Guild Wars 2

Angel McCoy.1832:

The steam creatures are a primo example of that. They were in the game when we launched, which was 1325 A.E. There’s no actual lore that says when they first appeared (but it was definitely prior to that). In the Asura personal story, we see them coming through a portal from a POSSIBLE future. Nothing we’ve done with Scarlet contradicts any of that.

But as the Steam creatures already existed in our Tyria at the point of the possible future being seen (1325 AE), that would mean it wasn’t a possible future but a possible future of an alternate dimension in which Ceara did not create steam creatures. That, or the Grand High Sovereign aka future self #24601, was a bloody liar in calling them his inventions that haven’t even been invented yet.

Sounds like a discrepancy.

I remain unconvinced, but a bit more hopeful, about the holdings on lore. Whether or not I’ll continue to post on the forum… I haven’t decided.

Angel McCoy.1832:

Furthermore, there was no reference to the 7-8 year space between the firstborn and the secondborn in our story wiki. Its origin is the one interview that was posted a year before we launched the game. We check the external wiki regularly, but we know better than to assume it’s always correct, and there was no link or citation to the original article on that wiki, so I defaulted to the information that’s in our internal story wiki. Koenig, you posted that line to the wiki back in 2011, and thank you for that, but I had no way of confirming that it was actual canon. In my records, it wasn’t.

I can honestly live with this explanation. I wish it was used right off the bat. I wish I knew if this was the truth, but now I am honestly thinking it – like all your forum post explanations (which are even more important than put-on-the-spot interviews) that explain plotholes in Season 1 – are mere cover-ups for your own retcon in hopes of winning those disheartened back. A mere excuse, because even though it’s perfectly reasonable, it also feels perfectly scapegoatish.

In the future, if you find something on the wiki that you’re not sure was actually said elsewhere and just didn’t get referenced, why not make a non-red account and ask the playerbase? Or better yet, just shoot me a PM. I could have told you instantly that it was from multiple (it was at least 2, btw, not just 1) interviews/posts by Ree and even provide links. And I can keep secrets well enough to not say anything (hell, I’ve had NDAs, I wouldn’t mind signing another to be some sort of volunteer external lorefactchecker).

Angel McCoy.1832:

One or two discrepancies in the lore does not mean we do not take it very seriously.

Yes… “one or two” >.>

Excluding the two (calendar and Secondborn birthdate) brought up, as well as the whole confusion on Scarlet Briar’s timeline (which has 4 points of discrepancies in of itself!):

• How could Orr, a magically advanced civilization, fall in less than 12 hours to the rather magically (and technologically) primitive charr?
• What’s up with Dagnar suddenly having a powerful sword (Sanguinary Blade)?
• Why is Orr’s navy still docked in Arah despite being at war and having had days of forewarning that the charr were coming?
• How could “all knowledge of Abaddon” be erased, but a temple of him obviously left in the open just a couple miles (tops) from the Orrian shore?
• Steam creatures’ origins (explanation below)
• His dialogue with Watchman Erik and Laurie is a copy of his dialog at the end of the Guild Wars Prophecies mission The Great Northern Wall with the player character. – what happened to the existence of the GW1 PC?

And that’s just what I can remember off-hand.

Angel McCoy.1832:

Bobby did not mean the books were not canon. He meant interviews. When someone is doing an interview, it can be a stressful thing. It’s easy to misspeak or create lore that doesn’t get into the actual canon because it changes during development (if the interview occurs prior to the finalization of the canon) or it could simply go undocumented in the official story wiki here at ArenaNet. We make every effort to say only truth in our interviews, but the reality is that interviews are simply not as reliable as what you see in the game.

It was less the novels (and short stories) that I was worried about, and more like all the forum posts done out of your own time, and the documents put in various magazines, guides, or other things – from the GW1 manuals, to the Art of Guild Wars (the sole source of certain GW1 facts – did you know that the undead hounds from GW1 were not actual undead, but constructs like bone minions?), An Empire Divided, most importantly of these the blog posts, and other such things. Things that are pre-thought and not put-on-the-spot information. Because saying “if it isn’t in the game, it is malleable” even if you take it to extend to the novels and both games, takes out a lot of lore – especially the background lore.

I’ve been waiting for a new red post here, to be the final determiner whether or not I stay or leave.

Angel McCoy.1832:

Lore is not malleable except under extreme circumstances. We are actually quite dedicated to the lore of GW1 and 2. However, situations do arise where we inadvertently or purposefully adjust lore.

And how hard was it to say this instead?

Bobby could have simply said “we felt it was necessary to change this because it makes more sense in the long scale of things.” Or given your latter comment about it not being in the internal wiki, say something akin to what you said there: “the external wiki wasn’t referenced and that line wasn’t in our internal wiki, so we presumed that GW2W was incorrect and made a new date that made sense given our current view of the story.”

Well, I suppose there is a reason Bobby isn’t PR. I know I wouldn’t make a good PR.

Angel McCoy.1832:

In the case of the “days per year,” that was a response to our new Living World cadence and the upcoming journal (which I couldn’t mention at the time). We felt it was important to align the real year with the in-game year. If we adamantly stuck to the old in-game calendar, then we’d be cumulatively off by 5 days every year. Before long, we’d be doing Wintersday in January. Which makes no sense whatsoever (and would completely kitten our development schedule! Hehe.). Plus, we wanted the new year to turn over on the same day as the real new year. I gave a loreful explanation for the change at the time.

Now this I completely cannot agree with in any way, shape, or form. And there’s really two points – which I’ve been making since the get go.

1. Why do Tyria and Earth need to align day-to-day exactly? GW1 had less than a month pass in 6 Earth months (between Prophecies and Factions), and even 3 years pass in 8 months (Factions to Nightfall) or 10 months (Nightfall to Eye of the North) and even 1 year pass in 3 years (Eye of the North to Beyond). Calendar syncing is just outright unnecessary. You don’t give dates in the journal either – you just give the year. So you can say that we’re going through 1 Tyrian year when we go through 1 Earth year without saying ‘they sync up exactly the same’. Especially since the latter – what you did – opens up a different can-o-wurms.
2. That can-o-wurms being that, if you actually looked at your calendar’s lore before changing it, you’d have noticed that the year starts at the Spring Equinox. For us, that’s March 20th (on average), not January 1st. Furthermore, Wintersday is the Tyrian New Years, so having Wintersday in December while the calendars ‘sync up’ now makes no sense. We now have cases where players sync up the calendars using January 1st as Season of the Zephyr 01 – which as you might guess, would put the holiday of the Autumn Lunatic (Mad King’s Day aka Halloween) in Winter…. yeah.

And furthermore, if the calendars are truly synced up, this gives the sense that kitten hits the fan in Tyria every 14 days. Which makes you think why the good guys don’t go on high alert every 14 days, and makes you think why the bad guys don’t decide to attack on the 15th day just to throw everyone off.

Honestly, your explanation here is lacking. You give years, not days, so there was no need to argue that the calendars sync up perfectly, when even if you just add 5 days… they don’t. We’re experiencing winter months after they should be.

In all honesty, there is no need to sync the calendars, at all. It is entirely superfluous to claim such, since you don’t go dating the journal as “32 Season of the Zephyr 1327 AE”. Heck, not even just “Season of the Zephyr 1327 AE.” You can quite literally say that Escape from Lion’s Arch and Battle for Lion’s Arch happen over the coarse of two days and get away with it perfectly, because in all honesty… the NPCs made it sound like it was just two days in the first place! You can say two adjacent updates happen three months apart from each other and we wouldn’t find it odd in the least (well, depending on the story dialogue).

Leviathans have been confirmed by ArenaNet (albeit out of game) to hold no direct ties to the Elder Dragons.

In Eye of the North, we see what appears to be the Prophecies’ undead underground and in far fewer numbers. They were likely scattered and eliminated slowly over time.

Jamais vu.5284:

Konig, as the king of GW lore, your honest assessment: do you, personally, even perceive GW2 as having a real connection to GW1 anymore lorewise? (Question also goes to all the other loremasters in this thread)
I think it doesn’t. They changed practically everything between the last “independent” GW1 installation, Nightfall, and GW2. Even between EotN and GW2.
E.g. the role and cultural diversity of humans, the downgraded gods, the extremely innovative races and enemies like Forgotten, Titans, Margonites, etc pp. which were all removed for more High Fantasy typical ones, the questionable new lore behind magic due to gameplay, the sheer geography of the world (Kryta not tropical anymore for example).
I was willing to humor them at release, but 2 years on it’s clear they don’t want to retread any facets of GW1 lore.

In a general sense, yes, Guild Wars 2 has a real lore connection to Guild Wars 1.

