Guild Wars 2

Aaron Ansari.1604:

Personally, I don’t think it’s unfounded so much as it is that many people on this forum have a long history of pointing out that the evidence for it has been tenuous, myself included. Proponents of this theory, seemingly more than any other theory out there, had a habit of stating it as fact and even using it as evidence for other theories, and we spent so long arguing so hard that they shouldn’t get carried away we developed an antipathy to the theory itself, not for its own merits but due to the nature of its loudest proponents. That… seems to have been a mistake.

My two coppers, anyway.

Unfortunately, many who were against the theory outright bullied people at the mere mention of it. Whether people who wanted to discuss the theory had strong facts or not, a few people made it their duty to shut down any conversation about the topic. This continued even after their prized arguments that “proved” it had been debunked were demonstrated not to be strong enough to justify that conclusion. Nothing justified their behavior.

I’m glad that this is the outcome. It made sense from a story perspective. The high level of nitpicking that was required to even challenge it, further made me want it to happen. It’s a shame no one was allowed to discuss it constructively for so long.

Hi, everyone! The spanish-speaking community of Guild Wars 2 had the opportunity a few months ago of doing an interview to Anet lore team. We receive the answer yesterday, and we think that was great to share it with everyone.

Enjoy!

Lore Q&A: The spanish community ask to Scott McGough, Angel McCoy and Bobby Stein

The Elder Dragons

• Can you give some detail on how the Elder Dragons behave towards each other?

The Elder Dragons are aware of each other, as would be any two apex predators whose hunting grounds overlap, but so far there is no record of them fighting each other (much as two overlapping apex predators can coexist, as long as they don’t encounter each other personally). Ascribing motives and reactions to them that we mortals can understand is a dicey business because they are so alien, but one of the most popular current theories among Tyria’s dragon researchers is that the Elder Dragons would fight each other (at least via their minion proxy armies) if they expanded into each other’s territories, but multiple Elder Dragons completing the “devouring” stage of their life cycles (sleep, wake, claim territory, devour all the magic, sleep) eats up all the magic on Tyria before that happens. It’s kind of a natural predatory equilibrium: the dragons are separated by enough distance and their wake times are staggered such that they are able to sustain themselves and return to their more dormant state without having to battle each other for the magical resources they consume.

• What is the exact process by which someone is corrupted by a dragon? Is there any way to protect yourself from dragon corruption or repel it?

The magic Elder Dragons use to corrupt things is ancient, powerful, and barely understood by the greatest magical minds on Tyria. There have been spells that could successfully cleanse a living thing of dragon corruption (see the Ruined City of Arah dungeon’s Forgotten path, or the climax of the Pact’s campaign in Orr) but they are not well understood, require significant resources to cast, and must be cast in a particular geographic location, so they are not universally available.

• Almost two years have passed since Zhaitan’s death and the cleansing process started by Trahearne, yet Orr still looks the same. Is it actually being slowly purified or are the remaining major minions somehow preventing it?

Orr is slowly being purified by Trahearne’s cleansing spell; it will take time, however, as Orr had centuries to soak up Zhaitan’s corruption. Even though Zhaitan itself is gone, its influence and impact are still playing out in Orr and its minions are still actively serving its interests.

Magic in Tyria

• Roleplaying wise, does magical healing depend on the knowledge the caster has of the patient’s anatomy? What about the state of the caster (poisoned, wounded, confused…) when attempting to self-heal or heal others?

A person’s magical ability and familiarity with a given healing spell is far more important than the caster’s knowledge of the patient’s anatomy or the caster’s current physical state. An injured/poisoned/etc. caster has a tougher time mustering the physical and mental resources necessary to cast a healing spell, but once the spell is cast at all it will have its full effect. Think of it as a sprinter recovering from a sprained ankle—they may take a bit longer to get to the finish line and they may feel a bit more pain along the way, but they will still finish the race.

Imho, there should be a better compromise between

• those who comprehend the game like a lobby with a character selection screen, an equipment locker, a chat and LFG, and a portals room to dungeons, farming sites, WB, and battle grounds, and
• those who want an open world to stride across, possibly with some other irl contingency implemented as well.

