Guild Wars 2

Ridley.3691:

Why are these forums filled with so much abuse being hurled at people with different opinions?

Not all of them are just expressing different opinions, they’re expressing differing beliefs regarding the resulting experience. If they were merely expressing opinions, it’d be fine, but they’re mistaking their beliefs and expectations for what the reality will be, a reality which is not yet set.

You have one side suggesting the Fall will be “epic” or that it may have us playing as the gods or that it will have new assets included, with minimal evidence. Likewise you have the other suggesting the Reactor explosion will have new effects outside the Fractal or some drastic reaction with the Mists because of the event’s replication there, again with minimal evidence. Both sides are asserting these beliefs as the likeliest results of either decision, yet they are each mostly unfounded, and as they each more fervently believe in their own side, they come to highlight the weaknesses of either of them while missing where those also appear in their own side’s beliefs.

Elbegast.6970:

Mif.3471:

Elbegast.6970:

TR = Asuran sci-fi garbage.

We need less sci-fi/steampunk and more wizards/magic.

Perhaps if you peaked out from under the brim of your wizards hat once in a while you would of noticed that Thaumanova is about chaos magic and dragons.

No, it’s sci-fi. They can say that ‘magic’ works the waypoints and portals and all that other Asuran technology but the fact is, it’s nothing more than sci-fi garbage. If the Asura used magic, they wouldn’t need laboratories, technological devices, portals and waypoints. Instead, they would wave a wand or utter an incantation and whisk themselves away to their Wizard Tower.

Seriously? …Seriously? Magic works however the creators deem it works, so you need to toss out your preconceptions built up from tired traditional fantasy habits. The only reason magic works that way in other areas of fantasy is because those involved with its creation were too lacking in creativity to think of another way to deal with it. They went with the established base because they knew people like yourself would love it for no other reason than it seemed more magical or something.

What the asura use is magic, what the charr use is steampunk scifi style stuff.

Get over it. Also, don’t tell me wizards don’t use labs. There are plenty of tales of wizards holed up in book-ridden places with the occasional alchemical apparatus conducting research into old magic. The only difference with the asura is that they’re not reliant on musty old tomes for their research, they have a knack for seeing the flow of magical energy and creating devices that tap it or capture it to be channeled into their intricate devices.

If you think digging around in preestablished magical research for the right little terms and waving wands about is more compelling, then well, good for you, but that’s not the only way to do magic.

DarksunG.9537:

Gmr Leon.1846:

Volcanic eruption versus shallow divine squabbles? Let’s be honest here, while the Elder Dragons essentially amount to a ravaging supernatural tsunami with no personality, the gods amount to prima donnas.

That’s like Saying Citizen Kane is dumb because it’s about “a stupid arrogant jerk” & Transformers is awesome because it’s about huge explosions.
“supernatural Tsunmi”? No, that’s Abaddon. Transforming entire dimension into torment, creating lifeforms & seeping into other plains of existence with cunning & manipulation.

The Dragons make zombies & smash stuff. GG.

You do realize I’m saying both are more or less dumb or going to be, right? I mean, did you really just stop reading there? There’s a line there at the end that I think makes my outlook on this clear: “No matter which way you go, the results aren’t terribly fascinating.”

Also, comparing the gods’ lore to something like Citizen Kane is hilarious. Citizen Kane is academy award winning material, whereas the gods’ lore is a mess of revisions and retcons as a result of changing writing staff (seriously, all kudos to the writing team of ArenaNet for trying to work with others’ material and improve upon it, including each other’s, I wouldn’t want that job).

Regardless, I stand by my point: natural disasters or prima donnas are hardly that interesting. If you slapped a personality on a natural disaster and had it demand worship, it wouldn’t be any more interesting. (See: stereotypical island tribe sacrificing people to volcano god.)

DarksunG.9537:

The only important reason why the Abaddon fractal is better: GW1 lore was way more interesting than GW2.

The gods are SO much more compelling than the boring, mindless, no-personality Dragons that we have to cannon to death. The idea that “we don’t know what happened” doesn’t necessarily make the story of what happened good. So far, the GW2 stuff has been pretty lame. I’d rather have a Fractal of the single most important event in the GW1 storyline ever. (of course I wouldn’t put it past Anet to ruin the story by making the gods even LESS important & powerful than they have already retconned.)

These responses are what I see on the forums and in game all the time. You all have already convinced yourself that the thaumanova reactor fractal will suck.

While in reality, the abaddon fractal will just be a boss fight.

wow.. So you have already convinced yourself that the Abaddon fight will be a boss fight & will suck. irony?

Volcanic eruption versus shallow divine squabbles? Let’s be honest here, while the Elder Dragons essentially amount to a ravaging supernatural tsunami with no personality, the gods amount to prima donnas. Balthazar gets beat in a board game and he rage murders the winner (and still expects worship). Dwayna brings a bunch of humans some place together and cries when they kill each other over whatever. Melandru gets upset that not everyone cares about nature as much as her. Lyssa fools people and then acts all judgmental about them judging her for appearances when she’s miss beauty queen (who probably inspires that BS in them to begin with). Grenth panders to the vengeful, and Abaddon seemingly goes genocidal when the whimps cry to the gods about his gift being too much and they suggest maybe toning it down. Or when the Forgotten start going genocidal on his followers for being too zealous, either way.

No matter which way you go, the results aren’t terribly fascinating.

Gregorius.1024:

@Gmr Leon
Each god’s individual wiki page lists what they did:
Dwayna came first and brought humanity with her.
Balthazar came second and proclaimed the world for humanity to take and swept Orr with a cleansing flame.
Melandru came after and terraformed Orr into a green, flowering expanse. She sought to maintain balance in the destruction of the world and urged peace among the races already living there.
An Orrian scroll says that Grenth’s mother is Dwayna, his father a sculptor. All pages on the GW and GW2 wikis say that Grenth was born on Tyria.

No, you can’t turn my words around. We DO know what Zhaitan’s energy could have done: it did NOTHING. He died and that was it, he was no threat to Tyria. Abaddon’s essence could not be destroyed and had to be absorbed by Kormir. Once a dragon dies it is no longer a threat, when a god dies, it’s essence must be absorbed or it will destroy Tyria. We don’t know how to fight the gods, unless they’re bound and weakened and half-mad. That’s how Destiny’s Edge fought Kralkattorik, but we did not fight a weakened Zhaitan. We weakened him throughout the course of the game. Zhaitan had 106 years of eating magical Orrian artifacts to sustain him. And to my knowledge, no Elder Dragon is capable of threatening the world on a global scale. All they can do is attack a small area at a time, and they’re pretty bad at that! Abaddon attacked 3 continents in the span of 5 years, with a long term plan lasting centuries. The Elder Dragons aren’t dumb but they’re also not really intelligent either. Sure they are a threat, but if Dhuum or Menzies or the pantheon of the Six attack Tyria, they will ipmact the world far more than the Dragons do.

So I haven’t looked up anything about the petty deities, okay. Regardless, the wiki is subject to inaccuracies, and unless those pieces are taken from findings in Orr, I see no reason to believe them just yet.

