Guild Wars 2

Daniel Handler.4816:

Obsidian.1328:

Daniel Handler.4816:

We are bound to ANET’s writing. I won’t hear any argument that discusses retcons as they aren’t canon arguments. Absolutely nothing is silly because it was written 8 years later, @see improved medical textbooks.

You may be bound to it, I’m certainly not. I’m bound to a writer’s writing. Citing medical textbooks is silly because those textbooks are based on science and new science comes out everyday to challenge old claims. Fictional writing has nothing to do with scientific facts. Its “truth” is completely in the mind of the writer, not the company or anyone else.

Tell me, which X-men narrative is canon? The original comic series, or the latest fad movie out in theatres? Companies retcon all the time in order to make a buck, ANet is no different.

This makes no sense. Marvel operates under a multiverse concept, both are canon. But when we make claims about a Universe we only use the Universe we are talking about. Which I why I can’t claim that Havok and Cycylops are related in the MovieVerse. And just like a medical textbook new “facts” come out to challenge old claims.

You sound like the people who don’t take lore from the letters of Tolkien as canon because he didn’t put them in the books.

Also you are bound to a writers writing. And as ANET are the writers you are bound to any and all changes they make. Your comment on writers switching is a silly as a Christian saying they didn’t believe in anything that wasn’t in the book of Matthew.

Oh…so the analogy wasn’t up to snuff for ya? Is Burton’s Batman canon and Nolan’s not? Same “movie-verse” right? But…they are both based on comics so neither.

Fact is, original authorship trumps anything else in the “universe” of all fiction everywhere. Why? Because it was birthed solely in the mind of said author(s). Which means when someone other than the original author starts changing things, you simply can’t argue for validity with a straight face.

I would say Tolkien’s letters concerning Middle Earth would probably be canon, but it depends on the intention and context. I’d have to see them.

ANet is a company, not a writer. They hire writers to…you know…write stuff. If the same writer for Proph had made all these GW2 thematic departures in narrative we wouldn’t be having this discussion…because it’s still his or her baby.

But that isn’t the case, and you know that. ANet owns the intellectual property of GW lore, we can all agree on that. But ownership =/= authorship.

Obsidian, it’s typically pointless to discuss with you but I’ll say this:

Daniel was saying that all of those were canon, but that they’re canon in different universes. Parallel worlds.

However, the Tyria in GW2 is the same Tyria in GW1. No parallel universes, and no “this is canon this isn’t.” All of both games are canon – the question is which is objective truth and which is subjective truth.

Its the entire thing behind Christianity. ANET is God, and though s/he inspired people to write stuff earlier, the people s/he inspired later to write stuff trump the earlier material. Its the same Universe, anything in the New Testament is suppose to trump the Old Testament. Anything in Gw2 trumps on the truth scale anything in Gw1.

To treat works like Christianity or ANET lore like simple imaginations of authors rips the fantasy from everything.

There is a reason its called a Living Story. It still hasn’t ended yet. You can’t imagine away that there are now 6 going on 7 Star Wars movies which are all cannon. These aren’t adaptions. This IS the original work.

The map overlaps are sufficiently fuzzy at the borders that you could argue that GW1 centaurs were not in GW2 Lornar’s Pass or GW2 Brisban. Certainly most were north of Lornar’s or west of Brisban. If Camp Resolve corresponds to Mamnoon Lagoon and Silverwastes to Silverwood, then all centaurs were west of Brisban. I had thought there were centaurs in Tangle Root, but GW1 Wiki does not mention them.

The way I read the location of Scoundrel’s Rise and the Griffon’s Mouth, southern Deldrimore Bowl is in Lornar’s Pass. However, it is easy to argue either way.

Daniel Handler.4816:

You first paragraph makes no sense as it contributes to my argument. Forcing charr to BL would primarily be bad if they had a large population. When I said “this” I was referring to your theories. The very fact they started to push outward probably meant they were getting crowded.

My point was simply that wherever they went they had the resources to create a large population pool. Aside from that we don’t know anything besides not going on the offensive again until they were united. Which presumably means the lack of Charr invasions had more to do with internal divisions than negative population pressures.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Your second paragraph was you not understanding the comparison. The louisiana purchase is the bloodland homelands, the area seized after the F&I war was not that land. The area of New France had most of its eastern land taken. There were only left with Louisiana and they were pressed on all sides by foreign kingdoms. Sound similar?

No because that’s not the situation the Charr were in and vice versa. Additionally, I did not say that the region of the Louisiana purchase is what was lost in the F&I war. Nowhere did I say that, I have no idea where you are drawing that. Again the situations are completely different, one is just a land claim with a few outposts and the other is a well populated ancestral heartland.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Your correction on manifest destiny is utterly wrong. And can easily be found wrong by researching the term. The social and national superiority was granted by Providence.

Fine, whatever, it still doesn’t give the Charr the moral high ground they think they have.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Last two paragraphs. They were both secondary settlers, and then a tertiary settlement took place. It would be like if we invaded Canada.

And I didn’t say otherwise.

Lostwingman.5034:

Daniel Handler.4816:

You first paragraph makes no sense as it contributes to my argument. Forcing charr to BL would primarily be bad if they had a large population. When I said “this” I was referring to your theories. The very fact they started to push outward probably meant they were getting crowded.

My point was simply that wherever they went they had the resources to create a large population pool. Aside from that we don’t know anything besides not going on the offensive again until they were united. Which presumably means the lack of Charr invasions had more to do with internal divisions than negative population pressures.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Your second paragraph was you not understanding the comparison. The louisiana purchase is the bloodland homelands, the area seized after the F&I war was not that land. The area of New France had most of its eastern land taken. There were only left with Louisiana and they were pressed on all sides by foreign kingdoms. Sound similar?

