Guild Wars 2

I agree that spirits can be limited. But that is irrelevant.

Esprits d’Orr : For gameplay considerations, each class can cast only a specific type of magic. However, in terms of roleplay, would it be possible for wizards to have a wider magical knowledge or potential, and therefore be able to cast spells from a variety of branches (such as an elementalist fireball coupled with a mesmer illusion) ?

Angel McCoy: I love that idea, as do many people living in Tyria. The reality, however, is that only the most powerful have the time and energy to do this. It’s like getting two doctorate degrees, one in medicine and one in engineering. Few have the time to do this, and usually, an individual doesn’t want to turn her back on everything she’s already learned to start a new magical discipline. She’d much rather continue advancing her knowledge in the discipline she’s invested decades in. Some, however, may dabble and experiment with specific spells. If a master elementalist can find a mesmer to teach her to produce an illusion, then she may explore ways to combine them. Most professions keep their secrets close to their chests though. And, the danger of a conflict between magical energies and thus, an explosion, is very real."

It is impractical to assume a significant portion of Ritualist is done by direct merging and not simply servitor work.Yes the spirits the Ritualist use may be confined to restorative pursuits, but that means little.

A spirit is not limited to a school. That idea treats spirits as if they only appeared after the Bloodstone’s creation. Rather, spirits are of a certain part of the spectrum of magic, and that sometimes aligns with how schools are divided.However sometimes not.

For instance, ranger spirits were using plant magic in gw1. Faction celestial skills can create suitable effects for all professions (including magical abilities for warrior and assassins that do not resemble any of their skills).

A school is just a collection of magical techniques that grant use of a particular bloodstone.

When we say water magic we most likely refer to the magic within the school of destruction that focuses on attuning to water etc. Why? Because naming things operated under a first come first serve policy back in gw1 days. People couldn’t simultaneously access two schools at once without great difficulty. So any watery effect was automatically linked to the school.

However we now know the truth. We know spirits and gods can use magic regardless of bloodstone or ley magic.

When I said Engineers adapted magic I meant literally. As you said, they have magical ingredient which they can combine to mimic the effect of certain spells. When alchemy can seemingly produce spells, its time for us to take a look at these categories we have placed on spirits. We need to accept they don’t have to be part of a school, or use its magic, to produce similar effects.

Never is this clearer than with combo fields. Look at the different flavors. If a warrior can shoot projectile finishers through an engi light field, I hardly think light is special .

I agree non-death magic can do the same. But the other dragons aren’t dead. Only one of the direct corruptors was dead at the time.

And my reasons were attempts at confirming what drax has said

… without death magic, Mordremoth might have been able to make clones of Zojja, but they would simply have been physical copies without magical abilities beyond what Mordremoth granted them through the hive mind. With death magic, Mordremoth could have made exact copies with Zojja’s powerful magic and knowledge of golems and technomagical devices.

because at the time it made more sense than your arguments.

However in trying to formulate a better response I found out that I am most definitely wrong.Not by your argument. But by my own discovery that no Mordrem in the game have ever used an ability that does not fall into mind or plant magic.

If Zhaitain can revive spellcasters and have them use their magic, but Mordremoth cannot. Then Mordremoth did not get that ability from Zhaitan.

tldr; You were right, I should have checked the lore first. What do you think Zhaitan gave to Mordremoth.

@konig
She said preservative not preservation. This may a game but the writers are using English. Whereas preservation can refer to several things, preservative(noun) refers to a substance preventing decay/decomposition/degradation. And given that formaldehyde is a preservative I don’t understand your reasoning.

As I see it.

• The second person rescued is worse off than the first.
• Preservatives in our world are toxic to the living.
• Sylvari are not duplicates of humans. If they were they would have genitals that worked. The duplicate ability is new.
• Destroyer/Mordrem are clones, Icebrood/Branded/Risen corrupt the organism itself. Comparing the minions of one group to the other is a non sequitur. Unless you know of Destroyers who use the magic of the races they copy.
• the pale tree was on a graveyard. I can draw a pig just by looking at rotting corpses/skeleton. But to accurately map the inside I would need to dissect a pig. And that requires some sort of preservative or cold to keep the tissue from rotting during the long process. Blight pods could easily be magical jars of formaldehyde.
• The necro has gotten good at animating and not all minions degenerate health as they use too. Moreover necromancers have the ability to stop people from bleeding out. Therefore necros clearly have some sort of ability to prevent tissue from decaying further.

At this point it doesn’t matter if things are reborn using plant matter, or just duplicated. The result is the same, and Mordremoth requires Zhaitan magic to do it.

Fay.2357:

SlimChance.6593:

From the wiki:

June 23, 2015 Patch
Specialization update:

Increased the delay before the clone is summoned by about 0.25 seconds to allow players to start casting this skill while moving within range and not have it fail.

The speed of attack of Illusion has been increased by about 0.35 seconds to allow for better tracking against moving targets.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Game_updates/2015-06-23#Skills_4

I was wrong on the LOS requirement. Just assumed since the skill generates a clone, LOS was required.

That was them normalizing the behavior of the skill to be like every other skill in the game. Previously, it summoned the clone instantly upon pressing the button, with the channel just for show or something. Now it summons the clone at the end of the channel.

This.

The clone is summoned .25 seconds into casting the skill. The next .25 seconds of the channel are meaningless You can cancel them if you want. Try doing leap, blurred frenzy .25 seconds into leap, then swap.

Also the skill is bugged. If you have multiple sword clones out they will leap to the target whenever you use the skill. They will apply cripple, then return to their original target.

SlimChance.6593:

The skill has a 1/2 second cast. A 1/4 second delay to the clone summoning was added to allow the player to start casting BEFORE getting into range.

This is where I usually mess up. You can start casting out of range, but if your not within range 1/4 second later then no clone. So if the target moves, or you move laterally, etc.. skill fails.

There’s also the one second delay between Leap>Swap. With all the AOE, cleave, powercreep, the clone doesn’t last long enough for that 1 second in order to swap to it.

I end up using only for the clone generation>shatter or as a semi escape mechanism. Enemy chasing your down…. Leap > Swap… run in opposite direction.

That one second delay could go down to 1/2 second. Funny how other professions gap closers are immediate(no delay in the middle) and ignore line of site. (Thief, Rev, Guardian) Mesmer’s need LOS to generate the clone, wait a second and (if the clone survives) then leap.

There is no 1/4 delay or LOS. I just tested it. Perhaps your are suffering from latency and you think you are in range but you are not.

I am a hypocrite.
I willingly said dervish were destruction because of the wind/earth. But I know better now.

Energies are manipulated by the classes. But that does not mean their effects are of said schools.

That is the message of the engineer. Toss elixir R mimics symbol of judgment. Toss elixir U mimics Wall of Reflection. Super elixir is a light field that heals and remove a condition.

When an engineer is turning people into a moa they aren’t casting magic. Nor do we try to align them with the Denial school. To an older observer they have merged denial with alchemy. But the reality is alchemy can replicate the effects of “true” magic.

Similarly, the solar beam resembles guardian light in color and effect; simultaneous healing to allies and damage to enemies. The celestial avatar’s Cosmic Ray even recycled the animation for the guardian tome of courage auto. The seed of life took its name from monks, and uses light. To an older observer druids have merged spirit with preservation. But the reality is they are an avatar of celestial power, and a star spirit can probably control light better than a mortal.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Light_field
Faith magic, chaos magic, nature magic, black magic, centaur magic all use light to heal in gw2. Just because faith magic is particularly adept at it means little.

X profession can control X force using X magic.
Guardians can control light using faith magic is a logical statement.
X profession can control X magic using X force.
Saying Guardians can control faith magic using light is illogical. Light itself is not magic.

A Ritualist controls healing/resurrection/vampirism/mist energy using spirit magic.
They adapted magic to their school as much as an Engineer adapted magic for Elixir U or Asura gates, by replicating what they could.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

@Vesuvius.9874:
[snip]
The whole blighting pod thing is unlikely too as living beings were put in them just as well as dead beings, and we see similar methodologies in less harmful manners used by the Pale Tree to create the sylvari (though the less harmful manner resulted in less accurate “cloning”).

