Guild Wars 2

I’m pretty sure that the Shadow Behemoth counts as a Nightmare, not a demon.

Traditional “demons from Hell” don’t exist in the GW-verse, given there is no location called Hell. The closest to such a location is the Realm of Torment from Nightfall, and the closest to natural inhabitants you got there were the previously linked Torment creatures.

Orrians were naturally powerful spellcasters though, and being an even more powerful one seems to have been a requirement of Orrian Viziers (per Under Siege as Trahearne automatically suspects a vizier when powerful magic is shown). So I wouldn’t list what Khilbron can do – pre or post mortem – as something “common” for necromancers or liches, or even wielders of the Scepter of Orr (especially given his ties to Abaddon as well).

Using Khilbron as a base for non-Orrians seems full of folly to me.

I mean, Vizier can teleport large distances and is constantly floating (though this latter may be part of whatever illusion keeps him looking human-like). Neither are typical necromancy.

Sublimatio.6981:

Actually, lets think, what nightmares really are? I think the “souls that are full of negative emotions” fits them perfectly, so why don’t you agree about Aatxes and Shades being them?

What I was denying was your comment that they are born from the Mists. You have nothing to support such a claim – and a fan-written wiki article stating that they “originate from the Mists” is no support at all.

If you read my posts, I stated that they are heavily hinted to be souls full of negative emotions, so I’m not in disagreement about Aatxes and shades being nightmares. If that’s what you were saying which it sounds. In fact, as I said above, nightmares in GW1 make “swoosh” sounds when fought in melee – I was referring specifically to aatxes. And I never once argued shades weren’t souls either. I never argued aatxes and shades were neither nightmares nor souls – just that they weren’t demons nor born directly from the mists as your original post claimed:

Sublimatio.6981:

Hey, born directly from the mists are also Aatxes or Shades, and they are nightmares, not demons :P

NinjaChris.9340:

I don’t see why Livia would have changed her appearance or created an entirely new persona for herself for that matter. In 1256 AE she looked exactly the way we last saw her in GW1, so why would she hide herself now?

Minor correction: She looked exactly the way we saw her in GW1, except that she had a stripe of white hair (I’m guessing in replace of that lighter-red stripe she had in GW1).

And this is a very good point, I think. If Livia didn’t bother changing her name and face 70 years ago, why would she now?

Furthermore, why would she go from leader to high ranking non-leader, to leader again? Also, to the OP saying that Livia in Sea of Sorrows was the “personal bodyguard” – I don’t think this is quite true. While she was the one ‘in charge’ during the related events of Sea of Sorrows, it seemed to me more that she joined because of the threat Orr poses which Livia knew how bad it was and knew Edair over-estimated said threat. She outright states she doesn’t care who takes the throne, so long as it is of the Salmaic dynasty (aka Queen Salma’s bloodline). If anything, she’d probably want to eliminate Edair given how poor for the throne he’d be, and promote getting his brother or sister on the throne instead (which may have happened, given King Roderick was the king’s name 50 years prior to GW2 – 20 years post-end of SoS). Either way, while she was advising the most out of the Shining Blade members, nothing says she was Edair’s personal bodyguard like Anise is to Jennah.

Azure Prower.8701:

You simply took the picture from a different angle.

This.

That portal only shows up during one of the events, btw.

You’re linking a fan-made article, and using that to argue against characters in the game calling what are mechanically Nightmares as spirits?

I don’t mean to sound harsh if I am, but using the wiki, unless it is copying verbatim (usually dialogue or blog posts/other out-of-game lore documents), is not a good choice as anyone can edit them and falsify the information – be it via speculation or just misinterpretation (or intentional vandalism that goes unnoticed even). It happens pretty frequently, actually. And there’s really only… three or so common editors, myself included, who focus on improving the lore parts of the official wikis.

Lord Kuru.3685:

So Marjory is now an expert in poisons. You think Anet’s slowling going to make her into a Mary Sue to counter Scarlet’s Villain Sue?

Being a detective who is a necromancer that happens to know stuff in poisons (nothing says she’s an expert on poisons btw) makes perfect sense, actually.

Necromancers deal greatly in decay, disease, and poison. So it’s only natural that they’d be dealing in antidotes. Wouldn’t want to be caught up in your own weapons, after all.

So long as Marjory doesn’t become good at everything – which is more or less how Scarlet is – then Marjory won’t become a Mary Sue. And let’s face it, she isn’t good at everything. I mean, her own background has a fault for her – she’s not the best necromancer there is out there.

So no, Marjory’s not becoming a Mar(jor)y Sue.

Scarlet isn’t a Mary Sue because she’s a great engineer. She’s a Mary Sue (or Villain Sue or w/e) because everybody likes her and lets her do whatever she wants (see her backstory), she can somehow do the impossible (unite oppressor haters (dredge) with oppressors (Flame Legion); unite xenophobics (krait) with tormentors (Nightmare Court)), knows just about everything, takes no consequences for failures (her failing at the Jubilee and TA held no effect on her character whatsoever), and almost always never fail herself (only when the PC are involved does she fail). She is just about “perfect” in every way – this is why she’s a Villain Sue. It’s mainly her background – that she somehow did something no asura could (pass all three colleges – until a redacting interview), did something nearly no norn could (become Beigarth’s, the greatest modern norn blacksmith, apprentice), can do something few charr can (learn from a stubborn old expert sniper), and did stuff no one else did and survived (survive that sensory deprivation device – and until a redacting interview, witness the Eternal Alchemy).

