Guild Wars 2

Andele.1306:

Charr are all big fluffy tsundere balls for cuddle, ofc you first have to beat them into crying since they would wanna rip your eyes out if you didnt, but still /hug on each of them~

Whaddyaknow? Elmyra Duff did live in Ebonhawke after all! lol

Oliver.4017:

When I see her armor of the white and gold I instantly think: WHITE MANTLE. But I could be wrong. Did anyone else think that or am I just bonkers? Not to mention her being all Miss Shady. Just some food for thought.

Naw its not just you, I’m thinking it as well.

mjhungness.8059:

Her armor looks awesome! But if she’s the new DE, will she also have a thing for Queen Jenna? (wink wink nod nod)

With our luck she’ll go for Smodur the Unflinching or Knut Whitebear

Duke Blackrose.4981:

Mathias.9657:

Obviously Jora from GW1. Dat armor… even though war heroes sucked I still used her haha.

If we’re counting Guild Wars 1 heroes, the answer is Livia.

Sorry, but I didn’t hear Hayda so I had to give the correct answer.
It is Hayda.

Name Vlad Mortis (formerly Brol Grogson)

Approximate Age 40

Affiliation Order of Whispers

Race Norn

Profession Necromancer

His name will echo throughout the shadows. He is the monster who fights monsters.
Sons of Svanir see his name as a curse word.

Appearance
He is a tall Norn, wide bodied, with short unkempt blonde hair and dark eyes.
His face is traced with many lines due to weather and combat.
He always carries a backpack that looks like a sack of toys and a scepter wand that has a pink star on it.

History
Youth
Brol was a simple Norn child before his life changed. He played and hunted with his family.
His father was a fine metalworker and sold meats to make extra coin.
His mother’s reputation as a wonderful tailor and leatherworker became an activity he enjoyed as well.
He had no siblings, but plenty of other children from nearby families served as proxy.

Early Life
Brol’s life as a young man changed forever with the death of his friend Val Ogdendottir.
They were trying to hunt a wolf and show their parents they were ready to strike out as adults.
During the hunt things went well until they finally realized the wolf was leading them to its pack.
Both managed to kill the wolf and drive away the pack, but Val was hurt badly and dying.
Brol was frantic and urged her to hold on as they made their way to the homestead.
It was at the homestead that the people living there realized Val was already dead, but moving because of Brol’s urgings. He didn’t notice that he raised her up from the dead briefly in his state of fear for her and his love.

This sickened her family and frightened many, but his father took the young man to a Raven Havroun.
The Havroun confered with the others and decided the boy must walk with Snow Leopard. This potential of his was mighty, but also deadly; Raven smiled on the boy but Leopard must nurture him. He had good intentions trying to help Val, but he needs to spend some time on his own for fear of repeating that again.

The boy never knew of Orr, Zhaitan, or the Risen. Yet the Shamans were worried he could be corrupted. The boy known as Brol Grogson changed his name to Vlad Mortis because he saw that young man as “dead” when Val died and needed to be reborn. The name Vlad came from a human merchant who was always kind to his parents.

Current Status
He hunts alone in Tyria now, he joined the order after the Elder Dragon’s fall. After Zhaitan’s fall, he decided to hear the stories of those heroes at Lion’s Arch during Wintersday.
After purchasing a toy bag and a pretty scepter some human found it funny to mock the big Norn buying such a strange things. It cost that human two teeth and Vlad was arrested. When the Lionsguard woman came to collect him, she didn’t have any cuffs or manacles but he went with her offering no resistance. After she inquired why he didn’t run he simply replied, “You faced someone bigger than you, but I saw Snow Leopard laughing at that danger in your eyes. I respect that, so I followed.”

Affiliations
Guilds and Groups
None. He walks the path of Snow Leopard.

Family and Friends
His family hasn’t spoken to him since the “death” of his previous life.
He wishes them well and prefers to patrol the Shiverpeaks attacking Sons of Svanir to protect homesteads like his former one.

