I am doubtful. There’s no implication that the Golem’s Eye had anything to do with the risen. Keep in mind that in the novels the risen are said to keep moving even after dismemberment. Simple decapitation won’t stop the body or the head. Cut off an arm? That arm will still try to strangle you.
So it would make sense that the body parts would try to reform if in close enough proximity.
Where was Scarlet at the end? “Tyria needs me”? Or “Tyria will bow before a new master”? Apparently both, but they’re fundamentally contradictory. I think it’s still possible to redeem her somewhat, if handled carefully. But I’ll be disappointed if “Tyria needs me” ends with “…because that’s what Mordremoth told me”.
Well if we assume Scarlet was indeed corrupted, then it wouldn’t be the first time a dragon minion has claimed that countering their master is poisoning the land. So it isn’t so contradictory.
It’s also possible that her “Tyria will bow to a new master” is a “if I die here” kind of statement. Or she was to the point of bipolar – which her rant before the Prime Hologram fight certainly shows happening. But yeah, everything else you said, concur.
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I think you’re recalling the Dolyak Express Q&A in which Jeff Grubb responded to a question about the gods, saying thus:
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.
In all honesty, it’s hard to say which can be more accurate because, well, EVERYTHING is in the Mists. So to say something is or isn’t in the Mists can mean a) it is/isn’t in the space between worlds, b) it is/isn’t in the afterlives, or c) it is/isn’t in Tyria.
Honestly, I think Jeff is referring to the last, while Rhie refers to the first or second (given her “they aren’t in the Mists, that’s for sure” kind of explanation).
No better way to welcome the new gamers of china than to introduce them to temporary content immediately!?
Yea recycled stuff!
That’s like saying they welcomed Factions’ release with the temporary content of birthday celebration.
I think this update proves that Crown Pavilion and Bazaar of the Four Winds are not “temporary” but RETURNING content. There’s a big difference.
I’d be incredibly surprised if we ended up visiting Cantha any time soon, but I can’t help but wonder about the Cantha theme aboard the Zephyr Sanctum. Has it just returned from Cantha? I wonder if it’ll bring news of what’s going on there.
I wonder if it has anything to do with Tsuru Whitewing, the new mini that could, in my view, be a potential tengu b-iconic. The tengu name their houses after each of the four winds, and we don’t actually know who runs the Bazaar of the Four Winds…
It’s not a Canthan theme. It’s a Chinese theme, because, y’know, Chinese release. I don’t think there’ll be a lore explanation for that – and if it is, it’ll be no different than Dragon Bash’s explanation – Canthan descendants coming to decorate in their tradition.
Also, we were told that the Bazaar of the Four Winds is run by black market folk, I believe. It’s unrelated to tengu as far as all indications go, despite the rampant theories connecting exactly what you connected since Bazaar of the Four Winds’ update last year was announced.
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It should be kept in mind that when Primordus woke up, nothing truly cataclysmic happened in the area around him.
Kralkatorrik actively made the Dragonbrand and did so while hunting down a renegade champion. Zhaitan had a peninsula collapsed on top of him.
Jormag also did very little the instance he woke up – though he capsized the kodan’s Sanctuaries as he scattered them, and though he shattered the Far Shiverpeaks to make Frostgorge Sound, the latter seems to be after he pushed the norn south (given that they fought against him in norn lands, and the shattering submerged about 60% of those lands if not more than) which in turn happened 4 years after waking (the norn had known Jormag was coming from a 4 year long blizzard before he actually was confronted), and given the kodan fled south as well as north, the capsizing of the Sanctuaries likely happened after shattering the Shiverpeaks – making his actual waking up… uneventful.
So there’s not necessarily a need for an immediate cataclysmic event from waking. Not beyond seismic activity from them unburrowing themselves. Which reportedly is already happening.
Actually, it’s possible that we have already seen the destruction caused by Mordremoth. Mordremoth is supposed to cause insanity, and who do we know who is insane and caused widespread destruction?
Scarlet and the entire Thorn family.
Nothing concretely says that Mordremoth causes insanity.
And if you look at it in certain lights, all Elder Dragons cause insanity in some fashion. But you shouldn’t try to link all insanity (such as the Thorn family) to Elder Dragons if you’re arguing that. It would be like saying all fire elementals are tied to Primordus, and all ice magic is tied to Jormag.
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Grenth is in the mists, likely in his house in the underworld.
And the Mad Realm is also in the Underworld….. What are the chances that Grenth won’t get bored enough to spend a day in the Mad Realm as Mad King Thorn’s guest?
According to Priestess Rhie (who acts like she is speaking for the general knowledge of the human priesthood), states that it is “known” that the Six are not in the Mists. And we know they’re not in Tyria.
