Guild Wars 2

I’ve been searching google and I cannot seem to find anything related to Thief lore.
I’ve recently deleted all my other characters, and iam now focusing on starting with a clean slate as a Thief soon-to-be Daredevil. I’am a Role Player so I take huge consideration with the character I play regarding their profession lore.

I was jus wondering if anyone can provide a link or whatever, detailing lore on Gw2 thieves. All I know so far is that Thieves use a form of denial magic similar to Mesmers, through shadow magic. But that’s all I know. Id like to know how thieves came about. I know they are descendants of assassins from GW1, but wiki states there are no lore parallels.

So I’m lost. Can anyone provide some juicy Thief lore information? Thanks!

Um, thieves can cover a wide range of “types” of characters. They aren’t perhaps criminals or actual thieves, it’s just the name of the class.

Also, why did you delete all your characters? birthday gifts!

Kalavier.1097:

Um, thieves can cover a wide range of “types” of characters. They aren’t perhaps criminals or actual thieves, it’s just the name of the class.

Also, why did you delete all your characters? birthday gifts!

Yea I meant the Thief profession in general. How did they come about in Tyria… Why do they exist?

(I’ve been playing gw2 since 2012… Never got a bday gift! I have this habit that I need to kick, of deleting characters. )

TBH, I see it as being a less organized/structured form of the Assassin.

There isn’t much lore given, but I think it’s something that varies greatly, and might not be called a thief in normal talking.

I don’t think there’s much lore on any of the professions.

There may be odd facts here and there, but usually tied into other things, like the engineer becoming more prominent than in GW1 (where engineers did exist, but only as NPCs responsible for things like catapults) as a result of the influence of the charr, and especially the iron legion.

But there’s no definitive origin stories for any of them. Even in GW1 there were only really a few details on the Factions and Nightfall specific professions – mainly to explain why they weren’t found on other continents.

So for example Rangers are simply a profession which focus on surviving in and making use of the natural world, both through nature magic and practical aspects like taming wild animals. Warriors are a martial profession who focus on learning to use a wide range of weapons and supporting their allies on the battlefield.

And Thieves are people who focus on speed, stealth and the unpredictability of using a wide range of tools (weapons, traps, poisons, shadow magic and whatever they can pick up during a fight) to give them an advantage over more conventional fighters.

The rest is filled in by your other choices during character creation and your own imagination.

For example my charr thief is absolutely not a thief in the conventional sense – he’s a loyal soldier who makes his living serving the Legions and then the Pact and wouldn’t dream of stealing from his fellow soldiers (or anyone else he considers an ally). But he’s Ash Legion, so he prefers stealth and subterfuge over direct combat, he prides himself on getting in and getting his target down before anyone knows he’s there. (Getting back out can be a bit messier, but he is still a charr, even Ash Legion love a good fight sometimes.)

A human thief I had for a while was almost the complete opposite. He is absolutely a thief in the convention sense (honestly he belonged in an Elder Scrolls game where he could steal anything that wasn’t nailed down, or pen and paper DnD where he could take the nails too) and only ended up helping Logan because he does have some sense of loyalty to his friends and it seemed like fun at the time. (He was a temporary character who never got past the level 40 storyline however.)

thief is a oddity IMO it mechanicly borrows so much from assassin it would make adding assassin redundant.
but its supposed to not be the same as assassin in lore

although it would make more sense to not know to me
it would be like knowing who or where the 1st RL warrior came from xD

There were a few tidbits while the professions were being announced in Guild Wars 2’s development. Most of the returning professions simply inherited whatever lore they had beforehand, obviously, although there was something about Rangers becoming more focused on nature and magic as technology developed, and mesmers switching to more overt semi-physical illusions.

Completely new professions like the engineers and guardians did have origin stories. Engineers were basically an evolution from siege engineers to the combat engineers we have as a profession now. For guardians, they actually gave a fairly detailed explanation of Paragons coming to Tyria as Sunspear refugees pairing up with Monks that were fed up with being everyone’s primary targets on the battlefield and wanting more armour and martial capabilities in general… unfortunately, that was in an interview on a general reviews site, and it got taken down years ago before anyone thought to save a copy.

Thieves are in a kind of middle ground, in that there are clear links with the assassin and, to a lesser extent, mesmer, but they’re still technically a new profession. It’s possibly most accurate to regard the GW1 assassins as a subset – possibly an elite specialisation? – of the thief profession.

There’s a Wartower interview that goes into some of the lore of the professions, including a bit of discussion on the thief – it’s on this page, although you’ll need to scroll down a bit.

draxynnic.3719:

Completely new professions like the engineers and guardians did have origin stories. Engineers were basically an evolution from siege engineers to the combat engineers we have as a profession now. For guardians, they actually gave a fairly detailed explanation of Paragons coming to Tyria as Sunspear refugees pairing up with Monks that were fed up with being everyone’s primary targets on the battlefield and wanting more armour and martial capabilities in general… unfortunately, that was in an interview on a general reviews site, and it got taken down years ago before anyone thought to save a copy.

Sea of Sorrows, from what I’ve heard/read, describes guardians as a mix of Monk, Ritualist, and Paragon training and magics.

Thieves are in a kind of middle ground, in that there are clear links with the assassin and, to a lesser extent, mesmer, but they’re still technically a new profession. It’s possibly most accurate to regard the GW1 assassins as a subset – possibly an elite specialisation? – of the thief profession.

There’s a Wartower interview that goes into some of the lore of the professions, including a bit of discussion on the thief – it’s on this page, although you’ll need to scroll down a bit.

I can see thieves simply being a less focused, less organized version of the Assassin’s. Factions had most Assassin named characters belonging to some sort of order/group.

The line is “It’s a pile of Elonian protection magic, mixed with a little monk training, wrapped up in some crazy ritualist hoo-ha from Cantha. A real grab bag of ‘you can’t hurt me’. They’re called guardians, and simply put, they mean trouble.”

(It also, incidentally, describes an Orb of Wrath as an ‘orb of lightning’, but that might simply be descriptive.)

At the time of SoS’s publication, we already knew that monk and paragon were part of the mix, but the “Elonian protective magic” description is imprecise enough to raise the possibility that dervish might be in there as well. (I’m inclined to think, however, that in GW2 terms, the dervish was a combination of melee-focused elementalist with human racial abilities.) Inclusion of ritualist stuff resolved an argument that had been in the lore forum previously about whether guardians made use of some ritualist teachings.

That’s pretty much all it says, though: Sea of Sorrows doesn’t say anything about how it happened, though.

The lost interview gave the origin story, talking about Paragon refugees from Joko’s conquest of Elona and Monks wanting more martial capabilities so they could better defend themselves in combat fusing into a single tradition. Less of the what (it didn’t talk about ritualists – that might have come later) but it was a fairly satisfying description of the how and why the guardian came about.

