That’s an interesting view but Shadows in the Water – The Krait make it sound like any race is “worthy” of joining the army… but they are to be joined as slaves, and as souls.
The krait sacrifice slaves to show reverence to the prophets and to ensure that the prophets will have servants in their mystical “other world.”
The Prophets’ army that other races are added to are spiritual. The souls of those the krait enslaved and sacrificed. No living non-krait is part of this army.
Equally comfortable above and below the water, the krait have never felt truly threatened by any of the land-dwelling races of Tyria. Perhaps that is why they have not bothered to communicate with other races. They have no need of anything land-dwellers can give them, other than slaves for their use and sacrifices for their rituals. However, the krait can seize those for themselves—with ruthless efficiency.
I found this line interesting, as it can be both used to explain and counter the krait allying with the Nightmare Court.
The krait see no reason to ally with land-dwelling races, because anything the land-dwelling race can provide, the krait believe they can simply take by force. But at the same time, no land-dwelling race has offered the krait something they can’t take by force.
Taking this bit into account, it may be that Scarlet somehow proved herself to be threatening even to the krait, making them bother to communicate since previously they wouldn’t – this can be supported in that the krait mooks now have voiced over lines. And then after showing to be strong, Scarlet offered the obelisk – by being threatening enough, the krait wouldn’t simply try to take it by force and enter negotiation.
Makes me wonder if the krait had ever clashed with the charr in full force before, if the krait would have opened communications in return. “Gain our respect by proving your strength to us first” kind of deal.
I’m unsurprised by such a view, however I’d say no. The jaws are much different as is the general shape of the Leviathan, which is more fish-like than snake-like (Leviathans are basically giant tusked sharp-teethed fish).
I’ve always been interested in the krait, actually. The Blue Orb of theirs along with some of their skill challenges with the blog post strike interesting thoughts in my mind.
My opinions, Narcemus?
Mechanically, and aesthetically, I love the update. Though I’m unhappy of the LS category requiring the dailies once again…
I love the addition of an Oratuss (at long last), and how the lore from the krait blog post is finally being put in-game (most if not all the other minor races’ lore blog posts’ lore was in the game upon release, but krait definitely wasn’t).
As for the alliance and “Scarlet did it” – predictable and sad, but not as terrible as it could have been. At least they’re bringing up the whole issue of xenophobia by the NPCs. Maybe we’ll see the full reason why the krait joined in next update – for now we only know “Scarlet gave them Obelisk shards”… why did the krait not gut Scarlet for defiling their most sacred of objects? How did Scarlet get the shards? Why did Scarlet make the Toxic Alliance? These are the things I want to know next update. And the answers can make or break the lore.
Perhaps because from what we’ve seen so far, this isn’t delving into the history of the Krait, or are the words “unlike anything seen before in Tyria” too ambiguous?
It does delve into their culture a bit though. Not much new that isn’t in the blog post, though.
At least that I’ve seen thus far.
But that’s fine to me, TBH, as it at least gives players who don’t know about the wiki (only place I know that blog post exists anymore) a chance to learn this lore in the game itself.
I think you guys are over exaggerating the situation of this one armor set. It isn’t that stripped down…
Though I do agree it is weird the female version doesn’t look much like the male version in this one set.
They even mentioned in the description of the LS that krait are xenophobes, so it’s not like they’re ignoring the lore.
They’re just changing it to fit their tastes and having the issue of changing it being lampshaded in the game with all the good guys going “why the hell is there an alliance?”
But their explanation isn’t all that bad – you got at least one Oratuss (the leadership of the krait) seeking the Prophets’ return and he believes that the alliance will further this goal. Temporarily working with another race so that they can bring their Prophets who can and will enslave all races? Doesn’t seem that contradictory.
And Scarlet using obelisk shards to seal the deal is… well, that’s both easy and hard to take in. I personally would have thought the krait would gut a sylvari where he/she stands for defiling their sacred relics, blaming the sylvari on destroying the obelisk to then try to use the krait by offering the shards. But I can see how one can be convinced to working with those who offer the shards.
And the Nightmare Courtiers being a splinter group of the Court makes it a bit more believable.
However, I don’t know what the hell Scarlet’s plan in all this is. What relevance does this all have with her overarching goal? And why is she working with the Nightmare Court whom she stated to hate?
The living story explains that whoever is pulling the strings (Scarlet, probably,) found something to offer them: Krait obelisk shards.
No one ever knew where to find them, yet Scarlet has triumphed where no one else could yet again. It was a poor way to fix a problem: Why the krait would ally themselves with others. In any profession you’re not supposed to fix problems but avoid them. The Krait-Nightmare Court alliance should never have happened.
What’re you talking about? People knew where to find them.
It’s just that they were all on the ocean floor and rather rare.
Sylvan hounds are born from the Pale Tree, and only from the Pale Tree. The difference is that they are born small and grow up. They do not reproduce (at least as far as we know). There’s a heart at Danador’s Kennel which has explaining this in a bit more detail and notes how even sylvari aren’t sure why.
The Nightmare Court seems to have a lot of splinter factions…
One ones in Sparkfly Fen and Mount Maelstrom are a splinter faction. Twilight Arbor features three splinter factions. And now Tower of Nightmare has another(?) splinter faction.
It lacks the ethereal look of Margonites.
Those look like plants to me, not wings.
Six eyes belong to more than just Margonites/Abaddon (Shades, Jade constructs, titans, etc.).
I’d say it’s a plant-infused krait or some super Nightmare Courtier. The next update will more than likely be the conclusion of Tower of Nightmare content.
^
15 golden charr
Interesting that this is tied to the krait prophets’ ascension. Makes me more certain that krait prophets = DSD champions because the toxin and physical change really makes me think Mordremoth – and given oral tradition, it’s possible they’re mistaking one ED’s corruption for another.
Though I note you didn’t specify how it’s related. I’ll have to dig into it myself and see if my initial thoughts redact.
If you were to ask me if the krait would ally with someone on the premise of acquiring parts of an obelisk, I would honestly have to say “I don’t know, but I will err on the side of: they wont.” I guess I have the answer to that now.