No because that’s not the situation the Charr were in and vice versa. Additionally, I did not say that the region of the Louisiana purchase is what was lost in the F&I war. Nowhere did I say that, I have no idea where you are drawing that. Again the situations are completely different, one is just a land claim with a few outposts and the other is a well populated ancestral heartland.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Your correction on manifest destiny is utterly wrong. And can easily be found wrong by researching the term. The social and national superiority was granted by Providence.

Fine, whatever, it still doesn’t give the Charr the moral high ground they think they have.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Last two paragraphs. They were both secondary settlers, and then a tertiary settlement took place. It would be like if we invaded Canada.

And I didn’t say otherwise.

" It depends on the topic and the frame and here it is relevant since the argument “the Charr were there first” and “it’s rightfully the Charr’s by way of earlier settlement” falls on it’s face when Grawl cultures (and has been mentioned, dwarves) lived there. "

That was you explaining why secondary settlement apparently doesn’t matter.

Here let me make it even simpler.
The Charr owned the area of New France. Then Humans who had originally had stuck to the coast push forward and ended up taking their land pushing them back to an area known as Louisiana. Only in this instance of history instead of leaving all their land, the Charr decided to try to take all of the US. This failed, but they at least got back the land they owned when they had New France. Years latter, mean men on something called the Foh-rums decides to appeal to concepts of barbarism. Because it was easier than 3-dimensional people.

Why didn’t the Charr just leave Louisiana and take land from Canada if they needed more land? Didn’t the Grawl own New France first? How many structures were in the areas of New France that were taken? Shouldn’t foreign cultures be able to share?

Metaphors aside. There are no moral high grounds. But I see zero instances where the humans behaved with any less “barbarism” than the Charr.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Metaphors aside. There are no moral high grounds. But I see zero instances where the humans behaved with any less “barbarism” than the Charr.

Maybe when they were just defending the land that they were born on, their fathers were born on, their grandfathers, their great-grandfathers etc. from an enemy with 0 interest in diplomacy?

You’re talking like the humans of the Ascalon that got Seared inherited the sins of long dead men from almost a millennium previous.

Anyways, this entire argument is kind of silly. The centaur use human aggression from hundreds of years ago to justify their war for territory and are pure black villains, the Charr used human aggression from almost a thousand years ago to justify their scorched-earth use of weapons of mass destruction and are heroic. Guild Wars lore simply is not a consistent thing, and in hindsight it doesn’t make a lot of sense to care about it that much.

When the writers would rather change the old lore to make it fit with the new lore than take reasonable care to ensure that the new lore develops from the old lore, when what happened only happened until such time as it becomes more convenient for something else to have happened, there’s no point even discussing it, because there is no lore. It’s just a mishmash of hey, wouldn’t it be cool if…

I prefer to think of GW2 as an alternate universe. Or a dream within a dream. An undigested bit of beef. A blot of mustard. So on and so forth.

The cows and their insatiable desire for entertainment have ruined it for us all.

Tachenon.5270:

When the writers would rather change the old lore to make it fit with the new lore than take reasonable care to ensure that the new lore develops from the old lore, when what happened only happened until such time as it becomes more convenient for something else to have happened, there’s no point even discussing it, because there is no lore. It’s just a mishmash of hey, wouldn’t it be cool if…

I prefer to think of GW2 as an alternate universe. Or a dream within a dream. An undigested bit of beef. A blot of mustard. So on and so forth.

The cows and their insatiable desire for entertainment have ruined it for us all.

You must understand the difference between lore in a finished story like Lord of the Rings, and lore in an evolving story like Magic the Gathering. The story is not completed yet. Who are we to argue with later chapters?

Pyro.4765:

Daniel Handler.4816:

Metaphors aside. There are no moral high grounds. But I see zero instances where the humans behaved with any less “barbarism” than the Charr.

Maybe when they were just defending the land that they were born on, their fathers were born on, their grandfathers, their great-grandfathers etc. from an enemy with 0 interest in diplomacy?

You’re talking like the humans of the Ascalon that got Seared inherited the sins of long dead men from almost a millennium previous.

Anyways, this entire argument is kind of silly. The centaur use human aggression from hundreds of years ago to justify their war for territory and are pure black villains, the Charr used human aggression from almost a thousand years ago to justify their scorched-earth use of weapons of mass destruction and are heroic. Guild Wars lore simply is not a consistent thing, and in hindsight it doesn’t make a lot of sense to care about it that much.

I don’t see any part of centaur history that points to villainism.

In the past, the centaurs were spread throughout the world. They were first displaced by humans in around 300 AE when the human kingdom of Kryta grew, and humans began settling the slopes of the Shiverpeak Mountains, home of the Modniir. In 1072 AE, two centaur tribes, the Harathi and Modniir, convened in the then-Maguuma Jungle and attempted an alliance, but human intervention prevented it. In 1075 AE, the Kournans decimated the Veldrunner by driving their prides westward, away from their territory, ancestry, and spirituality. General Bayel’s pacification campaigns allowed the province of Kourna to recruit many of them as slave laborers. Exiled and refugee centaurs raided human villages to survive, and most developed a fierce hatred for humanity. In 1078 AE, the Modniir were wiped out by a band of Ebon Vanguard and norn, on the steps of the Eye of the North, sparking the current conflict.

Later, in 1165 AE, the Modniir were pushed further south by the rise of Jormag, where they were put into further conflict with the humans and norn, as the recently displaced races competed for territory.³. In 1219 AE, the Rising of Orr set fleeing humans against centaurs, and the Harathi of the Maguuma joined the battle. Today, the Modniir-led centaur tribes wage war on humans to reclaim Kryta for themselves. The centaurs have struck a deal with the Lionguard and are not openly hostile to them (or anyone else paying a visit to their havens, for example), and some individuals seek a life away from centaur society and their vicious war (centaurs who openly speak against the war or the “War King,” Ulgoth, are exiled).

