Guild Wars 2

Icdan, the book’s been out for nearing a year now. It’s pretty expectant that there’d be story spoilers. :P

Anyway Dustfinger, just looked it up and there’s mention of a “bandit elementalist” amongst the group. 1 warrior with a hammer, two others with daggers, and an elementalist (who cast spells one can recognize in gameplay even). There is a scene where the warrior does slam the ground and dust and rocks fly up though:

Near the roowboat, the brigand with the mallet had been planning an attack of his own. He swung the hammer over his head to gain speed, and as his companion fell, the scruffy-looking warrior slammed it down. The earth and sand beneath the pier rumbled from the mighty force of the blow. An explosion of earth and rocks burst up in all directions, showing Cobiah and the rest with blinding sand.

It’s honestly hard to tell whether this is magic, or just very very powerful brute strength. Every other case of magic in the novel mentions incantations and special stances for each individual spell (which Cobiah used at times to predict and dodge spells).

The other attack you mention that threw Cobiah back sounds more like he just got struck to me, but left ambiguous:

Intending to throw himself forward to join the fight, Cobiah raised his sword and lunged forward – but where he expected to fly to the boy’s aid, his body suddenly refused to obey. A second wave of force from the scruffy-looking bandit’s hammer knocked him back again, and Cobiah found himself stumbling, pushed back aside […]

In either case, those are really the only two attacks the warrior had, and both times he had a lot of preparation for such, so I’d say that if he’s using magic (a good chance but nothing explicit), then he can’t use it well and isn’t casting spells but strengthening himself.

Not everyone begins casting spells as a child. In regards to which profession they fall into – it seems to be a case of study and/or natural talent for one form or another of magic. Cynn from GW1, for example, was a prodigy in elementalism; while Gwen was self-taught using research journals as a basis. And of course, there’s the option not given mechanically of being able to change your profession (such as Keiran, as pointed out, as well as secondary professions in GW1).

@FlamingFoxx: While we in GW2 start with few skills, I’d chock that up to mechanics and argue that, in GW2, having picked up the profession could have been long standing or short standing, and it just is a case of the PC not being exceptionally trained yet.

Wet plant matter does not burn easily. Firewood is always dry, and if it’s wet you have to dry it out to use it. Sylvari, being still living plants, will have liquid (primarily sap) in their body – they will not be dry like timber, so they will not burn as easily.

Not just this, but an elementalist can control the elements – not just wave it around, but prevent it from burning the self or allies. So an elementalist, regardless of species, would not burn himself. Same concept as the Flame Legion shamans who’s bodies are partially-transformed into or infused with fire.

@Dustfinger: If I’m recalling what you’re talking about right, wasn’t that a guardian with a mace (you’re thinking of Osh Moran, right?)

@Firestarr: Typically there is no clear-cut case of warriors using magic, but unlike Engineers they’re never said to not be using magic. At best, their magic – if they use it – would be body strengthening innate spells; a prime example of what such would be, is Rampage.

This said, everyone is said to have magic; it’s just a question of using it or not.

The Zephyrite ships are made of bamboo amongst other things; that’s likely part of wreckage from the explosion we see.

Sorann Peace.9056:

3. Dungeons: We’ll likely get new dungeons, but nobody should even think to assume we’ll get them right when July 1 rolls around. We got new dungeons during Season 1 as well, but they were temporary. Namely, Aetherblade Retreat and Molten Facility (the rest are actually classified as mini-dungeons, such as Scarlet’s Playhouse).

Everything in Season 2 will be permanent or changing pre-existing content (ala Tower of Nightmare’s aftermath), so if we can expect dungeons, we can expect permanent dungeons.

But I fully agree with the amount of self-over-hyping the release of Season 2.

Personally, my expectations for throughout the full coarse of Season 2 is:

• 2-4 zones, slowly introduced, to act as an equivalent of Orr. With about one full zone released per 3-or-so releases, and the first one introduced off the bat (fully released or not).
• 2 dungeons, none introduced off the bat. Maybe 3, but unlikely. One of which will feature Mordremoth, the other I’m hoping to be Fort Vandal with a focus on the Sinister Triad (and perhaps featuring Lazarus ).
  • For those who say this is too much: remember that Anet introduced not just Southsun Cove and Edge of the Mists, but 5 temporary small zones (Mad King’s Realm, Tixx’s Infinatarium, Crown Pavilion, Tower of Nightmares, Labyrinthine Cliffs) in Season 1, as well as redesigning 3 zones (Lion’s Arch, thrice; Kessex Hills, twice; Southsun Cove, once), and made 3 dungeons (Fractals of the Mists, Molten Facility, Aetherblade Retreat). Overall, I think 2 full-sized zones is fully possible, especially since they said they’ll be focusing less on features with individual releases.