But this connection is as strong as, say, Quake 2 and Quake 4 for those who’ve played those games. For those who haven’t:

Quake 2 is based on an alien homeworld in retaliation to them attacking us first, the planet being called Stroggos and the enemy being a cybernetic race called Strogg; Stroggos had a variety of landscapes from volcanic to jungle to arid. Quake 4 is based shortly after Quake 2 – same planet, same enemy – except that despite traveling large terrains, you only ever see a blasted arid landscape. Some manual facts were ignored, as well as a full expansion of Quake 2 which ended with “Congratulations you ended the Strogg threat.” (which could mean Quake 4 is based before said expansion); said manual fact forgotten is that the Makron (Strogg leader) is just the strongest of several warlords, and in Quake 4 it is taken with supreme surprise that a new Makron came into being (Quake 2 ending with the death of the Makron, and this fact fueling the plot of Quake 4).

In short: Guild Wars and Guild Wars 2 are set in the same universe, but are stories that aren’t really tied together, and has seen some alterations for narrative purposes. Because the stories are not tied together, GW1 fans are disappointed because there’s not a lot of call backs to GW1, and those that are are typically call backs designed to fuel the new story. This never bothered me… until Season 1. Because to me, Season 1 is yet another completely different story in the same universe, and at the end just suddenly ends up being the same story as the second of three stories.

Honestly, I never see why folks expected a return of Titans or Margonites. I loved the Titans but… they’re a threat which has come and gone. The place of their creation – the Foundry of Failed Creations – has been taken over. The Margonites explicitly stated in Nightfall to be wiped out or imprisoned. Same goes for the Forgotten – wiped out or left the world.

Even if GW2 was about the same exact plot… we would not see more of them, I am certain.

The downgrading of the gods, however, is something downright silly. But doesn’t dislocate the two games into being two different lore universes. IMO.

Gorgaan Peaudesang.8324:

sAdam.5876:

One question, was that mentioned in-game when Firstborn emerged? Maybe they just move timeline few years back?

According to some NPCs, they’ve been around for twenty-five years (?1300 AE). But, honestly, I’m not the most reliable when it comes to Sylvari.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Eistoir -> Our character say this : Even the Firstborn are only twenty-five.
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Grough_Heartless -> Ha. “Sylvari.” Fancy name for a talking weed. Did you know they’ve only been around for twenty-five years? They just appeared, poof. That’s suspicious.
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/The_Battle_of_Claw_Island -> Trahearne: I have studied Orrian creatures for twenty-five years, but I rarely engage in combat with them. It’s terrifying.
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Kasmeer_Meade/dialogue -> I guess I thought they were all goofy, childlike beings. I mean, their race is only twenty-five years old, right?

ArenaNet LOVES to round their numbers. It’s like saying that Zhaitan awoke exactly 100 years ago, or that Mad King Thorn and the Six Gods stopped interacting exactly 250 years ago, or that the Foefire happened exactly 250 years ago. ArenaNet rounds. Almost all the time.

Take for example that last quote from Kasmeer. That was said at the end of 1326 AE. The others are said in 1325 AE (or however ArenaNet wants to treat open world comments). They couldn’t have been born in both 1300 and 1301 AE.

Sorry, I wrote that up before double checking. Was not going to post if I was wrong. It is the case, she says she got the materials for the minotaur, and then later on mentioned that the brain is studying her portals.

Technically speaking it’s not absolute mention so they could alter it if they wish, but by all appearances, minotaur→brain. Where the standard Steamriders fit in, as well as the Steam Ogres, is unknown.

It was first said she built a minotaur, I believe, and later that a brain began mimicking her own building designs to the point where a steam brain created minotaurs in defense.

Though the mention of the Steam Brain is rather nice for a throwback. Sadly, what we see it use for defense aren’t Steam Mechataurs (aka Steam Minotaurs), but Steam Ogres (called Steam Champions).

Didn’t even catch that until now. >.>

What I meant was that the mention by a non-related-to-Scarlet was that proof was found in 1326 AE, and it was found that the discoverer of the proof was Scarlet. Not that Scarlet had revealed to the world her proof – just that she found it, and finding her proof happened in 1326 AE. Given Thaumanova, we know that Scarlet found proof no later than 1325 AE, after all.

Meaning that the book doesn’t directly related to Scarlet’s timeline, just credits her with the achievement of proving their existence (since, as far as we’re told, this is the case).

What was stated is that none of the playable races can interbreed with each other. The most likely possible of these cases were human and norn – and given recent lore, it seems that norn predate humanity on the world anyways.

It may be possible for a playable race and a non-playable to interbreed (only chance I can see happening would be norn with ogre or jotun since the three races are implied to be cousin races anyways), or between two non-playable races (such as hylek and heket – also cousin races – or naga and krait, whom are very similar). In any case it is most likely to result in sterile offspring.

Due to their non-Tyrian nature, it wouldn’t make much sense for humans to be genetically compatible with any race to produce halfbreeds.

But the source for this came from out of game, so who knows. All sources out of GW2 are malleable now.

“Scarlet’s birthdate is a minor piece of lore.”
Yes. It is. But you’d be missing the point if this is all you see for the complaints.

By changing Scarlet’s birthday the way it has been, you’re changing the birthdate of Secondborn everywhere. This also means that any player roleplaying a Secondborn now has to revise his/her character. This of itself is not a big thing, but then you hit “Angel McCoy’s very recent comment about their approach for the player characters”:

Initially, when we created the original body of the game, we were especially careful to never break immersion by using PC dialogue lines that you might feel didn’t fit your PC. We’ve relaxed this with Living World content and it has proven a more positive experience for many, I hope. Our original thought was that you would add the personality to the words when you heard them in your head. We still know you will do that, but we’re now more comfortable with having your PC say things that commit to an idea or a knowledge or a thought that you the player might not have had. Our goal is to increase immersion and make you feel more like it’s your PC’s story.

This feels like outright contradiction.

With one hand, you offer more self-customization of your PC’s personality by devoiding the story of it. With the other hand, you mess around with the canon lore that alters player-made stories for their PC.

But this is still just the tip of the iceberg of this issue. You see, when you retcon something there are three questions that must be asked:

1. What was changed?
2. Why was it changed?
3. How was it changed?

As pointed out above, the ‘how’ has, until now, always been via storytelling; the why has always been to improve the story. The what is really irrelevant – whether it is a big piece of lore or a small piece of lore, the why and the how determines how players will react to it, because whether it is the first or the last in their minds it opens up a door for lower quality if they remain quiet (at least for some players, and in this case, it seems to primarily be the older players).

Now tell me: what are the answers to the questions in this situation?

1. What: The birthdate of the Secondborn. The act of itself has some pros and cons to it, and as said it’s usually irrelevant in the big picture. Moving on.
2. Why: Because… we don’t know. “Because external sources are malleable” is all we’re told. This is the primary source of my frustration now. Not because of the explanation itself (or rather, lack of), but because of what the given explanation entails (that anything spoken by an NPC, or spoken by a dev, is subject to change and we may never even realize it).
3. How: They just did it. No explanation, no stating so until we figured it out by seeing what one would think unrelated, no story given. Nothing. They just did it blatantly, and without remorse.

This is similar to when the calendar got changed as talked about here because the “why” was ‘because we want to link up the two calendars’ and the how was kitten because they didn’t take into account that the Mouvelian calendar begins on the spring equinox (and furthermore, their story explanation was basically “we asura have realized that humans who’ve been studying the sky were wrong about the length of the calendar, even though the 5 days they missed would have put snow in the middle of summer and hot days in the middle of winter in half of their generation; we asura, however, despite not even knowing that the sky and stars existed until 250 years ago, have discovered these 5 days and are right.”) – though I suppose that’s now ‘malleable’ isn’kitten Well, still canon until they say otherwise. The main difference between then and now is that they told us then, but not now. And it is the fact that they didn’t tell us that is perhaps the biggest spark. Out of all the lore we’ve gotten out of game – if they didn’t tell us this has changed, what else has they not told us has changed? Are we going to need to sit down with an interview and ask the same questions we asked before again, just to see if the answer has been altered? We shouldn’t, to be honest. We really shouldn’t be.

I hope this clarified why there’s “this much discussion about such a small detail”. To put it in metaphorical terms, however, today’s retcon just a pebble that could start a rockslide.

