Guild Wars 2

Charr have a pretty wide variety of names, from Greco-Roman (Euryale, Elexus, Seneca) to very modern (Clawspur, Dinky, Maverick). So you almost can’t go wrong. My personal preference is for something that sounds somewhat harsh/growly for those Greco-Roman names that go well with all the Latin military terms the charr use (Legion, manipel, centurion, etc.).

A charr engineer from the Iron Legion is one of the most archetypical characters in the game, so don’t worry about engineer not fitting the species! They’re best for it, theme-wise.

As much as I love the charr, here’s a word of warning: many armors look like garbage on them, sadly, because they were designed exclusively for humans. Not only does a fancy, frilly design look patently weird on a charr, but there’s mane-, horn- and especially tail-clipping everywhere, even on some racial armors. Pauldrons are more likely to noticeably hover above your body than to actually touch your shoulders — again, even on racial armors, and especially on female characters. And because of the hunched posture, many textures look visibly stretched or distorted.

My suggestion: make a charr, pop into the Heart of the Mists and play with the PvP armor locker. If you can find some outfits there that look sweet to you and are not a complete PITA to acquire (check the wiki or a gallery site like http://argos-soft.net/GW2ArmorGallery/ for info of how to get the skin you want in PvE), you’re set. If not, you may be happier with another species.

At least you won’t have to deal with BS gendered armor when you play a female character, since both genders use the same armor model.

Charr are awesome. For the Legions!

SinerAthin.2374:

However, the Norn voice is just a bland and boring version of deep voice.(if you want good voice acting, look at the Charr)

Ehh. I really don’t like the female charr voice while the norn’s is a perfect fit. The charr voice lacks depth and volume and a kind of snarling undertone that some of the (male) NPCs have. It doesn’t really sound like the voice of a colossal, militant, predatory alien creature capable of bellowing orders across the hellish noise of a battlefield, but of a rather average human.

Well, the three devs on the livestream did say (paraphrased) that if a lot of people ask for it, they may listen.

Split for length.

Shiren.9532:

Maybe it’s because I (along with the rest of the GW2 audience) live in a world where gender matters and where equality does not mean the same. Someone’s gender is a part of their identity and it’s a part of their experiences and it’s something that I find very compelling as an element to a story.

Yeah, gender matters. It matters when you’re given a long, contradictory, dehumanizing, impossible list of things you MUST do, or must NEVER do, to “avoid” sexual harassment and assault — putting all the responsibility and blame for those crimes on the prospective victim, even when that victim is still a child. It matters when you’re denied ownership of your own body. It matters when you’re left to die in agony rather than saved with a simple medical procedure, just because male-dominated religions think that carrying children is your sole, true, divinely mandated purpose, and that you are worth less than the non-viable embryo that is killing you. It matters when, against the law, you’re denied employment or promotion because you’re pregnant — or have people flipping the eff out over your decision NOT to have any children. It matters when your gender identity is constantly used to insult and belittle. It matters when your gender identity is denied because you don’t march in lockstep with a status quo in which you had no say. It matters when said “deviation” is regarded as another perfectly reasonable excuse to hurt and discriminate against you. It matters when people voting for a female character are sneered at and accused of being shallow and just choosing her because she’s “hot”, which clearly is the only reason anyone would ever care about a woman. And so on and so forth.

There’s far too much of that toxic BS in real life, I don’t want to have it forced on me in my entertainment too. And that includes “benevolent” prejudice like the whole “women are so much more sensitive and nurturing” spiel, or “gay men have a natural fashion sense” or “blacks are great at sports” or “Asians are hot and exotic”. In the end, all prejudice only benefits those who have the privilege of being able to define, and being in line with, the status quo.

If we can imagine worlds with gods and magic, puny humans fighting huge giants and dragons that could squish them like bugs, walking talking plants, people in full plate running, jumping, flipping and swimming around in ways that would make any real-world Olympic athlete green with envy, etc. etc., I’ll never understand what is so terrible about “allowing” women to fully embrace such escapist fantasties just as men do. When men do it, it’s business as usual and an awesome story about interesting characters. When we do it, we’re Mary Sues and men with boobs.

To me, writers who actually think gender quality through and build their settings accordingly are an incredible breath of fresh air because they are so rare. (So kudos to the writing team for that, despite my many issues with how the story is handled!) There’s no way we can ever agree on these issues, so I’ll end it here.

Shiren.9532:

For starters, you’re missing the point.

I’m not “missing” anything. You repeatedly try to deny other people’s gender identity, which is a terrible thing to do. You repeatedly insist that real-world gender-essentialist stereotypes must apply anywhere.

I’m not sure what other conclusions I could reach while you keep writing things like this:

I’m not waging war on strong or masculine females, I’m annoyed that it’s used as a crutch to make women appear strong

Implying that women cannot actually be strong, only pretend to be by aping men?

at the expense of portraying feminine characters as strong front liners

So women can actually be strong, but only if they’re “feminine”? I’m not being snarky but honest when I say that I’m not sure how that would work. Stereotypical “femininity” is (among other things) the polar opposite of strength competence, which are, after all, stereotypically “masculine” traits. Even characters who are characterized as some variation of “strong but also nurturing” (similar to the way you described Balsa) or “smart for a girl” show this divide, as if there was some kind of internal contradiction to these traits.

It’s like someone is writing their own fantasy world where women still give birth (something men can’t do – that’s one of the reasons ‘equal’ is in quotation marks) and in some cases still have the physical appearance of a model yet they don’t face the realities of this. This is epitomised by Eir and charr society, where women still give birth but neither raise their children so they can continue to being equal to men.