If dungeons weren’t so easy to run (CoF p 1 & 2, all of AC, etc. etc.) then I’d probably agree with you. But if you can finish a dungeon in less than 15 minutes and get ~2-5g (varying on drop qualities) a run as is… I don’t think they need to be more profitable.

Not unless Anet wants an economy where it’s extremely easy for anyone to get lots and lots of gold.

Vevina wasn’t the final boss who was removed. Fyonna was.

Vevina’s final boss path (Forward). She is also killed in the Up path by Fyonna. She was killed as a half-way boss in the old Foward/Up path. All three bosses were always killed – it’s just where and how that changed between the paths (be it by one of the NPCs, or by the players, and as final boss or half-way boss).

Given that the Nightmare Court working with the krait are a splinter faction that don’t use the nobility titles of the main Nightmare Court group, it seems highly unlikely Faolain is involved.

Actually, not true. Nightmares appear to be souls that are full of negative emotions (the situation isn’t very clear, and the only hint of them being souls is in GW1 where they all have a “swoosh” sound when fighting melee and this quest – which would mean Aatxes and Shades are twisted (?) souls, which aren’t physical beings like demons.

For drax and Eluivietie if you’re still doubting Scarlet’s involvement.

As the title asks:

To the developers, what stuff of Tower of Nightmares (specifically regarding achievements, but other things too) becomes no longer available once the next update hits? Updates in the past have had achievements that were limited-time more so than the updates’ length themselves – for example, Opening Ceremony wasn’t available once Clockwork Chaos became available.

I presume t hat The Nightmare Unvieled will no longer be available – unless Marjory still offers replaying it. But if Marjory disappears for xyz reason, then I’d presume that the turning 50 seeds in would beocme unavailable on top of The Nightmare Unveiled.

But just so I’m not speculating, I’d like developer confirmation so that people aren’t caught off-guard when it happens.

haviz.1340:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

I wouldn’t mind the loot table for elites being raised, especially outside of dungeons, but overall I don’t think the “difficulty” of these mobs is worth complaining about. Maybe they’d have a guarantee white champ loot bag (never having a chance at the green or exotic versions… are there fine versions? I only get white green and orange text colors; if there’s blue then that could be the “high level/rare” drop for them). Cannot be the green version as then they’d be farmed too, I wouldn’t doubt. Though either case would be a big no for the dungeon variants.

Especially outside of dungeons? Everyone skips in dungeons because elites drop junk. There are like 2-3 weekly threads complaining about skipping in dungeon subforum and the reason is that it is a complete waste of time not to skip elites.

The issue with giving elites in dungeons good loot is that dungeons usually have nothing but elites, champions, and legendaries in them. The latter two serving as mini-bosses and bosses.

How many enemies are in dungeons? By upping the elite reward, you’re practically multiplying the dungeon rewards exponentially and dungeon running becomes insanely profitable (more so than now that is).

Unless dungeon mobs get nerfed to high-leveled Veterans mixed in with Elites, I don’t want to see elites in dungeons having that great of an increase in rewards. Even a small increase can have dramatic effects when you take in the number of elites you kill.

MithranArkanere.8957:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

[… ]

There’s champions in the story before they have entered dungeons, and I’m yet to find a low level champion that isn’t soloable by a character under level 30, I leveled 15 characters and killed all champion in all starting areas. And their attacks in those areas are not strong enough that they don’t have time to turn tail and look for help if things get nasty. Not even the Barradin’s Vault. Those take half your health in one hit at most. Horace is the heaviest hitter, with that nasty Flamestrike of his that is practically unavoidable. The place can give trouble to newbies not because of the champions, but because of the ceiling collapses.

These roaming elites are giving trouble to fully geared level 80, and have several one-hit-kill attacks able to take down a Sentinel warrior at full health. Imagine newbies that are level 15 and have started playing just a few days ago. They can’t have time to think twice and run away if they are downed in one hit and defeated the next one.

Either the solo roamers get toned down in low level areas like champions, or they should not appear until players have more tools to deal with them, namely more stun breakers, blocks, crowd control and condition removers, much like barely any creature can knock down in those areas.

All PS foes can be soloed. Those champions are made especially weak because they’re in solo content. Champions in the open world are different – if you’re tackling it at the zone’s level than you can’t solo – or can with a lot of time and kiting.

Your comment seems kind of contradictory though – “their attacks in those areas are not strong enough that they don’t have time to turn tail and look for help if things get nasty” which you immediately followed with “Those take half your health in one hit at most” (ergo, 2 hits you’re dead).

The odd thing is that elites are weaker than champions, yet you say champions are too easy… but elites are too hard? Maybe you’re just that good of a player when it comes to champs, but you underestimate elites. Because if you can solo champs (something I can’t do even on my best profession with a character that’s at the zone’s level – e.g., without a high level that has traits and rares+ equipment).

Elites are by far definitely solo’able, despite your earlier claim. Champions are if you know what you’re doing and you have a good build – though certainly not all champions (or so I would suspect at least). But outside of the personal story, champions aren’t meant to be solo’able. So if you have no qualm with champions, but you are with elites, I think you need to rethink what the purpose of the two ranks are and argue for something other than “remove elites, but keep champions.” Sounds to me more like all you care about is less difficulty for more rewards – or at least the more rewards part.