Suggestion:

• Let’s have WPs near all or most of the instanciated maps (and near guild puzzles if the opposite is unbearable). “Near” is still debatable, though.
• Let’s have one or two extra WPs on each map, provided they are erected in logical places, see below.

and…

• Let’s get ride of those indestructible, automatic cubic WP models in the wilds, whereas the “normal” asuran gates are damaged with a single explosive charge, and necessitate each one a qualified team to be operational. Seriously, there isn’t even a better range or a higher success rate associated with those normal asuran gates. The only difference is that they are free of charge (not counting the WPs in the capitals).
• Let’s replace the WPs with normal asuran gates properly manned, and build in protected (though contest-able) sites (such as Black Lion’s havens, and other outposts) or in any abandoned and ruined complex because lore-wise, it made sense for asuras to build and use/loan them in the past (place of power, temple, energy node, former mining facility, or why not harvesting station, etc.). The latter would need either some kind of Order’s team deployed to man them when they are repaired and on-line, or some kind of automation (but not as those inconsistent current WPs).

As for where would we resurrect when dead, there would s[t]ill be portals enough in any given map, imo. Remember what happened to the WPs inside the dungeons? The reasons why, the pros, the cons? Well, I feel like it’s time to consider what is the current open world compromise worth, and what would change in case of a slight or a more radical adjustment.

Upcoming plot twist! (That I pulled out of nowhere and is based on nothing besides idle speculation).

Interesting how you ignored this part at the bottom of the blog:

As always, the content above is subject to change as we test and iterate on these systems.

You also ignore the fact that they said rather long before the end of 2013 that they would push Legendary and Precursors forward, which was also later stated to be pushed forward until they have revamped the reward system.

What I find interesting is that there seems to be an expectation that ANet should pump out content much faster, but it sounds as if this expectations comes from an observation somewhere else.

Where would that be? WoW, which goes months between raid patches which are cut down in size to be a single small raid zone with a handful of bosses, and then a year until the next xpack? A year of nothing, ofc.
Wildstar? Which lacks content right out of the door?
Or are we looking outside of MMOs? Bioware pushing out content faster with DA2 certainly wasn’t well-received either, so there’s a negative precedent there. D3 went 2 years before it got more content, and it was only ~25% more, and the world isn’t large to begin with. PoE is still in it’s death throes so I doubt much will happen there.

No company releases lots of content fast.
For 2 weeks, Dry Top is quite good. Plus let’s be serious, adding new zones should be something done rarely, as it makes an already giant world even larger, each time they need to check whether Megaserver still fills each zone at least once over.

Just wanted to say I’m very, very glad to see how the storytelling has improved with this episode. I’ve been criticizing the poor storytelling, together with the lack of lore cohesion, since pretty much release.

This episode has been awesome storywise. The storytelling was pretty good, and what I always wanted and felt that was missing in this game. Congratulations for moving forward and improving it so much.

Deeper analysis:

The story was told very well, there were references to many things, the instanced story had steps in the open world, and the instanced and open world versions showed cohesion between them, dialogues included. I’d give it a 9/10, it was great. Some nitpicks:

The only part where this cohesion failed was when, in the instanced version, there were nearly no zephirites, while in the open world it’s full of them. I think the instanced version should have showed some injured zephyrites, or the same zephyrites as in the open world.

The seraph feel a bit out of place, too. We see none after crossing the portal, and then there’s a few medics who appeared out of nowhere, without any escort, and with the target of their expedition in front of them, and no reaction by them whatsoever. Where’s Corporal Jantzen and his troops? Why isn’t there at least one soldier next to the portal talking with the zephyrites to coordinate the medic camp north?

One of the problems with storytelling has been the lack of named enemies, and this didn’t get enough attention. There’s one named Inquest asura in the instance, that dies seconds after we meet him, but in the open world, who I assume is supposed to be leading them has no name, and is a generic NPC instead. It would have been better if this NPC got a name, and same dialogues tied to the Inquest events showing their motivations. Right now they feel a bit like filler, mostly because they have close to zero personality. The NPCs, and specially villains, need more personality.