I really don’t get what you’re trying to say here. Face what realities? Most (not all) women are theoretically capable of giving birth, at least during a certain time frame in their lives. How does it follow that they must raise their kids (“conveniently” taking themselves out of the picture) while fathers apparently do not matter at all? Again, there is nothing a female parent can do that a male parent cannot, and mothers do not magically become the one and only childcare experts as soon as they pop a kid out.

Charr society is written is the only way it can make sense. They’re a military society in which the individual matters little. It’d be a colossal waste of resources to chain half the able-bodied population to home and hearth for the duration of their peak physical strength and usefulness. Instead, valuable soldiers and workers can procreate and then return to their duties — and their warbands, the end-all and be-all of charr social bonds! — ASAP while the cubs are passed into the hands of trained specialists so they too learn as early as possible what being a charr means: doing your duty.

Charr society is one of my favourite aspects of this setting despite the fact that I don’t usually care for militant types at all. It’s well though through and thus believable— unlike a culture that states “yeah, I guess women are equal” but still falls into gender essentialism.

Your mention of diversity is ironic because you are approaching GW2 from an outside in perspective, but in the world of Tyria, women quite often win the numbers game.

GW2 has a good balance of male versus female characters. You seem to focus almost exclusively on what you would rather not see: the (non-“feminine”) women. It reminds me a little of the people who, honestly and sincerely, asked if there were any straight sylvari, or outright complained about there being none, just because of a grand total of two (now three, kind of) known same-sex couples.

The true protagonist and by far the most important person in this game is a man. Two out of the three order mentors, with whom we spend a lot more time than with their superiors, are men. Six out of the eight (now temporarily seven) members of the Captain’s Council are men. As is their Commodore. As is Imperator Smodur. (I think the Blood Legion Imperator, Bangar Ruinbringer, is male too?) And the leader of Ebonhawke. And Knut Whitebear, the de facto leader of Hoelbrak (plus his two sons lead the Wolfborn). And the leader of the asuran Arcane Council. The Firstborn sylvari were five men and four women. Charr have an entire story arc about their father, and three out of the five original warband members are male. Both chief delegates hammering out the charr/human peace treaty, one of the most important events in current history, are men. Norn can have a male rival or a male drinking buddy (that arc and that character are among my favourite parts of the game’s story overall).

That’s off the top of my head, not counting antagonists, outright villains or people who die before the beginning of the game. Men hardly get a bum deal in this setting, Shiren. Not only that, they get a TREMENDOUSLY better deal than women do in just about any other game.

There has been a lot of criticism and negative feedback about the living story. I’m curious how people would rank the content patches that have been released so far. As a returning player who only saw a little of last year’s Halloween patch, then quit and finally returned on the tail end of the Southsun karka problems, I have a feeling that I missed the “best” arc so far, Flame and Frost, because it actually tied into existing themes and wasn’t all about Lion’s Arch and its “cool” semi-pirates.

My own, naturally very short list:

1) Bazaar of the Four Winds.
The new zone is really well done in terms of design, music and overall atmosphere, and the NPCs and their conversations provide a good luck at the Zephyrite culture and its interactions with the visitors. Honorable mention to the seller of the imp-tome and her heavy sarcasm when we foolishly mess around with it. :p As someone who is not exactly good at jumping, I fully expected to hate this patch — but while I died a lot (not always my fault, the Aspect skills can be glitchy), I found it to be a surprisingly enjoyable challenge to get around and tag crystals. Sanctum Sprint is a minigame that, for once, ISN’T gimmick PvP with preset skills. Yeah, it’s still a competition with preset skills, but eh, I had quite a bit of fun with it. The only real downside is a lack of a “tier” system that prevents frequent winners from being put in the same lineup as struggling players.
Belcher’s Bluff on the other hand is boring, and Adnul remains a colossal tosser. Another aspect I do not care for: the RNG nature of trying to get recipes, and the fact that the crafted items are account-bound. And why on Earth does the Quartz Jewel recipe drop more often than all the others combined?
Finally, I was annoyed by the return of the Aetherblades. Can we have more attention given to established threats, please?
Overall, though, this is easily my favourite content patch (of the ones I have personally seen).

2) The Southsun battle
This is only in this spot because the other patches have more downsides. There was nothing I enjoyed very much, but nothing that annoyed me TOO much either. Actually, come to think of it, the ending of the arc with the Consortium getting its comeuppance and the settlers gaining their freedom was quite satisfying. Seeing so many people coming and working together was fun, if laggy. Bonus points and special mention to the Fervid Censer because it fits sylvari very well.
Biggest downside: lag. Also, the zone now serves as a example for how the “living world” really isn’t because everyone is back in Lion’s Arch and/or chasing the latest temporary content. Retuning the events would help a bit.

3) Dragon Bash
Eh, it had fancy fireworks. Some of the weapon skins look really good, and I made some extra money from spare wings and minipets. Everything else was “meh”, really. My biggest disappointment was that no dragon minions used this perfect excuse to cause some havoc.
Kudos for the nameless festival-goer sylvari who casually mentions her female beloved. Double kudos, actually. First, for having same-sex NPCs at all and second, for it being part of normal life — no bigotry aimed at it, no big deal made of it.

4) Cutthroat Politics
I don’t like politics and politicians, thank you very much. Where are the epic struggles? For that matter, where is the “insert all tokens” button? Yesterday, some chap in /map mentioned he was about to turn in 400 tokens. He was not looking forward to it, and his poor fingers have my sympathy. What else do we have? Not one but two gimmick-PvP minigames and the ridiculous Candidate Trials. Whatever happened to “play the game your way”? Between the Trials and the general PvE/dungeon “meta”, it sounds more and more like “go full DPS or go home”.
The only positive aspect of this patch that I can think of is that the Desert Rose and the Zephyrite backpack look quite good.
I really wish Anet had used the second part of the Bazaar arc to delve deeper into the Zephyrite lore instead of wasting in on some inane popularity contest that has nothing to do with the Sanctum at all.

