We actually do not have a date for when the White Mantle took over Kryta. All we know is that it was during the charr invasion, which began in 1070 AE but lasted for over a year, evident in the fact that the Cataclysm took place in 1071 AE.
Either way, Kryta (and in turn the White Mantle) was dealing with the charr until Orr had sank – or was just about to. Still, it prevents converting the most religious of kingdoms to the Unseen Ones’ faith.
And there was more than one person; his inability to see the king is not a case of the White Mantle not trying. And it should be noted that Zain went directly to the people, bypassing the king, and spread his teachings and artifacts.
Not at all, you just can’t see that there are a lot of shades of gray here, I wouldn’t call the Mursaat good, but what they did wasn’t evil for the sake of evil, they had actual understandable motivations. Glint was after revenge and the Mursaat desired self preservation at the cost of others. Neither are good, but one seems to me to be worse than the other.
ArenaNet’s made a pretty good reason in GW2 for the mursaat to be no shade of gray.
And “wasn’t evil for the sake of evil” – no kitten. No one does evil for the sake of being evil. That doesn’t mean that a person isn’t evil when they do evil things.
You cannot argue that the mursaat were anything but evil when they had the option to leave the world of Tyria – thus being unthreatened to the Titans on Tyria – but instead chose to kill thousands and subjugate hundreds of thousands.
And pray tell where is this “Glint’s revenge” you keep mentioning? There’s no such thing. Glint never showed any form of malice against the mursaat.
I mean we know they have a city in the jungle somewhere.
It’s funny to the point of annoying that people keep bringing this up. All we’re told about where Saul found the mursaat was “a dense forest”.
Nowhere is Maguuma Jungle ever specified. This has to be the longest running no-support player speculation in GW’s franchise.
Thank you Quintus Antonius.
I just find the idea of a wary alliance with the Mursaat far more interesting than an alliance with these Forgotten constructs that seem like loyal do-gooders.
I disagree. I wouldn’t find any form of alliance with a race that has not once but twice committed genocide for selfish reasons to be at all interesting.
We’re going to enlist the aid of people that are essentially Scooby snacks for elder dragons to defeat elder dragons.
Riiiiight…
You apparently missed the part where Forgotten magic is immune to dragon corruption and consumption.
Or at least has been.
And we’re not talking sylvari-level immunity. We mean “cannot be touched or altered by” immunity.
Didn’t mean to imply the materials were important, but rather that the change of materials is interesting to note.
However, a thought: in the HoT trailer (the first one) we saw an Exalted making a structure glow golden. Meaning that while the Exalted were hybernating, it wasn’t golden. Or at least as bright.
So maybe if the Exalted were to interact with the Altar of Glaust it would become bight, shining gold?
Maybe that’s the purpose of the golden orb in the Wealdwood which turns the nearby place gold.
Then again, can we trust Glint? What if she just wants to safe her child and help it attain EDs power for her own selfish desires? Who says, that we don`t exchange one evil against another.
“Selfish desires” would be obtaining Elder Dragon powers for oneself….
It’s pretty obvious that ArenaNet has 100% full intention to make Glint be the good guy.
Yes, the Mursaat were evil. However if history as told us, people can change. A reduced group of people might not want to do the same mistakes then their predecessors.
11,000 (or 3,000) years ago the mursaat wiped out an entire species then fled the world in an act of betrayal.
250 years ago the mursaat committed genocide and ruled an oppressive government from the shadows.
Do you really think they’d change in 250 years if they didn’t in over eleven/three thousand?
How willing are the Exalted really? Glint was able to use some mesmer magic if I am not mistaken. She is also very powerful. We can easily bring brainwashing into her cause as well.
Now you’re stretching things. The article outright claims they’re volunteers. And Glint only gave the Forgotten the instructions; she didn’t go talking to the volunteers herself.
Her extent of mesmer like abilities were limited to telepathy – both for between herself and others, and between others. The latter was limited, by all indication, by the location of her sanctuary.
The Mursaat also had volunteers. They had people who believed and died for them willingly. Even if they were mislead, they still choose to do so, even for the wrong reasons.