• Instances of equivalent size/number to the personal story steps of The Battle for Claw Island to Victory or Death.
• Lion’s Arch’s slow reconstruction throughout the whole season.
• Maybe some zone revamps ala Tower of Nightmares and Secret of Southsun.
• And if we’re super lucky, Season 1 – or part of – being made permanent by the end of Season 2.
• It to last 16 story driven releases; excluding breaks, that’d be 8 months (same length as Season 1, ignoring SAB/holdays, and counting Flame and Frost as a single release and including The Lost Shores). I’m expecting breaks inbetween, however, and using Tower of Nightmares/The Battle for Lion’s Arch as a basis, the breaks will come every 4 updates, and last about 4-5 weeks; so my expected order of things: 4 releases, 1 month break featuring a Feature Batch (ala April 15th release) and Anniversary; 4 more releases; month long break featuring Halloween (and a feature batch!?); and then 4 more releases, final release coinciding with Wintersday (and if story not done, then 4 more releases and it’d end the same time of year Season 1 did).

Berelious.3290:

While Konig and Mudbone do make good points, there is a point that I’d like to add. While it’s generally assumed that we know the locations of certain elder dragons, we don’t know “exact” locations. While Jormag is indeed located in the north somewhere… where exactly? He could be anywhere in the Shiverpeaks, which covers a lot of territory. Primordious and Mordremoth would be the only two that might be contestable with this theory, as Primordious has generally been understood to be underground and Mordremoth is in the jungle somewhere.

But Jormagwouldn’t be in Deldrimor Front, as he’s in the Far Shiverpeaks. Completely different areas that are basically on the opposite sides of (continental) Tyria.

Primordus and Kralkatorrik are the only dragons that can make the theory work, but only barely.

I agree with no new race in Season 2. That’s too big to not hint at, especially at this stage. However, about “no room for tengu,” I disagree. See attachment (it’s part of an old suggestion for expanding Southsun and how to fit tengu in as a new race that I never got to finishing).

And why can’t it be with a lot of water? Here’s your solution: aerial-based vertical-shaped zones. Most of the gameplay would be based on chunks of lands in the air, tengu-made contraptions that relate to their avian selfs.

A level 1-10 or 1-15 zone could be made inbetween Kessex and Lion’s Arch, stretching down to include the Wizard’s Tower and Claw Island if the latter, and tengu leveling for 10+ or 15+ can be done in Caledon and Kessex Hills, which we already have entryways for. The starter zone would also have access to Garrenhoff and Lion’s Arch, perhaps even Bloodtide and/or Southsun if desired.

People, people. Spears have been in LW concept art since Flame and Frost. They were there with Tequatl Rising. Why were they there?

Well, it’s easier to draw sticks than all the crazy kitten we have as weapons in-game.

The sylvari home instance isn’t small – it’s just highly vertical. You can climb up the roof which gives you access to more roofs and higher levels. It’s not the size of the charr or human home instance, but it’s much bigger than one would think.

Kormir’s avatars may be more unique than the rest, given that Balthazar’s avatars look like standard eternals an Melandru’s look like druids in the same manner as Grenth’s avatars look like ghosts (albeit non-standard ones), but Kormir’s Avatar of Kormir speaks as if she’s Kormir and not a mere avatar. Kormir’s two avatars don’t look spectral at all unlike the other five gods’ avatars.

I think the reason of Harathi being magical comes from no longer having access to the maguuma’s magical waters. Just unsupported speculation though.

Aaron Ansari.1604:

Seeing as it’s treated as a very big deal that the Hunter comes back, we actually have some evidence that it plain isn’t the case.

The Hunter is a 100% unique case, however, having been given magic of immortality by Khilbron, a lich.

onemantankwall.3641:

Idk if he was free i think he’d def make it known because as it stands he would be THE god, the most powerful being in tyria, and if i was him… The one most p***** off at the world… He now has free access to alot more than the underworld… The gods are missing he can easily promote himself to god of all since grenth and friends are MIA

He was imprisoned in the Mists. Who said that Dhuun would give one flying dolyak about Tyria? Also, he is a fallen god, not a god, and the Elder Dragons rival the gods.

Horst Hortensie.5420:

Which is interesting. The gods built Arah and it was a huge project. More than just a home for them. They built Arah over one of those Elder Dragon ?without noticing/knowing? I’m afraid that they either did something nasty with the dragon or created an intentional lockdown for it out of other speculative reasons.