5) Aetherblades
I didn’t do any of this. I simply could not be arsed. Neither pirates nor Steampunk hold any appeal to me, and the fact that they’re the only villains getting attention annoys me to no end. As mentioned above, I want to clash more with, and learn more about, the established threats — both the ones we meet in the “base” game and the ones only hinted from GW1 times so far. CC-spamming Steampunk pirates can take a long walk off a short plank.
Again: I don’t get why the second part of a storyarc isn’t used to explore existing themes (in this case, the dragons) instead of throwing in something completely random.

@Axiom: word. The notion of a “living world” or “living story” originally made me hope that it breathe life back into empty zones. Instead, it empties the world even further by focusing so much on Lion’s Arch which is the overrun, overdone hub already, and temporary content. No, “spam the interact button” scavenger hunts do not count as breathing life into the open world.

I want to actively take part in high fantasy story, not be a silent errand runner in the “pirates, pirates and gimmick PvP” loop that the game is stuck in.

Cloud.5312:

As for our character not being the center of the attention I think this is mostly due to how differently each one of us see the world of GW2… No to mention the sheer amount of races/classes/background combinations available…

Yes, that is one of my fundamental issues with the “personal story”: it is NOT personal, because there is no personality, no identity, no roleplaying, nothing. And it’s a bleeding shame because it didn’t have to be that way. Allowing for distinct stories based primarily on species/culture would have been a HUGE bonus to immersion and replayability.

And that’s the personal story. In the living story, our characters do not exist AT ALL. If I wanted to read about other people doing this-and-that, I’d go grab a book. In a game, I want to be involved in the story as an actual character, not be pushed off-stage as a mix of spectator and mute errand girl.

I don’t really have this diva complex that most players complaining for not being the main protagonist have… Mostly because this is not entirely true… Trahearne makes it clear on several occasions that it was only because of “you the player” that everything was possible…

Trust me, I very much do NOT want to be The One And Only Chosen Savior — games like that make me roll my eyes so hard I’m amazed they’re still in their sockets, what with how common that trope is. :p But I want to be involved.

Trahearne very much IS the protagonist, along with Destiny’s Edge, because our characters have no character. Non-characters cannot carry a story. No matter how annoying and badly-written one may consider the NPCs to be, at least they have their own identity. We do not have that, not even in the “personal” story, not outside the cultural arcs. Getting the rare pat on the head from one of the spotlight NPCs doesn’t make any difference to me if I have no option ever to roleplay, no opportunity to get to know and connect with anyone, and in the living story, not even a voice or a part in any of the conversations and events that move the plot along.

If there is to be another hero-group forming up, then at least I want to somehow be part of it. If I remain a non-entity, I’m going to have even less interest in the living story than I already do now — and I say that as someone who usually values story and lore above all else in a MMO.

The “irredeemable” bit is not just a plotline waiting to happen, it’s canon. Sure they could change that, but if a setting has no basis beyond a writer’s momentary whim, it isn’t worth much.

The fact that you can’t save a Courtier is a huge part of what makes the Nightmare Court so horrible, IMO. That bunch is worse than the Elder Dragons in a way, because Glint’s example shows that there is a way to break a dragon minion free, even if the method may be forgotten. Courtiers are gone for good. Caithe knows that better than anyone, and I wouldn’t be surprised if her anguish over Faolain plays a part in her ruthlessness against Faolain’s minions.

Bobby, are there any plans to allow our characters to actually take part in upcoming story arcs as someone who’s involved in what is going on and has a place in it, a role to play? Someone who can speak up, make decisions or at least suggestions, forge friendships, earn trust, make enemies? Something, anything, that gives us the feeling that we’re actually allowed to be a character in your world and your story instead of just, well, the NPCs’ silent servant who runs all the errand while they get all the credit and spotlight?

I don’t want to be The One And Only Chosen One. I just want a voice, a part, an emotional connection, a sense of actually “being there”. All I see is NPCs talking among themselves, moving the story along entirely by themselves with no acknowledgement of all my work on their behalf, and then barking orders at me in one-line non-voiced “conversations” that have no impact on anything.

That I could get behind, Elbegast!

As I have said before, I’m strongly of the opinion that one of the things that the game’s “story” (both personal and living) needs is to actually have a place for our own characters. Right now, it does not and there sadly has been no sign of that changing. But if Anet let our characters forge a handful of living story characters into a kickarse group of friends, allowed us time to befriend each of them and actually take an active part in the story instead of just being a silent servant girl/boy who does all the work while the NPCs get all the glory and the spotlight time, let us become not only be part of “Destiny’s Edge 2.0” but the de facto leader of it, I’d be absolutely tickled pink.

Of course, what would also be awesome is for characters from the personal story to become available as “henchmen”. The members of a charr character’s warband are prime candidates for that, for example. But that would require a lot more effort and would be much harder to balance both between species and between the chosen story arcs in each species, so I doubt we’d ever see it.

I hope not. What I want from future story elements is a) more spotlight time for established characters (both heroes and villains) and b) some room for my own character. As rich as the setting of this game is, the writing is horribly shallow, and I really don’t want to see it diluted further. We barely know the existing characters as it is.

Sure, they need to introduce some new people now and then, but what is really needed is more depth, and the time and opportunity to actually bond with anyone. Temporary content makes all of that even harder. If Destiny’s Edge 2.0 gets the same shallow treatment as Destiny’s Edge 1.0 PLUS no way to experience what little there is about them except during a very narrow time frame, it won’t be worth trying to remember their names, much less muster any interest in them. IMO, of course.

