Guild Wars 2

The one over Kessex, yes- and that makes sense, since it was the Toxic Alliance coming out of that one. Her other portals, including the one in the tower, show somewhere else though, somewhere with pipes and charr style metalwork.

knbBlackTemplar.3059:

Human gods are just incredibly powerful wizards.

That’s not really accurate. Their power isn’t magic, not as defined by the Tyrian setting, and goes well beyond what magic is capable of. We don’t know anything about their past before coming to Tyria, so we can’t say that they were ever human, or even mortal (with one exception). They’re no more “just powerful wizards” than any god in any setting. The only way they differ from your average god is A.) They played no (known) part in the beginning of the universe or the creation of life, and B.) Some, perhaps all, weren’t around at the time either began. You could argue the inclusion of a third point, that they can be killed, but that is not uncommon in polytheistic religions/settings. None of those things really detract from their divinity.

The game is not incredibly clear on this, as in so many aspects of sylvari biology, but putting together various statements from around the game it appears they can feel temperature (and therefor do have ‘thermoreceptors’) but are not adversely affected nor severely discomforted by it the way a creature of flesh and blood would be. Things like hypothermia and frostbite do not appear to affect sylvari, or at least not at the same threshold as it would a human. That doesn’t necessarily mean they are immune to the far ends of the spectrum, though- things like fire or a drake’s frost breath are still harmful.

By the dialogue, I think it’s randomly tailored to one of the pact soldiers there. Jennah for the human, Zojja for the asura. Third one is a charr, so maybe Rytlock?

Intriguing, but I would like to point out that the krait have no difficulties surviving and fighting on land, via both Shadows in the Water and our own experiences in GW1. I agree that they appear to be empowering themselves for their war against the surface races, but it is not necessary to their survival on land.

Other than that, I rather agree with all your points. The terraforming in particular seems a potent weapon to strip the land of the resources the terrestrial races need to survive.

Like Narcemus said. There’s roughly one random NPC added to your home instance at the the of every chapter, there to forever remain, without dialogue and often without explanation. Honestly, Mira was the only one that made any kind of sense to me- at least she, injured as she is, always appears near a bed.

I disagree. Their primary attack is still Life Blast, which is straight out of the necromancer’s repertoire, even if the poison cloud was somehow racial instead of necromancer (and note that the hypnoss used it before the big update that gave everything else poison). In addition, the new effect, which I may note is only utilized by vets, elites, and champs, while appearing visually similar to a chaos storm, only inflicts confusion (indicative of mind-muddling rather than true chaos magic) and results in a hallucination, not a mesmer illusion. As hallucinations are outright stated to be a result of the atmospheric toxins that the new alliance is playing with, I’d say that the hypnoss just found a different way to weaponize it- as you noted, they’ve a proclivity for poisons.

Interesting… found what you guys are talking about, and my apologies for jumping the gun there. It’s called “Summon Minions” and ends with a hallucination spawning. As the hallucinations are supposed to be due to the toxins, not magic, I’d still argue that it’s just a poison causing the effects of a mesmer mindkitten.

The other races adopted the years and dates. Why only adopt part of a calender?

Ah, the Shadow Behemoth… unfortunately, we don’t know near enough about it to say rather it technically qualifies as a demon or not, only that it is hostile, from the Underworld, and appears to be the same sort of creature as the Aatxe, which may or may not be nightmares- mechanical groupings are not a reliable indicator of how things are in the story.

Honestly, I loved how bizarre the torment creatures were… but no, there are none yet in-game. Imps are effectively your cliche demon look, with fire/ice/shadow effects mixed in, but any imp that’s under veteran rank is rather unimpressive, so don’t expect the same difficulty as you’d find in demons in other games.

Quite the opposite, Zoltreez- every one of us agrees that these are demons. The debate here is how far that definition can be spread.

And since we’re kinda beating around the bush, here is the GW definition of demon, verbatim from the Nightfall manuscripts:

“Outside the world we know, other dimensions exist, realms beyond what we can see and experience. Civilized humans know that when they die, their souls pass on into the Mists, the realm of the afterlife. Some spirits linger in this world, or find ways to walk back into the realm of flesh…yet there are other creatures who watch them and wait, drawn to the energy of countless souls.

