Guild Wars 2

It must be infinitely complex to code in all of these changes, I applaud all that you have already done in this area. I’m glad to hear that future living world content will have more of this as well.

One thing, however: my level 52 asura character who has just completed the Battle of Claw Island was referred to as Commander by Laranthir who also referenced her battle with Zhaitan, which has not happened. Should I report this as a bug?

My response to this thread is the same that I posted 7 months ago on a similar thread.

I See No Tomorrow.7302:

They allow you to do this in the first place because the rings start out as account bound so technically you could equip it on a different character.
That aside.

I agree with you. If it weren’t for the forum posts here and being suspicious of the “Unique” label on ascended gear, I don’t think I’d know this either. And since these threads are made every once in a while, I feel like Anet needs to do a little more about this than just say that “Unique” means you cannot equip more than one of the item. I am sorry that you lost laurels and badges over this.

And still nothing has changed.

I like this and am curious to see the discussion about it. My only addition would be to say that yes, I feel the same way. In fact, I was thinking earlier that our little “Personal Story” panel in the hero window could have a counterpart of “Living Story” that outlines our personal involvement with everything that’s happened since Halloween 2012.

Equating sylvari with trees and salad is like equating humans and charr to pigs and birds. Sure, they’re made of similar stuff (sylvari – plant matter | humans/charr – meat) but they are not the same. Hating flowers because of sylvari is just like hating pigs because of humans. It makes zero sense.

On the topic of hating sylvari, it seems a bit silly. After all, it was a single sylvari’s doing. Perhaps people are angry that there’s a prevalence of sylvari but I don’t see it that way. There’s just as many if not fewer sylvari in the world itself and one can see that easily. It just seems forced to some extent, and people are jumping on the train of saying anti-sylvari things because it’s cool to do it now. A thread about anything sylvari appears, and at least one person talks about using them as kindling or killing them or chopping the pale tree. Happens all the time. It’s cool to hate on sylvari on the forums, merely a trend. People will grow out of it, hopefully.

Personally, since sylvari were announced in 2007 I’ve wanted to play as one. Never disliked them, never will. The actions of one sylvari does not equate to the actions of all.

The fountain is still there. most pieces of old LA are still there, they just kinda moved a bit.

KehxD.6847:

I See No Tomorrow.7302:

My words!

Yes Malyck is from another tree, but he doesn’t know where he is from, nor does he really know what it means to be a Sylvari. He is a Sylvari that lost all his memory. It doesn’t really prove anything. Not that we are, nor that we are not dragon minions. He is just a Sylvari without any influence by a Pale Tree at all. He has no induced moral from at all, because he doesn’t remember. I don’t see how he makes a difference. It just tells us, there might be more trees.

I See No Tomorrow.7302:

My words

Well it certainly does sound like a point there, but I think you have to look at it from a slightly different perspective. does rock grow? Do crystals grow? I don’t think so, and I think the Risen actually change their appereance a bit over the time they are “alive”. So I don’t see why corrupting plants, which normally do grow, would hinder them to grow? How says crystalline wolves corrupted by Kralkatorrik can’t reproduce? We have no idea about that to be honest, so I don’t really see it as a, “it doesn’t make sense”. There is a difference between plants, rocks and living creatures. Why wouldn’t it minfest in that kind of reproducing way? After all the dragons are heavily magical beings, that should be able to do that kind of stuff.

If Malyck were a dragon minion lost, he would have connection to the Dragon he was associated with. Any minion in isolation will retain a connection with its respective Dragon. Malyck had zero connection to anything, proving that the Dream isn’t necessarily the natural state of the sylvari and probably has something to do with where the tree was planted and by whom.

You’re right, rocks and crystals don’t grow. That’s my point. Crystalline wolves are Dragon minions and have no sexual drive so any chance at reproduction is coincidental. Also if they could reproduce, Dragons would probably corrupt a few and make them breed a huge army to take over everything. They haven’t done that so I’d say it’s either not possible or not relevant.

Dragons corrupt things that are already there. Primordus corrupts rocks. Kralkatorrik corrupts living creatures, among other things. Jormag corrupts water-based stuff and that includes living beings (ice being its preferred medium). Zhaitan corrupts things that have died. None of these are creation-based, they use materials they already have to corrupt the form of their minions.
Sylvari may be built from minerals, but then again so is every living thing. I could easily construct an argument about how quaggans are freed Dragon minions from Bubbles because they live in the water and are, in fact, made from water. The fact that Mordremoth and sylvari are both plant-related does not indicate that they themselves are related. In fact, it gives us a chance to see Dragon corruption on sylvari as they may be susceptible to plant-based corruption.

In other words, the Dragons are incapable of traditional creation methods and that’s why they corrupt things instead of creating things. Thus the creation of the sylvari is not aligned with other Dragon minions and Champions.