I hear you. This has by said many time by many people, yet I cannot remember any devs ever commenting on our concerns.

Cheers! I should have checked the wiki, eh?

If memory serves, that verse is sung by someone close to the “entrance” of the airship. I heard it twice when idling near the Sanctum Sprint person.

HiddenNick.7206:

There are four teams working on living world updates. Each team has about 3 months to prepare their festival… ups… Content That is released in two separate updates during single month.

Whew, good, I’m glad to stand corrected on that! Two weeks (or a month for the whole arc) would just be impossible. It does make me wish even more for “deeper” content patches with substance and personal involvement — and more time to experience each update, preferably permanently.

You make a good point about human-centrism, and specifically white-human-centrism — on which I recall there having been several debates, since apparently GW1 did a better job with diversity, but I never played that one so I can only go by what other have said.

I don’t see Evon as a stereotypical charr, and would actually like him more if I did. :p Sylvari, charr and norn are vastly more interesting to me than humans. If future writing choices were up to me, we’d see more of the non-humans in their own cultural environment instead of the strongly human-themed Lion’s Arch and all its living story plots. I’m not a fan of the asura, but maybe that’d be all the more reason to support there being more of them, specifically competent and likeable ones beyond the weird mix of “arrogant supremacist” and “disaster-prone comic relief”. Kiel as an asura is an interesting thought.

Edge.4180:

Maybe because we don’t get enough of the “good ones” in real life?

Look at the current political landscape in the real world. Do you really look at congress and say “Well, that’s interesting/complicated”? Or do you just get a little nauseous at all the incompetence the self-interests and political scheming brings?

I’m not really sure I want to drag more of that into the game I’m supposed to be enjoying. :P

You nailed it.

The story in this game will, quite frankly, never be about our characters (and a kitten ed shame that is too). Faced with the outlook of being the eternal silent errand girl to the NPCs, I’d much rather help an upstanding person than a money-grubbing jerkwad schemer.

(And even if I absolutely adored Evon, the gambling aspect of the Black Lion Chests and similar gem store stuff would be enough to make me refuse to vote for him.)

draxynnic.3719:

Because I’d like to see some of the existing bad guys get some time.

A very good point! This is the same reason why I’m irritated about the Aetherblades. There’s so much interesting potential in this setting, and so many players have complained about how shallow the game’s writing has been so far, not doing justice to that lore, lacking continuity. Why dilute it even further? Stuff Evon and the “kewl” Steampunk pirates, give me the Nightmare Court or the White Mantle or some other villain camp that I’ve been eager to learn more about for months, and that frankly needs the attention if we’re supposed to take it seriously as an ongoing threat.

The same holds true for the “good guys” too, by the way. While I like Kiel well enough, I still wish they’d have given her spotlight time to established characters instead.

Abramelin.7356:

I don’t like Kiel because she is obnoxious and bullying. I don’t appreciate someone threatening to perforate my spleen on a first meeting

Yeah, that is a complete and utter “WTF you south-end of a north-bound jotun?!” line, and a perfect example of why all the pirates-are-cool hype annoys me. Pirates are not the good guys. Even if this was an attempt at giving that straight-faced soldier character a hint of deadpan humor, I’d consider it way out of line because threats are rarely funny, especially from a stranger and when you can’t tell if they’re serious or not.

That said, the line is weird because it does not match her actions otherwise. She could have let the Southsun settlers suffer under the Consortium because hey, a contract is a contract, why should she put her neck on the line for them, especially those who originally supported Canach. She could have kept the plunder from the Candidate Trials. In either case, she does not but instead tries to do the “right thing”.

Sorry for the late reply, this sort of thing is not easy to write.

Shiren.9532:

What stereotypical boxes?

The ones that try to force an narrow and often harmful pro/prescriptive existence on women in which we “asked for it” no matter what we did or did not do, and in which even what few positive characteristics we are “allowed” are usually doubled-edged swords. One obvious example: be told to be pretty and then despised as shallow, vain, stupid and sl*tty.

One of my favourite female characters in fiction is Balsa from Seirei no Moribito. She was probably one of the most skilled fighters in that story (if not the most skilled) and not only did she stand on equal ground with her male opponents, she often defeated them. Despite this she was also an incredibly strong maternal character.

Why “despite”?

As far as I know, women might be ‘equal’ but that does not mean the same. The writers of GW2 often seem to think that to write a strong female character, they need to essentially write a man, then give them the body of a woman.

Equality in dubious quotation marks?

I’m very tired of the “man with boobs” (or the equally toxic “whipped sissy boy”) that is trotted out whenever a character does not meet status quo approval. You do not get to decide who is a woman (or man) and who is not. Your preferences are your own, but they are not definitions of gender identity.

It’s not just about a game, but about real people too, and how media can influence people and society for good or ill. Gender stereotypes are still used to inflict enormous amounts of hurt on people of any gender in real life. Can you try to imagine what that is like? Can you try to imagine the sheer and honestly potentially life-saving relief when, for the first time ever, you see “someone like you” represented somewhere, not as a hateful stereotype, or the butt of jokes, or a freak who needs to be put in their place, but as someone who is accepted as they are, no particular attention drawn to it? It can be huge, and it doesn’t apply to gender stereotypes only, but also sexual orientation, color/ethnicity, physical or mental disability, and so on.

Diversity is good. No one can or should be forced to like a particular character for any reason ever, but please don’t try to deny a character’s gender identity (or any other intrinsic part of them).

Look at Eir. She was probably one of the more likeable members of Destiny’s Edge, yet she does a very “norn” thing and abandons her child to chase her own legend. It’s almost like we’re being told that being a mother, being maternal is something that strong female characters shouldn’t do.