I would argue that the krait would gut the land-dweller for defiling their sacred object.
I’m guessing she somehow convinced a krait leader to listen though.
I’m waiting for us to learn that Scarlet also mastered krait numerology.
Krait numerology? I’m guessing that’s something mentioned in-game.
Scarlet Briar
And now I must come to the most… tenuous issue. It is very easy to get up in flames about Scarlet. Many call her a Villain Sue. The thing is, she isn’t – not entirely. The problem is that you would only know this if you listened to this interview. – if you only know her from the game, then you know nothing about her except she’s behind everything in the Living Story, to which I go point back to the Pacing section. If you read the short story, then you see her as a villain whom everyone for some reason liked and tried to pamper, and when you slap in the Molten Alliance and – if .dat mining and news presses are to be believed – this new Nightmare Court/krait alliance she made… you get someone who is unrealistically convincing, as if her just speaking indoctinates people Reaper style.
But when you listen to that interview as well, then you have someone who’s living a false life, and isn’t as grand as the short story’s rather unclear wording makes her out to be. Some may view this has hastened “clean up” from the rather negative responses about her, but I’ll just take it as face value – that’s what she is. She didn’t see the Eternal Alchemy and she didn’t go through the complete colleges. Attacking the Jubilee was just a whim and not somehow tied to the odd goal of freeing sylvari.
Which comes to another point (or rather, returns us to): we know nothing of her plans. She wrecked parties. She tried getting Mai on the Captain’s Council. She occupied Twilight Arbor. Why? Her actions seem random (see section above with “random story”) because we don’t know what she’s trying to do.
And another issue is that she just isn’t a threat. Yeah, she’s presented as this grand and brilliantly mad engineer. Okay, so what? She only ever succeeds at anything because we didn’t know of her antics. Molten Alliance? Did so bad because the Orders were pre-occupied with Zhaitan. Mai Trin? Another sneak attack. Jubilee? Again, sneak attack. Twilight Assault? We got the drop on her, and there was effectively no major threat from her other than she somehow captured Caithe. She’s only a threat if the good guys hold the idiot ball (as draxynnic puts it, which is very befitting). If she doesn’t pose a real threat – a threat when we come in to stop her actions – then she’ll forever be just a clown. And despite the odd fear of clowns and despite the Joker, clowns in of themselves don’t make good villains.
It’s Not A “Living World” Story, It’s “Scarlet’s Story”
I’ve heard on the forum in the past that it isn’t a “living story” but a “random story.” I disagree with this. But I will say it is not a “Living World” nor a “Living Story” – it is a progressional story where earlier chapters are removed (thus leaving new players questioning what’s going on).
In my opinion, a “random story” would probably be preferable to what we have. A Living World would have multiple plots ongoing at once, in often unpredictable sequences. There are four cases I’d like to point to where a Living World was done… somewhat accurate.
The good points I listed are needed more of:
The Unpopular/Old Have A “No Touching!” Sign
This isn’t entirely Living Story related, but it is perhaps my biggest gripe of all, really. So I feel it needs being said. There seems to be an unspoken (publicly at least) saying that “if players don’t use it, we won’t improve it.” To paraphrase Colin from PAX – they won’t improve charr armors “yet” because they aren’t popular. It seems to be going over your – the developers’ – heads that they aren’t popular because of the armor clipping. Yeah, there’s some other reasons but that’s by far among the biggest (second biggest is likely “I don’t like them because I’m a GW1 player and they destroyed Ascalon” or the such).
On the flip side, it feels like any old content – like, for example, the Personal Story – isn’t going to ever get overhauls, even minor ones, unless it’s something of focus for the community like the world bosses. They’ll at best get bug fixes. But imagine how much better the personal story would be if you went in and improved some of the big boss fights? How many more players would be more willing to replay if Retribution (retaking Claw Island) was more than “escort this NPC, capture these points, old Tequatl fight, we win!”? Even if it alters the plot a little (like, for example, making the Sovereign Eye of Zhaitan a returning character – perhaps having it lead the assault on Claw Island and altering the cinematic to show it killing your Order mentor) some retroactive changes wouldn’t be hurtful – especially in later Personal Story.
And with the Living Story – why must the instances be temporary? Why not having them as expansions to the Personal Story? Will the Personal Story and what it affects be forever labeled as “forbidden” for touching because it’s meant to be stuck in 1325 AE or something? Why not bring back some removed Living Story content that would make sense to remain? For example, the events from Flame and Frost – the Molten Alliance has returned in the invasions. Why not having isolated forces keep at a “personal invasion”? Or the dungeons… were they ever really needed to be removed? It’d be like removing The Ruined City of Arah just because that story “was told.” They’re instanced and often out of the way. And simply bringing them back due to a change of heart wouldn’t be some grand blasphemy.
And just a little peeve I had – Twilight Assault. Why remove the Forward/Up path? Yes, it was perhaps the most unpopular dungeon path, but think about why it was – it was hated for one thing, and one thing only: the boss fight. Fix the boss fight, and it would have been perhaps the best Twilight Arbor explorable path of the three. I would have rather you remove Laurant’s path, and alter the F/U path so that Laurant would have a better chance at surviving… and if he did he’d follow you to the Nightmare Tree where he would take control rather than the spider girl (forgot name), thus you get 2 versions of the boss in one path. Would have been far more interesting, especially since the F/U path has three things unique unto that path – the husks, the bees, and fighting with Laurant.
TL;DR Don’t just ignore or remove unpopular content. Think of why it’s unpopular and fix it. Otherwise you’ll just funnel players to small areas and leave the rest of the game desolate – and by the “remove unpopular content” (or “replace unpopular content”) you’d be removing most of the game. Not a really good idea, IMHO.
Mechanical Content Updates
I feel that too much of the content that’s being pushed out is catering to the higher-tiered groups of players. Tequatl, champ loot, Ascended gear… these are all high-end stuff or stuff that – intentionally or not – promote farming. To paraphrase a question I saw in Queensdale the otherday: “Remember when Guild Wars 2 was more than a ’where’s the zerg’ game?”