So the gods are most likely in another world. Which excludes the Underworld from possibilities, given that it is in the Mists. Even in GW1, the gods were not in their realms.
Grenth showing up for Halloween is extremely unlikely given ArenaNet’s actions on the Six thus far in GW2.
What is most likely is a mere expansion of Eddie and Ozzy’s conflict, since that was the plot element of Halloween 2014’s plot, even without Eddie’s presence. No need for new faces, though some returning ones wouldn’t be bad (I’m looking at you, Dhuumy-boy).
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Really? Where is that event at? Don’t recall ever seeing it.
Though if it is in Orr then that would explain it. Never cared much for those events given how lackluster their lore-giving is.
There I meant only those three are named by player-known dwarven records (those names come from dwarven legends, Kralk’s name comes from Glint, Mordremoth’s name comes from outside in-game lore). To our knowledge, jotun records – which is where we get the number 6 from – does not name any dragon.
Wait a minute! Were the Krait around during the last rise of the dragons?
Like with the tengu and kodan, there are theories for it – which Aaron pointed out the basics of them all – but no solid confirmation nor solid support.
@Tamias: For once, I completely agree.
I know that Kuunavang is not an elder dragon. Didn’t say that he was. That is why I said that I knew that she is not a dragon like Zaitahan.
Also, I knew Kuunavang is a she, I don’t know why I wrote ‘he’ and ‘him’. Stupid mistake.
I also know that all the dragons of Cantha are not elder dragons, I think that is obvious. Just like I think it is obvious that Glint was not an elder dragon. Because I felt that it was obvious, I didn’t think I need to state it.
I also have seen those comments that state that Kuunavang may have been a dragon champion, but as you said, the comments were not very solid so I didn’t mention it.
What I meant by my comment was that Canthan’s are aware of Dragon’s existence. Not elder dragons perhaps, but dragons of the Glint/Kuunavang variety.
We don’t know if Cantha is aware of Elder Dragons now or not. I am certain they know that something big is up now that waterways have been cut off between Tyria and Cantha. Perhaps they even were made aware of Zaihtan’s rise before communication was severed. I don’t know. No one does. But Cantha was well aware of dragons’ existence even if it was dragon’s of the lesser variety.
You said “Though admittedly, I am no expert on dragon lore, it is obvious that Cantha was aware of them.” and this is what I was countering – it is not obvious that they’re aware of Elder Dragons, certainly not because of Kuunavang.
But now you say we don’t know if Cantha is aware.
Actually, there are records about six dragons. In the Priory you can find a charr scholar (Who is also in the Order of Whispers) who mentions “Five races against six dragons.”
And that’s dialogue before Zhaitan was defeated.
If you read my post in its entirity, you would have seen me state – and I quote myself – “We only know of six because that’s what jotun and dwarven records amount to (mainly jotun, dwarven records to our knowledge only account 3 dragons: Jormag, Zhaitan, and Primordus).”
The Priory only knows due to the jotun and dwarven records I state. The charr you mentioned – Scholar Trueclaw – and the other nearby scholars with dialogue on the Elder Dragons explain that they know only due to the jotun and dwarven records (which are old, sometimes rewritten, and thus outright stated to be potentially fallible).
I think the Canthans are aware of the existence of the dragons:
out of ‘winds of change’ in the Durmand priory base in DR: “They’ve closed their shores to us and left us to fight the dragons alone. To the Mists with them.”
That was written by a Tyrian who basically vandalized a library book. It is of non-decernable and thus untrusthworthy source and doesn’t state that the Canthans knew of Elder Dragons.
Eh, Cantha IIRC cut off contact before Zhaitan rose.
Cantha isolated itself but kept trade until Zhaitan’s rise – per Sea of Sorrows, as Cobiah had been on Cantha via royal trading. Jormag had been awake by about 50 years, and was the first Elder Dragon known to the common Tyrian (Primordus may have been awake roughly 50 years longer, but his influence was highly isolated to the dwarves, so few knew of him immediately).
Cantha may have known but only of Jormag and via word of mouth – unless the orders expanded into Cantha and brought knowledge of Primordus with them too.
They may know of the deep sea dragon, depending on its location.
Not touching the asian-community-view thing even with a 10 foot pole.
The dragons of Cantha are NOT Elder Dragons. Dragon != Elder Dragon. Nor is there confirmation that there’s any correlation between the Canthan dragons and Elder Dragons. Though there are hints to Kuunavang being a dragon champion like Glint, but these hints are far and few in-between, and don’t hold much weight due to the abstractness of the comments.