Wasn’t meaning to say that the witches are mesmers.

IIRC, though, the Oratuss fought in the story instance uses mesmer spells. As do the Toxic Hypnoss – I recall a smaller-radii (and deadlier) Chaos Storm effect.

Well if we do say that level dictates order in the initial release content, and then go by order of release after that…

There is the guild challenge mission that takes place there where you have to escort 10 quaggan that were imprisoned by the krait. So again, this update isn’t the first time that this “oddity” has occurred.

I would argue that should the PS take place post-hearts, then the ritual during the Source of Orr, the Pact’s continual push into Orr, and Zhaitan’s ultimate demise led to the corruption retreating.

Demons in the GW-verse can simply be stated to be “creatures born directly from the Mists.” There’s a wide variety of them – torment creatures were the most common in GW1, and the only ones we meet in GW2 are imps (which in GW1 we didn’t know were demons).

Demons are a rather interesting group in GW, IMO. They’re born most often as incomplete copies of other species by the Mists – the origin of all things – and their diet is souls and magic (much like the Elder Dragons in the latter case). They strive for absolute anarchy and are drawn to the lands of the living to spread said anarchy.

I don’t recall the exact source for Anise’s history. It was either Edge of Destiny, an interview, or The Line of Duty (which a quick readthrough would be no unless I’m just misremembering “Anise defended Jennah as her personal guard while Jennah was a young princess”).

It should be noted that liches of GW are not the same as liches in standard fantasy – though in both cases, they’re undead, and in standard fantasy, often skeletons. Livia, by all intents and purposes, seems to be anything but undead. And therefore not a lich. Not to mention there’s no reason to claim she’s a lich – given an interview with Angel McCoy, “magical longevity” is indeed possible – that is, lengthening one’s lifespan via powerful magics. It would not be lengthening one’s lifespan if it is done via undeath.

And I wouldn’t use that gossiping citizen as reliable. Just read any of the Gossiping Citizen dialogues. None but the Great Collapse’s seem remotely reliable.

Also, I have not once seen any line about Anise being Jennah’s father’s bodyguard. Just Jennah’s.

It should be noted, however, that Jennah appointed Anise as the leader of the Shining Blade. (As said in The Line of Duty)

Ignoring CHIPS’ fullout unsupported speculation…

I don’t see a similarity between Anise and Livia. While the “ruthless and effecient” and the Grenth lines are interesting similarities, the luxury and bound one? I don’t see that as “sounds like a lich who sold her soul” – especially given how nothing says Livia is a lich, especially since she isn’t rotten as all liches appear. She appears human, so her longevity is likely tied to the same as Magi Malaquire in GW1 who mentions having been with King Doric during the Siege of Jumah – that’d be over 1,000 years.

Furthermore, Anise is the childhood friend of Jennah and a mesmer, not a necromancer. This means that people – Jennah included – knew Anise as a child. If Anise was Livia, they wouldn’t know this. Furthermore, they knew Anise before she was a Shining Blade member – she joined the Shining Blade because she was a childhood friend of Jennah.

The fact that Anise has a known history kind of counteracts the theory that “Anise = Livia.” That’s ignoring the whole mesmer != necromancer thing.

Prophets aren’t the same as gods. They don’t seem to worship any “god” but rather more messiah-like figures. Just powerful krait that had ascended into a higher plane of existence with the promises of returning with a powerful army to fulfill the krait’s birthright (more or less). The prophets wouldn’t answer or return until they are ready with that army – and I doubt the krait would have prayed to the prophets for aid, all things considered.

An obelisk in of itself will not bring the prophets back. The obelisks are full of magic and mark where the prophets ascended to and as such were places of worship. They’re holy artifacts of actual power, not some beacon for their prophets to return to.

No, all the obelisk shards are new.

The waters were undefiled in the open world from the get go, where they not? That personal story step had always been disconnected with the open world, since once you left it’d be “clean” water once again with living krait. The hearts around there are all about getting the krait and risen to fight – by disguising yourself as a risen and killing living krait.

This isn’t something new to the living story step.

I think what’s more confusing is the krait obelisks in the Flooded Castavell (sp?) in Bloodtide Coast. The area has an unnamed krait Deeps but the place is overrun with risen, yet there are Toxic Krait in the back with their obelisk. While it isn’t lorebreaking, gotta wonder what they’re doing there – did they not know the Deeps was overrun with Risen?

It’d be after.

Honestly, I had been thinking the entire LS happened after all the dungeon explorable modes. But with Twilight Assault, it seems that ArenaNet intend to make their chronology of events confusing (even more), so it’s possible to tell when dungeon explorable modes happen. But I’m pretty sure that Tower of Nightmares happens post-Twilight Assault.

Tanith.5264:

Have we ever actually had a dev talk about the influences for these zones? I’d like to know if this is my own overactive imagination or not.

Art of Guild Wars 2 explains that part of the inspiration for Orr was to recreate the Realm of Torment, but make it “orderly” – where the RoT was mismatched shapes of horror, Orr was to be organized shapes of horror. It also goes to say that many dragon minions and dragon environments (specifically concept art for such) came from the artists’ nightmares – like the intro to Terminator 2 did.