If you think about it, too much of the content favors big groups, and is rather harmful to solo play. Tequatl’s obvious here, but look at the champion loot bags – while they don’t outright promote farming, champions aren’t meant to be solo’d so it’s pretty much moot to those who like playing outside of the large groups. Mad King’s Labyrinthe – the place is full to the brim with crowd controlling enemies. Go to fight one enemy, and you’ll soon be fighting ten more because you’re getting pushed, pulled, or immobilized at the wrong times in the wrong places. Best way to survive? Zerg! The Crown Pavilion – place was full of Veterans with Legendary bosses. Good luck solo’ing in there. Best way to survive? Zerg!
On the flip side, it feels like there’s a power creep that’s happening too fast. A lot of the game is rather a joke with Exotic gear, and now Ascended gear is being added in faster and faster. Soon enough, content’s going to be either a peace of cake, kittenly because you’re intentionally not getting top gear, or will have to be made harder to compensate for the power creep. Slap in the new limited-time skill we’re getting and the fact we’re likely to be getting even more of such skills and… well, power creep happens. And when you make these things time-gated or worse, limited-time only? New players will be left in the dust.
Suffice it to say: not a fan.
Please give some stuff for the non-zerg, non-hardcore players – like you did when you added Vexa’s Lab.
Alright, I’ll toss my hand into this frying pot as well and state my view of the Living Story in the most complete form possible. To do this I’ll divide it by subject, as there are IMO a lot of failing points and even more places for improvements.
And to note, I only discussed the Living Story in how it is and how what there is can/needs to be improved, rather than what I feel could be added in new motions.
(Side note: ANet, please increase the character limit)
Pacing of Story
I’ll start off with what I feel is the primary problematic crux in the “Living World” – the pacing of the story. In short, it’s too slow. Now don’t misunderstand me! I’m not saying “produce the udpates faster!” I’m no fool, I know such isn’t possible. In fact, I’d say the opposite.
Please bring the updates back to once-a-month. In my opinion, every two weeks for an update is too fast, especially with so much temporary content that can disappear either in two weeks or four weeks and you just don’t ever really know. Even if you improve communication for how long content lasts, how long the temporary stuff lasts still is too short in too many cases for its amount. And it’s even weirder that the Living World achievements can never be achieved after they go into Historical, despite old promises of otherwise. Giving an extra two weeks for development and testing would, I hope, also improve the quality of the content – as things stand, it feels like ArenaNet’s stance is “quantity, not quality” and that stance has to go out the window and into the sewers. It just isn’t healthy. While more things to do is never bad, sacrificing quality for that is no good – you destroy any memorable feelings the story or content can have.
Back to the point though – pacing of the story. It isn’t that the updates come too slowly, but rather that we get too little per update. Take, for example, the month of September and October – the combined content of SAB:Back to School, Tequatl Rising, and Twilight Assault. What did we get for story? Moto was pretty juicy story, but with Tequatl Rising we just got three points (“Tequatl got stronger for unknown reasons” “Rytlock told Rox to hunt Tequatl down” and “Bobby Stein promises there’s more to the story”) we didn’t even get a short story to it, and then with Twilight Assault? What did we learn? Caithe knew of Ceara when she was in the Grove, Scarlet made a deal with the Nightmare Court (which you’d only learn via the short story), and Ceara knows a secret of Caithe – oh, and somehow she can capture the sylvari best known for her guile and stealth…
We got next to nothing in-game about Scarlet in Twilight Assault, just like with Clockwork Chaos (what we got in-game then was "Scarlet’s behind the Molten Alliance and Aetherblades, and is norn-, charr-, hylek-, and asura-trained). If you want people to be invested in the story, you have to give them more than these miniscule breadcrumbs, and they must be in the game itself somehow.
TL;DR In short, what I’m saying here is that you need to produce more plot points in the game itself each update. It doesn’t matter how, just that it’s done. Make it come out of a grumbling skritt in the sewers of Lion’s Arch if you must, just get it in the game.
Then thousands were killed under the span of two years.
Possibly five years. It’s a common and VERY easily overlooked fact, but the Test of the Chosen began no later than 1067 AE . Saul’s return and spreading the White Mantle faith was much sooner than the charr invasion. Whether or not the sacrifices occurred so early on is questioned – and, IMO, unlikely given Saul’s attitude to the mursaat killing his people at the end of his BMP mission.
I don’t think that the miniatures in the sets will prelude important figures. I mean, if you look at set 1 for the named NPCs you got Eir, Logan, Big Nosed Ted, Yaotl the Fierce, and Comrade Molechev. We all know who Eir and Logan are, Ted was a human PS bandit (Commoner storyline) and not even the big-bad of that plot, Molachev was a Guild Wars 1 NPC, and Yaotl doesn’t seem to be in the game.
For the Set 2 named miniatures, we have Shaman of Jormag, Frost Fang (a drake), Eelob Poisonfang (a spider), Zojja, Maut, Skarm Darkhoof (a centaur), and Ragar Shardhammer (an icebrood). Sans Zojja, none of these miniatures are NPCs in the game.
When it comes to non-named NPCs, if the miniatures were meant to show a focus of plot NPCs, then we’d have a lot more risen in set 1 I would argue. The addition of the Twisted Clockwork is likely just because those were new models. Furthermore, on your point 1 and 2 – there’s a good number of centaurs, seraph, bandits, Inquest, and Peacemakers in set 1.
The only ones in the group that are of any interest are Maut and Frost Fang. Maut because who or what Maut is, is fully unknown. But the Conundrum of Maut gives an interesting view. Frost Fang because it’s an ice drake, and we had an ice drake miniature already (plus it shares names with the legendary axe) – this signifies this figure has some lore importance.
Either way, I’m doubtful they will lead to revealing future threats. I’d love if its right, since I’d enjoy an expansion of the Sinister Triad (whom Maut could be tied to if he’s Inquest), as well as Jormag, but I’m doubtful.
It is evident from the dialog that Malyck has not gone through the dream/nightmare. That I agree. But please don’t disregard part of what I said. When I talk about amnesia I am talking about how convenient it is that Malyck does know nothing about his tree. He just knows where it is. He knows nothign about his past.