Sometimes souls are not enough. In dimensions alien to the physical world, sentient entities scheme of ways to enter the realm of flesh, dreaming of the havoc they can wreak. Just as ghosts can defy death by returning to the land of the living, demons find ways into our world, where they feast on suffering, despair, and the vital energy of intelligent creatures.

Demons are more than creatures of the Mists—they are made from the Mists themselves, bits of etheric matter that have gained malignant sentience and power. Whether they appear as monstrous humanoids, bestial abominations, or radically inhuman horrors, they share many of the same aspirations: the strong consume or dominate the weak, reveling in their feasts and victimization. As they are not native to the real world, demons hold an abiding hatred of its denizens. They are also ruthlessly intelligent, more than willing to enter into arrangements that allow them to routinely prey on humans and other foolish living creatures. "

So, in short a demon is a creature that is A.) Made from the Mists themselves, B.) From the Mists, C.) Sentient, intelligent, and hateful of life, D.) Feed on negative emotions and vital energy of living beings, and E.) Desire to enter the physical world.

^ There’s a dialogue in one of the Ash camps in Fireheart that indicates that Ascalon can be completely covered in snow for the duration of winter. Seeing as northern Ascalon is largely volcanic/Flame wastes, that’s the only place I wouldn’t expect snow.

Also, another case of saying ‘winter’ instead of the proper ’Season of the Colossus"…

Assuming the obelisks are only found in the areas the krait inhabit, and not throughout the lower regions of the world, then it makes no sense at all, as they’d be square within known Bubbles territory. Assuming they aren’t… well, that raises quite a few additional questions.

Toxic Oratuss and Hypnoss both use necro spell effects exclusively. The higher ranked Hypnoss now use poison clouds that function similarly to chaos storms, but it’s the same attack visually as what the Hypnoss have always done- even uses the same name in the combat log.

Those are concept arts, subject to any level of change. They might end up exactly as depicted, or they might be unrecognizable as what is depicted there, or anything in-between.

There’s a dialogue in the Grove, of all places, saying Jennah is almost thirty. That’d have her taking the throne somewhere in her late teens.

To be fair, most enemies in GW1 were spellcasters. And like I said, the new krait are sufficiently disconnected to the old krait to make comparisons. And just because they’re led by spellcasters, doesn’t mean those spellcasters are remarkable compared to other races.

The word used in the Aquatic Fractal is “morphological properties” which suggests it is either non-magical or ornate, rather than some sort of spell. Furthermore, that Fractal is already suspected to be a mish-mash of unrelated things, and cannot be considered an accurate representation.

The Nonmoa krait does seem to have some sort of control over the weather (however, I’d argue that she’s less casting and more invoking) however this control does not extend beyond making an overcast drizzle and inspiring the nearby krait. When you actually fight the witches, they’re indistinguishable from champ hypnosses (hypnoi?)- that is, they use standard necromantic spells and summon more krait/barracuda. To paraphrase what you said on a different thread, necromancers != mesmers.

I dunno, Konig… while the blog post didn’t mention it, the new NPC says that the significance of the obelisks are that they’re to be “the vehicles of the prophets’ return”.

Using the approximate scale of levels, I always figured that that personal story step took place after the events of the open world heart- that the zone is set back in time to before the risen corrupted it. The weirdest part about that zone, to me, is that the largest krait city in-game had not a single event associated with it.

Actually, of all the dungeons, TA is the only one that we can say with absolute certainty had all its bosses killed. No matter what path is picked, Fyonna, Vevina and Leurant all are slain. Unfortunately, looking at past precedent, there’s no reason to believe we’ll ever be told who’s at the head of this group of NC. Look at the Molten Alliance. Besides the random and inexplicably blue leaders of each facility, we never saw any of their leadership, neither compositely nor as separate entities.

The thing is, though, we don’t know that the Pale Tree chooses what sylvari look like. The only thing that indicates she might is an ambiguously worded interview pre-release, which was inaccurate on several accounts by the time the game actually launched. Can you imagine individually sculpting each of the thousands of sylvari that the Pale Tree is pumping out? And to what end?