Personality
Temperament
He is rather flippant about the divide between life and death in some moments.
Out of all the Humans he ever heard about he thinks Grenth would be the best one to ever meet.
He does respect those who stand their ground. As with the case of the Lionguard, Vlad took his time in jail to sew together a small doll from cloth scraps and straw. He presented it to her as a gift when he was released. He uses leatherworking and tailoring as hobbies to calm his mind when things get crazy. He shudders and hates the Risen because of his past.

Stories and Art Involving This Character
I don’t have any good armor on him yet so no picture available, sorry.

Randulf.7614:

I’m suprised they don’t make it easier to download the books, say from their own website. It’s an easy money spin for them and would fill in some lore gaps for people, especially the destiny’s Edge one

You mean like the link they have already?
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/shop/

Logan Thackeray
Somewhat decent in the book, voice actor isn’t too bad, but overall he doesn’t learn his lesson well until our character comes in after two missions and finally gets he was thick. Though he finally apologizes of sorts in Citadel.
Overall a wash really, I don’t like him but I don’t hate him.

Trahearne
The problem here was ANet put so much focus on the Destiny’s Edge before this game launched we knew nothing about Trees and Oats here. He should not have been the hero proxy of the Personal Story. I pity him more than hate because he was trying to compete with Destiny’s Edge for our attention and didn’t do well.

Rurik
Thank the Gods for the Stone Summit roflstomping him! I didn’t mind his logic of reaching out to Kryta, but his AI was so idiotic I muttered in one mission “This boy is going to get me killed”. I was partially right, but wrong target. I will spare one Stone Summit dwarf as a thank you for ridding us of him.

Kormir
Nobody loves you Kormir.

Vayne.8563:

So to me, I didn’t see it as an individual battle. The entire battle with Zhaitan, to me, was a war that took weeks.

That’s kind of how I saw the dungeon as well.
Yes if you specifically pick on the big Godzilla Dragon moment only then the fight was a bust.
However if you factor in that you had to fight your way through three zones, liberate some temples (just to make things easier), blow up his boats, cut out his eyes, destroy his mouth, storm the beaches, take over his artillery, clean out Orr, and then deal with whatever mobs he frantically throws at you as a last ditch defense then the battle on Z felt better. Those three zones were him, parts of him, big BIG cooperative dungeons that were hair pulling insane at times.

Leo, I do understand where you are going with this.
However at the same time I feel that dungeons or Fractals would be the best place to ‘force’ people into being social. Whether or not they actually are is a completely different issue altogether.

Yes PvE is like playing single player, it has been that way even with GW1 and other games. Champions and group activities require some coordination even if that coordination doesn’t really need much communication.

I honestly never felt closer bonds to people when content required me to group up.
Helping the lower level character through a skill point, lending a hand with some Orr events, etc helped me in a better sense because there was always that ability to say “okay bye” and not feel too bad.

Some people have managed to use Guild activities to help others open up, others tend to do whatever they cook up in their minds to get people sociable. These are all fine ideas, but its if the player themselves are social or not really should be the question.

I’ve run instances in GW1 where folks hardly talked. WoW had really muted people as well.

If you make it available as a food tray recipe, I’ll glady plunk down the gold to make multiples for lower level folks to eat it.

Scott McGough.6897:

Glad to see the Faren love. Sorry he’s not everybody’s cup of tea, but he’s one of our favorites to write (and a fave of the voice actor Yuri Lowenthal, who supplies Faren’s dulcet tones).

So Ben 10 is Faren huh? That explains why I didn’t mind him too much.
I like his work.

Lady Kasmeer is a brand new character who is making her extended cameo debut in the Secret of Southsun. We will see more of her in future releases (or, I should say, we’ll spend more time with her but see less of her, as she won’t always be wearing her beach gear).

Just make her an Elementalist, that way her armor is still the beach garb.
BADUMPTISH!

Kraggy.4169:

My Necromancer wants one of these whips .. to go with her thigh-length black leather boots and …

… I think I need go lie down for a bit.

That’ll raise some minions lol.

Funny, in IoJ our chats are usually friendly and helpful.
Yes there are the stretches of time where most of it will be locations for group events, but when people do ask questions they get feedback.