I remember back when they first announced Thief. I no longer remember the exact words, but the gist of them stays with me as this was what helped shape the RP of my main character, Donari.

In essence, a GW2 Thief is not merely an assassin, or a WoW rogue. S/he is a physically agile master of deception. This can cover con men, swashbucklers, burglars, pickpockets, secret agents, etc. And it can cover backstabbing assassins and shadow-stealthing sorts as well, of course. As to the shadowstep and stealth powers, well. ICly my Thief doesn’t have those. He’s just superb at acting, disguise, blending in, sleight of hand, and not being noticed … when he’s not claiming center stage as the egocentric limelight seeker he is at heart.

To me, the game mechanics are there to be mechanics, rather than a laundry list of “this is what every thief can canonically do and everyone will know the list and expect it.” Having the mechanics does give a springboard to RP, I’ve certainly used profession skills and utilities to describe things my characters can do, but I prefer to use it as guiding inspiration so that what I do fits the setting. Also I limit it to a subset. As I say Donari doesn’t ICly magically shadowstep, or use poisons. My human necromancer is aces at blood magic and death-energy-channeling but she doesn’t do minions, whereas my asura necromancer is all about shaping flesh into useful servants, preferably with cyborg attachments to extend their shelf life …

So in the lack of in-game lore about Thieves, design your character to fit within the general parameters of the archetype and them make him or her your own

Adding this:
http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/03/arenanet-unveils-new-profession-and-norn-starting-area-for-guild/

Including this line:
“Ree Soesbee made the experience even better by giving some insight into what the Thief is and is not (don’t worry, this is definitely not a reskinned Assassin) and chatting about the origins of the class.”

I’m starving for dinner or I’d watch the videos in the article but apparently they include Soesbee’s comments.

Deleena.3406:

thief is a oddity IMO it mechanicly borrows so much from assassin it would make adding assassin redundant.
but its supposed to not be the same as assassin in lore

although it would make more sense to not know to me
it would be like knowing who or where the 1st RL warrior came from xD

I believe it was stated that, like how guardians are in lore derived from monks, paragons, and ritualists, thieves are in lore derived from assassins. Thieves are basically a post-GW1 ‘Tyrian alteration of the assassin profession’.

Edit: Though I suppose Donari’s video would prove or disprove this. Don’t think I ever saw that one.

I really wish this game had more lore surrounding professions. Its a shame really.

I tried watching the video. It gave me a segment on pistol use and then started another Thief clip. There seemed to be panels at the bottom to see what the topics were but none mentioned Soesbee and I couldn’t click them to hop around anyway.

I’ll need a lot more time and patience to try to find her section.

It looks to me like it’s the second, longer video, but I don’t have time to be sure.

i remember a past interview saying thief was a new profession that was only mechanically related to cantha assassin
that stuff is so hard to find now :s /i dont even remember what site it was on
(honestly i wonder if that’s even still true now)

(if we look at Eotn charr+vanguard. tyria already had a shadow/sneaking like profession of its own) (clearly the Charr Shadowblade/Avengers wernt related to canthan versions for example)

From what I recall, thieves have always existed in Tyria (as you might expect), but as you might expect the official academies that our GW1 PCs came from weren’t teaching those skills. A lot of the more supernatural stuff like shadowstepping wasn’t in the thief lineup at the time, though – instead, some of the skills of assassins filtered into Kryta’s criminal world between the two games. So thieves and assassins do have skills and abilities in common – however, the thief isn’t the modern incarnation of the assassin. At the closest, it’s like the guardian in that it’s a combination that happens to include assassin.

Some of this is discussed in the ‘Lore of the Classes’ interview on the link I posted above (unfortunately, I don’t think the site caters for direct linking).

Ash Legion almost certainly had assassins or something close to modern thieves all along, however. Ebon Vanguard use of assassins suggests that either Ascalon did too, or they picked up the skills from Cantha pretty soon after Factions (possibly Mhenlo calling in some favours).

Warrior doesn’t need lore explanation, they are just soldiers.

Guardians are trained thanks to Elonian and Canthan magic brought back from refugees and immigrants. They are Paragons with shouts and leadership, Ritualists with spirit weapons, and Monks with all the healing and light magic.

Revenant is the most recent one and it is a mix of Assassin and Ritualist (shadowstep + evades + channeling spirits) plus something new, Mist magic, that we are yet to be given an explanation since Rytlock only came back now. Probably they will try to adjust this in the future.

Rangers have always had that way too, but they have some background in the west Tyria with Druid and forest ambience. But again, apart for their spirit magical side, it’s normal.

Thief is basically a an elaboration of the Assassin. I can think of it as something that came in Tyria from Cantha, and the Daredevil spec strongly encourages this. They are people who learned a few more tricks from the oriental island just to know how to shadow step.

Engineer is obviously the new star. Basically he has appeared because of the technology advancement and industrial development the Charr have brought on, and with the Scrapper he has learned more asuran-like tech with the gyros.

Elementalist, Necromancers and Mesmers are really pretty much the same. The difference in some of their skills (eles conjured weapons, mesmer illusions and such) can be considered just an advancement on previous known knowledge.

Anton and Vael makes me think Ascalon had a Assassin/thief/Shadowy like professions all along (prolly as common as necros xD “the average ascalonian prolly never saw them”)
as already mentioned the Ascalon army did have Engineers npc after all.

Also (this is never derectly said ingame “i think”) But i always got the impression cantha assassin guilds didnt want their secrets getting outside their groups

I don’t think Vael is Ascalonian. He’s there carrying out a mission that was never revealed on behalf of an employer who was never revealed, but he’s traveled across Tyria, Cantha and Elona and shows no indication of being loyal to Ascalon particularly.

Anton is definitely Ascalonian, but given his treachery, I doubt he was part of an Ascalonian special forces unit before the Searing. The Ebon Vanguard definitely has assassins afterwards, so I suspect that he was trained as an assassin (possibly from a thief base) after joining the Vanguard.

Regarding the Canthan assassin guilds: They probably don’t like their secrets getting out, but the Shing Jea Monastery already knew enough to teach Assassins outside the guilds. And after Factions, it’s likely that Mhenlo had the pull to say “these skills would be really useful back home.” Tyrian PCs also got the chance to learn Assassin skills, and they might also have passed them on.

Are the thieves meant to be taking techniques from anything specific? Ash legion would be training theirs in a specific way but I was under the impression that for the most it’s more a role/type rather than anything tied to an organisation or a solid lore root.

Deleena.3406:

Anton and Vael makes me think Ascalon had a Assassin/thief/Shadowy like professions all along (prolly as common as necros xD “the average ascalonian prolly never saw them”)
as already mentioned the Ascalon army did have Engineers npc after all.