“The Game is Primary Source”
This just isn’t true, unfortunately. As has been explained, there isn’t a single NPC that cannot be redacted from telling truth to telling lies or being misinformed of the truth. This began with Ghosts of Ascalon, to player knowledge, and has continued ever sense. To quote Jeff Grubb:

We (the designers and writers) know what happened as far as the raw facts of the matter, and we keep an updated lore database in case any one of us steps in front of a bus. Matt [Forbeck] strained those facts through the racial viewpoints of both human and charr, based upon what information they would have (i.e., as survivors) and their own prejudices. The end result creates more of a feeling of real world, and for the inhabitants of the world there are different flavors of truth, depending on who you are and what you are doing.

This is just the most available to me of multiple interviews in which Jeff states the same at the end. Effectively: NPCs are only privy to the knowledge they’ve learned. That knowledge can be right, it can be wrong.

I could go through a long list of NPCs that have been proven wrong, but I’ll keep it short with obvious examples instead:

• ‘They say that ours was the first, but that the gods created other worlds after the Exodus.’
• ‘Yes. She was the first of all creatures on Tyria, created by the gods to be the caretaker, but it became clear that she needed help. That is when they summoned the creatures known now only as the Forgotten.’ (‘She’ refers to Glint)
• ‘The gods threatened to take magic from us. They were afraid we would use it against them. Our confusion was great, and the jotun kings began to fight among themselves.’

This basis also extends to in-universe external sources, such as the things that individuals in the short stories and novels say, as well as the written documents such as An Empire Divided. This has been known for quite some time. Because of this, the rule of thumb about the credibility of sources has had the following hierarchy of most credible to least:

1. What players see first hand in games, and what narrations describe in stories.
2. Word of God
3. What NPCs have experienced and told their first hand accounts to players (thus, second hand accounts for players)
4. What NPCs have heard and told their second+ hand accounts to players (thus third+ hand accounts for players)

This created 2 absolute types of sources, and 2 dubious types of sources. However, with Bobby’s comment, it now has become 1 absolute type of source, which gives exceedingly little details, and 3 dubious types of sources, and in the following order:

1. What players see first hand in games, and what narrations describe in stories.
2. What NPCs have experienced and told their first hand accounts to players (thus, second hand accounts for players)
3. What NPCs have heard and told their second+ hand accounts to players (thus third+ hand accounts for players)
4. Word of God

Most of the lore in the game now is fully ‘malleable’, because we can never be fully certain if an NPC is lying or misinformed, and because we can never be certain when a fact previously told to us by the developers has been altered.

While these facts aren’t changed yet, what Bobby Stein said is basically “they aren’t changed to players’ knowledge”.

This in itself is not that huge of a deal, but it makes our certainty of lore beyond low.

I’ve been monitoring this thread, and I felt the need to say something regarding how the discussion has progressed. Those whom are saying they don’t see what the big deal is seem to be misunderstanding (or lacking knowledge of) something or seeing the problems at face value. I see generally three main points being raised for why the reaction is an overreaction:

1. “Scarlet’s birthdate is a minor piece of lore.”
2. “The game is still primary source (and always was).”
3. “ArenaNet has retconned before, and so have many other stories that are very well known. This is not new.”

Allow me to extrapolate upon these in reverse order:

“Continuity Errors are Common”
This is true. Continuity errors, plotholes, and the like are very common amongst most stories, especially longer ones and those shared amongst more and more people such as Star Wars. The difference between Guild Wars and the rest however lies in two factors:

Firstly, ArenaNet has five people who’s primary job is to ensure continuity and the Guild Wars universe is not large enough for such to make constant slip ups especially around things that are highlighted and documented by the community.

Secondly, Jeff Grubb and Ree Soesbee had, in the past, presented extensive dislike of blatant retcons. Whenever they’ve retcon’d something it was done via presenting an story explanation for why this was done. For example: When Abaddon revealed as the Sixth God, the story was that the Five Gods removed all knowledge of him (or rather, tried to). Before we learned the truth of Glint Jeff Grubb said this:

Much of what we know about Glint comes from Glint herself. The truth of the matter may be very different, and she has her own reasons for saying what she has said.

It was about a year later that we had Edge of Destiny’s release and the truth of Glint revealed. ArenaNet has been very adamant about giving proper story explanations for any retcon.

However, this has lately changed when Season 1 went into high gear. Most such changes revolve around either interviews with Angel McCoy or Scarlet Briar’s in-game story.

(Side note: I have nothing against Angel, Bobby, or others as people; I do, however, have issues with what they do – I separate the two and mean no offense ever to the individuals as people)

Furthermore, in the past when the story is claimed for retcon but it isn’t, Jeff Grubb and others have gone out of their way to explain why it isn’t on occasion. For example, at one point before release it was believed that the creature beneath Drakkar Lake was Jormag, and this misconception came from abstract descriptions in Edge of Destiny as well as the concept art for Drakkar Lake. Jeff Grubb went to extensive lengths to prove that the concept art was talking about the original idea that got changed well before it or Eye of the North’s release. Unlike Malafide, I don’t mind the change to the Bloodstone itself per se, because they gave a story explanation (however poor it was).

ArenaNet has proven that they dislike retroactive continuity without giving proper and well thought out explanation. Until now.

I have loved this game and its lore for 7 strong years. I didn’t even take a break from playing GW1 until GW2 came out since I started playing at the beginning of July 2006. It wasn’t until last winter that I took a break from GW2. You managed to undo 7 years of strong followship in a single year. I suppose it is only fair that just after my 8th anniversary of playing this game, you go and put in what seems to be the final nail in the coffin for GW’s lore. I loved the game, Bobby, I loved the story. I joined the Test Krewe the moment I could because of such, and defended Anet and did other things that I cannot speak about due to NDA because of my love for the game and its story. But now? That love has all but gone, Bobby, destroyed by the utter clusterkitten to the lore that Scarlet Briar was (and what the kitten is with that over propagandizing of Scarlet? She’s not a good character, stop trying to pretend she is – Abaddon and Shiro were far better villains, and they never got an ounce of the attention Scarlet’s getting), and now by further contradictions and now outright making old lore “malleable”.

Old, established lore are the pillars of a continuing story. A poor writer does retroactive continuities. A good writer works in a way to explain why old ‘facts’ became ‘lies’ and uses that to boost the story. A great writer puts in what they want while not destroying the established pillars of the story. GW1 throughout its lifespan did the last; GW2 at release did the middle; and the Living Story is the first.

I don’t think I even want to play the game anymore, Bobby. I truly don’t. I think this will end up being my last post on the forums. For now, though, I’ll continue log in to unlock the future stories, and I’ll stalk the forums – only in hopes that you (ArenaNet’s writers) and Guild Wars returns to being a great story made by great writers.

BobbyStein.2315:

lakdav.3694:

Well they did move away from most of the things they said during development (see the manifesto), it only figures that interview-lore isnt sacred either.

Unless we’ve built content around something, it’s usually considered malleable from a design and lore standpoint. Occasionally we decide to go in a different direction months or years after the first ideas are documented or even talked about externally. In some cases that means what one member of staff says in an interview can change when it comes time to building a release. It’s part of our iterative process.

In short, go by what’s in the game.

lakdav.3694:

I wouldnt even mind to rely only on lore that is presented in the game if there would be enough lore in the game. Im still hoping for some kind of codex in the hero panel.

My advice for you and others who care about the lore is to let us know what you think of the implementation in season 2. We’ve put a lot more resources into seeding each episode with loreful bits.

As always, thanks for playing and letting us know what you think.

Woooooow. Is that really all you have to say?

You could at least explain why this change was made. Even if it’s made up on the spot. It’d raise your credibility.

But instead you say what is effectively “be ready to disregard anything not in the game.” For argument’s sake, I’ll pretend you said games and books. Otherwise we’d have to disregard all lore in GW1 and the three novels!

Tell me, should we disregard An Empire Divided (which is the source for almost all the lore on Shiro and Cantha’s history) too? And the GW1 manuals – after all, they weren’t in-game. Or how about the lore tidbits provided in Art of Guild Wars from the Prophecies CE which gives insights that was never brought up in-game (such as old Krytan funerals being performed on swamps, where the bodies are wrapped up and stood up on boats before being pushed off)? Should we disregard each and every interview, which gives hundreds of fascinating bits of lore? Was the Dolyak Express focusing on lore pointless then since you can change what’s given at a whim?

I suppose this also means that if we hate an interview like the poor reception this one with Angel McCoy got. Or even "the clarification posts made by you devs regarding unclear points in either interviews or the game itself – of which there’s even more than the total number of interviews?

Shall we just toss it all out then, because kitten it! You can just change it at a whim, because it’s not “in game”. But hell, even the things you present in-game get changed! Steam creatures’ origins got changed! The mentality and believability of krait and dredge and Flame Legion got changed!

It isn’t just “what isn’t in game is malleable” with you guys is it? Because you even alter the things presented in-game.