Also, Kuunavang is a she. :P
@Ayakaru: Zhaitan is dead/defeated. Jormag and Primordus are not “incarcarated” but are fully active (one’s being held off by the dwarves, the other is held off by nothing but basic resistances). Kralkatorrik isn’t really “pre-occupied”, and is active just not as active as the others. And the DSD is also active, as evident by its kicking out the quaggan, krait, and possibly largos and karka out of their homelands. Land-dwelling Tyrians just don’t know much, but the aquatic races (which don’t share much on the topic – or anything at all for most of them) do.
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That fire shaman one is always the same name. Always the same guy. I think the line about sending another one is more of a lampshade joke over the fact that the events recycle.
@Horst: That’s actually exactly what they said they were doing when Flame and Frost was ending (and again, when Last Stand at Southsun was ending) – that they were providing hints and clues that culmnivate into the the overarching plot so while it sounds disorderly, it isn’t.
The thing is, that they gave too little too slowly. Each update held so little story to it, that players were not satisfied. They prefer bursts of story, so they don’t have to remember obscure things from months ago – like when Twilight Assault came out, we finally got the answer of why the Aetherblades were stealing holoprojectors during DragonBash. This is why in terms of story, except for the repetitive nature of wiping out the Afflicted in Part 1, the Winds of Change update was well received – it was 3 large updates of content. In a similar light, after the immediate “omg we’re finally getting content again!” of War in Kryta died down, there was complaints when the updates hit a ~4 week hiatus after very frequent update schedule of little over time.
That’s the delivery issue – well, half of the issue – with Season 1. We got too little of a plot in too long of a timespan. It would be like we only got 1-3 Personal Story steps released to us every 2 weeks. That’d be nearly a year from the tutorial to killing Zhaitan at long last. I doubt many people would have liked that (though it wouldn’t be so disliked since it is setting the precedent rather than having something before it like Season 1 did (having the personal story)).
The other half of the issue is that we didn’t get nearly enough to properly understand all that we were given. So we’re wading through stuff we’ve got going in the completely wrong direction – and this is why the Dead End investigation that Stooperdale mentioned was needed to be put in. Not only as a recap, but to explain the many things we misunderstood due to poor delivery.
If Summoned Husks are a result of Mordremoth’s corruption, you mean.
But druid husks are not corrupted in any fashion.
For an open world example: you kill Kor the giant, and Daithor the Drill several times throughout events. Not to include the fire shaman in Iron MArches who’s name I can’t recall, the three named negotiators of the Sinister Triad just outside Fort Vandal, and dozens of others.
It is indeed possible – I won’t say which is more likely, but it’s possible they do have a well thought out story but delivered it poorly (that’s been my opinion the entire time tbh). And really I think it feels dragged out because we’re used to game stories being available all at once, rather than released slowly over time like tv series, webcomics, etc.
But usually for highlighted bosses and the like they don’t re-used models.
I mean, with the Molten Alliance alone they made 6 brand new models (3 charr, 3 dredge), when they clearly didn’t have to (could have done the typical “stick CoF/SE armor onto them” like they did with the mooks).
Unless there actually is a connection between the Shadow of the Dragon and Mordremoth, in that it is one of his dragon champions, then it is highly unlikely to be utilizing the same model. Since they can use the same frame and animations as the other dragon enemies (Shadow of the Dragon, Tequatl, Shatterer, Claw of Jormag, and the various risen dragons seen throughout the PS and Arah dungeon), a new skin (or model if you prefer) wouldn’t be much work.
Actually, nothing says Zhaitan is undead. He’s called the Elder Undeath Dragon because he uses undeath in his minions.
Do you work at ArenaNet, Windu? Have you seen their offices? Read their scripts?
How do you know that their story and lore isn’t deep and thought out, and not just poorly delivered? The fact is that you don’t. Even in GW1 – for all the praises of how much better it was in story – was pretty terrible in delivery outright as well. It just had better NPC AI (allied and foe) so it felt like it flowed better.
So don’t go saying “there’s nothing to think about” when there very well may be. And even if there isn’t, since it isn’t told, they could change their minds and alter the untold story by being inspired by us.
There’s a few interesting bits once you hit the Twilight Assault (mainly a heavy hint that the secret with Caithe will be revealed) and Tower of Nightmares stuff (which Aaron went over in the “You are the present of my becoming” thread that’s still on the first page atm), and the occasional mention of how they intended to portray Scarlet and other new characters (Braham and Rox were gone into with F&F stuff) – which is basically a carefree madman who turns serious over time as her goal came to be… which I kinda see but they did a rather bad job of showing that it was anything like a pre-designed intention.
But it’s mostly just a recap. Though it is interesting how they worded their response about how Scarlet would affect the Dream and other sylvari. Seems to me they intend to have a sylvari in Season 2 go mad like Scarlet due to her share of into the Dream.