The witches appear to be high ranked individuals. There was a priestess in a personal story who was similarly a spellcaster, as well as the Head Slaver Nymphassa (sp?). Even the Oratuss are spellcasters. All their known high ranking individuals are spellcasters.

Even in GW1, most of them were spellcasters. And the krait are known for their strong shapeshifting magic (see Aquatic Ruins Fractal). And there’s the Nonmoa Lake witch which as Narcemus said, summons a large storm (attempting to turn it into a Maelstrom – while she’s up the area gets cloudy and rains).

Walhalla.5473:

Anet left this one open. It is possible that there are obelisks high enough to have some of it above the surface. There is even concept art showing some Obelisks above the surface.. But right, nothing is outright said about this. But if think it is more than possible. It would even make sense on how Scarlet could gather these shards from the obelisks.

Actually, they rather didn’t in regards to the height of the obelisks. If you read the blog post from ages past – most of the information summarized by the lore NPC in the update – it states that the krait cities (“Deeps”) were built around one or more of these krait obelisks. The krait lived on the ocean floors, worshiping at the obelisks, while they built towers that reached up to the surface out of coral, shipwrecks, and goods stolen from the land during raids – the towers are where air-breathing slaves were kept.

The obelisks themselves didn’t reach the surface, it was instead the krait towers that did.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Collaborative-Development-Topic-Living-World/page/10#post3115999 This was his first post.

I’m not really sure if there’s any real need for “enchantments” – I mean, the avatars of the gods did say they gave Kormir their “greatest gift” but nothing really says that’s magical. I’m pretty much playing the devil’s advocate for my own view of that mission, but as far as we can tell they only said fancy words – no magic attached.

This said, however, it is extremely unlikely that Zhaitan had consumed a god. Even if the Lyssan priestesses are right in that Lyssa is dead, given our knowledge of divinity Zhaitan would have:
1) Exploded upon death.
2) Shined so bright we would have turned blind.
3) Not fall so easily despite being starved, given the pure amount of magical energies of a god it would have devoured.
3.5) It in turn would not have looked the way it did because the look was partially due to his starvation and the Pact’s other efforts in Orr.

If any Elder Dragon had consumed a god, it would be either Jormag – who via the Sons of Svanir has gained access to the Mists – or Kralkatorrik – who was last seen near Tomb of the Primeval Kings and hasn’t been heard from since (he could have fled into the Mists quite easily). But to do that not only would the dragon need access to the Mists, but to be able to find where the gods went after they left the Mists since per Priestess Rhia (sp?), the gods are known not to be within the Mists themselves anymore. And lastly, if there is a god that’s been killed, it’d be Lyssa since no other being mentions Lyssa’s potential death, and we know for a fact that Grenth is alive per the Avatar of Grenth (unless the reaper lies) – though the chance of it having been Zhaitan who killed her? Slim to none.

Either way, Perilisk, your theory of Scarlet having ascended into godhood by taking Lyssa’s divinity is fully and utterly debunked. Even if Lyssa was dead, her essence wouldn’t have gone to the Mists unless possibly if it caused an explosion the way Abaddon’s would have if not for Kormir, and Scarlet didn’t really go to the Eternal Alchemy (the device was merely a sensory deprivation device). Even if she did witness Eternal Alchemy, that’s not the same as the Mists. The Mists are protomatter that serve as the beginning and end of all life. The Eternal Alchemy is how everything interconnects and functions together. Technically speaking, the Eternal Alchemy is not a place to “go to” so even if Scarlet did see the Eternal Alchemy, she didn’t go there – as that would be an impossible act.

The tower’s cloaking was likely done by the krait since they’re known for spellcasting. Though the courtiers do too to a lesser extent. Depends on who’s in on that splinter faction of the Nightmare Court.

MithranArkanere.8957:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

[…]Even before champion loot bags, no one complained about these guys.[…]

Well, maybe not about veterans, since they have decent drops considering their difficulty, but people did complain about champions giving such bad rewards for the time they take to kill that nobody bothered with them.

They first addressed that with a guaranteed fine drop. But that was obviously not enough. And so they ended up coming up with the champion bags, which are now too much, to the point they should give champions ‘node flags’ so people start trying to find more champions instead killing the same ones in an endless loop.

I was referring to the fact that champions existed in low level areas with regards to the complaints on champions, actually.

Champion loot complaints were on a whole – about champions from Queensdale to champions in Cursed Shore. It had nothing to do with location. The point I was countering of you was about how they’re – and I quote – “deadly to newbies” and that they “should not be solo roamers until level >30 areas.” If you go by that argument, then we must remove all those non-event champions – of which there’s probably about 3-5 or so per >lvl30 zone – from said >lvl30 zones. And that, I would argue, is a bad move. So if we keep champions in newbie zones, why remove elites? Especially since these particular elites will likely go away when the LS moves on.

If these elites are “deadly to newbies” then so too are the solo-roaming champions that have existed, uncomplained about in their existence, in newbie areas since release.

Treise.6958:

I soloed an elite krait just fine with my mesmer, just had to be sure no other enemies distracted me :P

Even with a normal mob, I solo’d an elite fine. Then a second one aggroed me… think I killed five foes back to back or 2 at a time (3 regs, 2 elites) at that time. I downed twice, but I was able to survive nonetheless.

I just finish this today.