With you, it’s more of “we’ll change anything in our lore to fit our current design” isn’kitten So I must ask you this Bobby:

What the kitten are your continuity designers doing in which they’re not creating a continuity but a retcontinuity!

This destroys the story’s credibility, putting it on par to WoW with how often things get changed and retcon to fit the new releases. You might as well start writing the lore on toilet paper because that’ll stop plugging up the toilet when you flush the lore down. And don’t bother arguing that’s not what you do, because that’s exactly what you admitted to doing even if you don’t use those words. “Actions speak louder than words” and your actions have spoken a cacophony.

This is truly saddening that this was your reply Bobby. It destroys all credibility there is in any forum post or interview ever had and ever will be had. Hell, at this point you can even retcon those short stories put on the web because “it’s not in game.”

There is so little lore in the game that if someone were to just play the game they’d think that the world is a bland and boring place! How do I know this? I’ve seen people say that! And I had to go into great detail, linking dozens of articles and interviews and forum posts, to clarify otherwise! But it was only because of the lore that’s presented out of the game that I could convince them that it wasn’t the bland and boring game they believed it to be – and now you’re saying that you can toss all that lore, all those explanations and expositions, out the window at a whim?

Why not just say that there is no lore, Bobby, because that’s effectively what your words are meaning.

-continued in next post-

Watch, it’ll be that old TBA world event boss, only appearing once per so many hours.

@OP: A bit more serious, but those in Brisban are only there because of Toxal Bog’s little exposure to the Thaumanova stuff. Without Thaumanova exploding, there’d be no giants in Toxal Bog (or Brisban).

Kenrid.7859:

I think what Mr. Stein is trying to say here is things change. The interview and blog being quoted are from more than a year before the game was released. They changed the whole look of the sylvari during that time. A month after that interview they could have decided, you know, let’s make it so a whole crop of sylvari are about to be born. But the asura come in and experiment and kill all but the 12. We will call them The Survivors instead of First Born. They could have done that if they wanted, if they did, you still going to hold them to what they said a year before when still in the creation process?

You realize that those interviews and questions came out during ‘sylvari week’ – when the redesign was revealed, and they told us about the Firstborn and the Secondborn and so much more, right?

That was the big reveal of sylvari lore spread throughout multiple sites, revealing the big change and new direction of the sylvari from their earlier ‘pseudo-elf’ look.

And it is generally very poor form to change released story, because if they admit that they altered what was stated multiple time during the biggest reveal of sylvari lore via asking if it was in-game or not, that’s no different than saying “anything not in the game is subject to change.” And that’s a lot of the background lore we’ve been given over the years. Hundreds of interviews, hundreds of forum posts, dozens of livestreams, hundreds of documents released to give a sense of the lore of the game for potential customers. To say that all of that can change at the drop of the hate removes a hell of a lot of credibility from the writers at ArenaNet.

And if that’s the case, we might as well dump all the lore we get out of game, and as I said, that’s a kitten lot. Given how the lore is presented in GW2, in fact, most of the more enticing tidbits come from out of the game. Reasons for the gods’ leaving, reason why sylvari look humanoid, how and when the Flame Legion came upon the titans, the entire history of Shiro Tagachi that was never touched upon in-game. Because ArenaNet lacks a means of providing paragraphs of text without humongous dialogue trees – even in GW1 – most lengthy lore comes from out of game. To say that all of that is subject to change?

Then what’s the point of having all those forum clarifications by Angel and Scott? Why bother even accepting interviews that focus on the story? Why even release those “<race> week”s? There is no point, because hell, any of it can be discarded at the drop of a hat!

Kenrid.7859:

Jeff Grubb gave an interview on norn and was asked how they pick a mate. He said they are about their story, their legend, and look for a mate whose legend matches their own. I have not seen anything in game to confirm this.

Actually, this is shown in Eye of the North, the background around Knut Whitebear and his wife (though we never met her, there are a few NPCs who talk about how legendary she and Knut are, and how while Knut lives in Hoelbrak she’s out there still building her legend), this is also brought up with Eir and Bjorn (whom lived a similar life – the husband settled down while the wife continued to build her growing legend).

It’s also shown that it isn’t universally the case, however, such as the event chain in northern Dredgehaunt Cliffs.

Kenrid.7859:

In a small way this is kind of why companies don’t like giving out too much info during the design phase. And I don’t mean just lore, but skills, professions, whatever..

“Two years before the game came out you said there would be Wardens and Marksmen, where are they!”
“We took them out, didn’t work, we didn’t like them.”
“You can’t do that, you ruined the game!”

It’s one thing to change the mechanics and story before release, it’s another thing to change such after promising them. Because then you’re breaking promises. And in the case of lore pieces like this, when you present the same fact multiple times during a period which is emphasizing the aspect of lore you’re providing pieces of, and then go about changing it with no story reason, that’s just sloppy storytelling. They should know what they should reveal and not, and work around that which they revealed – whether it’s keeping it in place but making new stuff work out (like your “The Survivors” idea, though even that wouldn’t work due to the sylvari week reveals) or by explaining why it’s false via in-universe explanations (like why the History of Tyria from the Prophecies manual is mostly proven false now).

I trust Ree and Jeff, yes. The stories they’ve written have been good and consistent with continuity.

I do not trust Angel, Bobby, and Scott who’ve been writing the Living Story, however, as the stories have been… less, to put it nicely, and inconsistent with continuity.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Dolyak-Express-Jan-10-2014/page/3#post3545340

Q: Are the Six [gods] really gone or not? Their power is still very much present. Players can call upon the gods’ power with prayers, NPC priests can summon Reapers of Grenth etc., and their statues are still stuffed with energy. So if they left, why are their power still here?

Jeff Grubb: The human gods still exist, and their power is still felt within Tyria. However, they have pulled back into the mists, leaving the humans to stand (or fall) on their own merits. There has been a tendency for the human gods to, um, meddle with their worshippers a bit much, and in the wake of the final battle of Abaddon, they have been trying to cut back. Also, the destruction of the big A and his replacement with Kormir in the Pantheon resolved one of their ties with physical contact with Tyria. So there are ties, but you just can’t ring them up to take on the Elder Dragons.

Given that this is just the most recent of dozens of statements by the devs that the gods stopped communicating because they want humanity to stand on their own/have lost the last of their physical ties to the world, I doubt it has anything to do with the Elder Dragons or the levels of magic.

As Tiborb said, it came from Ree Soesbee, one was via Regina on Guru2 but another was an interview with a website, a link to which I provided in either this thread or the Scarlet Timeline thread (or both).

@MRA, the designation came from Ree, twice at least both times when she denoted the Secondborn came to being six or seven years after the Firstborn – long established lore by a narrative continuity designer.

Ronin.7381:

No. I expect you to provide proof for your claim that we know that it is impossible.

If we know it is impossible, then there must be proof that shows it is impossible. Otherwise it is a possibility; a mere chance; unproven; an unknown.

These two statements of yours contradict one another. It’s unfeasible. And you’re promoting the double-entrendre at the same time. I don’t understand how you think this is a logical retort. There’s no proof (with the exception of CoE which we have already covered) to show it is possible… outside of CoE. So if we’re to take the same process that we grant Kudu, taking things at face value, why is it suddenly “wrong” of me to assume these things do not occur outside?

Yes, you admitted that you accept the lack of existence outside but you keep trying to say it “can” happen. When I said, I believe it is “unlikely” you immediately dial back to prove me wrong through my lack of evidence supporting the non-existence. There’s nothing that can be provided at this time hence I speculate that the lack of existence is an answer in of itself. I’m not saying I’m right, I’m telling you what I think and that there is a stark difference.

You said that we know it is impossible.

This is not you saying it is unlikely. This is not saying “we have yet to see”.

I am merely asking for your source for what you said for “we know it is impossible” – which you did say, I quoted you, twice, in saying it. And you have yet – to what I have seen – retracted such a statement.

Yet when I ask for that source, you return to the same argument of what I just quoted. You respond to me with a statement that is not an answer to the question I am asking. It is as if I am asking you “what weighs as much as a duck?” and you say “a quack! But why does a witch weigh as much as a duck?” (if you get the reference, kudos).

Ronin.7381:

Crucial point is bolded. Consider the topography….

And you ignore everything else or the point of mentioning that. Ossuary of the Unquiet Dead – if you paid any proper attention – had the risen being created by setting the corpses into radiation of Zhaitan’s corruption – the event (both those in Orr and outside it) lack that “setting corpses into radiation of Zhaitan’s corruption” and have, unlike in Ossuary of the Unquiet Dead, instantaneous corruption.

But the main point was the creation of risen well outside Orr.