They built Arah (if they truly did, there’s subject of debate there) over the Artesian Waters where they first walked on the world and it was the Artesian Waters’magic that drew them. Zhaitan just happened to also be there.

onemantankwall.3641:

Risen are undead which can also fall under the term resurrected corpse or even the souls of the kings and queens to be resurrected as eyes of zhaitan, i don’t believe dhuum would agree with that

And i would hope the gods arent as killable as zhaitan was… Sitting on a mountain letting u kill it instead of gliding and shredding the rest of the airship

Undeath and resurrection are not the same thing.

And Zhaitan’s fight being so bland was merely mechanics. It took a huge effort to take down Zhaitan. It is just that the effort was iff-screen or provided by NPCs. It took an army and weeks of hindering Zhaitan’s feeding to weaken him enough to take down. When we fought him, he was starving, practically blinded, and weakened. And we used specialized anti-risen weaponry to finish the job.

onemantankwall.3641:

With the gods gone playong in the mists what happens when Dhuum breaks out of prison and theres no one there to rival him any more? Seems like a much bigger threat than silly dragons

The presiding theory is that he has broken free. And that’s why there are Nightmares (Aatxes and such) flooding into Tyria at Godslost Swamp and Reaper’s Gate – because if Grenth had full control over the Underworld, would he allow such to happen?

Mickey Frogeater.1470:

Shiro, the Emissary of Dhuum, Razakel, The Fury, Jadoth, Varesh, General Kahyet, General Bayel, The Hunger, The Drought, The Blasphemy, the Ravager of Dreams, the Reaper of Agony, the Oath of Profanity, the Onslaught of Terror, the Master of Misery, the Flame of Fervor, the Consort of Ruin, the Bringer of Deceit, the Blade of Corruption, the Bearer of Misfortune, the Harbinger of Nightfall, the Seed of Suffering, the Shadow of Fear, the Shepherd of Dementia, the Shrieker of Dread, the Storm of Anguish and the Vision of Despair will all be working for Dhuum once he’s free as likely as not….

Double dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Double Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. All (known) dead. Dead. All (known) dead and purpose lost (no more Nightfall to harbing). Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead.

Most demons – if not all – encountered in Nightfall are dead. Even a god of death cannot lead the dead, unless he raises them as undead… and he hates undead.

You seem to under the presumption that souls and demons respawn when killed. Ignoring the whole “leaving then returning into an instance” situation, that’s not shown to occur. Ever.

For Shiro, we fight and potentially destroy his soul. We don’t know the fate of souls that are slain in the Mists (which is where the Realm of Torment is). That Canthan guard wouldn’t know either.

Razakel likely was referring to his form as Terrick with “this vessel”. Nothing says demons have souls either, and Razakel’s true form we slay. And I don’t take his words to indicate Khilbron has a phylactery at all either (despite the existence of the Ascended item which has no known baring in actual lore given that we didn’t destroy it to kill Khilbron).

BTW, the Fortune Teller wasn’t an avatar of Abaddon and avatars don’t need their gods to exist – the Seven Reapers are the souls of seven mortals who fought alongside Grenth to take down Dhuum, for example, and were merely granted “immortality” as their reward.

There’s a difference between it being what they do, and what their purpose is. Angel McCoy merely said that’s their “natural role” – but that doesn’t mean that it’s their purpose nor what they do nor what they’re intending to do.

What they intend to do, by all indications, is rule the world and destroy anything they cannot corrupt.

We honestly don’t know what happens if we kill an Elder Dragon. Though being said that their “natural role” is to balance magic, this may be their “natural role” in so much as it is a bee’s natural role to pollinate flowers. In that creatures adapted to function that way, but it’s not downright necessary (bees are needed for a lot of things in the ecosystem, but only because the ecosystem and bees evolved to be part of each other; and if they can survive being separated, then they’ll evolve again, and bees can be replaced by something else even if). But unlike with bees, killing off the Elder Dragons without a substitute may have no negative consequences. Magic might not be needing balancing. And if it does, what prevents a substitute from being put in place?

The biggest issue of your theory is that Mordremoth is to the west – the cinematic at the end of Battle of Lion’s Arch showed the ley line moving past Thaumanova Reactor, and following the line leads to roughly the Magus Falls. Furthermore, Jormag is to the north – it awoke near the arctic seas and has been moving south ever since; and it is still north of Frostgorge Sound.

Additionally, there is no ‘accident’ in the tunnel leading to Zone Green – each tunnel (more or less) has a ‘run-off room’. There’s one near Zone Blue which contains a hologram of multiple cubes; there’s a cargo room near purple and white, and then there’s the entrance between red and black.

Furthermore, the run-off room that you circled looks nothing like DR beyond containing a circle. That circle, by the way, is a purple glowing plant (not too dissimilar to the glow of Branded plants or Nightmare Court plants) and has a champion golem underneath it.