Actually I’m tempted now to start a theory that all humans, norn, charr, asura, and quaggans are Bubble’s minions because water is a key component in their physicality…

Uh…
Wow.
So folks, I’d like to examine a few things. One, that some people are arguing for GW2 specifically, as in they want to examine GW2 and its representation outside of the realm of other video game media. Alright. Let’s first examine something else.
The Fresh Prince of Bel Air is a TV show about a black family. There’s white people on it sometimes but they’re not the focus. Did people throw tantrums when white people were not represented on this show? I don’t think so.
There are a multitude of Shoujo (more feminine, traditionally marketed towards girls and women, although very popular with men and boys too) manga and anime which has majority female casts. In addition, there are many Shoujo manga and anime that has majority male casts (I’m looking at you Ouran Host Club). I don’t believe there’s anything wrong with either one.

Now in GW2, we have a majority of women characters introduced. What’s wrong with that? It just happens to be a game with more women. To argue for having more men or an equal number is to make GW2 like any other video game, thus debunking many of your arguments that this is existing within a vacuum. You’re used to having representation but you’re uncomfortable when you don’t get as much of it. You may not realize this on a conscious level and are ‘fighting the good fight’ to get men represented in one game. But I’d like to point out that to do that is to effective bring GW2 to being similar to other games out there. Your argument is not to put GW2 in a vacuum, it’s to make GW2 indistinguishable from many other games that have equal men and women in the main cast. GW2 stands apart and that’s important; it’s important to have many women represented in many different forms.

Oh and by the way an objective argument is impossible because we all have subjective perspectives and thus exist in an intersubjective relationship with others. All knowledge collected is intersubjective and has no basis beyond subjects. This discussion is specifically about western culture and the debate would look different if one took a different culture into account. However since we’re in this western culture, my point still stands: there is nothing wrong with having a game with a majority of women characters.

My post was quoted earlier in this lovely little argument so I find no need to say any of that again but if you’re curious I recommend going to page 1 or 2 or wherever it is to get my full view.

Emiko.3217:

Nausicca.6038:

Emiko.3217:

Just a note here.. in real life, the only symbols of butterflies I’ve seen were on the packaging of feminine products and feminine clothes. Never seen it used for boys or men.

Annnnd? Should I understand that a woman “supposedly” symbol is something bad or inferior?

Absolutely NOT!
I just stated what is out there as far as how things are being marketed. I do not believe women are inferior in any sense of the word. Each gender is different, with their own unique roles and abilities. Neither gender is superior to the other, and if someone thinks otherwise, they seriously need to get back to reality.

Yeah, but I’d say that while each category is different (i.e., feminine and masculine), the actual differences between real genders in terms of personality and preferences are not set in stone. I fail to see why the relatively subtle feminine effects of butterflies worry some people and the extremely masculine effects of warriors and most other professions does not necessarily worry people. There’s little room for other professions to be feminine yet when there is some femininity in one profession people are quick to call it out and ask for a masculine alternative.

(Marketing towards men and women is really silly, by the way. “This is for women and it’s PINK! More expensive because of PINK and flowing lines and oh yes the men’s product is better but this one is somehow built specifically for women” & “This is for men and it says: FOR MEN. NO WOMEN. MANLINESS GUARANTEED. YES YOU WILL STILL BE MASCULINE MAN PERSON AFTER USING OUR PRODUCT.” I would find it more amusing if it didn’t perpetuate gender roles and limit the options of both women and men in expressing themselves.)

Although I fail to see how butterflies are feminine. What’s this person worried about, that he might be seen as fast and fleeting as a butterfly? Nothing’s more manly than a person who isn’t too worried about how masculine they appear to be for fear of somebody viewing them as feminine. Oh no what terror of femininity.

As to the aesthetics of the masculine and feminine, sure you can choose between them or even combine them due to personal preference. But in this case butterflies themselves are not really feminine per say, as many have linked them to the soul, illusions, chaos, etc. If we had an option to change the effects for mesmers, we’d have to add flower effects for warriors and pretty stuff for necros, which just ain’t happening. I like each profession’s effects, it gives them great and distinct looks that speak to how their magic (or pure physical ability) functions.

I would personally like more feminine armor for men and more masculine armor for women in this game. Especially more feminine looks for asura and charr. Like…wow, way to go with masculinity.

On a gameplay note, having one set of effects for each profession allows them to be noticeable and distinct from one another without the confusion of multiple effects for the same profession. Being able to distinguish between professions is very important for both open world PvE and specifically WvW & PvP.

Electro.4173:

I See No Tomorrow.7302:

As I’m sure others have pointed out already, but the more voices the more it is heard:

In nearly any other game you have a major cast of many many male characters. There are often token (and sometimes well-built) female characters, but there are very few. Now we get into the part where numbers and representation matters.

Men can see other men in the media wherever they look: the extremely vast majority of films and games and even many books have male protagonists. The issue of representation might be applicable to GW2 if it was the opposite case, but it’s not. There are enough men in the media. I, for one, find it refreshing to see a large number of good women characters in GW2 (or just women characters) because other games do not have this. GW2 does not exist in a vacuum. It exists in relation to other games. And newsflash, folks: women enjoy many games with a large majority of male protagonists! Many also have a problem with it, so they write threads like this one except their thread could be applied to almost any other game.