However, if they are accurate, then it only supports what I’ve been saying. They’re human-centric pieces of lore that are thoroughly irrelevant except to those that enjoy human lore despite there already being a vast amount of it. Expanding on them only further leaves the other races’ lore unexplored and relatively uninteresting as a result. Continuing the argument in favor of Abaddon on the basis of its being more interesting doesn’t help this matter at all. The other races’ lore will never develop so long as they focus on existing human elements.

Also, you seem to ignore that we fought Dhuum. We definitely know how to fight gods. Every fight with a god has been about the same as the fight with Zhaitan. We battle through their domain, weakening or affecting them in some way during the process, and then we defeat them. What happens afterward is the only difference, and again, we technically don’t know what happened to Zhaitan’s energy postmortem. You say it did nothing, probably because you didn’t see it, and that’s probably because they’re not good at conveying aftereffects very well.

We didn’t see much of anything happen after the Great Destroyer’s defeat in GW1, yet we had a Stone Summit member attempting to capture its energies. It’s very likely this is similar in GW2, and from what I’ve read, it sounds like the explorable version of the final dungeon relates in some way to researching it.

Leablo.2651:

Gmr Leon.1846:

Correct me if I’m wrong here, but aren’t they a tad randomized in terms of how you encounter them? In that case, wouldn’t it be incredibly silly of them to put anything of lore significance in any of them?

I’m sure if we try really hard, we’ll be able to think of a type of game that is heavily focused on storytelling, yet the outcome of nearly every action is randomized. Where could GW2 have gotten this idea from? Hmm… what type of game could an online role-playing game possibly be trying to emulate? I’m stumped.

Maybe I’m being dense here, but if you’re trying to suggest to me RPG, then you’re pretty wrong, if I’m understanding you properly. The majority of RPGs do not permit randomized actions. The crucial actions and decisions are all heavily framed and designed to ensure you either do them or make them to move the underlying plot forward. If you miss any of those actions or decisions, you end up just wasting your time in the same locations fighting many of the same enemies ad infinitum without seeing any story progression.

Even larger open world RPGs, which are the closest comparison you could make to GW2, follow this structure. There are side adventures here and there, but few if any of them do much to reveal anything of the world that’s of any interest, in my experience anyway.

Shiren.9532:

Leablo.2651:

Gmr Leon.1846:

Correct me if I’m wrong here, but aren’t they a tad randomized in terms of how you encounter them? In that case, wouldn’t it be incredibly silly of them to put anything of lore significance in any of them?

I’m sure if we try really hard, we’ll be able to think of a type of game that is heavily focused on storytelling, yet the outcome of nearly every action is randomized. Where could GW2 have gotten this idea from? Hmm… what type of game could an online role-playing game possibly be trying to emulate? I’m stumped.

Fractals aren’t heavily focused on storytelling. They are cool moments in Tyria. They are primarily a way to experience events which don’t fit into the world as we know it today. Most of their design is in creating a compelling gameplay experience that is able to scale in difficulty after repetition, not in delivering a story.

There is almost no story in any of the fractals. They aren’t much different from pictures. The simple fact that they aren’t even real events prevents them from having much story telling potential. You may as well be playing a dream.

This is what I suspected was the case. With that being the case, then, it’s really a bit of folly to expect much of anything big in terms of lore from either.

Gregorius.1024:

Snip.

hide spoiler

Gmr Leon.1846:

Gregorius.1024:

The Guild Wars 1 wiki page for Abaddon does say he was incensed when the gods sealed magic into the bloodstones, so perhaps it was a combination of all of the above.

My reasoning for choosing the Abaddon fractal is this: the Dragons were interesting until we defeated Zhaitan. I’m sorry, there’s really nothing to it anymore. Zhaitan got screwed by a megalaser. The Gods, however, have remained interesting and mysterious since Prophecies came out. Yes we learned more about them, but the extra info never diminished them in the player’s eyes.

And to say that their influence no longer effects Tyria is dead wrong. Why? Lyssa’s muse said it perfectly prior to the final battle against Abaddon:

“The divinity is within you.”

It’s time this debate got a lot more philosophical.

You. A human. GW2 is about all the races now. As to them not being diminished in player’s eyes, that’s subjective. Personally, I think they’re old hat, lore luggage brought on from fantasy RPG traditions that would be better off gone, but that’s never going to happen.

We already know they didn’t create Tyria, we know they didn’t create Glint or even the Forgotten for that matter, and it’s very likely they didn’t create humanity. Without that creative capacity, they’re little more than powerful mages and warriors going about expecting worship, which is utter garbage. The reverence, devotion, and worship are all that really deify them, and only very little else, when considered from a broader racial perspective.

“The divinity is within you” may as well be them fessing up to, oh, hey, sorry, did we never mention you guys could pull this stuff off too if you tried hard enough? We didn’t? Really? Ah man, sorry guys. That explains why you’ve been so pitiful.

Exactly, the god’s divinity is within humanity. Humanity is still on Tyria, therefore the gods still have influence. And just because they left doesn’t mean they’ll stay gone. They could be just uber-powerful mages and such but relatively speaking, all gods are like that. The point is, while they did not create Tyria, they SHAPED Tyria. Dwayna brought humans to Tyria. Balthazaar led the humans to crush all other races. A half-human named Grenth is lord of the Underworld. Abaddon gave magic to the races. Melandru and Dwayna tried to establish peace between all the races. Kormir transcended humanity into divinity. Lyssa is the patron of chaos energy, which is directly tied to the complications of Thaumanova (perhaps she’ll show up). Grenth and Balthazar has wars with Dhuum and Menzies. Who’s to say one of their wars spills into Tyria? Who’s to say Dhuum or Menzies won’t attempt what Abaddon did and attack Tyria?

The Dragons are here, yes. We know how to fight them. We know how to beat them. Yeah, we beat Abaddon, but he was still tired and grouchy from his beatdown from 1100 years beforehand, and chained, no less. And still his god-like essence threatened to destroy Tyria. No, the gods are still very relevant to Tyria.

GW2 is about all the races now, so humanity can go and take a backseat. Also, no, relatively speaking gods are not all just “like that” in fantasy. There are just as many that can actually, you know, create stuff, not just reshape it which even the races of Tyria can do.

Besides, most of your info on the gods is hardly even accurate. I’m not really sure there’s anything that clarifies which of the gods brought humanity to Tyria, nor do I think there’s anything that suggests Dwayna and Melandru tried to sow peace with the other races, and also as far as I’m aware there’s only suggestions of Grenth being half-human, with no firm confirmation. Those parts aside, Balthazar didn’t lead humans to crush all the other races. Hello, dwarves, did humanity crush you? No? A civil war and a great destiny led to your decline? Thanks for the update. Hello, seers, did humanity crush you? No? The mursaat did? Well how about that, that’s a kitten shame. Hello, Forgotten, did humanity crush you? No? Oh, you’re also followers of the gods and you willfully withdrew to the Crystal Desert as far as anyone knows? Interesting!

The list can go on, but I think the picture is clear.