Eir is a norn. Why should she NOT do a “norn thing”? Is being a norn (or a charr, since you mentioned Almorra as well) something that is reserved only for the men of the species?

For that matter, what is wrong with a father taking primary responsibility for his child? There is absolutely nothing that a female parent can do that a male parent can’t do just as well. (Aside form the obvious breast-feeding, which is not a non-negotiable requirement for the offspring’s survival when it comes to sentient beings.)

It’s as if we are being told that being a mother is a sign of weakness (despite Bear and the Pale tree being maternal, how often do they fight?).

I really can’t see that at all. There are hardly any parents of either gender mentioned prominently, which is only to be expected because this isn’t a soap opera but a “world in peril” in which we interact primarily with warriors, rulers and adventurers. The Pale Tree is just that, an enormous stationary tree. And we don’t see Bear at all, or any of the gods and spirits.

That’s just one example of an aspect unique to women which is often abandoned to make women look “tougher” or equal to men.

You write that sort of thing and then accuse me of “loaded responses” and the debate being highly inflammatory?

Again, there is nothing about being a parent or being nurturing that is either intrinsic or “unique” to women. The assumption that there is, is one of those abovementioned doubled-edged swords that can lead to a lot of harm. Plus, there are many fantastic male caregivers out there who don’t deserve to be handwaved away any more than women who are not stereotypically feminine do.

The core of why I have this particular issue with Kiel is that she lacks complexity or anything that makes her compelling.

See, why not just leave it at that instead of bringing the whole not-a-real-woman prejudice into it? I obviously don’t agree and can’t see why she’s less complex or compelling than say Marjory or especially Kasmeer, but to each their own. Some people like this, some people like that, and the setting is richer for it all being in there.

Honestly, if they want people to hand over 10 Euros for a single-use skin, the VERY LEAST they need to do is make sure what they’re trying to sell actually fits everyone. Why should charr players fork over real money for all those skins that were clearly made without a second’s thought or concern for charr characters and players?

Enough with the tail clipping and hover shoulders already.

Yes, I can’t imagine it’s really possible to crank out deep quality content in two weeks’ time, at least not consistently. In a way, the people who power through new content much faster than intended and then complain that there’s nothing to do get what they “deserve” with these shallow, gimmicky and impersonal updates. It’s just sad that those of us with more patience get the same. I’d be more than happy with (for example) quarterly content patches if they offered some depth, permanent content and room for my own character instead of making it solely about the NPCs. Pirates, parties, gimmick PvP and random gambling don’t interest in the first place and by now have long overstayed their welcome.

Has anyone tried to collect all the verses of this song? I’ve seen three so far and wonder how many more there are, and what order they’re supposed to go in:

Alas, alas how time must pass,
ancient, magical friend.
So terrible, so dreadful that
so treasured should so end.

Alas, alas, we’ve no more peace,
no ally from on high.
We’ll make our way to brighter days
and into clearer skies.

The summer sun shone bright once more,
warmed wood and cloth of home.
We honored those who came before,
and journeyed where they roamed.

Do you know that Courtiers are entirely irredeemable? What Caithe did may not have been nice, but it was pragmatic and justified. “Heroes” who let violent criminals walk free to abduct, torture, mutilate, pervert and murder some more are terrible because they care more about their own superficial “purity” than about the suffering of others, for which they become indirectly responsible. And that’s “normal” criminals who technically have a choice to change. Courtiers don’t have that.

Faowri.4159:

It’s point blank hard for the PC to have any impact on characters like Caithe because we are constantly positioned as subordinate to the likes of Destiny’s Edge, Trahearne, Order officers, etc. right up to the final showdown with Zhaitan. Always the educated, never the educator or even the peer :P Bit of a missed opportunity, methinks.

Yeah, treating the player character as ignorant is sadly par on course for computer games. It’s a neverending source of frustration and immersion-breaking, especially when contrasted by how the same NPCs who need to explain 2+2=4 to us nonetheless believe we are The Chosen One™ who will Save The World™.

It’s a result of equating player knowledge with character knowledge — or lack of knowledge, in these cases.

This game makes some attempts of letting us influence the NPCs, but it really falls short. Spoiler for Twilight Arbor:

Keep in mind that you can’t remotely compare human age to sylvari age. Sylvari fall from the Tree as fully functional adults. They don’t have to spend years learning to walk, talk, use the bathroom or tie their shoes, and even come with some much more advanced skills and knowledge “built in”. Sure, they can be clueless and naive about some things that others take for granted, but that does not make them stupid or childish — it just means they have not experienced these things yet.

A human aged 20-25 has just about finished development. A sylvari of the same age, especially one born with a Wyld Hunt, potentially has been working in her field of expertise for literally as long as she’s been alive. Now, we don’t know when Trahearne’s Hunt really kicked in and made him bugger off to Orr, and as a Firstborn he likely had to do more learning the normal/hard way, but he’s still way ahead of any same-age human, charr, norn or asura.

It’s definitely true that there should have been a better explanation for why the orders were willing to consider him as their leader, though. Just as there should have been more depth to just about every other aspect of the story. Even if the NPCs all know how unique and valuable his first-hand knowledge of Orr and Zhaitan’s minions and powers is, the players need to see it too.

arabeth.2361:

They don’t even publicize information about their game on their own website for the most part: it’s distributed between reddit, facebook, twitter, their forums, other forums, and interviews given out to a huge random bunch of sites (and probably other places).

That is one of the things that seriously keep ticking me off. It’s lazy and unprofessional, and frankly I’m not keen on many of these “social media” sites with their highly questionable (at best) stances on user privacy and harassment/abuse protection.

You make some really good points, but that doesn’t mean we have to like it. :p In fact, you may have put into words one reason why the game fails to grab me as I’d hoped it would.