But…but…there’s TOO MANY women in GW2! The scales are skewed! There should be complete equality!
Uh…I don’t think you understand what’s going on in popular culture and in the media and generally in our western society, do you? Ideally, there should be overall an equal representation of race and gender and sexual orientation in popular media. There’s not. So, to help it along, you make shows and games like the others except you make the majority of them women or POC or LGBTQA-etc., or something else. Because you know what? There’s nothing inherently wrong with an all-male cast. So there’s nothing inherently wrong with a majority all-female cast. It gives women the variety in representation they need, because otherwise we’d have the ‘femme-fatale’ or the ‘shy, smart, and clutzy’ tropes being the only representations of women. To tip the scales back into balance, we need games like GW2 where the scales are tipped the other direction for a change. If you want a strong male lead, look at literally any other game or piece of media. Give women a place to be represented in a variety of ways for a change.

As to the characterization of all of the characters in the Living Story, that’s a different story.

I’m of the exact opposite opinion. I think games should exist in a “vacuum” so to speak, or more accurately, simply that individual games should be their own entities and not be weighed against every other game in existence. The idea that there’s some grand “scorecard” of games and game X needs to skew its own balance to make up for the fact that game Y had a skewed balance in the other directly is silly to me. Why should completely different companies and individuals all be required to account for one another in some giant industry “scale”?

Nothing exists in a vacuum. Just because you want everything to exist within one, it doesn’t mean that they do. And if so, then what? We change LoTR to have female members of the Fellowship? We change Shoujo manga and anime to have an equal number of male characters? There’s nothing wrong with a piece of media that has an inequality, the problem is when the majority of media representations favor one view over all others. Perhaps my point on balance was ill-used, my point is that while a balance may not exist within a franchise, it should exist at large when one considers all franchises.

I’m not saying that GW2 is being weighted against other games. I’m saying that it exists within the context of western culture that cannot be ignored, ever. We can only ignore it once oppression and inequality stop existing, which appears to be no time soon. And even when such a fateful day does arrive, there’s still nothing wrong with gender imbalance in media as long as there is an alternative. For example, LoTR is not problematic when you take into account the existence of media that favors women instead of men. Then there’s good media that favors both, and some that favors one race over another, etc. Nobody complained that the Prince of Bel Air had bad representation because the majority (if not all) of the main actors were black. In fact, that’s part of the point: to represent a group that has not been adequately represented in mainstream media. Women and girls seeing many women being powerful or representing a variety of personality types displayed in the media gives them more confidence a lot of the time.

As I’m sure others have pointed out already, but the more voices the more it is heard:

In nearly any other game you have a major cast of many many male characters. There are often token (and sometimes well-built) female characters, but there are very few. Now we get into the part where numbers and representation matters.

Men can see other men in the media wherever they look: the extremely vast majority of films and games and even many books have male protagonists. The issue of representation might be applicable to GW2 if it was the opposite case, but it’s not. There are enough men in the media. I, for one, find it refreshing to see a large number of good women characters in GW2 (or just women characters) because other games do not have this. GW2 does not exist in a vacuum. It exists in relation to other games. And newsflash, folks: women enjoy many games with a large majority of male protagonists! Many also have a problem with it, so they write threads like this one except their thread could be applied to almost any other game.

But…but…there’s TOO MANY women in GW2! The scales are skewed! There should be complete equality!
Uh…I don’t think you understand what’s going on in popular culture and in the media and generally in our western society, do you? Ideally, there should be overall an equal representation of race and gender and sexual orientation in popular media. There’s not. So, to help it along, you make shows and games like the others except you make the majority of them women or POC or LGBTQA-etc., or something else. Because you know what? There’s nothing inherently wrong with an all-male cast. So there’s nothing inherently wrong with a majority all-female cast. It gives women the variety in representation they need, because otherwise we’d have the ‘femme-fatale’ or the ‘shy, smart, and clutzy’ tropes being the only representations of women. To tip the scales back into balance, we need games like GW2 where the scales are tipped the other direction for a change. If you want a strong male lead, look at literally any other game or piece of media. Give women a place to be represented in a variety of ways for a change.

As to the characterization of all of the characters in the Living Story, that’s a different story.

Jake.1430 is right, Malyck is from a different tree, is humanoid, and is not evil. If anything, he has better morals at less than a month old than most humans do in their 20s.

I think that kinda proves that sylvari are not inherently dragon minions and that their humanoid appearance is not influenced by Ronan or his family.

What I’m saying is that it is not possible that sylvari are un-corrupted dragon minions. People seem to love this concept, and I would have been all for it had the sylvari not been built in the way that they have. Dragons corrupt existence, the Pale Tree essentially birthed the sylvari. Corruption occurs to already living/nonliving matter. We have already seen living mobile plant creatures and they are not corruptions; sylvari exist in the same vein and would have to have been something else before being ‘corrupted’ into what we see as sylvari.
Examples: Primordus corrupts rock and lava; Kralkatorrik corrupts fleshy things mostly into more crystaline beings; Jormag corrupts snow and ice and also fleshy things; Zhaitan corrupts previously living things that are fleshy although it can also corrupt structures such as temples.
In other words, the sylvari would have had to be plant matter corrupted into sylvari form to be minions. Instead they are grown and born from pods, a method that does not happen to other dragon minions. In fact, all other dragon minions are created in the same way and this way is not from pods.