Also (this is never derectly said ingame “i think”) But i always got the impression cantha assassin guilds didnt want their secrets getting outside their groups

Untrue on both parts?

Necromancers were common, and Assassin’s were explicitly a Canthan based group. The fact they may have had training in it doesn’t mean Ascalon had it’s own assassins.

Yes, some of the teachings may have spread, but it most definitely wasn’t widely common. There were, IIRC, very few actual Ebon Vanguard assassins. I don’t know how much of the faction skills we should take as lore as opposed to gameplay.

Necros didnt seem common/wanted at all in fact alot of the trainers was kinda to themselves/away from the pubic
and Necromancers (PCs dont count!) was almost never among the random ascalon army NPCs

also i didnt say they was Cantha Assassin but just Tyria’s equivalents ( Unless Gron Fierceclaw took a trip to cantha xD) honestly i dont see how its imposible for any of the Sentient races to get daggers be sneaky with magic/steath o.O it would be like Rangers coming from only one area/race
/also i think it mostly mechanical for non-sentient creature. (im sure thos Grubs in NF wasnt really Monks/Paragons xD)

The random Ascalon Army NPCs were pretty much all warriors or rangers (elementalists only showed up when it was important to the story). We know Ascalon had more than that.

ArenaNet tends to be lazy when it comes to factions you rarely or never fight, only providing friendly factions with a couple of mob types that are intended to be broadly representative, but not showing everything the faction actually has. This is why, for instance, the Seraph appear to be all warriors in-game, while from Sea of Sorrows we know that according to the lore they have plenty of magical support. It’s also why in Guild Wars 1 unnamed Ascalonian allies were all warriors or rangers, while Foefire ghosts have the full range of professions.

For an enemy faction, on the other hand, it actually becomes important that the full range is implemented so the players have to respond to it. For the enemies, it’s actually mechanically important to show the full range, while for allies, generally all the player really cares about is that there are extra friendly bodies that can take or dish out damage. You can pretty much predict if a group that you’re initially allied with will stab you in the back at some point by how much variety they have in mob types.

Because of this, I tend to think that the makeup of (ex-)human factions that you can fight on a regular basis – GW1 White Mantle, Luxons, Kurzicks, Kournans, Ministry of Purity, Foefire ghosts – are more representative of what a typical human army looks like than the GW1 Ascalonian army, Lionguard, Imperial Guard, Sunspears, Vabbians, and Seraph. And the result of such observations is that while for a typical human army melee warriors and archers dominate, there is significant caster support as well.

Regarding necros specifically – there’s a lot of lore indicating that a lot of humans fear and distrust them, however every army that’s fully fleshed out has them. I tend to think of this as being similar to the charr attitude towards magic in general – it isn’t particularly liked by the general population, but military leaders are pragmatic enough to recognise that they’re better off with it than without it.

Deleena.3406:

Necros didnt seem common/wanted at all in fact alot of the trainers was kinda to themselves/away from the pubic
and Necromancers (PCs dont count!) was almost never among the random ascalon army NPCs

also i think it mostly mechanical for non-sentient creature. (im sure thos Grubs in NF wasnt really Monks/Paragons xD)

A: Necromancers are publically accepted parts of society, military and otherwise. Note that two of the trainers in pre-searing were also generally creepy people and both went crazy post searing and you got sent after them at some point in prophecies to kill them. The female trainer however, was close to the Abby IIRC, and stayed completely sane and normal.

B: I mean more of the fact some of the faction PVE skills are rather… weird. Like “Hey, I summon an ebon vanguard assassin out of nowhere! WHEEEEEE”. That’s obviously gameplay mechanic.

draxynnic.3719:

The random Ascalon Army NPCs were pretty much all warriors or rangers (elementalists only showed up when it was important to the story). We know Ascalon had more than that.

Lionguard were all warriors in GW1, if I remember right.

ArenaNet tends to be lazy when it comes to factions you rarely or never fight, only providing friendly factions with a couple of mob types that are intended to be broadly representative, but not showing everything the faction actually has. This is why, for instance, the Seraph appear to be all warriors in-game, while from Sea of Sorrows we know that according to the lore they have plenty of magical support. It’s also why in Guild Wars 1 unnamed Ascalonian allies were all warriors or rangers, while Foefire ghosts have the full range of professions.

It’s not Anet, it’s in general MMO. For example, typically allied npcs are weaker, or less diverse across the board. STO I remember was rather different in the fact with the KDF and fed side, the “allied” npcs of either side were actually enemies, so they tended to be more useful.

For an enemy faction, on the other hand, it actually becomes important that the full range is implemented so the players have to respond to it. For the enemies, it’s actually mechanically important to show the full range, while for allies, generally all the player really cares about is that there are extra friendly bodies that can take or dish out damage. You can pretty much predict if a group that you’re initially allied with will stab you in the back at some point by how much variety they have in mob types.

IIRC, linking to above statement of mine, the Kurzicks and Luxons had the most fleshed out forces, due to being both friendly and hostile..

Regarding necros specifically – there’s a lot of lore indicating that a lot of humans fear and distrust them, however every army that’s fully fleshed out has them. I tend to think of this as being similar to the charr attitude towards magic in general – it isn’t particularly liked by the general population, but military leaders are pragmatic enough to recognise that they’re better off with it than without it.

Distrust on some level perhaps, but at least by GW2 it’s quite obviously not something as kittenome people love to show it as. In casual, open air conversation people admit or talk about being necromancers. They don’t get shunned or frighten people because of it. In GW1 there was elements of it, but at the same time it wasn’t that bad.

Maybe I look at comments like that too in depth, but I’ve seen enough people foolishly and stupidly paint “necromancers and grenth are EVILLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL!” pictures.

Hell, going back to GW1, sure we can say the necro trainers are hidden away, but the player character isn’t. If we approach it as if the player character could be any profession, then mass distrust or fear of any specific class doesn’t make sense.

Or as I’ve stated elsewhere in other discussions (Was me or somebody else who said it, forget which If it wasn’t me, sorry). Why do necromancers apparently get this big distrust and fear, yet elementalists get nothing? “MY GODS, THAT MAN RAISED A BONE MINION!” makes sense, but “MY GODS, THAT MAN JUST LAUNCHED A FIREBALL THE SIZE OF A PERSON!” doesn’t to some apparently. Really, the Eles I’d imagine would be the most distrusted magic user simply because they are the most directly destructive path of magic.

That’s a derail though, Honestly, to the whole “Thief lore/assassin lore” bits, I’d imagine it in tiers.

Assassin’s are obviously the top tier, very carefully guarding their secrets and thus it’s really only taught in Cantha at all. Also could be an “order” thing. Canthan Assassin orders rarely took in outsiders maybe, so outsiders rarely learned it.