Not all centaurs in Tyria are part of the Modniir-led war. The Maguuma are a tribe of peaceful centaurs living in the Maguuma Wastes, who had splintered from the Harathi sometime in the past. This tribe is currently found in Dry Top, as the tribe in The Silverwastes was wiped out due to the actions of Caithe and Faolain in the past.

There was no agreed upon world order. Both cultures are barbaric. If the Native Americans rose up and retook the US from us would I be sad? Yes. Would I fault them? No. An aggression that happened a millennium ago still exists if the descendants are being actively disadvantaged. The only thing we do in the modern era is try to stabilize the borders in the name of world peace. Which is what apparently happened in Tyria. Truces formed.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Its the entire thing behind Christianity. ANET is God, and though s/he inspired people to write stuff earlier, the people s/he inspired later to write stuff trump the earlier material. Its the same Universe, anything in the New Testament is suppose to trump the Old Testament. Anything in Gw2 trumps on the truth scale anything in Gw1.

This… Seems like kind of a weird example to use, since there is an entire world-spanning religion based on explicitly rejecting the canonicity of the New Testament.

Daniel Handler.4816:

To treat works like Christianity or ANET lore like simple imaginations of authors rips the fantasy from everything.

I can’t agree with this. Despite being part of a larger piece of entertainment, the story of Guild Wars is just that – A story. No story transcends authorship. They are born and die in the minds of the writer and the reader.

Two authors can certainly create works based on the same ideas (Though the only real difference as to if this is “legitimate” or fanfiction are based on fairly arbitrary ideas of copyright and abstract ownership that have only really come into existance in the last 200 years with the advent of corporatism) but that doesn’t make them the same. For instance, there are many people who do not accept the Wheel of Time novels that were written after Robert Jordans death as a legitimate continuation of the story, and it’s perfectly fair for them to do so, since many of the ideas that would comprise the original conclusion are lost forever.

Guild Wars 1 and 2 are largely different works, created by different people. Choosing if you enjoy/accept both, just one, or even neither is entirely up to the reader.

Lurinna.4306:

Daniel Handler.4816:

Its the entire thing behind Christianity. ANET is God, and though s/he inspired people to write stuff earlier, the people s/he inspired later to write stuff trump the earlier material. Its the same Universe, anything in the New Testament is suppose to trump the Old Testament. Anything in Gw2 trumps on the truth scale anything in Gw1.

This… Seems like kind of a weird example to use, since there is an entire world-spanning religion based on explicitly rejecting the canonicity of the New Testament.

Daniel Handler.4816:

To treat works like Christianity or ANET lore like simple imaginations of authors rips the fantasy from everything.

I can’t agree with this. Despite being part of a larger piece of entertainment, the story of Guild Wars is just that – A story. No story transcends authorship. They are born and die in the minds of the writer and the reader.

Two authors can certainly create works based on the same ideas (Though the only real difference as to if this is “legitimate” or fanfiction are based on fairly arbitrary ideas of copyright and abstract ownership that have only really come into existance in the last 200 years with the advent of corporatism) but that doesn’t make them the same. For instance, there are many people who do not accept the Wheel of Time novels that were written after Robert Jordans death as a legitimate continuation of the story, and it’s perfectly fair for them to do so, since many of the ideas that would comprise the original conclusion are lost forever.

Guild Wars 1 and 2 are largely different works, created by different people. Choosing if you enjoy/accept both, just one, or even neither is entirely up to the reader.

But Gw1 and 2 and not novels. They are lore written by staff for Arena Net. This isn’t a book. And despite the eekiness of the metaphor, if God appeared before us all and said the new testament was the way to go, then that would be the way to go. No single author has control over any of the works. Nor did any single author write any single work without ANETs approval and probably editing.

These are video games. It would be like saying that Portal 2 is a dream because we don’t see Chell being readmitted to the facility until they added new footage later. Nooooooo. Valve owns Chell . You cannot use lore from a later game, and then argue it is incorrect because of lore in a previous game. Jigglypuff is now a Fairy Type, any Pokemon discussion we have now will not use data that refers to Jigglypuff as a Normal type.

Daniel Handler.4816:

I don’t see any part of centaur history that points to villainism.

I doubt you would, because they’re standing on much firmer moral ground than the Charr were (the centaur keep slaves, the Charr ate slaves). However, in the game we’re trying to thwart the evil centaur hordes and lead to believe they’re savage monsters while the Charr are the good guys. It’s a massive inconsistency, but ultimately the story of this game isn’t about consistency. Like Tachenon aptly said, the lore is just a big collage of wouldn’t it be cool if…

Daniel Handler.4816:

But Gw1 and 2 and not novels. They are lore written by staff for Arena Net. This isn’t a book. And despite the eekiness of the metaphor, if God appeared before us all and said the new testament was the way to go, then that would be the way to go. No single author has control over any of the works. Nor did any single author write any single work without ANETs approval and probably editing.

These are video games. It would be like saying that Portal 2 is a dream because we don’t see Chell being readmitted to the facility until they added new footage later. Nooooooo. Valve owns Chell . You cannot use lore from a later game, and then argue it is incorrect because of lore in a previous game. Jigglypuff is now a Fairy Type, any Pokemon discussion we have now will not use data that refers to Jigglypuff as a Normal type.

I don’t really agree with the notion that simply because someone holds the rights to a property that they have absolute retroactive control over it, especially if they’re not the ones who actually produced the original work to begin with.

And writing is writing, however it’s dressed up. Obviously I can’t pick and choose bits of GW2 and say they’re incorrect (I mean, I could, since all of this is a bunch of made up fluff to begin with, but it wouldn’t be very useful) since it’s all one cohesive work. But if someone wants to reject the entire of GW2 as a legitimate continuation of GW1, that’s entirely their right as a reader.

Pyro.4765:

Daniel Handler.4816:

I don’t see any part of centaur history that points to villainism.

