Guild Wars 2

Hi guys,
I’m a casual player and have played every episode of LW story since season 2 so far. But with the start of season 3 after HoT I lost connection to the storyline(s). All of the sudden there were chakk, two rival elder dragons, lazarus, the white mantle, aurene, balthasar, the-eye-of-something… tbh, I’m confused as a skritt may be when solo. Would someone be so kind and explain to me what happened during season 3 and why?

what is tyria focusing on? killing the elder dragons? doesn’t sound like it. war with the white mantle? maybe… i dunno. balthasar threatening tyria? defenetly, but why?

please help and thanks a lot!

Dschromm

If you didn’t play all the way through the original Guild Wars and don’t know (or remember) its story and lore then the current LS storyline probably has no resonance and not much meaning. I did play a fair bit of GW but I can’t remember much of this stuff – it must have been in the expansions I skipped.

As a GW2 player from beta I feel shortchanged in the way GW1 vets felt shortchanged by LS1 and 2. I’d take the Scarlet storyline over this in a heartbeat, for all its flaws but its clear that, as a GW2 player, I’m no longer the writers’ target audience.

Well, if it’s any comfort, as both a GW1 as well as GW2 veteran who has pretty much done all the content and is familiar with all the lore-aspects and re-introduced characters, I didn’t really understand it either.

Perhaps it will be better on a second coherent play-through with another character, but all this elder dragons waking, then Lazarus which is not Lazarus but Balthazar, though in the end you still defeat Lazarus cause Balthazar is left alive for the expansion… yeah OK. This has been like some poor soap opera without any eye-candy.

For the future, I think it would be more than enough to simply focus on one villain but doing that properly. To me, the whole LS3 felt like the developers didn’t know the full story yet themselves and just made some stuff up from episode to episode and then in the last two somehow had to get out of this mess. No thanks.

All of a sudden, LS1 and Scarlet seem really amazing…

Yeah, “Lazurus” alone was likely a big enough WTF if you hadn’t played GW and met the Mursaat. Then the “aspects” bit – one short speech from Taimi. Snooze, and forever stay confused. And after all the trekking around and being such a big thing, Aurene seems to have ended up as nothing more than an opportunity to pop “Lazarus” up again before the big reveal, and has just dropped out of the picture to no obvious point. And, hey, for months the dragons were such a big deal, then one LW episode and they’re all a big “Meh”. (“ARRGH! Doom and destruction! We’re going to destroy the world! Oh, wait… …we didn’t. And, hey, look – the dragon problem’s gone away.” A literal deus ex machina.) And, yes, I haven’t the foggiest where the “eye-of-whatever” came from, either (and I’ve played the story on multiple characters and accounts). As for a couple of the friends I play with once a week, two of whom rarely step into game apart from then – my own understanding is crystal clear compared to theirs. They have absolutely NO idea what’s going on at all, and frankly I’m not surprised – they don’t stand a chance. It’s gotten WAY too convoluted, contrived, and woolly.

Don’t get me wrong – I think that the basic LW concept is great as a way to keep an ageing game fresh – far better than only giving people new bits of map to go to and do more of the same. But it needs a coherent story plotted way ahead, that doesn’t just drop major threads with no more than a whimper because they’re “done with” and it’s time to move on to the next one.

(It will be great if those threads all prove to be not so done with after all, and come together in something epic – but I’m not holding my breath. I’ve played enough RPGs in my time to recognise the feel when a GM has run out of steam and wants to move on, and right now the old parts of LW feel a bit like that.)

All of this is spoilers (though old stuff so)

So at the end of Season 2 the pact had basically been destroyed by Mordremoth the jungle dragon. We go into Verdant Brink to try and find survivors (which we do) and then to go and try to find the members of Destinies Edge with Rhytlock returning having learned new magic and becoming the first revenant. Using some new allies we found in the jungle we manage to find Eir…yeah going to stop about that.

From Verdent Brink we go into Auric Basin where we learn that Caithe who had previously stole the egg from us has been spotted. While there we find a new glowy people and follow them, learning that the City is linked to the egg. We take back the egg from Caith and leave it safely in Tarir before tracking our companions down. When we find Taimi we activate a long dormant map that shows us two large magical centers. One is Mordremoth so we finally learn where he is and the other is the lost Asuran city. Those asurans in that city where searching for ways to beat elder dragons and may have information to beat Mordremoth so off we go to Tangled Depths to find this city.