Ronin.7381:

Or a necessary object/ritual is still required that is not present and since we also eliminate the mode of transportation, obviously the link is not connected.

If you actually read my post in full, and went to the links and read what I was talking about, you’d know that no object or ritual is ever performed. Just a spreading of corruption in the area, or the presence of risen who can spread corruption – however little.

And Kellach had that.

He also had an object spreading corruption – which is why he was corrupted in the first place.

Ronin.7381:

Additionally, it is peculiar at how similar Kellach and Scarlet act and while different the two act as mirrors to one another. So, with nothing to prove that Sylvari can be corrupted by the other EDs but she is in some way acting under Mord’s influence, we come full circle yet again arriving to the question of whether or not the susceptibility of the Sylvari is due to an unseen root (pun intended) connection.

By your argument, there is an unseen connection between humanity and Zhaitan.

Ronin.7381:

I simply disagree. In order for Dragon Corruption to take place, there needs to be a willful and conscious decision being made. What we see are dragon minions being housed in a facility and experimented on. There’s still not enough information throughout the lab to suggest the final experiments weren’t imitations.

What the conscious decision is needed for is the creation of corruptive magic or materials; if one has said magic or materials on hand by some means, then there is no longer a conscious decision to corrupt, because the corruption simply spreads.

We see this throughout the game, primarily with risen but also with others. In the case of risen, we see wildlife consuming risen corpses, becoming sickened or corrupted themselves, we see objects corrupting and killing living beings (such as Kellach and Howl), and many more such situations.

And we see more than just minions being housed and experimented on, but uncorrupted beings – humans, charr, kodan, etc. – being exposed to the corruptive magic of Elder Dragons (this is shown in story mode).

Ronin.7381:

I’m not denying anything, read what I said. Keyword: Presume. Because all we have to go off of is his commentary and the evidence of his experiments with no additional oversight or lore. Therein by we are taking everything witnessed in CoE at face value, I simply question but am not denying what he says. Kudu certainly thought he was in control, most villains do.

You question what he said, thus denying his view as correct but only as “potentially correct.”

Perhaps I worded that wrong previously.

Typically the means of taking in lore is by taking things by what the NPCs say except when there’s evidence to argue otherwise, otherwise we’ll just be second-guessing anything and everything we are told in the game.

If your character has the afro or other crazier hairstyles like sylvari tree branches, they’d clip insanely with helmets causing the helmet in some cases to be barely viewable.

The removal of hair was the alternative to allow the hairstyles people like in the first place.

That quest and everything around it was an April Fools joke. There is no canon lore to it.

Except that we did see him in Kryta after Zhaitan’s defeat. Season 1 takes place after the personal story – this got outright stated with the announcement of the journal, and during Dragon Bash, Queen’s Jubilee, and Clockwork Chaos we see him in Divinity’s Reach.

The unresolved plots from GW:B that never came to be were just the Halloween plot (including the lich), which seems to be getting concluding with GW2 (we just missed a stage or two where the Lunatic Court’s attempts backfired); Elona, which we never got a hint to but likely would be the stepping stones for Joko conquering Vabbit 55 years later; and the establishment of Ebonhawke (and the outcome of Evennia), the former we were told in GW2 via The Founding books in Ebonhawke. Technically M.O.X. wasn’t part of Beyond, but lets include that assassin too.

So really, we missed only 3 of 5 remaining Beyond plots, with the two we didn’t miss just lacking a first-person showing, rather than the second-person telling we got.

Now, plots left loose in GW1 in general… that’s a lot, but only because they were tiny threads that could be picked up, and not threads that would be.

Another thing I realize:

Her Season 1 journal was spoken in her “pre-Scarlet” voice, and this was stated by Bobby Stein to be a very important detail in the long run.

This shows that she became Scarlet Briar after the journal, due to the voice change, which would put her joining Omadd in 1320, but her entering the machine after spring 1323.

This would thus make more sense with the steam creature unleash point that Tamias mentions with the Priory (and the norn in Hoelbrak) making the steam creature invasion sound more recent than 5 years ago.

We also shouldn’t presume that her leaving one place and arriving at another occurred in the same year. If we take into account the Snaff Prize bit, then we could say that there are a few years blank – that she joined the colleges no earlier than 1317 AE. Given that Omadd got her into the colleges, I’m tempted to say that she joined the first college (Statics) in 1320 AE. But then the question becomes: how did she confirm the existence of ley lines in 1316 (presuming that’s not a typo)?

Ah, the contradictions! The confusion! The conundrums! Makes you wonder if they can make a cohesive story anymore.

Heh, I was going to compile this in a similar fashion yesterday but the four points of contradiction (the three you bring up, and the year of her birth) was annoying me to much to do so.

On thinking, I’m starting to believe that the 1316 comment was a typo for 1326. Reason being:
Firstly, the document says “alias Scarlet” which implies she was also known as Scarlet Briar when she discovered the ley lines. It is possible this is just a “in retrospect” situation however.

More importantly, however, is that in Fractured! (which happened in 1326), Kiel states: “Scarlet claimed to have identifies the channels that this magical energy follows as it courses in and around and through the globe. If she’s right, it could be a significant breakthrough.”

The reason this is important is that Kiel is no idiot. While she may not be a scientist studying magic, she’d be smart enough to run her findings in the fractal to Rata Sum’s databases – if she can negotiate with the Arcane Council to reduce waypoint costs in lore, she can surely negotiate accessing the Rata Sum archives, if not the Priory’s. Doing this alone would show that Ceara already proved their existence 10 years prior.

I tend not to question these things but we’ve seen Anet make date typos before (example one, example two":http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Statue_of_Ferro_the_Butcher ) and this one seems outright weird.

Ronin.7381:

In order for corpses to be risen, as the story in Orr shows us, they must be taken back to Orr in droves and delivered directly. So whether Kellach was free or not remains to be determined. What would happen if his corpse was brought to Orr and sent on those corpse-ships? I think we would have a completely different situation.

This is not entirely the case.

If you read Edge of Destiny or Sea of Sorrows, you’d probably remember that in both novels it is explicitly stated and shown that those slain do not even hit the ground before becoming risen. The act of being killed and turned into a risen is instantaneous when in the presence of a group of risen (large enough or powerful enough to spread corruption – which doesn’t require too much, it would seem, just a few mid-tiered minions would usually work in various events to spread the corruption).

Mazdak was apparently corrupted while in his tomb, halfway across the continent.

The storyline around the “krait orb” (aka Blue Orb aka Water Orb) shows that the krait are killed and turned in their own deeps when assaulted by risen.

Various events in Orr show NPCs being killed and raised immediately – such as the group event Defeat the Vigil Tactician that was taken over by Zhaitan. We see similar such events elsewhere, such as Slay the undead drake broodmother which was corrupted on the spot by a “Corpse Caller” risen wraith.

Ossuary of the Unquiet Dead was merely presenting that corpses not killed around risen are “looted” and taken back to Orr to be basked in Zhaitan’s corruption.

Kellach, having been killed around risen, should have returned as a risen if he wasn’t already corrupted.

Ronin.7381:

Minions not dragons. Minions. Which begs the question why the Husks and Nightmare Hounds are present.

The topic is not how the Elder Dragons interact, but how their minions do. So saying there are no dragons in CoE… sounds irrelevant to me.

Ronin.7381:

Actually we presume he had control. And as you say, the monster is quickly dispatched right after. I could toss that easily to arrogance on Kudu’s part and we were but the subject of which the monster could hone its aggression on.

At this point, you’re denying NPC commentary without evidence countering them being right.

Ronin.7381:

You expect me to provide proof of somethings lack of existence as if its tangible.

No. I expect you to provide proof for your claim that we know that it is impossible.

If we know it is impossible, then there must be proof that shows it is impossible. Otherwise it is a possibility; a mere chance; unproven; an unknown.

Ronin.7381:

To bring the point home, Sylvari still have not been seen corrupted by any other Elder Dragon. So therein by saying Sylvari are corruptible by all of the EDs is highly suspect.

I don’t think anyone has claimed that sylvari are corruptible by all of the Elder Dragons. In fact, I’m pretty sure no one has claimed such.

You seem to be taking our argument that dragon minions can corrupt one another with something that we’ve been arguing against: the theory that sylvari are dragon minions.

In fact, I – I don’t know about others – am using the argument of multiple-corruptions as an argument for why the sylvari are not dragon minions. So there is no reason for me to argue that sylvari can be corrupted by any Elder Dragon beyond Mordremoth – and even the sylvari being corruptible by Mordremoth is unproven, a mere possibility, a chance, an unknown.

Ronin.7381:

Now while the Pale Tree idea sounds solid, once life has returned to the earth they would leave a body behind and we know from Primordus that he doesn’t need to corrupt things but instead manifest them from the materials of the earth; yet not a single Destroyer of the Sylvari are present.