There’s many cool objectives across the zone, tied to the personal story. However, some of them should really stay invisible if you’re not doing the mission, else they feel completely out of place, and sometimes spoil what’s to come if you decide to explore the zone before completing the instanced story. I’m talking about the dead merchant and the notes, for example. They don’t really make sense as permanent world additions, they should stay invisible while you’re not (re)playing the living world story.

Finally, I don’t like the zone too much, which doesn’t seem to be tied to lore, but is. The zone is awesome, and I love everything about it, but it is too small. Why the major sites in the zone (Prosperity town, seraph camp and zephyrite wreckage) aren’t separated by a long walk across dunes and cliffs is beyond me, it really kills immersion to see everything so close. It affects gameplay negatively, too, since everything is so squeezed together you arrive anywhere by walking a bit. The feeling of crossing a wasteland is nowhere to be seen with such a small sized zone.

All in all, except the zone-size problem, which has more consequences on gameplay than lore, the game has really stepped forward, into a much more better direction. Great job, really, the story, lore and storytelling this patch were awesome.

Story telling wise anets writer made a leap .

that was amazing good story telling.

I couldnt stop. after everybody left the room of scarlet me and taimi stayed and i watched and read her hologram

5Stars for that

Im dead sleepy but i need to know the end

Don’t get me wrong, I think this is a great feature and should continue to be implemented in the Living Story. However, I honestly didn’t want to replay ALL of the new content, and I don’t really care about the achievements, so can we please have an option to cancel the story replay without finishing everything again?

That green star which is now hovering over my UI is incredibly irritating, and I won’t be using the feature in the future if this is going to be how it works. There is a couple of parts which I would love to replay, such as the final boss fight against Aerin, but if it comes at the cost of having a green star pestering me until I replay everything else, I probably won’t use try this again.

Again, great work on the “Replay Episode” feature – I think it’s a great addition to the game, but it would be nice to be able to replay selected content without having to finish all of it.

So, now with yet another Sylvari seemingly influenced by Mordy it might be time to accept that the Sylvari are very much tied to it (or might even be minions).

WereDragon.6083:

Zephyrite: The summer sun shone bright once more, warmed wood and cloth of home.
Zephyrite: We honored those who came before, and journeyed where they roamed.
Zephyrite: (humming)
Zephyrite: Alas, alas, we’ve no more peace, no ally from on high.
Zephyrite: We’ll make our way to brighter day and into clearer skies.
Zephyrite: (humming)
Zephyrite: No more to tame the wind and rain, the skies to swallow whole.
Zephyrite: She flies no more in glinting beam and leaves a hollow hole.
Zephyrite: (humming)
Zephyrite: Alas, her magic strewn in sand. Alas, her soul undone.
Zephyrite: The clouds shed tears upon the land for the loss of our crystal sun.(voice says “mourning of crystal sun.”)
Zephyrite: (humming)
Zephyrite: No more to tame the wind and rain, the skies to swallow whole.
Zephyrite: She flies no more in glinting beam and leaves a hollow hole.
Zephyrite: (humming)
Zephyrite: Alas, alas, how time must pass. Ancient, magical friend.
Zephyrite: So terrible, so dreadful that so treasured should so end.
Zephyrite: (humming)
Zephyrite: No more to tame the wind and rain, the skies to swallow whole.
Zephyrite: She flies no more in glinting beam and leaves a hollow hole.
Zephyrite: Alas, alas, alas, alas…
Zephyrite: Alas, and so we go…
Zephyrite: We fly on high into the sky…
Zephyrite: And cry, “Alas, alas, alas…”

That’s the song they sing aboard the ship and they also mention tending to “Her Legacy” We know a legacy is often times a child or offspring.

For them to bring the child along, instead of hiding it away, even more so with glints past beef with Kralkatoric it seems kind of odd to expose the offspring to such dangers.

Just wondering is it crystal sun or crystal son play on words or a name. I just read a my Sun a girl joke. sorry Child crying for parents maybe though. The ambient conversation in game is really what Anet needs to expand on because i think they are one of their strong points in the game.