In tangled Depths we face a new enemy in the Chak who eat lay magic (that is all they really are). We split the team up, one two track down the city and the other to track down the remaining members of Destinies Edge and Trahearn. We find the city and learn that each elder dragon has a weakness, though we do not learn what Mordremoths weakness is. We track down our team whom we sent ahead to find the members of Destiny’s edge leading us to Dragonstand.

In Dragonstand the only important thing is we beat Mordremoth, and learn that each time a dragon is killed the other dragons absorb some of the power of the previous killed dragons, which explains why Mordremoth had some undead minions.

I do not really understand Season 3.

Basically, there was trouble brewing in Kryta with the bandits getting all worked up over something. Turns out it was a minister rallying them under the banner of the White Mantle. The group traveled to the Bloodstone and attempted to awaken the Mursaat – awakening Lazarus the Dire, who would help them reclaim Kryta as he and his kind had done in the past… or so they thought. Lazarus kinda shrugged his shoulders at the White Mantle and left with barely a ‘screw you guys, I’m going home". He later approached the Commander with an offer of alliance against the Elder Dragons. Against the Commander’s better judgement, Marjoy goes with him. Meanwhile, Taimi noticed some strange readings with the dragon energy, and sent you to check out the minions of Primordus and Jormag who were both beginning to stir into awakening following the deaths of Zhaitan and Mordremoth. Turns out that killing one dragon allows the others to absorb the left over energy and add it to their own. It later turns out the killing the dragons is not a good thing, as doing so will eventually cause Tyria to be destroyed. Marjory returns to let the commander know that Lazarus is not at all what he seems to be, and when confronted he reveals himself to be Balthazar, the Human god of Fire and War. He has been weakened by a loss of power and sees the dragons as a new energy source… One he plans to tap into even if it means destroying the world as we know it.

Following the Raid storyline, we discover the White Mantle had several ‘aspects’ of Lazarus the Dire that they had planned to bring together to resurrect him fully. Minister Caudecus had hidden one of the aspects, leading to the botched ritual in Bloodstone Fen. In the process of tracking down Balthazar, the Commander runs into Anise, who sends them to find a missing Shining Blade Exemplar who was tracking the last missing aspect. Once found, it is revealed the Exemplar plans to use the aspects to revive the true Lazarus in order to destroy him fully once and for all.

theoneparttwo.9561:

Basically, there was trouble brewing in Kryta with the bandits getting all worked up over something. Turns out it was a minister rallying them under the banner of the White Mantle. The group traveled to the Bloodstone and attempted to awaken the Mursaat – awakening Lazarus the Dire, who would help them reclaim Kryta as he and his kind had done in the past… or so they thought. Lazarus kinda shrugged his shoulders at the White Mantle and left with barely a ‘screw you guys, I’m going home". He later approached the Commander with an offer of alliance against the Elder Dragons. Against the Commander’s better judgement, Marjoy goes with him. Meanwhile, Taimi noticed some strange readings with the dragon energy, and sent you to check out the minions of Primordus and Jormag who were both beginning to stir into awakening following the deaths of Zhaitan and Mordremoth. Turns out that killing one dragon allows the others to absorb the left over energy and add it to their own. It later turns out the killing the dragons is not a good thing, as doing so will eventually cause Tyria to be destroyed. Marjory returns to let the commander know that Lazarus is not at all what he seems to be, and when confronted he reveals himself to be Balthazar, the Human god of Fire and War. He has been weakened by a loss of power and sees the dragons as a new energy source… One he plans to tap into even if it means destroying the world as we know it.

Following the Raid storyline, we discover the White Mantle had several ‘aspects’ of Lazarus the Dire that they had planned to bring together to resurrect him fully. Minister Caudecus had hidden one of the aspects, leading to the botched ritual in Bloodstone Fen. In the process of tracking down Balthazar, the Commander runs into Anise, who sends them to find a missing Shining Blade Exemplar who was tracking the last missing aspect. Once found, it is revealed the Exemplar plans to use the aspects to revive the true Lazarus in order to destroy him fully once and for all.