I had done Caledon, Kessex, Gendarran, and Mount Maelstrom prior to an update that was early today (the 30th). I had done Timberline Falls, Sparkfly Fen, and Bloodtide Coast today. That’s the order I did the zones in as well. I visited 24 total, but I’m now at 23/24.

Based on this thread and my own experience, whatever’s causing the problem, it was caused by the update, and doing some prior and some after it.

azizul.8469:

looks like it is going to be permanent….

so, we can tell the future generation of GW2 players that once upon a time, on that side of the lake, there were trees…..

Sounds liek some thing will be permanent, and others will not be.

Trees regrowing sounds like something that’ll return. Over time if not immediately. But the Toxic Alliance forces are likely to be greatly reduced (if not outright just turned to krait forces depending on how the plot goes).

Meriem.3504:

Azure Prower.8701:

Meriem.3504:

They NEED to do the thing that WoW did which was very sucessful which is phasing so we can do both the old and new area and still give the living world feel.

-snip the nos-

In case you didn’t get the message. No.

Phasing is not a good thing.

Care to explain why? I can understand the emphasizing of know but you took this too far and explained nothing. PERMANENT is the lesser of the 2 evils I am sorry. I rather not lose content. Phasing gives the option to do old content.

It divides the playerbase a lot in a game where a lot of the zones are already fairly barren of players (mainly because all the players funnel to their zerging activities like Frostgorge and Queensdale, or enjoy running dungeons which are instanced). By phasing zones, you’re basically doubling every single zone there is, which drastically divides the playerbase.

Phasing has its good points – you can experience both new and old – but it has its bad points.

Furthermore, ArenaNet is after a “living breathing world” – phasing kind of defeats the purpose of that (as does temporary content but that’s something else), so phasing content would in fact be counteractive with ArenaNet’s intention and even the manifesto.

MithranArkanere.8957:

But there’s some that roam around solo. Killing them is pointless as the only thing they’ll drop if you are lucky is junk, and they are deadly to newbies. There should not be solo roamers until level >30 areas, after players have met them in a dungeon, and know that killing them is an utter pointless waste of time and they are best avoided.

There are solo roaming veterans and champions. Even before champion loot bags, no one complained about these guys. I’d say the champions are even more of a threat to newbies – or at least are when you’re not in Queensdale, and certainly were before champ bags.

I wouldn’t mind the loot table for elites being raised, especially outside of dungeons, but overall I don’t think the “difficulty” of these mobs is worth complaining about. Maybe they’d have a guarantee white champ loot bag (never having a chance at the green or exotic versions… are there fine versions? I only get white green and orange text colors; if there’s blue then that could be the “high level/rare” drop for them). Cannot be the green version as then they’d be farmed too, I wouldn’t doubt. Though either case would be a big no for the dungeon variants.

MatthewMedina.5419:

This change has actually been needed since launch. As noted, we’ve already been using these difficulty mobs in content, though in a more limited way. That was due primarily to the fact that both species ended up being named “Veteran”, but one was solo-friendly, the other was not, and all it did was cause confusion. There will be more updates in the future to bring the rest of the species at this difficulty level in line with this change.

Will naming the silver mobs with the prefix of “Elite” and affecting their contribution to the veteran dailies be changed and/or retroactive?

I would love to see the silver mobs from release and since to be renamed to have the “Elite” prefix – would make documenting them on the wiki easier, as well as identification in larger groups with regular foes since you wouldn’t have to select them to point them out. Especially if old events get scaled to include more of them.

Honestly, I love the growing addition of elite mobs in the open world. And if they get separated from veterans in the daily, well, that’s reason for more dailies! (“Kill 3 Elites” “Kill 1 <region> Elites” – scaling based off of Champions… and come to think of it, why no Legendary slaying daily/monthly?)

I’ll patiently await Eluviete’s and Drax’s contributions to losing the bet. Aaron paid already, tyvm.

Rather do wish I was wrong but what can I do.

zamalek.2154:

That’s a historical document, though, Konig. The krait would be forced to adapt because they have been forced away from that sea floor by bubbles, they wouldn’t just abandon the concept of summoning their prophets back to Tryia.

Either way now we know it’s a weird krait obelisk tree people hybrid thing.

It’s not a krait obelisk. It’s just a krait tower built around a giant tree/flower/weed.

Also, the krait didn’t build the obelisks as far as we know. So they’ve been forced to leave them, since I doubt they’d have been able to transport those huge massive obelisks of a single block of stone while fleeing the Deep Sea Dragon.

Identical twins or doppleganger sylvari probably is possible. I mean, if we take the generic NPC appearances as literal, then most sylvari look the same. Though I’m sure that’s mechanics.

As to dead sylvari – the sylvari hold multiple beliefs about their dead. Some believe they go to the Mists, some believe they return to the Dream. Physically, they see it as a return to the world, the ground, w/e. But spiritually there seems to be multiple views. What’s interesting is that we have yet to see a sylvari soul… They very well may be soulless beings.

zwierz.9012:

The funny thing is, NOTIHNG so far is pointing directly to Scarlet being involved from what I saw, except that NPC.

False. Above at least one event in Kessex Hills, there is a portal just like above the Scarlet invasion meta events. The one above the caves to the SE of the tower that is about closing three Toxic Alliance portals.

Edit: I see Aaron mentioned that already.