So… yeah, your theory doesn’t really work. It seems more of pure coincidence that Arah and Zone Black lines up, as well as the Dragon’s Lair and Zone Purple (Kralkatorrik isn’t even in that area anymore, BTW) lining up. Primordus may end up being in that area, but it seems unlikely given that’s where we’ll be heading next by all appearances; and the DSD would be a long way south for that compass to line up with that.

P.S., something like this would probably get more attention in the lore forum.

Season 2, which starts July 1st, is fully permanent content. It was revealed about 20 days ago – and there was a follow up live stream further elaborating that stuff.

It’s obvious that Evon was the one who blew up the Zephyrites. Why? Simple: they’re competition. Thanks to Kiel, Evon became likely to be the top merchant in Lion’s Arch, but he has a major competitor in the Zephyrites. Take out the Zephyrites, and he can easily have Lion’s Arch under his thumb – which was his original intention in forming the Black Lion Trading Post as shown in his background short story.

Evon is Season 2’s villain.

#TeamSuwash

/justcuz

The Maguuma Wastes is rather new, in terms of names. There was always arid parts of the Maguuma, but that was due to elevation – hence the “top” in Dry Top – but down in the canyons they had lots of vegetation. We see one such canyon in northwestern Brisban, but there’s no vegetation any more. Now the Maguuma Jungle is divided into three rather than two; before it was Tarnished Coast and the Maguuma Jungle, but now it’s Tarnished Coast, Magus Falls, and Maguuma Wastes.

In short, in the past 250 years those arid areas expanded greatly enough to be considered “dried up” rather than “away from the water table” (which is mentioned as being underneath the jungle and the reason why those lower lands had heavy vegetation).

The primary theory is Primordus having dug underneath the Maguuma at one point and dried that water table up a lot, and given we have destroyers in the Maguuma… that’s rather likely. The other primary theory being Mordremoth’s influence, but as we see with all other Elder Dragons – unless there’s a champion awake, the Elder Dragons don’t have influence while asleep. And we have no knowledge of a champion of Mordremoth (yet).

Smooth Penguin.5294:

Think about it, who was responsible for Lion’s Arch being destroyed? Kiel.

I’m not seeing this. Kiel was the one warning the Captain’s Council once evidence of the attack was delivered. While we were told that should Evon have been elected LA would have stood a better chance, it isn’t Kiel’s fault that LA was unprepared but the rest of the Captain’s Council.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

Now who was responsible for organizing the trade agreement, only to have the cargo filled with explosives? Kiel.

Who said that the explosives came from the cargo?

Smooth Penguin.5294:

Who benefits from the money raised by the Zephyrites to rebuild LA? Kiel.

All of Lion’s Arch, rather than just Kiel.
Who benefits from the money raised by the Zephyrites to rebuild LA? Kiel.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

Now that all the money was transferred to the Captain’s Council, she had no further need for them, so she blew up the airship, ala the Consortium ship in Southsun Cove’s LS.

She blew up a ship that had no one on board and in turn destroyed a bunch of paper contracts that kept refugees effective prisoners on an island full of hostiles.

Not exactly close to how you’re painting it.

CureForLiving.5360:

I have to disagree with you, they weren’t badly written, they weren’t written at all. They showed up with no explanation in game as to where they came from, who they were or anything.

Sure they did. Molten Alliance got this expositioned in at the end of Flame and Frost via interrogating prisoners; Twilight Assault’s short story gave the intro of the Nightmare Court working with Scarlet; krait, somewhat, got this when we met the first Oratuss.

It wasn’t well or fully written, but there was some of it. And it was that “so little of it” being written in that made it poorly done.

Actually, Aidan, that’s just mechanical because otherwise the Maguuma would be the smallest region in the game besides Orr. Sparkly Fen and Mount Maelstrom are NOT part of the Maguuma Jungle in terms of lore. Lore-wise, they’re part of the Steamspur Mountains (as is Timberline Falls).

Wanderer.3248:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

That kind of infers that dragons need champions to create minions.

The causation could be the reverse – dragons need champions to control minions, at least when they’re asleep.

Will we see minions right “out of the gate”? I’m not sure. If we do, they’ll probably be the lesser, dumber variety, building up to the champions later.

My point was that when Elder Dragons sleep, it has always been their champions creating their minions – and those that had minions while asleep, had champions waking from the previous dragon rise (Drakkar, Great Destroyer, Glint, and the Risen Giganticus Lupicus being the four minions we know come from the previous dragon rise).