The problem is how do PvE players find out this info in-game (not in a raid which not everyone plays):

-Who is the White Mantle?
-Who are the Mursaat?
-Who is Lazarus?
Etc.

Basically, Season 3 has no back story in normal PvE. I don’t think the raids even really explain much. These issues and characters appear out of nowhere.

Djinn.9245:

The problem is how do PvE players find out this info in-game (not in a raid which not everyone plays):

-Who is the White Mantle?
-Who are the Mursaat?
-Who is Lazarus?
Etc.

By doing lots of online research — the GW1 and GW2 wikis should be of help here.

Doghouse.1562:

Don’t get me wrong – I think that the basic LW concept is great as a way to keep an ageing game fresh – far better than only giving people new bits of map to go to and do more of the same. But it needs a coherent story plotted way ahead, that doesn’t just drop major threads with no more than a whimper because they’re “done with” and it’s time to move on to the next one.

I believe this paragraph sums it up nicely. The writing has grown increasingly amateurish, in coherence of content and quality of wording, and I think it is time for ArenaNet to hire a professional writer to fix this mess.

Ashantara.8731:

Djinn.9245:

The problem is how do PvE players find out this info in-game (not in a raid which not everyone plays):

-Who is the White Mantle?
-Who are the Mursaat?
-Who is Lazarus?
Etc.

By doing lots of online research — the GW1 and GW2 wikis should be of help here.

If the story telling needs you to go and read 10 articles on wiki to get the point of the plot, that story telling is a piece of crap. All the introductions and expositions relevant to the main plot should be available in the game itself, not in an spin-off comic book or wiki.

Ider.1276:

If the story telling needs you to go and read 10 articles on wiki to get the point of the plot, that story telling is a piece of crap.

I never said it was a good solution, I just said it was the only solution that we are left with. I will leave it to people to use their own judgment in evaluating that status quo.

Personal Story for human (unknown parents) reveals the white mantle still exist and provides basic lore.

Speaking with Shining Blade NPCs / Countess Anise also reveals some lore.

Not sure, but I think there may be interactable objects in Durmand Priory that concerns Mursaat and White Mantle.

And of course the season 3 storyline provides more than enough for a basic grounding if you pay attention

Ider.1276:

All the introductions and expositions relevant to the main plot should be available in the game itself, not in an spin-off comic book or wiki.

Basically, this. The problem (and its solution) goes back more than a century. LW is, at heart, serialising a long story in short episodes. And every medium to date that has done the same – magazine, Saturday movie serial, TV (and doubtless others) – has arrived sooner or later at the same conclusion – the need to provide, within the experience itself, some form of regularly-updated summary of The Story So Far (“New readers start here:”; “In last week’s thrilling episode…”; “Previously on…” and so forth). Obliging paying customers to do the dog work themselves or go without is NOT a substitute.

One possible challenge, of course, is that ANet would really like new players to dig into their pockets and shell out real money for LW Season 2 (and, soon, Season 3). And I can see how that might make them reluctant to make it too easy for new players to trip over spoilers that might make them less inclined to fork out for that back material. But, frankly, it can’t be beyond the wit of man to find a sensible compromise – and if not doing so means that current LW is too incomprehensible, sooner or later those same players are going to start taking one look and deciding it’s not worth paying for more of the same anyway.

theoneparttwo.9561:

Personal Story for human (unknown parents) reveals the white mantle still exist and provides basic lore.

Speaking with Shining Blade NPCs / Countess Anise also reveals some lore.

Not sure, but I think there may be interactable objects in Durmand Priory that concerns Mursaat and White Mantle.

And of course the season 3 storyline provides more than enough for a basic grounding if you pay attention

Not remotely enough. New players need to be spoon-fed enough background to bring them up to speed. Every time one of them hits a basic LW plot point that doesn’t make sense to them, from the point of GW2 as a commercial product that’s a fail, pure and simple.

I think one of the biggest failings in this episode was the crossover between raid and main stories. Anyone that didn’t play GW1 or know the raid stories isn’t going to have any clue what the Eye of Janthir is, and be missing some huge pieces of the Lazarus story. Far too little understanding for the Livia revenge story to become a main LS plotline.

