Pact wasn’t there (as people have pointed out, it effectively was through the participation of the orders, just not under the flag) – the issue is that the keywords ‘charter’ and ‘justified’ are being used. If the Pact had wanted to intervene as the Pact, as people have stated… nobody, except Scarlet, would have tried to stop them.

A better explanation would have been:

“That’s not what we do. We’ve been tasked with slaying the Elder Dragons, and expect local forces to be able to handle other threats. But then we heard the dragon’s cry.”

and

“We believe Scarlet’s drilling raised a dragon. If we’d known that was her plan, we would have assigned additional resources to stopping her.”

Okay, let say the Pact moves back to save a burnt down city. The dragon minions will advance and annihilate the rest of Tyria.

I don’t see the difference between defending Lion’s Arch and retaking Claw Island when Zhaitan attacked it and doing the same for Lion’s Arch when Scarlet attacks it.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Not to mention they had grievous damage to their air forces while fighting Zhaitan, including their flagship. I count that as one airship heavily damaged, one which had to be scuttled, and some number quietly nicked by Aetherblades (probably from repair drydocks).

All the more reason to deal with the invasion – the people stealing Pact ships are there.

Alice.8694:

As I have said before, I’ll say it again. The pact is not your personal army to point at a location and raze it. The story would cease to be believable if it were.

No-one is saying the Pact is anyone’s personal army. I’m saying that the Pact have good reason to want Lion’s Arch to survive and through the player commander, they had good reason to believe it wouldn’t. They benefit from Lion’s Arch surviving the attack (that’s why the Pact already defended the city once – defending Lion’s Arch was the first mission for the Pact when they retook Claw Island) and when it fell to Scarlet it was a great loss for the Pact.

Scarlet systematically demonstrated prior to Lion’s Arch that she is not a petty villain (or in Laranthir’s ignorant words, a deviant – how he could trivialise Scarlet like that while at the same time standing in the wreckage of one of Tyria’s greatest cities after thousands died is astonishing). Currently she’s one of the most accomplished villains in Tyria, there is a big difference between stopping Scarlet and stopping Caudecus or the centaurs. She succeeded where Zhaitan failed. The Pact didn’t have to cease all operations, they could have just postponed non-critical operations and supported the city with weapon, air ships (air superiority wins wars and the Pact have the best air ships out of the allied forces) or supplies.

“If it’s not a dragon it’s not my problem” is a fast way to fail. The Pact wants to save Tyria, there’s no point defeating the Elder Dragons if you’re going to let Scarlet do what the dragons threatened to do.

Before posting about how silly it is to expect the Pact to intervene answer these questions. What does the Pact do if Lion’s Arch falls and the Lionguard and Order forces fighting for the city were all wiped out? How long before they inevitably have to deal with Scarlet (who for all we know was a dragon minion)? Has the Pact’s mission has been negatively impacted by Scarlet’s attack? Does the Pact benefit from Scarlet being swiftly defeated and Lion’s Arch staying relatively healthy?

The put it another way, under the current logic, if Jormag’s minions attacked Lion’s Arch one week, the Pact would defend the city. If a week later Scarlet attacked the city, the Pact wouldn’t intervene. That doesn’t make sense.

From the living story so far we should now understand that we can’t assume anything based on what NPCs are not doing. Many NPCs have never done the minimum of what we expect them to do and instead of being a plot clue it has just been the limited scale of the game content. We have to accept that. There’s no use asking why the Pact isn’t in Lion’s Arch or why Queen Jennah hasn’t tried to catch Scarlet and recover the clockwork technology, say. Players will never though accept clear continuity errors in what we are shown in game.

If the Pact was in Lion’s Arch it would create continuity errors with the personal story. It is as straightforward as that. Some of our characters have actually founded the Pact as part of the personal story. Other characters have not. There is a massive, inexcusable, continuity error if the Pact is there defending Lion’s Arch today and tomorrow your character founds the Pact from three orders who refuse to work together. The three Orders exist in any timeline and they do take in refugees from Lion’s Arch, consistent for any timeline, so we see that in game.

Anet have already been sloppy in putting other continuity errors needlessly into the game (such as the Aetherblades stealing Pact airships), however I’d rather not see those errors compounded until their timelines become an even worse mess than they are right now. We all clearly want the story to take account of our character history, but it has to be correct for everyone. It is far easier to have the customization in an instance or have a couple of open world characters with text dialogs saying “Hello, Pact Commander”.