Our Lion’s Arch is helpful as well, the other day I partied up with a guild to help on bounty hunting for the first time.

Hmmm hot, blonde, pretty, gold-white armor, shiny and frilly things like the Mursaat sticking around it.
Yep she’s the evil person in this game, probably the person those Molten were talking about.

Astralporing.1957:

There was a reason why so many people liked GW1’s Pre-Searing, especially as compared to later Ascalon…

Pirlipat.2479:

@Astralporing: Erm, sry could you elaborate your point please abit? I have never played GW1 and I’m somehow missing the reference.^^

Pre-Searing Ascalon was beautiful and bright, much like Queensdale in GW2 is.
Post-Searing Ascalon was a burned out dead looking place of despair, so combine that area near Shaemoor Garrison (where we fought the Earth Elemental) with Orr.

I don’t want a lot of grit in my games like GW2. I see too much of it in other medias as it is. Its now getting to the point where its boring in some places.

I feel that GW2 does have some grittiness to it, but enough to still make it family friendly. People do say ‘ kitten #8217;, Oozes show up if Bandits poison the watering hole, Black Citadel is industrial, not eco friendly, and the Charr are still pushy.

Then we’ve got beautiful pristine areas like Rata Sum and the Sylvari gardens which brighten the game.

In GW1 I too loved Pre-Searing Ascalon and the Charr areas in Eye of the North because they had life and looked like they were separated from the horrors.

I couldn’t stand Kaening City in Factions. In fact I can’t finish that episode because the city is so wretched.

I See No Tomorrow.7302:

And Anet said that they wanted everyone to feel like a hero. Well Anet, I support you on most things but this is actually kinda offensive to some people. You’re telling people that they cannot look like a hero if they have other body types than those portrayed in the game. I mean, congrats on having so many options in the first place, but these options don’t provide nearly the variation that is needed.

I wouldn’t blame ArenaNet too much for that. They are following the hero archetypes that have been echoing throughout story telling for countless generations. I too would like more varied body types.

Even though I’m more for the idea of letting living stories die out once they’ve served their time, I do also see the desire to replay certain moments. I did that with Braham and Rox’s missions before the F&F ended.

Sure ArenaNet gave us Fractals, possibly the one avenue where old dungeons go to live again, but I think we should also look at it from another angle that OP touched on.

For elements in the Living story that people missed, the non-dungeon instanced stories, ArenaNet should use the recap NPCs in a bigger way. They were available if you beat that instance but wanted to play again. We should not only ask for Fractals of dungeons, we should put out on the Suggestion forum a desire for a storyteller NPC which acts as the Recap. They could put one in each major city or even just the Major cities of the Races for that event.

F&F would have a Norn and Charr NPC dedicated to keeping those stories available in the form of recap: “Listen to my tale of Braham and his friends…” or “Some cub named Rox jumped at the chance to defend the Legions, here’s the mission report”.

Southsun could be one of those where at the beach some Lionguard retells the story: “Whew you missed out on a wild party….” Though since Cove doesn’t have any instances yet, I am not sure if this one would be possible.
You get the picture.
Each living story instanced mission we get could create these NPCs near the major cities or areas where the action happened and so won’t clutter the landscape with old missions, but still allow people to go back if they want.

Crona.2509:

why does sooooo manny guyz say EIR ? she’s soooo ugly :o

Tall, redheaded, and some guys like that voice.
Norn women have the leg up on some of the Human women, though I will agree Reil and the good Countess are stunning examples of Human.

From LOTRO:
Housing and storage for town clothes

From GW1:
The ability to save and load up traits as I had them.
Also the fact that I could name my pet in GW1 and it stay that name unless I change it again. Lately in GW2 it forgets my pet’s name or the nicknames I’ve established for my friend’s list.

Sepreh.5924:

PolawBew.2851:

anyhoo, here’s Dwayna… pales in comparison.

Don’t let malchor hear you say that

lol I remember one of the Pact Soldiers guarding the Dwayna statue say he couldn’t understand why people found her hot.
He liked more stout women and didn’t believe in the gods, but I love little moments like that in game.