The key to understanding LS3 is probably knowing the White Mantle and Mursaat(Lazarus’ race) backstory. The end of HoT and a couple other things don’t seem as important in the current storylines, but I’ll try to knock out a couple of them.

Tie-ins from HoT

The Chak
Bugs native to the underground areas of the jungle that feed on magic/ley line energy. Their current relevance is Taimi’s use of a chak organ in her research and tracking of dragons via their magic energies. The organ is a part of their digestive system that filters different types of magic unique to each dragon.

Aurene
She is the baby dragon that hatched from the egg Caithe acquired in season 2, and ended up in the chamber under Tarir during HoT. The child of the dragon Glint, a former lieutenant of elder dragon Kralkatorrik that turned on her master to help the other races of Tyria long ago. Glint was killed prior to GW2’s storyline, and Aurene is her legacy left in the care of the Exalted for some yet to be seen purpose.

The rival elder dragons
The dragons are established rivals already in lore, which is highlighted in the current story because we are dealing with the fire and ice dragons. The polar opposites, which we were originally wanting to pit against one another. However, Taimi’s research showed that continuing to kill elder dragons and release their energy (which surviving dragons would then consume) would lead to Tyria’s destruction.

LS3 and the Mantle/Mursaat backstory

GW History: The Mursaat, The Mantle, and the Eye
The Mursaat are an ancient race that were rediscovered before the story of GW1 by Saul D’Alessio, an exiled Krytan. Saul founded the White Mantle, who worshipped the Mursaat as gods. The group rose to power when they stopped the charr from destroying Kryta.

During the events of GW1, the true agenda of the Mursaat is discovered by the Shining Blade. They are only using the Mantle and Kryta to hunt down magically adept humans and sacrifice them on a Bloodstone to harness their energy. The Eye of Janthir is the device/being used by the Mursaat/Mantle to identify humans powerful enough for this sacrifice. The energy gained from the sacrifices was used to power a magic barrier, the Door of Komalie, inside a volcano in the Ring of Fire. This barrier prevented another race, the Titans, from entering Tyria from their realm and wiping out the Mursaat. Their demise had been told in Glint’s prophecies, and the Mursaat were killing their followers to prevent it.

The Titans ended up being released anyway, which lead to most Mursaat being killed. The players and Shining Blade then lead a civil war in Kryta that overthrew the Mantle, and wiped out the remaining Mursaat leaders. All but Lazarus, who had split himself into “aspects” and hidden them around Tyria to be rejoined sometime in the future.

Balthazar and the Aspects of Lazarus
The White Mantle cult survived throughout the time between GW1 and GW2, hiding till they could restore their god Lazarus. At the start of LS3, they had all of the aspects and were attempting this, but their leader Caudecus wanted power for himself and had stolen one of the aspects and replaced it with a fake. The human god Balthazar, who had either returned or had been hiding on Tyria for centuries (I don’t think this is ever explained), saw this as a chance to gain allies and power himself.

Balthazar disguised himself as Lazarus and allowed the White Mantle (those not loyal to Caudecus) to believe he was their Mursaat god. After absorbing the energy of the bloodstone explosion the Mantle had caused in their attempts to bring back a Mursaat, he turned his attention to the dragons to get more power. This is what he was doing when we discovered his true identity, and stopped him from killing Primordus and Jormag at the end of ep5.

The Eye of Janthir
The Eye appears pretty much out of nowhere at the beginning of ep6, but it had already been revealed in the Bastion of the Penitent raid. It had been keeping Saul D’Alessio, founder of the Mantle, alive as a prisoner for the past couple hundred years. He was thought to have been killed by the Mursaat at the end of the Charr/Kryta war, after seeing them for what they really are and denouncing them. Instead of killing him to keep him silent, they imprisoned him in the Bastion of the Penitent.

After Saul finally does die, the Eye no longer has a purpose. With no other task, it seeks out its lost masters, following the aspects of Lazarus it can sense. This leads it to chasing Balthazar to Orr, after we find the Eye with Justiciar Araya and take the aspect they had.

