Guild Wars 2

In GW1, Krytans explicitly “Rode” Saul out of Krytan and beyond the borders before dumping him and leaving him (which lead to him finding the Mursaat).

In GW2, we see fancy carriages and wagons that would be horse-drawn. In Party Politics I believe, a group of nobles are talking about a party, and one mentions equestrian being out of the question because possibility of confusion for centaurs. In DR you can get into a stable with stored jousting carnival toys.

A guard mentions ponies for riding.

The same things that would negate Cavalry would affect Centaurs as well, if you think about it :P.

Fireballs are great, but they are not instant win buttons. I wouldn’t see them being any more effective against Cavalry then an infantry group, and we hardly hear about singular elementalists wiping out entire groups casually (bar hero/very powerful ones like Cynn or such).

It’s a clear case of “Anet did not want to deal with the complaints about mounts that would appear if they had horses ingame.”

edit: Another thing is, IIRC, it’s mentioned some of the centaur tribes don’t really like magic, and it’s far less common with them then humans?

dace.8019:

Coming in late, but regarding banners (and possibly Warriors & Magic) I always found this concept art interesting.

It’s fairly clear in showing summoned banners falling from skyward into waiting hands.

Those banners are also brightly glowing even in the persons hand. IIRC, the banners ingame do not share that aspect.

It’s also the mist wars loading screen, so the mists tend to be weird.

Another aspect is that some loading screens show stuff not even ingame. Harathi hinterslands shows a series of castles or walls that doesn’t exist ingame. One map (I think Kessex hills originally?) showed a field/stream with a number of the statues of the gods, some huge. Which isn’t in the map either :P.

So, I bought the guild pillar on one character, and when I went to craft the shimmering staff on my artificer (another character), it’s not letting me do so.

So I have to buy every guild commendation weapon (which are soulbound on purchase), on the character who can actually craft the shimmering weapon? (whicha re account bound, according to the wiki)?

Squee.7829:

I think the betrayal element added to a lot of hate for Caithe. It’s certainly why I would have preferred killing her over Faolain by the end of the story. (I would have liked to kill both, but I really hated Caithe). With Canach, we have a guy we had no reason to trust or even like. He was kind of a bad guy. And we expect a bad guy to do bad things. Up until we’re pleasantly surprised when he ends up doing good things.

Caithe was the opposite. While what Caithe did wasn’t technically “bad” or malicious, it was a complete breach of trust. Here was a person we had put a lot of faith into to help us and generally be our friend, and she goes and steals Glint’s egg from us. We were on the same side. All parties involved wanted the egg to be safe, but she stole it from us for…what? Because she thought we were too incompetent to handle it? We ended up spending time and resources on a ridiculous goose chase just to make sure we and Caithe were still on the same side.

Because Caithe is one of the stealthiest people around and we were in areas the Mordrem had strength/access to easily? :P

And she never thought we were incompetent. Hate the explanation she gave if you want, but she did say she got a new wyld hunt to protect the egg/take it somewhere safe (I think she saw Tarir in it), and it was incredibly overpowering.

I love Canach in an out of character manner, but I see no reason why the PC should extend the incredible amount of trust they did (IMO) to him.

Jaken.6801:

Kalavier.1097:

Question, unsure if it was asked as I don’t have the time to read the long posts in this thread since I last looked.

Anet, is there any reason why the PC so utterly hates Caithe in the final missions of HoT, where the PC’s comment about Caithe disappearing after City of Hope (taking the egg to Tarir), is a neutral sounding statement about how “She’ll turn up again.” Then the very next time they meet, the PC is extremely hateful and distrusting of Caithe.

edit: I ask because it feels to me that the relationship between the PC and Caithe does a number of dramatic flip-flops in HoT.

To be honest, there are a lot of dramatic flip-flops.
I think there is a lot we have to add in ourselves, because we only see important moments.
That’s why we suddenly trust Canach, even though we declared our hate for a long time and are all buddy buddy with him at the end.
We missed the budding friendship that blossomed in several nights spend together under the stars.

That’s part of my confusion too, at least from a player out of world perspective. Everybody hates Caithe, an ally who is sometimes Shady but works for the greater good, but loves Canach, a literal criminal who unleashed the Karka on LA and Southsun, and tried to kill us a few times. :P

Question, unsure if it was asked as I don’t have the time to read the long posts in this thread since I last looked.

Anet, is there any reason why the PC so utterly hates Caithe in the final missions of HoT, where the PC’s comment about Caithe disappearing after City of Hope (taking the egg to Tarir), is a neutral sounding statement about how “She’ll turn up again.” Then the very next time they meet, the PC is extremely hateful and distrusting of Caithe.

edit: I ask because it feels to me that the relationship between the PC and Caithe does a number of dramatic flip-flops in HoT.

Verdant brink events take place in a single day.

Pale Reaver rally starts immediately after the first story instance. Jaka Itzel has no food problems by the time the PC gets there.

The noble camp happens the morning after as well, as Faren was on the ship and was declared missing for “mere hours.” Ordnance corp is the one you could fudge the most, given how they are in the Prisoners of the Dragon instance, but at the same time they could’ve been captured (as the one spot is filled with supply crates, corpses, and a destroyed tower).

The overall story is a short, brutal one though. Since a number of open world events don’t actually match up with the storyline (for example, all of Auric basin basically), and a number of Tangled Depths camps aren’t even touched outside of the Nuhoch village, which was during a period when the PC was trying to get to Rata Novus as fast as they could (which they succeeded at, being literally the first people in, the OoW came in afterward, and that Asura was the one who setup the cannons in the Ley Line chamber).

I think Prisoners of the dragon gives a timeframe for how long Eir had been captured, but a few months seems like a rather long time for a Mordrem prison caravan to go from central Verdant Brink to Dragon’s stand. Because we know the one group escaped that Caravan near the start of Tangled Depths with help of Trahearne, Logan, and Zojja.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

• I wouldn’t call it easily accessible given that a caved in drill is in the way – remember that the drill was going on for a long time (couple weeks even in lore), so it must have gone deep before hitting that ley line.[

Eh, I honestly doubt it was there for a couple weeks, because the driving force preventing the lionguard from charging back into the city was merely the miasma, which they were waiting for the wind to shift and blow it out. Even then, we know the drill is huge and it had the breachmaker powering it, so I doubt anything will be able to match that soon, especially from the White Mantle.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Kalavier.1097:

Can you please give me a source for the Engineer line? I brought that up once (I didn’t have a source), and got it flung back into my face about it not being said by Anet.

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

What’s your source for “engineers don’t use magic” ? The wiki articles on magic and engineer don’t mention this, nor does the official description of the engineer .

Seems like something that the wiki would have documented.

This was said somewhere shortly after the engineer’s reveal back in 2011 or so. Before the wiki was really spot on documenting lore from interviews.

Unfortunately, I don’t remember the site it was said on, just that it was an interview with Ree Soesbee, and in that same interview it was talked about how sylvari being engineers isn’t that uncommon and that sylvari were not as flammable as dry wood so seeing one with a flame thrower wouldn’t be suicidal – and that different races could have different mixtures for their engineer tools, like charr engineers having gasoline like substance for flamethrowers while sylvari engineers would have biodegradeable fuel.

It was something talked about though, by Ree unless my memory fails me there too which I don’t think it does.

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

Can we name specific NPCs that are known to have never used magic?

