Guild Wars 2

Lupini.6938:

I hope they can tie it all together again.

Hah hah, thanks for the laugh!

What you can expect is more such nonsense. Unless they finally find the means to hire a professional writer for future content.

Actually, that ridiculuos Shining Blade initiation ritual would be perfectly fitting as the beginning of the high fantasy story. You know, normal guy lives normal boring live then joins a secret order and starts a life full of adventure, danger and romance. Problem is the Pact Commander is actually pretty seasoned guy (or girl) who has seen some kittens.
More so, there is about 33,333% chance the Commander is a member of the Order of Whispers – you know, secret society too but working on the bigger scale. So the Shining Blade feels just like… less cool version of it.
There were no reason for so deep dive into human politics. ANet writers could make litteraly the same plot (including working with Shining Blade while tracking Balthazar and slaying the last of Mursaat that finally ties one of hanging story lines from GW1) with some small changes to make it not feel like sequel to Human Noble personal story.
…Wait I just realized I said that. Whole Season 3 final episode makes sense if you assume it continues Human Nobleman personal story. Holy kitten.

ErickDntn.1847:

Anise couldn’t tell us their mission due to the oath

The Oath of Confidence was created by the head of the Shining Blade, the Master Exemplar (Livia, presumed dead, but only retired). The current Master Exemplar and head of the Shining Blade is Anise. So she could have changed the rules of the Shining Blade to make an exception for our Hero (the player character).

With this oath the player-character binds himself to a nationalist Krytan cult-like royal guard that is also a secret organisation. It felt wrong, as if the player character is an idiot. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idiot_plot

Zok.4956:

ErickDntn.1847:

Anise couldn’t tell us their mission due to the oath

The Oath of Confidence was created by the head of the Shining Blade, the Master Exemplar (Livia, presumed dead, but only retired). The current Master Exemplar and head of the Shining Blade is Anise. So she could have changed the rules of the Shining Blade to make an exception for our Hero (the player character).

With this oath the player-character binds himself to a nationalist Krytan cult-like royal guard that is also a secret organisation. It felt wrong, as if the player character is an idiot. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idiot_plot

I appreciate you bringing up the actual term for it. Do we need to update the TVTropes entries too?

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/StupidityIsTheOnlyOption

Zoltar MacRoth.7146:

Yes. Because studies show that information extracted under torture is unreliable. The victims will say anything they think the torturer wants. When the blade members tell the truth, their captors will think they’re lying. Doesn’t that sound just like the kind of devious plan Anise would come up with?

I’m just kidding. I don’t think anet ever invisioned it to that depth. This whole deadly oath think just smacks of so much misinformation. Do the shining blade members actually say that Anise told them that would happen, or did they hear it from a friend of a friend? Did anyone ever come back after being tortured and reveal that they blabbed but didn’t die? Is there any evidence this thing has ever really been demonstrated?

There is another non-magical possibility – some kind of psychosomatic death. If blade members are so indoctrinated that they truly believe the oath will kill them, the belief itself might kill them if they start to blab.

That last one I might buy, maybe.

Also, I’ve pointed it out elsewhere, but did you notice that we never turned off the communicator with Taimi? The one that allows her to hear, see, and scan everything near us? Nor did she complain that she lost contact with us at any point, so it wasn’t blocked.

I hope they just toss in something where Taimi says “Well, with all the magic you’ve been exposed to, that oath didn’t really stick. At worst, it might give you an upset stomach. At best, you won’t even notice it.” Then they can just ignore it and move on.

Far as I’m concerned, the “magic death bomb if you tell secrets” thing is all nonsense. I mean, its a fantasy setting and all so there has to be some suspension of disbelief, but how the heck does some spell “know” you’re telling secrets? How does it even “know” what qualifies as a secret? How does it “know” you aren’t talking to members of the Shining Blade, and if it does somehow “know” that, then what if an imposter gets in, do you still die even if you think you’re telling secrets to a trusted source? Heck, mind reading / control is a thing in Tyria, what if you get mind read, does that still count as you telling secrets, and the spell somehow “knows” that too?

My point is, that’s an awful lot of sentience and intelligence to attribute to some random spell. Too much for me to believe its a real thing. It seems more like a simple tool for the Examplar’s to stress just how serious these secrets are, one that’s gotten “ghost story” levels of infamy over the years.

At absolute most, I can see there MAYBE being some kind of spell that would alert the Exemplar to the fact that one of their agents may have been compromised. And maybe they can act so swiftly and secretly to dispatch such a compromised agent that it SEEMS like there’s a death spell.

Yes, I know there’s that one Blade that’s like “Well, if you need to commit suicide just start blabbing secrets”. No, I don’t think that’s evidence of it being real. I doubt Anise or any Exemplar specifically told him that, that’s just his own interpretation of the supposed “spell” based on the reputation its gained. He thinks there’s a death spell, so his own thought process is “well, this is what I could do if I ever get captured and need to commit suicide”. Not that he’s ever been told it actually works (at least not by anyone in a position of power, if anything just other normal agents) or ever heard any credible reports that’s how it works.