The volunteers were those who killed the Chosen, not those who died.
It wouldn`t be the first time, we see something that was supposed to be completly evil, to be not so. I mean, just look at the Charr.
In Prophecies, the charr had no personality to them, unlike the White Mantle and mursaat. In Nightfall, they were given personality – and good guys. In Eye of the North, we got more good guys.
It was a steady stream of exposing them to a mix of good and evil. The mursaat has had a steady stream of exposing them to be nothing but evil.
Not exactly a good comparison.
So are Humans and the Charr, and the Asura have in the past tried to wipe out the Skritt too. But I guess it only matters if you kitten off an Elder dragon champion? Then you can say goodbye to your entire race.
Humans haven’t attempted genocide except in retaliation.
While the asura pre-release lore does say that some believe in genocide of skritt, not only was this toned down for the actual release but few ever acted upon it (beliefs of the few do not define the whole). Charr are by far a better comparison, but even they ally with their enemies when the world is threatened (see human-charr peace accord).
What do the mursaat do when the world is threatened?
They use the strongest weapon against said threat, betray their allies, commit genocide, and flee the world. When they come back, they manipulate other races into worshiping them and commit genocide again to save themselves and no other reason.
The mursaat did more than just “kitten off a dragon champion”.
The Mursaat didn’t take over Kryta because they got off on taking over and being worshipped as gods, they took over as a means of getting rid of the chosen ones – To save their own race.
You presume they knew of the Flameseeker Prophecies before they used Saul to gain a foothold.
Nothing actually said in the Flameseeker Prophecies that the Chosen come from Kryta.
Otherwise why not take Orr, Ascalon and Elona too?
Orr was destroyed and if you paid close attention in GW1, you’d note that they tried spreading influence to Ascalon.
As for the war in Kryta, most of the Mursaat were dead, the rest were being hunted down, again it seems like their main motivation was self preservation. I don’t recall Queen Salma ever trying to secure peace with the Mursaat, in fact wasn’t it she who declared war on the White Mantle? With the prophecy over it doesn’t seem like there would be any need for the Mursaat to keep sacrificing the chosen.
No, self preservation at that point would be to leave humanity alone. There was no reason for them to continue backing the White Mantle who were in an outright war if their only goal was self-preservation.
Sure, Salma didn’t try to secure peace with the mursaat…. but neither did the mursaat attempt such.
So when Glint/Humans/Charr kill people for the hell of it it’s fine, but when the Mursaat do it to save themselves it’s wrong? Sounds like jingoism and racism to me.
You’re twisting my words, and the situation of the mursaat, to fit your own desires of wanting to see the mursaat as good guys.
From this statement I take it you mean that magic in tyria is a closed system. But the only way to recycle it 100% is with dragons consuming it.
So in the event of no more dragons we could get to 0 from overspending and have no way to reduce and recycle the magic trapped in living/non living things.
No. That situation would mean that dragons produce magic.
If ‘dragons’ = magic can reach 100 from 0 while ‘no dragons’ = magic cannot reach 100 from 0, that means dragons produce magic.
They don’t.
They cycle it.
Magic is never destroyed. It merely changes form. Similar to energy for us, except that there’s no form of entropy in magic.
What the dragons do is wake up when magic reaches 90 and begin consuming until it reaches 10 where they go to sleep and seep out that 80 magic they consumed. If magic in the open world hits 91 or 9 then disaster begins.
Magic users utilizing magic does not affect the quantity of magic.
That is how magic is presented to us.
In other words, if a single dragon were to remain awake and active and consumed/exuded magic willingly and in a generous fashion to keep magic in 40-60 range, then there would be no cyclic nature of dragons.
The theory on the six gods I have is that they were the “elder dragons” of their world, and kept magic in a single quantity – since lore states that humans didn’t know (much of) magic prior to Abaddon’s gift of magic this would mean their homeworld’s magic state was kept at ~10 continuously with no cyclic system.
- How would Glint 2.0 solve any of this? The magic is still bound in living things. And the extraction process that we know of causes death.