Not much, to me, since all it really said is “we hear you, and looking back this is what I wish we did” with the old promises he made before with a reminder we won’t see change for months due to how they develop things. But no mention of how they intend to improve things, just that “we’re working on it” more or less.

That’s arguable… Hitler made a temporary cease fire (I think it was such, been a while since I delved into WW2 politics) with Russia because Germany would have then be fighting a two-sided war. Unfortunately, he prematurely ended the cease fire via attacking Russia when his forces were succeeding on the western front. It was in his intentions the whole time to betray the Russians – the “alliance with weaker individuals” was merely to buy him and his forces time.

So I don’t think this is nearly the same as the krait, who have been fanatical zealots for several dozen generations – and not a movement that isn’t even a generation old.

Certainly the krait’s motivations may be similar, but unlike Hitler’s forces the krait have not had any big drawbacks yet. Even a superior individual can be beaten by pure numbers – Hitler had experienced this already, I believe, but the krait have not. They don’t view themselves defeatable so why would they ally with a lesser race, be it to strengthen themselves or give them one less enemy to fight at a time?

BobbyStein.2315:

Dragons
Guild Wars 2 has a dragon on the box cover. The primary motivation for players on their 80-level journey is to kill a dragon. So yeah, giant, winged beasts are a part of Tyria, they’re core to the game, and we haven’t forgotten about them. That stated, I can’t say when we’ll return to them—only that we will. There is a plan in place.

I don’t think you need to “return to them” so much as increase their presence and focus. Tequatl was nice, but that was one boss update with next to no story revealed (even with promises of plot relevance) for over a year that focused on the Elder Dragons and their threat. I get there’s other threats but the Elder Dragons are supposed to be the “big looming threat” yet we get nothing on it.

Honestly, I think players would be satisfied, to varying degrees, if all we got was the Claw of Jormag now suddenly flying over Wayfarer’s Foothills and roaring; or the Shatterer making appearances along the Dragonbrand in Iron Marches and/or Fields of Ruin. No boss updates needed, just an exposure of something new related to the dragons. Do this every other or so month and you’ll help remind players that you haven’t forgotten them.

BobbyStein.2315:

With our current tech, the PC cannot speak outside of a cinematic conversation (which were featured inside the Personal Story at ship) or contextual chatter (crippled = “My leg!”). We intend to explore possible solutions in the somewhat near future.

Please do. Seeing my character respond to an event or instance dialogue outside of a cinematic would be a huge plus. I wouldn’t be surprised if the coding that allowed contextual chatter would result in that, since it ties to achievements and exploration as well as skill effects.

BobbyStein.2315:

Our revised cinematic technology does not currently support player voice variants (i.e. 10 different PC voices).

That sounds very odd to me, given Guild Wars 1 (even if then it was only 2 voice variants).

BobbyStein.2315:

We have a few things planned for upcoming releases that should make the player feel like more of a driver and less of a passenger, but please remember that it takes upwards of four months for content to go from concept to completion. Nothing I say here will happen immediately due to the nature of how we build things.

Which is why I began holding a “I’ll wait and see where we are going after 4 months” as of September since August really seemed to have sparked the criticism even among formerly liking figures like myself.

And honestly speaking, I wouldn’t mind it being 8 months if the releases got slowed by half (becoming quad-weekly rather than bi-weekly).

BobbyStein.2315:

One of the challenges of the semi-monthly release cycle is that we’re limited in how much content we can put inside each one. This can be a good thing if the story is very focused and doesn’t have a lot of moving parts. The problem we ran into is that we needed to develop a larger cast of non-player characters to account for every playable race, and then create the content in which to put them. That sort of build up takes time and incurs an amount of long-term development debt.

So then my question is:

Why are you sticking to the bi-weekly release schedule? If you know it hinders you, why keep at it? That makes no sense to me. I know you’re not the guy to set it, but I’m sure you know why it’s set there and who sets it and can explain to us this befuddlement – if not get the players’ opinion on it to the person or people who set the schedule.

BobbyStein.2315:

The end goal was to have multiple arcs going simultaneously like on more modern television shows, but where a weekly drama might have 20 – 40 minutes of character time to get things moving, we have maybe half that (or less). So after a few releases it started to feel like there were a lot of unresolved plot threads out there and you (the player) had no way of knowing which ones would be resumed.

Perhaps a better approach would have been to start and resolve each arc before introducing another.

Nein. The concept you had was good. The issue is that you didn’t go through with that concept. You had one arc, then you paused it and had another, then you paused that one and had another. That is not doing multiple arcs simultaneously.

On a side note, I keep seeing you (ArenaNet) compare the living story to television shows or books. The issue I am finding is that’s how you’re treating Guild Wars – like a novel or like a television show. But it isn’t. It’s a video game. And you write and make video games much differently. With TV and novels, you cannot show multiple scenes at once and instead have to show them back to back even if they occur at the same time. In video games, especially open world ones, this is not so – you can have multiple things happening simultaneously within a set timeframe, even if the players don’t always see this. E.g., when Flame and Frost: Retribution was going on, you had Super Adventure Box. That’s how you do multiple arcs simultaneously – having the content available to players at the same time. Not doing part of an arc, then part of another, then part of a third.

Doing one arc and then going to the next can work, but then it’s even less of a “living world” – it’s just a bunch of linear tales being told one after another. A living world has multiple places in the world evolving at once. See again, April 2013.