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Given that the minions in the other experimental labs are in advanced stages of corruption and are called “evolved” (although this may not necessarily refer to how corrupted they are) I’d say it’s a reasonable assumption that the nightmare husks and hounds there are “fully corrupted”. Just so we’re on the same page, I’m not saying that they are fully corrupted, just that they could well be.
I would argue otherwise. Sparkfly Fen would not happen long before Crucible of Eternity, storywise, so there isn’t that much time passed between the Inquest acquiring husks and them being in CoE. Furthermore, destroyer and risen corruption is (usually) instantaneous, and while Icebrood is not, except for the Colossus all are in standard (not long progressed) states.
I don’t think anyone ever claimed to know what they were called. Unless you’re saying that we can’t speculate, in which case unless someone died and made you king of the lore forums, we kind of can.
I never said we cannot speculate, however, my point was not in someone claiming a name, but that we don’t know the name – and as such, we have even less hold on what Mordremoth’s method of corruption is.
Like before, you completely took my point the other way around.
I think the most likely contender is nightmare to be honest, since that seems to be Mordremoth’s vector for spreading corruption. It’s also used for all suspected minions of Mordremoth (husks, hounds, vines) except for the Shadow of the Dragon.
And this is my issue with your wording. Not that your theorycrafting, but you’re stating it as fact.
It is not the most likely contender because we know far too little, and NOTHING connects, firmly, that the Nightmare is dragon corruption. If you still retain it’s the “most likely contender” that contender is as big as an ant.
Finally, we do see hounds without courtiers in at least one place I can think of off the top of my head, in the sylvari tutorial instance.
Except that the entire thing is outright stated to be the Nightmare Court’s doing. They’re still tied to Nightmare, and not to anything else or lacking Nightmare Court influence.
All I was saying that because all the other minions in those labs are dragon minions, to me it seems likely that the husks and hounds are as well. That’s all. I said nothing about how they came to be dragon minions (although the Inquest explanation seems unlikely given these creatures’ activities elsewhere).
Wow, why is this not more common knowledge? The husks and hounds are linked to Mordremoth, but up until now we had nothing linking Mordremoth and the Nightmare Court. If the NC are responsible for creating the husks, then that’s something that directly relates them and Mordremoth.
It felt more than heavily implied.
Let me do a more direct counter to your statement then: Just because Husks can be corrupted by Mordremoth, doesn’t mean in any way, shape, or form that their originators are already corrupted by Mordremoth – which is what you rather explicitly state, that linking the Husks’ origin to the Nightmare Court links the Nightmare Court to Mordremoth (even though there’s no evidence to support any husk outside CoE is influenced by Mordremoth).
As an aside, I think you’re looking at the “different kind of minions” thing the wrong way. -snip-
You completely misunderstood me. And insult me by believing I don’t know everything you posted in that paragraph, when I was the one who had pointed them to you before.
I was saying that in the most generals of generals, this is what minions are – that they are created either from organic or inorganic matter, and never made themselves. That each and every one of them comes from something. Be it rock (destroyers), ice (Icebrood Elementals), lightning (Branded Air Elemental), or other.
The hounds, being born from the Pale Tree like the sylvari, cannot count as this in of itself. You tend to try to do one or the other. In the case of mentioning sylvari, I was making a pre-emptive strike since you went further off-topic with bringing up the Wychmire Swamp meta and Shadow of the Dragon – both of which are 100% completely irrelevant to the topic OP, or to my comment of no concrete proof of Mordremoth minions (or influence beyond CoE).
On the flip side, Husks, being made of organic matter, cannot be like destroyers, which the typical view of them as dragon minions (not necessarily by you) takes them as.
All I can offer is speculation based on what I think is probable, which is (rather explicitly) what I have been doing throughout this thread. I’m not sure why that upsets you so much—that’s what lore forums are for.
You completely missed why your post felt like a slap to my face, as well as your latest response. It is not you theorizing. It is you acting like I don’t know all these points you repeatedly bring up, knowing that you’ve told them to me previously – and possibly even knowing that I myself have brought them up before.
It seems you’d rather only discuss the “solid” information we have on Mordremoth, which actually amounts to very little.
No, rather, I’d stop trying to take “most likelies” as facts, which you have a huge tendency to do. And I’d rather you stop trying to bring out every point of “fact” to me every single time this discussion is held.
The search is terrible on this forum, because there’s an entire forum dedicated to discussing lore.
Firstly, I am well aware of all the evidence for your theorycrafting, seeing how I was amongst the first to make the correlation between Wychmire Swamp and Mordremoth – and then some. Please do not insult me. If it was not intended to be insulting, it certainly read as such to me.