I doubt you would, because they’re standing on much firmer moral ground than the Charr were (the centaur keep slaves, the Charr ate slaves). However, in the game we’re trying to thwart the evil centaur hordes and lead to believe they’re savage monsters while the Charr are the good guys. It’s a massive inconsistency, but ultimately the story of this game isn’t about consistency. Like Tachenon aptly said, the lore is just a big collage of wouldn’t it be cool if…

Very true. However only the humans are led to believe that. Not the other races. It still remains that most of the lore was written in the perspective of humans. I think this racial war debate is too messed up to process. The basic facts are all there, but the he said she said has been lost in history. A thousand arguments could be written on the very little slim of lore ANET has graced us with.

What parts of the lore annoy me?

There isn’t enough of it.

And I understand the concept of not letting a wrong ripen into evil or sorrow, but there should be some in game Asura-Sylvari dialogue. Torturing a firstborn does not get unnoticed in a culture with a semi collective consciousnesses.

Lurinna.4306:

Daniel Handler.4816:

But Gw1 and 2 and not novels. They are lore written by staff for Arena Net. This isn’t a book. And despite the eekiness of the metaphor, if God appeared before us all and said the new testament was the way to go, then that would be the way to go. No single author has control over any of the works. Nor did any single author write any single work without ANETs approval and probably editing.

These are video games. It would be like saying that Portal 2 is a dream because we don’t see Chell being readmitted to the facility until they added new footage later. Nooooooo. Valve owns Chell . You cannot use lore from a later game, and then argue it is incorrect because of lore in a previous game. Jigglypuff is now a Fairy Type, any Pokemon discussion we have now will not use data that refers to Jigglypuff as a Normal type.

I don’t really agree with the notion that simply because someone holds the rights to a property that they have absolute retroactive control over it, especially if they’re not the ones who actually produced the original work to begin with.

And writing is writing, however it’s dressed up. Obviously I can’t pick and choose bits of GW2 and say they’re incorrect (I mean, I could, since all of this is a bunch of made up fluff to begin with, but it wouldn’t be very useful) since it’s all one cohesive work. But if someone wants to reject the entire of GW2 as a legitimate continuation of GW1, that’s entirely their right as a reader.

I have no issue with that point at all. The problem I had with the argument was the person rejecting ANET’s revision because the idea that the entirety of the events of Gw1 were written from human perspective, didn’t fit with them.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Obsidian, it’s typically pointless to discuss with you but I’ll say this:

Daniel was saying that all of those were canon, but that they’re canon in different universes. Parallel worlds.

However, the Tyria in GW2 is the same Tyria in GW1. No parallel universes, and no “this is canon this isn’t.” All of both games are canon – the question is which is objective truth and which is subjective truth.

If it’s outright implied that those fictions are supposed to be in parallel worlds, then yes I’d agree with you.

But if a later fiction in the same world seeks to correct an earlier fiction by implying the earlier isn’t just wrong, but also was always wrong, then that is just plain wrong….unless it’s the same author doing so. And even that is suspect. (I’m looking at you Lucas!)

Objective and subjective truths in fiction depends on who birthed the fiction in the first place. Placing the authority of objective truth on a blanket company who employs authors writing disparate fictions for over a decade is not the best way to go about finding truth.

It would be more apt to say ANet employed writers to write a sequel that would allow them to “bend”, not break, the narrative so that they could expand upon multiple thematic elements not readily found in the original narrative. And as long as they connect all their thousands of lore dots nice an neat, they can claim it a valid reflection of the foundational work.

Technically they’d be right, but I wouldn’t want to buy a used car from ANet.

Daniel Handler.4816:

You must understand the difference between lore in a finished story like Lord of the Rings, and lore in an evolving story like Magic the Gathering. The story is not completed yet. Who are we to argue with later chapters?

The problem with that is that Proph was written as a completed story, they had no idea if it would be successful enough to make another campaign. It was conceived, written, and presented as a complete whole. That they added on to it later is irrelevant for your point.

Daniel Handler.4816:

The problem I had with the argument was the person rejecting ANET’s revision because the idea that the entirety of the events of Gw1 were written from human perspective, didn’t fit with them.

If you can find a quote from the author that explicitly states that GW1 was meant to be taken as strictly human perspective, and therefore bias, then you’d have something there.

If not, every fiction story everywhere in the history of time can easily be changed by the colossal cop-out of “Well…that earlier stuff was all [insert race] bias and shouldn’t be taken seriously.”

Seriously?

Daniel Handler.4816:

But Gw1 and 2 and not novels. They are lore written by staff for Arena Net. This isn’t a book. And despite the eekiness of the metaphor, if God appeared before us all and said the new testament was the way to go, then that would be the way to go. No single author has control over any of the works. Nor did any single author write any single work without ANETs approval and probably editing.

Control only implies ownership, not authorship. And literature is literature, it doesn’t matter if it’s in novel form or not. What you’re basically arguing is that a company’s stamp of approval is the ultimate arbiter of truth in the stories they hired someone to write. Like the simple act of allowing something to see the light of day bestows literary authority.

You should go into the publishing business.

A few actually…

1. While we have the Ossan district with Elonian exiles, why does DR have this stupid Great Collapse that happens out of the blue and incidentally removed the Canthan district for nothing else than political (out-of-game) reasons…

2. As I’ve posted a new topic about; for an unbroken royal family line from Queen Salma to the current ruler, Queen Jennah, there sure is a lot of obscured details about the exact rules… heck, where is even Salma’s heir that is King Baede’s parent?

3. The Forgotten are placed on Tyria by the Gods, and the Gods arrive shortly “predating the Humans”. But we know the Humans appeared in Cantha back in 786 BE, but also that lore articles+interviews state that the Kingdom of Orr was the first to be established, by Gods and humans together, as stated by Ree

So, once long, long ago, the gods of the humans brought the humans to Tyria. And they founded a kingdom called Orr and the city of Arah.