So, this just occurred to me, and since this thread is talking about the holes in Scarlet’s story I’ll put it here…

Scarlet/Ceara was on Teyo’s krewe leading up to the Snaff Prize. We don’t know that this is our Snaff Prize from the asuran personal story, but assuming it is, Teyo’s krewe was also the one in charge of that year’s entry. And what was said entry? A device that is capable of bending non-asura to the user’s will. IF Scarlet used the Floating Grizwhirl- and I’m not saying she did, just that it’s a possibility- but if she did, I’d feel a lot better about her managing to smooth-talk her way with the Flame Legion and dredge leadership. Though it would still be aggravating that the devs didn’t even hint at it until a short story months later.

Nowhere is it said that the obelisks extend above the surface, and in a couple of places it is implied that they do not, though I grant that it is never outright said.

Krait aren’t known for spellcasting. Yes spellcasters hold rank in their society, but the only substantial lore resources we’ve had on krait only say they practice magic, not what kinds or how powerful. In-game, we can see with our own eyes that they only magic they utilize these days is a form of necromancy, even those varieties that formerly used other sorts, like the hypnoss and arcanoss. If I had to guess, I’d say that’s their niche, much like centaurs as a race only practice forms of earth magic. The Nightmare Court, on the other hand, has been seen in multiple occasions holding mesmers in high esteem, especially when it comes to spreading nightmare through interactions with other races, and they practice forms of mesmerism beyond the mainstream run-of-the-mill the playable races seem to like, so I’d guess that they created the veil.

Kos, I’ve got a couple theories there, but the krait themselves seem to believe that these obelisks are how their prophets shall return. Interestingly enough, though, the Oratuss we fight never mentions the prophets- instead, he has a line that suggests that they seek themselves to ascend in like manner. As for the NC- we still don’t even know what they’re doing here, so speculation is difficult.

The new lore NPC says that they’re massive (forgot her exact words, but that’s the gist of it.) And while they may be ripped from the obelisks, that still doesn’t answer how Scarlet got them- it’d be even harder for her to track down little pieces of the things.

Yes, that’s my point. To change that would be to compromise environmental themes they’ve been fine-tuning since GW1 launched, and greatly detract from the uniqueness and distinctness of these different regions.

Well, that and that you’ve got one of her steam portals going in the southern part of the zone. Maybe elsewhere too.

Xoee also implies Scarlet’s involvement. Unfortunately, I’ve completed the obelisk hunt, so I no longer have access to Dolja’s mention. Could someone who does transcribe it here, word-for-word?

EDIT: Oh, and one of Marjory’s ambient dialogues states her conviction of Scarlet’s involvement too. Still not a guarantee of her involvement, but at the very least we’re looking at someone imitating her.

The one downhill from the vet raptor? It’s always been there.

Difficulty aside, I don’t think they will solely due to aesthetics. The early fall look is iconic to Ascalon, and a large part of what makes the Shiverpeaks distinct is that they are the only place we see snow- and on top of that, people will be unhappy if a third of the game was switched to a primarily white and gray palate.

Oh? Would it have anything to do with the fact that it isn’t near as luminescent as the other toxic krait? That was the second thing to jump out at me. Well, maybe third.

I’m pretty sure Thal, Konig, and therapite are the only ones who were on the winning side. I’m just splitting my funds equally among them

For those of you, like me, who rarely poke their heads out of this hole, I’d like to bring this to your attention. The devs have asked for our input regarding the Living World, and have promised to chime in and discuss it with us.

In this here lore forum, there has been much… shall we say, critique of that very aspect. I encourage all of you who’ve been active in past discussions here to make yourself heard on this new thread and reiterate your points. It’s very rare that an opportunity arises where the devs promise to pay attention to our concerns; don’t let it go to waste!

We’ve heard a grand total of nothing from Trahearne. As for the elder Dragons, there have been times when the community has jumped and said “Bubbles!” or “Mordremoth!” but those are all at the least unsubstantiated alarm. There’s nothing about Zhaitan being dead, very little about the Pact other than that they’re still interested in fighting dragons, in short no development of anything from the Personal Story. Essentially the Living Story acts as a completely unconnected parallel plot.

Fractals lore hasn’t been expanded upon since its release, but we did see more of the Consortium during that Southsun stuff- but the wiki has most of that.