And this is where I say you are wrong. He knows his past from the moment of awakening to the present. He is able to perfectly trace back his steps with Caithe’s option, without going “I remember now!” – because he never forgot. Hence why I said he didn’t have amnesia. I wasn’t disregarding what you said, I was saying you’re wrong.
Now, is the lack of dream/nightmare because his tree does not have such? Or it is because his pod travelled far from the tree before Malyck was mature enough to enter the dream?
We can’t say.
Malyck talks about a feelign of distance and a loss. The distance might be his tree. But the loss? Can’t it be because he is missing something like the dream?
True, we cannot say why he doesn’t have a dream – but it should be noted that the Dream is not unique to sylvari, so one shouldn’t automatically believe that all sylvari are meant to be part of the Dream.
I took his comment of distance and loss about him not knowing his own origins (his tree). He figures out his tree’s location based on the river and the fact that his pod must have floated down it.
About neutrality : he is rescued by the player when the nightmare court was assaulting his friends. Of course he would side with him! But when the player tries to explain the difference between the dream and the nightmare, Malyck answers :
Player (about the dream/nightmare) : The two concepts share origins, but ours come from the Dream. Theirs spawn from the Nightmare
Malyck: I do not wholly understand the difference, but I see that it means a great deal to you.
Later he goes with the player because “You’ve been kind, while those courtiers bring suffering. So I can agree”
As I said, he sides with the player because he was nice to him while the nightmare court chased his friends (and during many dialogues, he finds them to be mad :Malyck:The Knight of Embers is a fool. Whatever this “nightmare” is, it led her to obsession and madness. Is your “Dream” the same?
<Character Name>:No. The Dream is a vision of hope and a feeling of purpose. It guides us toward the light, not into evil.
Malyck :I wish I could say that I understood the difference, but I don’t.Again : he does not know the difference. The are the same for him.
For me it means Malyck is neutral in the dream/nightmare fight. He sides with the player for some reasons, but not because it is his nature to side with the dream faction.
Philosophically, he is indeed neutral. But his actions speak different than his words. He acts far more like someone of the Dream, rather than someone of Nightmare. As they say – actions speak far louder than words.
About the lab discussion, it is a matter of feelings. For me anything happening in an Asuran lab can not be taken as ‘natural’. Asura tend to try to combine impossible things and defy the usual laws of ‘nature’.
This again is a point of view.
I never said it was natural. I said that it is possible. And seeing how it is not possible for a sylvari to be corrupted, as stated to us by a developer in that when corruption touches a sylvari, said sylvari die, then they cannot be the same. It would require altering the sylvari – changing whatever it is that allows them to be “immune” to corruption – in order to corrupt a sylvari. But all the Inquest had done was instill dragon corruption on individuals (both minions and not).
-snip-
The Nightmare in the Dream of Dreams is heavily hinted to be tied to the Elder Dragons, which are definitely not the same as Nightmares – which are, in effect, malicious spiritual beings (based on my GW1 research at least, primarily from Xandra’s quest in the Far Shiverpeaks).
Faolain and Caithe, for example, are said to first encounter the Nightmare in Orr – this is where Faolain first fell to Nightmare (before joining the Nightmare Court), though Caithe managed to pull back from it.
They are still classified as ‘nightmare’ in the wiki but the only naming one can barely see them sharing is ‘shadow’. Shadow behemoth, shadow beast, shade… they are hardly ever referred to as ‘nighatmares’.
Shadow fiend* – the wiki classification is an unofficial term based off of GW1 classification.
Krait would never work along any other race. So I lean towards they looking ‘shadowy and nightmarish’ because they are using nightmare power, not because they are related to the nightmare court.
Explain the giant thorns coming from the tower in the preview pics/video, and the giant flower-like thing at the very top of it. Then there’s also the news presses that state the krait and Nightmare Court are allies, and dat-mining that says Scarlet’s behind it all.
Actually, most (if not all) Nightmare Court care about spreading Nightmare. The differentiation is that they all have their own views about how to spread it. For example, those three coutiers in Twilight Arbor? One wants to plunge everyone in war to spread Nightmare, one wants to invoke primordial fear (arachniphobia), and one wants to subjugate everyone. In the end, Nightmare – via fear, pain, and torment – gets spread. It’s just different ways. Faolain also wants to spread Nightmare, but she’s more… isolated. She wants to convert Caithe specifically – still spreading Nightmare, but her personal goals are, well, personal.
And that’s just talking about those in Twilight Arbor. Go into the personal story and every major Nightmare Courtier is seeking to spread the Nightmare in their own way – Faolain isn’t unique in how she does it, btw, as seen in the Shield of the Moon storyline where the mesmer (forgot her name) seeks to bring her lover to Nightmare (and may succeed depending on your actions).
(edited by Konig Des Todes.2086)
So I haven’t played in a while, and I’m trying to get back into the game, realizing that I’ve missed a lot of the story.
Basically, I left after the first part of Living Story (refugees) and know they now reside in Southsun?
What of the Elder Dragons and such? Trahearne?
Consortium, Fractals of the Mists, any of the lore been explained for that? I thought it really intriguing.
Just wanting a basic outline of the lore following the fall of Zhaitan and how it all strings together so far, thanks!
To answer these questions exactly (in order):
Thanks for the link, I’ve browsed through that exact wiki page before but I was hoping to extract from the community some way that this all ties into the overarching plot, assuming it’s still one of the Elder Dragon threat that forced Tyrians to ally with each other.
The Living Story takes the spotlight away from the Elder Dragons for now. We were told that the plotline of Scarlet is meant to be an “intermission” between the Elder Dragons – to give us players something other than “Dragons, Dragons! DRAGONS!!!” to have as enemies.
This came from the same interview that told us the current state of the Pact. A line of “a couple years” was mentioned for how long intermission plotlines are to take between the Elder Dragons’ own plots. Aka we’ll should see the next Elder Dragon in mid/late-2014, and 2015 by the latest. When being optimistic.