I think modern games have come to accept the idea that their game does not exist solely within the game itself. Some have really played with this idea further, but even simple games still have FAQs and videos and fan sites and a huge plethora of out-of-game information which is all still a part of the whole experience of playing the game. I mean take these forums: some people come to the forums while they’re at work because they can’t play the game any other way while they’re at work. Using the forums is just another way of participating in the game. And in the end, isn’t the game actually richer because of all this?

Sure, it’s also great fun to discuss the plot and characters with like-minded fans — sometimes to a much greater depth than the game itself affords these issues. And class/dungeon strategy guides can be a great help. Nonetheless, there is a colossal difference between communication among the player community, which is impossible to do to this extent in-game, and the devs not bothering to make information promptly and centrally available, or not bothering to write a coherent story in-game.

Maybe I’m “old-fashioned”, but there is no way I’d be able to enjoy a game a fraction as much if I can’t experience it by actually playing it.

The information is more spread out and harder to access but also more rich.

I can’t agree with that. At all. When I first learned about this game, I thought its lore and setting were quite interesting, but they don’t seem to be doing anything with it. Also, there is no reason why any “richness” that may exist can’t be available in-game.

I’d rather wait longer between updates and in return get some content with depth and importance, and the minigames are particularly annoying. How many variations of the “PvP with gimmick preset skills” theme do we need?

I’m really hoping for something with a little more depth and connection to the original story, too. Parties, pirates and gimmicky PvP minigames just feel worlds removed from the “world in dire peril” theme. Sure, have a morale-raising event here and there, but party! party! party! nonstop while completely ignoring established threats is nonsensical.

I like the Bazaar because it looks like an interesting new culture tied into some also interesting background lore, but no more Lion’s Arch for a long while please, and no more parties.

Erik the Dauntless.4063:

To add: this is an mmo-RPG, we as the players shouldn’t be shoehorned into playing one race. This extends from armors to story btw, it has been said before and i’ll say it again: I play Charr, The story should reflect that, and not limit itself to only the first few missions!

Full agreement.

Every MMO with a “hub” will see most players flock to it ASAP. It certainly doesn’t help that Anet is pushing people there for all the Living Story content, either.

Opynn.2936:

They make race specific armor right now- they make all armors to fit humans, norns (biger humans), sylvari (green humans) and asura ( small humans with big ears)

Very good point, except I would stop short at saying that they make human armor. Sylvari, norn and asura may not have the same issues as charr do, but the outfits are clearly not made for them, they are human designs made for humans.

I can see why Anet does not want to do more cultural armor, or cultural content period, though that’s a bloody shame IMO since one-size-fits-all without allowing for cultural identity is aggravating. What’s the point in playing a non-human if I almost never get to look, act, feel like or be treated as one? The least they could — and should, at this point! — do is to make armor that is not, for once, human-themed. Give us some norn-themed, sylvari-themed or yes, charr-themed armor. Please. It’s terribly overdue after all the humans-this, humans-that gear.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

I don’t know how everyone seems to think one either must be masculine or feminine when you can just be someone. A strong female character doesn’t necessarily have to demonstrate femininity, to be a strong female character. She needs to be a strong character, who happens to be female.

Exactly. Thank you.

Does a character’s race, gender, sexuality (or lack thereof), rank, job . . . do these have to define a character, and are they required to be present for a “strong” character?

Definitely not. Depending on setting and context, these aspects may of course have a smaller or greater impact, but if they are used in a pre- or proscriptive instead of descriptive manner, the result is a weakened character and a lack of diversity. This is especially true if our real-world perceptions of what female/gay/black/whatever people MUST be like are forced onto a setting in which the conditions that shaped those perceptions (many of them terribly negative: sexism, racism, homophobia, etc.) do not exist.

Agreement from me as well. Everything we need to know about current and past stories should be available in-game. Having to go outside of the game irritates me because it smacks of laziness and a lack of concern for immersion — there’s just a colossal difference between my character learning something from an in-game source and me having to google the same information. It’s one thing to give out-of-game “behind the scenes” information like what the inspiration for a design or a story or a culture were, or touch on something that has not shown up in the game (yet).

Standing on Zephyr’s Sanctum listening to the NPCs talk among themselves, or going to talk to them, is fun. I generally like sitting idle for a while and see if any NPCs around me have anything to say. That is immersive. “Go to this link to read a story that explains what’s going on” is not.

For that matter, immersion would also be helped if my character was more involved and felt like she has a place in what’s going on. If I’m not actively taking part in conversations and events as they happen, but only get a second-hand “go-here-do-that” order after the fact, I — again — feel irritated because it’s like my character has no brains and no agency and is just an servant for the NPCs.

As for achievements, hunting them CAN be fun — the Sanctum meta had me going for some jumping puzzles which I had not done before because I generally do not like them, or managed to miss them altogether. I found that when I did succeed at them it was actually satisfying in and of itself, not just because it advanced the achievement count. But overall, there’s definitely too much emphasis on random tasks and not enough on story and lore.

dybryd.1358:

You really think the “lovable rogue” stereotype is any less overdone?

Word.

I like Kiel because she’s hands-on, down-to-earth and dedicated to a dangerous and difficult job in the service of others. Is she shallow? Sure. As is every single character in this game. For all the great lore, the writing is incredibly shallow overall, which is one of my biggest disappointments. At least Kiel is someone we actually get to spend some time with. And while she may be out of her element right now — which I too do like — the ending of the Southsun arc shows that she knows how to use her brain to get the best out of a bad situation.

So while she is hardly a particularly engaging character by broader standards, by this game’s standards she is above the cut, to me at least. Gnashblade on the other hand has absolutely nothing appealing to him, and there is NO WAY I’d ever support the gambling-with-real-money BS of the Black Lion Chests and other slot machines from the gem store.