Dozens, even ignoring the major ones that Kalavier mentioned (and of major characters, let’s add some more: Riona from GoA, Eir (beyond the norn forms which isn’t profession based), Taimi and Canach from DE 2.0, Gullik’s cousin (forgot her name) from GoA (beyond the norn form, which isn’t profession based)).

Of course this isn’t stating they can’t use magic, just that they don’t – whether this is a choice of “I don’t want to use magic” or a more likely one of “I never learned how to use magic, though if I took the time I could use magic.”

Which is where the one question came up. In the one article/interview, it’s implied that basically everybody learns and uses magic. Yet we have major characters that are never stated to use magic a single time, even something that could be attributed to a “passive” magic like a warrior attack causing shockwaves. (In cause of Rytlock, Gullik, his cousin, etc).

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

Or in short: do we really know enough about magic to say that there are any specific professions that exist in Tyria without magic affecting their powers? Can we name specific NPCs that are known to have never used magic?

Rytlock – priory to his anti-foefire ritual (which may not have even been him, just artifacts).
Dougal Keane
Ember Doomforge
Gullik whatever-his-name is.
Forgal
Tybalt
I really wanna say Laranthir of the wild hasn’t been show to do anything magic related either. :P

edit: Addtional question.

Just how common is magic in Kryta/Ascalon these days? The one interview/article a long time ago makes it sound like it’s extremely common place, yet the world as present does not match that statement/implications.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Actually, nothing indicates warriors use magic in their skills. ArenaNet outright stated they wanted flashy skills so they’re noticeable. I wouldn’t automatically put this as “magic”.

Now, that doesn’t mean warriors can’t use magic – they can. There’s no debating that. It’s been explicitly stated that everyone can use magic.

But not everyone does use magic.

Engineers, for example, were explicitly stated to have no magic in their kitten nal. Just, at best, magically-enchanted/infused tools. This doesn’t mean they can’t use magic – just that they don’t.

Warriors, by all indication, are the same.

Hence Kalavier’s statement of an old debate :P

Can you please give me a source for the Engineer line? I brought that up once (I didn’t have a source), and got it flung back into my face about it not being said by Anet.

And yes, I keep getting torn apart by people for DARING TO SUGGEST most warriors don’t train or use magic (Hence, I don’t call them “magic user”). I’m sick of the debate. Since Rytlock, Dougal, and other characters in the books were described as not using magic at all.

Scott McGough.6897:

I say go ahead and ask your questions.

Aaron A. is right, we can’t and won’t say anything that might spoil future story lines, but if it’s a question we can answer, this forum is the right place for it.

Well, if I can post them here. These shouldn’t be related to any spoilers at all hehe.

A: When stated that “Basically everybody learns their first spells from tutoring of their parents.” What does that mean? Human example: does this mean most people learn the “Prayer to Dwayna” style skills, or profession specific. That specific source mentions Charr in Farhars learning their first spells (implying nearly all), yet we have Rytlock who never used magic, that is until his anti-foefire ritual.
B: Part of the “warriors and magic debate” I see a lot. Warrior shouts. Can a warrior use the one shout to actually heal a wound(Like the one skill does ingame)? Or is this a case of “most of the time, it’s just morale.”
C: This one is stupid, but I’m putting it here just to silence it… Warriors do not summon banners from the sky do they? Again, something I see a lot despite how silly it is.
D: In comparison to adventurers/military forces/orders, what kind of spells or power levels do civilian spellcasters have, like the civilian necromancers in Divinity’s Reach.
E: Relating to above slightly, how often (in a generalized statement across all the races), do warriors use magic in a trained manner? How much magic could a Seraph warrior squad be expected to showcase? Obviously some warriors train in magic (asura especially), but how about the other races?

Those are the ones that pop into mind immediately.

My questions mostly fall into the age old, super kittening hot topic debate of “Warriors and magic” and “Magic in general civilian use.”

Simply because I’m tired of it and wish for a concrete, solid answer that will silence it either way, once and for all. :/.

Asking because there are some lore questions that keep bouncing around that I would like to ask her, and get concrete answers for :/.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

I recall seeing her using the shortbow model. As well as shortbow skills (particularly shortbow 2 and 3).

In one trailer she does a “Leap backwards and fire an arrow” skill.

But ingame I’m pretty sure she purely uses longbow.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

‘The egg arc’ is just two instances, one of which is half about regrouping with the Pact. How the hell is that out of place? Hell, the primary objective before finding out the Pact Fleet fell was getting the egg to Tarir (though the PC didn’t know what or where Tarir was – just that it was a golden location).

“Okay guys, we need to rescue Destiny’s Edge and get the Pact up on it’s feet fully!”

“Oh, commander, I saw Caithe going that way.”

“kittenING CAITHE, GET OVER HERE!”

You forgot the second primary objective given at the beginning of HoT: recruiting local allies, and that’s exactly what “the egg arc” does – and is why we detour to Rata Novus, why we would help out Malyck, or investigate the Nightmare Court.

The more you delay, the more holes appear in the storyline they set up. Hell, the egg arc only causes that by ‘accident’ in terms of Lore. The commander had zero plan or idea what to do with the Egg after securing it, which makes the Exalted just kinda… spawn in there. And the Exalted don’t do much in terms of the story either beyond that point. They aren’t present in the final fight.

The problem, to me, is that they gave us a bunch of new objectives and set them to all be the end goal, rather than incrementing our objective-goal situations. For example, if we had rescued Destiny’s Edge halfway rather than at the end, then there’d be room and reason to spend a bit of time doing other things. And even then, you can have a race-against-the-clock plot without having it short. Act 2 was half the size of Act 1, and Acts 3 and 4 were each half the size of Act 2.

In order to make any extra side arcs happen, we’d have to rescue Traehearne/Destiny’s Edge early on. Without that, it makes more detours seem weird, out of place, pace-breaking or simply “What the kitten?” plot hole. I agree it doesn’t perhaps have to be ‘short’, but you have to keep a pace going. It’s like, Mass Effect 2 I guess. “OMG, WE HAVE TO DO THIS MISSION ASAP!” “Eh, okay.” goes and does side missions and exploration for 5 days of gameplay.

The further we progressed, the less content we got. And the less continuity between open world and story (a Durmand Priory camp in the story instances suddenly becomes an Order of Whispers camp in the open world – referring to the one in Roots of Terror).

IIRC, the npc we talk to in the camp is OoW, the group is a mixed group that just escaped from a prison convoy, and the ranking officer was a Priory member. The tents were OoW and nothing states much about the camp other then “Hey, there is a Pact camp up here!”

Not going to say the plot was bad, but it wasn’t great, and I think pacing was the issue here. Most ‘epic adventure’ stories have 1 overarching goal and several incremental smaller but still primary goal – HoT had 3 overarching goals (recover Pact, rescue DE, kill Mordy) and 1 smaller primary goal (bring Egg to Tarir). There should have been 1 overarching goal (kill Mordy) with 4/5 smaller primary goals (bring Egg to Tarir, rescue DE, recover Pact, recruit allies, and hold off a new push of Mordremoth’s forces heading towards Central Tyria is what I would have gone with – the ‘recruit allies’ would include Nightmare Court and Malyck along with Exalted/Itzel/Nuhoch that we got).