It’s telling Scarlet’s story – Scarlet Briar’s actions and the repercussions of those actions.
Scarlet seems the be the personal nemesis they are talking about, but to our knowledge she is not involved in many of the Living World episodes:
Flame and Frost – deeply involved
Secret of Southsun – no evidence of involvement
Dragon Bash – involved
Cutthroat Politics – almost no evidence of involvement (one fight with Aetherblades doing ordinary pirate work)
Queen’s Jubilee – deeply involved
Tequatl Rising – no evidence of involvement
Super Adventure Box – no evidence of involvement
Halloween – predates Scarlet’s shenanigans, so not a fair comparison
I fully disagree:
Flame and Frost: Scarlet was behind the Molten Alliance
Secret of Southsun/Last Stand at Southsun: Repercussions of the Molten Alliance’s (and by extension, Scarlet’s) actions
Dragon Bash/Sky Pirates: Attack by Aetherblades, who work for Scarlet.
Bazaar of the Four Winds/Cutthroat Poltiics: Repercussions of Aetherblades (aka Scarlet’s) actions.
Queen’s Jubilee/Clockwork Chaos: Scarlet attacks.
SAB: No Scarlet.
Tequatl Rising: No Scarlet – yet (note: Bobby Stein said that Tequatl Rising’s story is tied to the Living Story progression, we just don’t know how yet).
Twilight Assault: Scarlet’s base
Blood and Madness: no Scarlet, though we got a preview of Tower of Nightmares.
Tower of Nightmares: dat-mining claims Scarlet’s involved.
So only Halloween, SAB, Lost Shores, Wintersday, and Tequatl Rising has shown to have no Scarlet involvement – directly or indirectly. Overall, that’s a grand total of 7 updates out 20 (21 if including Tower of Nightmares) since the updates began that do not involve Scarlet or involve the repercussions of her antics – you can easily subtract 3 (Shadow of Mad King, Lost Shores, Wonderful Workshop of Tixx) if you wish since that’s before Scarlet’s plot as you said.
Tequatl is essentially just updating world bosses and apart from the fig leaf of having Rox running around, has no significant story behind it.
One would think that given what we saw in-game, but Bobby Stein says otherwise! See this thread.
To quote the more important line: “Tequatl becoming stronger (and Rox being present) are both tied into the overall LW story. More will be revealed later.”
Eh, I’m quite tired with the whole “A wild Scarlet appears.” She only ever does any amount of damage because her antics are unknown.
We’ve known about her for a while now, we need to start figuring out her antics before she’s ready to reveal her plan and cause havoc. And she still needs to be a threat then.
My issues with Scarlet can be summed up in four parts – from most important to least (and all are very big issues):
It’s a Scarlet conga that’s in an infinite loop.
Concerning lore. The lore is never static. It is subject of change and evolution. At the moment we witness the growth of a new aspect of the lore. Lore is flexible and unbreakable. It simply growths in a new direction.
Since when did “change and evolution” regard making unexplained and sometimes blatant retcons to already and LONG established lore?
Lore is VERY much breakable. It happens in this thing called “retconning without plausible explanation.”
No, we got NPCs in the brand that were there in them mids of it when kralky flew off that are still uncorrupted (and a entire skillpoint and a master of a manly order in the personal story nicely dedicated to it). Also he does corrupt water, oil and even somehow rain clouds n brushes which by all rights should be blocked off by the corruption and burned off respectively.
Again, do the personal story skritt line, a you nicely get the explanation that before corrupting the fossil of a ancient crab, it still had eggs in it, thats why the whole thing goes apekitten.
Jormag and Kralky have no known usage of dead people (dying yes but not dead).
Jormag and Kralky corrupt in the same way of spreading parts of their corruption by force as shown again in the brand and Frostgorge meta/HotW (4 times in a row as a matter of fact).
So no all your points are once again wrong as shown by in game events and descriptions.
For the NPCs, are you referring to Almorra? Because it was stated that she was on the edge of the Dragonbrand, not within it, as Kralkatorrik flew over. She quite literally missed being corrupted by a hair. This was stated in an interview shortly after Ghosts of Ascalon’s release – the skill point marking where Almorra killed her warband is even on the edge of the Dragonbrand and the cinematic showing Kralkatorrik flying overhead (seen when joining the Vigil) shows Almorra on the edge as well.
I’m not sure what water you refer to, given how the water is actually clear in the Dragonbrand. The things within the water got corrupted, but not the water itself by all appearances (the water did not turn to crystal). Same goes for the rainclouds – I’ve not seen any such mention of that, though there is the “Brandstorm” which is created by the concentrated corruption (note: made by the corruption, not corrupted storm clouds).
And I have done the skritt storyline, nothing proves that the Destroyer Queen was a corrupted living being. The mentor does speculate that it could be because other dragons have done that (see Branded Devourer Queen and most Risen Spiders/Drakes), but all mentors also state it can just be a new kind of destroyer minion. Furthermore, those “destroyer eggs” hatch full grown Destroyer Crabs and even Destroyer Trolls. I don’t know of a crab that can breed trolls. Do you? And nothing says that Destroyer Queen was even a fossil.
See Edge of Destiny, chapter 1, for Jormag corrupting a corpse. In fact, I’ll quote for you:
Eir roared, her blades flinging out to slash the throats of two more icebrood. They fell beside her as another came on – a man with hair like a horse’s tail.
She knew this man, though his face was smashed, his nose canted to one side, his teeth gone where some great fist had struck him. His flesh was sealed in ice. His eyes were white, filled with the fury of the Dragonspawn.
His face was caved in by a powerful blow before he was turned into an icebrood. There are other lines in that chapter which call the icebrood “dead men” as well. So yes, some icebrood are in fact, corpses.
As seen in Edge of Destiny and this post by Stephane lo Presti responding on behalf of Jeff Grubb, Jormag corrupts mentally. Kralkatorrik, as seen in Edge of Destiny, corrupted by breathing on the beings. In linked post by Stephane, in fact, Jeff outright states:
“[…]not all Elder Dragons and their champions have the same general powers. Jormag has definite mind-affecting powers – the others may not. The Great Destroyer did not seem to corrupt living creatures as opposed to create mockeries out of stone and magma, while Kralkatorrik definitely did. Each Elder Dragon is a unique form of destruction, and expecting them to have the same abilities is like expecting a typhoon to be an earthquake. Their similarity is in the destruction and pain they leave in their wake.”