As to your last point, I can easily swap out the words:

The gods were here, yes. We know how to fight them. We know how to beat them. Yes, we beat Zhaitan, but it required all the races and their technology, and besides, he was still hungry from his last awakening who knows when. And we don’t yet know what his released energy may have done, not to mention there are still several other Elder Dragons actually on Tyria capable of destroying it. No, the Elder Dragons are still extremely relevant to Tyria, and there’s barely an argument to be had to say that they are more relevant since they’re there and affecting things.

Rainbow Sprint.3215:

Have we ever known which fractals are what specifically? All we know is what the urban battleground fractal is.

This time we know what we’re going into.

Correct me if I’m wrong here, but aren’t they a tad randomized in terms of how you encounter them? In that case, wouldn’t it be incredibly silly of them to put anything of lore significance in any of them?

Rainbow Sprint.3215:

It will give us a glimpse into lore (Either something we know or something we dont). Some people actually like the lore in the game.

Have any of the Fractals ever given any decent glimpses into the lore?

Carighan.6758:

Alga.6498:

I really hope the Charr will win! I mean, who dosen’t want an awesome Fractals dungeon of the Fall of Abbadon?!

Since both “human” and “god” are boring concepts on their own, what can I really expect from this? 15 minutes of inane mumbling following by one boss fight? :P

Not exactly, but roughly speaking, probably? If not mumbling, you’ll get silence, like in the actual Abaddon fight of GW1, or you’ll get annoying caps lock third-person speak like in the Dhuum fight.

Okay, so as I understand it Fractals have never influenced anything in the open world, but the Fractals themselves reflect influential events of the past. Considering that, why are we bothering to think anything will come of either Fractal being made other than yet another little dungeon-esque experience being added to the game?

If anything, it seems almost like people are suspecting that this election is the conclusion of the story arc concerning Lion’s Arch affairs, without much evidence to support it, to my knowledge. If it is the conclusion, it’s unlikely the Living Story will continue with either Fractal having related to the next stage, but instead either something we’re not considering (looking at the coming soon image, seems most likely) or something relating to recent elements added to branch off of, i.e. violent flying faction/peaceful flying faction (if the Aetherblade haven’t been completely shattered, this is also a viable possibility).

Gregorius.1024:

The Guild Wars 1 wiki page for Abaddon does say he was incensed when the gods sealed magic into the bloodstones, so perhaps it was a combination of all of the above.

My reasoning for choosing the Abaddon fractal is this: the Dragons were interesting until we defeated Zhaitan. I’m sorry, there’s really nothing to it anymore. Zhaitan got screwed by a megalaser. The Gods, however, have remained interesting and mysterious since Prophecies came out. Yes we learned more about them, but the extra info never diminished them in the player’s eyes.

And to say that their influence no longer effects Tyria is dead wrong. Why? Lyssa’s muse said it perfectly prior to the final battle against Abaddon:

“The divinity is within you.”

It’s time this debate got a lot more philosophical.

You. A human. GW2 is about all the races now. As to them not being diminished in player’s eyes, that’s subjective. Personally, I think they’re old hat, lore luggage brought on from fantasy RPG traditions that would be better off gone, but that’s never going to happen.

We already know they didn’t create Tyria, we know they didn’t create Glint or even the Forgotten for that matter, and it’s very likely they didn’t create humanity. Without that creative capacity, they’re little more than powerful mages and warriors going about expecting worship, which is utter garbage. The reverence, devotion, and worship are all that really deify them, and only very little else, when considered from a broader racial perspective.

“The divinity is within you” may as well be them fessing up to, oh, hey, sorry, did we never mention you guys could pull this stuff off too if you tried hard enough? We didn’t? Really? Ah man, sorry guys. That explains why you’ve been so pitiful.

Erasculio.2914:

Gmr Leon.1846:

It’s subjective, but as far as I’m concerned, if you’re looking for epic fights, you’re better suited to a single-player experience which isn’t sullied by poor coordination and combat that’s toned down so as not to drop the framerates of other players and balance concerns.

Funny to see even here the old excuse of “It will be mediocre content but that’s ok, it’s a MMO”. No wonder people still accept “kill 10 rats” quests.

I’m not meaning to excuse it, I just know from my experience with the GW2 content that there’s hardly any good reason to expect better. I went in without too many expectations, I like to think, and I saw the standard ArenaNet set for itself, and excluding art and animation, it struck me as being set pretty low when it comes to the content itself. In terms of systems, they set their standards pretty high, but when the systems are full of lackluster content, there’s not much to admire in their flow through the systems, now is there?

If anything, it seems ArenaNet themselves took that excuse to heart. “They’ll take any content, it’s okay, it’s a MMO, it’ll have amazing backend systems that shine with all the players interacting!”

Except that we don’t create or drive the content that much to aid the systems, they do. With every dynamic event, renown heart, and dungeon full of same old style stuff. >_>

DarksunG.9537:

joe.9815:

We don’t know why the reactor exploded. Also abaddon is dead who cares about him, the reactor might have something that matters about the current dragons.

The reactor exploded, who cares? The dragons are boring as hell, who cares?

Abaddon was defeated and imprisoned, who cares? The gods are boring as hell, who cares?

We can do this all day. =)

Speculatively speaking, if either Fractal holds any significance to the story and lore, and only one is certain to be made, it may be appropriate to suggest that when boiled down, they reduce to the same base components.

Which is to say:
Both involve magic in some manner.
Both involve drastic events that influenced the state of magic.
The Elder Dragons are central to the main story of GW2.
Both events’ effects on magic reveal something that may aid in our response to the Elder Dragons.

It may then be asserted that it is a matter of thematic presentation. One coated in your generic big war battle scenario (which likely will not be epic, if only because this is a RPG with okay combat and you’re forced to try and coordinate with others), and one coated in your generic big experiment gone wrong scenario (which again, probably won’t be epic because of okay combat and coordinating with others).

It’s subjective, but as far as I’m concerned, if you’re looking for epic fights, you’re better suited to a single-player experience which isn’t sullied by poor coordination and combat that’s toned down so as not to drop the framerates of other players and balance concerns.

Shiren.9532:

What makes any of this different from the average asuran personal story (I haven’t played it, but I heard the steam creatures have something to do with the Infinity Ball)? At no point in the human personal story did we interact with the gods. The Abaddon fractal sounds like it will be as big as the final battle of an epic blockbuster move. A divine disagreement is huge in the world of Tyria. Yet another asuran experiment gone wrong is an every day occurrence.

The fall of Abaddon was a significant event in Tyrian history. We know that because we’ve played through many of the consequences in GW1. If the Thaumanova Reactor is an important event in Tyria history, wouldn’t it make sense that the story would go there at some point? In a world with a Living Story, more personal story on the horizon and some kind of expansion level content, if the Reactor is truly important, they wouldn’t be able to ignore it.

What makes any of this different from any of the personal story? At no point in the personal story did we deal with Thaumanova Reactor (not even in the asura personal story, for that matter, I just double-checked). The Thaumanova Reactor fractal sounds like it will be as big as the Resonance Cascade of Half-Life. A magical experiment that purportedly turned the fabric of reality inside out is huge to the world of Tyria. Yet another divine disagreement is irrelevant to other races.