Even if it IS actually real, my Charr wouldn’t actually believe that to be the case. Charr are skeptical of magic by nature. So in my Charr’s eyes, he’s doing what “has to be done” at the time with no real threat beyond “Keep our secrets or we kill you!”. Not that he’s looking to betray the Blades or specifically looking for secrets to bring back to the Legions, but if it comes down to Kryta vs the Legions he wouldn’t hesitate to side with the Legions, with no second thought to some silly “death spell”.

Though I do wish they would have written the story in such a way that it didn’t have to join the Blade and take some oath in the first place. Like, someone earlier suggested to just have your character reluctantly go along with the plan and let Lazarus reveal Livia on his own. You’d eventually get the truth without needing to force the player to join some secret society cult thing. I mean, you could argue they wouldn’t have let you come along without joining first, but with all the talk of “prophecies” and such that Livia starts spouting, it makes it sound like they needed YOU specifically, and if that’s the case I’m sure they aren’t going to throw that away just because you refuse to join their club.

I get that HoT, and the lead up to it, was Sylvari focused.
I get that PoF, and the lead up to it, is Human focused.

But, forcing the PC to join a secret Human order (with all that it entails) is ridiculous.
I am Asura. Neither I, as the PC, nor most of my race would join the Shining Blade…ever (and 99.99% sure would never be allowed to in GW1).

Someone at Anet decided to write the story as if this was GW1 (I get the throwback attempt that is going on with the run into Elona for PoF). GW1 only had playable humans…I get it. This is horribly written for GW2 where there are 5 playable races, 4 of whom are NOT human.

With regards to the “magic bomb” people are talking about. I think I would just go stand next to the leader of the Shining Blade with someone who doesn’t have the clearance to know about it and tell them the secrets. That’ll show ’em.

I assumed the “Oath” was another lie. Livia literally tells you where the SECRET BLADES HQ is and doesn’t die. So its mostly to intimidate you as far as I’m concerned. The only “Blades” secret you’re ever given is their mission and where the HQ is. Considering you completed the mission the only thing you have to not tell others about is the “Secret” Blades HQ.

Okhu.7948:

I assumed the “Oath” was another lie. Livia literally tells you where the SECRET BLADES HQ is and doesn’t die. So its mostly to intimidate you as far as I’m concerned. The only “Blades” secret you’re ever given is their mission and where the HQ is. Considering you completed the mission the only thing you have to not tell others about is the “Secret” Blades HQ.

…. I was so focussed on the part why it is a stupid decision from our Character to actually do this death oath thing that I completly missed that gigantic plot hole…….

So the whole “if we make you believe hardly enough that you will die you actually will” thing becomes more and more realistic. Therefore Livia (and probably Anise) are immune to the death oath because they know the truth. That is actually quite cool.

It is still stupid of our Character to just agree on it. Because he/she doesnt know about that…..

The really sad thing is that all it would need to completly solve this problem is 1-2 race specific lines from our Character….. and everyone would be happy.

So for example a human would say, that he/she is honored to serve his country. While a Charr might be like: “A Death Oath? Things like that do not exist. If you want me to say some words I will do, but dont bother me with that fantasy stories.”
And a Asura might just Analyze that such kind of spell is impossible, because there is no clear definition of “secret” or “telling a secret” (compare a few posts above).

That would highen the story by so much ……… just 1-2 race specific lines…….

Gomes.5643:

It is still stupid of our Character to just agree on it. Because he/she doesn’t know about that…..

With how absolutely blase our character is about it, I pretty much expect something snarky and flippant:

PC: (reveals secret about Shining Blade) “And that.. shall be my last… aaaaargh!” (PC falls over dramatically, like Anise hamming it up during initiation) “Pffft, ha, as if. I kill dragons, like some pinky swear is going to kill me.”

The really sad thing is that all it would need to completely solve this problem is 1-2 race specific lines from our Character….. and everyone would be happy.

I’m not too inclined to agree, because it’s more than just the death oath. It’s swearing allegiance to the crown of Kryta. And while our characters have the common good in mind, the Charr still owe allegiance to their own, the other races wouldn’t really commit, and as a force that works for Tyria as a whole, they need to be able to respond in case Kryta becomes a threat.

The story is so utterly Human-centric that I just can’t even.

When you join as a Sylvarri, one of them gets all super racist at you. #makeshingingbladegreatagain

Ubi.4136:

I get that HoT, and the lead up to it, was Sylvari focused.
I get that PoF, and the lead up to it, is Human focused.

But, forcing the PC to join a secret Human order (with all that it entails) is ridiculous.

This! I don’t have any issues with humans getting extra flavor dialogue, but the main story should make sense for all races.

Electro.4173:

Far as I’m concerned, the “magic death bomb if you tell secrets” thing is all nonsense. I mean, its a fantasy setting and all so there has to be some suspension of disbelief, but how the heck does some spell “know” you’re telling secrets?

The answer: it’s mesmer magic (Livia’s, to be precise). Mesmer magic, like asura magitech, can do anything and everything, no rules or restrictions need apply. Now I wouldn’t want to rules-lawyer the mystery out of magic, but it does need its limits, and this “mesmers/magitech are the handwave excuse to let the writers do whatever they want, and they sure love to use it too” thing is really lazy.

narcx.3570:

When you join as a Sylvarri, one of them gets all super racist at you. #makeshingingbladegreatagain

I think it’s all non-humans. Would have been interesting to have a line or two of objection for each individual race.