I’m probably taking things a bit too literally, but the mystery of this timeline is slightly annoying I think they’re just honest mistakes, but I really hope the Anet Lore Bible doesn’t contain great holes in its logic.

So the Charr eat food that talks…how is that evil?

Humans=Protein

The lack of in-game profession lore is really disappointing.

Obsidian.1328:

Daniel Handler.4816:

You must understand the difference between lore in a finished story like Lord of the Rings, and lore in an evolving story like Magic the Gathering. The story is not completed yet. Who are we to argue with later chapters?

The problem with that is that Proph was written as a completed story, they had no idea if it would be successful enough to make another campaign. It was conceived, written, and presented as a complete whole. That they added on to it later is irrelevant for your point.

Who is they? You keep mentioning authors who apparently wrote all of gw lore with no collaborative oversight from superiors. Newspapers can post redactions. And Lucas when he wrote Star Wars 4-6 had no idea 1-3 were a thing. The movies even say Padme died in childbirth which we now know was a lie. It’s like saying that the last season of a television show is a lie because a lot of the writers had changed by then. Feel free to rewrite the ending to How I Met Your Mother or Scrubs as you see fit.

Please show me your reasoning that the story was finished and identity the sole creators.

When Anet made Prophecies, they had the full intent to create subsequent campaigns every 6 months. This didn’t pan out, as Factions took a year to make, but they had the full intention of making more stories.

Furthermore, they intended to tell stories in 3-piece arcs. So when they made Prophecies, they intended to close it with Nightfall. The question was the form it would take and the story. When writing Prophecies, they only created threads – like the Ghostly Hero (aka Turai Ossa) having a one sentence passing on defeating Palawa Joko. Such threads existed for both lore on Cantha and Elona, but they were minimal – there only to present a “hey, yeah, there’s more out there”. When Nightfall was written, Anet even seeded in hints to Utopia – though since Utopia got scrapped, we can’t really be certain what said hints were.

The belief that “Prophecies was written as a completed story” is false.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

When Anet made Prophecies, they had the full intent to create subsequent campaigns every 6 months. This didn’t pan out, as Factions took a year to make, but they had the full intention of making more stories.

Furthermore, they intended to tell stories in 3-piece arcs. So when they made Prophecies, they intended to close it with Nightfall. The question was the form it would take and the story. When writing Prophecies, they only created threads – like the Ghostly Hero (aka Turai Ossa) having a one sentence passing on defeating Palawa Joko. Such threads existed for both lore on Cantha and Elona, but they were minimal – there only to present a “hey, yeah, there’s more out there”. When Nightfall was written, Anet even seeded in hints to Utopia – though since Utopia got scrapped, we can’t really be certain what said hints were.

The belief that “Prophecies was written as a completed story” is false.

Thank you. I compare this game more to soap opera television than novels. Yes it’s unfortunate that one writer killed off Banjo Joe. And another writer resurrected Banjo Joe by claiming he faked his death. But as long as the television show is ongoing we will treat Banjo Joe as if he is alive. It sucks, but unless you can prove ANET lost all of its writers between Gw1 and Gw2, your appeal to original authorship doesn’t work.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

When Anet made Prophecies, they had the full intent to create subsequent campaigns every 6 months. This didn’t pan out, as Factions took a year to make, but they had the full intention of making more stories.

Furthermore, they intended to tell stories in 3-piece arcs. So when they made Prophecies, they intended to close it with Nightfall. The question was the form it would take and the story. When writing Prophecies, they only created threads – like the Ghostly Hero (aka Turai Ossa) having a one sentence passing on defeating Palawa Joko. Such threads existed for both lore on Cantha and Elona, but they were minimal – there only to present a “hey, yeah, there’s more out there”. When Nightfall was written, Anet even seeded in hints to Utopia – though since Utopia got scrapped, we can’t really be certain what said hints were.

The belief that “Prophecies was written as a completed story” is false.

Actually it’s true.

I know it’s true because I’ve actually spoken to its author. Have you? All of Proph was written by one guy, and at the time they had no idea if it would pan out. Of course he made references to things outside the scope of the Proph story arc, but every writer does that in case they need to expand on it later. That’s common sense. But that doesn’t mean he expected to, nor does it mean he intended the Proph story to be incomplete. It was written as complete, and later all of those little reference threads were used to help seed the additional story arcs.

I’m actually a little surprised you’d think so, given that you yourself have stated multiple times that the “Abaddon was behind the Searing and Shiro too” thing was retroactively inserted into the narrative when Grubb and co. wrote Nightfall.

Daniel Handler.4816:

but unless you can prove ANET lost all of its writers between Gw1 and Gw2, your appeal to original authorship doesn’t work.

Not all, but one…who happened to solo write Proph, and wrote Factions as well but had some help with that one. He left after that.

Obsidian.1328:

Daniel Handler.4816:

but unless you can prove ANET lost all of its writers between Gw1 and Gw2, your appeal to original authorship doesn’t work.

Not all, but one…who happened to solo write Proph, and wrote Factions as well but had some help with that one. He left after that.

Yeah I am gonna need a name.

“I spoke to a guy at ANET who said you were wrong. But I am not going to show any official crediting to prove who this guy was, or what his position at ANET was.”

…

Daniel Handler.4816:

Obsidian.1328:

Daniel Handler.4816:

but unless you can prove ANET lost all of its writers between Gw1 and Gw2, your appeal to original authorship doesn’t work.

Not all, but one…who happened to solo write Proph, and wrote Factions as well but had some help with that one. He left after that.

Yeah I am gonna need a name.

“I spoke to a guy at ANET who said you were wrong. But I am not going to show any official crediting to prove who this guy was, or what his position at ANET was.”

…

For goodness sake dude, it’s not a secret. He’s well known here, and you can easily look him up. His name is Jess Lebow.

There’s even a little homage to him in in the Aurora Remains event in Aurora Glade in the form of Less Longbow.

sheesh

Obsidian.1328:

Have you?