- Why would they call exalted immortal when they run on magic and magic is finite?
- Revenants, ritualists, and rangers draw on energies outside the dragons reach. Do they constantly suck magic out of the world?
- Are mesmers and guardians more eco-friendly because they bind magic to temporary forms? Can one expect the magic of their creations to return instantly to the environment? This in contrast to the magically created water of elementalists.
More importantly for me at least:
- How did they not think that magic was a temporary resource when they acknowledged that water is, and elementalists can create water with magic?
To answer your questions (if above did not), based on current lore (or at least my interpretation of it):
Ah, I saw 2,000 BE and read it as 2,000 years ago, instead of a bit over 3,000. However, that poses a problem: The Forgotten appearing on Tyria would be within a very short timeframe of the dragonrise.
That’s not much of a problem given that the only interaction the Forgotten are known to have with the Elder Dragons or before is freeing Glint.
If daily activity causes them to lose the magical energy that keeps them alive, then they are mortal. If they are required to be in stasis in order to live longer, then they are not effectively immortal.
Losing energy due to daily activity is the same as aging. Aging implies mortality.
Poor joe, he died from taking one to many trips to the store to buy beer. He should have remained in stasis.
I think you misunderstand why they went into stasis.
It wasn’t to lengthen their lives. It was because they had nothing else to do.
Would you sleep for 300 years, or sit and stare at the sky for 300 years?
(edited by Konig Des Todes.2086)
I’m sorry perhaps I didn’t explain properly.
You have resources like aluminum which are infinite because the can be recycled 99% and so for the lifetime of the universe we should always have aluminum.
That’s not an infinite resource.
If you took all aluminum – let’s give it the quantity of 100 – and use it, you’re left with 0. If you recycle all aluminum used and get 99% back, you now have 99 aluminum. After doing this several hundred times, you’d result with 1 aluminum in all the lifetime of the universe.
It is by far finite.
Infinite means that it is uncountable – continuing forever. There’d be no need to recycle.
Magic in Tyria is portrayed like your aluminum example, except that you can recycle for a 100% return. Meaning that our quantity is 100, but can be “refined” (aka consumed by Elder Dragons) to be reduced; however, magic can be “recycled” (aka exuded by the Elder Dragons) to be increased. However, you will always have 100 magic whether it is in the “refined” or “recycled” state.
This is our current statement in lore. But that is not infinite.
Another interesting point is that the Forgotten are included in the list of 5 races that worked on the Bloodstones to survive the last dragonrise. And the Forgotten are also stated to have arrived only 3,000 years ago or so.
If the last dragonrise was only 2,000 years ago, that means it roughly coincided with the appearance of humans in Cantha. 500 years after the rise would be their first appearance in the northern lands.
The last dragonrise is indicated to be 3,000 years ago not 2,000. Depending on if you subscribe to the Priory NPCs’ claims (which state 11,000 years ago) or the subliminal history of Glint, Forgotten, and dwarves (which point to 3,000 years ago).
Unless they’re doing an awful lot of rounding in that article, the “300 years ago” when the Exalted were created would have been 50 years before the events of GW1.
As I’ve been saying, it wouldn’t be the first time they’ve done “an awful lot of rounding”.
btw. isn`t Glint doing something similiar to what the Mursaat did? Gathering loyal followers, sucking out/ converting their high magic potential into something to use later?
Sure, their Souls and Minds are still there, but we live in a world where brainwashing is certainly a thing and Glint might have needed someone to run the whole show.
There’s three major differences.
1) Glint didn’t do this to save herself. Mursaat did – and not only that, but to rule as gods.
2) The Exalted were volunteers. The mursaat took unwilling sacrifices.
3) The Exalted still live, the Chosen did not.
Plenty of dwarves didn’t undergo the ritual – the ones that died before the ritual took place. With dwarves already serving Glint and the Rite of the Great Dwarf didn’t happen until years later, it’s easy to say “a number of the Brotherhood of the Dragon became Exhaulted and thus had nothing to do with the Rite of the Great Dwarf”.