What HoT fails at, IMO, is the Pact. After Verdant Brink and the very first mission in Auric Basin, we do next to nothing with the Pact at all in the story. For example, in Rata Novus we are the first people in, and then leave. Go to open world and we have OoW people trying to secure a base inside of it. Why couldn’t we have had part of that happen within the story mode? Or a mention. “Taimi, you’ll be okay until the Pact gets here? Won’t be long.” instead of implying that Taimi is being left utterly alone without any backup coming while the Commander, Braham, and Canach leave.

Extra arcs could work if they had the Pact reinforced and secured early on (alongside Destiny’s Edge) which would remove a bit of the urgency. Oh, and having the Pact actually play a part in almost the entire storyline instead of mostly disappearing. :P

I do feel like some of the stuff they cut out they forgot to actually edit things that were left behind, leading us to get the irrational, utterly crazy and sudden “I HATE CAITHE WITH MY ENTIRE SOUL!” attitude and Braham calling her explicitly a traitor.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Kalavier.1097:

They apparently cut out an entire nightmare court arc, which probably would explain why everybody has this giant hate-kitten for Caithe and considers her the biggest traitor in the world.

I would’ve tweaked the Eir/Faolin scene, and heavily changed the Egg-subplot.

They also cut Malyck from the early drafts. They also originally had Eir die in the first story instance, but pushed it back to the end of Act 1 (and good thing too).

They apparently cut off a lot of plot – for the sake of going for a ‘blockbuster movie’ feel of a plot (which just does not work for games like GW – has never, will never). Which I really, really, think they shouldn’t have. Even if it meant waiting 5 more months.

I agree with their comments about pacing though.

The storyline they chose, with the fleet being destroyed makes any real ‘pause’ feel horribly out of place and jarring. The more they delayed from the “Get to Trahearne/destiny’s edge, and regroup the Pact to fight Mordremoth!”, the more plot holes and blargh they spawn.

Hell, the egg arc itself is shoved in to finish that stuff from living story off, and it feels out of place to me.

Jaken.6801:

I just leave this here, for that particular matter:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Dev-quotes-from-Reddit/page/5#post6099708

I like both answers given.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

The entire second half of HoT’s story instances was a wasted opportunity, as was Eir, Mr. Sparkles, Garm, and Faolain. And, naturally, Malyck.

Though I would have changed things with Eir and Faolain’s fate, if I had my hands on HoT’s story I would not be able to keep pretty much anything the same after visiting Tarir. It’s just missing too much.

They apparently cut out an entire nightmare court arc, which probably would explain why everybody has this giant hate-kitten for Caithe and considers her the biggest traitor in the world.

I would’ve tweaked the Eir/Faolin scene, and heavily changed the Egg-subplot.

Palador.2170:

You know, I’ve long suspected that there’s more to Garm than we’ve been told, and that he might actually be a norn that transformed for too long or too intensely and became stuck as a wolf. Given the vague way they’ve talked about Braham’s father and anything around him, I could even see said norn being Braham’s real father. And that way, Braham could lose a parent for the THIRD time in his life, and with even more unresolved issues than what Eir left him with!

Only, we know who Braham’s father is, and how he died… Kinda puts kitten in that theory. :P

Strange theories aside, though, I do hope Garm shows up and acts of his own free will instead of acting like a lost dog. It would be interesting if he just starts to follow the main character around as a new alpha, though I could also see him going with Logan, Braham, or Canach. (Canach would be confused as to why, though.)

It would interesting to have him rejoin the crew. I’m hoping they merge Destiny’s Edge and the biconics into a new team under the PC.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Kalavier.1097:

B: Likewise, where Zojja is Mr Sparkles isn’t always with her.

True, but he is found in Torn from the Sky near the airship crash (which you go to if you fortify defenses – he’ll show up regardless though).

Kalavier.1097:

Implying that he would refuse Braham is weird, because Braham is the child of Eir. If anything, I’d see Braham being the one Garm goes to first, if not another Destiny’s Edge member.

Garm saw Eir as his alpha, and without that he’d either find a new alpha or make his own pack, most likely.

If he sticks with Braham, I imagine it’d be more out of sense of duty to Eir (taking care of her child rather than following Braham).

point on Mr sparkles is more of “Using him as an example doesn’t mean the same is always true for Eir and Garm.”

The other point, is the fact people implied he’s just some animal, when we know he’s intelligent and actually have talked to him (in wolf form, for Norn characters in one arc). Acting as if he’d have to go through “doggie classes!” to see Braham as anything but another annoying Norn or such.

Garm is not just yet another random wolf plucked from the forest.

Zakhelm.4618:

character lineage: Ascalonian
race: Human
social standing: noble
class: guardian
Order chosen: Vigil

Not a bad setup, depending how you play it out.

So the questions that I wish to ask are thus:
How do you Roleplay your guardian/Dragon hunter?

My guardian is a vigil warmaster, norn elder (97 years old). She is protective and caring for her squad, allies, and civilians, and will stand in the line of fire to shield them from harm at risk of her own life.

What motivates them IE. what is there belief/faith that drives them?

Guardians are not like typical ‘paladins’ in requiring faith or belief. My Norn is a follower of Bear mainly, but motivation? Fighting the battle against the dragon minions and general evil in place of the many that cannot.

What are the Limits to their abilities?

Mine? She’s very experienced, so her abilities are pretty powerful. But, a thing to note is anybody can over-extend themselves at the cost of their own health.

Is normal to just specialize in one form of guardian type magic or does your character pull out all the stops to achieve their goal?

This falls into a pretty standard discussion regarding any class. A ‘guardian’ who focuses purely in healing magic will be far greater at in the a general ‘jack of all trades’ (My necromancers mother is basically a monk, but for the people who throw a complete fit over that term, she’s a guardian with absolutely zero offensive capabilities at all). For example, my Guardian is pretty good at both offensive and defensive abilities, but the healing area (and summoning the spirit weapons) are stuff she is not the best in.

A specialist can beat a jack of all trades in one area, but will be weaker at everything else. This can be played on for interesting results though, such as a ‘tank’ of a Guardian could absorb damage and shield friends for a long time, but require the help of their allies to actually push the enemy back.

What are there reactions to other classes such as necros, mesmers, revanants, etc?

This is purely and utterly a personal thing, as there is no lore-based hard feuds between any classes. Sure, in GW1 some mesmers found necromancers icky, but in a general sense just being a necro or mesmer isn’t going to cause a guardian to hate them. So you can have your character personally react in a certain way for backstory reasons, or simply play it as “They don’t care.”

My norn, since you are kinda asking about others take on it, doesn’t care a bit about what magic class or profession somebody is, but instead how they behave and act (Like the other person said).

Nero.8047:

I’m not really into roleplay so I can’t help you a lot but…
What motivates them?
One of the best thing to look at here is their virtues.
Virtue of Justice, a strong feeling and opinion on what is just drives a Guardian towards protection of their allies and the smiting of their opponents.
Virtue of Resolve, Guardians make a decision and stick to their beliefs. Their resolve makes them sturdy, trustworthy characters.
Virtue of Courage, Guardians are Courageous, they don’t hide behind their allies, they stand in front of them, facing dangers as an impenetrable wall to shield their allies.

An interesting take, one that you can twist for each race to generate a more unique stance on even. I like that.

What are the limits to their abilities?
Guardians are very powerful.
Take Logan for example, he’s able to shield his allies from enemy attacks for a long period of time although this takes a lot of effort/concentration.
Logan is however likely an exceptionally gifted Guardian.
I’d focus on not being too powerful. If your Guardian shields his/her allies make the shield have a duration that isn’t too long.