Primordus corrupts rock and lava, not fossils or tissue, however.

Maybe ancient fossils, but there is no ancient sylvari corpse deep in the ground, and it’s a heavy point that Primordus corrupts hard stone and not soil, and that he doesn’t corrupt near the surface except in vats of lava (per Edge of Destiny) or in odd cases like the Destroyer Queen, egg-shaped mobile vats of lava containing a single destroyer.

Ronin.7381:

In life no but yes, in death they are. Zhaitan couldn’t resurrect Risen without corpses. Kellach is spared death and free’d of Zhaitan’s influence, so he doesn’t have a corpse to offer.

Kellach is not freed of Zhaitan’s influence except when he’s killed (and he doesn’t rise again). So… that argument kind of goes out the window.

Ronin.7381:

It isn’t likely, is what I have been stating. You’re looking for absolutes, you wont find them.

I quoted you stating that we know it isn’t possible. You stated an absolute. Look to my previous post again if you don’t believe me.

You’ve been saying it isn’t possible, not that it isn’t likely.

Ronin.7381:

And your point is faulty because we aren’t seeing the dragons interact in Crucible of Eternity. We’re seeing experiments conducted using their energy, not will power and furthermore there’s again the same problem of whether or not the presence are legitimate or imitations. Imitations in that, villains like Kudu are often naive in thinking they have control until they lose it.

Second encounter with Subject Alpha when choosing the submarine path, an Inquest is surrounded by a Nightmare Hound, Icebrood Wolf, Destroyer Harpy, and Icebrood Troll. They do not attack each other. They fight together. And when they die, Subject Alpha appears, rising the Inquest (if they died) as risen.

We see dragon minions interact in CoE.

And as far as we know, Kudu did have control – over Kudu’s Monster, which we killed immediately after. Subject Alpha obviously was a failed experiment in terms of control, but Kudu’s Monster apparently was not.

Ronin.7381:

All the same, you have not proven to me it has happened outside of Crucible of Eternity, when I ask for you to provide you resort to asking me instead to do the work for you.

I never said it has occured outside of CoE. I merely stated that it is actually possible – though we do not know how – for a creature to be corrupted by multiple dragons.

I have admitted that we have not seen creatures corrupted by multiple dragons outside CoE. I have answered your question, and ask again where your source for your previous comment of impossibility – an absolute – exists, where you only state that we have not seen such, and once more demand the same question which I have answered.

If anyone’s circling, it is you.

I have not said CoE is proof that it does happen. I said that CoE is proof that it can happen. There is a distinct difference between the two scenarios.

Ronin.7381:

So all of this putting burdens onto others and you have nothing you and I don’t know already, to provide.

The funny thing is… you’re doing this as well.

Logan is unofficially the top leader. Technically speaking, there is no “top leader”. Beneath whomever is on the throne (currently Jennah), there are typically 5 to 10 captains (exact number unknown, we’ve met 7 of them, and a couple generically named) each assigned a different location. Thackeray’s location of jurisdiction is Divinity’s Reach, and due to his closeness to Jennah, as well as his past legacy as a dragon champion slayer, and Jennah’s occupation with the human-charr treaty, he’s regarded as the top Captain of the Seraph, though legally he holds no jurisdiction over any other Captain’s area of command. If Logan were to order one of Captain Edwards’ men (Edwards is one of the two Captains running the assault on the centaurs in Harathi Hinterlands), if Edwards says no, the soldier can ignore Logan.

Thus far, the captains’ we met were all located in:

• Divinity’s Reach (Logan Thackeray)
• Claypool (Lindel)
• Ascalon Settlement (Vonne)
• Nebo Terrace (Brandin Glenavon)
• Seraph’s Landing/Modniir Gorge (Edwards)
• Wynchona Rally Point (Marshal)
• Triskell Quay (Rendar)
• Queensdale in general (Tervelan; dies in PS)

Ronin.7381:

That can be summed up by the simple fact that it’s a process. A corpse needs to exist for Zhaitan to resurrect it. Kellach was not dead but sick, there’s no telling where it would have lead him. An example of this are the Quaggan who we see getting sick but we know for a fact are actually apart of the Risen forces, taking that into consideration – there’s a process that must be completed before the dead can be turned.

The sick quaggans aren’t part of the risen forces. But Kellach is, as the risen follow and listen to him, but still very alive.

Ronin.7381:

This is nothing more than a bait and switch. I cannot find evidence that isn’t there or I don’t believe is there. Furthermore, we don’t know whether the experiments are legitimate (as in Kudu actually managed to pull it off or the powers granted act similar) or imitations of its root source. We don’t know because not much oversight is given, it’s just the assumption: “Hey, he’s glowing ridiculously so he must be under the influence!”

But the experiments prove it is possible. And that’s the whole argument being made. That. It. Is. Possible.

But you’re stating that it isn’t possible, and that such impossibility is a fact. Yet you provide no support for this claim beyond “well, we don’t see it outside of CoE.”

The fact of the matter is that you’re arguing a case of “lack of evidence is evidence of lacking” but that’s not entirely true because we don’t see everywhere that dragon minions exist.

While, yes, we don’t see it happening in the wild, this doesn’t prove that it cannot happen in the wild, it just means we don’t see it. But is this proof that it can happen in the wild? No. But CoE and the lack of any statement saying it cannot happen does point that it might happen in the wild – we just don’t know. And that’s what Erukk, and myself, are saying.

So unless you have something that says that it cannot happen and not just continuously go back to the argument of “lack of evidence is evidence of lacking” argument that you’ve used the entire previous page, well, then this argument is done really, because you cannot support your claim.

Ronin.7381:

Which is exactly what I have said if you read back enough. Again, you can’t keep spinning around in circles and then push burdens of proof on other people because they’re asking the questions. That’s just shifting the conversation towards another to make up for your lack of own personal data. The only data you have is one I recognize and question the authenticity of its existence because nowhere else in the world do we find this experiment occurring naturally. Nowhere.

I’m not trying to spin in circles – you’re just bringing us back to the same point whenever I ask you for your support. And by doing such, your ignoring the crux of my point:

We don’t see any interaction of dragon minions in the open world. The only interaction we see is at Crucible of Eternity.

But at the same time, we have absolutely nothing that claims that dragon minions cannot be corrupted by other dragons. You had originally stated that “We also know that a corrupted individual cannot be re-corrupted.”

But the fact of the matter is that we do not know this. It is a mere possibility, with no support against except the lack of evidence, and no support for except that it can be done in a controlled environment.

You said that we know it cannot be done. So I asked you for your source. You do not provide.

ElysianEternity.6215:

Tho…

Horst Hortensie.5420:

Priory Durmand library
“Scarlet Briar: a Brief”

“Scarlet Briar: a brief” by Priory Scholar Donn
(read on)
Scarlet Briar: 1304 – 1327 (Sylvari, Cycle of Day)
(read on)

…ow.

“Ow” indeed. Cycle of the Day, aka Cycle of the Noon are the warriors, yet there’s a cycle for diplomats (“silver-tongued” Scarlet’s claimed to be) and one for scholars (engineer she’s claimed to be).

And then we know from the novels’ timeline that the sylvari came into being in 1302 AE. And per Ree Soesbee the Secondborn came to be 6 or 7 years later.

Yeah. “Ow.”

So….

Scarlet is older than the Secondborn, but younger than the Firstborn then.

Yeah………………………………….

Well, unless they decided to retcon Ree’s 3+ mentions of saying the Secondborn are 6 or 7 years younger than the Firstborn because, in quite all honesty, that didn’t make much sense when we take into consideration that Malomedies wasn’t returned after the First Asuran Contact until Cadeyrn was around. So I guess that’s the case.

Since the chances of devs reading this is likely, can we get some clarification on this conundrum?

If Ree’s multiple statements in interviews and the such about the Secondborn’s time of birth does end up wrong, then it throws the entire above calculations into the dumpster – but on the other hand, knowing when Ceara was born then gives way into proper timeline-ing her life via using 1304 as the base and going across What Scarlet Saw and the journals.

Edit: Found the three books.

The Waypoint one is interesting, and obviously is a foreshadowing. The ley line one is also obvious foreshadowing.

But what’s more interesting of the ley line one is this line:

“In 1316, a sylvari named Ceara (alias Scarlet Briar) found proof.” Which hints to her time in Prosperity to being 1316. Buuuut… this would put her comment of being 16 cycles old meaning she was born in 1300… sigh all sorts of clusterkitten confusion in lore.

