Guild Wars 2

Hello GW2 Lore forums! I’ve been playing GW2 for over a year and a half now, and I can honestly say I’ve enjoyed every minute of it! This will be my first forum post on the official forums, though I have been an avid lore nerd on GW2RP.

I’m bringing a peeve of mine to the community to discuss. My peeve has to do with the current start and end times of the Sylvari cycles. I will detail my thoughts and reasons below. My goal is to get this in front of the Devs, and hopefully spark positive dialogue and maybe, just maybe, get the lore corrected.

Currently the sylvari cycles are separated like this:

Cycle of Dawn
The Cycle of Dawn refers to those born between midnight and 6 a.m.

Cycle of Noon
The Cycle of Noon refers to those born between 6 a.m. and noon

Cycle of Dusk
The Cycle of Dusk refers to those born between noon and 6 p.m.

Cycle of Night
The Cycle of Night refers to those born between 6 p.m. and midnight

Source

However, my peeve starts with the information listed for the Cycle of Dawn. Yes, technically by the 24 hour clock a new ‘day’ starts at 0001 hours (12:01 am). Intuitively however, midnight to 6am is still the middle of the night. In my mind, there are only three Tyrian races where midnight would be the start of a new day; humans, asura and Charr. My reasons for believing this is because of the more technical natures of their societies, and the prevalence of the use of clocks and other time pieces. Sylvari and norn rely more on the sun placement in the sky than what “time” it is.

The following conversation occurs on the top floor of the Grove, near where the entrance to the Oomphalos chamber is found:
Warden: Shhhh. Listen. Feel.
Warden (2): What?
Warden: Ah, there it is. The moment when night gives up its dominion, and day opens its eyes upon the world.

Anecdotally, I believe I have heard this conversation during the times ingame where it is changing from night to day. I say this because the times I have spent idling on the top floor this particular conversation doesn’t seem to repeat as much or as often as the rest of the conversations. If night is becoming day ingame, and the glow effects of Sylvari are turned off and the game is brightening to daytime, wouldn’t that suggest that the sun rising is when Dawn should start?

So my proposal to the community would be to align the Cycles to reflect what makes more sense to how the Sylvari would view a day:

Cycle of Dawn: 6am to Noon
Cycle of Noon: Noon to 6pm
Cycle of Dusk: 6pm to midnight
Cycle of Night: Midnight to 6am

Or to get REALLY crazy:

Cycle of Dawn: 3am to 9am
Cycle of Noon: 9am to 3pm
Cycle of Dusk: 3pm to 9pm
Cycle of Night: 9pm to 3am

What do you guys think? I look forward to hearing everyone’s comments and discussing it with all of you.

It is what it is. The community doesn’t decide it and it works as it is.

Also, it is stated that there is “leeway” in what cycle one counts towards. You can still count as night if born at 11:54 PM, for example, or even dusk if born at 12:11 AM.

It isn’t meant to be picture perfect. It isn’t super strict either. More of a ‘general guide to describe the division of sylvari personalities’ and could be labeled stuff like Cycle of the Leaf/Trunk/Flower/Branch or even something silly like Cycle of the Oompa/Fliperdaple/Loompa/Neverland.

You said the same thing on 2RP Konig. You need new comments.

Technically, I said the same thing there as I said here. And it’s the same topic, so why should my opinion change? Especially when the audience is different – that’s like going to a motivational speaker multiple times in different cities and expecting the speech to be different when the topic’s stated to be the same.

Also, I did say a bit more over there, particularly regarding how the cycles weren’t originally called dawn/noon/dusk/night.

How about this:

Dawn: 4am to 10 am
Noon: 10 am to 4 pm
Dusk: 4 pm to 10 pm
Night: 10 pm to 4 am

I personally think of dawn starting at 4 am. Dusk starting at 4pm also makes sense because that when the sun starts moving towards the horizon.

With the current system, Dawn starting at midnight is very unrealistic. Dusk starting at noon time doesn’t make sense either.

I really enjoy the idea of fixing the cycles to adhere to how a Sylvari would see them.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Technically, I said the same thing there as I said here. And it’s the same topic, so why should my opinion change?

Well, you could add something that you forgot to say back on 2RP. Just a suggestion.

Back on guildwars2roleplayers.com (aka 2RP), I did suggest to the OP to post the idea here, so the devs can see it and consider adding it to the game’s lore. Devs, what do you think of the OP’s idea?