Secondly, as I tried to imply, those Nightmare Hounds and Summoned Husks may be tied to Mordremoth, but if so it could just as easily be because the Inquest made them tied to Mordremoth. To claim that their existence in Experimental Green Lab proves that Mordremoth makes either is like claiming that Bjarl the Rampager, and all the other icebrood and risen were always (read: created as and never anything else) icebrood or risen. I doubt you’d claim that, , because doing so would be just silly as we know full well that those are corrupted beings, so why claim that the husks come from Mordremoth?
We see two kinds of minions in the most general sense amongst all dragons: those that were made from non-living materials (e.g., rock, fire, ice, lightning), and those that were made out of living or deceased materials.
The sad fact of the matter is that we have absolutely ZERO confirmed cases of Mordremoth minions. We do not know what they are made of or what they look like. We, in fact, actually have zero proof that Mordremoth’s minions will even be plants! The attack named after him is soil and rock, not plant, so it could be that Mordremoth will end up being a bunch of rock minions – likely? No, not really. The name “Jungle Dragon” comes form its location though and we really don’t have any solid evidence of his corruption – not even Wychmire Swamp is solid evidence (that darker force can be any number of things – Elder Dragons aren’t the only ones whom are dark and ancient forces). Again, the closest we have is Crucible of Eternity, but also again – how much corruption is there in those minions? Is that how Mordremoth’s minions will look like when fully corrupted? What they’d be called? Keep in mind not all corruption takes immediate physical change (Icebrood), nor do all those with draconic influence look at all like a dragon minion when the like-dragon minions change instantly. And for name, ArenaNet would easily keep such secret to make it more surprising (it’s more likely to be Blighted than Nightmare or Summoned, or heck, it may even be “Planted” or “Sprouted” or even “Mordy”). We simply do not know. And as such, we cannot make claims to such – even if it is “a simpler explanation” or most likely or most obvious or whatever you wish to call it (ArenaNet are seldom simple in their lore, either way).
But of what we see with four cases, all dragon minions are created from something, never born (unlike sylvari), and in three cases they come from living and/or dead animals. Mordremoth is likely the same as those three cases but with plants. So that means that in order to create dragon minions, it must obtain already living, or dead, plant-life – or it’ll be making plant matter from non-plants (which, again, does not fit with the hounds or sylvari’ birth).
So again, even if those in Crucible of Eternity are tied to Mordremoth, nothing says that they originate from Mordremoth. As in, their point of origins is Mordremoth, which is what you presented as fact (it is, rather, simply the most obvious outcome in your perspective). And this is what I was saying.
TL;DR Husks and Hounds in CoE are tied to Mordremoth, those outside have no proof of such.
On an aside, no, hounds always appear with Nightmare Courtiers nearby (exception being the Crucible of Eternity, but that does not prove any unique origin away from the Court, given that we see Inquest and Nightmare Courtiers doing trades). Crucible of Eternity is the only place we see Nightmare Hounds without Nightmare Courtiers – not even at Wychmire Swamp.
The physical corruption of the hounds is actually the single strongest argument for the Nightmare to be tied to dragon corruption. The second strongest being the change in mentality to sylvari.
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For engineers, it was said that they’re a pure technology profession, but they do use magical aspects in their chemicals and elixers, etc. The healing turret for example was said to use some sort of magical mist that heals wounds. But this is a “in general cases” and not hardcore lore for each individual case. Same for appearance. They keep these things overall open ended for the sake of role play.
It was brought to my attention that I was misremembering the event chain.
What I thought was the case was NC capturing 3 sylvari and sacrificing them to spawn a husk which is then traded to the Inquest.
What happens is that the Inquest traded the 3 captured sylvari for the husk after which (2 hours later real time) they are sacrificed in some unanimated ritual with proclamations of such being done to “strengthen the spawn.” After a bit, the event chain resets – husk given to Inquest for three sylvari. Etc. Only enemies in the area are Courtiers, Nightmare Hounds, and the traded husk.
Also, Tamias, we have no solid proof that hounds (which come from the Pale Tree) and husks are tied to Mordremoth – at least as far as their origin is concerned. Best we have is their presence in Experimental Lab Green but it could be that they brought them there (traded for with NC) to expose to Mordremoth’s corruption.
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In Sparkfly Fen, there is an event in which we see Nightmare Courtiers making husks out of three sylvari sacrifices, if I remember correctly.
So it would seem that husks are just that: husks made out of plant matter.
When Dessa tried leaving the fractal via the asura gate, she appeared on the cliff (her usual starting spot, just a couple feet from the asura gate), and yeah, doesn’t know anyone or what just happened with the Thaumanova stuff.
The Dragon is a lie.
GW1 remake? No.
GW1 continued new content releases? YES!
I would buy this in a second.
All GW1 fans would.
GW1 remake? No.