While Jormag and his champions may, like Kralkatorrik and his champions, transport its minions via “crystals” (Ice Crystals in Jormag’s case, as they’re called), they corrupt differently. Jormag corrupts mentally, Kralkatorrik does not. They may seem similar superficially, but it is just that – on the surface.
TL;DR: While it is possible for the Elder Dragons to corrupt in similar or the same manners (Kellach proves Zhaitan can corrupt living; Sanguinary Blade proves Jormag can corrupt non-mentally; Edge of Destiny proves Jormag can corrupt corpses; this interview proves Primordus can corrupt living beings (but we haven’t seen such), they each hold their own way of corrupting. Why they corrupt differently is still unknown. But this much is a fact, as I have shown.
(edited by Konig Des Todes.2086)
First, Malyck indeed acts different than the standard Sylvari. Malick is the Switzerland of the Sylvari and cant really make a difference between the Nightmare and the Dream, implying that being born far from its tree he is missing the ‘final formatting’.
During hsi dialogues he implies that he follows the player because he is nice and the others look kind of mad, but not because he understands this notion of nightmare/evil Dream/good.
Malick is neutral.]On top of that he has amnesy. Talk about a nice way to later find that upon returning to his tree, he lives through a terrifying episode of ’I am your father! Noooooooo" (have you noticed how sylvary nightmare/dream is reminder of certain Jedi light.dark side? Up to the physiical changes upon abusing of the dark side?)
Amnesy was always a nice way in fantasy novels to later find that the hero is the son of Satan.Edit: I talk about amnesy in terms of not knowing nothing about where he came from/ not knowing his own past/ not knowing his parents.
Malyck is not fast to trust or judge, but that doesn’t make him “neutral” – he is very unrelenting in fighting and he helps those who help him. He is far more like Caithe than any Nightmare Courtier. He follows and trusts the player because the player went out of his/her way to help Malyck and Malyck’s friends (the Wardens were who captured by the Nightmare Courtiers who were looking for Malyck). It is not because “the others look mad” – it’s because the PC proved he/she is trustworthy to Malyck.
Furthermore, Malyck does NOT have amnesia. If you go with Caithe, he shows full well that he remembers everything. The bit about amnesia was an assumption by the player character because Malyck never heard of the Grove, Pale Tree, or the Dream. He never lost his memory, but he never had a Dream of Dreams experience either (note: the Dream of Dreams is not unique unto sylvari, as per the White Stag, so the Pale Tree may be unique among the sylvari trees to be tied to the Dream of Dreams).
About minions being immune… Is not about being immune, is more about the fact that as far as I know, no minion was corrupted by another ED (as if they could not do it)
The special examples in game are all found in a Lab! Come on… we can find in labs mouses growing human ears in their backs for prostetic purposes. It does not mean mouses can grow human ears… They can’t… unless in a lab…
And why would asura try to combine corruptions in the first place if this was possible ‘naturaly’?I like the theory of the sylvari being linked to a dragon and I dont find it at all rebunked by those arguments.
Dragon minions indeed can be corrupted by another Elder Dragon. Kudu’s Monster, Kudu, and Subject Alpha are all such cases – the first I listed, Kudu’s MOnster, is a Risen Giant who has abilities tied to Primordus, Jormag, and Kralkatorrik. What Subject Alpha was originally is rather unclear though he also shows abilities of Zhaitan, Primordus, Jormag, and Kralkatorrik – as well as “Mordremoth” (the suspected name for the jungle dragon). Kudu himself appear Branded but somehow managed to retain his individuality, and iirc, also exhibits Primordus and Jormag-related skills.
The very fact that it is possible proves that sylvari are not dragon minions. The reason being that for sylvari it is not possible at all – coming into contact with draconic corruption kills a sylvari. This makes it physically impossible for them to be corrupted by any Elder Dragon – naturally or artificially. Even if we only have artificially created multi-dragon minions, the fact we have multi-dragon minions and cannot even get a uni-dragon minion sylvari proves that it is not possible for sylvari to be a dragon minion.
To use your rat and human ear argument – though you’ll be hard pressed to find a rat growing a human ear in nature, a genetic mutation is still possible to occur. This is, in fact, what tumors and cancers are. The rat growing a human ear is just a specialized (read: artificially made) tumor.
Scarlet is not acting as minion, but she can be a champion. Or is there some official rule that champion of elder dragon has to be a dragon?
A “dragon champion” is just a lieutenant of an Elder Dragon – a dragon minion with more self-will and the ability to control other nearby (weaker willed) minions.
So no, not all dragon champions are dragons; they’re just champions of an Elder Dragon. Most of the talking risen at the end of the personal story (in Orr) and even in Orr events (especially the temple priests/priestesses) are potentially considered dragon champions.
(edited by Konig Des Todes.2086)
She is a lazy attempt to wrap everything into one tight basket and needs to go.
The irony of it is that when John Stumme transferred over from GW2 back to GW1 as the new Live Team lead, he explicitly stated that they (Anet) wanted to go away from the whole “Abaddon did it” mentality so as it make their lore wider, rather than deeper (where everything is interconnected).
And then they bring out Scarlet and Elder Dragons. What isn’t connected to the Elder Dragons, is connected to Scarlet (or soon will be given the current rate). And they’ve managed to fill up the depth they made with the Six Gods and Abaddon, revoking many of their greatest accomplishments.
2 Things:
Because who knows, maybe if we’re told more, people won’t see Scarlet kitten lore breaking. Maybe we if know how she got the Flame Legion and Dredge working together, what her goals are, or how she’s behind the krait and Nightmare Court (if dat mining is correct) then perhaps there’ll actually be something there to like. The main hate of the LS in the story itself is its lack of telling story. And every update I pray this gets improved.