Guardians still have amazingly strong shields, walls, wards and heals. (100% health in a single cast that takes a while to cast!)

All spellcasters can be incredibly powerful, it’s just a matter of if they can support it. In Sea of Sorrow’s (I haven’t read it personally), I’ve been told about a scene where they are five or so Krytan guardians on a ship. As the Risen start using Orrian magic to assault the ship, the guardians, one at a time, generate a protective shield, expending their entire lifeforce to shield against that one, powerful strike.

As for the other, don’t always take game mechanics as 100% lore. But yes, I agree Logan is probably one of the more powerful defensive guardians alive right now.

Specializing in Guardian magic types normal?
I believe you should answer this question yourself, regarding the characteristics of your Guardian. Here I’d suggest your Guardian to focus on a certain type of magic.
Either defensive or offensive, perhaps even utility-magic in the shape of immobilizing or warding off enemies. This doesn’t mean your guardian is locked out of other types of magic, but you could say he/she is less confident in magic that isn’t their specialty

In my opinion it depends on every guardian if they choose to stick to a certain type of magic/combat or not.

Agree entirely. Another thing to add is in Age, training, and experience. Obviously, to the OP, your character is ‘noble-born’ and has access to better training and tutors, but if he’s like, 20 years old, he won’t be nearly as powerful as an older, more experienced guardian.

Reactions to other classes?
I believe the Guardian defines others rather for their character than for their profession. Necromancers aren’t inherently evil, nor are Berserker-warriors inherently brutes. It once again depends a lot on the specific characters and thus I can’t give you a straight answer.

Honestly, I think most of (rational)Tyria acts this way.

eduardo.1436:

A) as Eir’s pet he is considered a member of DE (also this an in game excuse…..ranger pet)

B) Mr. Sparkles was found in the jungle and he was not in Camp Resolve or the end of S2 cinematic, same applies to Garm

C) sure Braham mentions he doesnt know whether Garm was in the crash or not……but Mordremoth is able to create a blighted ILLUSION of the wolf, how? he must have seen him

but the point of all this is whether Garm is alive or not, is he going to appear in S3 or not?

A: There have been other points, IIRC, where Eir has been around but Garm has not. I’ll have to double check, but I believe in the situation where you clear out the icebrood fortress to secure Knut’s participation in the world summit, Garm is not present.

B: Likewise, where Zojja is Mr Sparkles isn’t always with her.

C: Mordremoth creates blighted illusions of the order mentors, who where never in the jungle in the first place. Your point there is kinda moot.

Gany.1793:

I find it hard to believe that Garm would not have accompanied Eir on the mission. Ranger’s and their pets are seperatable only, really, by death. Course, a big nasty evil Elder Dragon imprisioning the separately might also be able to do the trick

I think we may have to wait for LW S3, S4 or beyond to find out Garm’s story

Gany

Actually, there isn’t much lore on ranger-pet relationships. There is nothing stating they are always with each other. Hell, in GW1 most rangers didn’t even have animal companions. Aiden, of the iconic Ascalon adventuring group, had no pet.

Narcemus.1348:

What I mean by trained is that Garm would have to be trained to the point that he would trust and look up to Braham. I say this because in general, Braham is mostly a stranger to Garm. He wasn’t really around Eir and Garm very much before her death. And Garm followed Eir, based on he books, because he saw her as his alpha, and he would have to be made to view Braham in this way. This would take some time and effort.

You do know Garm is intelligent right? In a Norn story instance where you turn into a wolf, you actually converse with him.

“You are Eir’s new pack? Good. She has missed her old pack. She is sad too often. Now, we will hunt one more!”

Her old pack? You mean Destiny’s Edge?

“Yes. The charr and the human and the rest. I have missed them too, but most of all I have missed my alpha’s smile.”

Don’t worry Garm. Everything’s going to be better now. I promise.

(other dialogue option)Wait a second – Garm? You can talk?

“Only to other wolves, young one. Now watch your tail, and prepare to fight!”

All right, then! I’m all wolfed up and ready to go!

Implying that he would refuse Braham is weird, because Braham is the child of Eir. If anything, I’d see Braham being the one Garm goes to first, if not another Destiny’s Edge member.

Brokensunday.4098:

Garm is looking for magdaer, we are going to have a sword wielding dog. No for real he is somewere in the jungle prob gonna see him in s3

Why is he in the jungle? He was never, ever spotted among the Pact fleet around Camp Resolve or even in the cutscene of the fleet being destroyed.

All evidence points that Garm wasn’t even with the Fleet, and Braham states such after Eir’s death, that he doesn’t know where Garm is, or if he was with Eir at all.

Narcemus.1348:

I honestly almost wish that Braham had been a ranger instead of a guardian so he could find Garm and train him, but unless we start seeing people break profession lines in Guild Wars 2, that doesn’t seem likely.

Why would Garm need trained?

Also, He’s never seen in the Pact camp at Resolve, so he was likely never with the fleet in the first place.

As of right now, he’s alive unless Anet comes out and says something different.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

We also saw a rusty looking Scruffy from dat-diving by that_shaman. This is likely the “Scruffy 2.0” that Taimi mentions at the end of that mission.

Ooh, link? I’ve not looked at what Shaman has dug up lately. I don’t reddit much :P.

eNeRgOo.5463:

You’re thinking too much.
Asuras told that Sylvaris have sexual organs without reproducing functions. It’s easy because they don’t need that function, they have Pale Tree to do that.
They never told why they have them though. It was never revealed. My simply idea is – to feel pleasure. Nobody told they aren’t doing sexual intercourses. They feel love, love is both physical and psychical. Also sexualism and love aren’t just about reproducing. Proof? Check orientations.

Actually, anet explicitly came out and said that Sylvari do have sex, purely for pleasure or love but not having babies.

draxynnic.3719:

That’s been pretty much my thinking. First, the orders do have their own seperate identities still, they just happen to have formed an alliance. Second, with the Pact being an alliance of the three orders (and others), actually destroying the Pact would require destroying at least two of the orders or creating such a rift between them that they dissolve the alliance.

The events of HoT have probably drastically decreased the strength of the Pact, but as long as the orders still exist and still have a formal arrangement to work together on common goals, there will still be a Pact.

At the core, the Pact simply is the joint operation command for the three orders. Hell, such a rift would be very weird/hard to pull off considering how the whole PS was getting the orders to stop bickering (as quoted in my last post lol), and actually understand the strengths and weaknesses of the different groups, and their approaches.

So, the joint operation deployment area of the orders has a vastly weakened manpower, and the bulk of their airships are destroyed. As far as we know, most of the leadership elements of the Pact survived, but the PC commander and Laranthir were among the highest ranking operatives on the field and combat-able.

draxynnic.3719:

Necromancers, on the other hand, do. There are examples in both games of necromancers killing people in order to experiment with minion raising techniques. We don’t see any cases of this in-game, but there’s also the possibility from the viewpoint of a regular person that a necromancer might decide to harm or kill them just to build up life force (most if not all means of building up life force requires something to be harmed if not killed). Practitioners of other types of magic might still decide to commit murder with their magic for other reasons, but they just don’t have the potential to be directly rewarded for it by their magic like necromancy offers.

A: The necromancer who was actively killing to experiment with minion raising techniques was instantly branded an outcast by the rest of the necromancers, and they sent people after him will full intentions to KILL HIM because of it. Not because they were against what his experiments were after goal-wise, but because he was actively murdering civilians to do so.