The Thaumanova Reactor explosion may be a hugely significant event in Tyrian history that’s effects are still being learned. We know that because its consequences can be discovered by the observant across Tyria. If the Fall of Abaddon was such an important event in Tyrian history, why is it exclusive to humanity, and wouldn’t it make sense that the story would go there at some point? In a world with multiple races, and a Living and Personal Story involving all of them, and some kind of expansion level content on the horizon, if the Fall of Abaddon is truly important, they wouldn’t be able to ignore it.

It goes both ways, man.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Gmr Leon.1846:

If it had been repaired sooner, so many refugees from the Molten Alliance’s attacks wouldn’t have to have been endangered by the Consortium down at Southsun Cove, and it would have served to create another interracial hub besides Lion’s Arch.

Why would the human nation, who have enough of their own problems, house non-human (especially charr given the immense hatred of them in the government and people) refugees?

Politics! It’d look good! On the flipside, a good question is why would ArenaNet make the only Asian-themed continent in the series look awful by making them isolationist, xenophobic, and apparently all so into it that we only see the tengu fleeing to make the Dominion of Winds and next to no human refugees alongside them? If they’d included some humans, we could have maybe seen some racial sympathy and openmindedness amongst the members of Cantha.

Instead, it’s kind of funny, since by not including the Canthan District and by leaving our last bit of knowledge of them with tyranny and racism, they make their Asian inspirations look worse than if they had included the Canthan District. At least then we could have read and heard of dissenting opinions…Now we’re left to think the Canthan humans are all just racist jerks.

Great move!

I don’t know for sure, but I think they give the dead so much power because, well, at least in my cause I spawned in dead. I was dead on arrival, and that’s incredibly dull until you (randomly? I couldn’t tell) got a charge of vengeance or wrath or whatever it is. If that’s the real case, then they should just better sort out loading in multiple games/new games so you don’t have to spawn into running games as a silly ghost highly disoriented with what you’re even supposed to be doing till you finish reading the instructions (which do not brief you on the dead side of the mini-game, unless I overlooked it).

That’s the issue I’ve found with many of these mini-games so far, personally. Jumping into already running mini-games that are competitive is not my definition of fun, considering it’s already stacked in favor of those that were already there for awhile.

This is the only reason you can bring up against this Fractal to support your awesome millionth human god-related thing.

Then answer these questions, because I do not know what happened:
-What was the sample used? Where was it gathered?
-Were Destroyers involved? Was it krewe infighting? Was it sabotage? Did something simply manifest out of the experiment wreaking havoc and requiring containment?
-How were the major effects even contained to begin with?
-Why is there Ancient Fire Elemental Energy that keeps emerging there whereas the other effects tend to be the teleportation in of enemies from across Tyria, and the rest of its effects tend to be Chaos Magic related?
-What’s so crucial about Chaos Magic that the Inquest was inspired to continue its work, despite such a critical failure at Thaumanova Reactor?
These are just some questions.

We know the Fall of Abaddon happened, we’ve heard about it tons of times from GW1, we know it was divine disagreement that caused his fall.

I would also like to know more about the Fall, but not at this cost.

If the Thaumanova Reactor will lose because of a few spared gems for keys then I won’t really care because I think I probably won’t see either Fractal anyway. I just think there should always be paralleling contradictory threads in every forum, because it’s fun to see both sides.

Erasculio.2914:

Gmr Leon.1846:

There are equally compelling questions from other races:

Asura: what is magic? How does it function? Where does it come from? What does it look like, unmodified? How powerful can it become?

And how do we (the races) use it so easily, at least some of us? Why does it behave differently from place to place?

Charr: why do we aid any of the other races, when they prove so disorganized, undisciplined, and, generally, weak? Why doesn’t Iron Legion crush the Blood Legion and the Flame Legion for one’s dull brutality and the other’s disrespectful audacity to subvert the proud will of its fellow charr?

The “Asura” questions are not really linked to the Asura (magic is not exclusive to them), if anything those questions are more likely based on lore about the ancient races, considering the entire Bloodstone thing.

The Charr questions also have the same answer – they are not that powerful alone and need the other’s help. It’s less a matter of being a mystery than being a matter of politics. If anything, maybe the ancient story of the Charrs would be more interesting.

I would love to know more about the Pale Tree, or about the Spirits of the Wild. The fact GW2 could use more lore about the Six Gods doesn’t mean it also wouldn’t be nice to get lore about those other aspects of the game.

Unfortunatelly, that’s not what the incoming Fractals will be about. Our choices currently are more of the same (Thaumanova) or the answer to some mysteries (Abaddon).

I disagree. On the charr, I’d say it’s subjective, and thus not to drag it out, but I feel they could, organized and unified, be strong enough on their own to deal with their own problems.

As to the asura, again it may be subjective here, but I’m inclined to believe they are the only race with a pseudoscientific enough approach to truly bring understanding to magic, whereas the other races hardly display any similar interest. The closest you have to them in terms of interest of the other races may be found in the Durmand Priory, and even then, it’s only faintly comparable from what we’ve seen.

On the very final point, I disagree entirely. I think the Fractals from a lore perspective are about exactly the same thing, only in different stages and forms. I think the Fall of Abaddon concerns itself with pre-Bloodstone magic, while Thaumanova Reactor concerns itself also with pre-Bloodstone magic, of another stripe. One is of divine magic, and one is of draconic magic.

By the slights of “chaotic” magic, I think it’s fair to suggest that while both are raw forms of magic, each resembles the source. Divine may be more controlled, or tempered, while draconic may be uncontrolled, or unrefined. Either one will answer mysteries of magic, and the simple question left is, which mystery of magic are you more intrigued by?

Frankly, given the direction of the writing, I’m doubtful of either culminating in anything greatly interesting, but I think looking at it from this angle evens the playing field from a lore perspective.

Erasculio.2914:

Gmr Leon.1846:

GW2 could use some god lore? Really?

Really. They are a mystery. What exactly are them? Where did they come from? What do they actually look like? How powerful they are, when compared to the Elder Dragons?

And where are they now? Why did they leave? Was it truly because they wanted humanity to stand on its own legs, or did they flee from the Elder Dragons? Or is the Risen Priestess of Lyssa right, and they have been actually devoured by Zhaitan and the others?

We don’t know the answers to those questions, despite how they are mentioned often within the game.

There are equally compelling questions from other races:

Asura: what is magic? How does it function? Where does it come from? What does it look like, unmodified? How powerful can it become?

And how do we (the races) use it so easily, at least some of us? Why does it behave differently from place to place?

Charr: why do we aid any of the other races, when they prove so disorganized, undisciplined, and, generally, weak? Why doesn’t Iron Legion crush the Blood Legion and the Flame Legion for one’s dull brutality and the other’s disrespectful audacity to subvert the proud will of its fellow charr?

Norn: what exactly are the Spirits of the Wild? Where did they come from? Why do those that help us appear often as animals? How powerful are they, compared to the human gods or the Elder Dragons?

Are they still listening and with us as much as on our flight from the Far Shiverpeaks? Why do they aid us and not the other races?