GW1 continued new content releases? YES!
It was actually explained in some interview a while back for why Thorn disappeared. Basically, the Lunatic Court’s attempts to free him full time backfired, and they’re the group that thinks “if it didn’t work the first time, try it again but harder!” The Lunatic Court’s attempts to break the seals actually made them stronger… for a time.
Don’t remember where this interview was exactly, but it was a video (I think a Live Stream one) with John Stumme (who was the one who answered it).
Forest, Flower, and Jungle are more or less the same thing. Do note that Mordremoth’s only called the Jungle Dragon because of its location (like calling Kralkatorrik the desert dragon, the deep sea dragon, or Zhaitan being called the Orrian Dragon). Jeff Grubb once mentioned the attributes of the Elder Dragons listing “fire, water, vegetation, elements and more” – Mordremoth would be the vegetation there (and “elements” would likely be Kralkatorrik since we got crystal/sand, lightning, and fire with him all in one go).
Primordus is fire, not lava. He also has lava, because lava is basically liquid fire. He’s also called the “Rock Dragon” – thus Earth is fitted into three dragons in various forms (Mordremoth, Kralkatorrik, and Primordus – soil, crystal, and rock).
Sand would also be Kralkatorrik, as he himself turns into a sandstorm.
And Zhaitan deals with disease too, he isn’t a “Zombie Dragon” but rather the Elder Dragon of death, undeath, and decay – and disease falls to his capabilities too, as seen in certain open world events.
The Elder Dragons are not very specific, but rather general in their elemental themes. So trying to split things between “Jungle, Forest, and Flower” or “Fire and Lava” or “Crystal, Earth, and Sand” is rather silly, since such division gets all covered by a single (or multiple) dragons.
Because they can be easily missed, I figured I’d make a thread for a couple recent lore interviews had.
GuildMag LW Season 1 Interview
TowerTalk Season 1 Interview Part 1
TowerTalk Season 1 Interview Part 2
Kudos to Aaron for pointing out the Towertalk one.
There’s also the situation of culture.
Asura have a heavy deal with magic, and sylvari though in a different method. Charr, however, due to their history of being controlled by magic users hate magic – they see magic users as potential oppressors, more or less, but still useful tools. Humans have a distinct history of being unable to use magic and even then with the exception of Orr only through a good amount of training, and though 1,300 years have passed since they gained magic (roughly), this history has remained tied into human culture.
Kind of an old topic (I blame the poor search function on this forum), but for the most part, what Aaron said.
We only know of six because that’s what jotun and dwarven records amount to (mainly jotun, dwarven records to our knowledge only account 3 dragons: Jormag, Zhaitan, and Primordus).
It should also be noted that only Jormag, Primordus, and Kralkatorrik have history with Tyria during the majority of the previous cycle – and Jormag’s not even all that close to Tyria when he woke (he wasn’t in Tyria but the arctic sea, or between the two). There’s some implications that Kralkatorrik’s old reign was over Orr, the Crystal Sea/Desert, and Ascalon/Blood Legion Homelands, and Zhaitan may have only moved in near the end. Mordremoth has no historical records whatsoever, nor does the deep sea dragon who’s existence we only know about due to the quaggan, krait, hylek (indirectly), largos, and karka. So those two may have held no influence on Tyria in the past at all.
Tiny question on upcoming LS season and predictions here. With Mordremoth and obviously some sort of elder dragon corruption tied in with the story in Maguuma Jungle now, I was a bit curious when I came across some concept art done by Kekai Kotaki.
There’s a series of artworks dubbed ‘Evil Sylvari’ and maybe they’re just what became Nightmare Court because at that point of drawing the artists maybe just imagined Nightmare Court as evil version of the Sylvari. However, they don’t look so much like any of the incarnations we’ve seen of the Nightmare Court so far – maybe with the exception of some of the Toxic Alliance.
Those are the original designs of the Nightmare Court, long since scrapped.
Kekai’s works are at this point all either used or scrapped, though some (like the Ascended armor works) may be used later presently it’s only in those two categories. Kekai’s not been with ArenaNet for some time, so looking at his concept art for the newer stuff like Toxic Alliance is likely a poor direction to look.
It seems they went up on the wiki relatively recently, but do we know the history of those images?
They make me think of really old sylvari artwork from before the redesign, when sylvari actually had hair (or something a lot more hairlike) rather than the foliage they have on their heads now. So it may be that someone’s just found something old rather than this being a hint as to what’s to come.
Kekai hasn’t worked for ArenaNet since at least 2012, if not earlier. So none of his artwork for Guild Wars 2 is new, even if they’re just now going on the wikittenkai has, over the past year now, been putting up some never-before-seen GW2 concept art (mostly baby quaggan variations), which have not all gotten onto the wiki.