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Legendary_Blademaster_Diarmid

" Legendary Blademaster Diarmid was a sylvari of the Pact who died when Mordremoth tore the fleet apart. Occam knew her and saw her die. Her corpse was taken and used to create a Commander of the Mordrem Guard. She first appeared as a Mordrem Guard around the Corpse Grove in Verdant Brink, where she attacked the Pact’s Ordnance Corps Outpost, only to be reborn again from her pod in the Central Blighting Tower."

Mordremoth got the gift of rebirth from Mordremoth, but not all of death magic. He kills people to reanimate them, but uses plant matter rather than tissue.

Had Zojja/Logan stayed in the towers longer they would have died. The one that is saved second is considerably sicker, but has clones. Were they to have died I presume their clones would use actually use their abilities rather than just inherit their will. That is what was critical. With true rebirth Mordrem could use magic that Mordremoth cannot, similar to risen spellcasters.

draxynnic.3719:

…
(Incidentally, I’m inclined to think that shadowsteps are true teleports, akin to mesmer teleports. I generally think of the magic used by thieves – which they clearly do use – as being a specialised form of the same general type of magic that mesmers use. Others may disagree, though. Regarding monk fire and necromancer ice: Both can ultimately result in something that is genuine fire and ice. They just get there through a different route than fire and water magic, respectively. There’s more than one way to light a fire – just because the end result is similar does not mean that the route is the same.

Yes, I’m aware that a similar argument could be made regarding ritualists and Preservation… but as I said, we know ritualists incorporated bloodstone magic of some variety into their skills, which makes it a question of “which school is it”. And for reasons previously discussed, I think Preservation is the most likely.)

Reread the text.

These human Ritualists adapted to true magic when the gods introduced it, but still rely on the Spirits of the dead to put these skills into practice.
Unfortunately for scholars such as myself, the skills of the true Ritualist are no longer to be seen; but those that evolved from the merging of magic and Spirit certainly are widespread. Master Togo of Shing Jea Monastery, to name just one example, is a Ritualist of uncanny ability.

The reality of merging means they recognize these abilities are not of the four schools. Which they justify based on observations that Ritualists still rely on their spirits. There is no caveat to what rely on means. It could be all, but if restoration magic was such a huge exception I assume that would be noted.

Regardless this is a problematic source.

When a person says true magic, and then refuses to call it spirit magic, this is an issue. Not only because they say true magic instead of referring to which school, but also because they begin to lack credibility. We know bloodstone magic is not the true magic.

And when this person says they know there was a merge, but not what the original skills were, I don’t believe them. They have no idea whether or not the schools completely resemble the original Ritualist magic. In our travels we have met a spirit for each school. The author doesn’t consider that possibility, in their mind only monks can be expansive healers. Resurrection comes from Dwayna. The gods did not give these abilities beforehand, therefore to have them expressed through spirit means a merge took place.

There is no lore reason for any healing ability to be related to preservation, unless expressly stated.

The chill effect can be produced by nature magic, chaos magic, dark magic, water magic, and light magic. Why not healing?

The well of blood, the healing spring, swirling aura were ways to heal others in gw1. Somehow everyone decided that mixing magic is easier than advancing the healing abilities inherent to one’s profession. And this defies what we know about mixing magic. It is explosive and dangerous.

There was no mixing. There is just a scholar who can’t accept that such abilities could match or exceed true magic.

Ranger/ritualist/revenant are tainted. They each appeal to different powers, we have no reason to believe that any of their abilities are their own and not that of the entities they channel.

The Revenant is not Denial just because Shiro was an Assassin. Nor is the Druid Denial because they can summon black holes. Nor is the ritualist Denial because they can teleport their Spirits to them.

They can be everything, so they are nothing.

@amai

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Scarlet's_End
Braham’s leg broke.

Compare

Mhenlo rushed to push the creature’s carcass from on top of the mage’s body. The man was barely conscious. He had been badly mauled by the Charr. His face was slashed, and he coughed blood. Dropping to his knees beside the man, the Monk laid his hands on the mage’s wounds. With a quick word, a flood of blue-white energy crossed over from the Monk to the wounded man…"Then what are we waiting for?” said Cynn, starting off to the east…Mhenlo looked up from his ministrations to the wounded mage. “Cynn, please. You aren’t helping.”

Vs

The Charr let out a howl then raked its axe across the Warrior’s face, cutting a deep wound into her flesh. But as quickly as the wound was made, her skin knitted itself together again.

Both from https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/The_Nolani_Academy_of_the_Arcane_Arts

It takes time to heal serious wounds, yes there is an element of plot to it, but it’s pretty consistent throughout both games. Rox spent time healing Marjory so she didn’t die, they didn’t have to to help Braham. And you were too busy fighting, you didn’t have several minutes to devote to healing.

In their universe damage to the flesh is not serious, burnt/bleeding skin can easily be regrown. Damage to the internal organs (coughing blood is lung damage) or bone is much more complicated.

Moreover as drax mentioned some conditions are magical and can simply be dispelled.

Whether you were a Druid or a Guardian you wouldn’t have had time to heal properly.

The issue is if spirits can boost them then I have no reason to believe they aren’t spirit to begin with. From the urn spells, and the binding rituals, we know spirts can heal/ressurect. As they said in an empire divided "These human Ritualists adapted to true magic when the gods introduced it, but still rely on the Spirits of the dead to put these skills into practice."

There are no untainted skills in ritualist. Whatever you see is just as easily them converting their own spirit rather than other spirits. Monks have only one skill that made them lose health to heal. And the direct implications was you were transferring health from your body to an ally. They didn’t sacrifice health to ressurect or use spirits for it. Restoration has far to much health loss for such an easy comparison.

If ritualist lightning isn’t true lightning, monk fire isn’t true fire, necromancer ice isn’t true ice, shadowsteps aren’t true teleports, then treating restoration magic as true preservation is just as off. It resembles it, but it got there by using spirits.

You have created enough reasonable doubt for Ranger, Ritualist, and Revenant to be in none of the ley schools.

There are no healing skills that don’t interact with spirits in some way. So yes you are correct they are using preservation magic, as druids use destruction magic, and the revenants use denial magic. But they using their spirits to do it, not themselves.

My comment on aggression was based on the game telling us they aligned with Grenth. The skills don’t describe their old abilities or anything other than servitor magic of the underworld, nature, and reflections in the mist.

Also the concept of ambient magic is meaningless. Unless you are referring to Mursat magic the Seers bound all main in the bloodstone. We are told using multiple schools is hard but not impossible. Plant magic is most likely a combination several schools.

Moreover if plant magic wasn’t in the undivided bloodstone then Mordremoth had no reason to sleep.

Edit: Moreover whether it’s ambient or bloodstone or dragon, tyrian magic allows Mordremoth to access Mists.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Tell that to the NPCs at Tequatl. Or the freshly made risen in Arah.

Zhaitan died, but his corruption was spread through his champions still.

Maybe new corruption couldn’t be made – we’re not sure – but it still existed, and new minions were still being made.

Is that what Sylvari terraforming is? Can they spread their uncorrupted magic?

Amaimon.7823:

I was always curious about healing magic. We, the PC can fix dismemberment, piercing, burns, poisons, rots, mental corruptions. But heroes and allies sit out a fight because their legs hurt.. are we somehow easier to heal? Is our healing divine? Then why dont PCs heal entire armies?

Rapidly healing entire armies is called being a Lich.

Doctors in our world can fix that list you described. For instance if my toe is cut off I can have it reattached if I am quick enough. The only difference is magic treatment is more speedy, and they are better at resuscitation than we are.

So with magic/medicine waiting to seek care makes the issue harder to resolve.

The longer something is dead/diseased/damage/decaying/decomposing the less they can help.

It becomes the domain of necromancers.

If I wait a year to reattach my rotting toe only a Dr. Frankenstein could fix it. However I would still be left with a dead toe that was reanimated, an undead toe.

Specifically with Taimi’s leg she has a degenerative disease that appears to be genetic. They are to stop it at her leg but they can’t regenerate the function of the leg itself.

I personally would love for Marjory to reanimate Taimi’s leg, but I don’t know if it’s possible without killing her.

Okay.
First I don’t know where I picked up snaff was a necromancer. Perhaps in the association of Oola. Idk. I may be wrong.

So have we seen mesmers mind control on the level of minion magic? It seems like will suppression was always an aggression thing.

Now rather than saying there is no spirit magic (which uses the biased language of Prophecies) I will specify.