So a few things that people have said but seem to be getting lost:

Sylvari are definitely not inherently dragon minions. They may be able to become corrupted by our good friend Mordremoth, but not by our old friends Zhaitan, Jormag, Kralkatorrik, and Primordus. Sylvari arose from the Pale Tree as fully sentient beings with free will (and a Dream of Dreams, from our Tree at least). The existence of another Tree indicates that all sylvari are certainly not inherently servants of Mordremoth. There are too many factors pointing to the fact that the Pale Tree is not a Champion, no matter what people seem to want to happen (this same tired theory has been cropping up for years).

Sylvari cannot completely sever their connection with the Dream. Soundless attempt to block it out using meditation and other techniques but the Pale Tree can always reach any living sylvari.

The sylvari of the Dream have a variety of different personalities and different levels of aggression or peacefulness, etc. Sylvari of the Nightmare, on the other hand, chose to turn to Nightmare and are actively attempting to turn the Dream into Nightmare. Their goal is purely sylvari-oriented, that’s why the Toxic alliance was so unusual: the suffering of non-sylvari does not get transmitted to the Dream at all, while torturing a sylvari will add some pain and suffering to the Dream. Their ultimate goal is to have a Nightmare of Nightmares and a corrupted Pale Tree which produces aggressive and ‘evil’ individuals.

However, it has been noted that the Nightmare is something one cannot be freed from. Once one is enthralled by Nightmare, they cannot turn back to the Dream even if they tried…although part of being enthralled seems to be that they cannot even try to turn back at all. This, at least, seems to be similar to Dragon Corruption.

How similar it is remains to be seen, although the founders of the Nightmare Court do not appear to have encountered Mordremoth and developed their concept independent of the Pale Tree. The formation of Nightmare was a philosophical and political act which turned out being much more malevolent than others could have anticipated.

Scarlet appears to have been trying to awaken Mordremoth, that much is certain. Why is slightly open to interpretation but we can make some assumptions. One, that Scarlet seems to have been touched by Mordremoth in the Dream of Dreams. This is not unusual, but it is curious because it means that a sylvari has, at some point, encountered Mordremoth or one of its champions. She was protected from corruption for awhile but it was constantly nagging her in the back of her mind. She spent her time seeking out an answer and went to the reluctant asura who taught her many things. Eventually she got into that one experiment: a turning point for her, this experiment opened her up from the inside to the corruption of Mordremoth and drove her slightly insane. If she was corrupted then it seems she still retained some free will, that beyond the limited free will of the Nightmare Court.

At some point (I forget when exactly) she is contacted by the Pale Tree, but Scarlet rejects the Tree’s pleas and continues with her plans. I reject the OP’s position of Scarlet attempting to kill Mordremoth, for a few reasons. One, she could outline her plan to those others who could easily understand it; i.e. the five main races of Tyria. Since she did not, and instead decided to cause death and destruction for a very long time through pushing alliances between odd bedfellows and just essentially killing and hurting a heck of a lot of people. If she merely wanted to kill the dragon she could have enlisted help. Two, she seems to have had a plan. While the drill was programmed to not end even if she had died, that’s more likely a Plan B than her primary plan. She still seemed pretty eager to survive even when pushed into a corner.

What exactly her motives were are unknown, although two immediately come to mind: releasing the dragon so that she can serve it and cause more chaos; or controlling the dragon possibly through methods that Snaff used to control Kralkatorrik, or some other method. Control of the dragon could have allowed her to do so much more damage.

(TL;DR? The 6th paragraph pertains directly to Mordremoth and Scarlet, the rest to clarifying points for the thread in general.)

No, they’re not one in the same. In GW1 we find that there is active communication between humans and the Gods. In Nightfall we meet a god (Abaddon) which we kill. On top of that we can directly observe at least two Elder Dragons (sleeping) in GW1 (Primordus & Kralkatorrik) in the EoTN expansion.
The active communication between humans and gods is through active communication with avatars of the gods and different servers gaining the favor of the gods through battles essentially hosted by the gods in the Mists. The dragons are entirely different entities.

Conflating similar numbers with being linked in some way can cause a number of different ideas to emerge; there are six major races with the means to interact with the world in large numbers: Tengu, Humans, Charr, Asura, Sylvari, and Norn. Someone could equate these races with the gods or dragons as well.
Or even better we could say that the new worm boss south of LA has three heads so each head must be related to one of the three Orders of Tyria.
Numbers do not make things related.

It’s certainly not Abaddon, as we’ve already thoroughly established on these forums since the beta weekends (and before, in NF itself) that he is quite dead.