Sylvari: where did the Pale Tree’s seed come from? Are there other Pale Trees? How did the tree give rise to us and the Dream of Dreams? Was it magic, or was the seed special somehow? How do the Soundless remove themselves from the Dream? How are Wyld Hunts decided or formed? Why do so many follow them without much second thought?

Tagus Eleuthera.7305:

Evon is the dirty politician type.. maybe they figured they needed to give an incentive to vote for him. Its almost a shame that the abaddon fractal might not get made though. GW2 could seriously use some god lore!

GW2 could use some god lore? Really? The game’s personal story already has you treading on their former turf at the end. I’d argue that, the Krytan region, and the whole first game chattering about them, is more than enough.

AnthonyOrdon.3926:

Your tin foil hats need tuning because I’m hoping for Kiel. But I have a vested interest because my team will probably be working on the fractals. I had nothing to do with this content though.

The Cutthroat Politics team tried to make it as even as possible.

They mostly did a good job, except…It becomes a little uneven when microtransactions are thrown in the mix. It would have been more even to affect all players by discounting the cost to place an item on the trading post, I think, and would have easily been within the power of the head of the Black Lion Trading Company.

Not calling you out, but I feel like the team behind this part had some marketing team pressure put on them in that part of their decision. Which is okay, in any other circumstance, except here where the stated intent was to make the choices even.

It’s unevenly set up right now so that those that may not care about the Gem Store will easily ignore Evon, and choose Ellen, or those that may not worry about waypoint costs will easily ignore Ellen, and choose Evon. Another way of looking at it is: wealthy in-game players will have a bias towards Evon, since they might convert their gold to gems to get keys, and more casual players that may not be as wealthy will have a bias towards Ellen, since they want more time to play and waypoints assist in getting as much done in the hour or two they may have to play.

It’s really kind of an ugly affair of pitting two very different sides of the community against each other, if viewed from that angle, which I don’t think was the intent.

Wait wait wait, if the datamined update info is something about a royal terrace, why is it a royal terrace? The Krytan royalty, as fair as it is attempted to be portrayed in comparison to some elements of the Ministry, is still akittens base a monarchy. This is a gross expansion on the basis of monarchical power into an area that could better serve to house more refugees.

If it had been repaired sooner, so many refugees from the Molten Alliance’s attacks wouldn’t have to have been endangered by the Consortium down at Southsun Cove, and it would have served to create another interracial hub besides Lion’s Arch.

I’m glad I didn’t help one side over the other back in GW1 with reinstating this antiquated governmental system.

I’m not a pro PvP gamer by any means, but why do you guys want rewards so much or even to bring your equipment from PvE over? First time I hopped into PvP when I was low level, I thought I looked way better than in PvE, personally, and I was happy to get to see what the future of my character held with all my actual gameplay-related stuff unlocked, like skills and traits.

As an example of a game that isn’t a MMO, but is one of the top tier esports games out there, let’s look at Starcraft II. Cutting it down to basics, the PvP mode is essentially its own game separate from the campaign, and you don’t get to take whatever you’ve researched or unlocked from the campaign into it. No complaints from the players there, and the only real “rewards” you get from playing it are climbing the ranks to face more skilled players (alongside some irrelevant unit skins/emblems, I believe).

It’s also mostly the same game mode for competitive matches, if I’m not terribly mistaken (if I am, whoops, I don’t play the multi much since I just fool with the free demo/trial version). If nothing else, the PvP in GW2 does definitely need what others have mentioned here, balancing and I’d say more modes, but rewards? Victory should be adequate, if you ask me, and if it ever got to esports level, victory and actual money would be awesome if you’re that skilled.

Shiren.9532:

The paranoia theory about the Consortium and the original Southsun update being hidden messages about ArenaNet and Nexon was much better than this one. I can only hope you are joking about this, because this is insane.

Care to elaborate? This isn’t a theory, by any stretch. It’s flimsy speculation that maybe the split decision reflects internal divisions of opinion on the dev team of which direction they want to take content development. More content for the Gem Store, versus same amount alongside the usual (but maybe more? more elaborate? as if I could guess) content we’re seeing.

It would be insane if I was stalwartly defending the speculation and if it didn’t have any basis in reality (the internal affairs and organization of a company can greatly influence what they produce, believe it or not), but I’m admitting where there are holes in it and where I may have leaned too heavily into one path of speculation over another. It’s not big enough of a deal to call insane, if you ask me. That’s simply being rude and seemingly assuming I have some overzealous devotion to an idea I jotted down about a company I’m hardly invested in, on the Internet of all places.

The primary reason I’m continuing to respond is to offer clarifications, apologies, and admissions of mistakes now.

Edit: You edited as I was writing this, so I want to clarify that this speculation isn’t intended to suggest the shuttering of the whole RNG box affair that seems to have had players a bit miffed since release/past few months. I completely agree with you that they will undoubtedly keep running the Gem Store as-is, regardless of what the players choose in this event. All this speculation is referencing is the maybe-possibly of more content being funneled through it as opposed to the current amount.

However, that’s admittedly silly in its own right, as they’ll make that decision one way or another regardless of player sentiments. Although this would be a clever method of gauging the potential response, if nothing else.

DeShadowWolf.6854:

Gmr Leon.1846:

~snip~

Anywho, addressing your hair-splits of my hair-splits. I didn’t ignore Evon’s with your support, I suggested that it wasn’t as focused on us as we might think, instead addressing more his company members. Regarding the expect/gratitude show, as someone else said, that’s basically your usual campaign promising bribes for support kinda stuff, so neither are in the clear for that.

As to the Sanctum and Zephyrites…Yeah, you’re saying what I said, roughly. Sanctum, being where the people live, is the closest equivalent for them of a nation despite being manmade. Zephyrites on the other hand seems to me to possibly focus in on individual Zephyrites, i.e. probably the most profitable ones, whereas Sanctum suggests any of the Zephyrites, including the not so profitable ones alongside the profitable ones. ~snip~

Except that, after the original stating of what he said, there is nowhere you even mention the “With your support,” part. You offer no comment on it, and DO ignore it, while still honing in on similarly-meant words used by Kiel.

Actually we were saying entirely different things, you simply twist my wording. If I go live on an airplane for the rest of my life, the airplane becomes the closest thing to my nation…..yeah, we can see where that logic leads. The “Zephyrites” does not in any way suggest only a few people of the Zephyrites. Just an out-of-game comparison, the “Israelites” (like from the Bible) indicates the people of Israel, not jut a few of them. Nuff said, I hope.

Oh well. In all honesty, I probably honed in on it because I went in with the working framework that Ellen was a flat warrior type without much complexity, whereas Evon was potentially more complex, having more subtlety in his dialogue. My bad, I guess.

Apparently I also carried over my mental framework about the Sanctum/Zephyrites in interpreting how you were discussing them. Again, my bad, as to be frank, twisting some stranger’s words is in the least of my interests and I doubt I could easily do it intentionally if I wanted to without it becoming blatantly obvious. I’m not a politician, after all. =P

To clarify though: when I was highlighting the difference, I didn’t mean only a few of them, I was trying to point out how it could make it easier to single out individual Zephyrites for the deal. In my mind at least, it makes sense to think that if you reference a deal with a city or a nation, it would deal with and influence every citizen, whereas if you mention the more specific name for people of the city or the nation, you may leave yourself more room for meaning specific individuals amongst them.