This post reminded me of another interview that may ahve gone unnoticed with GuildMag, over here.
They didn’t go into much detail there, but did say that the Toxic Hybrid was a standard krait that was transformed.
My outcome of this is that the tower was just spreading the Nightmare outside of the Dream – to the other races as well. It being a spreading of Mordremoth’s corruption is an alternative, but I’m questionable on if they’re both the same thing still. But this may be my biasness in hoping that the “sylvari = dragon minions” don’t come to pass.
To the whole “Scarlet is an agent of Mordremoth” with this theory of “the Tower spreads Mordremoth’s corruption” – there’s two issues that I see:
1) The Toxic Pollen has an antidote. Dragon corruption does not (not even slow acting dragon corruption seems to have a counter, as seen with the guy who sells the Icy Lodestones).
2) Why would Scarlet or the Toxic Alliance, if dragon minions of some variety, stop spreading the corruption and go for something that kills rather than corrupt (the miasma used in Lion’s Arch).
The final piece of evidence, while dubious, is why I wanted to bring this up- apparently, a little while back, this image was posted on Naomi Baker’s site as “Naomi_Baker_Concept_Art_Illustration_Guild_Wars_2_ka_brisban.jpg”, and then quickly taken down. Full story here. The rampant overgrowth of thorny roots veined through with glowing purple energy? We’ve seen that before. The Tower of Nightmares might serve as a useful starting place for speculation on what we’ll encounter out west.
I disagree. There was actually very little purple glow with the Tower of Nightmares, and its roots definitely weren’t glowing any color. Most of the Toxic stuff’s glow was in fact light blue and black (very similar to the ice of Jormag, in fact), like the Aetherized Nightmare weapons.
(edited by Konig Des Todes.2086)
They can say whatever they want, but in reality, all their recent content have been zerg oriented.
It’s more accurate to say that all their recent (and temporary!) content is designed to not be roflstomped by zergs.
Untrue. Recent introducion of megaserver and changes to World Boss schedule were definitely zerg-promoting (and very permanent).
Agreed. With the introduction of megaservers AND world boss scheduling, I’d say Anet only wants people to zerg. Its why I have little faith that Queensdale will ever be a welcoming environment.
I wouldn’t say the megaservers promotes zerging – rather, it promotes populating maps (they’re not hte same thing!). The timer… yeah, that does push for zergs.
But if you say “Anet only wants people to zerg” because of the timer+megaserver combo, then you’re purposefully only looking at a quarter of the picture, completely ignoring the zerg-splitting content of the Triple Trouble wurm, the Marionette, the punishment-scaling Escape from LA events, and the obvious zerg-splitting of the Assault Knights and Prime Hologram during Battle for LA.
I wouldn’t mind more races, but keep in mind that with more races come more work with armors and NPC dialogues – which in turn takes time so thus less content for the same amount of time. In all honesty, I’d only add races where they make sense on both a storytelling and ease-of-armor-making standard. Thus I’d limit, for what races are known to us, to Kodan, Largos, and Tengu roughly (I’d love naga for if we go to Cantha but the whole “serpent legs” thing kinda makes it unlikely).
For new professions, I only want one more – and just for the sake of having 3 professions per armor class. I don’t want more because the current 8 already fill most niches of gameplay, and more classes = more balance. Though thematically having 5 per armor class (1 non-magic + 4 schools per armor class). But still, I’d much rather have a larger variety of skills available to a single profession, including wider range of weapons and even weapon skill sets. More variety in the individuals, rather than more professions.
Basically, every single Fractal takes place in the past. The one with the collosus for example (IIRC) takes place when Tyria as a world was brand new. Urban during the searing, I’d say snowblind during Jormags rise and the Norn heading south.
Correction, Cliffside takes place when humans were new on Tyria. As evident by the fact that humans are not native to the world, and are in the fractal. Beginning of human history.
(Edit: noted now this was clarified)
If it’s definetly NOT Rata Sum, then where is it? It doesn’t even look similar to Rata Pten, and it IS above ground. But the Asura have only been fully above ground, that we know of, for around 200 years.
We know of three asuran cities aboveground that’s existed recently (Rata Sum, Thaumanova, and Mrot Boru in southcentral Brisban), but we haven’t been everywhere the asura could be.
If Dessa recognizes it, could it be that it was another hidden city of the Asura, one that was never discovered, or talked about, as what had happened there was so terrible that no Asura would even dare think about it? Something even worse then Primordus awakening and driving them to the surface? And in hiding it away the removed every trace of it so it could never be discovered?
Just because the players don’t know about it, doesn’t mean it’s a well-kept secret.
Now, Rata Sum is the only above-ground asuran settlement that we know of—this is something I’ve spoken about before.