BobbyStein.2315:

Here’s where I think we could have done a better job with her.

I’ll be frank – and please excuse me if I’m too blunt here. I don’t care about “what could have been” – what I want to know is what will you do to fix the issue? And spoilers aren’t needed to be told for this. I’m talking about your plans for future exposition. And I’d like something more than the atypical “there is a story planned” and “it will all make sense in the future” because let’s face it, with the pacing of the story we might start to see what you see in, oh, 2015 maybe? At the rate I’m seeing, and I’ve been delving into it as much as I possibly could, that’s where I’m predicting things will finally start making sense.

So please, if you read this, inform us somehow about how you intend to improve your storytelling. Because as far as I see it, that is your numero uno issue.

(cont.)

Stephen.6312:

At one stage Scarlet says to Caithe, “I know what you did and what you did was nasty.” Given Scarlet’s penchant for referring to violent acts humorously, I think that we can all agree that it involves something to do with the killing of someone. The fact that Faolin doesn’t know it either suggests 1) that she is aware of the killing, but doesn’t know who is responsible, 2) she would find the information valuable, or 3) she is/was a close confidant of Caithe to whom such things would usually be disclosed.

Given Scarlet’s nature, I disagree with your assessment.

She thinks nothing of killing, so why would she say someone else killing is “nasty”?

What Scarlet hates is being forced into something – not being able to control her own destiny, and others telling her what to do. I think Scarlet’s secret has to do with Caithe limiting others’ choices somehow. And keeping Malyck secret from Faolain and the Nightmare Court, thus preventing them from seeking out a new Pale Tree and forcing them to continue attempting to corrupt the Pale Tree, would be fitting of Scarlet’s own dislike thus to her it is befittingly “nasty.”

The Door of Komalie looks like a tear in the fabric of reality to me. I always thought it was Odran’s first portal (which is befitting with the sacrifices he’s said to have made to open his first portal).

@Mularc: About Abaddon sending mininos… there’s actually 3 cases prior to Prophecies itself, and 3 cases during or since Prophecies prior to Nightfall. In the first case, you have the Fortune Teller, Razekiel (spelling may be off), and the titan(s) who appeared before the Flame Legion – two of which occured 200 years prior to Nightfall (roughly); fun fact, that’s around when Odran opened his portals. The latter three was Khilbron opening the door of Komalie (which per Domain of ANguish dialogue was meant to be a massive invasive front led by The Fury), the demons attacking Tomb of the Primeval Kings via the Hall of Heroes and one large chaos rift, and finally the Dragon Festival 2006 which had minor chaos rifts.

With her motivations, I was referring to this line:

In my opinion, these “alliances” that were set up by Scarlet serve two purposes: first, they give her the resources (magitechnology, spores) she needs to fulfill her goals (see below), and second, to create discord and chaos, which is apparently her main motivation.

I was clarifying what her main motivation is, and that chaos is just a side-effect or actions she does on a whim. She doesn’t – or at least shouldn’t – need chaos to end predetermination in the manner she’s trying to end them. It sounds more like she’s trying to remove the Dream and the Nightmare, since they are what creates that pre-determination. Or remove sylvari from being connected to them.

To your quote – Scott says elsewhere that “she didn’t see what she thought she saw” and explained the nature of the machine, and that said machine is what drove her insane. (Side note: how can you call someone insane, but not crazy? o.O Don’t they mean the same thing, effectively? Same with ‘mad.’)

As to your stated main point in said last post – they do know what they’re doing, for sure – as in they know their actions. As far as plotting out goes. But the question is whether or not they know what they’re doing as in their actions’ effects on the lore. Or why their actions (mainly their terrible habit of having no exposition) is negatively effecting the story.

(had to split due to size)

On a separate matter, there’s the nature of the tower. At the top – as you can also see via the map – you have a giant plant. Flower? Tree? Not sure. However, from the preview article: “A toxic seed has been grown.”

From Twilight Assault, Scarlet mentions a secret Caithe has and threatens to tell Faolain, which seems bad for Caithe – the only secret we know Caithe has is the one of Malyck, a sylvari born of another tree, which she and others worked hard to prevent the knowledge of getting to the Nightmare Court.

I suspect that Scarlet found out about Malyck somehow, and found the cave of seeds. She gave the NC said seed and the krait the obelisk shards to get their cooperations. Sylvari, known for having magic which grows plants, used said magic to hasten the seed’s grown and is using it to spread these pollens. On top of this, tying this theory to my one on Mordremoth and the Nightmare, I suspect that this tree looks so different because it’s been corrupted by Mordremoth via the Nightmare Court, and the hallucinations and poisons are a side-effect of his corruption.

The corruption concept is supported by one of the achievements (though I have not yet seen what it refers to):

Toxic Spore Cleanser
Kill spore-corrupted creatures.
Find and kill creatures throughout the world who have been corrupted by spores.

Furthermore, this reminds me of the Southsun Cove incident, frankly enough, where Canach used the Fervid Censer to spread berserk-inducing pollen across the island. The pollen matches colors with the krait and NC’s glow, and the side-effects were irreversible. When people are struck with the hallucinations, they sometimes go berserk, thinking they’re under attack and fend for their lives – what if the berserking nature of the Southsun wildlife is just this? They’re not going berserk, but rather they’re hallucinating and believe that they’re being threatened.