B: Even ingame, lifeforce only affects the death shroud, which (to me) seems to be a rather… powerful magic that all necromancers may not do, or be able to do. Lifeforce has no real affect on any of their other abilities (in game mechanics, or even the lore I know, and my main in both games is a necromancer).

The likelyhood of the neighborhood necromancer to just stab somebody to ‘gain power for a spell’ is so incredibly low I can’t even see that being a thing besides the most nut-job people.

Now, something else we see is that a lot of necromancers follow a set of rules that keeps the distrust from growing too much. Guild Wars 1 shows that the necromancer community self-polices itself to an extent, and the interaction between Aria Venom and Draithor may be an extension of that. Minions being composed of animals (even though we know, from Ghosts of Ascalon, that they can make minions directly from sapient creatures) may also be the necromancer community’s way of saying “Look, we’re not going to kill you to raise a minion, we only use animals as raw materials!”

I’ll again point out, it’s seeming more and more that it’s less necromancy, more of minions. Even going off the GW1 split of necromancy trees, assuming that applies to them as a whole, we could be talking about like… 25% of necromancers in general actively using minions all the time. Frankly, I don’t see minions as being the primary focus of necromancers, merely one branch of it that most don’t use. Certainly it’s not used by ‘civilian’ necromancers, which the bulk of people would interact with.

In Marjory’s specific case, I think that’s because she largely presents herself as a detective rather than a necromancer. Necromancy is a tool in her investigations and a weapon when she needs one, but it’s not her primary identity. That said, I also think the prejudice is a relatively mild one as long as the necromancer isn’t flaunting the stereotypes. Somebody who appears normal and mentions they’re a necromancer… whatever the other person’s initial impression of them happened to be will probably override any necromancer prejudice they have unless it’s particularly strong. Somebody walking around wearing black robes decorated with lots of bones, on the other hand…

The last example could easily just be a priest of Grenth, which are respected just as much as any other priest (Dwayna, Balth, etc)Priests of grenth, in GW2, actually do have bones as part of their robes. But, I agree with the bulk of this point.

In general, a person won’t care. If the necromancer flaunts it in a gruesome manner or other general creepiness, they might get more “ew”.

Hell, we know of at least two women in DR who find being a bard far more awkward and weird then being a necromancer and actively using minions. :P

Eh, it’s been forever since I delved into the lore around the White Mantle.

I would still maintain that Saul could have brought it back with the Mursaat having given it to him, as opposed to him ‘finding’ it. And the White mantle were enshrouded in propaganda and lies throughout Prophecies, and some of their interactions with the PC were to paint a better picture then what they were really doing.

Course, Franklin states that Saul traveled South… to an Island north of Kryta. I’ll give that a typo pass though.

It’s been forever since I read the thing about Ronan and the seed, but I just recalled that the cave was guarded by creatures (IIRC, plant like), and he didn’t simply waltz in and out easily. He did however, come out of the situation with one seed from the cave, which was filled with many seeds.

Randulf.7614:

The Pact has been weakened by the events in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns, but it still exists

Personally I was sad to see this. The Pact feels harmful to the story, making the orders lose much of their flavour and uniqueness. A united front I can understand, but the Orders working separately would be so much more fun and really give depth and variety to story arcs. Something so desperately needed right now after the scale of problems in the current story

You do know that the Pact doesn’t erase the orders?

It’s merely a joint leadership and deployment force. Note even in HoT, each order was doing their own things, in their own manner. Priory were actively researching the Exalted ruins, OoW were scouting the depths and setting up stuff for a push. Vigil was securing Verdant Brink and setting up bases.

I’ve never seen the Pact make the orders lose their ‘flavor’, as the Pact is simply the three orders combining their abilities, resources, and manpower into a united force. It’s leagues over what it was, where the orders would bicker over tiny stuff instead of working together, which was far more harmful both in a lore sense, and a storytelling sense.

“So this order is more military, armies based, and that one is researched based, yet both are dedicated to stopping the elder dragons.”

“Yes”

“Then why the hell are they fighting each other (Verbally, at most) instead of actively working together?”

“Erm…”

draxynnic.3719:

Given what we’ve seen, I think it is very much to do with the cemetery. The Pale Tree is almost certainly a Blighting Tree that had her independence from Mordremoth – I think it’s reasonable to presume that her method of gaining templates is the same. She needs a corpse to use as the starting point.

As people have said, though, humans have been spread throughout the jungle. It’s entirely possible that Malyck’s tree also had humans to copy off. It might not exclusively use humans and dogs as templates like the Pale Tree does, however…

It does raise a question, like where the other seeds in the cave planted by semi-dormant Mordrem after Ronan had fought his way through and claimed it?

Did Ventari’s influence and magic cause the Pale tree to be free, or was it that she was ‘planted early’ perhaps?

One thing I maintain is I doubt the Mursaat are all dead. I figure the ones behind the white mantle are all gone, but we know Saul stumbled into a golden city of the Mursaat, and they had cities/places on the Isle of Janthir.

I suspect there are more Mursaat out there, just more isolationist and hidden and Lazarus is the last active one in the wide world.

As for the Eye, it most definately was sent by the Mursaat, as we all know Saul disappeared shortly before the White mantle completely took over Kryta. Maybe it’ll show up in the raid, given how this seems to be where the White Mantle retreated to and built a base after being defeated.

Donari.5237:

It’s been years since I read Ghosts of Ascalon but as I recall the act that triggered the disgust was when Killeen animated a recent corpse of one of their companions to walk across a trapped area to set off the traps.

It’s been forever since I read the book as well, but every time it’s been brought up the fact she is a necromancer or makes minions does not trigger disgust or distrust in any way.

It’s when she literally turns a recently fallen Ebon Vanguard soldier that both humans in the group knew personally into a minion, that they express feelings. And even then it always is said it’s more of a “Could you please not do that anymore?” and not a “UGH. MINIONS.”

Hell, I remember her openly asking Dougal if she could turn him into a minion if he died/study his corpse got more of an “Eh… what?” :P

[quote=6058409;Donari.5237:][quote]

Sigh, this is completely off topic and there is a reason I did not reply to it. It’s not relevant to the OP.

Yannir.4132:

Kalavier.1097:

Or as I’ve stated elsewhere in other discussions (Was me or somebody else who said it, forget which If it wasn’t me, sorry). Why do necromancers apparently get this big distrust and fear, yet elementalists get nothing? “MY GODS, THAT MAN RAISED A BONE MINION!” makes sense, but “MY GODS, THAT MAN JUST LAUNCHED A FIREBALL THE SIZE OF A PERSON!” doesn’t to some apparently. Really, the Eles I’d imagine would be the most distrusted magic user simply because they are the most directly destructive path of magic.

Any rational person can make the deduction that Necromancers and Elementalists are equally destructive. The reason why necros are distrusted more than eles is not because of this direct correlation. Just a few examples follow:

A. Necromancy is pretty disgusting. The average person wouldn’t wanna go anywhere near rotting corpses ridden with carrion feeding insects and the like, rotten and foul smelling flesh, or deal with the diseases that may follow. Just reflect your own feelings on modern day morticians. I mean, while it’s respectable work and somebody needs to do it, you wouldn’t want to do it yourself.

Last I checked actually, none of the minions appear to be rotting. :P However, we must understand that we see the minions on the battlefield, not casually.