Erm, no it isn’t. Other than Soreen Draa (which is tbh more of a suberbs of Rata Sum) and Thaumanova (which is called a city), there is Mrot Boru. And this doesn’t cover anywhere south of Metrica, or elsewhere off the map.
(edited by Konig Des Todes.2086)
That isn’t true. There are presently 5 airship models in the game. You have the original Pact model, the Aetherblade model, and the three PvP/WvW models (the difference between the red PvP/WvW model and the Aetherblade model is that the Aetherblades’ airships have their emblem (a skull/cog mix) on the sides of the balloons while the PvP/WvW ones are blank).
I think Kiel’s airship actually uses the red PvP/WvW model, as I don’t recall the Aetherblade emblem on its side (Which would make perfect sense too).
Only 1 showed up I think, but it uses the same model as Havoc’s Heir so the two could be the same. I think the Lionguard only have 2 airships.
Don’t you guys see?
Eir will try to make up with Braham to ease the tension between mother and son, and will do so by giving him Magdaer since Logan has made up with Rytlock. Magdear, being a Flaming Dragon Sword, forged from Orr before the Exodus of the Gods, will have the power to break the tooth. Thus, Braham will be hailed as the norn hero – son of the legendary Bjorne the Sun-Chaser and Eir Stegalkin of Destiny’s Edge, and ally to the Dragonslayer (the player). He will lead the Wolfborn who’ve been secretly trained by Knut (per NPC dialogue) as a special unit within the Pact and will be there with his allies and Destiny’s Edge to slay the dragon of ice and snow.
/makesperfectsense
The game is designed to be played by zerging. So it’s perfect that there’s a zerg going around in starting areas — let’s new players learn how to zerg.
No it’s not. The developers have outright stated that the Zerging is a problem from both a technical and gameplay standpoint, and are trying to find ways to reduce it without penalizing smaller-scale spontaneous groupings.
They can say whatever they want, but in reality, all their recent content have been zerg oriented.
It’s more accurate to say that all their recent (and temporary!) content is designed to not be roflstomped by zergs. Zerg is an issue, which makes most content really easy, and because they hadn’t created a solution yet they’ve geared it to work with zergs in mind.
Regarding champ trains. Typically, I’m against it because it spikes hostility in the community. But I’m more against it in a starting zone. I don’t really care if a train existed in Harathi or Frostgorge, but in Queensdale or Kessex it’s a bit more problematic to me – personal opinion, though.
The idea of a zerg train won’t be destroyed unless ArenaNet somehow manages to make zerging worse than small groups (like they did with Escape content for getting the citizen bag rewards). So rather than trying to undo such things, it’d probably be better for everyone to try and relocate the trains.
Which is why I don’t get the bigger nerfs to Frostgorge’s train than to Queensdale’s train. To me, the Queensdale one is the problem more than Frostgorge – Frostgorge’s train was only an issue because it would result in massive overflows when Claw spawned, leaving those wanting to do Claw unable to do such – and this is no longer an issue ever since the megaserver update.
@Lakdav: how about the crystals to aid workers in getting hard-to-reach places, or hastening the travel of supplies?
Wasn’t it just a trade agreement?
Technically, yes. A trade agreement, but the Zephyrites are said to often be used for peace summits and the like, so it would not be strange for them to offer what they could to aid in rebuilding those they have agreements with (perhaps for a price, but equally likely more as an investment – without LA, what can they trade for?).
If one looks at Lion’s Arch, while on the surface it is a place for outlaws, but underneath at its core, it is more a place for peaceful co-existence. And this is what the Zephyrites strive for.
Accepting or not, LA has a bad track record of attracting negative attention. Just in the GW2 timeline, so the last 2 years, it’s been attacked three times, and the last one razed it to the ground, while all the other major cities have only experienced one attack (well, two, in DR’s case) in the same time frame, none of which did any lasting damage. Short of an area under the control of an active Elder Dragon, LA seems the worst place for the Zephyrites to put down roots.
Four attempts on LA (Priory storyline being the fourth, which didn’t get close to a threat on the actual city due to the once-in-the-game preemptive strike by the good guys). But it is attacked because of my prior point – that it is a place for multiple cultures co-existing (lots more targets than the other cities) and is a social and trade hub.
The reasons it is attacked are the same reasons why the Zephyrites would probably want a foothold there.
Lion’s Arch has a treaty with the Zephyrites. Aiding in rebuilding LA would be a good show of that treaty.
Orr is considered a part of the Tyrian continent. Though originally there’s heavy implication that prior to the Exodus (aka with the Crystal Sea), it was directly connected to Elona while closer to Tyrian civilizations (Ascalon and Kryta, mainly).
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