Thieves likely are middle tier or were lower tier. Similar styles and training, but it’s not as structured. In the period between GW1 and GW2, the “thief” style has evolved and become a bit more then it used to be.

Kalavier.1097:

Or as I’ve stated elsewhere in other discussions (Was me or somebody else who said it, forget which If it wasn’t me, sorry). Why do necromancers apparently get this big distrust and fear, yet elementalists get nothing? “MY GODS, THAT MAN RAISED A BONE MINION!” makes sense, but “MY GODS, THAT MAN JUST LAUNCHED A FIREBALL THE SIZE OF A PERSON!” doesn’t to some apparently. Really, the Eles I’d imagine would be the most distrusted magic user simply because they are the most directly destructive path of magic.

It’s less of what one’s capable of, and more of what they deal with. Necromancy ties to death, which is something a lot of living beings are often hesitant to work with and around, so it becomes natural to try to shun those who do.

Then there’s the whole ‘desecrating corpses’ that necromancers do (moreso in GW1, when the distrust of necromancy was more prevalent).

Add in Zhaitan’s horde of undead, or even Khilbron/Joko’s undead armies, and you get in both games a very modern case of ‘undeath and those working with it – e.g., necromancers – are those we’re fighting’. Kind of like how so many Americans are seeing all Muslims as potential enemies, when it’s only a few.

If we had more villains that were burning all things with fire coming out of their fingertips, I’m sure elementalists would be harder to trust.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

If we had more villains that were burning all things with fire coming out of their fingertips, I’m sure elementalists would be harder to trust.

The charr are arguably even an example of this- none of the allied legions have generic NPCs using elemental magic, but there are plenty of Ash Legion that are necromancers.

Kalavier.1097:

That’s a derail though, Honestly, to the whole “Thief lore/assassin lore” bits, I’d imagine it in tiers.

Assassin’s are obviously the top tier, very carefully guarding their secrets and thus it’s really only taught in Cantha at all. Also could be an “order” thing. Canthan Assassin orders rarely took in outsiders maybe, so outsiders rarely learned it.

Thieves likely are middle tier or were lower tier. Similar styles and training, but it’s not as structured. In the period between GW1 and GW2, the “thief” style has evolved and become a bit more then it used to be.

Hmm. I prefer not to think of thieves as specifically trained in that fashion. I don’t think every “Thief” has gone to a Thief School and received exactly the same set of skills, or been inducted into the Mysteries. They’re scoundrels, conmen, daring acrobats, sneakthieves, pickpockets, swashbuckling privateers, thugs, ladykillers, shady dealers, fences, etc. Mine, for instance (getting into RP backstory here) was adopted into a noble family, found out he was adopted when he was 8, and decided since he wasn’t really of noble blood he could be just about anything he wanted. He snuck off regularly to run in the streets, picked up skills and a mentor, then made friends with a gypsy sort and learned acting and theater, all as a double life with his noble side. A partier, a ladies man, a diligent practicer of all things sleight of hand and maker of many an intricate con scheme, he grew to be the life of the party, a carouser, a master of disguise and acrobatics, and his ego knew no bounds until LA’s destruction convinced him that Lyssa wasn’t playing nice with him any more.

He doesn’t ICly shadowstep, as I said in a previous post. He’s all trained skill (sort of Batman like, without the angst), not magic, and he certainly has limits including a great susceptibility to mind-magic and being only human, he can’t really take down huge monsters on his own or fight ghosts terribly effectively. Nor can he read Charr expressions the way he can his own race, so his charm doesn’t resonate off them nearly as well.

So he’s not a mystic practicioner of the shadow arts, he’s just a handsome man full of derring do and an addiction to danger.

(PS, in a story arc that took a year to hit that point, he learned that his gypsy friend was his half brother, his adoptive father was his actual blood father, and he had to settle in and be the family heir after all. He was Not Happy).

Kalavier.1097:

ArenaNet tends to be lazy when it comes to factions you rarely or never fight, only providing friendly factions with a couple of mob types that are intended to be broadly representative, but not showing everything the faction actually has. This is why, for instance, the Seraph appear to be all warriors in-game, while from Sea of Sorrows we know that according to the lore they have plenty of magical support. It’s also why in Guild Wars 1 unnamed Ascalonian allies were all warriors or rangers, while Foefire ghosts have the full range of professions.

It’s not Anet, it’s in general MMO. For example, typically allied npcs are weaker, or less diverse across the board. STO I remember was rather different in the fact with the KDF and fed side, the “allied” npcs of either side were actually enemies, so they tended to be more useful.

To take it a step further RPGs and other games where you can customise your character are more likely to have enemies with varied appearances – different skin colours, hair styles, mix of male and female etc. but usually only for playable races.

If you’ve made all those options for players to use it’s a lot easier to justify using them for the enemies too (it may even be less effort to do it that way, especially if they’re procedurally generated).

Whereas if the player character has a fixed appearance it’s a lot harder to justify making all those variations just for enemies that most people will kill without ever really looking at them so you’re more likely to get all the enemies of one type looking the same, or within a small number of variations. (E.g. all mages are blonde females, all warriors are mid-brown men with short hair etc.)

Donari.5237:

Hmm. I prefer not to think of thieves as specifically trained in that fashion. I don’t think every “Thief” has gone to a Thief School and received exactly the same set of skills, or been inducted into the Mysteries.

I suspect the same is true of all professions. Even when there are schools or orders that teach a profession not all of them will teach the same things and not everyone will learn there. That’s certainly how it works in real life, even within relatively similar situations – what I was taught on my behavioural biology course isn’t the same as my colleague learned on her animal behaviour course even thought we both learned in UK universities within a year of each other.

Factor in different races with their own traditions and ideas and you’ve got even more of a range. An asuran thief who is part of the college of Synergetics will probably learn different things from one who is part of the college of Statics and both will be very different to what a human street rat will learn since they’re unlikely to attend a formal school or worry much about the deeper meaning or origins of their skills.

I never meant to imply that all thieves go to some school to be trained in the methods.

What I meant was compared to the Canthan Assassin’s, the thieves in GW2 are unstructured and more diverse. Aka, we see no thieves guilds or groups and in general they do what they want.

The GW1 assassin’s typically belonged to an order or got training in Shing Jea/an academy. Thieves simply don’t have that.

Right, let me clarify my commentary a bit in regard to that. I don’t think of thieves as a profession that forms guilds. I sort of grit my teeth at it in D&D and Elder Scrolls. I mean there can be associations, syndicates, guilds that band together to do illegal things, mafia and gang style or Victorian child pickpocket group style. Yet I can’t quite see them going “you’re a thief so you’re gonna follow the thief rules and pay the thief tithes and use the thief skills.” It’s more they have the upperstory burglars, the confidence men, the muscle, the blackmailers, the money launderers, etc.