There is
* ley magic,
* dragon Magic (corrupted ley),
* mist magic (which includes non spirit entities)

We see this with: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Cosmic_Power
* Energy of the Mists
* Magic of the Elder Dragons
* Power of the Ley Lines

"Taking out all the things related to spirits" is impossible.
Every spell in restoration magic relates to spirits, item/weapon spells. Performing healing prayers by converting spirit matter to life does not make you any closer to a monk than to a necro, especially when several require skills require blood sacrifice. Moreover we are told their skills don’t resemble their original forms.

"Ritualist magic" is servitor work. I only associated it with Aggression because servitor work was already in that school and the game told us rits filed under Grenth.

You say things like:

You seem stuck in the mindset that “ritualist magic is unique unto them” and that “ritualist magic can only take form in what ritualists do” when neither of those are true.

Which makes no sense.

I didn’t create a list of dragons to imply dragons were using ritualist magic. I meant that it’s ridiculous to assume that the dragons use the same type of magic. And to treat it as some monolithic field.

From wizards mutating seeds, to necro plant minions, there is no evidence to treat Mordremoth plant magic as something special. It’s a combination of several schools.

You deny every skill that mentions soul/spirit/demon/god/death/rebirth in prophecies.

As well as necros using cold from the underworld. Monks using heat from fissure of woe. And turn them into bizarre elementalists.

draxynnic.3719:

The Restoration Magic skills that involve lifesteal are spirit weapon skills, which are thematically channeling a spirit into the weapon (like Belinda inhabiting her sword, albeit on a more temporary basis). They come from the Spirit “school”, not from any of the bloodstone schools.

I’m talking about the direct heals, not the special skill types that were available to ritualists alone.

Check out the section of An Empire Divided that relates to ritualists. None of the bloodstone schools are about channeling otherworldly energies – channeling otherworldly energies was a branch of magic that existed before the gods tinkered with the bloodstone and made the other forms of magic available. The bloodstone schools are different flavours of Tyrian magics; Spirit is literally otherworldly, being able to access and draw from the Mists. (It’s likely that Spirit still requires some Tyrian magic to access the Mists in the first place, but you can get more powerful effects with a smaller amount of Tyrian magic because most of the energy is coming from the Mists.)

Aggression, as demonstrated in the GW1 necromancer, doesn’t actually conclusively have any channeling of otherworldly entities. Spiteful Spirit maybe, but we don’t know what was actually going on with that skill… it might just be a name for the hex. Broadly speaking, Aggression allowed necromancers to channel the powers of death within Tyria, but granted no access to the afterlife: that was the domain of ritualists and Spirit. GW2 necromancers do (Shadow Fiend), but as I’ve previously stated, this probably involved necromancers picking up some ritualist knowledge between GW1 and GW2.

Regarding Joko: We actually don’t know what goes into making sapient corporeal undead, except that everyone who’s done it is a necromancer. I suspect it requires a mixture of Aggression and Spirit: Aggression to animate the corpse, Spirit to bind a soul within the corpse. Assuming it can be done through pure Aggression, though… you’re right, this does mean that sufficiently powerful necromancers can indirectly control the four schools through their minions. Which is similar to users of Spirit being able to generate effects that look like they might belong to a bloodstone school by binding the appropriate spirit. Or a good leader having followers with other magic types. Indirectly controlling a magic type through a servitor is not saying anything about what you could do without such a servitor.

Which is exactly what ritualists are doing. Controlling the magic of the four schools through a servitor. There is no “spirit magic”. We are told it resembled, but was not Tyrian magic. Rituals allowed rangers and ritualists to invoke the power of entities outside of the world (aka access mist magic they wasn’t bound in the bloodstone) without using tyrian magic to empower the connection. Later they started using ley energy like everyone else, but kept their connections to “spirits.” The powers of celestial spirits, spirits of the wild, ghosts, etc are too variant to treat them as one unified magic. Rather they are entities that can perform several acts of magic.

Look at the Dragons. Several can access the mist without relying on ritual.

• Zhaitan creates sapient undead, corrupts several ghosts, and a reaper of grenth. They are not a ritualist.
• Mordremoth accesses the dream. They are not a ritualist.
• Jormag forces a havroun into allowing him access the mist. There are not a ritualist.

Accessing otherwordly energies/spirits has nothing to do with a fifth school. Its just that all interact with said entities, as well as energies in general, in different ways.

As for ranger/ritualist/necro
The game itself allowed the spawning power of ritualists to apply to ranger spirits and necro minions, but not to conjure spells of ele/mesmer. Necro summon animals like locusts, shrimp, and snaff pioneered telepathic control. Rangers summon animals like birds, piranha, and they have pioneered empathic connections.

Also you are incorrect. https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Bloodsong was not a spirit weapon. And we are directly told “Necromancers, calling on the spirits of the dead, and even death itself, to overpower enemies and assist allies.” Arbitrary defining death as solely within Tyria (and not telling us this in the manuscripts), while simultaneously introducing the concept of an underworld is too confusing to have been part of the writing process. Similarly monks resurrected from the afterlife, otherwise Grenth would not have had to overturn Dhuum’s ban on it. It just happens that the underworld is one of several places the dead go before the hall of heroes.

@konig
The world’s are islands floating in aether connected through the rift. Necromancers channel the ice abilities of death and their ice is as comparable to water magic as holy fire is to fire.
And though it may be associated with no more healer philosophies, preservation mixed the most with the other schools.

@drax elemetalists, mesmers, and necros use ether differently.
(I had to rub to the shop, thems the breaks)

You comment about aggression got me thinking.

So if you wanted to define the bloodstones it pretty much looks like this. (at least in my eyes)

Mesmers use magic to alter the energy in themselves/others, inducing temporary realites from surrounding ether. Essentially they change the laws of physics and matter responds (most skills use altered gravity/kinetic energy/etc to create permanent results). Mesmers use immaterial energies like light/darkness/ether and seem unable to produce matter from energy(i.e Razah). The closest thing is a phantasm.

Elementalists use magic to channel energy in the world, inducing temporary form from surrounding ether. Essentially they change ether to matter and the laws of physics respond (most skills are physical changes obeying heat/gravity/etc). Elementalists use the four elements and seem unable to produce energy from matter. The closest thing is recycling the energy of their spells.

Necros use magic to gather energy from flesh, which fuels the channeling of dark powers. Essentially these abilities give them control over things like darkness, ice, disease, undeath, etc. They seem unable to benefit the living, the closest thing is using blood magic to enhance allies.

Monks use magic to gather energy from their faith/spirit?, which fuels the channeling of light powers. Essentially these abilities give them control over things like light, fire, healing, resurrection etc. They seem unable to benefit the undead, the closest thing is using healing magic to repair minions.

Here is where it gets tricky.

Has this game in trying to balance classes warped the lore? They constantly avoided giving necromancers projectile destruction skills, but when they did it went into a poison field. All the while revenants have dark fields that destroy arrows.

Are they implying that projectile destruction with light is natural to Tyrian magic but using darkness to achieve the same goal is demonic?

Why does guardian fire have more properties to it than necro ice if both are otherworldy? E.g necro ice behaves like elementalist ice, guardian fire doesn’t act like elementalist fire.

Moreover guardian light doesn’t act like the light of any other class. Cleansing, reflection, healing is shared by all. Mesmers may use it with time/stealth magic but guardians just start making stuff with it. Where are the shadow constructs?

The issue is the prevalence of lifesteal magic in restoration magic which is unheard of in preservation. Moreover necromancers can indirectly access the four schools through their minions. Joko could control air magic through undead elementalists, it’s unclear how this is different from a Ritualist or Ranger using their spirits to perform an action. Also when Anet explained explained preservation was faith based rather than a conduit to the gods it’s made aggression the only school that actually channeled otherworldly energies.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

As I said before transformation magic existed long before dervishes even existed.

I would argue that ritualists are preservation + mists magic, personally, as the spells that don’t seem to relate to spirits and rifts are healing magic. They were also, alongside paragons and monks, merged into guardians in lore – would make sense all three were of the same school of magic.

I agree dervishes are Destruction; I’d argue rangers went into that school too, if any.

I would argue flash enchantments being restricted to dervishes is a mechanical limitation, not a lore one of their school – same with conjuring weapons (after all we see guardians do such) or transformations. I would not attribute shifting attunements to flash enchantments at all.