That’s obviously not airtight, by any means, but it strikes me as a decent possibility.

It also would go to explaining why so many get frustrated with their politicians after they said they were working for [insert word for countrymen here] only to find them seeming to aid only a specific set of the countrymen. They didn’t lie, but they weren’t entirely honest either. See where I’m coming from? I’m probably wrong, of course, but hey, everything’s up for discussion and speculation.

Leablo.2651:

Gmr Leon.1846:

~shrug~ They sometimes say the content being worked on internally is a reflection of the studio environment

Who’s they?

Thanks for calling me out on this, I try to avoid it where possible. They is referring to some games journalists and the like. You can find similar analysis of the bigger tech companies, where some try to learn how Apple or Microsoft are internally structured to produce their products. It’s largely why there was a small chatter when Microsoft announced internal reorganization, and speculation as to how this may influence their new products and revisions to existing products.

In games development, you might find similar journalists/analysts very interested in Valve’s internal organization, as an example, given their success in producing quality game series like the Half-Life series, the Portal series, and Left 4 Dead series.

DanteZero.9736:

What times of the day are you logging in? On SBI, logging in around 7-9 PM (eastern time), you’ll see a lot of players online.

Might be the worst times ever, I suppose. I’m mostly nocturnal so it’s usually way late nights or early mornings for the East coast.

Not sure if I’m just playing at the wrong times on my world, but wondering how the other worlds are doing. I play on Sanctum of Rall, and went around to the areas I’d expect to be fairly high traffic, like Lion’s Arch and the Bazaar of the Four Winds, and they seemed surprisingly empty.

There were definitely the usual crowd around the banks in Lion’s Arch, mind you, but even in the later years of GW1’s life that seemed the case. Am I looking about the wrong places for people? I noticed hopping in WvW there seemed more chatter, and admittedly in almost every area I’d at least catch one or two people talking.

That seems eerily quiet to me though, and I’m guessing maybe the concentrations of players are just elsewhere that I’m unaware of. Considering that, how’s it looking on your world?

…I’ve not been following the living story very closely, so correct me if I’m wrong, but has Evon been in our way throughout them? If not, couldn’t this be viewed as an opportunity to dock Ellen, so she’s not accompanying us and as some here like to say, stealing our glory?

Just a thought. I have no idea whether that may be the case, and probably won’t be too heavily involved in any of this as it heats up, so it doesn’t concern me that much.

DeShadowWolf.6854:

Gmr Leon.1846:

Illi.3647:

~snip~

I’m not really for one side or the other personally, just presenting another perspective on it beyond the scope of charr/human/Fractal/discount support. ~snip~

I think half of your points and a good portion of other text decidedly does not concur with the above sentence. Much of your wording and phrasing suggests this to be intended to give weight to the Kiel idea that “A vote for Evon is a vote for RNG,” which is just starting to get a bit silly if you know what I mean.

Oh, and, dicing more hair, I also notice that you completely ignore how Evon says “With your support,” while honing in on Kiel’s phrase “I’ll need your help,” which only seems to indicate another spot in which she will have Kormir Syndrome.

Got the cutting board out? Great, because, now that we come to discuss rewards, there’s more hair to dice.
Evon Gnashblade: “If I am elected to the Captain’s Council, I’ll show my gratitude for your support in the following ways:” Thank-you gift anyone?
“Ellen” Kiel: “If I’m fortunate enough to earn a position on the Captain’s Council, here’s what you can expect from Ellen Kiel:” Bribe anyone?

“Zephyr Sanctum” suggests the floating ship-thing that the Zephyrites live on. It is an object that flies around, and that they live on. “Zephyrites” suggests the people of Zephyr (or the body of the people of Zephyr)

It wasn’t fully intended, though I admit I saw where it could be seen as I was writing it out. I’ve barely been involved with the game until the past few days (my guildmates can attest to that, trust me), so the RNG thing doesn’t apply as much as you might think. Not that it makes tons of difference, but if I really hated it, would I play an engineer and have 19 chests tucked away in case I get a key or decide to shoot for one? That’s practically the epitome of RNG right there.

Anywho, addressing your hair-splits of my hair-splits. I didn’t ignore Evon’s with your support, I suggested that it wasn’t as focused on us as we might think, instead addressing more his company members. Regarding the expect/gratitude show, as someone else said, that’s basically your usual campaign promising bribes for support kinda stuff, so neither are in the clear for that.

As to the Sanctum and Zephyrites…Yeah, you’re saying what I said, roughly. Sanctum, being where the people live, is the closest equivalent for them of a nation despite being manmade. Zephyrites on the other hand seems to me to possibly focus in on individual Zephyrites, i.e. probably the most profitable ones, whereas Sanctum suggests any of the Zephyrites, including the not so profitable ones alongside the profitable ones.

It makes sense and it’s not an attempt on my part to show bias. It’s not bad on Evon’s part, it’s smart business sense and probably would help Lion’s Arch. However, the same could be said for Ellen’s plan, except it may not be as business savvy, but that’s to be expected, she’s not a businessperson. Albeit there’s certainly an argument for the Lionguard wanting to make the deal for everyone so they can receive even more protection deals for the newly coming trade.

Here’s to hoping that maybe by voting one of them in they can just serve as a backdrop to our adventures without being along for the ride.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Gmr Leon.1846:

As far as I’m concerned, their physical departure denotes their withdrawal of attention as well. I don’t feel like pulling up a scattering of quotes, but I’m fairly certain there are many instances to be found of people wondering whether the gods still even give a care about them. There’s also the clear cut example of the White Mantle to give evidence to the faltering faith of the people, which it has essentially turned into, a faith, since the gods’ interactions with Tyria have dropped so dramatically that people can actually doubt them and switch to a different following (where for some, it wasn’t a faith as their gods were there before them).

Then explain the presence of the annual appearance of the avatars of Dwayna and Grenth, as well as the occasional favor of the world and avatars summoned at statues and by priests in temples (per GW2 Orrian lore – for Grenth at least)?

The gods physically left the world, but their avatars were constantly present. The faltering faith may have been more based on the fact that the mursaat were among them, the Five Gods weren’t and their avatars appeared at selected placements, which including not when humanity needed help to survive the charr assault.

Just my personal perspective here, I don’t consider the attention of servants to be proper attention of their masters. If you have a chill master and he leaves, you’ll just keep doing whatever because why not until he comes back, including the old habits.

Case in point the Reapers trying to keep control of the Underworld. You could basically say that’s the servants trying to keep the hyperenergetic sadist relative from getting out of the basement asylum and messing up the house. Hard to say whether the master even knew his house came close to being ruined.

SpeedFiend.4521:

LumAnth.5124:

I’ve fought enough of Margonites, Demons, Titans, undead Liches, Shiro’ken, and even an Envoy in my time playing GW1 ( and I still play it regularly to add that!).

Basically, as a GW1 veteran, I’m tired of Abaddon. Proph, Factions and Nightfall all eventually tied into this “god”. Can I have something a little different?