Shiren.9532:

I’m also no a fan of the way GW2 handles female characters. I actually really enjoy female heroines in fiction but Kiel just seems like another “woman can be strong too” character. It often seems like the writers strip away femininity from a character as a way of making them look tough and Guild Wars in general is especially bad at this (it didn’t stop them from making Kiel an attractive human female). It’s just another part of her personality that doesn’t exist.

What is “femininity”? And why should a world in which women are equal in every way NOT have female characters who are not constrained by real-world stereotypes based on inequality?

I want MORE female characters like Ellen. People who can’t be forced into those stereotypical boxes exist despite massive pressure (and often abuse) to conform, and they are not a iota less of a woman/man, thank you very much.

I really enjoyed most of the cultural story arc that I did on my sylvari guardian — the White Stag, Where Life Goes, learning about Caladbolg, recovering it and then wielding it in the Vigil-version of the finale and its full-on assault on the lich. The Priory arc felt much less satisfying in comparison, but you are right that it IS weird those inventions are never used again.

As a charr, I liked Blood Legion/Sorcerous Shaman more than Ash Legion/Gladium. As a norn, I enjoyed Protecting the Spirits, and the “passed out at the moot” story had me in stitches.

IMO the cultural story arcs are the best. I did rather enjoy the initial Vigil mission in Fields of Ruin though, for its involvement in unifying everyone against the greater danger.

Reclaiming Claw Island was okay because seeing everyone work together at last is satisfying, as is getting revenge for Forgal.

Let us please not turn this into another Trahearne-bashing thread. Even if Anet gave in to all the haters and senselessly murdered Trahearne, Destiny’s Edge and anyone else of any importance in some horrible way, there still would not be any room for our own characters in the game’s storytelling as it is. The spotlight will remain exclusively on the NPCs as long as our characters are not allowed to be characters and thus remain unable to carry or a story.

@Tom Gore: sure you can. Yes, you have to ignore the fact that tens of thousands of other people are playing the same story and that your progress in the world isn’t saved/visible in the way it might be in a single-player game (outside of instanced content), but that doesn’t mean it’s not possible. Nor does it mean you’re competing with them in any way. It’s really not too different from knowing that thousands of people play the same single-player game, which doesn’t influence me, my choices and my enjoyment either.

I’ve been wishing and hoping for this as well, because I dislike it when games take this “one single hub, every other place is dead and ignored” approach, and because I am not a fan of Lion’s Arch and would much rather all the interesting aspects in the world fleshed out instead.

Humans are far from my favourites, but I’d even take an asura-focus over more Lion’s Arch. So cheers if Divinity’s Reach will indeed get some attention next!

It’s a huge shame, yes. Charr and sylvari are far and wide my favourites, and both have huge issues with armor designed obviously and exclusively for humans. With the sylvari, at least non-cultural outfits “just” tend to look really weird, especially all those awful frilly-skimpy light armors on female characters. The charr on the other hand not only look weird running around in the gear of their former enemy, but they also have all these anatomical problems you described so well. The tail clipping on the light T3 and the floating shoulders on about half the cultural sets serve as the worst examples of terrible armor design for this species. If even their very own special gear does not fit them, it’s really no surprise that little else does either.

Thrudrheim.8143:

I actually loved the personal story and I’m not really sure what you didn’t like about it.

There have been quite a few posts about it, but I can sum it up again. The huge problem is that it is neither personal nor a story. It is not a story because there is no continuity, only a collection of shallow one-shots that cease to matter and are usually completely forgotten once they are over. And it is not personal because there’s no room for emotional attachment, character development, choices and interaction, or in fact anything that would allow my character to have a personality and identity.

As a charr, I lose my warband, gain another and abandon it again forever without the slightest emotional involvement because there is zero time to get to know them, interact with them, which renders the closest bonds a charr has and the greatest loss she can suffer completely hollow. As a sylvari, I’m a Valiant of the Wyld Hunt, born burning with one specific purpose — which is forgotten and never mentioned again only a handful of levels later, just as the charr’s warband is forgotten, just as everything else is forgotten. And because I’m never allowed to have a personality, a cultural identity, an emotional attachment to anyone, continuity or credit for past actions, my character is not in fact a character. Of course, a non-character cannot carry a story or in any way, so it becomes all about the NPCs. And that is hugely frustrating. It very much is NOT “all about me” despite what the game promises.

Hell, I don’t WANT it to be “all about me” because I’m sick and tired of all the silly games that fawn my character over the moon as the only intelligent and capable individual in the multiverse, the promised savior, the chosen one, blah blah blah. I don’t mind sharing the spotlight, or taking orders, or helping someone else grow into their potential, as long as I still have my purpose and get recognized for it. But I very much mind not even being allowed to be a character.

And since the Living World content features just about zero interaction between my character and the all-important NPCs, it is even more frustrating than the personal story, which at least has my character participate in cutscene conversations and receive some recognition from NPCs as someone who’s supposed to matter, even if the shoddy execution botches it.

With the Living World content, I get the feeling that they don’t even intend for us to have a place in it. If that’s the future of GW2’s attempt at storytelling, it’ll be a huge letdown. I very much want them to fix the problems with their storytelling, not give up any attempt of involving my character altogether.

No one can tell you what looks good in your own eyes. In my book, though, sylvari tend to look “wrong” in almost anything beside cultural gear and the Twilight Arbor sets. The human design of the other outfits just clashes badly with the unique plant-features, especially the skimpy/frilly light armors.

Many people have voiced their disappointment over the fact that the “personal story” is anything but that. Lack of continuity and connections, choices and anything resembling cultural/personal identity once you’re out of the earliest chapters made the story a colossal letdown. The result is that it’s all about Trahearne, which has made him the target of a LOT of hate (undeserved, IMO, as he’s not the problem, just a symptom).