Ritualist’s are clearly aggression. Even the restoration skills you mention largely feature life stealing. Remember they had blood sacrifice as a consequence of not being in range of a spirit when using a spell. And they harnessed ashes to boost their connection.

Rangers/ritualists/necromancer all share common traits.

1. Communing with the spirit world.
2. Binding the will of others

• binding rituals which are forceful
• nature rituals which create an open bond
• death magic, which is forceful
  3. Accessing multiple schools by channeling
• necros have spellcaster minions and can use ice magic
• ritualists can access lightning magic and healing prayers
• rangers can access stealth and gravity and water.

To me the empathic bond rangers can have with pets is just a more friendly form of minion

The other schools make sense.
All matter/energy/reality came from ether and it connects the worlds/dimensions.
So of course ele can conjure matter from ether, necros can use it to contact other dimensions, and mesmers can bend reality with it.

But why would a divided bloodstones allow all three to occur in the school of preservation?

Why could monks create light from nothing, contact otherworldly entities using willpower, and defy reality by making light solid. Adding in healing thats four schools in one.

What is the school of preservation? What exactly is a direct conduit to the gods if it could be faith based magic all along.

This seems like the power tripping of all schools. Sure mesmers can alter reality temporarily but monks could passify you through will alone. Paragons could could order people to burst into flame, and other physical impossible things to command a person to perform.

It’s even more wonky when you see how easily all of the professions are using healing magic now. None of the other schools were mixed into the other ones.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Aaron Ansari.1604:

I think it depends on whether they were aware at the time that monk magic wasn’t solely from the gods, which in turn boils down to an individual’s interpretation of monks and dervishes using ‘prayers’ instead of magic. If they had a sound grasp on the fact that the praying is just their specific way of tapping into the magic and not necessarily the only way to do so, it’d be as you say.

People of the time could believe that monks’ power came directly from the gods, and solely, while still accepting that other races have healing magic that doesn’t.

There’s never any mention about non-humans healing folks praying to the gods they hate (be it Stone Summit, charr, or other). So I’d argue that if it isn’t brought up, there’s no common case of folks getting all riled up over charr who hate the gods using the gods’ magic. Or thinking them ignorant and stupid about it.

How much of the racial skills can we attribute to lore?
Based on the elite skills the dervish ability of transformations has become very well known.
Also if ritualists were brought into the aggression school (but can access all schools through their spirits), what did dervish join?

Even if the dervish weren’t incorporated into necro and druid, I think it always was part of Destruction.

There are the wind and earth prayers.

And as far as metamagic the instant casting of flash enchantments resembles the principles of the glyph of essence more than fast casting.

The effects of FC revolved around mechanics that would become alacrity, quickness, and slow.

While Elementalist kept with the FE route, developing cantrips and instant attuneing.

Even in keeping with that tradition there is 1 second delay between shifting attunements, the same delay on using flash enchantments.

It makes sense for melee mesmer to blurr instead of dodges.

I imagine the new dodges will allow you to use your skills while evading, and won’t move you.
Basically warrior stances with far less mobility.

Deceptive evasion will have its description changed to produce a clone when you evade.

I don’t know what condition it will be. But mirage sounds like a confusion build. Although it may be burning given that its the desert.

@Drax I agree that Necromancers probably cannot control elementals directly. I agree with you categories, although I don’t know if ranger spirits are undead.

@Drax&Konig
Are Death Shroud, Celestial Avatar, and the Transform skills, convergent evolution to Dervish forms?

Would Dervishes have been perturbed if they met a Charr monk https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Charr_Prophet using Dwayna’s kiss?

Anka.5086:

for those players who don’t have the time to farm 600 crystaline ore

I recently found out you can get them from the heroic notary in wvw for 75 proof of heroics. If you haven’t spent yours on hero points go take a look. The vendor is on the desert border land at each spawn.

draxynnic.3719:

That’s a valid observation, although I will note that outside of game mechanics we don’t know what the Carven Effigies actually are. They’re clearly not natural elementals, and seem to be essentially constructs. They could be powered by bound elementals, though.

It’s worth noting that some prerelease information on golems indicates that most golems are powered by nonsapient elemental spirits, with the Inquest and other unsavoury groups being willing to use sapient spirits (including humanoids) for golems. That seems to be an element that hasn’t been translated into the game, though, apart from one event in Mt Maelstrom where an Inquest agent is trying to collect sylvari to make sylvari-infused golems – what we see of golems ingame seems more like magic-powered robots than golems powered by elemental spirits. Still, if we do consider this to still be accurate, then if we combine it with other considerations (Oola’s connecting of necromancy and golemancy, and the original Iron Forgeman) does suggest that necromancers can control elemental spirits as long as they are bound into a construct.

We haven’t, however, seen any evidence that they can control elementals in their ‘natural’ state. They can – probably – bind elemental spirits into constructs, which is probably a similar magic to that used to create sapient undead (contrast the Awakened to necrominions) or Shiro’ken. But we don’t see much evidence that they can control elementals without infusing them into something. (With the exception, again, of whatever Isgarren is up to. However, soul transfer seems to be a magic that isn’t necessarily limited to necromancers, so Isgarren might not be a necromancer – and, in fact, most likely isn’t.)

I completely agree. And I see where my language was confusing. I’ll clarify. Minion shifted definition from gw1 to gw2 to include all undead servants. I applied the term to gw1 creatures that would be classed as minions in gw2. And flesh back then meant different things (essentially it had a corpse that could be reanimated).

So I classified necro minions into summoned spirits, reanimations of organic tissue, and constructs (like Carven Entity), and said that Necromancer’s can control all three types. Which is clearly true: https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Undead
Although can =/= will. And examining all AI elementals can be constructs or animations.

• summons (spirits)
• animations (elementals, fleshy undead, most likely illusions)
• constructs (gyros, turrets, golems)
• allies (pets, fellow thieves)

@sock
So basically the part we see of ethereal magic is the form it has taken.
Meaning ether isn’t magenta, chaos magic is magenta.

@konig we know dragons corrupt using unique dragon energy. To stop corruption you have to stop energy either from binding or from flowing.

Regardless do you believe Mordremoth can attach minions to the Dream?

If so why is the SotD the only one we see?
If not why can’t he?

Necromancers most definitely can have elemental minions.
Palawa Joko has undead elementals. https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Carven_Effigy
And the Djinn powered Iron Forgeman are bound by necromancers
https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Rage_Binder

Also active communication is not a required part of the definition for group mind. Only that the consciousness came from a single entity. And Modremoth’s mind is a hive mind and a metaphysical location, so I don’t see your point.

However I have edited the OP so to take out the contentious aspect of #2. Do you have any opinion on mysticism becoming public once atheist guardians became a thing. And do you agree the soul is made of dust?

Sock.2785:

Aether is everywhere, “it’s a metaphysical substance that occupies the space between planets as well as the space between protons and neutrons (if said space had a magical presence to it)”, but unlike other aspects of magic it’s not itself detectable (locatable) like, for example, ley lines are.

The main fact is that in Tyria’s universe sentient beings can sense and use magic, since, as suggested by Snaff’s research, mind and magic are linked; this is the reason why Gwen and mesmers in general can manipulate aether, it being one aspect of magic amongst others, but they don’t entirely understand it. In addition, mesmers make also use of chaos magic and possibly mind magic.

As for the Dream of Dreams, it’s stated in the wiki that its true nature is unknown even to the Pale Tree; even though it is deeply tied to it, considering that it acts as its custodian, the Pale Tree doesn’t know how it really works. Personally, the Dream appears to be one of the many realms of the mists, and as such accessible by outsiders via portals. Sylvari themselves spawn from it and are transported physically in Tyria just later via the Pale Tree; Sylvari seems to be a creation of the mists much like Razah or the demons you mentioned are. Aether might have a role in generating such beings (by the way this knowledge comes to us from the game’s manual and as such might be one that’s not shared with tyrians, unless specifically said), but I don’t see how one could directly study or measure it this way.

Daniel Handler.4816:

There are ways to reproduce it.

That’s not what “reproducibly [locate, measure, or study]” meant. Also, one doesn’t reproduce aether; you use it.

Ultimately, I don’t really see any discrepancy, at least not in the ones you mentioned so far.

P.S. Where is it stated that Dynamics’s exponents study or make use of aether?