The only other thing the norn have that’s larger than a homestead is Cragstead, which is perhaps comparable to Beetletun. I’d be interested to see/hear your source for there being multiple cities- I’ve certainly never come across it.

Yes, humans only have two major cities- that’s one more than the asura, sylvari, or norn. Still, the number of population centers is only an approximate model of the races’ power. In the case of Divinity’s Reach and Ebonhawke, you’re seeing more of a vestige of past power than a current claim.

As far as the humans losing to the centaurs, that’s because they went into that war with both hands tied behind their back. The Ministry undercut the Seraph at every opportunity, both by the body’s indecisiveness and more directly treasonous actions by certain Ministers. Their performance is in no way reflective of their power.

To answer for the ones you specifically asked about-

Lightbringer has always been a term used by the Order of Whispers for those who lead the way in the fight against darkness. At the time of GW1 it was defined as “someone who serves as a beacon to others, illuminating the way of righteousness in these dark times.” In GW2 it serves a more codified role as the highest rank of operative in the Order, but the connotations of the original meaning most likely remain.

I don’t know rather there are any enforcers in the Peacemakers- it sounds like a task that organization would leave to golems- but there is no such rank in the Vigil. Nor are there Justiciars- that title was one of substantial standing in the White Mantle, and such a negative association serves to insure it is not resurrected for modern use. The rank-and-file of the Vigil are Crusaders, and the officers are Warmasters, like the old Ascalonian military officers, and equivalent to the Priory Magisters.

Do the asura have specific bounty-hunter type troops? Probably not. I doubt any of Tyria’s governments have that sort of capacity- too many places to go to ground, too many more substantial difficulties tying up their troops. Even the orders of Tyria, who have a greater reach than any government, turn to independent guilds to bring in bounties.

A general note about the Peacemakers- the asura in that organization are mostly marginalized to deskwork and oversight. There is an ambient dialogue in the Arcane Council chambers that states they have ten golems to every asura, and that that discrepancy is only growing. Only in the rare aberrant case where a golem is insufficient for the brute work required would a Peacemaker dirty his own hands.

EDIT: The exception to this appears to be those members of the Peacemakers directly involved in combating the Inquest, possibly because the Inquest has a variety of means to renders their golems a liability, possibly because to go after a group with such sway with the Arcane Council deprives them of official support, likely a mixture of the two.

Usoku is not our only indicator. We know things were bad enough at the time of the rise of Orr- a century before GW2, and a century after Usoku’s reforms- that the Tengu left behind lands that in GW1’s time they were willing to fight to the bitter end to keep.

Personally, it is my hope that Usoku is still alive, a wizened immortal sitting on the throne of the most powerful nation to ever exist (while precedent shows that such a thing is within the realm of possibility in Tyria, I stress that there is no reason to believe that it has happened; this is simply my hopes for an intriguing Cantha).

There may be advantages to mages wearing light armor, but there are NPC’s that don’t follow those restrictions, so lore-wise I’d say they don’t exist. Ash Legion necros, for instance, wear medium armor, and Bria, also a necro, wore heavy armor in life.

I really don’t see where people are drawing the husk comparison from. Husks are yellow, going on orange near the bottom edge. The new krait are yellow-green going on green, much the same shade as shadow imps or twisted clockworks.

No, mostly because of the Nightmare Court roots coming out of the tower.

Obelisks, until this coming patch comes, have not been mentioned a single time in-game. All we have to go on is the pre-release article, which is strange enough on it’s own. I mean, how would surface scholars even know these things exist, let alone enough to formulate hypotheses about their origins?

To the best of my knowledge, anyway, it’s just an inference. One of those pre-release articles said the only reason Blood plays nice with the others in Ascalon is because Bangar hates the humans even more than he mistrusts the other legions. More of a “what-if” thought process for potential future stories. Personally, I don’t buy into it, simply on account of the Renegades’ pitiful size, but it would be interesting if it were true.

Ah, yes. Still, disregard for underlings’ safety and willingness to let others take the risks does not equate to viewing someone as “material”.

Um… that event really only indirectly touches on asura at all. It’s about a charr who has developed a way to contain the Ascalonian ghosts, with a touch of asura magitech enabling a small part of the process. Certainly nothing about using other asura as ‘disposable materials’, a practice only done by the Inquest. Asura may be callous towards their assistants and whatever accidents might happen to them, but that’s another issue entirely.