Somewhere out there are worshippers in Kryta that probably think someone like Grenth is dreamy, heck with this forum there’s probably a few posters as well.

The intro videos for every race, especially Charr.
However the moments I love best were in that final mission in Arah.
When the Champion Eye of Zhaitan tried to play with my head I just thought “That’s it you die NOW!” In fact that’s why it made my signature today.
The second best was during the final moments when Fear not this Night played instrumental, the game slowed down, and I hear the Pact forces screaming to hold the line. This would be it!
I loved final showdowns like that.

I’m liking it so far because the minigames, events, and the fact that all of this brought some life to a dead island.
I’ll be disappointed when some things go away, but I hope the Living Story will revisit it again afterwards.

I enjoyed this part of the Living Story very much.
I especially loved how we get buffs based on which side we want to help out.
Plus anything which gives that island more life to it will get bonus points with me.

MistaMike.7356:

lol its a silly game… running around with a crab who thought of this.. i mean its good but whoever came up with it has a silly mind..

I think that’s part of the reason why I love it.
Only with this mini game can I scream out loud “I finally caught crabs!” with a smile on my face and explain it in a way where people don’t back away from me. It is just so weird and out there, that’s the fun.

Oh sweet Gods my Guardian would marry her. Panda hat with bathing suit, she fears nothing.
Also that’s the most adorable panda hat I’ve never gotten to see. lol

Melee claws for Engineers and Necros.

I love it! This is like Keg Brawling, but smaller arena and more fun.
Sure they could tone down the amount of Vet Karka on the field but other than that I wish this was permanent.

Isn’t a Rift some place in the Fractals?
Oh it is another game. Good luck to them, I’m going to log back into GW2 when I can today.

I don’t think we’ll permanently lose a chunk of the gamer base. People tend to have habits where they will drop a game but then come back to see if its dead yet or they are curious about something new.

Bloodstealer.5978:

This is exactly why you will always be a number not a person in an MMO… where did the OP say you have to stop in the middle of something and type “HI” but then you knew that already, your just too plain ignorant and looked for the easiest way to try and get yourself noticed… life in your guild must be real peachy.

But at the end of the day… each to their own

This is where you’ll always be someone who doesn’t read posts apparently and make snap judgments. I feel so sad for your guildies.

Let’s look at the part where OP gets judgemental at how people play right off the bat shall we?

if you consider yourself too busy with farming for that, really, useless legendary skin to even say HELLO, then you are doing it WRONG. Really, I don’t care how busy you are – It takes you like, 2 seconds to type “hi” if someone says hello – You ALWAYS have enough time for that, it works for me, and it can work for YOU too.

If I’m in the middle of a fight I don’t have two seconds. If you read further, which apparently it seems like you didn’t, you’ll notice that I do tend to chat when there’s no danger nearby.

But then again you’re just too plain ignorant and looked for the easiest way to try and get yourself noticed I see, once again I weep for your guildies.

Also the only guild I have is one I made up for the guild stash only. I don’t invite folks, I don’t expect to expand, and I noticed there less guild invite spam when I have my tag on.

So despite your ignorance you were correct in one assumption: life in my guild is rather peachy.

So I’ll award troll attempt a decent 5/10. Good show so far.

Some things should stay permanent, such as minigames like this crab toss (oh so much fun and frustrating), but events and storylines really should give way to new ones if they plan on making a living story that changes and grows.

Meanwhile we have people screaming that they were never informed of such Living Story moments. This game really does have the spectrum of players it seems.
Though I will say if they added some way to alter the UI and give folks the ability to disable this it might help some.

I’ve done the following multiple times with joy:

*Showed people where Lion’s Arch is, explaining how their Hall of Monuments stuff worked out from GW1 to GW2

*Randomly rez players who take on mobs nearly twice their experience.

*Lay out food trays because someone could benefit from the buffs. Which brings me to a question: Do they need to be a certain level to enjoy a certain food tray?

*Loop around most hearts and champions to help anyone out just…because.

*Answer questions and offer tips on the professions.

*Randomly mail away potions, boost items, and food because I craft way too much.