Even when awake, it seems to be the champions controlling minions, never the Elder Dragons themselves. With no champion, all minions are mindless (or next to) and have a single tactic: “swarm them!”

Kalavier.1097:

I’ll note the Triad has been in the game since the start. It’s not like they are introducing brand new groups out of the blue if they use it. IMO, it’s likely going to be dealing with the Triad to fight to (and maybe take) Fort Vandal, then go past it to the wreckage.

Fort Vandal is most likely to be a dungeon, IMO, as its design matches dungeons from the BWEs – where there was a portal inside a structure, and a PoI on top of said structure (as well as a dungeon icon, since those others were already dungeons).

Given that Fort Vandal is already said to be a huge complex full of the Sinister Triad, it seems weird that it would be used for a mere zone portal.

Middle Eastern dragons were akin to European dragons, but wingless (or had such small wings they couldn’t fly), Wanderer. There’s more kinds of dragons than just the European standard and the Asian standard.

Jaken.6801:

Interesting Characters, but as long as they are not more pro-active aside from Majory, then please fade them out.

As long as they are not able to give us a “real” reason why they are involved in this stuff, aside from “we heard soemthing was going on here”, then please keep them away.
That is exactly everything they did in Season 1 (again, aside from majory who actually did something towards the end, however at that point several more qualified people should be able to extract more information out of everything…).

Give us a reason why we should follow them and not “more qualified” people, exept from “hey, they are our Biconics, people identify the LS with them and they like them.”

Less Fanservice, more (main-)story please

The biconics were involved because of Scarlet. Braham’s homestead was attacked, Rox was given orders – they met up in the MA threat which Scarlet was behind. Marjory and Kasmeer, co-workers, were hired to solve an assassination Scarlet. Since then, they were tracking Scarlet down, and ended up meeting up together during Tower of Nightmares. Scarlet was also why Taimi came in – she’s a fan of Scarlet’s work.

In Season 2, we’re already told what they’re going to be doing: investigating the dragon’s roar (Marjory+Kasmeer) and the voice in Scarlet’s head (Braham+Rox). And we have Belinda whom will likely act as a bridge, being that she’s Seraph assigned to Brisban Wildlands.

They always had a reason to be involved. It’s always been more than “I heard there’s something going on here” – it was “we got attacked by Scarlet and I want revenge/to stop her” and now it’s “we’re going to stop the threat behind Scarlet, and whatever her actions spurred.”

As said above, “I heard something was going on” is why the players are involved. We heard, or were asked for help, and we showed up. The biconics had legit reasons for showing up.

Jaken.6801:

So the player is even more usefull then the supposed “greatest detective”, does not really help the case.

I didn’t know Sherlock and Batman were in GW2! :O

In seriousness, whomever said Marjory was the greatest detective? She’s just a detective. A good one, but never called “the greatest.”

Kalavier.1097:

wouw.5837:

Erukk.1408:

I don’t think there are any strong examples of interracial relationships in lore, but it is possible. I think the most we have gotten is one-sided attractions. No children would ever come from those relationships though. We do have dev confirmation on that part.

They probably could get kids actually, only those kids would be infertile, like a donkey+horse=a mule(infertile)

No, actually Anet explicitly said before GW2 release that (at least as of GW2 depending on your viewpoint), there is no such thing as a halfbreed.

No half-norn, half humans exist in GW2. No half norn/half charr. It’s impossible.

Technically what was said is that no player races are compatible with each other genetically.

So a playable race + a non-playable, or two non-playable races, is not really off the table. However, beyond something like a jotun/ogre, hylek/heket, or krait/naga halfbreed, we have no real reason to believe such is possible.

Shiren.9532:

The Mesmer Collective is just a magical shoehorn used to wedge Kasmeer into the Tower of Nightmares release.

Hardly. The two showed up because Marjory is a detective and the veil was a mystery to be solved. Detectives love mysteries – that’s why they do the job they do.

There wasn’t a need for a mesmer collective just to “wedge” Kasmeer and Marjory into that plot.

Look at the Labyrinthine Cliffs map and you’ll see 11 maps. And that’s just that docked for Bazaar/Festival of the Four Winds. Zephyr Sactum is just the largest, where the Master of Peace resides. It is, after all, a flotilla.

In Festival, a new designed ship was introduced, and at the end of the explosions it is struck in the trailer. We only see two ships exploded, but given the size of Zephyr Sanctum, it wouldn’t be impossible for others to be struck.

Yes. It was a heavy point (hardly minor when the constant messages of the gods come via dreams and two main plot characters is centered around these) in Nightfall with Melonni and how Abaddon influenced the world through making nightmares reality.

I just rewatched and there’s no destroyers in the cinematic.