As to the OP, power is distributed roughly evenly among the five playable races. Each is able to exert control over the lands surrounding their capital, but not so far out that they begin conflicting with another’s sphere of influence. It’s impossible to quantify such things, of course, but a few general observations can be made.

Asura have no possibility of being the next rulers of Tyria (though I can see one as the next ruler’s able right hand). Asura can’t even rule asura. Squabbles between themselves aside, asuran culture is so noncohesive that each krewe ultimately functions as a political body apart. The Arcane Council wields power only in the sense that it has the most bullyboys, both in the sense of Peacemakers and Arcane Eye, but while this is ideal for maintaining order and staying top of the pile, it is useless as a tool of conquest. Bottom line, as much as asura like to talk about their race’s assured dominance, they don’t have the political or military apparatus to back it up. The one exception being the Inquest, and organization that, while promising at first, has since attracted any number of enemies, both within the asura and without, which ties their hands rather severely. Technologically, the asura are top dog, but while that allows them to make themselves useful it isn’t something that can be leveraged for control.

Charr are the second-biggest wildcard. From what we see already in-game, I would say they are the strongest race- well-disciplined army,culture experienced in conquest, very centralized power structure, technological innovation second only to the asura. In addition to all that, though, while we’ve seen most of what the other races have, the charr have at least as much again as we’ve already seen somewhere to the north and east, in the lands of Ash and Blood. Beyond the guess that they aren’t as technologically advanced, we can’t say much about these other assets, but seeing as what we’ve seen is already better than what the other races have to offer, I’d say that a charr nation under a Khan-Ur is the only form of monoracial dominance Tyria is likely to see.

Humans- can’t say much about them, too many ifs. If they manage to get back on their feet, if they can expunge governmental corruption and power plays, if they can decisively drive back the centaurs, if the other races then give them room to breath for a bit, then we shall see if they’re in any position to be a power again.

Norn- Lots of potential individually, but will never dominate anything but their own stories. Perhaps some could be good shock troops or mercenaries, but much like the asura, actual rule is out of their character. They’re also in a vulnerable situation similar to what the humans once were, in that a lot of their power and culture depends on the patronage of their guardian Spirits.

Sylvari- biggest wild card. As Infamous touched on, there are any number of scenarios where sylvari dominate the globe, but here it’s less ifs and more outright questions: How long will the Pale Tree maintain this exponential birthrate? Once it ends, will it end for good, or just slow? How many other trees are there? What are their birthrates? How successful will the Nightmare Court be in the long run? How long can a sylvari live? Will Trahearne ever find his emotions? The list goes on and on. Far too many unknowns, so like the humans, I’d say check back in another century or so.

EDIT: Also, one huge caveat for the humans- last we’d heard, and we have no reason to believe this has changed, a different human nation held an entire continent with an iron fist. So here’s another if: if the Dragon Empire has the will and the means to enter a colonial stage, the charr might have a very good fight on their hands.

@Konig The color looks familiar to me as well. You can’t put too much stock into that, unless Mordremoth is also the progenitor of all shadow imps.

There aren’t, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. There weren’t any MA or Twisted clockworks there either (unless you count the Clockheart) and very few steam creatures. On top of that the base was still under construction, so I doubt anyone had moved in beyond the construction crews and what was necessary to meet Scarlet’s quotas.

^ Actually, you do see the Aetherblades constructing the ships in the new TA. My guess is that they stole a template and reverse-engineered it.

Fortunately, there is no chance of that occurring, as the Mists are Scarlet’s subconscious mind. That’s how she was able to see the Eternal Alchemy- the sensory deprivation chamber wasn’t perfect, a little light got in, and she saw her own reflection.

Apparently the witches do. There’s one in Caledon, and there was one in that field now, so it isn’t out of the question.

Not sure it matters, but the Hypnoss were also more appropriately mesmers in GW1- though they use necromancer-esque abilities now.

EDIT: Now that I’ve done personal research, the witches are quasi-necromancers too. So no, it appears they don’t, but nonetheless mesmer magic has been used.

We can guess. While age doesn’t seem to be a factor, there are any number of other ways one can die in Tyria. It’s a possibility, but to assume either way is a shot in the dark.