I’ve spoken with devs who’ve been around since Prophecies, such as John Stumme, yes.

The fact that you constantly refer to a single writer is proof that you haven’t, however, as when Prophecies was written it had two head writers, and their opinion on the direction of the plot didn’t mesh which is why the plot of Prophecies seems back and forth between threats – but this ended up making the greatness of the plot in the end.

Obsidian.1328:

I’m actually a little surprised you’d think so, given that you yourself have stated multiple times that the “Abaddon was behind the Searing and Shiro too” thing was retroactively inserted into the narrative when Grubb and co. wrote Nightfall.

If you read my post, you’d note that I never said that they planned Abaddon to be behind Prophecies and Factions’ plots. What I said was that from the beginning they intended to have the stories told in arcs of three releases.

The very early lore of the Ring of Fire is that the landscape was twisted by a malevolent energy locked away; in Factions, Suun says at the end that us stopping Shiro prevented something far greater than evident. These were parts of the hints that Anet put in that there was a bigger plot. But the “how they fit exactly” wasn’t made until Nightfall. There’s heavy hints that the original puppetmaster was to be Dhuum or Arachnia, not Abaddon.

Obsidian.1328:

Daniel Handler.4816:

but unless you can prove ANET lost all of its writers between Gw1 and Gw2, your appeal to original authorship doesn’t work.

Not all, but one…who happened to solo write Proph, and wrote Factions as well but had some help with that one. He left after that.

Except there were two…

Unless you’re telling me that I’ve been lied to by people who worked at ArenaNet, working with said writers.

I will again tell you that this is not a completed story. The second they made Nightfall, and you played it, it became canon. Not all things in Magic The Gathering have stayed as they are. Some things have been retconned.

We better tell people that the new Klingon look is not because of a canon lore shift but because of a change in the writers. All the cosplayers have it so wrong heaven help us all.

Daniel Handler.4816:

We better tell people that the new Klingon look is not because of a canon lore shift but because of a change in the writers. All the cosplayers have it so wrong heaven help us all.

At least Klingons don’t pretend to be targs in order to train their targs to fight.

So long as that mission remains — the one in which our characters pretend to be cows in order to train cows to fight — there’s no point in taking anything at all about GW2’s ‘lore’ seriously. That mission makes the entire storyline of GW2 a silly joke.

Daniel Handler.4816:

" It depends on the topic and the frame and here it is relevant since the argument “the Charr were there first” and “it’s rightfully the Charr’s by way of earlier settlement” falls on it’s face when Grawl cultures (and has been mentioned, dwarves) lived there. "

That was you explaining why secondary settlement apparently doesn’t matter.

Not that it doesn’t matter at all, just that the Charr arguments in moral relation to human colonization are moot.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Here let me make it even simpler.
The Charr owned the area of New France. Then Humans who had originally had stuck to the coast push forward and ended up taking their land pushing them back to an area known as Louisiana. Only in this instance of history instead of leaving all their land, the Charr decided to try to take all of the US. This failed, but they at least got back the land they owned when they had New France. Years latter, mean men on something called the Foh-rums decides to appeal to concepts of barbarism. Because it was easier than 3-dimensional people.

The way you are wording your argument is if the humans in this were off New Foundland and reduced New France from the Northeast over and ate up not just half but most of Charr land. This is NOT what actually happened, you are still drawing a false equivalency. Again the Charr were pushed from an area that is much smaller than what they kept. You are arguing that Ascalon was the bulk of the territory the Charr controlled pre-humanity. We know that the Charr have at least two other regions (Ash and Blood homelands) that could be roughly the same size as Ascalon each (hinted at by various maps to be larger than Ascalon) and the Blood legion at the least has been described as similar to Ascalon was pre-searing so hardly lacking for food production. Also, what is with this characterization of my position? My irritation is with both moral high ground the Charr park themselves on with seeming little to no self-awareness on their part and the rewrite that somehow it was all the Flame Legions fault that the Charr invaded the way they did despite conquest being practically a Charr a way of life.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Why didn’t the Charr just leave Louisiana and take land from Canada if they needed more land?

They…did? Or at least they tried. Why are you acting like the Charr weren’t staunch in the stance of conquering and seeing everything as an enemy?

Daniel Handler.4816:

Didn’t the Grawl own New France first?

Yes, and the Charr being cultural ingrained with “conquer everything in front of us” conquered them.

How many structures were in the areas of New France that were taken?

About as many as the Humans took until we’re told otherwise.

Shouldn’t foreign cultures be able to share?

What does this have to do with anything? What are you even talking about?

Metaphors aside. There are no moral high grounds. But I see zero instances where the humans behaved with any less “barbarism” than the Charr.

Charr were big into the genocides, at least when it came to driving out the humans. Again, my stance is not that the Charr were worse than the humans but rather that they are no better and hold no moral high ground on them.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

~snip~

Your first point…writing something because you know there will be 2 more installments is one thing. Writing something because you hope there will be is another entirely. Can you prove that they wrote Proph as part 1 of 3? I doubt it. Referring to something like “you prevented a greater evil” is so ridiculously vague. There are literally dozens and dozens of loose plot threads in Proph. Like I said, every writer does that.

Your second point…either he lied to me or yours lied to you. Both can’t be true. I’ll gladly bow out if you can prove it somehow.

Interesting huh, that these opposing claims even exist in the first place…

Funny how you want me to prove my claims, but don’t bother with such for yours – just saying “well it’s obvious who I mean!”

Also funny that earlier you claimed that they lost the writer after Prophecies, but Jess – the writer you claim about – was around for Factions too.

I can easily imagine, from what I was told, why there’d be opposing claims – I know of one designer/writer (the name was not told to me, but was the person who wrote An Empire Divided) – left during the development of Factions under unfriendly conditions, and took a lot of planned lore (such as the calendar lore with the Ages brought up in An Empire Divided) with him. And what I was told about he Prophecies story was of conflicting views on how the story went. Which means that there was head-butting. If you were told from one of those head-butters, then the opinions may be skewed.