As well as Fields of Ruin, half of Blazeridge and Frostgorge, and 3/4 of Fireheart. But that’s all semantics. :P

Egg Shennn.6240:

Yeah I remember the mission, I just thought these ghosts were really meaning there was a champion there, and with seeing the shimmery ghost like figure, thought it may actually be that they plan to open that and there be a champion there.

There is a champion there, and that area does open up – for a group event. This one.

Aerinndis.2730:

You mean southwest corner of the map don’t you instead of southeast? I also see a faint path out of Aurora’s Remains in the upper left of that part of the map. Should be interesting to find out. Good find.

Er, yes. I sometimes mix up my west and east.

And that path just leads to the Demagogue event that’s been there since release.

kefkejaco.5642:

Well I actually didn’t see that before. Because the cinematic showed some waste lands after going through thaumova i tough it would go more to the maguuma waste side and that they would take a northern entrance. Maybe they will use the northern later then or as another way to a second zone above the dry top part. But I still can’t find how to unfog the new map piece tough xp

The new piece cannot be unfogged yet – that map I linked was pulled from the gw.dat, not the game. If it can be unfogged, then it’s via map exploiting (and there’s nothing there in-game yet, folks have checked).

The northern portal was most likely to lead to a scrapped piece of Kryta that was talked about in this interview. I don’t expect to see it anytime soon.

I don’t think they were shot. There’s no trail on those explosions – they happened from within. Which means that whomever it was that set them off was on the ship itself. And there were no (apparent) bandits/White Mantle/Inquest in Labryinthine Cliffs to board the ship then.

The only highlighted person who joined the Zephyrites would be Trader Aerin. But that could easily be a red-herring given that he said he was leaving his gear on the docks because as he was told it is customary to leave one’s burdens when first joining the Zephyrites. Which either means that the explosives where brought on board by a returning passenger, or the Zephyrites brought them themselves (and whomever set them off did not bring them). Which either means accident or internal conflict or returning passenger/sleeper.

Or, I suppose, it could have taken place a bit after an Aetherblade attack, with a survivor of the Aetherblades hiding after the Zephyrites won the battle. But that seems like a stretch. Saboteur is more likely, IMO.

Ascalon is the Iron Legion homeland now (though originally all charr are said to come from east of the Blazeridge); where Ash makes its home and citadel, or if they have such, is unknown.

Well originally, they anchored in Labyrinthine Cliffs because of the Bazaar of the Four Winds – not to trade with LA. This time, it’s more a reuse of resources (and the Bazaar of the Four Winds taking place there again as decided to for explaining said reuse) than “we’re trading with Lion’s Arch, but landing far away.”

Mordremoth did awake in a heavily forested area… that’s on the other side of a desert-like area. The scene right after the Thaumanova showing was an arid wasteland. Where we’re going now may be that arid wasteland.

Morfedel.4165:

kefkejaco.5642:

But what is this map update of brisban wildlands whith festival update? I have not seen it.

Me neither, do tell.

Since I haven’t seen this answered yet, there was a part of the world map for Brisban that was added. You can see the edge of it if you unfog Toxal Bog and Aurora’s Remains, but dat diving uncovered the full of it. Here is one version:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/images/archive/e/e4/20140607172200!Brisban_Wildlands_map.jpg

Southeast corner. A pond, a small structure, and a very faint path to the edge of the map.

Dual.8953:

Was that a Scarab at 1 minute into the video?
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Moss_Scarab

Devourer.

kny.3789:

on second look devourers seems much more obvious, especially the smaller ones. could/would mordy hold sway over such creatures? or maybe its the classic “the local wildlife is riled up cause ‘x’ badguy is doing ‘y’ thing” i just hope they pull something completely unexpected like my initial “what if afflicted?” speculation. maybe blowing up the zaphyrites was unexpected but its hard to get excited about that.

Devourers – namely, Thorn Devourers – were commonplace in the more arid areas of the Maguuma Jungle (now called the Maguuma Wastes).

I don’t see why they’d be related to Mordremoth, given we’re still far from where he awoke.

kny.3789:

not to argue the point, but jormag started corrupting things many years before his awakening, like jora’s brother svanir. and primordus had a pretty good army of destroyers + a champion in gw1. i agree that its likely we wont see mordy minions for a while but we cant rule out that they are there.

Jormag and Primordus had minions before they woke because they had a champion that was awake. Mordremoth, as far as we know, did not. Zhaitan might have, the other two unknown.

Shiren.9532:

It’s probably on the other side of the portal inside of Fort Vandal.

Or part of the new area in SE Brisban, which is IMO far more likely.

Shiren.9532:

Where are people getting Aetherblades from?