Why does the cycle need to be divided into 4 six hour parts. Why not let it follow the actual day-night cycle in game.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Day_and_night#Day.E2.80.93night_cycle

So that there’s roughly even proportions. If it were along the the line of the in-game cycle, you’d have 14 noon sylvari for every 1 dusk or dawn. At 4% of the population a piece, the Nightmare Court (per an old interview) would outnumber the two groups put together, possibly almost two to one. Marginalizing what are supposed to be two of the race’s main factions to such a degree undermines the concept; the cycles are supposed to be a way to draw attention to various aspects of the sylvari character, not to banish half of them to obscure corners.

Aaron Ansari.1604:

So that there’s roughly even proportions. If it were along the the line of the in-game cycle, you’d have 14 noon sylvari for every 1 dusk or dawn. At 4% of the population a piece, the Nightmare Court (per an old interview) would outnumber the two groups put together, possibly almost two to one. Marginalizing what are supposed to be two of the race’s main factions to such a degree undermines the concept; the cycles are supposed to be a way to draw attention to various aspects of the sylvari character, not to banish half of them to obscure corners.

Only when you assume that Silvary awaken equally during each hour. It could be as well that more Silvary per hour awaken during dusk or dawn. What I rather wanted to say: I think the concept of the day -night cycle doesn’t fit into an concept which messures time in equal proportions. For me it’s rather a poetic description of the first impressions that a Silvary has when he/she awakens. I think a Silvary wouldn’t say “I awakened at 9:23am, so I’m a day born.” A Silvary would rather say something like “I awakened when the last dew drops were molten by the morning sun.” or something like that.

There’s been enough pointless retcons reducing the game’s continuity stability to swiss cheese and less, I don’t think we need more pointless retcons to the game’s continuity.

Lisentia.1738:

Hello GW2 Lore forums! I’ve been playing GW2 for over a year and a half now, and I can honestly say I’ve enjoyed every minute of it! This will be my first forum post on the official forums, though I have been an avid lore nerd on GW2RP.

I’m bringing a peeve of mine to the community to discuss. My peeve has to do with the current start and end times of the Sylvari cycles. I will detail my thoughts and reasons below. My goal is to get this in front of the Devs, and hopefully spark positive dialogue and maybe, just maybe, get the lore corrected.

Currently the sylvari cycles are separated like this:

Cycle of Dawn
The Cycle of Dawn refers to those born between midnight and 6 a.m.

Cycle of Noon
The Cycle of Noon refers to those born between 6 a.m. and noon

Cycle of Dusk
The Cycle of Dusk refers to those born between noon and 6 p.m.

Cycle of Night
The Cycle of Night refers to those born between 6 p.m. and midnight

Source

However, my peeve starts with the information listed for the Cycle of Dawn. Yes, technically by the 24 hour clock a new ‘day’ starts at 0001 hours (12:01 am). Intuitively however, midnight to 6am is still the middle of the night. In my mind, there are only three Tyrian races where midnight would be the start of a new day; humans, asura and Charr. My reasons for believing this is because of the more technical natures of their societies, and the prevalence of the use of clocks and other time pieces. Sylvari and norn rely more on the sun placement in the sky than what “time” it is.

The following conversation occurs on the top floor of the Grove, near where the entrance to the Oomphalos chamber is found:
Warden: Shhhh. Listen. Feel.
Warden (2): What?
Warden: Ah, there it is. The moment when night gives up its dominion, and day opens its eyes upon the world.

Anecdotally, I believe I have heard this conversation during the times ingame where it is changing from night to day. I say this because the times I have spent idling on the top floor this particular conversation doesn’t seem to repeat as much or as often as the rest of the conversations. If night is becoming day ingame, and the glow effects of Sylvari are turned off and the game is brightening to daytime, wouldn’t that suggest that the sun rising is when Dawn should start?

So my proposal to the community would be to align the Cycles to reflect what makes more sense to how the Sylvari would view a day:

Cycle of Dawn: 6am to Noon
Cycle of Noon: Noon to 6pm
Cycle of Dusk: 6pm to midnight
Cycle of Night: Midnight to 6am

Or to get REALLY crazy:

Cycle of Dawn: 3am to 9am
Cycle of Noon: 9am to 3pm
Cycle of Dusk: 3pm to 9pm
Cycle of Night: 9pm to 3am

What do you guys think? I look forward to hearing everyone’s comments and discussing it with all of you.