B. Why is a bone minion worse than a fireball in your face? Well, the result is pretty much the same, so it’s not that. You either survive or you don’t. Doesn’t make a difference.

Ok so, while the fireball materializes seemingly out of thin air, the bone minion you are now facing may have previously been your comrade and friend. Now this runt of a necromancer has gone and desecrated the body of your friend. All that’s left is a misshapen and corrupted piece of flesh and bone, where previously was a living and breathing person.

Only it’s actually pretty uncool by necromancers to casually use friends or comrades for minions. Every minion type is based off an animal. Again, how often do we see necromancers casually forming minions from fellow humans (going from purely a human perspective)? Not often. Bar cases of actually evil ones.

Taking that into account, that piece of flesh that was previously your comrade, would make you feel like life itself has betrayed you. It’s outraging, unfair and it soils the memory you have of that person. It’s no wonder people wouldn’t like necromancers.

Sure, this works for military people dealing with an evil one. However, how does this affect the general population? Not at all is the answer!

C. What happens after you die? The necromancer raises your corpse as well to add to his ever growing army of minions, desecrating your body and stealing your soul. He leaves to prowl on his next adversary.
What does the ele do? He may rob your corpse, but he may also be nice enough to return your corpse(charred to a crisp as it is…) to your family, and they can make their peace with your death.

However, this is also not true. Your average necromancer does not have an army of undead. A lot don’t even use minions. Most don’t steal or bind souls either. Yes, necromancers do stuff with them, but 95% of them don’t bind souls. See GW1, the necromancer order. Hell, in general. Necromancers (humans) patron god is GRENTH. You really think they are going to bind souls when Grenth is the god of the afterlife and justice? No, hell, some good guy necromancers were all about sending the souls TO GRENTH.

D. People in this world believe in an afterlife and it’s very real. Getting your soul ripped out by a necromancer may rob you of that deserved resting place in the Mists/Hall of Heroes/Underworld. It’s exactly why ghosts are almost always angry, and rarely peaceful.

Yes, because human necromancers, devoted to Grenth, are totally going to bind souls 100% of the time instead of sending them to Grenth to judge. I covered this before, but this makes NO SENSE AT ALL. Nor is it even implied to be a thing for the majority of necromancers. Grenth literally spawned necromancy’s origins. The very god in charge of the underworld, aka the human afterlife.
________________________________________

Most people think with their hearts, not with their heads. They are guided by feelings rather than thoughts. So the general opinion would sway towards hating and distrusting necromancers in general. It’s not to say everybody does it, or all necromancers are like that.

Sorry for the rant, but I honestly don’t understand how you can’t see this.

I honestly can’t understand how you believe that stuff is applicable to the general population, who have shown that talking casually, publically about being a necromancer is not a distrusted or hated thing. The one civilain who talks about Grenth being creepy gets told “Maybe you should rethink your profession.” Not hated or scorned. YES, necromancers can be viewed as creepy, and the worst are really bad. But the MAJORITY are not anywhere close to that level. The Majority don’t spawn armies of minions from their dead neighbor and his three dogs and a pony.

Marjory is a necromancer, and she receives ZERO HATRED about it. ZERO distrust. She’s hired as a detective enough to be profitable before she joins the player character.

Yes, there is some distrust. But GW2 necromancers are not even a shred alike socially to the WoW warlocks or other universe necromancers. Olias, IIRC, was all about sending souls to grenth to be judged, not binding them to minions.

I didn’t reply in the first place because this is not the place for necromancer discussion, this topic is about thieves as a professsion.

Nero.8047:

An Asura Warrior could be an Asura who values tradition a lot.
Remember, 250 years ago a LOT of Asurans you’d see were simple warriors using axes made out of stone (or perhaps obsidian, my memory is slightly hazy on this.)

As stated in another topic or another forum (I forget which), friendly AI is not a good showing of what the races can do. Otherwise we assume the Seraph are all warriors that use sword-shield or bow. Likewise other factions had very limited professions shown, I think all Lionguard period were warriors in GW1. Ascalon had rangers and warriors, but little else. Going off gameplay alone.

Why would they value tradition and use an axe when even back then they were a heavily magic society? Asura warriors in general don’t operate like other races. Even if it’s a simple “They hit smarter”. They are smaller then most races and not as strong.

A Charr Mesmer could work.
Although the Charr in general frown upon the use of magic due to the Shaman Caste it does not stop all Charr from practicing magic entirely.

If so all Charr would be either Warriors, Engineers, Thieves or Rangers.
Remember that individual personalities are more dominant than the shared traits of a race.

Charr see magic as a tool, not a win all. They don’t worship it or see somebody with magic as better then everybody else (As the Shamans did).

I do however agree with you, I’d love to have official lore on the professions from the unique races’ points of view.
I’d love to have more than “It is possible.”

The problem is each class can be in a range of subclasses or viewpoints.

An Asura ranger could be an oddball who loves animals (One is found in Metrica, an Asura who refuses to do any experiments on rabbits and thus is hidden in a cave with a whole bunch), a person studying animal behaviors, a zoologist studying animals in general, or even one seeking to make animal-like golems.

A thief can be anything from a con-man to a pickpocket to an assassin to a sneaky scout for the military to a spy.

It’s hard to say a unique racial viewpoint on some classes without just going into a very vague, generalized statement that doesn’t truly help :P.

TPMN.1483:

This would be the best – to play EU + US Servers together.
The sync issues is mostly for loots – let them back-sync.

IF there was a map where it was ‘international’ for open world – the latency of update for the individual player would go to either server. TBH there is not that much latency from US <-> EU to make it happen (you are looking at 120ms max) for syncronous replication.

WvW – can stay EU/US Split – makes sense.
PVP – can stay EU/US Split makes sense unless you choose ‘international’ for a map instance – get placed randomly on EU or US Servers so your latency would be higher but thats a price worth paying.

The question is what needs to be sycronised – its only loot – this is not that much information – that can still be sent to US or EU Servers and kept seperate.

So, like a new realm server that’s linked to both? I wouldn’t mind that depends how it works with megaserver.

Well, we are basically in agreement then. I do believe there is some ties of sorts, the playstyles are very similar between the two and there are some shared skills/skill names.

But there are differences as well.

I just cringe at the name really. I’m sure there are some tutors/mentors for it, or even small schools (especially for Ash legion Charr!), but the rest of the professions are pretty decently named, then you have “thieves”. Caithe is a thief by profession, but she doesn’t actually steal stuff like actual thieves. I would almost prefer it if they called the class “Rogue” or something. Much more diverse set of skills or roles that can be applied to it, and a more common name that won’t instantly get everybody riled about law-breaking!

Garambola.2461:

It is very unlikely to ever happen. This was asked for several times in the past, but the reply was pretty much that the account/character info is stored in two different locations and for that reason it is not possible.

This is why I have more than one account. (Well, and the have more characters.)

It seems so odd that basically ever function is shared across the board, yet that is not.

I’d rather not make a second account, but apparently I’ll have to at some point.

Came up recently in a conversation, and I further thought on it.

Ingame, I can already invite somebody to a party, mail them items or gold, whisper and chat with them, yet I cannot actually play with them. I think it would be great if that could be possible, at least in PVE.

I never meant to imply that all thieves go to some school to be trained in the methods.

What I meant was compared to the Canthan Assassin’s, the thieves in GW2 are unstructured and more diverse. Aka, we see no thieves guilds or groups and in general they do what they want.