But the point about the Mursaat is intriguing, Anet has mentioned that they may bring back mursaat in the future in some form and there has been no mention since. They didn’t kill them all off, either. So far we know about Lazarus the Dire, but were all mursaat really that dedicated to being allied with (i.e. controlling of) the White Mantle? Somehow I doubt that an entire race would dedicate themselves to a human governing entity. There were likely mursaat that avoided being involved in the whole conflict in GW1 and we know that they are an elder race so there could possibly be more to them than we know.

On the other hand, nothing points to them at all in this story so it’d be pulling them from nowhere. I do maintain, however, that mursaat are still on the table and are always possible for future living story/expansions.

Abaddon is dead. He is not imprisoned.

Well first of all I think this should go in the suggestions subforum. Second of all, I think that “raising the stone dwarves” itself and the colossus (from Cliffside I assume?) would be thoroughly against the lore of the game in a big way.

Dwarves are autonomous living beings like everyone else, and they are still around. They just live in the depths of Tyria, holding back the destroyers.

But Scarlet, due to the website lore article and partially what happens in game, is completely within some lore bounds (even if many of them are stretched).

The wiki is updated by players, not Anet. If players did not know about the change, then it isn’t on the wiki until it is known.

Elbegast.6970:

BobbyStein.2315:

We’re currently working on a system that will better direct players through Living World content. Eventually, it will also provide story context for LW and other content types. The first phase of the system should be ready before the end of the year.

That should have shipped with the initial release of the living story. That system should have been designed before the living story content was even written.

You can’t change the past. At least they’re working on it now.

But discovery doesn’t change the actual recipe right? If you want to craft any of those items you discovered in the past, all you have to do is re-craft it in the discovery tab.

If your point is that you like them on your list, then I suppose that can be a complaint but functionally it is indistinguishable.

Condas.7056:

Caliga Meshima.4768:

They confirmed it today during the live developer feed. Transmuted legendaries will NOT be upgraded to ascended.

In order to get the upgrade to ascended, you’ll have to untransmute your legendary with a new item they are releasing called a “Transmutation Splitter.”

Lets hope that means it will be possible for legendary weapons that have been transmuted multiple times. Otherwise it is a non issue in my opinion.

If I were to guess, I’d say that the transmutation retains only two items of information on each transmuted object. The first piece of information is data on the item that provided the skin, the second is on the data that provided the stats. If you transmuted a legendary multiple times, I believe it would retain the skin data through each transmutation, only changing the data for the item that provided the stats.

Then again, it might retain the previously transmuted stats as part of the skin information, but I have a feeling that is not the case. If this is intended as a fix for transmuted legendaries, that would be a painful oversight for those who own them.

Have you noticed how when you preview a transmuted item (armor or weapon, doesn’t matter) it shows you the original skin of the item and not the transmuted skin?

Also I heard rumor of an un-transmutation stone of some sort, which supposedly splits a transmuted item into its two original components.

If these two things line up, it will mean two things:
1. Transmuted Legendaries will not receive the stat upgrade.
2. HOWEVER there is a way to retrieve your original Legendary with this un-transmutation stone.

If this is true, great, if not then I am curious to see what Anet does to address transmuted legendaries.

Whatever I end up doing that day. I don’t focus on any specific activity to make money.

Were there zero Orrians outside of Orr when the Cataclysm happened?

I find it hard to believe that every single Orrian was in Orr at the time of the Cataclysm.

Why have we heard of no humans of Orrian descent?

I’ll just offer my two cents on this.
People were surprised that anyone would play the Gauntlet for fun? Personally, I was surprised that anyone would attempt to farm the event and saw farming Deadeye or Subject 7 to be pointless.

I understand that if you enjoy amassing large amount of money at once that you feel like you’re missing out, but surely you can survive without making that much money, right? For example, I got a precursor drop from Karka Queen (Storm) which gave me a significant amount of money (around 140g). Have I ever gotten a precursor or anything even closely equivalent since then? No. I was happy to have had that drop in the first place and don’t mind if it never comes around again.

In this case, I doubt that farming one of the bosses was entirely intended by Anet, but once they knew about it it seems that they were nice enough to let it stick around until Clockwork Chaos. I see no problem with the changes.

A Massive Headache.1879:

@I See No Tomorrow actually the minions of dragons can’t be corrupted by other dragons, or at least all evidence so far points to that. there are inquest mixing dragon magics; however, I’m not entirely sure that’s relevant

All evidence? The only evidence we have is from the Inquest. If the Inquest hasn’t created a branded, risen, icebrood, or even destroyer sylvari then I’m afraid that your argument falls flat. The Inquest mix dragon magic, if they can do it why wouldn’t the Dragons’ latent magic (i.e. the exact same magical energy) be able to do the same thing?

Juclesia Elcritian.8410:

I See No Tomorrow.7302:

It is interesting that they are incorruptible but it is more likely that they were created to fight the Dragons by an ancient and long dead race than being Dragon minions themselves.

Except that sylari ARE corruptable. The Nightmare Court can corrupt them. Just like Svanir corrupt norn into more svanir, etc.

We don’t fully understand what Nightmare Court corruption is. It certainly isn’t Elder Dragon magic as far as we know so far. If it is Dragon magic it may be our good friend the Jungle Dragon, but until we know that for sure then it is merely sylvari-created corruption: nothing more, nothing less.