Explosions in the air, I’m guessing.

Of course, nothing really says that those explosions are at all related to the Inquest seen.

Egg Shennn.6240:

Was just checking out all the area;

The portal in Brisban, behind the bushes you can’t get through has something that looks sort of like a shimmery figure in front of it, not sure, hard to tell. But the shining blade ghosts in that Aurora ruins area say there is a White mantle Champion in there somewhere, and all I saw was some normal white mantle ghosts, no champion. So wondering if when the access opens, if the shimmery figure ends up being a white mantle champion in front of the portal.

The Brisban bandit talk (not sure if people are discussing it anywhere) has to be about the fort a little ways above where aurora is, that’s filled with level 80 champion bandits. No way to actually fight them, though with 1200 range weapons, you can poke at them, and get them to pretty much one shot you down… Not sure how that fort will get implemented for play, 80 lv foes in a much lower lv zone.

All that has been there since release. The “shimmery figure” is the Champion Demagogue, part of an event chain. Behind him is nothing, no portal or the like.

They have a lot to deal with the Elder Dragons. What if they were investigating Mordremoth’s rise (or intending to)?

I don’t think that was exactly an attack – you often see your enemies before such if they’re coming at you. Yet they were calm up until the explosions. And they know about Aetherblades (whom are hiding out in the Mists under Mai Trin’s orders presently) and have defenses (even if rather primitive looking) so it would seem weird that they’d be caught off-guard completely.

draxynnic.3719:

Actually, there is some minor indication – Fort Koga was supposed to be protecting a western trade route. Who that trade was with was left up in the air – there might be another nation on the coast, for instance.

I had always thought that the trade route was basically Kryta’s way to bypass Orrian guilds in trading with Cantha and Elona, given the state of the Guild Wars (mainly third). It was said to fall into disuse after the Guild Wars ended so it would make sense.

Though a nation to the west could have been the topic of Utopia, perhaps? Which would be placed on the continent west of Tyria in this map.

Sirius.4510:

Yeah, I’m pretty sure this means they’re not heading to Cantha, which is interesting. I hadn’t figured on them having anything to do with Season 2 either.

But no, there isn’t a lot out that way – that we know of. Maguuma was the end of the region we explored in GW1, and it didn’t seem any more inhabited in GW2.

They appeared to have just come from Cantha, and there was a Zephyrite who said they wouldn’t likely return to where they just visited for some time due to distance.

Xhelock.7803:

Hmm… I really want to see what is the the east of the Crytal Desert and east of the Blazeridge mountains.

East of the Blazeridge is the Blood Legion lands (continued) where the Blood Citadel is located.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

2) The final cut scene showing the ley line path runs through Brisban and through the reactor

There’s nothing in that cinematic that definitively points to Brisban. After the reactor you have a wasteland, which is more likely to be west of Metrica (Ettin’s Back or Dry Top from GW1 – that general area, west of Brisban too), before you have a generic forested area.

sigh

It’s an opinion. I’m allowed to have one, ya know.

You aren’t of the same opinion. Fine.

Then don’t state that’s a fact. :P

ascii.9267:

The portal surrounded by thorned vines seen in the image on the main site that says “season 2 starts july 1” is in Brisban Wildlands. I’ve been to it and it’s currently blocked by other vines. It’s kinda hidden in the lower southwest corner of the map.

That’s the old map and what you circled is the passage into Aurora’s Remains.

sorudo.9054:

in order to go down you at times first need to go up.
i……have no idea what you mean….
that’s not something i can answer, i don’t work for Anet and only Anet knows.

1. Except when you can just go straight west to the target. Which seems to be what they’re doing, given the new area to Brisban.
2. Why make that new area in Brisban, if you’re not going to use it?
3. But you can hypothesize.

kefkejaco.5642:

But the region north of brisban still belong to the regions that in gw1 belonged to the maguuma jungle. It may be krytan territory but still belongs to maguuma so expansion could go in both directions. We still don’t no where modremoth actually lives so it could be more west.

The area north of Brisban is actually both Kryta and Maguuma. It would literally land in the center of Majesty’s Rest of GW1 which was the border of Kryta and the Maguuma (in that portion).

We have a fairly good guess of where Mordremoth is, thanks to the cinematic showing a path through Thaumanova Reactor. The path would thus place it somewhere in northern Magus Falls most likely.

Underdark.3726:

why is everyone so sure the portal is in Brisban? Maybe is in Metrica Province.

Two reasons: 1) Belinda mentioned going into Brisban during the Aftermath content. 2) Brisban Wildlands’ map got updated with the Festival update.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

2) The final cut scene showing the ley line path runs through Brisban and through the reactor

There’s nothing in that cinematic that definitively points to Brisban. After the reactor you have a wasteland, which is more likely to be west of Metrica (Ettin’s Back or Dry Top from GW1 – that general area, west of Brisban too), before you have a generic forested area.