The living world arcs I’ve seen take that even further and don’t involve us at all. Even more than in the main plot, we’re just tagalongs while the NPCs babble among themselves. Sure, they order us around and we do the actual work, and now and then we may get a pat on the head for our efforts, but we’re not actual characters in these stories.

I understand why this is done, of course. Recording spoken lines for all species and genders is more expensive than just having the NPCs talk. Implementing actual dialog choices or personalized conversations (a charr acting and being treated differently from a sylvari) would cost even more. But without our characters’ involvement, without choices and without a sense of identity, we will never have a place in this game’s stories. And that’s a bleeding shame since that was one of the things that were supposed to be different in this game.

So I’m very curious if there are any plans to make at least a little space for our characters in future events. If we can’t talk in cutscenes, can we at least have some more non-voiced conversations with NPCs that go into a little depth? Can we get to know them, form connections? Can we hope to ever be able to feel like we’re actually playing a charr when playing a charr, playing a norn when playing a norn, and so on? Or will both the epic and the whimsical stories just be a matter of NPCs doing their thing while we stand silently by the wayside as a generic, featureless extra?

I don’t want to take the sole spotlight. I do want interesting NPCs who grow and are competent and involved and get things done, but I have to be able to connect with them, get credit for my actions and feel like I’m actually an active participant in the stories.

Technically, one doesn’t have to play any of the temporary content, of course. Still, I agree that making most new content temporary feels ridiculous. Seasonal festivals are one thing, at least these will hopefully come back each year. But if they didn’t remove the basic game’s storyline after month or two, regardless of how many people were done with it or not and how many latecomers would never see it, why remove the new content?

As a latecomer — I quit the game a few weeks after launch and only returned recently — I’m also a bit concerned about how temporary zones combines with fractals to suck players out of older content. It’s nice if new things happen in a game now and then, but can they really call it a “living world” when the players are concentrated almost exclusively in Lion’s Arch, CoF1 speedruns, high-level fractals and whatever the current temporary content is?

I don’t want more Trahearne, honestly. I don’t dislike him so don’t want him to go to the villain route just because people hate him and want to murder him, but I don’t want to spend more time in his shadow either. He completed his life’s purpose, let him step down and fade out of the spotlight. It’s likely far too late to “salvage” him in the eyes of most people. Which is a shame, really.

I never played GW1, so I don’t know or care much about those events, though some of the lore is fun to hear and read about. And I really don’t like the humans much, all in all. But the atmosphere in Ebonhawk is definitely well-done, and actually getting different reactions on my charr warrior compared to my sylvari guardian was a very pleasant surprise. It’s one of the few areas and situations in the game where it feels like one’s species actually makes some difference. There should be more of that!

In particular, there’s this huge glaring disparity between non-instanced Ebonhawk and doing the Vigil arc of the “impersonal” story, which treated said two characters exactly the same. What a letdown.

IMO Caladbolg shouldn’t be a craftable weapon because:

1) It’s a unique artifact grown by the Pale Tree for a specific purpose.
2) Being craftable would mean it’s available to every species, and I’d hate that, similarly to how I disliked everyone and their grandma riding a nighsaber in WoW. It’s a signature artifact of the sylvari, it should stay in sylvari hands.
3) It does not act like a normal weapon but bestows its own unique set of skills.
4) Which means that a crafted Calabolg would not be Caladbolg at all, just a generic sylvari-skinned weapon.
5) And it means that if your class does not normally have access to greatswords, you would not even be able to touch crafted Caladbolg despite having wielded the real thing in your personal story as the Pale Tree’s Herald.

It just wouldn’t make any sense.

panzer’s right. Norn women have the option to be a bit stockier than human women, and that’s a small mercy at least, especially in the light of how painfully scrawny the humans are. But it’s not enough to make the norn women look like norn instead of tall humans. They should be thicker overall, broader in the shoulders in particular.

If the game actually had any continuity and coherence whatsoever in its “personal story”, I could live with a few unanswered questions. Sadly, it doesn’t. So in a sense, getting nowhere with this situation is par on course, but it’s still highly annoying — in no small part because it’s more personal than many others. The whole thing is just begging for a follow-up story arc, whether or not you let him live.

I like second chances myself, though my charr are definitely less forgiving than say the sylvari. The problem is that busting an untrustworthy person out of jail would come at the cost of others’ health and lives, and that’s just not an option. His “second chance” is in the choice of being straight with his offspring, but he does not take that chance.

As someone who’s very much a fan of the charr, especially the women, I heartily approve of this thread and all the kitten-looking characters in it. My own elementalist is a twig, but I do have a charrmer.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

To invent a combat mechanic, and then make all bosses immune to it, is to break one’s own combat system.

Every game designer out there should be made to hand-write this about 10,000 times until it haunts them in their sleep.

Really? I think it looks extremely awkward and unrealistic, especially when wearing full armor, and it’s doubly awkward because NPCs don’t do it. I’m really curious why they gave that animation to players but not NPCs — were they aware it’d look weird if all the charr loped around like that?

My elementalist hit 80 and I’m looking into crafting her some rare armor. She’s currently 0/10/10/20/30 but that’s not set in stone except for the 30 in Arcana. I do like both the movement speed from Air 5 and the 20 in Water, though. So what armor would folks recommend for an inexperienced player who mainly does solo PvE with occasional WvWvW and maybe an eye on joining a guild to try some group content? Berserker for all out damage since according to many people, killing stuff fast is the best way to stay alive and I have the Water traits for survival? Knight for some more durability at the cost of crit damage? A mix of both?

And cheers for the guide. I might have said this before, but going D/D got me interested in the class again.