Shiren.9532:

“If it’s not a dragon it’s not my problem” is a fast way to fail. The Pact wants to save Tyria, there’s no point defeating the Elder Dragons if you’re going to let Scarlet do what the dragons threatened to do.

facepalm

Tune in next Saturday for the next thrilling episode of…. SUPER PACT.
The all new adventures of everyone’s favorite army.
Capable of leaping a single continent in a single patch!.
Can be anywhere! Can do anything!
Total political immunity for it’s actions because it does good things!
Saving Tyria from every enemy no matter the insignificance!
Knowing facts in hindsight before they even happen!
Dragons? They can wait, there’s a plant that’s getting a bit too big for it’s britches!

Trahearne is the Pact’s general … what else you guys expected? A good military strategy?

It was the three orders joined with the lion guard that defended and took back LA. And it was a pact member that unveiled Scarlets plans and killed her in the end…

draxynnic.3719:

And last I heard, ArenaNet was still holding to the fiction that the Living Story and Personal Story were simultaneous, regardless of how increasingly ridiculous that’s becoming. Hopefully, with Lion’s Arch trashed, they’ve realised that’s a conceit they really can’t hold on to.

Actually, it was stated by Mike Zadorojny that the events of the Living Story take place one year after the Personnal Story :

Mike Zadorojny : The Living World is generally thought to take place one year after the events of the personal story. The Pact forces have been cleaning up in the wake of Zaithan and weren’t prepared for Scarlet’s assault. The Orders of Tyria are each assisting in the attempt to retake the city. (link)

However, I don’t know if their position on this matter has changed between the beginning of this arc of the Living Story more than a year ago, and now.

There is no way it takes place parellel, unless you are talking about parallel dimensions.

To Konig and Alice: we’re not saying that the entire Pact army should have mobilized against Scarlet. It’s understood that they still have Risen to combat and can’t just pack up and roll out. Nor do I consider them my personal army to point at my foes. That’s not the issue here.

The issue is a complete lack of concern or interest until the dragon’s cry. Yes, their job is to fight dragons. But that’s the stated goal of all three Orders as well, and they had zero problem defending the city. And the Pact is just all three Orders working together…you mean that none of the Orders called Fort Trinity for backup? That Trahearne saw all three of the Pact’s component forces join in the fight and he couldn’t be bothered to send a single airship?

It would be one thing if it was a centaur siege on Divinity’s Reach. But this was a massive assault on the capital of free Tyria by an enormous army, not to mention an airship-drill nearly half the size of the city itself. I didn’t expect the entire Pact to mobilize on the city. But I did expect them to acknowledge the gravity of the situation and show some concern and support.

I mean, what if Scarlet had won and then turned her forces against the Order headquarters? All three Orders burning to the ground; would that have been enough to get the Pact involved? At what point does the stated mission of the alliance take precedence to ensuring the survival of the Orders and peoples that forged the alliance in the first place?

Kalarchis.8635:

But that’s the stated goal of all three Orders as well

It is?
I mean, the Vigil was formed because of the rise of the Elder Dragons, but the Order and Priory have made the Elder Dragons priority goals because they are existential threats. The Order is about maintaining power structures and the Priory is about protecting knowledge and history.

Also, the Pact is just the organizing structure of how the orders work together. It is not a power in and of itself. People keep treating it like it’s its own military but really it is more like NATO.

The dragons may not be why the Whispers and Priory were founded, but they’re certainly their focus at the time of our involvement in the game. All three Orders were introduced and sold to us as dragon-fighting organizations, the differences being their approach.

The Pact is similar to NATO but they do have their own military force, particularly a fleet of airships, submarines, and helicopters. This fleet was created by the Pact for the Pact.

Ox Lee.7319:

Actually, it was stated by Mike Zadorojny that the events of the Living Story take place one year after the Personnal Story :

It was, then there was some confusing comments that seemed to make it less certain, then Bobby Stein corrected that confusion. What is known is that they were deliberately trying to make it so that no matter where you were in the personal story it wouldn’t be obvious to you that you were missing something. That from your perspective the world always made sense.

draxynnic.3719:

And last I heard, ArenaNet was still holding to the fiction that the Living Story and Personal Story were simultaneous, regardless of how increasingly ridiculous that’s becoming. Hopefully, with Lion’s Arch trashed, they’ve realised that’s a conceit they really can’t hold on to.