Honestly this depends on how accurate that “300 years ago” was. It wouldn’t be the first time ArenaNet used “300 years ago” but meant “247 years ago”.
Just like they’ve used “250 years ago” but meant more along the lines of “211 years ago”. (Note: exact years pulled out of my rear end, but the general idea has been done).
But even if that isn’t the case – wouldn’t Glint, who’s working to counter the Elder Dragon*s* want to ensure that there’s maximum defense against Primordus, the first to awaken?
Maybe she intended for the Rite of the Great Dwarf to counter Primordus, while the Exalted were to have other fields. If so, why take resources away from one front for another in a war when you can take resources not being used for the war?
Supply distribution 101.
Forgotten pop up whenever it’s convenient. It was established that humans didn’t even remember Forgotten during the events of Prophecies but this lore article states several of them ran into the Forgotten during the Exhaulted recruitment drive. Why not simply have a secret enclave of Forgotten, hiding away in Maguuma waiting for the day we arrive? MIA can also include “waiting in the city of Tarir”.
Humanity didn’t forget about the Forgotten’s existence. Rather, it’s that humanity lost the name of their race. The very first piece of Forgotten lore comes from the History of Tyria which was written by a human Orrian in 1071-1072 AE (prior to the events of Prophecies but after the Cataclysm). So clearly humanity knew about the Forgotten’s existence.
Just not their name or their exact appearance (the latter at least for Elonians during Turai’s time).
Why did it have to be humans? Why did it even need to be a new faction (were they created to fit the story of being mistaken for Mursaat)?
Doubtful given that they resemble the Enchanted armors from GW1.
While reintroducing the Mursaat might have been lorebreaking, what we got was far worse: a race of glowing floating magical exalted goody-two-shoes Marty Stus.
Except that nothing says they’re perfect, therefore nothing says they’re Sues or Stus.
I like this theory very much. However, I see one big weakness within it – if we assume that the Orrians knew about the Exalted ‘project’, what would have stopped Zhaitan from using that knowledge extracted from Risen Orrians and sending his dragon champions after the sleeping Exalted, beings of pure magic?
Overall, the idea of creating beings of pure magic to fight Elder Dragons who feats upon magic seems a bit odd to me (and others who noted on this before).
Why didn’t Zhaitan consume the magic from the Forgotten artifacts lying right under his nose in Arah?
People seem to be forgetting this very important fact: Forgotten magic is thus far immune to dragon consumption and corruption.
By similiar I mean: EDs and Exalted are beings, confined to a construct/host body, who gather magic to survive and their purposes (abriged version, if we go witht the idea, that the ED energy is to some degree sentient or has a parasitic/symbiotic nature).
Why a complete new race which seems to have only one purpose? I don`t see them have more relevance, aside from this story.
I don’t think the Elder Dragons are constructs or pure energy like the Exalted.
Nor do the Exalted show any need of consuming magic to live, like dragons (not just Elder Dragons, but simply dragons).
Okay, they were sealed away in stasis… in the enemies territory… I really hope they explain that and how they didn`t become a tasty snack for Mordremoth, if they are brimming with magical energy.
Everything related to the Forgotten has been immune to both consumption and corruption by the Elder Dragons.
What better place to store a weapon against the enemy then where it’ll wake up, when said weapon cannot be used by said enemy?
Though to be honest, they didn’t hibernate in enemy territory – per the post, they were meant to wake up before Mordremoth did.
Why couldn`t the Mursaat work?
Because, despite people’s desires, they are selfish, evil kittens.
Last time the Elder Dragons woke up, they commited genocide and then fled the world. Last time they showed up they attempted genocide.
See a running trend yet?
They are your typical fantasy-based facist kingdom bent on killing or ruling everyone not themselves.
They’re not good guys. They never were.
(also the white mantle mostly reduced to bandits is kinda sad. I hope they have some of their armor laying around.)
I think you misunderstand the White Mantle plot. They aren’t “reduced” to bandits, but play the role of bandits to hinder their enemies’ political popularity while their inside men (e.g., Caudecus and his cronies by all indication) work to establish their foothold.