I don’t think Thieves grew out of GW1 Assassins any more than the Sharks and the Jets grew out of the Hashishim It’s just a convenient game mechanics label.

Well, we are basically in agreement then. I do believe there is some ties of sorts, the playstyles are very similar between the two and there are some shared skills/skill names.

But there are differences as well.

I just cringe at the name really. I’m sure there are some tutors/mentors for it, or even small schools (especially for Ash legion Charr!), but the rest of the professions are pretty decently named, then you have “thieves”. Caithe is a thief by profession, but she doesn’t actually steal stuff like actual thieves. I would almost prefer it if they called the class “Rogue” or something. Much more diverse set of skills or roles that can be applied to it, and a more common name that won’t instantly get everybody riled about law-breaking!

I’d say they’re called thieves for the F1 Steal mechanic. Which is more along the lines of stealing something from your opponent in-combat to use it against them compared to stealing a bread from a bakery for example.

We know thieves are dirty-fighters who use everything they can to win. Stealing is just a handy ability to gain an advantage. It currently doesn’t involve or hint to breaking the law for me.

Then likely the replies will come along the lines of:
“They have the steal mechanic because they’re thieves.”
or
“They could give that mechanic any name fitting of another profession-name.”

But yea, just wanted to voice my opinion.

In other regards.
The following has been taken from “An Empire Divided”:

“The Assassin: A Noble Killer

The Assassin profession was a natural outgrowth of a culture divided between nobility and the common folk for as long as any in Cantha can remember. Assassins originally filled a simple need for Canthan nobles—the ability to quickly eliminate a single rival or enemy, with a minimum of fuss or bother on the part of said nobles. Assassins were and are hired or (more often) kept on retainer for this very purpose even today.

As the ranks of the nobility grew, more Assassins were required to keep up with demand, and soon they began to organize into their own unions and guilds to ensure fair payment for the Assassin and to establish rules and regulations that govern the profession’s work. Eventually these organizations became self-perpetuating, and now few Assassins work for only one client. Those who have—including, according to the histories, the Betrayer called Shiro Tagachi—are usually employed as bodyguards to the most powerful Canthans."

Not criticizing anyone by copy-pasting this, just providing the wall of text to anyone who may want to give it a quick read to clear up the origins of the Assassin.

They mentioned the reasoning behind the name in one of the TowerTalk interviews- it’s been a while, but the way I remember it, they struggled to find one that’d apply equally well across all five races and settled on thief. They made a point of adding that the practitioners don’t all call themselves that, but the profession as a whole ended up getting named by its detractors.

EDIT: Found it. Link here, but this is the relevant part.

Jeff Grubb: When we originally created the thief profession, we had a big debate in-house about what the best name for it was. Because thief carries a lot of negative baggage, and yes there are the thieves who are going to be the bandits and who are going to be the brigands, but there are also the thieves who are going to be the agents (Ree: Robin Hood!), the spies, the Robin Hoods, basically, you know, the heroic type characters. So the thief has now turned more or less into, you know, a profession, there are good warriors, there are bad warriors, there are good thieves, there are bad thieves.

al’Ellisande: So you think it’s normal to come up as a character and say, well, you know, I’m a thief.

Ree Soesbee: Depends on what race. (Jeff:And depends on the situation.) An asura might be proud to be a thief. ‘I take things from you. You can’t stop me.’ (Jeff: We prefer ‘acquisition agent’, thank you. We’ve got a department over on the other side of HR.) By the same token, a charr would be proud to say he’s a spy. I mean, that was one of those- and the argument we had was very much each race would kind of have their own name for it, and the only name that we really thought was applicable across the board was thief, and, sure, that kind of means the class was named by people not of the class, like, a charr will say ’I’m a spy’ and the Blood Legion charr will go ‘Pff. You’re a thief!‘, and so that’s sort of what stuck.

Jeff: And from a profession standpoint, from a gamplay standpoint, we want a unified name across the board. So, basically, you will have a thief trainer, who would basically, you know, downplay the negative nature of that.

Aaron Ansari, thank you! I think that is what I was remembering from way back when. Though I still have the sense that the same sentiment was elaborated on more than that, that swashbucklers were mentioned by that term, not just as “Robin Hoods.”

Anyway, that’s the best quote thus far found for Thief Lore in this thread. Kudos.

Kalavier.1097:

Or as I’ve stated elsewhere in other discussions (Was me or somebody else who said it, forget which If it wasn’t me, sorry). Why do necromancers apparently get this big distrust and fear, yet elementalists get nothing? “MY GODS, THAT MAN RAISED A BONE MINION!” makes sense, but “MY GODS, THAT MAN JUST LAUNCHED A FIREBALL THE SIZE OF A PERSON!” doesn’t to some apparently. Really, the Eles I’d imagine would be the most distrusted magic user simply because they are the most directly destructive path of magic.

Any rational person can make the deduction that Necromancers and Elementalists are equally destructive. The reason why necros are distrusted more than eles is not because of this direct correlation. Just a few examples follow:

A. Necromancy is pretty disgusting. The average person wouldn’t wanna go anywhere near rotting corpses ridden with carrion feeding insects and the like, rotten and foul smelling flesh, or deal with the diseases that may follow. Just reflect your own feelings on modern day morticians. I mean, while it’s respectable work and somebody needs to do it, you wouldn’t want to do it yourself.

B. Why is a bone minion worse than a fireball in your face? Well, the result is pretty much the same, so it’s not that. You either survive or you don’t. Doesn’t make a difference.

Ok so, while the fireball materializes seemingly out of thin air, the bone minion you are now facing may have previously been your comrade and friend. Now this runt of a necromancer has gone and desecrated the body of your friend. All that’s left is a misshapen and corrupted piece of flesh and bone, where previously was a living and breathing person.

To set this up further, I have to tell you I’ve been in the military. While I never saw any combat, or even deployments, just the training period forms deep bonds of friendship with the people you go through that with. Much deeper than with your average friend, if not your best friend. I can just imagine how deep that friendship goes when you survive combat together.

Taking that into account, that piece of flesh that was previously your comrade, would make you feel like life itself has betrayed you. It’s outraging, unfair and it soils the memory you have of that person. It’s no wonder people wouldn’t like necromancers.

C. What happens after you die? The necromancer raises your corpse as well to add to his ever growing army of minions, desecrating your body and stealing your soul. He leaves to prowl on his next adversary.
What does the ele do? He may rob your corpse, but he may also be nice enough to return your corpse(charred to a crisp as it is…) to your family, and they can make their peace with your death.