The statement of 3 chapters per story arc was from elsewhere though. An interview/magazine article from Prophecies’ early days. Few such exist still, so I doubt that does too even if I remembered which publisher it was. Draxynnic had read it personally, so he could certainly clarify what I don’t recall on such.

Well I didn’t exactly ask permission to name-drop him, so I don’t really feel comfortable doing it already. We had corresponded through emails several years ago. You’re free to contact him if you want, I believe he still lives in China so a face-to-face might be rather difficult. :-/

I’ve mixed up Factions and Nightfall in my posts a dozen times, and someone already called me out on this one earlier…to which I apologized and edited it correctly last week. Is that the best complaint you have?

I can’t speak on the “unfriendly” conditions that you brought up, Jeff only said he loved his time at ANet. Perhaps it was him and he was just being courteous, perhaps not. I really don’t know about that.

Drax is a good fellow, I wouldn’t mind hearing what he recalled reading.

Hrm… Something that annoys me about the lore… Well, it’s not really the lore itself that annoys me, but the player reaction to it, namely the conflict between Charr and humanity, and the insane idea that humanity could actually attempt to take on and win against the Charr in this day and age.

First and foremost, to those arguing about who did what first, who exactly struck the first blow doesn’t matter. What does matter is that in terms of lore we’re told that humanity started this whole thing off by expanding into lands they didn’t really need and using the power of the human gods to force the Iron Legion out of their homelands.

No matter what anyone says about whether the Charr were too brutal and savage against the humans, the fact remains that they were forced out of their ancestral lands by invaders who they had no quarrel with, and who viewed them as simple beasts. That a ‘primitive’ race that had little to no access to magic wound up using the age old tactics of brutality and genocide against another, larger ‘tribe’ should come as no surprise, nor should their eager embracing of the Gold legion’s magic to combat the humans’ powers. Neither too should it be said that it’s wrong of a group of people to hold a longstanding grudge with another group, only to act out on it when they had the power to do so. Were the native American Indians in such a position, would some of their tribes not do the same to regain the lands they had long since been robbed of by the American settlers?

As to humanity actually standing against the Charr… No. Look at the lore. Humanity isn’t even a shadow of it’s former glory at this point. Confined to a single major city and smaller outlying settlements, with much of it’s military locked in a never ending war against centaurs that can barely be kept from the city gates, they simply wouldn’t have the force of arms to hold off an assault from the Charr.

Technologically as well they’re outclassed. There’s only one human inventor that’s on par with the Charr right now, and his watchwork legion is trashed and buried amid the rubble of Lion’s Arch. Humanity at this point is impressed by windmills, water wheels and the odd steam powered orchestra. Militarily, they’re still using catapults, ballistae and trebuchets. The Charr, on the other hand, have long since mastered these technologies and now have everything from helicopters and flamethrowers to mortars and main battle tanks. Were even a handful of their kitten nal turned against the Reach, it would be in flames within a fortnight.

Humanity needs to learn its place. Its time of glory has come and gone, and now it needs to either fall by the wayside for the other races to take their place, or it needs to learn to suck up it’s pride and work with them to ensure it’s survival. Right now, it’s doing the latter, thanks to Queen Jenna. She understands the situation. I just wish that the rest of the Reach did.

Pahawe.4865:

Hrm… Something that annoys me about the lore… Well, it’s not really the lore itself that annoys me, but the player reaction to it, namely the conflict between Charr and humanity, and the insane idea that humanity could actually attempt to take on and win against the Charr in this day and age.

First and foremost, to those arguing about who did what first, who exactly struck the first blow doesn’t matter. What does matter is that in terms of lore we’re told that humanity started this whole thing off by expanding into lands they didn’t really need and using the power of the human gods to force the Iron Legion out of their homelands.

No matter what anyone says about whether the Charr were too brutal and savage against the humans, the fact remains that they were forced out of their ancestral lands by invaders who they had no quarrel with, and who viewed them as simple beasts. That a ‘primitive’ race that had little to no access to magic wound up using the age old tactics of brutality and genocide against another, larger ‘tribe’ should come as no surprise, nor should their eager embracing of the Gold legion’s magic to combat the humans’ powers. Neither too should it be said that it’s wrong of a group of people to hold a longstanding grudge with another group, only to act out on it when they had the power to do so. Were the native American Indians in such a position, would some of their tribes not do the same to regain the lands they had long since been robbed of by the American settlers?

As to humanity actually standing against the Charr… No. Look at the lore. Humanity isn’t even a shadow of it’s former glory at this point. Confined to a single major city and smaller outlying settlements, with much of it’s military locked in a never ending war against centaurs that can barely be kept from the city gates, they simply wouldn’t have the force of arms to hold off an assault from the Charr.

Technologically as well they’re outclassed. There’s only one human inventor that’s on par with the Charr right now, and his watchwork legion is trashed and buried amid the rubble of Lion’s Arch. Humanity at this point is impressed by windmills, water wheels and the odd steam powered orchestra. Militarily, they’re still using catapults, ballistae and trebuchets. The Charr, on the other hand, have long since mastered these technologies and now have everything from helicopters and flamethrowers to mortars and main battle tanks. Were even a handful of their kitten nal turned against the Reach, it would be in flames within a fortnight.

Humanity needs to learn its place. Its time of glory has come and gone, and now it needs to either fall by the wayside for the other races to take their place, or it needs to learn to suck up it’s pride and work with them to ensure it’s survival. Right now, it’s doing the latter, thanks to Queen Jenna. She understands the situation. I just wish that the rest of the Reach did.

I don’t agree with all of these points. But at the same time I don’t think there was any indication in gw1 that they were going to take back Ascalon. Some of the themes in Gw2 just play with the ideas of meeting alien races. Like in Star Trek the Vulcan were ahead of the humans. The Charr may have started out more primitive but they applied themselves furiously. And so I agree with you on that. Given the events of Gw1 it is no surprise the humans are where they are in Gw2.