Given all the dialogue, it’s actually indicated that most bandits don’t even realize they’re working for the White Mantle. The White Mantle funds the bandits, but are not the bandits – not in large, at least (bandit leaders may be, however).
I never really get the Mursaat hate. I mean did they actually do something that justified the entire genocide of their race?
Sure, they fled when the elder dragons awoke, they fled to save their people. You can say it’s cowardly sure, but how exactly does cowardice justify Glint’s revenge?
It’s one thing to flee the world when world-ending beings wake up.
It’s another thing to have the greatest offense and defense against the dragons, to bring a race to near extinction, and then flee the world.
The mursaat aren’t guilty of cowardice. They’re guilty of treachery and genocide. Multiple times – because the moment they returned to the world, they just did the same thing again: attempt genocide and be treacherous.
I mean, even if the prophecy was an actual prophecy Glint could have you know… kept her mouth shut and the Mursaat wouldn’t have been any the wiser, probably just chilled in their pocket dimension and wouldn’t have tried to kill the chosen ones.
Presuming that the mursaat didn’t know that ancient enemies were out to kill them.
Keep in mind that they’ve fought titans before – so have seers and Forgotten. The titans are said to be as old as the Forgotten, even.
Then there’s the whole problem of the titans. Was it ever actually explained why the titans tried to kill the Mursaat?
Explicitly? No. But we know they were ancient enemies.
But regardless, should we really be allying with a Dragon who, just to get her genocidal jollies, creates a plan to set free the minions of an insane god? Surely that’s a worse crime? The titans didn’t just kill Mursaat, they killed humans and dwarves too. The Mursaat only killed, essentially, in their own self defence, Glint killed for revenge.
To be fair, Glint didn’t foresee how devastating the titans would be, but she did foresee that the players would close the gate before the full potential of the titan threat could be unleashed.
And I wouldn’t say that starting a war which wiped out almost all of an entire race and keeping up a portfolio of godhood while subjugating another species (and killing amongst said subjugated species at random) is “in their own self defense”.
The Seer/Mursaat war occurred after the Mursaat had fled.
While we don’t have an exact date, we do know that the war occurred before the mursaat fled the world. We know this from Arah explorable – talk to Randal Graystone, who states that the mursaat betrayed the allied races, nearly wiped out the seers, and fled the world.
It doesn’t seem likely that the Mursaat really had any reason to return to this world, they only did so to stop the prophecy and save themselves. The Seers were most likely the instigators of the war.
Uh…
Why would you return to a world from the Mists in order to prevent a group of beings hostile to your race, which is prophecized to eliminate you, from entering said same world from the Mists?
Why not… go to a different world?
Keep in mind that the mursaat returned to the world of Tyria “shortly” before GW1’s events per Scholar Yissa.
So with the confirmation that the golden city, aka Tarir, was prepared by the Forgotten, I think that furthers the thought that the Ascendant’s Ring is related to the Altar of Glaust.
Though my question is why wasn’t the Altar of Glaust gold/why do we now have gold stuff?
Hey Joe, I know how we can keep people from attacking our city. We can just go to sleep.
Seriously? These exalted smell of BS.
The article says that the Exalted had allies that weren’t there when they woke.
Meaning that they didn’t leave their city undefended. Though it ended up that way for reasons unknown.
It also explains why the Exhaulted are so visually similar to Mursaat – ArenaNet may have wanted us to have the same impression that Saul did – they wanted us to think the Exhaulted were Mursaat, making Saul’s mistake more believable because we made the same one.
Physical similarity is already explained by the fact that the Enchanted armor were physically similar (particularly in helm, glove, and boot) to the mursaat. Reasons have been unknown for that for some time.
I don’t know why they chose gold, but appearance is likely based off of the Enchanted, not mursaat.
Why would the Exhaulted help Saul? He was a gambler, a thief, a drunk and an outcast. He was exhiled from Kryta – blindfolded on a cart for three weeks and dumped before he wandered for four days before reaching the golden city. If the Exhaulted had no intention of intervening in the affairs of Saul, the White Mantle or the charr invasion, why did Saul think they would? Why didn’t the Exhaulted turn up at all at any point in the following conflict?