Ep6: Where we are now

This episode does seem to leave a few things unclear, but it’s basically a vengeance story for Livia. She was a member of the Shining Blade way back during GW1’s story, and had helped defeat the Mursaat. Livia survived all this time because she had rediscovered the Scepter of Orr, a powerful artifact used in GW1 and lost at the end of its story.

After recovering the aspect of Lazarus from Justiciar Araya and the Eye, we join the Shining Blade, and are let in on Livia’s true identity and her plan to kill Lazarus, the last Mursaat. The Eye leads us to Balthazar and the final aspect, which allows the real Lazarus to be resurrected and killed for good.

The now masterless Eye of Janthir is used one last time to show us where Balthazar has went. It reveals he has gone to the Crystal Desert, which is where Kralkatorrik currently is. The Eye then vanishes, and we’re left to go off to the desert to deal with Balthazar.

Dschromm.1673:

Hi guys,
I’m a casual player and have played every episode of LW story since season 2 so far. But with the start of season 3 after HoT I lost connection to the storyline(s). All of the sudden there were chakk, two rival elder dragons, lazarus, the white mantle, aurene, balthasar, the-eye-of-something… tbh, I’m confused as a skritt may be when solo. Would someone be so kind and explain to me what happened during season 3 and why?

what is tyria focusing on? killing the elder dragons? doesn’t sound like it. war with the white mantle? maybe… i dunno. balthasar threatening tyria? defenetly, but why?

please help and thanks a lot!

Dschromm

I just posted something similar. Didn’t notice this until afterward.

I’m with you! What the heck is going on here?

mrstealth.6701

: snipped for length

The key to understanding LS3 is probably knowing the White Mantle and Mursaat(Lazarus’ race) backstory. The end of HoT and a couple other things don’t seem as important in the current storylines, but I’ll try to knock out a couple of them.

Tie-ins from HoT

The Chak
Bugs native to the underground areas of the jungle that feed on magic/ley line energy. Their current relevance is Taimi’s use of a chak organ in her research and tracking of dragons via their magic energies. The organ is a part of their digestive system that filters different types of magic unique to each dragon.

Aurene
She is the baby dragon that hatched from the egg Caithe acquired in season 2, and ended up in the chamber under Tarir during HoT. The child of the dragon Glint, a former lieutenant of elder dragon Kralkatorrik that turned on her master to help the other races of Tyria long ago. Glint was killed prior to GW2’s storyline, and Aurene is her legacy left in the care of the Exalted for some yet to be seen purpose.

The rival elder dragons
The dragons are established rivals already in lore, which is highlighted in the current story because we are dealing with the fire and ice dragons. The polar opposites, which we were originally wanting to pit against one another. However, Taimi’s research showed that continuing to kill elder dragons and release their energy (which surviving dragons would then consume) would lead to Tyria’s destruction.

LS3 and the Mantle/Mursaat backstory

GW History: The Mursaat, The Mantle, and the Eye
The Mursaat are an ancient race that were rediscovered before the story of GW1 by Saul D’Alessio, an exiled Krytan. Saul founded the White Mantle, who worshipped the Mursaat as gods. The group rose to power when they stopped the charr from destroying Kryta.

During the events of GW1, the true agenda of the Mursaat is discovered by the Shining Blade. They are only using the Mantle and Kryta to hunt down magically adept humans and sacrifice them on a Bloodstone to harness their energy. The Eye of Janthir is the device/being used by the Mursaat/Mantle to identify humans powerful enough for this sacrifice. The energy gained from the sacrifices was used to power a magic barrier, the Door of Komalie, inside a volcano in the Ring of Fire. This barrier prevented another race, the Titans, from entering Tyria from their realm and wiping out the Mursaat. Their demise had been told in Glint’s prophecies, and the Mursaat were killing their followers to prevent it.

The Titans ended up being released anyway, which lead to most Mursaat being killed. The players and Shining Blade then lead a civil war in Kryta that overthrew the Mantle, and wiped out the remaining Mursaat leaders. All but Lazarus, who had split himself into “aspects” and hidden them around Tyria to be rejoined sometime in the future.