D. People in this world believe in an afterlife and it’s very real. Getting your soul ripped out by a necromancer may rob you of that deserved resting place in the Mists/Hall of Heroes/Underworld. It’s exactly why ghosts are almost always angry, and rarely peaceful.
________________________________________

Most people think with their hearts, not with their heads. They are guided by feelings rather than thoughts. So the general opinion would sway towards hating and distrusting necromancers in general. It’s not to say everybody does it, or all necromancers are like that.

Sorry for the rant, but I honestly don’t understand how you can’t see this.

Necromancers generally do not deal with the souls, but with the left over flesh. Only he extremely powerful liches or Zhaitan would bind souls to the reanimated corpse. The only possible grey area is the example of the shade that you can create as a Necromancer. So you can almost think of a Necromancer as you would an elementalist to a sense, only their element is living (or dead) flesh. In some races Necromancers actually are seen as relatively good in the same general sense as morticians and possibly priests.

That’s not true at all, Narcemus. Necromancers in Tyria and Elona deal with souls a lot:

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Rites_of_Remembrance
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Crypt-ology
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Ghosts_in_the_Graveyard

This has remained true in GW2, though is most evident in the Priests of Grenth (whom are usually necromancers – like Priestess Rhie).

To be entirely honest with you, Theives are not all criminals. as far as i can tell they all work in sects of a group called the Thieves Guild (Crappy DnD movie anyone?) Which likely is just a big cover up for a bandit group…. but hey! They killed a dragon! Anyway, they seem to not mind covering one another’s backs but that’s likely because they’re all working at the same gold- I mean uh… goal… So yeah, thieves are a guild of more civil bandits and pirates organized by a sect which is determined by your race. (btw the uniform of such appears to be Sneakthief dyed midnight ice and deep pine in case you’ve ever wondered.)

Konig Des Todes.2086:

That’s not true at all, Narcemus. Necromancers in Tyria and Elona deal with souls a lot:

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Rites_of_Remembrance
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Crypt-ology
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Ghosts_in_the_Graveyard

This has remained true in GW2, though is most evident in the Priests of Grenth (whom are usually necromancers – like Priestess Rhie).

Sorry Konig, I screwed up. What I meant was mostly that in the creation of minions and such Necromancers (at least PC Necromancers) reanimate the flesh without the soul in general. I did not mean that they don’t deal with souls, even though when re reading that is exactly what I said, I merely meant that unlike Zhaitan or Joko who seems to imbue souls into the bodies of it’s undead, Necromancers seem not to do such. Even powerful ones such as Verata seem not to imbue their minions with souls.

But yes, Necromancers do deal with souls.

In making minions, not using souls seems to be more about morals and/or social graces than anything else (like not murdering people for minion making but using the corpses of enemies from battle), seeing how we see Joko (who, unlike Zhaitan, is indeed a necromancer) and Khilbron using souls (either in their undead or not) – and I would not attribute this to them being powerful liches, but something they were willing to do that ‘moral necromancers’ do not. Oberan might have used souls in his minions, too, given that they’re very similar to Joko’s and Khilbron’s. And there’s Fendi Nin as well, who did the same.

Or like how Bria’s and Daithor’s minions are spectral.

But then again, we have shades in GW2, which are Nightmares which are some kind of twisted, hostile spirit. So in a way while we didn’t have souls for minions in GW1, we do in GW2.

In the end, it all falls down to one’s willingness, and not capabilities or even moralities in the act itself.

After all, even when Khilbron uses the souls of the recently killed White Mantle to fight off the remnents of the Stone Summit at the end of Thunderhead Keep – or brought souls of the dead to fight off the White Mantle in Sanctum Cay – there was no moral objection.

Sigh, this is completely off topic and there is a reason I did not reply to it. It’s not relevant to the OP.

Yannir.4132:

Kalavier.1097:

Or as I’ve stated elsewhere in other discussions (Was me or somebody else who said it, forget which If it wasn’t me, sorry). Why do necromancers apparently get this big distrust and fear, yet elementalists get nothing? “MY GODS, THAT MAN RAISED A BONE MINION!” makes sense, but “MY GODS, THAT MAN JUST LAUNCHED A FIREBALL THE SIZE OF A PERSON!” doesn’t to some apparently. Really, the Eles I’d imagine would be the most distrusted magic user simply because they are the most directly destructive path of magic.

Any rational person can make the deduction that Necromancers and Elementalists are equally destructive. The reason why necros are distrusted more than eles is not because of this direct correlation. Just a few examples follow:

A. Necromancy is pretty disgusting. The average person wouldn’t wanna go anywhere near rotting corpses ridden with carrion feeding insects and the like, rotten and foul smelling flesh, or deal with the diseases that may follow. Just reflect your own feelings on modern day morticians. I mean, while it’s respectable work and somebody needs to do it, you wouldn’t want to do it yourself.

Last I checked actually, none of the minions appear to be rotting. :P However, we must understand that we see the minions on the battlefield, not casually.

B. Why is a bone minion worse than a fireball in your face? Well, the result is pretty much the same, so it’s not that. You either survive or you don’t. Doesn’t make a difference.

Ok so, while the fireball materializes seemingly out of thin air, the bone minion you are now facing may have previously been your comrade and friend. Now this runt of a necromancer has gone and desecrated the body of your friend. All that’s left is a misshapen and corrupted piece of flesh and bone, where previously was a living and breathing person.

Only it’s actually pretty uncool by necromancers to casually use friends or comrades for minions. Every minion type is based off an animal. Again, how often do we see necromancers casually forming minions from fellow humans (going from purely a human perspective)? Not often. Bar cases of actually evil ones.

Taking that into account, that piece of flesh that was previously your comrade, would make you feel like life itself has betrayed you. It’s outraging, unfair and it soils the memory you have of that person. It’s no wonder people wouldn’t like necromancers.

Sure, this works for military people dealing with an evil one. However, how does this affect the general population? Not at all is the answer!

C. What happens after you die? The necromancer raises your corpse as well to add to his ever growing army of minions, desecrating your body and stealing your soul. He leaves to prowl on his next adversary.
What does the ele do? He may rob your corpse, but he may also be nice enough to return your corpse(charred to a crisp as it is…) to your family, and they can make their peace with your death.

However, this is also not true. Your average necromancer does not have an army of undead. A lot don’t even use minions. Most don’t steal or bind souls either. Yes, necromancers do stuff with them, but 95% of them don’t bind souls. See GW1, the necromancer order. Hell, in general. Necromancers (humans) patron god is GRENTH. You really think they are going to bind souls when Grenth is the god of the afterlife and justice? No, hell, some good guy necromancers were all about sending the souls TO GRENTH.