If it isn’t, I may end up leaving GW2 before its inevitable flop.
No one suggested Cobra yet?
That’s saved for when the naga (who have hoods like cobras) are involved.
I think the living story is cool. It’s a great way to tell little stories about events going on around the world and a great way to give people a reason to keep playing (Yes Seyo I know I quit playing for almost a year). HOWEVER, they aren’t good for major storylines like the dragons.
The funny thing is that the living story isn’t telling little stories abotu events going on around the world.
It’s telling Scarlet’s story – Scarlet Briar’s actions and the repercussions of those actions.
One of the Living Story developers said the LS teams were not developing an expansion. Some news sites then declared GW2 was not doing any expansions. Colin then posted a clarification saying other teams were working on longer term projects. Colin should not have to have done so, since the interviews I heard made it perfectly clear they were taking about the LS teams.
News to me. The “clarification” I saw was Colin saying that they haven’t definitively decided on no-expansion but instead want to explore the possibility of giving the content of an expansion in Living Story format.
Granted, as drax said, it was a long time ago. So things may have changed without me seeing. I’d love to see the source though, as that’d be at least one improvement ArenaNet’s made recently.
We do not see routine examples of xenophobic races such as the Grawl, Jotun, or Centaurs within the ranks of the Elder Dragons. This does not make them immune by nature, of course. Nor does it mean that xenophobic races are not present in the various armies of the Elder Dragons: The Krait are amongst the foremost examples of just one such race being overrepresented in at least Zaithan’s army.
I would list the grawl, jotun, and centaurs as being a case of “model resources and/or considered too far” – same with other races we don’t see.
I mean, we do see grawl and jotun being attempted to be turned by the Sons of Svanir, and we have concept art for centaurs being both risen and icebrood.
I would hardly call jotun, grawl, and centaurs xenophobic, mind you. Well, jotun arguably, but not really the others.
As far as I know, we have no tidy explanation for why Almorra Soulkeeper was spared the Kralkatorrik’s corruption.
From the developers’ mouth: She was on the edge of the Dragonbrand, not within it. Unfortunately, I cannot find the interview…
And for the record, in the past people did question the possibility of isolated (read: not species-wide) prevention of corruption long long ago, back when Ghosts of Ascalon was released because the story isn’t exactly clear on Almorra’s placement. A later interview which stated she was at the edge of the Dragonbrand, thus not touched by the corruption, more or less ended it.
Aesgir furthered the speculation, though at first we were led to believe that it was the Spirits of the Wild that prevented him from becoming corrupted. Now, however, we know he was in the possession of an ancient and possibly-powerful scroll suspected to be of jotun origins which may have aided him in the fight against Jormag.
As for an “antidote” – such was known since Edge of Destiny. Though I really dislike your usage of viruses in this, as it is very very pointblankedly not viral but magical (plus, how the heck does a virus turn your body into ice/crystal/lava? Just how!?), in Edge of Destiny, Snaff utilizes gray powerstones to block the Dragonspawn’s mesmer-like magic that is how it corrupts. Though said powerstones wouldn’t prevent corruption by other means.
The Elder Dragons corrupt by exuding their own twisting magic. Their transformation is probably little different than how Abaddon turned Margonites into etheric demonic entities (something you would not call “viral”), but with the addition of altering the personality, removing their free will, and taking their knowledge.
Unless some tales about the Six Gods creating the world isn’t entirely wrong, and they created various races in the world.
But then again, Balthazar wanted humanity to rule the world with a warring fist, and all six gods are getting continuously demoted with “they didn’t really do all that, the humans were wrong.”
I think they were talking about Baron Wycker or the one the Mad Baron follows: Eddie, the Painlord.
I don’t recall the mentioning drax said, but it may be that I didn’t see that interview. Though his statement about just because guardians can use magic through heavy armor doesn’t mean others can too.
That said, I do not believe there is any lore reason why casters cannot wear armor. We know that armor classes is fully mechanical as in Edge of Destiny, Logan is wearing leather armor (which would count as medium, not heavy). The same can likely go for weapons, though in lore (at least with recent magical usage in Sea of Sorrows) they are used as focii for spellcasters (and there is a one-time-mentioned statement that magic cannot be used without some form of focus – so supposedly the mechanical usage of utility skills etc. without a weapon equipped is not lore-wise possible).
It should be noted that in Sea of Sorrows, the elementalist (who’s name I cannot recall atm) did wear robes embroidered with magical runes to strengthen his magic. It’d be possible but harder to do the same to metal armor, so this may hold some baring on the situation (plus it’s possible that it must be on cloth for some reason).
Should also be mentioned that the same field of magic – at least same general field of magic – of the elementalists and mesmers can be used with leather armor. Rangers and elementalists as well as thieves and mesmers appear to use the same direction of magic – the former pair being Destruction (by the Bloodstones’ standards – elemental by thematic standards), and the latter pair being Denial (by the Bloodstones’ standards, again – deception, reality altering, and general mind screws by thematic standards). The adventurer professions in these cases use magic as supplementary though (thieves more so) and utilize tools primarily.
I really cannot see how that scripture passage is similar to sylvari. Sylvari do not have branches sprouting from their limbs. That’d be a case of branches popping out of the forearm or elbow or shin and whatnot.
Yes, sylvari are the most humanoid, but the scripture passage really sounds like Ewan and his tribe has lost its humanity (physically), becoming more plant-like than human-like.
And @ Alleluia: Though the sylvari do look humanoid, nothing really requires them to have been “hardcoded to look human before hand” – there’s a good deal of humanoid races that likely don’t share origins with humanity. Jotun, ogres, norn, harpies, etc.
And arguably the seeds could have “spontaneously popped into existence” – we already have multiple cases of large trees (Stonewood being one Maguuman species) as well as magical trees (Ancestor Trees and Urgoz), and treants must come from somewhere (as well as the GW1 plant creatures). Who’s to say that sylvari aren’t just an evolutionary step from these other sentient plants? Magic may make it possible for evolution to make leaps and bounds compared to natural evolution as well.