Balthazar and the Aspects of Lazarus
The White Mantle cult survived throughout the time between GW1 and GW2, hiding till they could restore their god Lazarus. At the start of LS3, they had all of the aspects and were attempting this, but their leader Caudecus wanted power for himself and had stolen one of the aspects and replaced it with a fake. The human god Balthazar, who had either returned or had been hiding on Tyria for centuries (I don’t think this is ever explained), saw this as a chance to gain allies and power himself.

Balthazar disguised himself as Lazarus and allowed the White Mantle (those not loyal to Caudecus) to believe he was their Mursaat god. After absorbing the energy of the bloodstone explosion the Mantle had caused in their attempts to bring back a Mursaat, he turned his attention to the dragons to get more power. This is what he was doing when we discovered his true identity, and stopped him from killing Primordus and Jormag at the end of ep5.

The Eye of Janthir
The Eye appears pretty much out of nowhere at the beginning of ep6, but it had already been revealed in the Bastion of the Penitent raid. It had been keeping Saul D’Alessio, founder of the Mantle, alive as a prisoner for the past couple hundred years. He was thought to have been killed by the Mursaat at the end of the Charr/Kryta war, after seeing them for what they really are and denouncing them. Instead of killing him to keep him silent, they imprisoned him in the Bastion of the Penitent.

After Saul finally does die, the Eye no longer has a purpose. With no other task, it seeks out its lost masters, following the aspects of Lazarus it can sense. This leads it to chasing Balthazar to Orr, after we find the Eye with Justiciar Araya and take the aspect they had.

Ep6: Where we are now

This episode does seem to leave a few things unclear, but it’s basically a vengeance story for Livia. She was a member of the Shining Blade way back during GW1’s story, and had helped defeat the Mursaat. Livia survived all this time because she had rediscovered the Scepter of Orr, a powerful artifact used in GW1 and lost at the end of its story.

After recovering the aspect of Lazarus from Justiciar Araya and the Eye, we join the Shining Blade, and are let in on Livia’s true identity and her plan to kill Lazarus, the last Mursaat. The Eye leads us to Balthazar and the final aspect, which allows the real Lazarus to be resurrected and killed for good.

The now masterless Eye of Janthir is used one last time to show us where Balthazar has went. It reveals he has gone to the Crystal Desert, which is where Kralkatorrik currently is. The Eye then vanishes, and we’re left to go off to the desert to deal with Balthazar.

This is very good. Have you, if not already, considered editing the Wiki? I’m sure your input would be much appreciated. =)

Good luck.

mrstealth.6701:

I think one of the biggest failings in this episode was the crossover between raid and main stories. Anyone that didn’t play GW1 or know the raid stories isn’t going to have any clue what the Eye of Janthir is, and be missing some huge pieces of the Lazarus story.

This is an important, but subtly different, point – what story points current players learn (in that not everyone plays every part of the game – I don’t, and probably never will, raid, for example). “Story” should be STORY – not something you stumble over because you happen to do something else. And it shouldn’t (to pick an example out of the air) hark back at random to something fairly minor from another game 10 years ago (I’m looking at you, Livia) without being darn sure to hit you repeatedly with a great big clue-bat.

How hard would it be to record a simple, skippable “the story so far…” cinematic/trailer for each episode that would play when you set it as the active chapter (only focusing on things in the past that will be relevant to the episode in question)? It could mostly just be pasting clips of old content together if you want to save resources.

It would be doubly useful when understanding the story requires something that you can’t reasonably assume the audience knows, like raid stories, GW1 story, or LS1.

Edit: While it would be unreasonable to think they would do this for past LS content, I think it would really be advisable to add it to Ep6, since it’s otherwise so incomprehensible to a lot of people.

Ider.1276:

Ashantara.8731:

Djinn.9245:

The problem is how do PvE players find out this info in-game (not in a raid which not everyone plays):

-Who is the White Mantle?
-Who are the Mursaat?
-Who is Lazarus?
Etc.

By doing lots of online research — the GW1 and GW2 wikis should be of help here.

If the story telling needs you to go and read 10 articles on wiki to get the point of the plot, that story telling is a piece of crap. All the introductions and expositions relevant to the main plot should be available in the game itself, not in an spin-off comic book or wiki.

Agreed. A simples floating “hint baloon” will be enough, others games have some “enciclopaedia” built int. nothing that requires much resources. text is the cheapest resource consume in developing games.