“His work with asura gates gave him expertise in handling etheric couplings.”
- https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Golemancer

In the Guild Wars Novel “Sea of Sorrows” it is revealed that only graduates from the college of Dynamics are able to build and repair the gates. (page 337)
- https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Asura_gate

How is the Pale Tree unable to reliably locate the Dream, which is made of Aether?
How are people building asura gates unable to reliably locate areas in the mists?
Demons are made of ether and only ether, has no one ever studied them?
How can we make ethereal fields with different properties if we can’t reproducibly study ether?

Sock.2785:

Daniel Handler.4816:

Then aether is diffferent from ether. […]

I forgot to quote the interviewer’s question, here it is:

What is ‘ether’ and how does it relate to the kind of magic our characters use, the ley lines and dragon energy?

Seems like aether and ether are really the same, just a difference in spelling, like color and colour.

Daniel Handler.4816:

[…] by this quote aether just basically means outer space to them.

But it’s really not outer space, that’s not what they said; they compared it to dark matter: it’s not directly observable but its interactions with the typical matter are.

Really? Ether = aether. They are that lazy. Regardless this reveals a pretty frustrating lore discrepancy.

“As such, aether is one aspect of the magic mortals or Elder Dragons use. It is part of the magical/physical structure of the universe, but unavailable for direct study…no one can reproducibly locate, measure, or study it…”
http://pactfiftythird.enjin.com/mobile/forum/viewthread/m/28600115/id/19093296-lore-article-directory

It clearly is locatable .
“By focusing the ether around my body…”
https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Research_Journal

The Pale tree can locate the Dream.
“The Dream itself is said to be made of aether and memories”
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Dream_of_Dreams

There are are things we can study.
“[Demons] are made from the Mists themselves, bits of etheric matter that have gained malignant sentience and power”
-https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Demon

There are ways to reproduce it
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Ethereal_field’

And the whole concept of Dynamics and their portal gates, as well as Mesmer Magic in general, is based on studying ether.

The only way to justify this seeming inconsistency is that ether is the invisible substance. While ethereal is the visible energy, and etheric is the visible matter.

draxynnic.3719:

[snip] It stands to reason that Mordremoth could use this link to more easily influence sylvari minds than the minds of, say, humans.

You have good points that I missed in the back and forth.

I agree with all of your points. But just because they are unique to all Mordrem that doesn’t make them insignificant.

There are several flukes in this game.
Charr among cats.
Humans among primates (there are unintelligent gorilla)
Djinn among elementals.
Sylvari among Mordrem.

Why did he stop making them? Was death magic cloning so much more useful?

There should be more Sylvari that are purely his, there should be more minions connected to the Dream for the IQ boost. But there aren’t.

Mem no Fushia.7604:

What with ghost minions? ghost necromancers summon ghost minions?

Minions are made from three different methods

• summoning spirits (nightmare fiend)
• reanimating flesh (jagged horror)
• constructs (elementals)
  Necromancers can control them all.

@rognik some corrections

• we know malyck’s tree was purified because he is an uncorrupted sylvari. There is literally no other known method for uncorrupted sylvari to be produced.
• the dream can’t be part of Mordremoth’s mindscape, because he is said to have a connection to the Dream. Your cordoned off analogy makes as much sense as saying France has a connection to Paris, but not all natural citizens of Paris are citizens of France.
• the white stag is important because all Modrem are created from plants,.Even if the Dream was a part of his being turned on him the Stag should not be fleshy. Mordremoth ability to create hyper realistic clones came after Zhaitan’s death.
• Trahearne’s Hunt is to cleanse Orr, the PC’s is to kill Zhaitan. Neither perform the either.
• Google some of this stuff beforehand.

Sock.2785:

Here is a collection of various lore interviews (the original source doesn’t seem to be accessible anymore); I’ll extract the part about the aether here:

In Tyria, “aether” refers to the metaphysical substance that occupies the spaces between matter and energy; analogous to the vacuum of space between planets as well as the space between protons and neutrons (if said vacuum of space had a magical presence to it). It is not a definable and measurable thing like ley lines, which represent the actual flow of magical energy through and across Tyria.

As such, aether is one aspect of the magic mortals or Elder Dragons use. It is part of the magical/physical structure of the universe, but unavailable for direct study—sort of like dark matter: there is something there, a presence that includes a magical aspect, which we can observe and verify from the effects it produces, but so far no one can reproducibly locate, measure, or study it. They’ve only learned how to tap it. If tapping a source of power you don’t entirely understand sounds dangerous to you, that’s because it is.

According to the given definition, I guess one could attune to aether like if it was, let’s say, fire magic. By the process of attuning magic users focus on a particular aspect of magic, making use of it effectively (elementalists are the best example). On a side note, attuning to multiple aspects of magic at the same time might be very dangerous and difficult, if not impossible, to most.

Then aether is diffferent from ether. Because ether is like quarks and by this quote aether just basically means outer space to them.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Daniel Handler.4816:

I never specified that Mordremoth owned, controlled, or created the Dream.

You originally were saying that the Dream is the mordrem/sylvari hive mind, which would mean originating from Mordremoth who’d be the owner of the hive mind.

No that is not what it would mean.
The owner of the hive mind is the Dream. Just like the owner of the Internet is the Internet. The Sylvari are just part of domain of devices, with the Pale Tree being the domain controller. It may not be the traditional hive mind, but it is still a network.

The CIA has a network of PCs that aren’t connected to the internet, they do this for security reasons.
Similarly Mordremoth has a network of Mordrem that aren’t connected to the dream, they do this for security reasons. Here are some possibilities

• Hunts work both ways. The Pale Tree would be able to implant suggestions in his creatures.
• He doesn’t want his creature to have the intelligence of Sylvari.
• He literally cannot connect a corrupted creature to the Dream. Only one Mordrem has ever accessed the dream. And we know for a fact the Pale Tree can portal people directly into the dream without connecting them to it. So we currently have no definitive proof Mordremoth has connected anything to the Dream.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Daniel Handler.4816:

Moreover you keep mentioning the Blue Orb analogy and evidence, please explain.

Both prevent corruption. Neither reverts corruption. A corrupted individual standing near the Blue Orb has no changes to it – a corrupted individual tied to the Dream has no changes to it.

The Blue Orb analogy is problematic enough.
What would happen if this “blue orb” was attached to the mouth of Zhaitan.
Oil doesn’t have to purify water to mess with fluid dynamics. And I don’t remember saying purifying. Just that a connection would be disadvantageous.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

You are acting as if the Dream is a purifying force, like the spell the Forgotten used on Glint. This is not true. There would be no reason for Mordremoth to not connect his minions to the Dream if he could.

Daniel Handler.4816:

From my current perspective there are no Mordrem connected to the Dream. And only one has been guested in. Guesting is not the same type of connected given that she can send anyone in through portals. It is odd that there are not more Mordrem like the Sylvari.

Exactly my point.

Daniel Handler.4816:

YES that is what I have been trying to say that whole time.

If the Dream allows things to resist the influence of an ED. Why would Mordremoth connect his creatures to it.

The Dream allows non-corrupted things to resist.

That’s what you’re missing.

The Shadow of the Dragon still worked for Mordremoth, unabated, while it was in the Dream just as afterwards. The sole case of a Mordrem tied to the Dream.

I’m not missing that. I said, and you just agreed, the Shadow of the Dragon guested in.
If the PC of any race can be sent into the Dream by the Pale Tree, then Mordremoth can send creatures into the Dream without connecting them to the Dream.

Moreover the SotD was clearly disadvantaged anyway. It couldn’t make Mordrem it was forced to make Nightmare. And this might just be because of the tutorial but it was clearly weaker than its irl counterpart, something that doesn’t happen when the Pale Tree guests people into visions etc.

Edit: I mostly agree with this statement you previously made
“It would be closer to a server with sylvari being computers that download from the server when first turning on, but only upload to the server afterwards.”
Where I disagree is Hunts are clearly downloaded, and servers cannot prevent domain users from joining other servers if given direct access to their PC. It makes more sense for the Dream to be Internet given its scope and the soundless ability to lessen the connection (disable automatic updates) and the administrative firewall that blocks most of Mordremoth.

Regardless the main issue is that you claim its not a hive mind.