I do have to agree more with your 2nd aka crazy times reasoning as those i was thinking myself.simply said,i made a sylvari few mins after midnight unaware of the times cycles have at all so i suggested a night cycle will be safe at least one hour before till one hour after midnight.

kta.6502:

How about this:

Dawn: 4am to 10 am
Noon: 10 am to 4 pm
Dusk: 4 pm to 10 pm
Night: 10 pm to 4 am

I personally think of dawn starting at 4 am. Dusk starting at 4pm also makes sense because that when the sun starts moving towards the horizon.

With the current system, Dawn starting at midnight is very unrealistic. Dusk starting at noon time doesn’t make sense either.

I really enjoy the idea of fixing the cycles to adhere to how a Sylvari would see them.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Technically, I said the same thing there as I said here. And it’s the same topic, so why should my opinion change?

Well, you could add something that you forgot to say back on 2RP. Just a suggestion.

Back on guildwars2roleplayers.com (aka 2RP), I did suggest to the OP to post the idea here, so the devs can see it and consider adding it to the game’s lore. Devs, what do you think of the OP’s idea?

wow your times idea is even better then the “9 to 3,3 to 9” idea i was thinking of and which i saw also reffered here as well.

If Sylvari base their “cycle order” in the modern humans, then the current division is ok.
If they base their “cycle order” in the actual events that mark the day/night cycle in a normal planet, then indicating specific hours doesn’t make sense: dawn and dusk times move slow but constantly though the year, in such a way that they only hit the same (aprox) hour twice a year. The period between dusk and noon increases heading summer and decreases toward winter… ETC.

The point is: any fixed, static hour system wouldn’t be natural. If it is not natural, it really doesn’t matter if it coincides with nature, it’s just a convention. If you want natural rules, you can’t use fixed, equal, hour periods. You need to adjust to the way the sun actually interacts with the planet shape, with changing cycles of uneven light periods.

Lisentia.1738:

The following conversation occurs on the top floor of the Grove, near where the entrance to the Oomphalos chamber is found:
Warden: Shhhh. Listen. Feel.
Warden (2): What?
Warden: Ah, there it is. The moment when night gives up its dominion, and day opens its eyes upon the world.

Anecdotally, I believe I have heard this conversation during the times ingame where it is changing from night to day. I say this because the times I have spent idling on the top floor this particular conversation doesn’t seem to repeat as much or as often as the rest of the conversations. If night is becoming day ingame, and the glow effects of Sylvari are turned off and the game is brightening to daytime, wouldn’t that suggest that the sun rising is when Dawn should start?

Empirically, I can tell you that the time of day has no bearing on this conversation, having witnessed it in midday and close to dusk time.

On the main topic, while I agree that there are probably slightly better ways to divide the day, any such division is ultimately going to be arbitrary. Currently, the cycles are arranged much like seasons are, starting at solstices and equinoxes which serve as convenient clear break points that are easy to measure, even though it causes winter, for example, to start at the shortest and darkest and very nearly coldest part of the year.

Likewise, breaking up cycles so the Cycle of Noon lasts right from when the sun rises to when it’s directly overhead isn’t the most efficient way to encompass the maximum amount of noon-ness in the time period, but it does make it much easier to say “You, you’re a Dawn bloom, but the sun just came up so you ten minutes later are a Noon, here are your respective mentors”. It’s a more practical way to delineate the groups for organization in a world where clocks are not sitting in everyone’s pocket 24/7. A 9am division makes more sense to us, but your average Sylvari has no way of knowing when 9am is. Unless there’s a clock or a sundial sitting right there (the former being expensive and rare and the latter being not so useful in the shade of a giant tree) it’s going to be super hard to estimate when the threshold has passed.

Given that there’s no reason to think there’s a hard, fast cutoff where the Dream flips a switch and personalities radically change, the ease of use of the 6/12 cycle seems like a more practical, if less ideologically perfect, way to break up an otherwise smooth transition into four unambiguous chunks.

(Apologies for the necro but this thread appeared to be the source of some hilarious Sylvari RP fandom drama and I had to say my piece)

For some reason, I really felt like the cycles were more related to the seasons, rather than a one day cycle. Dawn = Spring, Day = Summer, Dusk = Fall, Night = Winter.

Just a thought on a different perspective.

You probably thought that because, originally, the cycles were named after the seasons rather than the time of day, but the cycle you fell into (by lore) was still determined by time of day (as all Firstborn were born in the same few days).

This was changed mid-development, as part of the sylvari redesign.