Salad? Don’t make me laugh when all of the other races can be turned into sausages.

Also, let me set a few things straight:
If the sylvari were dragon minions, they’d be corruptible. They’re not corruptible.
If Ventari’s tablet guided the Pale Tree differently than intended, Malyk would not be a fairly decent person by Ventari’s standards.
Dragon minions CORRUPT. They do not grow, they corrupt. Primordus corrupts stone and lava, Kralkatorrik corrupts people and land with crystalline corruption, Jormag corrupts people and is able to corrupt snow as well, Zhaitan corrupts people, corpses, god statues and temples, and an entire undead nation. The Pale Tree grows. It does not corrupt humans or charr into a sylvari, the Tree grows a sylvari in a pod until they are born.
As an end result, whether the sylvari is Trahearne or Scarlet, they are unable to be corrupted by any known Elder Dragon’s influence. They simply die.

It is interesting that they are incorruptible but it is more likely that they were created to fight the Dragons by an ancient and long dead race than being Dragon minions themselves.

I believe somebody said you could get one of the scanners for each character by talking to Vorpp, so you can definitely do it with multiple characters.

There’s perm content.

Update Notes:

After the Clockwork Chaos release, the invasions will continue at a less frequent pace.

So the invasions seem to be sticking around.

They allow you to do this in the first place because the rings start out as account bound so technically you could equip it on a different character.
That aside.

I agree with you. If it weren’t for the forum posts here and being suspicious of the “Unique” label on ascended gear, I don’t think I’d know this either. And since these threads are made every once in a while, I feel like Anet needs to do a little more about this than just say that “Unique” means you cannot equip more than one of the item. I am sorry that you lost laurels and badges over this.

There are a number of different kinds of foci, and whether or not it’s a useful weapon is not the issue here.

All I want is a focus item that is a fan. There were a number of them related to Factions back in GW1 http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Paper_Fan but as long as there is some kind of fan at some point in the future, I will be happy.

That is all.

Duke Blackrose.4981:

Is that she was really Zhaitan all along and the one killed by the Pact was nothing more than an illusion. It was all part of her nefarious plot to bring important heroes and representatives of all races together to eliminate them. This spirals out into a chain of events:

1) Logan’s Quest
Sexually confused over his attraction to Queen Zhaitan, Logan Thackeray questions everything and runs away again. Rytlock seeks to find him and snap him out of it.

2) Minister Caudecas is revealed as having been a hero all along
Siding with the Separatists was nothing more than an extreme and necessary method of opposing a ruler who he knew to be evil all along. Help him thwart Queen Zhaitan’s plans at the speech.

3) Scarlet is a member of an underground faction seeking to put an end to Queen Zhaitan’s reign. You must help her hunt down and burn the disguised undead among the Krytan populace before the clock ticks down and time runs out.

4) Tybalt, Sieran, and Forgal are revealed to have survived Claw Island thanks to the help of Livia and the Scepter of Orr. You gladly accept their aid in slaying Queen Zhaitan.

5) Trahearne saves the day through his remarkable powers of prediction.
“This won’t end well.”

Despite the fact that this won’t happen, this was a wonderful read.

This won’t end well.

I have no experience with WoW so I had no idea it was actually that bad. I suppose without the ability (or creativity) to do what Anet is doing, that was the best that game could do.

I agree with you though, it’s pretty fantastic being able to see things unfold, even if some events are lackluster. For example, if the Consortium comes back in a big way in a few months, I feel like I’ll be gleeful in that “I remember when the Consortium first moved to LA” kind of way. The Southsun events could have definitely been better, but they were definitely experienced by us.

A few months or years down the road, it will be very interesting to see the development of many characters, which ones come back, and how they interact with each other. What happened to the Molten Alliance? How does Rox’s interaction with Rytlock go? Etc. etc.

Despite some of the shortcomings of many of the stories, I still find it exciting, yes. I look forward to tomorrow’s update.

Queen Jenna’s fashion choices always seem to be under fire.

Perhaps tomorrow she will announce her intention to wear shoes, which will be ascended shoes and give her stats and latent mesmer abilities such a huge increase that Scarlet must destroy Jenna before the Queen can wear the ascended shoes for the good of Kryta.

…

But honestly, I see no problem with this. It’s her fashion choice, she’s not required to wear shoes by anyone, is she?

That’s terrible.

I took dungeons slowly, so even though I’ve been playing for about a year now I still haven’t done any explorable paths in dungeons (unless Fractals counts).

I…don’t know what to do about this apart from what people have already suggested: report them, try to make note of people doing it, etc.

I don’t see a huge problem with people just generally running these things and selling empty slots to others, as what Mexican Cookie thinks is happening. No, the problem here is what is said in the OP: people going along on a dungeon path run and being kicked before being allowed to receive their reward for the hard work they put into running the dungeon because someone “sold their spot”. That event is bad.