The Exalted are stated to be seeking a better world. They’re basically idealists, optimists, and overall kind people going off of the article.
How good of a person can you be if you ignore a starving, hallucinating man in dire need of help?
As for why they didn’t show up – maybe they finished their preparations and went into hibernation between the point of sending Saul back and the charr invasion happening in 1070 AE. Maybe they simply didn’t know – they’re not omniscient.
I saw that similarity too, and I figured that the druids likely mimicked the Forgotten’s ritual that made the exalted, using plants as the shell for their energy instead of golden armor.
I also took the druids as being some of those allies that went missing – 1) the druids are the only civilized group we know of (other than the owner of the Tarnished Coast ruins) that have lived that deep into the jungle; 2) the druids disappeared since the supposed creation of the Exalted; 3) Most importantly, in GW2 there’s lines about the druids being called south from Brisban/Henge of Denravi. Turn this southwest and we have the approximate location of the Exalted (unless Tarir is north of Rata Sum – thus south of GW1’s Tangle Root/north of Magus Stones).
I mean alone from the metal mask the exalted are pretty darn close to a mursaat.
Not really. The implications was that magic levels were balanced. Not that it was finite. Finite implies that the leylines don’t draw magic in from the Mists. And the ED consume it but they don’t process it like water/ore/tumber.
Er… The fact that magic can be balanced indicates that it is not infinite.
In this case, “balanced” means that the quantity remains within a certain amount. E.g., 1-10. When magic hits 1, dragons go to sleep and radiate it back out. When it hits 10, dragons wake up and consume it.
Infinite does not exist within these numbers, so if magic were infinite then we could lower the quantity down to 1, let alone 10.
And the Elder Dragons do “process” it in a way. They exude magic as they sleep.
We actually know that magic is a finite resource. This was explained in the asura chapter 3 storyline’s main dialogue. And further in Hidden Arcana’s side dialogue. We also know that killing the Elder Dragons will be long-term bad for the world, per Hidden Arcana’s side dialogues.
Still doesn’t explain how a city in the maguuma was kept hidden, and not through one game but two, from the white mantle and shining blade, and the asura (if it was hidden underground, which doesn’t seem likely from the pictures).
As I said in the other thread, it depends on where in the jungle it was.
The Shining Blade, asura, etc. didn’t go as deep as we players did in GW1, and by the indication of the guild hall, the Exalted went deeper. The guild hall – an abandoned outpost – is placed on the edge of The Falls’ GW1 map per That_Shaman’s historical map. Indicating that Tarir is deeper in than the deepest we – or anyone who returned to civilization – went.
Furthermore, if the 300 rounding is meant to be post-Prophecies, then all three presences of Shining Blade, White Mantle, and asura would have been gone – leaving no one but the druids. And the druids could very well be the “missing allies” mentioned in the article.
It also doesn’t explain why glint would use humans, when her custodians at that time would have been dwarves.
She’s a prophet and the dwarves had a prophecy that foretold the doom of their race.
It’s not hard to guess the reason why. Especially if the rounded number of years isn’t meant to indicate “before GW1’s events”.
Or why the master of peace has been flying around for the last few years with her legacy instead of dropping it off at the city actually designed to protect it.
The article explains this. The egg was in stasis and was only to be given to the Exalted when it became active; the reason is because the Exalted were in hibernation until said egg came out of stasis.
It’s also unknown when the Master of Peace got the egg – for all we know, he got the egg between when we meet them during the Bazaar of the Four Winds and the Festival of the Four Winds. After all, between those two releases they gain a new aircraft which has an interesting glow to it – later to be heavily hinted to be the aircraft carrying the egg.
The blog also makes it sound like the Exalted were surprised that Mordremoth happened to have woken up near them, surely glint would have known that Mordremoth was there having been one of the beings that worked to put him back to sleep.
Actually, the article says that the Exalted were surprised that Mordremoth woke already. They were clearly expecting the egg to become active before Mordremoth – and Scarlet screwed that up for them.