No, they officially abandoned that as of this year.

Kalarchis.8635:

To Konig and Alice: we’re not saying that the entire Pact army should have mobilized against Scarlet. It’s understood that they still have Risen to combat and can’t just pack up and roll out. Nor do I consider them my personal army to point at my foes. That’s not the issue here.

The issue is a complete lack of concern or interest until the dragon’s cry. Yes, their job is to fight dragons. But that’s the stated goal of all three Orders as well, and they had zero problem defending the city. And the Pact is just all three Orders working together…you mean that none of the Orders called Fort Trinity for backup? That Trahearne saw all three of the Pact’s component forces join in the fight and he couldn’t be bothered to send a single airship?

A few things.

1) The Pact is more than some of each of the three orders. You have members of wolfborn, High Legions, Seraph, and random adventurers joined in too.
2) The Orders have many goals. Killing the Elder Dragons is just one of the bigger ones. And for this, they give their dragon-hunting troops to the Pact.
3) The Orders are huge and likely wouldn’t pull their troops from fighting dragon’s even without the Pact.

Miroe.2054:

It was the three orders joined with the lion guard that defended and took back LA. And it was a pact member that unveiled Scarlets plans and killed her in the end…

You have a point. I think would be cool if this big failure could cause some politics intrigues inside The Pact. Maybe the departure of Trahearne as general?

Captain Magnus has some tough dialogue about Lionguard situation, even about himself. I dont think Captains Council power structure will remain the same.

The big problem I have with the pact is that the main character is technically still the second in command. I can buy that they didn’t interfere because they are busy with the dragons (even though we never actually see any significant advancement, but that’s hard to implement I suppose), but the PC, their commander, the second-in-command of the entire organisation basically went AWOL for a year playing grabass with a loony sylvari and neither Trahearnne nor any of the Pact members seem to care about that. I guess it turned all out fine since there was a dragon involved after all…

Also, what popped into my head after meeting Laranthir in LA:

[Laranthir comes into Trahearnne’s office, salutes]
Laranthir: Marshal Trahearnne, we can’t ignore this anymore. It seems Scarlet was working for an Elder Dragon after all!
Trahearnne: Oh, uhm… the fighting is already over, right? Even if we send someone, we wouldn’t have to… you know… do anything?
Laranthir: … yes.
Trahearnne: Excellent! Off with you! Observe the situation in Lion’s Arch or something. Report back to me, but… not too frequently. You know the drill.
Laranthir: Yes, sir. [prepares to leave the office]
Trahearnne: Oh, and Laranthir... if you see the Commander, tell him he is the best at his job and should keep doing what he’s doing!
Laranthir: But sir... he didn’t report back to headquarters for over a year..
Trahearnne: [Devilish grin] Exactly!

I get that there are limitations in what can be shown in game and that you can justify it in lore, but the Pact still comes off as an organisation with a lot of resources that’s not really doing much of anything in over a year.

It really would have been a lot smoother if the Pact disbanded after the Personal Story or at least the PC would have left it for the time being.

The thing is that they don’t have a lot of resources. All resources they have come directly from the major races and three orders. For the sole purpose of fighting dragons.

Would you like it if you gave someone $1,000,000 to go build a house for homeless, but after putting down the foundation they began building a grocery store? I wouldn’t think so.

Let’s get this straight people. If I’m in charge of Kryta, and the pact goes to defend the largest stronghold of pirates on the continent, then I will no longer support the pact financially nor will I support it with men and arms.

The Pact was made to kill dragons. That isn’t to say they aren’t involved by proxy, via the orders.

To be fair, they were involved, but with plausible deniability because it was the vigil, priory, and whispers working together.