AntiGw.9367:

penatbater.4710:

You want raids? Go do Grenth :P

In GW2, Grenth raids you!

Lyssa and that kitten Gorilla.

To some degree Mercurio I get that, but from the non-VOIP side of things that can get a little distracting to just listen.
Some folks do have a problem with trying to play a game while someone chatters, makes noises on mic, or just overall background noise filtering in.

Then there’s the handicaps. Some have social anxiety but can handle text, some could be hard of hearing, or might have some speech problems.

On the rare occasions I do actually VOIP on a shooter I play this one player talks like Sgt Hooks from Police Academy. Its a very soft whisper of talk even with their mic on high volume. At times I just have the poor soul text the grid location where he wants me to kill things.

For this game I have no problem using Skype or other programs similar. I did that for a former player who wanted me to guild up, but I never really contribute much in the way of small talk because it just doesn’t fit me. For missions or other things related to gameplay I contribute quite well however.

But yes overall it is a pain to type up things while in game. My earlier post brings up a fair example to which I can expand on. A few days back I was holding back the centaur waves at Shaemoor garrison when someone on my friends list popped up and I replied, “Hi. Centaurs.”

After the event was over I was more than happy to explain what that line meant.

Very nice Mercurio, if I were ever in SF I’d help pitch in.

Nice videos, but for some reason I came into the thread thinking of Team America’s “America” song instead. lol

Farzo.8410:

The flower looks better, in my opinion :P

Now I want that for a Sylvari character.
I don’t care which one, but he’ll get it!

Mine too but I didn’t want people to know.
Ah crud now they do.

Wow, Cthlulhu/Unseen Ones all into one backpiece.
How…scary.

Goodie for you then.

Oxstar.7643:

if you consider yourself too busy with farming for that, really, useless legendary skin to even say HELLO, then you are doing it WRONG. Really, I don’t care how busy you are – It takes you like, 2 seconds to type “hi” if someone says hello – You ALWAYS have enough time for that, it works for me, and it can work for YOU too.

I’ll try to remember that next time I’m swamped with Risen, Minotaurs, Centaurs, Flame Legion, or Karka.

Hmmm kill this mob or say hi then die… :p
It seems like every time I get someone from my friends list messaging me it is right in the middle of the fight. At least most of them tend 5 minutes or so to wait before asking if anything is wrong.

brainlessant.3641:

Atlas.9704:

brainlessant.3641:

Maybe Anet could allow newcomers like me or future players to experience F&F in a different environment…Maybe in a server where the world is stuck in a timeloop with F&F event.

That would be akin to asking the Universe to allow you a chance to relive the 5th grade because you missed a friend’s party.

There will be other events, other stories, and you can participate in them now that you are in this game.

Of course I always welcome new Fractals as Hoyvin spoke earlier.

I dont really know exactly what Fractals is but Im assuming its like WoW’s (Please dont hurt me!!!) Caverns of Times where you replay the past events.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Fractals_of_the_Mists
Not that far off I guess, I’ve never played WoW. Fractals is just a dungeon which has different moments in time to play out. This gives the ability for ANet to put dang well whatever they want as a Dungeon.

Still, Im quite a completionist.
The fact that I cant get 100% on certain parts of the game kinda disappoints me…
It also doesnt help that I have gotten only 1 achievement from F&F (Kindling the bonfire achievement)

I can see myself in the future:
FFFFFFFF-
99% completion rate….only thing left is F&F living story
IT BURNSSSS AHHHHHHHH

Well maybe one day the concept of Living Story will give you that chance. shrugs
I for one didn’t finish Lost Shore, Wintersday, or Halloween.
Also there’s achievements we can’t even complete like bar brawl at the moment.

RedSpectrum.1975:

Chaotic Storm.2815:

i’m a 50/50 on this, I love the exotic nature of sylvari, but I also love a women with long legs and lets face is norns got that in spades

Its like….picture throwing a hotdog down a hallway. :/

Yeah but they look so nice

brainlessant.3641:

Maybe Anet could allow newcomers like me or future players to experience F&F in a different environment…Maybe in a server where the world is stuck in a timeloop with F&F event.