The GW1 assassin’s typically belonged to an order or got training in Shing Jea/an academy. Thieves simply don’t have that.

Because they do, and Anet said so.

Deleena.3406:

Necros didnt seem common/wanted at all in fact alot of the trainers was kinda to themselves/away from the pubic
and Necromancers (PCs dont count!) was almost never among the random ascalon army NPCs

also i think it mostly mechanical for non-sentient creature. (im sure thos Grubs in NF wasnt really Monks/Paragons xD)

A: Necromancers are publically accepted parts of society, military and otherwise. Note that two of the trainers in pre-searing were also generally creepy people and both went crazy post searing and you got sent after them at some point in prophecies to kill them. The female trainer however, was close to the Abby IIRC, and stayed completely sane and normal.

B: I mean more of the fact some of the faction PVE skills are rather… weird. Like “Hey, I summon an ebon vanguard assassin out of nowhere! WHEEEEEE”. That’s obviously gameplay mechanic.

draxynnic.3719:

The random Ascalon Army NPCs were pretty much all warriors or rangers (elementalists only showed up when it was important to the story). We know Ascalon had more than that.

Lionguard were all warriors in GW1, if I remember right.

ArenaNet tends to be lazy when it comes to factions you rarely or never fight, only providing friendly factions with a couple of mob types that are intended to be broadly representative, but not showing everything the faction actually has. This is why, for instance, the Seraph appear to be all warriors in-game, while from Sea of Sorrows we know that according to the lore they have plenty of magical support. It’s also why in Guild Wars 1 unnamed Ascalonian allies were all warriors or rangers, while Foefire ghosts have the full range of professions.

It’s not Anet, it’s in general MMO. For example, typically allied npcs are weaker, or less diverse across the board. STO I remember was rather different in the fact with the KDF and fed side, the “allied” npcs of either side were actually enemies, so they tended to be more useful.

For an enemy faction, on the other hand, it actually becomes important that the full range is implemented so the players have to respond to it. For the enemies, it’s actually mechanically important to show the full range, while for allies, generally all the player really cares about is that there are extra friendly bodies that can take or dish out damage. You can pretty much predict if a group that you’re initially allied with will stab you in the back at some point by how much variety they have in mob types.

IIRC, linking to above statement of mine, the Kurzicks and Luxons had the most fleshed out forces, due to being both friendly and hostile..

Regarding necros specifically – there’s a lot of lore indicating that a lot of humans fear and distrust them, however every army that’s fully fleshed out has them. I tend to think of this as being similar to the charr attitude towards magic in general – it isn’t particularly liked by the general population, but military leaders are pragmatic enough to recognise that they’re better off with it than without it.

Distrust on some level perhaps, but at least by GW2 it’s quite obviously not something as kittenome people love to show it as. In casual, open air conversation people admit or talk about being necromancers. They don’t get shunned or frighten people because of it. In GW1 there was elements of it, but at the same time it wasn’t that bad.

Maybe I look at comments like that too in depth, but I’ve seen enough people foolishly and stupidly paint “necromancers and grenth are EVILLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL!” pictures.

Hell, going back to GW1, sure we can say the necro trainers are hidden away, but the player character isn’t. If we approach it as if the player character could be any profession, then mass distrust or fear of any specific class doesn’t make sense.

Or as I’ve stated elsewhere in other discussions (Was me or somebody else who said it, forget which If it wasn’t me, sorry). Why do necromancers apparently get this big distrust and fear, yet elementalists get nothing? “MY GODS, THAT MAN RAISED A BONE MINION!” makes sense, but “MY GODS, THAT MAN JUST LAUNCHED A FIREBALL THE SIZE OF A PERSON!” doesn’t to some apparently. Really, the Eles I’d imagine would be the most distrusted magic user simply because they are the most directly destructive path of magic.

That’s a derail though, Honestly, to the whole “Thief lore/assassin lore” bits, I’d imagine it in tiers.

Assassin’s are obviously the top tier, very carefully guarding their secrets and thus it’s really only taught in Cantha at all. Also could be an “order” thing. Canthan Assassin orders rarely took in outsiders maybe, so outsiders rarely learned it.

Thieves likely are middle tier or were lower tier. Similar styles and training, but it’s not as structured. In the period between GW1 and GW2, the “thief” style has evolved and become a bit more then it used to be.

Deleena.3406:

Anton and Vael makes me think Ascalon had a Assassin/thief/Shadowy like professions all along (prolly as common as necros xD “the average ascalonian prolly never saw them”)
as already mentioned the Ascalon army did have Engineers npc after all.

Also (this is never derectly said ingame “i think”) But i always got the impression cantha assassin guilds didnt want their secrets getting outside their groups

Untrue on both parts?

Necromancers were common, and Assassin’s were explicitly a Canthan based group. The fact they may have had training in it doesn’t mean Ascalon had it’s own assassins.

Yes, some of the teachings may have spread, but it most definitely wasn’t widely common. There were, IIRC, very few actual Ebon Vanguard assassins. I don’t know how much of the faction skills we should take as lore as opposed to gameplay.

Ascalon Academy isn’t even close to to that area.

The gears are probably replaced parts from the Black Citadel though.

draxynnic.3719:

Completely new professions like the engineers and guardians did have origin stories. Engineers were basically an evolution from siege engineers to the combat engineers we have as a profession now. For guardians, they actually gave a fairly detailed explanation of Paragons coming to Tyria as Sunspear refugees pairing up with Monks that were fed up with being everyone’s primary targets on the battlefield and wanting more armour and martial capabilities in general… unfortunately, that was in an interview on a general reviews site, and it got taken down years ago before anyone thought to save a copy.

Sea of Sorrows, from what I’ve heard/read, describes guardians as a mix of Monk, Ritualist, and Paragon training and magics.

Thieves are in a kind of middle ground, in that there are clear links with the assassin and, to a lesser extent, mesmer, but they’re still technically a new profession. It’s possibly most accurate to regard the GW1 assassins as a subset – possibly an elite specialisation? – of the thief profession.

There’s a Wartower interview that goes into some of the lore of the professions, including a bit of discussion on the thief – it’s on this page, although you’ll need to scroll down a bit.

I can see thieves simply being a less focused, less organized version of the Assassin’s. Factions had most Assassin named characters belonging to some sort of order/group.

TBH, I see it as being a less organized/structured form of the Assassin.

There isn’t much lore given, but I think it’s something that varies greatly, and might not be called a thief in normal talking.

Um, thieves can cover a wide range of “types” of characters. They aren’t perhaps criminals or actual thieves, it’s just the name of the class.

Also, why did you delete all your characters? birthday gifts!

Well, there are magical ways to keep you alive forever/a very long time. Anet explicitly stated such.

Honestly, I’d have to state, why that backstory? Some characters make sense to have long lives, but this combo makes me wonder. Elite guard of Adelbern, launched into the mists and emerging 250+ years later? I’d imagine such a character would be hard to play in the first place, as they’d likely share bits of personality with Adelbern. A person with strong feelings against Kryta emerging and seeing Ascalon gone and Kryta as the only true human nation around in the local area? Big, big leap.

As others said, it probably more likely to encounter some sort of random portal that opened back then, and emerged in modern GW2 times and spat him out before closing. But, he wouldn’t be a guardian or Revenant. Neither existed back then. One could pull a “Monk, but quickly learned some of the offensive guardian tricks and trained physically to start using the armor and weapons.” maybe.