The idea that the Pact is a task force designed specifically to fight dragons is noticeable, but you have to account that while the Orders make up most of the Pact forces, they also include auxiliaries of all nations in the continent of Tyria. You really can’t deploy them all without due support from their home nations, as shown with Reach’s reluctance to give support to Lion’s Arch. In addition, during the rescue operations, while it wasn’t the Pact that responded, the Orders did. All the three orders assisted in the evacuation of the Arch as well as setting up the refugee camps. If I remember right, the Priory helped set up another gate to cut through Lornar’s from Lion’s Arch, Vigil set up the temporary main site for Lion’s Arch, and Whispers for general evacuation of many citizens of L.A.

Either way there is some massive communication blunders that happened all around during the living story for season 1. I hope that someone (an antagonist) takes advantage of it, and beats it over the head(s) of all those responsible for Lion’s Arch downfall. Since loosing LA as a major multiracial capital would put a strain on all of the other primary racial capitals. Making it easier for the Elder Dragons to commit their forces in taking the remaining major racial city’s out (one by one).

Belzebu.3912:

Trahearne is the Pact’s general … what else you guys expected? A good military strategy?

I can’t wait until we fight mordy.

Us: What are we going to do?
Trahearne: I don’t know…
Us: What?
Trahearne: Well you see… I’m a zombie dragon specialist… In fact I was specifically chosen to lead the Pack for no other reason then my knowledge of Orr and that I was neutral order-wise. Plant dragons however… um… let’s shoot a lazer at it?
Us: Ok guess I’m pulling the weight… again!

AsgarZigel.4530:

It really would have been a lot smoother if the Pact disbanded after the Personal Story or at least the PC would have left it for the time being.

Well it’s not too late to salvage it though. All we need is a living world content in which we see the pack heavily engaged in fighting one of the dragons (preferably not mordy since he just woke up), suffering heavy casualties and what not to justify why they couldn’t spare any troops. I guess lore wise it could be explained: the other dragons sensed Mordy was about to be awakened and because more active requiring more Pact force to keep them at bay.
You know basically some filler living world content. Doesn’t really explain why they didn’t call the second in command to help… maybe the fighting was so bad that the post office stopped working? Of course then why didn’t we go check on them?
Ok maybe this will require a bit more effort to salvage.

A lot of Pact members are on “holiday” leave after killing Zhaitan. Many of them (e.g. the players) did help in fighting Scarlet while on holiday.

Its the only explanation I can come up with. Traherne should have said something, even if he cannot help.

Keep in mind, guys, the Pact is still currently fighting other threats (IE, the Shatterers, Claws of Jormag)

However, I do feel that they were being a little obtuse when they continued to ignore her after her Marionette weapons test.

Why would the completely failed Marionette grab the Pact’s attention if the Tower of Nightmares, which was far more destructive, did not?

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Why would the completely failed Marionette grab the Pact’s attention if the Tower of Nightmares, which was far more destructive, did not?

Not sure I follow you on the Marionette. How did it fail? What was it supposed to accomplish that it didn’t?

DarcShriek.5829:

Let’s get this straight people. If I’m in charge of Kryta, and the pact goes to defend the largest stronghold of pirates on the continent, then I will no longer support the pact financially nor will I support it with men and arms.

Advent Leader.1083:

The idea that the Pact is a task force designed specifically to fight dragons is noticeable, but you have to account that while the Orders make up most of the Pact forces, they also include auxiliaries of all nations in the continent of Tyria. You really can’t deploy them all without due support from their home nations, as shown with Reach’s reluctance to give support to Lion’s Arch.

Exactly.
An organisation like the Pact would only be allowed to exist under joint tutelage of the 6 nations. If it were to act independently from the conditions set up by the nations, i would become a rogue organisation, likely to be outlawed by some of them, if not all in order to avoid a diplomatic incident. Though those tight reins allow the Pact to only operate in a narrow field, it is a necessity to prevent the Pact from competing with the structures of power and eventually gain the imperial policy-making power of the Praetorian Guard in the Roman Empire.

Well the pact is made up of the vigil, the priory, and the order of whispers. I saw order agents and vigil soldiers helping people get out of lion’s arch. The priory has never been the order to be on the battlefield but all three opened camps to assist citizens that fled while you took care of Scarlet. What more do you want?

DarcShriek.5829:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Why would the completely failed Marionette grab the Pact’s attention if the Tower of Nightmares, which was far more destructive, did not?

Not sure I follow you on the Marionette. How did it fail? What was it supposed to accomplish that it didn’t?

I just meant that it was destroyed.