Whether the mursaat were good or evil was a debate held for a while. Because we don’t know if their motives was “saving their own kitten” or “protecting Tyria – needs of the many over the lives of the few.” However, with Arah explorable we learn that in the previous ED rising, the mursaat had the best weapon against the Elder Dragons (their phasing out) but for still-unclear reasons, betrayed the other races, nearly committed genocide on the Seers, and then fled into the Mists to save their own kitten.
Them willingly killing others to escape a threat to themselves kind of removes the arguments for them being “needs of the many over the lives of the few” kind of individuals. Which, IMO, really downsized the quality of mursaat lore.
Caithe said she was the only sylvari to have seen Zhaitan and lived in that instance – the same instance in which the Pale Tree claims the Shadow of the Dragon to be a representation of Zhaitan and the PC’s Wyld Hunt to kill it. Which was the end of the lvl 1-10 story step when you meet the Mother Tree at the very end, and are informed that Trahearne has returned from Orr and you’re told to meet him (which triggers the second storyline).
They did not. In fact, they’ve been mentioning that they’re hoping the living story can replace the need of expansions.
Extremely doubtful from what we’ve seen. And if they do manage it, it’ll be in bits and pieces over a year or two with it being severly buggy and a storyline that goes away every 2 or 4 weeks!
1. Livia is still out there somewhere..yes alive, can’t remember where i read this but the scepter caused her long life.
She was alive as of the end of Sea of Sorrows novel. But that was 70 years ago so she may be dead now.
3. Kralkatorrik is most likely the next dragon due to the crystal desert being so close, or Jormag to open the way to Cantha. Definelty think there will be no allaicne made with an Elder dragon it defeats the concept
Jormag to open way to Cantha? You do realize that Jormag is north, and Cantha is south, right?
Technically speaking, Ozzie Thorn himself has never expressed desire to break free. He did express the desire for revenge – the subjects of whom have all long passed away – and did attempt breaking free when it became possible (last Halloween) – but oddly didn’t try again this year.
It has always been his loyal subjects, the Lunatic Court, trying to allow Ozzie Thorn to return full-time.
Honestly, I think I’d enjoy that. Far superior of a plot than The-Salad-Whom-Shall-Not-Be-Named.
Those roots are purple and full of thorns.
Plus there’s been several press releases saying Nightmare Court – typically they’re given more than the official site previews so it’s likely truth.
The God’s eye (it’s a rare one that I never see mentioned.)
It’s a crashed asuran device of unspecified origins.
Seems Anet wants to make us think that the asura are building satellites.
@Konig
You forgot to add that Scarlet was the one that created the Pale Tree seeds. So, in the end, she winds up being her own grandmother.
Great Scott! She created a time paradox, the results of which could cause a chain reaction that would unravel the very fabric of the space time continuum, and destroy the entire universe! Granted, that’s a worst case scenario. The destruction might in fact be very localized, limited to merely our own galaxy.
No, worse case scenario would be that the devastation seeps into the mists and destroys all things.
Pfft. True worst case scenario:
We become one with Scarlet.
3. Magni the Bison my GW2’s ancestor whupped you 250 years ago and I wonder if you have family today.
We whupped him so hard he couldn’t have children. Clearly.
Probably more due to mechanics, not very many people are enthused about underwater combat, and for good reason, it’s clunky and the flow of combat isn’t very good
And enter ArenaNet’s design philosophy:
“If players don’t like it, we ignore it. If players like it, we fix what isn’t broken.”
Just because players don’t like something doesn’t mean it should be avoided. It means the opposite – they should work to improve it, and a content update focused on underwater stuff would be the best time to work on improving such.
not even Kiel who promised to look into the Aetherblades and Molten Alliance (ironically, just before Scarlet decided to reveal herself). And lo-and-behold, Kiel’s not doing much about it (but Magnus is, thank god).
Really? What is Magnus doing about it? Finally a male in a role that isn’t comic relief or a dimwit.
Didn’t read the short story release for Twilight Assault, I take it?
He’s the one who gave Kiel a ship to command, and put her up for the council position. He’s also been behind-the-scenes-investigating the Aetherblades and was the one who sent the Lionguard to Twilight Arbor.
You find out that the Flame & Frost alliance, the Aetherblade revelation, the Watchwork attack, the LA murder, the Steam Creature invasion….all connected by one Moriarty type character. A genius. A true nemesis, that can pull the strings of multiple entities to craft a detailed web of confusion, distrust, and chaos. It’s an M. Night Shyamalan twist revelation and everyone is all ho-hum, another salad. So she’s a Sylvari…so what?! She’s orchestrating something that we haven’t been able to figure out. We haven’t caught her. She’s struck many times, both overtly and from the shadows. Yet she continues down her path undeterred. We hope she dies pitifully while we speculate what new atrocity she’ll visit upon us. Her insanity makes some rolls their eyes, simply because they feel the need to compare her to the only other insane villian they can think of; The Joker. But she’s not. She’s part Moriarty (brilliant, calculating), part Harley Quinn (petulant, insane, precocious), part Magneto (reshaping the world).
She’s a quality villian, she just needs a better delivery.
A few things:
I’m just wondering if Halloween is somehow connected with the Krits… I mean Mad King is trying to escape the realm, and at the same time Kraits are making a tower that somehow works as a portal for their prophet… Is Mad King the prophet??? Somehow it doesn’t connect, but the timing is just TOO perfect…
Nothing says the tower is to work as a portal for their prophet… At least as far as I’ve seen. Got a source for that?
As I see it, there is only THREE ways in which the krait allying with the Nightmare Court works:
Bangar is the true wild card, distrustful and prone to rage. Still, his hatred for humans overcomes his suspicions about the other imperators, and he has committed a great number of troops to the Black Citadel’s command.
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/The_Legions_of_the_Charr
This is pretty much where the fan-made inference comes from. Bangar hates humans and is the only imperator who’s not for the treaty. It seems that he only goes along with it, more or less, to avoid war with the other two imperators.
Other than this, it really isn’t hinted upon. But his hatred of humans being stronger than his mistrust of the other imperators does say to me he’s probably not too happy about the peace talks.
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