The one on Scarlet Briar doesn’t make sense on two accounts. Along with the date of her birth, as noted above, there is her cycle. “Cycle of Day” – aka Cycle of Noon. These are warriors typically, not thinkers. One would suspect Dawn or Dusk (diplomats and scholars respectively). Looks like Scarlet’s trying to break all the barriers of commonality. >.>

Yeah….

Edit2: There’s actually four new books in the Priory.

The fourth one is written by Ogden, titled “A Dragon Primer” and it bulletpoints known facts about Elder Dragons. But nothing that isn’t known to players who’ve paid enough attention.

pzyonix.1645:

In viewpoint of Firstborn-Secondborn-Thirdborn etc…

There is mention of Ceara/Scarlet being 16 cycles old.
This just popped into my mind and post it before I forget,
but every ‘tier’ of born Sylvari’s seem to be happening within 1 cycle. And not every cycle brings a new batch of Sylvarii. Else we would have had a lot more generations of Sylvarii.

Makes me wonder what tier of generation us as players would be.

Anyways Scarlet is secondborn no doubt about that.
I am curious about a LOT more things, but I think the details come to us within weeks in LS content. Also the Worldcup just kicked off for my country (Netherlands) so untill next time XD

Per devs, there is only “Firstborn” (which we have learned were born in 1302 AE), the “Secondborn” (which we have learned were born in 1308 and/or 1309 AE), and then “everyone else”.

Thirdborn is a fully fan-made term to describe that “everyone else”. We were told that at first sylvari birth was exceeding rare – so rare that 6 years passed between Firstborn and Secondborn. There was a gap between Secondborn and the next generation, but it was smaller; and there was a gap after that generation, but yet again smaller, and kept on getting smaller and smaller of a gap until there is the rate of sylvari characters being made (so the dev explanation was). But all the generations born after the Secondborn are just “everyone else” in sylvari generation.

Theoretically, if we knew how bit the gap between the Secondborn and following group of born sylvari were, then we’d be able to make an educated guess as to how many generations there are in full.

But the Firstborn were born in the course of 3 days, while Secondborn were apparently born over the course of, well, unknown, and each subsequent “generation” lasted longer in being born, with shorter breaks between them.

http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/17676-arenanet-dream-and-nightmare/page__st__210#entry842850

Cadeyrn’s fall from grace happens over the course of a few years, not all at once; the events are separated in time. There is a total passage of about five years from the beginning to the end of the story. It feels a bit ‘rushed’ because it’s all told in succession, as the blog posts have to be, to try to keep them small. The firstborn came from the tree, then six or seven years passed, and then the secondborn… and then more generations, each coming closer in time together and producing larger groups, until we get to the present day, where sylvari are being born… oh, about as fast as players are making characters.

250 years ago. This is Evennia we’re talking about.

You may be thinking of Livia from Sea of Sorrows, which was 70 years ago (roughly) – though originally ZHaitan was to rise ~150 years prior to GW2, where I think you got that 150 from. Unless you meant 2 instead of 1.

When the next release comes about you should be able to switch this release’s story instance replaying for another’s. So being unable to “turn it off” is just an inconvenience for this week. From then on you just got to switch around – or to turn it off completely, complete a replay.

Sadly, no replay of PS chapters…

Ronin.7381:

Which again stands to reason that all of a sudden two examples of people who lost sanction of the Pale Tree happen to go insane surrounding Mord’s awakening. That alone is highly suspect. I do agree they are of course guilty by association and thus susceptible to Mord’s influence however I could see the Pale Tree being some form of vegetational offspring of Mord. Anet prove me wrong.

Actually, per research on Scarlet’s timeline that I’ve done and presented here, evidence that doesn’t contradict established lore would put Scarlet’s first interactions with the entity three years before losing ties to the Dream.

Furthermore, while ArenaNet presented a piece of evidence that would point Aerin as having begun the meditations of the Soundless, nothing actually proves that he was Soundless and thus beyond the Pale Tree’s protections.

Ronin.7381:

The only instance we see this actually happening is in Crucible of Eternity, which as I pointed out was not only an experiment conducted by the Inquest but also ended up poorly. So as far as the world is concerned, we haven’t seen any event to suggest it’s possible in a natural environment.

It ended poorly because a bunch of adventurers came in and started wrecking havoc on their krewe, preventing them from stablizing a reactor meltdown.

You have yet to provide evidence to support yourself.

And that’s really the crux of the issue. The whole “sylvari are Mordremoth’s minions” argument relies on the lack of evidence against it, and has a lack of evidence to support it.

You can only support “the sylvari are vulnerable to Mordremoth’s corruption” but not “sylvari are Mordremoth’s minions.”

Ronin.7381:

Show me proof that this has happened anywhere else outside of Crucible of Eternity. Go on, I’ll wait. I’m legitimately curious. Because if you find it then I’ll admit I was wrong and move on as any responsible person will or should. However, consider the following if you can’t…..

This whole argument you’ve had for the several past posts is basically being presented to me as this:

“I have no evidence to support my claim. If you ask, I’ll just ask you for evidence to support that which isn’t your claim.”

Erukk wasn’t saying they do happen in the while – nor was I and possibly lordkrall – we (possibly three) were saying it is possible. And it is, because it happened. We don’t know how the Inquest got it to happen, so naturally we cannot deny that it cannot happen outside of a lab because we simply don’t know how it happened. You cannot say it is impossible to occur, because there is nothing to say it is impossible to occur, and you have nothing to prove how the Inquest managed it.

For all we know, the Inquest managed it by sticking two dragon minions capable of spreading corruption in the same room and let them do the rest. If something like that occurred, then it would be fully possible to occur outside of their influence – we just haven’t seen such happen.

Or maybe the Elder Dragons don’t want such to happen because as we see with Subject Alpha, it means that whatever minion becomes corrupted by multiple dragons’ corruption, is capable of leading both kinds of minions. But we don’t know where Alpha’s loyalties lie. So corrupting another dragons’ minions may result in the Elder Dragon losing its control over its own minions and creating a third party contender. Which is bad for both sides. And we know the Elder Dragons are intelligent enough to realize this much.

Ronin.7381:

lordkrall.7241:

The reason we don’t see it in nature is due to the fact that they kill each other on sight…

And death is how Risen are made so the question remains why do we not see Risen Sylvari?

Naturally, Risen only corrupt flesh (be it of animal or plant). Branded, Icebrood, and Destroyers are the very opposite of that – elements, not flesh.

However, any conflict between dragon minions that happens is off screen. So despite lordkrall’s statement, there very well might be minions corrupted by multiple dragons, we just don’t see them. We’re told that if they wander across each other they’d fight to the death like any other case of dragon minions approaching anything not of its shared dragon minions type (e.g., risen approaching any non-risen; icebrood approaching any non-icebrood). The exception is icebrood whom will not attack if there’s a Son of Svanir who’s bordering becoming an Icebrood – mainly, the “shamans.”

Ronin.7381:

Clearly it doesn’t work or we would see walking corpses of the Soundless and the Nightmare Court all over Orr.

Why would “dragon minions can corrupt each other, this clearly works” result into “it clearly doesn’t, for we do not see risen sylvari!”

We have no proof that sylvari=dragon minion. There are no destroyers who approach Orr; or the Dragonbrand, or icebrood territory. Similarly, there are no icebrood who approach Orr or the Dragonbrand, or branded who approach Orr. The ONLY case we see in-game of dragon minions interacting with other types of dragon minions is Crucible of Eternity… where they’re under the control of Subject Alpha or Kudu’s Monster.

Ronin.7381:

Looking at this from another perspective. Glint didn’t gain free will on her own, it was done so through the Forgotten. Who is to say that the Pale Tree didn’t imprint on Ronan and Ventari and gained it’s free will that way? A complete accident as it were. Wrong place at the right time and all that jazz.

Glint gained her free will through a magical ritual of the Forgotten. Something left unknown for who-knows-how-long. Mere conversation wouldn’t give a dragon minion free will. If the Pale Tree was a dragon minion of Mordremoth, then she gained freedom well before meeting Ronan and Ventari – as a seed.

However, I think the vines we see with this update kind of counters the argument that the Pale Tree is Mordremoth’s champion. The Pale Tree looks nothing like those thorn-filled vines. Texture, appearance, anything. There’s no similarity between the two.

lordkrall.7241:

You might have noticed that there are no risen plants, and as such it would seem like Zhaitan can’t corrupt non-“alive” stuff.

Go do the hearts in Bloodtide Coast and Sparkfly Fen. Corrupted trees, mushrooms, and tree stumps are all over the place, tied to the various hearts.