I feel like that answer just poses more questions. Why pull away from Tyria but not Cantha or Elona? The Brotherhood of the Dragon never had ties to those places, and while Elona is near to the Crystal Desert, why would they consider it ok but not Tyria? And Cantha? The isolationist empire, which under Usoku’s iron-fisted rule expelled all who didn’t agree with the official policies? Why would dedicated pacifists with ties to a dragon on the other side of the world do their recruiting there?

bullyrook.2165:

Wait a minute! Were the Krait around during the last rise of the dragons?

Like with the tengu and kodan, there are theories for it – which Aaron pointed out the basics of them all – but no solid confirmation nor solid support.

@Tamias: For once, I completely agree.

Sorry for the necro, but I didn’t want to make a new hybrid thread when there was an old one gathering dust, and this was the first one I found.

So, for those who don’t keep tabs on such things, a German podcast called TowerTalk does semi-frequent lore interviews with the devs. They’ve recently posted a two-part recap of the Living World Season 1 with Scott McGough, Angel McCoy, and Bobby Stein. Most of it was just going over things we already know. (Although it is fascinating how different it was from the developer perspective, compared to the disjointed impression we had.) Very notable, however is that in the second part (about the 10 minute mark)they explain just what the hybrid was.

In Angel’s words “[Scarlet] has created this hybrid of krait and nightmare that, that is really nightmarish, if you’ll pardon my using the same word again. Um, so, she’s telling everyone that this is, this is the prophet. The krait believe her. She’s basically incubated a normal krait inside the, a pod on the, on the plant, and as it has become infused with the toxins from this plant, uh, in, in great quantity, it has evolved, and it comes out, and, um, you fight it.”

A couple other interesting things from that section: Scarlet found the plant, so it wasn’t, as some (myself included) theorized, provided by the nightmare court. She also said that if the pollen had been allowed to spread, it would have meant “nightmare everywhere.” Again, nightmare as a singular term, not the plural “nightmares” that might have been used to describe the hallucinations. The same term that was used to describe the make-up of the hybrid. More on that later.

On the last new note, she says the toxic krait were “infected by the plant, and changed by it”. She touches on what she’s already said here, that these changes mean the other krait won’t take them back and so they have nowhere else to turn but Scarlet… but also that “there’s also a certain amount of mental control that Scarlet has over them.”

That’s where Angel leaves off, the end of the Word of Dev fact of this post. However, I feel like wading into the kiddie end of the speculation pool and resurrecting the theory that the toxins of the Tower were, or at the very least communicated, Mordremoth’s corruption. I don’t remember if it was debunked or just forgotten, but it’s certainly fallen by the wayside. It does have some problems, but nothing insurmountable, but there is a lot going for it. It would account for why the krait changed physically but the sylvari only got a glowy aura. It would explain why Angel talked about it turning things into nightmare, the Nightmare being popularly theorized to be tainted by Mordremoth. It, combined with the popular theory that Scarlet was acting as an agent of Mordremoth and by proxy the Nightmare, would explain how Scarlet kept the loyalty of the Toxic Alliance, the most dubious of the three, and also account for this new mention of mental control. The final piece of evidence, while dubious, is why I wanted to bring this up- apparently, a little while back, this image was posted on Naomi Baker’s site as “Naomi_Baker_Concept_Art_Illustration_Guild_Wars_2_ka_brisban.jpg”, and then quickly taken down. Full story here. The rampant overgrowth of thorny roots veined through with glowing purple energy? We’ve seen that before. The Tower of Nightmares might serve as a useful starting place for speculation on what we’ll encounter out west.

Anyway, maybe most of my “theories” will be more of “no kitten” to you guys, but I did feel the hybrid explanation deserved attention, since it was such a compelling mystery. Really wish ANet would have some sort okittennowledgement of these interviews instead of making us stumble upon them weeks after the fact, but it’s a pointless complaint. Enjoy my stumbling.