None of this makes any sense lore wise, other than name dropping glint and the forgotten it has nothing to do with any lore that has been established thus far, and instead you have to find ways to weasel it in.
Not really weaseling when the article explains a third of it, a third of it is explained by the city’s location, and the last third is explained by presuming “300 years ago” doesn’t mean “before GW1”.
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: Konig Des Todes.2086
Not as much of a “wtf” as there having been a city in the maguuma that no one has seen this entire time. Besides how do you know what the remaining Mursaat could have done in 250 years? Scarlet made an entire army in a few weeks/months. You wouldn’t need huge numbers either, even a few Mursaat could probably wreck kitten, the last Eidolon I saw was a shield and the Seers aren’t anywhere to be seen.
1) Depends on where in the jungle the city is. We went pretty deep by lore standards – deeper than anyone sans the druids. However, based on the guild hall that’s the golden city, that’s even deeper.
2) Scarlet didn’t raise any armies. She took control of pre-existing armies. The remaining mursaat already have an army – the White Mantle – and have been waging a secret war for 250 years. Presuming that the mursaat still lead the White Mantle.
3) Do remember that the last known mursaat, Lazarus, had his very being messed with. Who knows what that would do long-term.
Wouldn’t be the first time we’ve done that.
I wonder how Elona is doing since we released Palawa Joko.
Palawa Joko didn’t kitten an entire species to extinction for the sake of saving his own behind, nor abandoned an entire world to destruction.
When the world was threatened, Joko put aside differences and aided his enemies.
I don’t think the two compare.
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: Konig Des Todes.2086
This is something I’ve never understood….We’re talking about a race that can literally phase into and out of the mists at will. How do you know there’s not billions of Mursaat just thriving in the mists somewhere right now? Have you personally explored every inch of the infinite mists? Sure, all the ones on Tyria were jerks, but maybe that’s because when Glint told her prophecy of the Mursaat’s defeat, almost all of them decided to flee, and a few decided to stay behind and fight the prophecy, thus the only ones we encountered in GW1 were the ones dedicated to stay and be jerks?
The mursaat fled the world during the previous dragonrise, after wiping out the Seers to near extinction. This was thousands of years before Glint foresaw the Flameseeker Prophecies.
But all indication shows that the mursaat are in few numbers. Not just from the fact we killed hundreds upon hundreds of them in GW1, but let’s not forget that the Titans – also beings of the Mists – hunted them down. And there’s also all the dev comments or NPC comments about how they’re so few in number if not nigh extinct.
It would be a pretty big “wtf!?” if the mursaat returned in huge numbers.
Also, I would rather have had them been Mursaat….
Mursaat have been established as powerful but selfish kittens who are willing to kitten entire worlds and races for their own existence. They’ve done such twice.
Would you really want those kinds of people as your allies (as the Exalted are allies and known to have been since the masteries were found)? I know I wouldn’t.
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: Konig Des Todes.2086
I’m less bothered about the Exalted and more about they just dropped the Master of Peace’s actual goal like it was nothing. You had most of Season 2 revolving about the mystery of the whereabouts of Glint’s Egg and you spoil it before the game even comes out?
^^^
This.
The lore works, despite constant complaints (and funny thing to me is that the complainer’s “better lore” doesn’t work with continuity despite their claim). But honestly, this was supposed to be a huge discovery in the game. And we get it as some blog post…
snip..
Your argument is basically “don’t pay attention to anything Anet actually says”.
…No it isn’t. The only thing I said not to pay exact attention to is rounded dates.
If you did pay attention to anything Anet actually says, you would know that they love to round practically everything.
I mean most lore is from manuals, short stories written by the writers or blog posts rather than the actual games, If we ignore those then the gw universe has pretty much no lore.
This couldn’t be more wrong. Most lore actually comes from the games. It’s just that you have to look, read, and pay attention. Not something most folks do, I know, but that’s the cold hard truth.
I know you’ll keep trying to justify these things
I’m not trying to justify anything, really. I’m merely stating your attempts to de-justify is a poor argument.