Well you are right, it’s not. It’s a group mind. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Group_mind_(science_fiction)#List_of_non-hive_group_minds

A group mind that protects against hive minds.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

The major issue about the Dream being linked to Mordremoth – especially as Mordremoth owning, controling, or creating the Dream in some way – is that the Wyld Hunts and Dark Hunts actively send sylvari to fight not just other Elder Dragons, but Mordremoth himself. At the end of The World Summit, sylvari PCs state they have a new Wyld Hunt: to kill Mordremoth..

You keep messing up the order. I am trying to be clear about what I mean. I’ll try again.

The Dream is linked to Mordremoth as much as the Internet is linked to my computer.

It is better to say:
Mordremoth is linked to the Dream.
The Pale Tree is linked to the Dream
The White Stag is linked to the Dream.
My computer is linked to the Internet.

As long as a PC is connected to the Internet it can update its firewall.
Soundless are Sylvari who saw that annoying automatic windows update and disabled it. Now its easier to hack their PC.
Mordremoth can influence the Dream. And I can influence the Internet. I am doing it right now typing this response.

Do I control the Internet?

I never specified that Mordremoth owned, controlled, or created the Dream.
Instead of opening his minions up to Hunts he keeps them on a private server, just like the CIA having a network that cannot connect to the internet as a security measure.

Moreover you keep mentioning the Blue Orb analogy and evidence, please explain.

From my current perspective there are no Mordrem connected to the Dream. And only one has been guested in. Guesting is not the same type of connected given that she can send anyone in through portals. It is odd that there are not more Mordrem like the Sylvari.

You would think if there was an Elder Dragon of Animals he would create a large number of humans.

Rognik.2579:

Daniel Handler.4816:

Are the ED unable to create uncorrupted things?

I doubt that they can, but even if they could, why would they? Their purpose (as far as we can tell) is to collect all the ambient magic in the world, and fall asleep after it has had enough. So what if a few mortal beings get killed in the process? They’re replaceable, and most have some of that yummy magic on their person! Usually not enough to count as more than just a morsel, but every little bit counts.

So counterargument: why would an ED create something free of their corruption?

YES that is what I have been trying to say that whole time.

If the Dream allows things to resist the influence of an ED. Why would Mordremoth connect his creatures to it.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

[snip]

Neither of those statements contradict each other. Explain what you mean.

If you had kept on reading…

A subconsciousness is less than what we see it described as. And a mere subconscious cannot show the future.

I did keep on reading and gave a second response to the second half ( because i went over 5000 with the first) but the forum seems to have eaten it.

From what I can remember I brought up this.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/lore/Living-World-S2E7-Seeds-of-Truth-SPOILERS/page/2#post4606542

I was operating under the concept that the Dream provided a D$ shared network for memory access. Sylvari would feel big uploads even though they couldn’t access them. However that appears to not be the case, the death of Riannoc was not felt automatically. But this only means the hive mind does not contain peer to peer interactions.

Control is not just about making people do things, but preventing them from doing other things.

They can’t turn it off. The Nightmare is still part of the Dream. And the Soundless can be spoken to if the PT tries hard enough. All that happens with the Soundless is automatic windows updates are turned off and the PC becomes more vulnerable to being hacked.
__________________________________________________________________

Now as for your new reply.

A network of PCs can back up files to the same FTP, that doesn’t mean the FTP is the entire internet.

Those with the Mind Sphere of Influence can access the Internet (Dream).

Access is not omniscience. Mordremoth knows as much about the White Stag as Primordius can sense whenever an Elementalist enters fire attunement.

Also I don’t know what you science you are operating under. You discount outliers in data, not outliers in species. Just because a platypus is weird doesn’t mean it doesn’t deserve classification. And by your logic humans are not primates because they have abilities not seen in any other animal.

Unless this is a case of true speciation, radioactive goop, or the Sylvari are actually X-men, then they are also Mordrem. This is the most likely of cases from what we know.
The Pale Tree can access the Dream. And Mordremoth can access the Dream. Mordremoth can transfer consciousness. The Pale Tree can transfer knowledge with the Dream.

It is stretching it to assume the Pale Tree’s access to the Dream came from the Forsaken. Sylvari are just uncorrupted plants that are tied to the Dream.

Can Mordremoth not create corrupted Sylvari with the same amount of extra intelligence from the dream?

Are the ED unable to create uncorrupted things?

Why doesn’t Zhaitan play nice and reanimate people with their soul and will intact?
Why doesn’t Jormag make skating rinks?

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Daniel Handler.4816:

You are right I am getting ahead of myself. Not all Mordrem are more intelligent but some clearly are.

But most show to be no more intelligent than your average destroyer.

Those that are more intelligent are like drax mentioned with the risen wizards, or that I mentioned: the more magic they have, the smarter they are. This is the same for all dragon minions. Mordrem are no exception – the only exception is sylvari, and in turn the Mordrem Guard.

Don’t downplay the exceptions.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Daniel Handler.4816:

Yes the dream is in Mordremoth sphere of influence, (his domain) and we see him influencing Wyld Hunts.

Nothing actually indicates that the Dream is part of his domain, let alone his creation or under his control. The fact that the Dream sends Wyld Hunts to kill Mordremoth in fact indicates that the Dream is neither his creation nor under his control.

He is capable of hijacking the Dream, but this may be more caused by him having a connection to it just as the Pale Tree and White Stag (which is noticeably not related to Mordremoth) do.

This is a contradiction. The sphere of “influence” is not called a sphere of control. Being in something’s domain does not mean you necessarily control it. Moreover, I did a disservice by using the word Domain for simplicity. In game lore has apparently never used Domain when describing the spheres, and neither should I. Because of the Sphere of Mind Mordremoth and the Pale Tree can access the Dream.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Unfortunately, we still do not know what the nature of the Dream is, or why those three individuals have a tie to the Dream while Malyck and, it seems, his tree does not.

Daniel Handler.4816:

Just because you have influence over something doesn’t mean you will use it. Reanimation that returns the original soul (and will) are part of Death Magic yet we don’t see Zhaitan doing that. Primordius doesn’t use divine fire but makes his minions immune to it.

I have no idea what your point here is, and there is nothing in game that relates Primordus to divine fire let alone his minions being immune to it.

The one about Primordius is mostly mechanics. Guardians use divine fire, Destroyers are immune to burning caused by Elementalists or Guardians. We don’t see any Destroyers using divine fire. Does this mean the Fire sphere of influence doesn’t extend to divine fire? Possibly. But that would separate fire and divine fire, and not explain the blanket immunity (other than of course its game mechanics)

Zhaitan could resurrect people with their original souls and will intact. There is certainly a precedent in death magic for giving something free will.
He could just let Mazdak be as in control as the Kurzick Juggernauts get to be. But he didn’t because that would be stupid.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Daniel Handler.4816:

Similarly Mordremoth could attach the dream to his minions and weaken his influence over them. But he doesn’t.

Why would it weaken his influence over them? The Dream doesn’t really do anything and if anything is the sole reason why Mordremoth has influence over the Mordrem Guard – which certainly do not have a weakened influence from Mordremoth because of it (all indication is that, as I said, the Dream is the only reason why Mordremoth has any influence at all).

As you said:

Basically, given this and various dialogue in Season 2, the Pale Tree is capable of protecting the sylvari via the Dream/Nightmare. However, there are loopholes in that protection which Mordremoth is utilizing (Wyld Hunts and Dark Hunts) now that he’s awake.

Why would Mordremoth use his influence to protect his minions from himself?

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Daniel Handler.4816:

As for unconsciousness the pale tree clearly says:
“The Dream is the sylvari unconscious, the wellspring from which we flow. It holds our memories, as well as our hopes and fears. I am its keeper.”
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/A_Light_in_the_Darkness

I’m pretty sure she’s meaning that metaphorically since in the very same instance Trahearne states:

The Dream is not reality, <Character name>. It is made of memory, aether, and powerful magic. Even I do not understand it.

Neither of those statements contradict each other. Explain what you mean.

@konig

• You are right I am getting ahead of myself. Not all Mordrem are more intelligent but some clearly are.
• Yes the dream is in Mordremoth sphere of influence, (his domain) and we see him influencing Wyld Hunts.
• Just because you have influence over something doesn’t mean you will use it. Reanimation that returns the original soul (and will) are part of Death Magic yet we don’t see Zhaitan doing that. Primordius doesn’t use divine fire but makes his minions immune to it.
• Similarly Mordremoth could attach the dream to his minions and weaken his influence over them. But he doesn’t.