That would be akin to asking the Universe to allow you a chance to relive the 5th grade because you missed a friend’s party.

There will be other events, other stories, and you can participate in them now that you are in this game.

Of course I always welcome new Fractals as Hoyvin spoke earlier.

Satisfactory for the small size it was given, but if promised a “expansions worth of content” then no. Though I will give the concept of the Living Story that scale because it is constantly growing.

Flame and Frost is more like looking at part of a chapter and thinking this was the book. Things are set into motion, stuff that was introduced could come back. The Lost Shores and this most recent event are examples of such.

Overall I don’t mind the idea of some temporary content while some things are added as a permanent reminder. I hope to see elements from Flame and Frost last well past the removal of the story mission itself.

ANet is learning more and more with each part of the Living Story being released. For good or for ill I find it better than GW1’s system at the moment, heresy I know.
Don’t get me wrong I loved GW1 because it brought me into this world, but I can go back and rerun just about everything; not much changed save War in Kryta. To some that’s ideal, but to others that’s somewhat stagnant.

War in Kryta excited me because there was change to the map. It gave me a reason to complete EoTN and Prophecies because I wanted to see this stuff.

So I do applaud the idea in Living Story that some things will change, that parts of the map might be different a month or year from now because the world moves along as it should.

Should dynamic hearts or events be removed as well? Yes, why not? Why not give us new dynamic events a couple of months later? Maybe the Centaurs were finally pushed out of Queensdale. Perhaps the Maguuma Jungle has more Nightmare Court hiding in the shadows of new Sylvari colonies? I think the only thing they can’t completely remove is the Personal Story, because that’s the main narrative for players. Yes it can be opted out, but I’m unsure how they can do that successfully.

If done right Living Story can show we could have fun supplements to the game without relying completely on a expansion pack every year or so. I’m going to give this more time before I fully get behind any idea of it passing or failing because even though I didn’t enjoy Lost Shores much, I did enjoy Flame and Frost for what it did.

I want to learn more about that giant in the Fractals.
What happened? Did he go home when I released him or did he go rampage someone’s place?

I hope they never remove the upleveling. It helps not only lower leveled players enjoy the game, but also lower leveled alts that folks have.

Besides even if you are a level 20 playing as an 80 you haven’t had the experience with skills to really play like an 80 at times with some professions. To echo what the others said, true level 80s still have some advantage.

PetricaKerempuh.7958:

if only i could help low lvl ppl doing their harts, i would be happy… i dnt even need any reward.

That’s kind of how I play in the lower levels now.
I’ll purposely use a support build and follow lower level folks offering buffs and heals while they do their thing. Sometimes I’ll come in to stomp on a vet or high health monster for fun.

Though I do enjoy the premise of hearts being reworked for dailies, almost like a ‘keep up with…’ activity to see if things are going okay for that NPC.

Oh I just happened to drop by the apple orchard. What’s that you say? Spiders still? I’ll stomp a few and then that contributed to my daily along with my daily kills.

I do still visit some karma dealers because peaches and apples are cheaper that way for me.

Atherakhia.4086:

What should happen is a guild can introduce a tax and a percent of the gold you loot actually goes to the guild bank.

Um no, if I’m going to tithe it would be to Lyssa or Dwayna.

I’ve had moments on map where enemy players would wave and look at a vista, then leave the place for me to use the vistas.

How considerate of them and I don’t even have the heart to hunt down people after that.

Danikat.8537:

Paul Belz.7351:

I guess the only way to be sure is to go check the areas out after the release today ;p

Be thorough

That was exactly my plan.

I hope there is something there. I don’t think I ever went to the Hatchery location before this but I remember the spot where Cragstead is (or the entrance at least) and it’d be a shame to see it just bare rock and snow again.

What I saw yesterday shows the opposite. The characters are rebuilding, wounds will heal but they recognize that Rox and Braham, with their heroic friend, helped save the day.

As a casual who drifts around maps, I’ve noticed folks in your guild.
Good, solid people. It’s fun to take down Troll or Lyssa with them.
I’m not looking to join, but rather to just put the compliment out there.