I know neither Kiel or Evon will bring this, but how about the mystery of the Mursaat? What ever happened to them? Do they have a city?

Arrrrghhh…. instead they focus on worn out Lore (Abaddon) or a new thing all together!!

Snip

hide spoiler

The Mursaat were wiped out to within an inch of Lazarus the Dire’s life. On the flip side, we know that there are some cool plans for them in GW2.

Sure, we’ve fought Margonites and all their assorted allies before, but we’re not quite sure WHY. Everyone claims Abaddon is evil and so on, so forth, but we’ve never heard his side of the story.

He gifted magic to all the races of Tyria (for reasons unknown), then waged war on the five when they sealed said gift in the Bloodstone and shattered it. He alone (and now that kitten able usurper Kormir) knows just what was so bad about the place humanity left for Tyria.

You have to remember, he’s the god of secrets. Odds are, he knew about the Elder Dragons. He could have easily forseen the Gods’ “no intervention” policy leading to our collective demise at the hands of the EDs. So what does he do? He gives us freakin’ MAGIC to fight back with. Sure, even the limited magic of today was enough, but it required technology, research and a very very weak target. The, for lack of a better term, overkill magic Abaddon gifted the races of Tyria would would surely fare better against the threat of the EDs.

In closing… what if I told you we might have been playing for the wrong team this whole time?

As far as some are concerned, that’s all we’ve ever been doing in all of the stories. So yeah, we haven’t come very far.

~shrug~ They sometimes say the content being worked on internally is a reflection of the studio environment, so this wasn’t that big of a stretch for me. Nor was it really that much to put into, I just happen to believe that it’s better to be thoroughly long and clear than short and unclear.

Either way, we’ll see how things turn out.

lordkrall.7241:

Gmr Leon.1846:

That’s passive entertainment though. This is a game, interactive entertainment. There’s a desire for the culmination of both in a decent way. Clearly the OP doesn’t see the blending done well in this case, and that’s okay. He/she can ignore it until it passes.

Not like bleckish moments in your personal story at any rate…

True, but the OP seems to assume that fantasy can’t involve politics, and I simply corrected him and gave an recent example.

A fantasy story consisting only of magic and dragons and mythical beast would most likely be quite boring after all.

Eh, depends on your preference. If you’re the action/adventure type, then political intrigue is less enticing. Given the nature of games, there’s room for action/adventure with political intrigue, but I’d imagine it’s weighted more towards an interest in action/adventure, at least when it comes to multiplayer games.

Political intrigue I’d expect a little more in a solo game, but that’s just me.

I see what you mean though. Seems OP’s more fantasy action/adventure inclined, at least with online games, and with minimal story/story with politics involved.

Illi.3647:

~snip~

I’m not really for one side or the other personally, just presenting another perspective on it beyond the scope of charr/human/Fractal/discount support. As a company, obviously they’re going to be for both content and money (they’ve gotta produce something to sell). It does have to be pondered how they intend to allocate resources for each though.

Obviously I’m thinking one side may represent monetized content whereas the other focuses more on maybe existing and new content with less monetization, but that’s neither here nor there. We’re going to get a mixture of both, regardless, it’s just to be seen if it’s a balance or weighted one way over the other.

lordkrall.7241:

I would guess you have never heard of a series called A Song of Ice and Fire (more commonly known as the basis for the tv-series Game of Thrones).

That is probably one of the biggest fantasy series at the moment and it have extremely much to do with politics and stuff like that.

That’s passive entertainment though. This is a game, interactive entertainment. There’s a desire for the culmination of both in a decent way. Clearly the OP doesn’t see the blending done well in this case, and that’s okay. He/she can ignore it until it passes.

Not like bleckish moments in your personal story at any rate…

darkace.8925:

Farzo.8410:

I don’t want to play as a god if Evon wins, because bad players would just die and make the gods look bad.

The gods abandoned their followers in their time of need, they already look bad.

The gods look bad for way more reasons, and that is not one. They ditched a millennium before the Elder Dragons even started doing much of anything.

So…What I’ve gathered from this is pretty straightforward:

Instead of passively shifting responsibilities, we should be given the role, then have to defer it to a NPC when something (and something most certainly will) comes to our attention to be handled.

In the case of Kormir, we should have been granted the blessing and had the option to make ourselves the god/goddess, but had to grant it to Kormir instead. Or we took the godhood but had a Kratos moment wherein it is somehow stripped from us so we could have another game to play.

In the case of Ellen, we should’ve been set up under Magnus, and ordered Ellen off, then suggested her to take the role of council member instead of us because politics can shove it, we like blowing things up.

There, you’ve pulled all the strings, get the praise for it, and remained a crazy funloving adventurer.

Well, what both of them are bringing to the table is a deal with the Zephyr Sanctum, lorewise. Looking at the bigger picture, it strikes me almost as if one’s bringing more silly microtransactions while the other is bringing more content, if both are to influence longer term events, anyway.

Not that we won’t get content either way in the future, but it will be interesting to see which there’s more of after this.

IndigoSundown.5419:

This initiative on ANet’s part reminds me of PvE skills in GW. While I enjoyed them, they were in some cases more powerful than elite skills, and trivialized much of the earlier content. GW2 does not have a lot of room for more trivialization of content, especially as they are planning to go through with the rest of Ascended, which means “moar stats.”

Yeaah. That’s a little bit of what I’m concerned with as well. I already don’t use my racial skills out of dislike for those old PvE skills which bugged me to no end.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Technically, Leon, while the gods physically departed from the world, they kept in contact until sometime shortly after 1078 AE, exact year unknown. They didn’t have a “sudden resurgence” in attention.
…
So I don’t think there’s a big question/reason behind why Abaddon attacked when he did. He just attacked when it was ready.™

As far as I’m concerned, their physical departure denotes their withdrawal of attention as well. I don’t feel like pulling up a scattering of quotes, but I’m fairly certain there are many instances to be found of people wondering whether the gods still even give a care about them. There’s also the clear cut example of the White Mantle to give evidence to the faltering faith of the people, which it has essentially turned into, a faith, since the gods’ interactions with Tyria have dropped so dramatically that people can actually doubt them and switch to a different following (where for some, it wasn’t a faith as their gods were there before them).

That aside, I think at the very least the question of why Abaddon attacked (and even prepared for his attack) when he did is more compelling than the OP’s question. But that’s coming from someone who’s been around this lore way too long by now.

Sindex.9520:

Don’t get me wrong I love the Asura, and I find them to less bland then humans. It’s just that the Thaumanova Reactor incident has me picturing the inquest planting a bomb like a game of Counter Strike. I’m sorry but Kudu’s (bad mixture of Ernst Blofeld & Albert Wesker) failed CoE experiment was a melodramatic “carrot on stick” information pertaining to the Elder Dragons was terrible. This is probably exactly what we will be seeing again. I could be wrong though and if Kiel wins I hope A-net does prove that they know how to weave elaborate narrative still (without forcing upon us).

Why would the Inquest plant a bomb in their own reactor? The experiment just went wrong somehow.