As for unconsciousness the pale tree clearly says:
“The Dream is the sylvari unconscious, the wellspring from which we flow. It holds our memories, as well as our hopes and fears. I am its keeper.”
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/A_Light_in_the_Darkness

Hive mind isn’t the best word. Perhaps server is. Still there is an element of control.

Let’s run with the server idea.

• window domain: Sylvan
• domain controller: Pale Tree
• all computers have default account for their type
• all have the C-onciousness drive that backs up to a D-ream drive.
• D$ shared network backed up to cloud (dream proper)
• D$ sharing is disabled for soundless and nightmarers

I could go on.

There are enough starting conditions to consider it control.

Here is more explanation over what I said.

As for you other claims. The theory of dracono-enchantment has only been tested on non-mordremoth minions. That is major experimental error. Why would the Mind Dragon have to express intelligence the same way as the other dragons?

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mordrem_Troll copied
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Jungle_Troll

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Risen_Troll reanimated
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Cave_Troll

Mordrem are more intelligent than Risen of the same level. Not because of better cloning, there is no better clone than direct reanimation, but because they can exercise mind magic. So a Mordrem troll can seemingly coordinate a swarm of insects, while his Risen counterpart just runs around vomiting and the swarm follows him.

It would make sense that no other ED has made intelligent minions with the Dream. The other ED don’t have the ability, and the one that does can’t without losing control of them.
The very purpose of the Dream was to protect their psyche from Mordremoth. Why would he put it in his minions? And why should one of his strongest champions be unable to?

Mordremoth can transfer consciousness directly. What is the dream other than a consciousness sylvari experience before awaking, and their unconsciousness afterwards?

The Pale Tree did what no other ED can, and what Mordremoth wouldn’t. She gave something else control of her minions. She knew she couldn’t protect them without the dream. But now she can’t control them either. The best she can do is modulate the transfer process so that all sylvari get basic skills. Now the dream is their hivemimd.

It’s a sad life. You know you can’t make them minions or papa will take them. So you try to steer them to do good. Then people like Scarlet come forward and you try to stop them but you can’t. Perhaps with Mordremoth gone she will make true minions rather than hardware for someone else’s operating system.

@konig the dream is in the mist because everything is in the mist. Second they don’t return to the Dream when they die, because the Dream is the conscious part they remember. But they know that their mind goes there when they die, and they know there are other parts of the Dream they haven’t seen yet.

The white stag is new to them, clearly they need to explore more of the dream.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Hell, how would he know where his tree was, if he didn’t remember where he came from? [snip]

Salmon remember where they came from, that doesn’t mean they remember the events of their birth. Some animals are just born knowing these things.

There are things I know you have forgotten, and you don’t even need to tell me. You don’t remember much of learning how to walk or how to talk.

Sylvari aren’t like you, or like Malyck. They remember things from pre-awakening.

Sylvari awaken when they are fully grown. Irl humans awaken when they are 2 years old.

Malyck is brain damaged. He is a disabled Sylvari who can’t access Grandma’s Scrapbook (the dream) to see all the videos of him learning how to crawl.

As for you other claims. The theory of dracono-enchantment has only been tested on non-mordremoth minions. That is major experimental error. Why would the Mind Dragon have to express intelligence the same way as the other dragons?

It would make sense that no other ED has made intelligent minions with the Dream. The other ED don’t have the ability, and the one that does can’t without losing control of them.

The very purpose of the Dream was to protect their psyche from Mordremoth. Why would he put it in his minions? And why should one of his strongest champions be unable to?

https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Ethereal_Soul_Explosion Ritualists
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Ether_Renewal Elementalists
https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Ethereal_Light Monks
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Spectral_Wall Necromancers
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Ether_Bolt Mesmers

All spellcasters seem to have some ability to manipulate the proto-matter “ether”

The process of attuning, while normally applied to elementalists, is not exclusive to them.
https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Life_Attunement

Is attuning and ether related? We know that magic in the leylines is combined, but that dragons and spellcasters use different energy signatures. Are we just turning ether into energy? Do all spellcasters have their own version of
https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Ether_Prism to split the spectrum?

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Daniel Handler.4816:

With mind magic you don’t need a soul. You just need psychic plants that can capture/store information from the dream.

While I agree that sylvari don’t have souls – we’ve seen none, and honestly there’s no indication that they do; same goes for any dragon minion, in fact, except those that imprison another being’s soul (such as certain high level risen) as far as we know – I disagree with this.

Malyck being why. He explicitly states, multiple times even after his apparently amnesia being discovered to not have been amnesia at all (he remembers all since awakening), that he has no ties to the Dream or Nightmare. So he is sapient without “information from the Dream”.

Furthermore, mordrem are mindless – if this was an attribute given to all minions of Mordremoth, then the mordrem would not be so..

First off remember what they told us about Djinn. “Djinn are to other elementals as humans are to other animals.” The same can be said about Sylvari vs mordrem. Sylvari are more advanced.

Second you are confused on how amnesia works.

Forgetting things before a certain date (retrograde amnesia) does not mean everything is lost.

The specific form Malyck has is common to all races.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Childhood_amnesia

“Childhookitten esia, also called infantile amnesia, is the inability of adults to retrieve episodic memories which are memories of specific events (times, places, associated emotions, and other contextual who, what, when, and where) before the age of 2–4 years, as well as the period before age 10 of which adults retain fewer memories than might otherwise be expected given the passage of time.”

Like human babies Malyck knows how to walk and talk but doesn’t remember learning those processes. He is like a normal human.

When he lost access to the dream he lost access to having been in the dream.

“The Dream is the sylvari unconscious, the wellspring from which we flow. It holds our memories, as well as our hopes and fears. I am its keeper.” – https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/A_Light_in_the_Darkness

The Pale Tree is their programmer, their engineer. She designs their hardware, and their software. Lets call her Plant Google, giving her children fiber access and Chrome.

His amnesia is simple to explain.

• Our brains/computers don’t remember being made, but we can learn how it happened with external knowledge (books/the internet).
• Because of genetics and proprietary software there aren’t panaceas for fixing problems in humans/computing. Expecting the Pale Tree to know how to fix his dream connection is like asking Apple Technicians to repair a Windows PC.
• No internet means Malyck can’t store data in the cloud, or access his user manual.

" You just need psychic plants that can capture/store information from the dream."

Can does not mean will.

Sylvari don’t have a traditional soul. They have a fusion of plant/mind magic which is sapient. Malyck just has broken hardware that corrupted his access to external memories. Like a baby he can’t remember episodic memories of pre-awakening.

——————————————4——————————————
Pretty simple to follow. Souls are made of dust.

Ectoplasm is the structure of the soul for ghosts.
“Ascalonian ghosts retain their human forms but their flesh has been replaced by a pale-blue ectoplasm. According to Ghosts of Ascalon, killing an Ascalonian ghost outright is difficult – attacking them only removes ectoplasm from the form until they dissipate and, after a period of time (which may vary) the ghost will simply reform. "
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Ascalonian_ghost

Which makes sense given the color of aggregated ectoplasm.
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Massive_Glob_of_Ectoplasm_

When we salvage ectoplasm we can get dust.
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Pile_of_Crystalline_Dust

In general, and in both games, dust is only dropped by the undead, or the elemental (including non earthy elementals).
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Pile_of_Dust

You don’t get dust from killing creatures that send their soul to another place upon death. You don’t get dust from unintelligent animals, or from plants.

No you only get dust from things we know have souls.

This supports the idea that the soul is made of dust. However this may be coincidence.

To test we need to see more creatures in the beastiary that support or deny my suspicions.

——————————————2——————————————
Do sylvari have souls?

In gw1, plant sentience was linked to excessive magic.

But as expected sapience was linked to souls.

The only sapient plants were created by necromancers tying the soul of a human to the soul of a tree. However this was an act of Necromancy and Mordremoth does not have domain over death or shadow. Moreover, the constructs were fleshy, as in they left exploitable corpses that could be reanimated with death magic.

As such Sylvari are incredibly unusual.

Of the sapient entities we cannot reanimate, only the djinn had corporeal form.

Are Sylvari elementals? That is extremely unlikely for a variety of reason, foremost being there are no plant elementals and we have no reason to believe Mordremoth has influence over elemental magic.