Konig Des Todes.2086:

The first two story missions deal us with surviving a night, and end with us being told to look for NPCs (and I don’t mean the next story step folks – I mean the Pale Reaver scout, the Pact Camp, and the hylek scouts).

Between the first and second, you are directed straight to the Pact camp, and you cannot interact with them if it is night time.

Torn from the sky is the first night. Then we are told to talk to the scout (right up the hill), who directs us to the Pact camp.

Act 1 is far from rushed, and in all honesty gives the sensation of at least a week taking place between the prologue and entering Auric Basin – with the instances themselves taking a day (and in two cases, night) each. The other Acts feel far more fast paced in comparison, however…

The entire story is rushed. It’s the nature of the story they made.

Keep in mind all the story pauses caused not just by talking to NPCs in the open world, which happens between each story instance, in which you have to go do stuff if you reach the NPCs at certain times half the time, but also keep in mind the mastery gates established – it’s easy to forget those because you only do them once.

But some of the mastery gates make zero sense. For example, I hit the “Exalted markings master” AFTER getting the egg. Would that imply the commander ran around the jungle with the egg on their back, instead of rushing for the city?

After the first instance, you have to learn how to glide. After the second, you’re told to learn mushrooms (mind you, this isn’t enforced but the dialogue matches the first to the point where it was clearly originally intended to be enforced but got scrapped after the voice overs were done), and after the first instance of Act II you got another, and another after the second instance of Act II, and another after the first instance of Act III, and, originally, yet another after the second instance of Act III.

While some make sense, others don’t. IE, I had to learn exalted markings to get the Tahir mission, which only appeared after I got the egg. Originally they were going to make you max out every jungle mastery IIRC.

Prologue -> Torn from the Sky -> Pale Reaver camp chain -> Pact Encampment chain -> The Jungle Provides -> Jaka Itzel chain -> Noble chain -> Prisoners of the Dragon -> Pact Ordnance chain (Prisoners contains saving the characters of the Pact Ordnance group from near death on re-runs) -> Prized Possessions (this instance shows the egg activating the outposts at the end, thus before the open world) -> Auric Basin outpost chains -> City of Hope -> Strange Observations -> Roots of Terror -> Jaka Nuhoch chain -> Buried Insights -> Bitter Harvest/Dragon’s Stand lanes -> Hearts and Minds/Mouth of Mordremoth

Problem. I’ve heard (not personally done all of the noble event chain, but I’ve heard this) that at one point Faren comments about the jungle, and somebody else points out they have been in the jungle for HOURS, not days or even a week. Prized possessions ends with you having the egg, and the exalted tells you to go straight to the city. Why would the commander run around the jungle with such a valuable, mordrem attracting item? The little post mission complete blurb even says the commander has decided to check it out, not delaying.

There’s not much indication that the Pact Commander had a role in Ogre, Rata Novus, or Scar lanes – or the Gerent fight – in Tangled Depths, but there’s lines and breaks for masteries indicating that the Pact Commander dealt with the main chains of Verdant Brink one by one as well as the Tarir stuff (as part of learning to trust the Exalted). And these are established by ArenaNet making us pause from rushing through the story to grind the masteries. A poor tactic, and one that’s negated upon subsequent playthroughs, but a clear one all the same.

I can agree the commander did some stuff in brink, but the rest of the story? Not nearly as much.

The fault is indeed with Anet’s storytelling methods, as they have already established times when open world events were part of the story, and could have had us do certain (or x number of) events in the maps like they had us do events in Iron Marches in S2.

> Likewise, the story missions (again, as I recall) very rarely mention the open world events in any real manner.

Maybe if they had actually tied it in, not so much as “Do so many events”, but instead had a step being securing the Pact camp. Admittedly this could be very troublesome with a map possibly being halfway done, and thus you don’t get any credit.

Torn from the Sky explicitly sets up the Pale Reaver chain, and Jungle Provides explicitly talks about the Jaka Itzel meta chain and night time threats they face; Prisoners of the Dragon has – upon reruns – as you mentioned the Pact Ordnance group.

Doesn’t jungle provides explicitly be our first meeting with the Itzel? <_<. Agree that pale reaver chain is heavily set up and happens immediately after Torn from the Sky. Jaka Itzel is really odd, because the mission is the first meeting and has no mention of starvation (which kinda would imply the event chain was completed), but at the same time nothing in the mission happens that would cause such devastating food loss, or nothing is mentioned.

In Act 2, Prized Possession opens us to the story of the open world Auric Basin, signifying that it takes place before those events; City of Hope begins with the PC talking about beginning to trust the Exalted, and believing Tarir to be safe, but not yet entering – showing that the PC worked with them a bit longer than just running from Faolain – this is a nod to the whole “getting Exalted Language” mastery done, by doing the events in Auric Basin (specifically reactivating the pylons). The lack of entering Tarir indicates that to the PC the Attack on Tarir meta did not happen.

Problem with this logic is it means the commander spent time wandering around Auric basin with the giant, very important, but huge magnet of Glint’s Egg on their back, instead of going straight for the city. The last bit of the journal text implies they decide to go check out the city.

In Act 3, Roots of Terror has us establishing the Order of Whispers’ camp free from hostile Chak, and the open world step after has us dealing with the Nuhoch.

We do secure that one camp, but sadly after a little bit with the Nuhoch, rest of tangeled depths takes place after the commander leaves.

In the open instance after Bitter Harvest, the pilot explicitly mentions progress in the lanes – that’s the DS meta – and Hearts and Minds talks about Mordremoth in a bit fight.

They are small, easily overlooked, ultimately treated as insignificant, but there all the same.

IMO, The lanes takes part at same time as bitter Harvest, and the final battle with Mouth of Mordremoth takes place at the same time as we head down into the lair after Trahearne.

Though, to simply shorten things… Anet does a poorish job of linking open world to the story instances, and IMO does a blah job at showing timeframe overall. I’ve seen people argue that there is the huge gap from end of living story season 2, to HoT release in lore, because of the one comment Anet did about trying to link living story releases to RL dates in timeframe.

I personally wish (and I know, anet won’t do it because of reasons like wanting players to have their own timeframes or whatever), Anet would come out with a clear cut timeline. Even something as simple as “This mission takes place this week, that mission takes place next week.” Or months.

The thing is, the Verdant Brink story missions (as I remember them) were all very rapid. There wasn’t actually possible blank periods of time between missions besides the very first one, which pretty much was “Go to the central pact camp, and talk to the scouts there.” Which lead us to going to the Itzel, which then was a back and forth of us either catching up to Braham/Rytlock or running ahead to try to find out where Mordrem prisoners were. After the prisoners mission (which also involves rescuing the members of the Ordanance corp), we instantly go to Auric basin… so how do we help setup that camp if after saving the core people, we head south? :P

Some of the open world events match up with the story missions or gaps in them, but others do not. Orr suffered a similar way, but the fact of major troop movements/battles were more obvious in that one.

It’s part of a fault with Anet’s storytelling method. There is no real timeframe you can tell between missions most of the time, And sometimes the open world and instanced story simply don’t click together seamlessly.

Likewise, the story missions (again, as I recall) very rarely mention the open world events in any real manner. We go through Rata Novus, but there is not a single mention about the OoW teams working to help the various groups (and securing Rata Novus), or the lanes/cannons at the end. Infact, all that seems to happen AFTER we finish Tangled Depths section of the story and move on.