Also, fun fact, Abaddon was only really elaborate because they had to sort out so many loose ends left by sketchy lore to begin with. Not to mention they had to pull him out of thin air, despite already having an existing ancient god to work with, and then cover it up with broad strokes like, “The gods covered up all remaining traces of him.” Which was in the face of producing additional problems…Like his statues being found, the gigantic wasteland containing wreckage of some of his people, and some stuff in Orr.

Don’t get me wrong, I like Abaddon as a character, since he’s probably one of the deeper and more complex ones we have, but I’m not going to look past that that’s because he was the result of trying to fix a lot of standing problems with the lore. And even then, his creation produced additional problems that have only kind of messily been addressed.

Also, for anyone interested, here’s some loreside speculation I had to cut from the OP. It basically cuts down to: Evon may be addressing his own company more than the actual Lion’s Arch citizenry, and will get trade with the Zephyrites either way. Ellen’s addressing the LA citizenry, and is interested in obtaining trade opportunities for everyone from each side (everyone from Zephyr Sanctum and everyone/every business owner in LA, not just the Black Lion Trading Company and maybe the Consortium).

When it comes to the choices, many are dividing across racial lines, and some are more reasonably looking at the longer term picture with what we’ll receive in the form of Fractals. However, I think there may be a little more to it than that suggested by the subtlety of both candidates’ messages.

TL;DR: I suspect that this entire event may be suggestive of an internal division of interest at ArenaNet, one side more financially driven while the other is more creatively driven, and that the former is represented by Evon, while the latter is represented more by Ellen.

Voting for Evon unwittingly supports the side more interested in making money to create more items for the Gem Store, while voting for Ellen may support the side more interested in improving the game and providing more interesting content for everyone.

Ellen Kiel, #TeamKiel.

On Ellen Kiel’s side:
She presents evidence of of Evon’s association with the Consortium, an organization known for its unethical and lifethreatening behavior by fooling people into signing away their rights to free movement and to moving into an unsafe location when that’s the last thing they need.

Ellen’s campaigning is I would say, more broadly focused.
Looking at the facts:

Her campaigning is focused neither on one individual, or one individual race. Her Fractal research promises, a little unusually, research into another race’s affairs than her own, the asura. However, while the gods have definitely influenced all of Tyria, their influence has arguably been waning for some time now, whereas the Inquest’s has been growing and it would seem Thaumanova may have affected all of Tyria more than we know.

Besides that, her discount on waypoints would actually help everyone that plays PvE and travels about often.

Evon Gnashblade, #TeamGnashblade.

On Evon Gnashblade’s side:
Evon ignores her actions to protect the settlers of Southsun Coves and eliminate the source of their problems at the same time. He completely lies about her actions and attempts to gain support through the old hometown pride strategy.

As mentioned, many are dividing this along racial lines, but here’s what’s curious: Evon is technically more human-centered in almost every respect regarding his strategy.
Let’s look at the facts:

His campaigning is riddled with references to Lion’s Arch, being there between the good and the bad, as have been many current and old time fans. His Fractal research promises, as some newer fans have caught on to being odd, research into an ancient human god’s downfall.

Also, for the lazy who glance over the page, he’s first. His placement is capitalizing on real-life human behavior. Not to mention the discount on keys to chests, which is arguably gambling, is also doing so.

Speculation Section:

Now, what does all of this come down to beyond what’s obviously stated? I’d suggest that it may actually present a reflection of internal divisions of interest at ArenaNet. I suspect some may be more financially driven, while some are more creatively driven, and I think that in large respects, this is shown in the benefits each side is offering.

The discount on keys ensures that more players will be more inclined to spend real money on gems for them.

The discount on waypoints arguably ensures more players will zip around the world more enjoying the creator’s creation.

The Fall of Abaddon Fractal arguably requires less imagination, since they’ve already worked out a fair amount of the backstory to it, even if it isn’t to the greatest depth.

The Thaumanova Reactor Explosion Fractal, however, arguably requires more imagination, since the extent to which they’ve messed with how it did anything was reduced only to its aftermath. Seeing the actual explosion’s effects at fever pitch/instant of happening however may offer more interesting results.

TL;DR: I suspect that this entire event may be suggestive of an internal division of interest at ArenaNet, one side more financially driven while the other is more creatively driven, and that the former is represented by Evon, while the latter is represented more by Ellen.

Voting for Evon unwittingly supports the side more interested in making money to create more items for the Gem Store, while voting for Ellen may support the side more interested in improving the game and providing more interesting content for everyone.

Charr are interested in Abaddon probably because Abaddon was behind the manipulation of their entire race through his proxies the Titans, which were encountered by the Flame Legion and subsequently hailed as gods. However, we killed a bunch of them alongside their charr worshipers, which shook everything up for the charr. It made them realize that the Flame Legion and Shaman Caste were just a bunch of power hungry jerks that were tired of the Khan-Ur infighting game and found a way around it by uniting to impose worship of the Titans and devout belief in their will as being the will of the Titans (or something like that, it’s never really clear how they convinced the rest of the charr to follow them).

So yeah. Charr have a decent reason to want insight into what inspired a human god to take interest in them enough to manipulate them and then give them an artifact with the power to finally overcome the kingdom of Ascalon.

Might be a way to figure out how to recreate or rediscover the artifact to fight the Elder Dragons for all we know.

Nick.6972:

Is it explained exactly why they disappeared from the face of the earth when the dragons awakened?

It isn’t, entirely, and that’s in part because they didn’t. They left a millennium before anyone was even aware the Elder Dragons were stirring. As far as I’m aware, and someone may correct me if I’m mistaken, there were no signs of their awakening until 1078 AE. There is hardly any coincidence between the gods’ full departure from Tyria to wherever in 0 AE, and that. If anything, what is curious is the sudden resurgence in any of the gods’ attention to Tyria in 1075 AE, and I don’t just mean because of the onset of Nightfall by Abaddon either, but the entire rattling of Abaddon’s prison foundations/bars by his trying to return.

What should really be asked here is not exactly, why’d they leave when the Elder Dragons began to awaken (which they didn’t), but why’d one of them try to come back when he did? Even if it was in a bit of a crazy way.

Mad Queen Malafide.7512:

In my opinion, the Fall of Abaddon guarantees that we’ll get the lore we expect. With the reactor, we have no clue what to expect. It could be some great new information, or it could just be another vague Fractal. I guess that is why I’m keeping my fingers crossed for Fall of Abaddon. Nostalgia, and guaranteed lore. Predictable, yes, but I like to know what I’m getting.

I’ve not explored the Fractals very much, or dungeons for that matter, but I wouldn’t even say it’s a guarantee for lore from my experience. Not to be a pessimist, it’s just what my minimal experience with dungeons has led me to believe (as well as the overall design of much of the game). I’ll be cool with either, myself.

Karast.1927:

I’m for the reactor.

Playing the role of the god would cheapen their existance for me. They are best left out of the hands of the players.

Also Abandons = no possibility of dwarves

Reactor = almost no possibility of dwarves

Do remember, the whole idea of playing as the gods is solely user speculation. We have no real idea whether this will actually prove to be the case or not.