Ronin.7381:

And who is to say, beyond yourself and others who support your argument, that the very reason why they can’t be corrupted by Zhaitan, Kralk, Prim, or Jormag is because they are already corrupted by Mord based on heredity? We haven’t seen a single Branded or Icebrood culled into the Risen ranks.

Have we seen Branded or Icebrood interact with Risen?

In all honesty, the closest we get to dragon minion interaction beyond CoE is Mount Maelstrom, with risen and destroyers being nearby. Maybe if the meta event with the Megadestroyer fails and destroyers spawn everywhere we’d see some actual interaction, but we don’t.

We never see dragon minions interact. We only know they’d fight via Ree and Jeff’s words that they would. But would they do more than fight? Who knows. We don’t. We don’t know one way or the other.

What we do know is that the Inquest found a way to twist a Risen Giant with the corruptive magic of Primordus, Jormag, and Kralkatorrik.

Now let me throw the question back at you:

Who is to say, other than you and those who support your argument, that the reason why dragon minions cannot corrupt another dragons’ minion?

Where is your evidence. We’ve provided ours (CoE), but where is yours?

Ronin.7381:

In order for Zhaitan to corrupt, they have to die. That’s what happens in Orr as you’re taking a team in and they are then assimilated.

Not entirely true. Kellach appears by all rights to have been corrupted into a dragon minion and never died. There are trees in both Bloodtide Coast and Sparkfly Swamp which are fully alive, but obviously twisted.

And an interesting thing I just noted about both of those cases: their skin/bark is altered, full of vein-like influences, and in the case of plants, changed color too.

Kellach – take note of the neck, which is also viewable on the face but less so (iirc, this is a moving effect). Corrupted Tree in Bloodtide – doesn’t show well in an image, but it’s darker, shimers a bit, swerves too.

Most corruption by Zhaitan requires corpses, and is effective immediately, but not all.

Ronin.7381:

We also know that a corrupted individual cannot be re-corrupted. IE: Brand cannot be turned and brought into Jormag or Zhaitan’s folds. So who is to say that the Pale Tree if being a child of Mord, and the children that follow it, can be corrupted by the other dragons. It is as the text states, a death sentence and even with death being Zhaitan’s influence; he wasn’t capable of bringing Sylvari in.

Actually, we do not know this. And Subject Alpha, Kudu’s Monster, and Kudu himself are all cases that counters this argument. There is not a single example or case that tells us “dragon minions cannot be corrupted by another dragon.”

Ronin.7381:

While another user did state that the Pale Tree that we know of is not the only one, Malyck does express he came from another – hence still under the influence of his parent tree.

There are hints – heavy hints – that the Pale Tree’s protection comes from the Dream of Dreams; Malyck has no Dream of Dreams experience. He does not share that heavily hinted source of protection.

Ronin.7381:

That’s speculation and not definitive proof. CoE is an area for experimentation under would-be controlled environments until obviously something goes haywire thanks to Kudu. In the wilds we have not seen a single being corrupted by one Dragon and then switched for another. There hasn’t been a single brand turned Risen or brood turned brand, zero.

What’s speculative about an obviously Risen Giant using Branded crystals, ice attacks, and fire attacks? What’s speculative about a creature of unique appearance controlling minions of five different Elder Dragons and using branded crystals, risen tendrils, and attacks named after the other three of said five Elder Dragons?

That’s not speculative.

What is speculative is claiming that dragon minions cannot be corrupted by other Elder Dragons – in fact, that’s just debunked speculation, since we see that they can. The question is “can they under any circumstance, and if not what are the circumstances?”

But thus far there is nothing to say that dragon minions cannot be corrupted by other dragons’ corruption.

Would have been 2 centaurs, technically, Dustfinger. And at least 4 humans (as of 1078 AE; this does not include any travelers). Per Ventari’s sanctuary in GW1

That’s the mystery of it. Why is Malyck humanoid indeed.

Though he is less humanoid than any sylvari NPC. Even if his face can be used in character creation that is because ANet allowed all NPC faces be usable in character creation and any new ones have been getting added to the makeover kits. So his face is unique unto ‘not Pale Tree’ so maybe what he was modeled after was merely humanoid.

Or his tree came into contact with White Mantle.

DarcShriek.5829:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

DarcShriek.5829:

I think Scarlet’s case can be easily explained. Until she entered Omadd’s device, she had the protection of the Dream. Once inside the device, she lost that protection. Similarly, with Aerin, he lacked the protection of the Dream because he was soundless.

This may not be so. Per the discussion in this thread and my calculations on her timeline, it seems that Scarlet encountered the entity (known to be from 1321 to 1323 AE) first several years before entering the machine. So she still had the connections to the Dream at that point.

So the Dream isn’t offering protection. There are no barriers that introduced the entity to Ceara. It might have allowed the entity to get further into her, but it didn’t prevent it.

Up until Ceara entered Omadd’s device, the holograms sounded normal. Upon seperating from the dream in the device, the hologram’s voice changes. This is a good indication that the dream was protecting her.

But she intereacted with the entity before entering the device by 3 years as I pointed out.

The device did alter her, but the entity was with her beforehand. Hence “what was in there was only that she took in with her”.

Unless we take the t-shirt that apparently dates Scarlet’s life as 1304-1327 AE as canon, which means she is in fact older than the Secondborn by 4 years, and would put her entering the machine in 1319 or 1320 AE, thus before the journal, but then we hit the whole “written versus not written” and the voice change issue. It’s much cleaner and less contradictory to ignore that silly stupid propaganda of a t-shirt.

The Pale Tree modeling sylvari after Ronan isn’t a theory. It was stated by a developer to be the case.

Wanderer.3248:

Her hologram said that her experience in Omad’s machine confirmed the existence of ley lines, which to me indicates that she was interested in them before she was aware of the entity.

She likely knew of them via her studies in Synergetics, but for asura it’s been only theory. Confirmation doesn’t mean she had an interest, just heard of the theories, really.

@drax: I remember a discussion with either Canach during The Lost Shores, or Laranthir in the PS (perhaps both) where if you’re a sylvari it is mentioned that Secondborn are looked up to but not as much as Firstborn.

To the Pale Tree (and/or Caithe/Firstborn), Secondborn are nothing of importance, but to the younger sylvari they are figureheads.

storiessave.3807:

Heh, I noticed pictures of these dolphins a few months ago and showed them to my boyfriend saying the same thing. They really do look identical if you only see their heads. Makes me wonder if quaggans were modeled after them. ._.

They kind of were.

“The quaggans originally showed up as more roly-poly, almost cartoony creatures, and they were quickly adopted as a cute aquatic race. Their original round appearance proved challenging to rig for animation, so they went through a number of iterations, at one point slimming down and becoming more like dolphins. Later they regained some of their weight but retained a beaver-shaped tail from earlier designs.”

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/The_Mostly_Harmless_Quaggan

@Elysian: That’s odd, given that Caithe was a traveler and rarely in the Grove. It seems weird that she would have a “student” in the Grove.

I doubt they ever realized how much Sue-dom they packed into Scarlet, and to be honest, explaining that she was able to do all this as a sylvari because she’s been around long enough (aka was a Secondborn), that’d actually reduce her Sue-dom.

@Frosch: That makes even less sense. The Firstborn were born in 1302 AE – this is canonically stated as fact in the novels’ timelines. The Secondborn were outright said by Ree Soesbee to be born 6-7 years after the Firstborn, thus placing them to be born in 1308-1309 AE. It’s also stated in-game that the Firstborn were born 4 per day (1 per cycle per day) for 3 days. There were no sylvari born between 1303 and 1307 AE.

That t-shirt is a blatant contradiction of canon lore (and kind of shows to what a clusterkitten Scarlet’s lore is). I’m betting that whomever designed that t-shirt didn’t get fact checked.

And that t-shirt has further convinced me that they no longer have narrative continuity designers. Even if Angel and Scott call themselves such, and Jeff and Ree have been nowhere to be seen in their actions on the game.

Yes, that journal is dated late 1321 to early 1323 (in the A Study in Scarlet instance); given Scarlet’s comment of turning 16 while Ceara, that means she had to be a Secondborn, which would by default place her becomign Scarlet to 1324 (not even 1325 due to Thaumanova and Steam creature incidents). So when she first recorded encountering the entity in her head was roughly 3 years prior to going into the machine.

Why is that quaggan even in Dry Top to begin with?

Why would it seem weird for her to keep some of her things that hold stuff of importance (her first recollections of the entity she seems to have been fighting), and leave behind the things that aren’t of importance (a diary saying she won’t write anymore, and a hologram of old experiments she’s moved beyond)?

And that’s a good point to bring up. It may be she picked that place under the Priory to infiltrate them before she was an active threat. To “borrow” their public (and not public) books and items.