D. People in this world believe in an afterlife and it’s very real. Getting your soul ripped out by a necromancer may rob you of that deserved resting place in the Mists/Hall of Heroes/Underworld. It’s exactly why ghosts are almost always angry, and rarely peaceful.

Yes, because human necromancers, devoted to Grenth, are totally going to bind souls 100% of the time instead of sending them to Grenth to judge. I covered this before, but this makes NO SENSE AT ALL. Nor is it even implied to be a thing for the majority of necromancers. Grenth literally spawned necromancy’s origins. The very god in charge of the underworld, aka the human afterlife.
________________________________________

Most people think with their hearts, not with their heads. They are guided by feelings rather than thoughts. So the general opinion would sway towards hating and distrusting necromancers in general. It’s not to say everybody does it, or all necromancers are like that.

Sorry for the rant, but I honestly don’t understand how you can’t see this.

I honestly can’t understand how you believe that stuff is applicable to the general population, who have shown that talking casually, publically about being a necromancer is not a distrusted or hated thing. The one civilain who talks about Grenth being creepy gets told “Maybe you should rethink your profession.” Not hated or scorned. YES, necromancers can be viewed as creepy, and the worst are really bad. But the MAJORITY are not anywhere close to that level. The Majority don’t spawn armies of minions from their dead neighbor and his three dogs and a pony.

Marjory is a necromancer, and she receives ZERO HATRED about it. ZERO distrust. She’s hired as a detective enough to be profitable before she joins the player character.

Yes, there is some distrust. But GW2 necromancers are not even a shred alike socially to the WoW warlocks or other universe necromancers. Olias, IIRC, was all about sending souls to grenth to be judged, not binding them to minions.

I didn’t reply in the first place because this is not the place for necromancer discussion, this topic is about thieves as a professsion.

Kalavier.1097:

Most people think with their hearts, not with their heads. They are guided by feelings rather than thoughts. So the general opinion would sway towards hating and distrusting necromancers in general. It’s not to say everybody does it, or all necromancers are like that.

Sorry for the rant, but I honestly don’t understand how you can’t see this.

I honestly can’t understand how you believe that stuff is applicable to the general population, who have shown that talking casually, publically about being a necromancer is not a distrusted or hated thing. The one civilain who talks about Grenth being creepy gets told “Maybe you should rethink your profession.” Not hated or scorned. YES, necromancers can be viewed as creepy, and the worst are really bad. But the MAJORITY are not anywhere close to that level. The Majority don’t spawn armies of minions from their dead neighbor and his three dogs and a pony.

Marjory is a necromancer, and she receives ZERO HATRED about it. ZERO distrust. She’s hired as a detective enough to be profitable before she joins the player character.

Yes, there is some distrust. But GW2 necromancers are not even a shred alike socially to the WoW warlocks or other universe necromancers. Olias, IIRC, was all about sending souls to grenth to be judged, not binding them to minions.

I didn’t reply in the first place because this is not the place for necromancer discussion, this topic is about thieves as a professsion.

The game shows this poorly – along with all versions of disgust and distrust among the ‘good guys’. There’s a bit of sylvari distrust added lately, but beyond pretty much everyone sans some oddball dialogues.

I’d suggest reading Ghosts of Ascalon, which shows Killeen, a sylvari necromancer, who is shown with a bit of disgust by her friends for being a necromancer – especially when she makes minions.

Marjory hasn’t really used any minions around her allies, which is the biggest ‘problem’ most people have shown to have. As memory serves, she only made such during the Fort Salma instance, where only the player and Kasmeer was around.

It’s been years since I read Ghosts of Ascalon but as I recall the act that triggered the disgust was when Killeen animated a recent corpse of one of their companions to walk across a trapped area to set off the traps.

I do know that the devs said more than once that Tyrian necromancy is not inherently evil and doesn’t make people stop being friends with you. They wanted to ring changes on the theme (remember, the professions were designed when they were doing their best to be a different kind of MMO).

So that’s why their thieves are called “thieves” for gameplay reasons but not because they are all dishonest property nappers or back stabbing assassins. The name gives Terran readers certain connotations, just as does “necromancer,” but ANet has at least tried to change the paradigms on them.

Donari.5237:

It’s been years since I read Ghosts of Ascalon but as I recall the act that triggered the disgust was when Killeen animated a recent corpse of one of their companions to walk across a trapped area to set off the traps.

It’s been forever since I read the book as well, but every time it’s been brought up the fact she is a necromancer or makes minions does not trigger disgust or distrust in any way.

It’s when she literally turns a recently fallen Ebon Vanguard soldier that both humans in the group knew personally into a minion, that they express feelings. And even then it always is said it’s more of a “Could you please not do that anymore?” and not a “UGH. MINIONS.”

Hell, I remember her openly asking Dougal if she could turn him into a minion if he died/study his corpse got more of an “Eh… what?” :P

[quote=6058409;Donari.5237:][quote]

Konig Des Todes.2086:

That’s not true at all, Narcemus. Necromancers in Tyria and Elona deal with souls a lot:

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Rites_of_Remembrance
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Crypt-ology
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Ghosts_in_the_Graveyard

This has remained true in GW2, though is most evident in the Priests of Grenth (whom are usually necromancers – like Priestess Rhie).

Actually… IIRC, in combat she throws lightning orbs like a Priestess of Dwayna. I consider that to be an oversight, though. :P

Regarding necromancers and humans, there’s a quote from Dougal in Ghosts of Ascalon:

Dougal Keane

Necromancers among the humans have been considered rather unsettling for centuries, even though they work in magic like elementalists, mesmers and other practitioners

Dougal seems to recognise that it’s irrational, but it’s canon that it exists. The reasons are probably largely as people have already said, but one other distinction between a necromancer and an elementalist, mesmer, or another practitioner is that other practitioners have no inherent motive to kill (they may still choose to use their powers to kill, but the nature of their power isn’t such that they gain a benefit from it).

Necromancers, on the other hand, do. There are examples in both games of necromancers killing people in order to experiment with minion raising techniques. We don’t see any cases of this in-game, but there’s also the possibility from the viewpoint of a regular person that a necromancer might decide to harm or kill them just to build up life force (most if not all means of building up life force requires something to be harmed if not killed). Practitioners of other types of magic might still decide to commit murder with their magic for other reasons, but they just don’t have the potential to be directly rewarded for it by their magic like necromancy offers.

Now, something else we see is that a lot of necromancers follow a set of rules that keeps the distrust from growing too much. Guild Wars 1 shows that the necromancer community self-polices itself to an extent, and the interaction between Aria Venom and Draithor may be an extension of that. Minions being composed of animals (even though we know, from Ghosts of Ascalon, that they can make minions directly from sapient creatures) may also be the necromancer community’s way of saying “Look, we’re not going to kill you to raise a minion, we only use animals as raw materials!”