If I am right about this, then I can then further my Elder Dragon persona theory – the one where each Elder Dragon has its own “desire” that’s extremely strong and what motivates them into their actions beyond consuming magic to survive:

• Primordus and his minions appear to seek destroying all living life (even his means of corrupting living creatures – encasing them in stone and liquifying the body – supports this, as corrupting living creatures is no different than turning htem into the resources he uses).
• Jormag appears to seek out the strong – he’s described as giving promises of power before corrupting his minions, and some related-to-Jormag skill challenges talk about strength and that Jormag can grant it (non-Sons of Svanir related skill challenges at that).
• Zhaitan’s minions talk a lot about eternal life after death, leading me to view Zhaitan as desiring – or promising – immortality through undeath.
• Kralkatorrik’s mentality in Edge of Destiny matches that of greed – seeking to obtain all things, and destroy the rest. In a way, this can be viewed as wanting to obtain perfection or becoming the sole existence (perfection by definition can be either “without flaws” or “contains everything” – it’d be the second definition by this standard, and possibly even the first!). What’s interesting about the Branded is the sole talking Branded other than Glint is rather… masochistic in speech.
• Mordremoth, through the above theory, appears to be wanting to pit animals (as plants may be affected differently given that’s what, if the theory is right, he corrupts outright) against each other. His corruption doesn’t corrupt them, but rather puts them into frenzies via poisonings.
• The DSD, still hard at this point. I suspect he and his champions are his prophets – the Blue Orb and the Oratuss’ appearance support this IMO, but only very loosely – which would lead, should the krait view of them now be the same as the DSD’s goals, to the DSD wanting to flood the world and drown all life, leaving nothing but the aquatic lifeforms.

Heh. Went on a tangent there…

The notion of Mordremoth’s influence in the pollen also leads to supporting the theory that Scarlet has been influenced by Mordremoth (which kind of fits the vision she had, as he would most certainly be wanting to take out the Pale Tree given its existence is to fight the Elder Dragons – be it by nature or nurture).

Edit: Just found a spore corrupted creature and killed it; was just a standard Toxic Krait with a buff sadly, but interestingly I think that the glow on that one didn’t fade away. It disappeared fast and among permanently-dead krait corpses (which remain glowing) so I’m unsure on this and it requires more testing.

And something mentioned to me in-game by Aaron about the krait – post-fading glow, the colors seem different than usual krait. Which means there’s some amount of permanent alteration by whatever’s causing the glow.

I was going to make a separate thread for this, but I’ll post it here anyways.

The Toxic Oratuss, rather than glowing a yellow-green, has cracked skin. And from this cracked skin you have a light blue glow coming forth (again, rather than yellow-green). It seems he has not taken to whatever magic the other krait have. The eyes and inside of the mouth share this coloring.

What’s most interesting to note is that this is the same coloring as the Blue Orb aka “krait orb” from the personal story, which is stated by Sayeh to “have its own dangers.” What if this appearance is the dangers she mentioned?

I suspect DSD corruption. The yellow-green glow may be Mordremoth, though a big counter is that the NC glow now (which means Mordremoth either finally found a way to corrupt them physically, even if minorly, or it isn’t Mordy corruption), and the glow ceases upon death (which would make it unique for ED corruption). Note: the blue glow does not cease upon death.

Jeez, apparently I’m the poorest of the winners. lol Mind if I increase my share? :P

(Kidding, of course).

220g split between Thalador, myself, and therapite. It doesn’t split evenly.

I’d suggestion 80-80-60g split with therapite getting the least because he offered the least (in standard betting and gambling, giving higher risk results in higher output and both me and Thal offered 50g per capita ).

The losers’ placement was:
Narcemus: 20g
Aaron: 35g
zwierzL 50g
Draxynnic: 45g
Eluviete: 50g
Maethor: 20g

So to streamline trading as best as possible:

To Thalador:
Narc sends 20g
zwierzl sends 50g
Aaron sends 10g

To Me:
Eluviete sends 50g
Aaron sends 15g
Drax sends 5g

To therapite:
Drax sends 40g
Maethor sends 20g

Unless therapite or Thalador have issues with my suggested division (honestly, I’d probably want to give Thalador the least, Mr. 700g+ in bank >.>), but I feel this is most fair.

I didn’t read this in full, but I’d like to note one thing: Scarlet’s motivation.

We actually have it, at least part of it.

“But I see the flaws in that design. My people don’t have to take what we’re given, or be what we were “born to be.” No people do. We can change the rules…well, I can. And I’m going to.”

Her intention is to remove the concept of predetermination (aka Wyld Hunts). Her attacks on Queen’s Jubilee are unrelated to this, as stated in this interview and were actually just done on a whim.

So in a way, she does create chaos for the sake of creating chaos. That’s what she did with the Jubilee. And she isn’t so much “really, really stupid” but rather just that insane. Her act of “seeing the Eternal Alchemy” was false – the device she was strapped to was a sensory deprivation device. In other words, she just lost all sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch. That typically sends people insane and Scarlet is no exception. She hallucinated, but was told she’d see the Eternal Alchemy (a placebo at best) so she believes she saw the Eternal Alchemy.

Indeed, I went through the trouble of capturing 20-some images of that guy during the fight. Uploaded the best. But there’s an interesting thing about the model which has peaked my interest more than it just being an Oratuss.