I want to make a note of the discussion on younger people playing the game. The game is rated Teen in America (and whatever the equivalent is in Europe and China), and as such people who are teenagers are technically allowed to play the game. You are fully within your right to not play with people you do not want to play with, but personally, as someone who has been playing various online games since I was younger than a teenager, I think you should learn about the individual before learning they cannot be trusted. I am currently in my 20’s myself, but I’ve met plenty of people who acted a heck of a lot younger than their age even when older than me. I’m sure plenty of these people doing this terrible dungeon run kick thing are adults.

Which of course brings us to the community. I feel like even though GW1 was an almost entirely instanced game, it had a better social feel to it. I’ve rarely been able to hold a conversation with random people in LA or any other city since release, and the only interaction I got was when I joined a guild. The BWEs were another story, those were full of social activity and interaction. It was wonderful.

What happened?

I’m curious as to why this is not the case, perhaps it would be confusing with different time zones?

All I know is that it’s been like this ever since /age was invented in GW1 and I always found it odd how it didn’t display the date of creation.

That’s what I want to know as well: what is a nameplate?

So the poem said that Scarlet would burn Kryta. Livia would never burn Kryta unless she was an unusually adept dragon minion.

Secondly, she no longer has possession of the Scepter of Orr. When she lost possession and what she did while it was within her possession are unknown.

Thirdly, the mysterious figure, a red-skinned sylvari, is most likely Scarlet. Livia is not and never has been a plant. Thus Livia is likely not Scarlet.

In the end: Livia is not Scarlet. Livia would not write a poem like Scarlet wrote. Nor would she make graffiti saying “Scarlet was here” or draw little silly "x"s on the eyes of the Queen. We’re dealing with someone who views this all as a game, some kind of fun. I doubt a 270+ year old Livia would pretend harming Kryta and the Queen was a game.

I believe that having two different types of the world (like pre-searing and post-searing) is a possible workaround, but then again there are many many people who would like to go back to pre-searing but cannot.

Anet said in the past that moving players from pre searing to post searing was found to be too displacing and caused many people not to play any more because it was too confusing, hence no equivalent in Factions or Nightfall. If you make two different Orrs, then you’ll have players who intentionally do not finish the story because they prefer the original Orr, and others who have finished the story being given no way to play along side those who have not finished the story. It creates a separation between people.

I’m not saying that there’s no possible way to cleanse Orr, but from my perspective Anet kinda backed themselves into a corner on this one and there doesn’t seem to be an effective way out.

miki.8735:

I See No Tomorrow.7302:

Then those that go to Orr before defeating Zhaitan will see zero Risen.

Also even this point is good becouse as you all probably have noticed arena net adds alot of temporary content. Soon its gonna be a year since 1st team defeated zhaithan why wouldn’t it be a great idea to kick risen from most of locations as sign of progress of this “living world” (newcomers would feel not like "well its a year since release and i still have to fight risen like its 1325AE , but its year after release and its 1326 AE and there IS NO ZHAITAN THEN WHY RISEN !)

Well if you’ve just bought the game and your personal story says to kill all these Risen and that Zhaitan is a real threat and you just see a bunch of Inquest wandering around and no Risen, would that not create a disconnect for the player? It might even be enough to confuse someone so they leave the game entirely.

Don’t get me wrong, I hate Risen and I really dislike fighting them. I just think that the way things are makes the most sense.

Some people get through the living story in a month, others in longer amounts of time.

The question still stands as to how Corsairs are able to access the power of god statues throughout Orr to make them deal damage and such.

It was possible in GW1 to easily do this because GW1 was a heavily instanced game. In that game you didn’t risk mixing the afflicted with the scavengers because it was not open-world. So if someone buys Factions now, they’ll see the afflicted everywhere and when they beat Winds of Change they’ll see scavengers. In what you’re suggesting, someone could buy GW2 and not see Risen, thus creating a disconnect with what they’re fighting in the open world and what they’re fighting in the personal story. I just defeated corsairs guarding the Gates of Arah, why is Zhaitan alive inside? I just stopped corsairs from capturing the temple of Balthazar, why are Risen using the Temple of Lyssa to make more Risen?

Either way, the army of Zhaitan seems to be formidable. Zhaitan was merely one large and powerful Elder Dragon, but an undead army is much more difficult to wipe out.

I think most people agree with you, as do I. As such, I believe an Anet employee has said that they’re attempting to work on something that will help resolve this issue or make Condition builds more viable.

Another problem is that condition builds do almost nothing against objects in PvE, the ones that cannot have conditions. I feel like they can at least feel Burning, eh?

It would be nice but from a Lore perspective I doubt that, even with the peace treaty, there would be zero chance for a gate to be built between the Black Citadel and Divinity’s Reach. Same with communication between other races.

I do like the idea that we can travel to our own city from anywhere in the world, perhaps something can be implemented.

How would non-Risen corrupt ancient human god temples and use their influence to spread powerful destructive magic through the god statues throughout Orr? And what happens to Tequatl? A giant evil airship?