Pahawe.4865:

~snip~

In GW1, Ascalon wasn’t Charr ancestral land or legion homeland or anything like that. That was artificially injected into the narrative a few years ago…probably to further legitimize the Charr claim to it is my guess.

Also, every creature, large or small, numerous or few, basically used magic the same way in GW1. Some races might have had a better aptitude towards it perhaps, but that’s hard to prove. Every enemy and ally used the same named spells and such. I suppose you could argue they may have called a particular spell something different within their respective races, but something like Dwayna’s Kiss did the same thing whether you were a human, Charr, grawl, or Mursaat.

Your last 3 paragraphs are pretty spot on though.

Only then Ascalon was only ‘ancestral land’ because they conquered it first. The Charr were very warlike before humans ever turned up. They even wared against the Forgotten. Even then, how long do you need to hold land for it to become ancestral. The humans were their for over a thousand years.

As for humanity standing against the Charr, well that would require a civil war between the legions which is quite possible under the right circumstances. There is a reason non have tried to claim the title of Khan Ur even now that the Claw has been found. The Charr are three allied nations and one enemy nation, not one united one. If the Legions went to war against each other it would cripple them which, as stated by Jeff Grubb, is Smolder’s worst nightmare.

Also what ‘one human inventor’? We have no idea who made the Watchknights. If your talking about Uzolan, he is dead long before the Watchknights are a thing.

Your also overlooking three things.

Ebonhawke survived a 200 year siege by the Charr. It was such a tough nut to crack the charr have a statue in the Black Citadel to the charr who first got to the top of its walls.

Secondly, the technology we see the charr having is mainly the domain of the Iron Legion. The Ash and Blood still much lower tech in their own lands. Blood actually leans quite heavily on warbeasts over high tech engineering. Do remember we have only seen the Iron Legion lands which are by the nature of the Legions the heart of Charr engineering.

Thirdly, while the Charr have much better tech, humans still seem to have magical superiority still. We are still yet to see any charr magi pull of some of the feats characters like Jennah have.

However I will agree with you that Humanity seem to be the worn out old man of GW2. Certainly, humanity isn’t presented as a force that can even handle its own problems let alone go on the offensive.

It weirds me out when people talk like the way humanity is presented in GW2 is something that we, the players outside of the game, are silly to occasionally complain about, as if it’s all inevitable truth.

You can’t critique history, but you can certainly do so with writing, which is what this is. It was all done with the stroke of the pen. It can be undone with the stroke of a pen.

Also, the Centuar invasion isn’t really a good example of how humanity would totally collapse if another threat piled on it. In the 2013 interview, the writers stated that it’s mostly spurred on by funding from the ministry – Paying for their weapons, maintaining supply lines, etc, in an effort to undermine the queens authority. Presumbly if the kingdom itself was actually in danger, they would quit doing that.

That too many people are so mired in the lore of the first game that they won’t allow the lore of the second game to evolve

to be contrasted with a writing department that won’t make fixes to cover the minutiae when they forget some random fact. So, you know, this goes both ways.

Bathos.6341:

You clearly need to look at that lore more closely. Ascalon was built by humans ON CHARR LAND.

No it was not. It belonged to the Grawl (and possibly dwarves too), then Charr stole it from them. The Charr like pointing fingers at humans for conquering ‘their’ land while they themselves are guilty of the very same thing.

Sariel V.7024:

That too many people are so mired in the lore of the first game that they won’t allow the lore of the second game to evolve

to be contrasted with a writing department that won’t make fixes to cover the minutiae when they forget some random fact. So, you know, this goes both ways.

Lol…well put!

Why is there an argument about the canonicity of GW2 lore? It doesn’t matter what the writer of Prophecies originally intended. The Guild Wars franchise isn’t a single story. It’s a continuous story that draws in smaller stories written by multiple writers over the years, each story branching off and exploring different aspects of the lore and occasionally introducing new information that we didn’t have before.

In this case Ascalon belonged to the charr before humans settled it. That is 100% canon fact. It doesn’t matter when it was written, all that matters is that it’s considered canon to the Guild Wars universe.

By that rationale, only the most current writing matters then.

Sure glad Terminator Genysis is coming out, I hear Cameron was all /sadpanda at the obviously non-canon Rise of the Machines and Salvation. He even wants you to pretend those two never existed, even though he did not write/direct them…nor Genysis.

I’m so confuzzled!!

Lutinz.6915:

Secondly, the technology we see the charr having is mainly the domain of the Iron Legion. The Ash and Blood still much lower tech in their own lands. Blood actually leans quite heavily on warbeasts over high tech engineering. Do remember we have only seen the Iron Legion lands which are by the nature of the Legions the heart of Charr engineering.

Just going to pop in and tell you that shortly after creating the Ghostbore Musket, both Blood AND Ash legion have successfully recreated and modified it to both work as either a small remote turret or a giant cannon.

Hard to do if they were behind Iron Legion in terms of tech. They just have less Engineers is all.

Kalavier.1097:

513137kitteninz.6915:

Secondly, the technology we see the charr having is mainly the domain of the Iron Legion. The Ash and Blood still much lower tech in their own lands. Blood actually leans quite heavily on warbeasts over high tech engineering. Do remember we have only seen the Iron Legion lands which are by the nature of the Legions the heart of Charr engineering.

Just going to pop in and tell you that shortly after creating the Ghostbore Musket, both Blood AND Ash legion have successfully recreated and modified it to both work as either a small remote turret or a giant cannon.

Hard to do if they were behind Iron Legion in terms of tech. They just have less Engineers is all.

Eh, there’s a difference between R&D and reproduction. We don’t entirely know the logistics behind it so either the Iron Legion is supplying them of the other two legions have been given the plans for it.