Kulvar.1239:

Just to be clear : Charrs aren’t purring fur ball. Players do whatever they want, but the lore is the lore. You try to hug a Charr, he scratch and howl back.

Not really. There’s a Zephyrite child and a charr near the Ice Elemental event in Labyrinthine Cliffs in which the boy says the charr is beautiful and has a pretty coat of fur, rather than being mean and scary like he’s heard about charr. The charr acts tough (“I’m plenty scary!”) but still gets a bit bashful at the compliment.

Just because charr are warlike as a race doesn’t mean they’ll get hostile for being hugged as individuals.

Kulvar.1239:

Asura like intelligence, big forehead, big ears, small size, huge head.

In general. But odd-balls exists. And it’s really just intelligence really, though there are side-comments about big ears or large craniums. The rest I’ve never seen.

Kulvar.1239:

Charr like their partner tall, strong, ferocious.

Can you source, because I’ve never seen that. I don’t think I’ve seen any “preferences” for charr dating, really.

Back in GW1, drakes were mechanically part of the same overarching family (a mechanical setting that things such as disease and edge of extinction triggered on). Lorewise, they were not dragons. Nothing lorewise points them to being dragons.

This said, dragons in Cantha were a very certain thing and some were similar to drakes in general (mainly the Turtle Dragons – and the Dragon Moss was also very similar, though being a plant not reptile). So there are non-Elder Dragon-related dragons (also, all the Bone Dragons).

There are quite a few asura who show worry and care for others that aren’t asura. But many do hide that worry and care behind “I’m just afraid we’ll lose whatever intelligence they have” or “if they’re gone, my genius is vulnerable!” (for those whom are in hostile areas). Not many, but enough to be noticed if you read dialogue.

Atlas.9704:

Even within the Pact there’s Fia and Jasper (Sylvari and Human). Jasper came back to find her because

“I followed you. I didn’t want to, at first, but I realized camp was a lot less interesting without you.”

It has been a while since I did that event.
I’m unsure of the tone and how he says it, but it could be taken as a simple moment between friends. It could also be taken that he does like her.

If you talk to him during and after he does give hints of having more-than-friends feelings for her. But she’s oblivious to it. That was actually the event I had in mind with my own post where we see humans interested in sylvari but no sign of any sylvari interested in humans.

Atlas.9704:

Also there’s a Norn Lionguard woman who hits on Charr and Norn at Twinspur Haven Waypoint. She asks if you like to drink or fight, with a charm option as a reply.
When attempting to talk with her as a smaller race (human/slyvari/asura) she isn’t as interested.

Apparently she likes big guys.

Or she likes those who look like tough fighers who can hold their ales – because she’s a norn, and norn in general tend to love fights and drinking contests (or just drinking). I don’t read anything special into that (or the drunken line about asura hitting on him by calling him a bookah, that’s more a joke on human ignorance).

There are a couple examples of humans liking norn though – before destruction in LA there were two human females who comment on two passing norn, one of which blatantly gives a sultry comment on the man. In Timberline Falls there’s a Vigil patrol where a human guy is constantly trying to woo a female norn with poetry (and she’s constantly turning him down).

The others couldn’t, as for CoE the labs are meant to be under the zones of the same color lorewise, and with AC the two Foefire’s Heart places are meant to line up (lorewise the PoI is that tunnel Dougal climbed down, I believe, why Magdaer is down there Idk in all honesty unless the spell crashed it through the ground which would explain the hole with the light and the name), but the spot of the sword in AC is underneath Iron Marches (and, oddly, with a ceiling – most likely an oversight there).

Joy’s End is also somewhat underground and Twilight Arbor views the sky, but Joy’s End is on an incline, higher than TA. Thus cannot work together. Especially now that TA has an airport.

During a Live stream, Angel McCoy said there weren’t going to be highlighted interracial relationships (this was in response to being asked if Braham and Rox will become a couple) – though as we can see in-game, they do make jokes of humans interested in norn and sylvari romantically or sexually (but thus far never the other way around).

This said, there really isn’t saying such cannot happen – just that such wouldn’t be highlighted anytime soon.

Kalavier.1097:

Also, to expand on Order of Whispers, the members in GW1 all had the same uniform.

False.

And GW1 made it a point to say that those we meet are only those who wish themselves revealed because they’re footsoldiers against demons and we’re allied. Jurah said he has men linked to the Clanmarshals of Istan, but we never see any men drapped in red robes around there.