Either way, since Risen are a huge force in Orr it wouldn’t make sense for them to be utterly wiped out. The war with the Risen is still a difficult one and Zhaitan’s champions can still corrupt people to some extent (see: Drakkar corrupting Svanir). So the Risen aren’t gone by a long shot.

spikyblackhair.4951:

I’m no expert on swordsmanship, but from the little that I do know, this was a valid stance in Medieval Europe, although it seems to have been favored more by Italians than by the German schools.

Further research reveals that it was known as the posta di coda longa, or tail guard, and was used as a deceptive and inviting stance, feigning defenselessness while still being capable of making strong cuts along several angles. The stance is also apparently occasionally referred to as/seen as synonymous with nebenhut, although the accuracy of this is disputed.

So in sum, I see nothing wrong with its use. In fact, it is a rather advanced guard, and its practical use as a ploy to invite attack is not entirely at odds with what one might imagine a female warrior/combatant to do in this kind of setting. Hope that helps some of you.

Finally, a more mundane reason for making most characters hold their swords behind them might be that it would simply look silly for everyone to run around holding their swords in front of or above them all the time. The most realistic option would probably be to have them hold the sword in only one hand as they run instead of remaining at their guard, but that would also look silly at times (e.g. if you ran four feet, stopped, ran four feet again, and so on, forcing the character to switch positions at a frenetic pace).

For further edification (last two links in Italian):

http://www.aemma.org/onlineResources/liberi/liberi11_body.htm
http://www.scrimipedia.it/mediawiki/index.php?title=Guardie_di_coda_lunga
http://www.scrimipedia.it/mediawiki/index.php?title=Coda_lunga_distesa

Yes, this ^

I saw one of these threads a long time ago during the Beta Weekend Events, and somebody else thankfully said something similar to Spiky here. I dislike the hate on the stance, as it is certainly not “weak” or “improper”.

It seems the women in the game know how to hold their greatswords correctly folks. This isn’t some random “weak” animation, this is a legitimate stance that will help one make full use of their greatsword. It’s a good animation and I’m glad that Anet included something other than “hold sword in front of you” for a default stance.

Then those that go to Orr before defeating Zhaitan will see zero Risen. The reason they’re still around is because new characters and players have not beaten the personal story.

Besides, removing content (no Risen, no corrupted God Temple events) would not be a good thing in my opinion.

I agree that something needs to be done for those of us who have defeated Zhaitan, but as this state of the game does not apply to everybody I think that it would be unwise to remove content from both Orr and other areas in Tyria.

I can see the honeycomb structures on the normal background. Less so on your inverted coloration picture.

I doubt it’s a clue, just a background.

But are these Runestones used to actually forge a legendary or does the Djinn in the Mystic Forge (forget his name) eat them as snacks during the off hours in GW2? The Djinn essentially just seems to spit out random results (especially when throwing rare or exotic weapons at it), so we don’t know if the materials that we give to the Djinn actually go into creating the legendary or just trade for it.

So here’s something I’d like folks to discuss that I do not think has been discussed before.

Legendary and Ascended items are of a rarity that goes beyond exotic, obviously. The Devs have made it clear that Ascended gear beyond just trinkets and accessories will become reality this year.

One thing I’ve noticed, though. Legendary items are…weird. We have Twilight, a greatsword which looks like a gash in reality leading into the night sky. We have the Moot, a mace which is essentially a rotating disco ball. Then there’s the pistol which seems silly and the Dreamer which shoots rainbows. I have no problem with the differences in traditional “epicness” when it comes to legendaries. However, we then have ascended gear.

So far, ascended gear has been things like Adelbern’s Royal Signet Ring, Jade Wind Orb, an Ancient Mursaat Token, etc. If they continue with this trend into ascended armor and eventually ascended weapons, I predict (but in no way believe myself to be absolutely knowledgeable) that these weapons and armor will have a similar ring to them. Shiro’s Blades, perhaps, or Pyre Fierceshot’s bow.

I suppose my question would be…what exactly makes the legendary items legendary? Apart from the incredible effort that it takes to create a legendary weapon and the relatively pleasant effects, I don’t know what makes them legends. They don’t have any background to them and there seems to be little connection to Guild Wars 2 honestly. Where is any other reference to unicorns or disco orbs or even to Eternity (apart from that one NPC that wields Eternity)?

Perhaps there is an easy answer and perhaps there isn’t one. I don’t know.

HawkMeister.4758:

And we better not even start talking about the quasi fascist Charr childrearing by “the state” or the blatant misandry shown in the “Charr-feminist uprising” and the “evil patriarchy” threat of the Son´s of Svanir.

Because charr women wanting to be treated equally after an age of oppression is just as bad as the Sons of Svanir’s blatant misogyny and hate of women. Yup. Okay.

On-topic, my largest gripe with the hologram is that they didn’t model it correctly to be see-through and her eyes are really freakin’ creepy.

Other than that, technological advancement has been largest for the charr, not the asura. The asura aren’t actually that far more advanced than they were in GW1. Losing the Central Transfer Chamber set them back pretty far as far as I can tell.

Holograms have been around for awhile in Guild Wars. You just need to know where to look.

Melee weapons seem to work. Dunno why it gets obstructed though.

Rox and Braham recognized me during the instance but not after the instance.