Every swamp has it’s secrets and every good one knows how to keep them. The best are peat bogs. Once fertile, now fouled, these morasses are the archetypal lying landmass – concealing countless crimes against nature. Wychmire Swamp is one such bog. Nestled in north-western Caledon Forest, this slough secures not only it’s own secrets, but those of many others, including the indiscretions of a gargantuan Maguuman Great Jungle Wurm.

The wurm’s origins are shrouded in mystery. Where did it come from? Presumably, Maguuman Jungle Wurms migrated east from a region west of Magus Falls. Regardless, there is little doubt about why it has made the mire home: Husks. (This appears to be the only (accessible) part of continental Tyria to which the latter are native.) And it is the mature Maguuman Jungle Wurms’ predilection for husks that has fueled speculation associating them with the Elder Dragon Mordremoth.

Scholars have long suspected a link between husks and Mordremoth. Popular conjecture muses that the husks may be the Elder Dragon’s minion’s – whether corrupted or created; by extension, the Great Jungle Wurms of Tyria are considered (potential) minions because husks appear to cooperate with them. Whilst it is not my intention to discuss the evidence propelling these suspicions, I do wish to explore the relationship between Great Jungle Wurms and husks.

Where Do Husks Come From?

From The Belly Of The Beast
I have entertained the theory that husks come from Maguuman Jungle Wurms. Husks may begin their lives as decaying plant matter, taking form and sentience in the bowels of a wurm, before being regurgitated. If this is the case, it would explain the origins not only of the husks of the Bloodtide Coast, but also of Wychmire Swamp. The only problem with this theory is the marked difference between husks from each wurm. The husks of the swamp show none of the evidences of partial digestion that we observe in those from the coast, such as yellow-coloured parasitic infestation.

From The Nightmare
Those who have read some of my former posts may recall that I have also entertained the theory that husks come from the Nightmare. Wychmire husks are described as “Summoned” after all, in like manner to sylvari, who are “summoned by the Dream”. That some of them are blighted is, in my opinion, evidence not so much of Elder Dragonic corruption (I am not suggesting that they are not corrupted, of course), more so of the state of the plant matter out of which they are formed. Thus, husks formed from the decaying plant material of fens are more likely to be blighted; husks formed from plant material rich in flammable solvents and stored under pressure and/or exposed to heat are more likely to be flame-touched; husks formed from plant material laced with pollen are more likely to be torrential and so on and so forth.

From A Plant
I think that most would agree that irrespective of the opinions I have already presented, husks come from a plant or plants. Consider, for example, the prevalence of toxic and flame-touched husks in the Tower Of Nightmares – it is possible that these husks were regurgitated by the toxic wurms dwelling in the structure. However, I propose that the fate of the Tower is strongly suggestive of the origins of (at least) the flame-touched husks therein. The toxic plant encased within the Tower exploded; it was rich in flammable solvents (which also contributed to the flammable gases it produced). In my opinion, the flame-touched husks encountered within the Tower were created from it (although they may not have been created by it).

Further research is required to arrive at any definite conclusions, even if the origins of the humble husk seem clearer now than ever before.

It is here, having proposed these few ideas about the origins of husks – the sustenance of mature Maguuman Jungle Wurms – that this installment of Fertile Soils: Maguuman Jungle Wurms must enter a brief diapause. Follow us in the next release as we continue to delve into the mysterious relationship between wurms and husks set in Wychmire Swamp.

Tamias.7059:

So I was poking around concept art websites (again), and found this page on Naomi Baker.

Is that first page you linked where you found the actual image? Because I just checked it now and can’t find the image you attached to your post. Perhaps someone caught wind of it and had it removed? xD

Nightmare Court weapons from TA glow purple. /shrug

IIRC, the Court also already have a presence in Brisban, and I suspect that they would welcome Mordy’s corruption with open arms, at least at first. See it as a way to spread further havoc in the Dream, and all that. At least until Mordy/Mordy’s minions show the same courtesy to the Courtiers that they do to everyone else.

I know there is another thread on this, but as that one started on a sour note, and asked for something else. I think i’d like to ask a question about this a bit diffrent and with another intent, in the hopes to find an answer to it, i can’t seem to find in the other thread.