Bazompora.2635:

DarcShriek.5829:

Let’s get this straight people. If I’m in charge of Kryta, and the pact goes to defend the largest stronghold of pirates on the continent, then I will no longer support the pact financially nor will I support it with men and arms.

Advent Leader.1083:

The idea that the Pact is a task force designed specifically to fight dragons is noticeable, but you have to account that while the Orders make up most of the Pact forces, they also include auxiliaries of all nations in the continent of Tyria. You really can’t deploy them all without due support from their home nations, as shown with Reach’s reluctance to give support to Lion’s Arch.

Exactly.
An organisation like the Pact would only be allowed to exist under joint tutelage of the 6 nations. If it were to act independently from the conditions set up by the nations, i would become a rogue organisation, likely to be outlawed by some of them, if not all in order to avoid a diplomatic incident. Though those tight reins allow the Pact to only operate in a narrow field, it is a necessity to prevent the Pact from competing with the structures of power and eventually gain the imperial policy-making power of the Praetorian Guard in the Roman Empire.

Maybe in the future a more radical faction of the Pact will exist. They see the Pact as too “passive” and “slow to response” in the face of danger. The Pact isn’t as efficient in protecting the people as they would like.

Remember that we (the players) are the Pact. If many of us (not all) feel that the Pact leadership is too passive, that means many members of the Pact feels the same. By lore, Traherne and the Pact leadership cannot ignore these opinions. They are real in the game.

By extension, any “popular” opinion posted on these lore forums are indeed opinions from members of the Pact. These is no absolute “right” and “wrong”. It is obvious that members of the Pact often disagree with each other on how to do things.

The Pact isn’t run by some absolute monarchy, so freedom of opinion and freedom of speech is highly valued.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

DarcShriek.5829:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Why would the completely failed Marionette grab the Pact’s attention if the Tower of Nightmares, which was far more destructive, did not?

Not sure I follow you on the Marionette. How did it fail? What was it supposed to accomplish that it didn’t?

I just meant that it was destroyed.

I seem to remember a lot of people dying due to what you call a failed weapon.

CHIPS.6018:

Bazompora.2635:

DarcShriek.5829:

Let’s get this straight people. If I’m in charge of Kryta, and the pact goes to defend the largest stronghold of pirates on the continent, then I will no longer support the pact financially nor will I support it with men and arms.

Advent Leader.1083:

The idea that the Pact is a task force designed specifically to fight dragons is noticeable, but you have to account that while the Orders make up most of the Pact forces, they also include auxiliaries of all nations in the continent of Tyria. You really can’t deploy them all without due support from their home nations, as shown with Reach’s reluctance to give support to Lion’s Arch.

Exactly.
An organisation like the Pact would only be allowed to exist under joint tutelage of the 6 nations. If it were to act independently from the conditions set up by the nations, i would become a rogue organisation, likely to be outlawed by some of them, if not all in order to avoid a diplomatic incident. Though those tight reins allow the Pact to only operate in a narrow field, it is a necessity to prevent the Pact from competing with the structures of power and eventually gain the imperial policy-making power of the Praetorian Guard in the Roman Empire.

Maybe in the future a more radical faction of the Pact will exist. They see the Pact as too “passive” and “slow to response” in the face of danger. The Pact isn’t as efficient in protecting the people as they would like.

Remember that we (the players) are the Pact. If many of us (not all) feel that the Pact leadership is too passive, that means many members of the Pact feels the same. By lore, Traherne and the Pact leadership cannot ignore these opinions. They are real in the game.

By extension, any “popular” opinion posted on these lore forums are indeed opinions from members of the Pact. These is no absolute “right” and “wrong”. It is obvious that members of the Pact often disagree with each other on how to do things.

The Pact isn’t run by some absolute monarchy, so freedom of opinion and freedom of speech is highly valued.

However, the pact is funded by an absolute monarchy.

Thinking about this I wonder why people think the Pact should be involved?

It’s an organisation put together to fight the Elder Dragons, it’s not there to solve every internal conflict or war within or between nations. Should the Pact also be involved in fighting the Inquest? or the rebels threatening the human/charr peace around Ebonhawke.

As the NPC added in this update said, had they known Scarlet was involved with the Elder Dragons they would have assisted. This is because then they would be filling their role.