However Mordremoth does have influence over the Mind and Plants, and that is how they achieve sapience with apparently no elemental/spiritual soul. With mind magic you don’t need a soul. You just need psychic plants that can capture/store information from the dream. They are safe from reanimation until an ED accumulates enough Death and Plant magic ( and knows how to use it).

Sylvari have souls as much as Djinn have souls, but neither are necromantic, neither can be reanimated or become ghosts.

——————————————3——————————————
After Nightfall we stopped seeing Dervishes. But if the teachings of paragons got out, then definitely some dervish as well.

Atheist people were working holy magic. Guardians just needed faith in something, this would not have sat nicely with Dervishes. Wandering asceticism was lonely and becoming unnecessary. It is unlikely the mystic arts stayed secret at that point.

While Monks developed into Guardians. Dervishes were absorbed into the other spellcaster professions. This brought the art of flash enchantment/avatar magic to the schools.

Eles:

• In Eye of the North, the campaign to tie gw1 to gw2, players discovered chromatic drakes. https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Chromatic_Drake This was the first instance of an elementalist switching skills/attributes merely by changing attunement.
  https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Elemental_Shift
• Naturally Tyrians wanted the Chromatic Drake’s adaptability, but lacked the refine in shapeshifting. In addition they wanted to attune instantly. Dervish taught them flash enchantment, and now Elementalists could attune instantly without needing Glyphs.

Necro:

• Dying to become a lich is not very nice. Necros would have heard of Palawa Joko but not all would have the strength or the willpower to go all the way.
• Transformation was the new thing. A person could become an avatar of something, change their flesh, but not stay in that form forever.
• By this point the energy storage techniques of Elementalist would be known to Necros. Exploiting corpses was way too impractical. Stockpiling life force became the norm.
• Necros learned how to transform into death shroud, or into lich form, or plague without dying by channeling life force as Dervish channeled the gods.

Ranger:

• It was much harder for them. They were already attuned to natural energy but not on the level of the spellcaster professions (mesmer sense chaos, necro sense life force, ele sense elements, guardians sense life)
• Also its much harder than it looks. Investigating https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Astralaria We discover what might go into being a celestial avatar. https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Cosmic_Power
• After Rangers upped their attunement, and started practicing energy storage. They just copied the Necromancers. Becoming Celestial Avatars, rather than avatars of death.

Mesmer already had the art of transformation from chaos magic.

A few weeks ago I tried to map the spectrum of magic, I think I am close but it was much harder than I thought. Until then here are some discoveries I found during my search. Here is the tldr; explanations below.

1. The Soul is the Source of Intelligence in Tyria
2. Sylvari Have No Spectral Soul
3. Dervish were the catalyst for modern magic. (speculation)
4. Souls are made from dust. (hypothesis)

——————————————1——————————————
The soul-body duality.

Gw2 appeals to dualistic philosophies. Specifically Cartesian Dualism. The mind is produced through communication between the rational soul and the animalistic body. Essentially all people are just souls piloting the body they were born into.

• “In most cases reanimated undead do not retain their original soul and as such they are bound to the will of a master – the magician who brought the creature into undeath – and would usually be useless without one, either perishing along their master or continuing to wander without purpose. "
• “[Constructs] that display apparent intelligent behavior are usually animated by souls (for example, the Iron Forgeman is powered by Flame Djinn and Shiro’ken by bound spirits)."
• “Demons find ways into our world, where they feast on suffering, despair, and the vital energy of intelligent creatures.” vital energy aka = Orrian Spirit Gildran: “Slay these demons before they feast on my soul!” -https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/A_Fleshy_Operation

However a large difference is that a “soul” is not necessarily made of spirit.

• Djinn: “Unlike most elementals, djinn are free-willed and sapient beings, and their souls are made out of elemental energies.”

As a result, Elder dragons don’t need access to the death or spirit spheres of influence to produce souls. Concentrating energy is sufficient. Sapient beings are just the highly concentrated souls.

• Tests attempting to verify the theory of draconic enchanto-consumption have shown that the amount of power and free will a dragon minion has is proportional to the amount of dragon energy imbued in it by its master.

Necromancers are most likely using dark magic to make artificial souls to pilot corpses. This makes perfect sense considering the work of golemancers to unify necromancy and golemancy. Is it not surprising that the first mind/golem interface was created by a Necromancer.

The explanation is complicated. It will take at least 2 days to write a post explaining the spectrum. Mainly because thermodynamics is involved. I will make a new post when it’s ready.

Here is the magic spectrum using CYMK subtractive color theory
http://imgur.com/7lo0GP1 – rough draft, finished version coming soon

I believe I have completed the spectrum. http://imgur.com/F0rEpCY
Edit- the spectrum for magic is correct, the labeling of deities is off

We have to know the second domains to be sure. But here is one possible idea:

• Primordius, fire/earth, red/orange
• Mordremoth, plant/mind, yellow/green
• Zhaitan, death/shadow, dark green
• Jormag, ice/spirit, pale blue
• Bubbles, water/? , blue
• Kralkatorrik, crystal/air, violet
• Mist energies, translucent or the color of the location in the mist

And the spectrum is:

• red/fire is ele, ranger, and berserker
• orange/earth is ele, ranger, and berserker
• yellow/plants is ranger
• green/mind is mesmer, and thief
• dark green/shadow is mesmer, thief, and necro
• greenish black/death is necro
• blueish white/spirit is necro, guardian, ranger
• pale blue/ice is ele, and ranger
• blue/water is ele, and ranger
• violet/air is ele, and ranger

If correct this leads to some interesting insights

• magenta is the inverse of green, an extra spectral color our minds produce. Mesmers take away your ability to doubt. And you do what is natural, you perceive the loss of green as magenta
• plant magic would not be green because green plants can’t absorb green light. Instead they went with the standard of a yellow sun fueling growth
• hues add light magic, shades add dark magic,
• the mind is green/perception, a phantasm is magenta fueled by stolen green, shadow is when you add darkness to perception, minions are when you add a dash of mind magic to a large amount of darkness, l

There is more insights. I’ll upload an image soon

After Zhaitan’s death Tequatl rose in strength, did the same happen with the Pale Tree?

She is presumably the only champion of Mordremoth left. (Apart from possibly Malyck’s tree). Should she not take over the domain of mind? After all who else has her level of access to the dream of dreams.

draxynnic.3719:

What I think might be going on is that magic is actually divided among at least 12 domains. The dragons each have two, while for the professions it’s messier, and some might be missing altogether in the professions. It’s also possible that there are some domains that none of the dragons have been able to claim… or which may not have been a natural part of the Tyrian system and which is only present now because it was brought to Tyria by the gods and the Forgotten.

Draxy has the right approach.

We made the mistake before in our reality when we confined the spectrum of light to sensory experience. With more research we found out roygbiv is not all there is. Similarly Tyria is discovering there is more to magic than they thought. Lets say denial is violet, aggression is green, destruction is red, preservation is blue. What is thaumanovic radiation? There is clearly an other, we just don’t know how big the other is.

!https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/30/EM_spectrumrevised.png!

With science we explored the spectrum and we found out that pink is an illusion our brains made to fill in the gaps in our sight. So is Kralkatorrik really making Mesmer chaos fields? Or do the citizen of Tyria have difficulty seeing dragon energies correctly?

Birds can see ultraviolet, snakes can sense infrared, perhaps dragons can interact with magic in ways unknown to the post-bloodstone races. Hopefully Taimi and others will develop technologies to explore the spectrum accurately. And perhaps even to experience it directly as we have with infrared goggles.

Shepstar.8429:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fa8-p1CuZ0k

here reminder but you can still get close to 100% like 80% to 90% with protection food frost aura

credits lootballs for video

This video is old. It is from a bug that caused traited Rite of the Great Dwarf to stack additively.

Today ~97% damage reduction is the highest in the game, and it requires 5 different classes to produce it on the Revenant
The math is multiplicative

• .9 from frost aura
• .9 from shrouded mists
• .9 from determined resolution
• .9 from close quarters for far enemies or .93 for near (rune of the scrapper)
• .9 from food
• .66 from protection
• .66 from “guard”
• .66 from phantasmal defender
• .66 from bulwark gyro
• .5 from rite of the great dwarf
• .61 for having 3000 armor.

But the Revenant itself can only reach 87% for short bursts of time. Otherwise at rest it is around 74% damage reduction. How is that any different than a Warrior that rests around 45% damage reduction, and burst to 100% with stances?