The question:
Has there been any announcement i missed about upcoming patches/releases and how long we have to wait untill the next one? with all the news articles out there it’s been hard to find the right information. Please give a source with your asnwer, so i can read the article myself as well.

The reason:
I enjoy playing GW2 especially the idea of new temporary content each two weeks really makes it fun for me, since March this seems to be on hiatus for a moment (Anet has been busting their kitten off, so it’s well earned), yet i do long to see new temporary content.

Again, i’d love to see mentions of the source of your information, so do include them in your answer.

In a light in the darkness we enter the dream through a portal, but a world with mesmer the portal could just be a suggested entrance for your mind or anything else. Important is there, that the told future is not the same like we experience.

We never see Traherne in Jofast’s camp and get knowledge of the fight against the risen there. We do not meet the last king of Orr (which is not named in the dream) Reza in the royal tombs. We meet him in the artesian waters.

Interesting is that there is a distinct line between hostile risen and ghostly risen. Do two sides use risen?

After we leave the dream the Pale Tree says: “To know the future, even a mere possibility, can be a great burden. I am sorry, brave heroes, that you must walk this path.”. My impression of this mere future is that someone knows a lot and shows us his way to solution while telling us how horrible the dragon is. A cinema. Topic: Dream of Dreams; Producer: Unknown

And to make it complete we are getting asked about our greatest fear, which becomes truth along the way.

In retribution just two missions later the initial pact is forged. We suggest Traherne to take the post, because we get bombed with arguments and the urgency to act and we saw him leading an army with members of all orders in the dream.

And the horror continues step by step up towards a hidden assasination and even further.

The Nightmare Court isn’t agressive? You may want to replay the explo mode in TA again. While they have confederations, they still try to drive all Sylvari into the Nightmare. It is only logical to not kill Sylvari since they aren’t able to expand their forces on their own. They do however attack any other race. And taming pets is no clue for them being nice whatsoever.

This behaviour will probably change if Malyck’s tree will be found alive. I’m afraid that it’s dead. Torturing isn’t killing. Even Skritt are more dominated or catched than killed and they are not known for having a dream. All nightmare courtiers feel free and we cannot imagine why until we get the torture to release us.

In conclusion:

As I’ve said a few times, one of the handicaps on my side of this debate is that it is impossible to prove a negative (except by proving a positive that requires said negative). Is it possible that the sylvari are dragon minions? Of course it is. It’s also possible that the sylvari were an experiment by ArenaNet’s knockoff of the X-Com aliens (coming in Living Story Season 6!) that were dumped with the rest of the trash on their last visit. Short of being given a full history of sylvari evolution that shows there is no possibility that they ever were minions, the possibility is always out there.

Given that the sylvari are possibly the race whose origins we know the most about, I’m not holding my breath on that one.

What we can do, however, is demonstrate that the evidence that has been presented for the hypothesis is weak and/or flawed, that there are other, better explanations for the things that the theory claims to explain, and generally that there are other possibilities that are equally or more likely to be the case.

We can’t prove that it’s impossible, but we can demonstrate that it doesn’t deserve to be put on the pedestal that some have been putting it on, stating it as confirmed fact or otherwise presenting it as the strongest theory. Yes, it could be true. But there are a lot of outlandish theories that could be true.

Kanaxai can dominate the minds it has corrupted just like an Elder Dragon.

Many things can do what Elder Dragons can….

Glint can create Crystal Elementals(subclass of Branded) bound to her will, the Great Dwarf can create Stone Dwarves(this guy isn’t related to Elder Dragons) bound to a single goal and Foefire can corrupt Ascalon’s Ghosts to Adelbern’s hatred(was Adelbern’s sword forged from Zhaitan’s blood or not?)….

Dare I mention how Shiro could also corrupt beings into Afflicted? And how Urgoz once corrupted by Shiro could corrupt the creatures into dark forest beings(by the way is there any likelyhood of Urgoz being an Elder Dragon Champion)?

All powerful beings corrupt like Elder Dragons and their Champions….