In Marjory’s specific case, I think that’s because she largely presents herself as a detective rather than a necromancer. Necromancy is a tool in her investigations and a weapon when she needs one, but it’s not her primary identity. That said, I also think the prejudice is a relatively mild one as long as the necromancer isn’t flaunting the stereotypes. Somebody who appears normal and mentions they’re a necromancer… whatever the other person’s initial impression of them happened to be will probably override any necromancer prejudice they have unless it’s particularly strong. Somebody walking around wearing black robes decorated with lots of bones, on the other hand…

Search for 2016 USA election :V.

Donari.5237:

It’s been years since I read Ghosts of Ascalon but as I recall the act that triggered the disgust was when Killeen animated a recent corpse of one of their companions to walk across a trapped area to set off the traps.

Kalavier.1097:

It’s when she literally turns a recently fallen Ebon Vanguard soldier that both humans in the group knew personally into a minion, that they express feelings. And even then it always is said it’s more of a “Could you please not do that anymore?” and not a “UGH. MINIONS.”

The Ebon Vanguard is mentioned because it’s more obvious. But there’s more than one case than this, which people seem to forget (perhaps because it isn’t so obvious or because it isn’t so often quoted).

On page 7/8 Killeen makes a minion out of long dead bones in the Divinity’s Reach crypts. The reaction was….

“Dougal shuddered as Killeen gave the creature a satisfied smile.”

This, while not obvious, does show some discomfort with necromancy – at the very first time he sees her using necromancy, at that. And again, in making a minion – but this time using methods more similar to what day to day necromancers (read: player characters) use.

Then there’s also the quote that drax brought up.

Overall, it’s far more than “oh my god that poor Ebon Vanguard that we just killed!”

draxynnic.3719:

Necromancers, on the other hand, do. There are examples in both games of necromancers killing people in order to experiment with minion raising techniques. We don’t see any cases of this in-game, but there’s also the possibility from the viewpoint of a regular person that a necromancer might decide to harm or kill them just to build up life force (most if not all means of building up life force requires something to be harmed if not killed). Practitioners of other types of magic might still decide to commit murder with their magic for other reasons, but they just don’t have the potential to be directly rewarded for it by their magic like necromancy offers.

A: The necromancer who was actively killing to experiment with minion raising techniques was instantly branded an outcast by the rest of the necromancers, and they sent people after him will full intentions to KILL HIM because of it. Not because they were against what his experiments were after goal-wise, but because he was actively murdering civilians to do so.

B: Even ingame, lifeforce only affects the death shroud, which (to me) seems to be a rather… powerful magic that all necromancers may not do, or be able to do. Lifeforce has no real affect on any of their other abilities (in game mechanics, or even the lore I know, and my main in both games is a necromancer).

The likelyhood of the neighborhood necromancer to just stab somebody to ‘gain power for a spell’ is so incredibly low I can’t even see that being a thing besides the most nut-job people.

Now, something else we see is that a lot of necromancers follow a set of rules that keeps the distrust from growing too much. Guild Wars 1 shows that the necromancer community self-polices itself to an extent, and the interaction between Aria Venom and Draithor may be an extension of that. Minions being composed of animals (even though we know, from Ghosts of Ascalon, that they can make minions directly from sapient creatures) may also be the necromancer community’s way of saying “Look, we’re not going to kill you to raise a minion, we only use animals as raw materials!”

I’ll again point out, it’s seeming more and more that it’s less necromancy, more of minions. Even going off the GW1 split of necromancy trees, assuming that applies to them as a whole, we could be talking about like… 25% of necromancers in general actively using minions all the time. Frankly, I don’t see minions as being the primary focus of necromancers, merely one branch of it that most don’t use. Certainly it’s not used by ‘civilian’ necromancers, which the bulk of people would interact with.

In Marjory’s specific case, I think that’s because she largely presents herself as a detective rather than a necromancer. Necromancy is a tool in her investigations and a weapon when she needs one, but it’s not her primary identity. That said, I also think the prejudice is a relatively mild one as long as the necromancer isn’t flaunting the stereotypes. Somebody who appears normal and mentions they’re a necromancer… whatever the other person’s initial impression of them happened to be will probably override any necromancer prejudice they have unless it’s particularly strong. Somebody walking around wearing black robes decorated with lots of bones, on the other hand…

The last example could easily just be a priest of Grenth, which are respected just as much as any other priest (Dwayna, Balth, etc)Priests of grenth, in GW2, actually do have bones as part of their robes. But, I agree with the bulk of this point.

In general, a person won’t care. If the necromancer flaunts it in a gruesome manner or other general creepiness, they might get more “ew”.

Hell, we know of at least two women in DR who find being a bard far more awkward and weird then being a necromancer and actively using minions. :P

On A: Yes, it’s probably well known that the necromancer community self-polices… but nevertheless, it’s probably also well known that incidents have happened. It’s cold comfort that the necromancer that murdered you is going to be hunted down by the others after you’re already dead. The self-policing aspect is probably a large part of why the prejudice is relatively minor, rather than all necromancers being outcasts at best as they are in many settings – socially speaking, the benefit of having necromancers around is worth the occasional bad apple, especially when the other necromancers actively work to minimise the impact of those bad apples.

On B: Sure, maybe shroud magic is only available to a small set of necromancers. However, lifestealing allows necromancers to heal themselves out of drawing life force from someone else. Wells used to require corpses, and from a lore perspective, perhaps still do. Lorewise, necromancers who don’t use life force for shroud magic might use something like the old-fashioned GW1 soul reaping to gain energy from deaths nearby instead. Furthermore, the common citizen is probably not intimately familiar with the details of how necromancy works. All they might know is that a necromancer can power themselves up by killing people and can then make use of their corpses to work additional magic. The likelihood is low (see A), and this is why they’re generally tolerated, but the very possibility would be enough to make people uncomfortable with necromancers that they don’t know, more so than other spellcasters that don’t have that factor.

Keep in mind, also, that you don’t need to be one of the most nutjob people to be irrational, and it’s also very easy for people to have unconscious prejudices that they know has no rational basis (Dougal, for instance, seems to know that necromancer prejudice is irrational, but he’s still wigged out by it). Also keep in mind that both Kryta and Elona have been invaded by undead twice, which will probably influence human attitudes to anything connected to undead. The other races do not have necromancer-specific prejudices: asura and sylvari view it as just another branch of magic (sylvari necromancers have been said to be uncommon, but I think that’s more that sylvari are more likely to be interested in other pursuits), norn disapprove of individuals that desecrate the dead but otherwise don’t care, and among charr necromancy might actually be one of the more accepted forms of magic (there are indications that necromancy was a branch of magic much more associated with Ash than Flame.)