ArenaNet has been more full of holes and contradictions in their story the past two years than any individual group I’ve known beyond webcomics that intentionally don’t care for their story because they’re there for jokes, not plot.
You’ve already seen the quote describing the city as alabaster and gold. And the only mention of the location of the hidden mursaat city says that it was two weeks ride from kryta, with no mention of swimming or sailing being part of that walk.
Show me where in this golden city of Tarir where alabaster lies.
And it’s gold filigree, not gold everything.
Two weeks ride… but riding in what? Perhaps… riding a boat?
And even if it means solely a cart or wagon, you do realize that there is a forest – the term used to describe where Saul was exiled to – north of Kryta, right? It’s called Woodland Cascades, and while not named was there in Prophecies.
You don’t have to always suck up to whatever Arena Net does without any criticism, you know?
You clearly don’t know me. You might want to look up people’s actual views on things before insulting them.
Especially as of late, I’ve been criticizing them left and right. The thing that differentiates this thread from what I do is that I cite and I explain, I give analytical thought, comparisons, and reasons for why things are bad. Not just “wtf golden beings aren’t mursaat no! wtf anetkitten” Which sadly perfectly describes every post I’ve seen complaining about this. With varying degrees of harshness.
You keep using this argument, but gold filigree is usually used on small objects and decorative panels, a CITY made of alabaster and gold filigree could certainly be described as golden.
Sure.
But Tarir isn’t described as golden. It’s shown as golden.
The city Saul stumbled upon, however, is described as alabastar and golden filigree.
The issue is that now there are TWO golden (or GOLDEN FILIGREE COVERED) cities in or very close to the maguuma each housing two races which look extremely similar, only one of which has ever been mentioned previously.
Eh. Three issues:
1) Mursaat and Exalted don’t really look similar. One is flesh and blood and has been more or less extinct for ~250 years, the other is pure energy and has been hibernating for ~300 years.
2) Alabastar and golden filigree is not a golden city.
3) Nothing actually states where Saul found that city. It’s only “in a forest”. And that’s…. very vague. To quote:
“Alone, broke, and lost, Saul wandered through a dense forest for several days, surviving on only roots and berries. On the fourth day, delirious with hunger, Saul emerged from the trees to see what he thought was a hallucination—a city of massive towers reaching into the heavens. The architecture was astounding, and the creatures who lived here were unlike any he had ever seen. Walking down into their city, Saul got a closer look at the denizens of this place. They were tall and thin with strange wing-like appendages that waved about in the slightest breeze. When they walked, their feet seemed not to touch the ground, and when they spoke, it was the most melodious sound he had ever heard. Surely these creatures were the stuff of divinity. Hungry and exhausted, his clothes ragged and dirty, Saul dropped to his knees and touched his forehead to the ground. He had found his gods, and they in turn had found their most devoted disciple.”
Alt version (that you quoted):
“The local authorities blindfolded him and rode him out two full weeks before leaving him to fend for himself. Alone, penniless, and lost, Saul wandered through a dense forest for three full days. On the fourth day, Saul emerged from among the trees to see what he thought was a hallucination—a city of massive towers reaching into the heavens. It was a sight to behold, alabaster and golden filigree. This was a place of purity, a place where a man such as Saul could begin anew.”
There’s more than one “dense forest” near Kryta.
Exalted only woke up when Glint’s egg became active. They were all in hibernation until then (or so the article makes it seem).
The egg became active between mid-Season 1 and prologue to Season 2. In other words, E predates when the Exalted should have woken at the earliest.
GW2 lore is currently underdocumented in a wide range of places. Just read all the dialogue you can is what I say.
As for the Bloodstone retcon, rather than it being “oh we found out x was wrong” it’s more of “y is the situation, let’s go.” The dungeon literally doesn’t mention the old human stories of the Bloodstone’s creation.
It was brought up to devs. It has to be an oversight, tbh. Wouldn’t make sense for it not to be.
The timeline doesn’t add up. Why Glint not tell me, my gw1 character, how to become exalted? Or may be my character is the first exalted and their leader.
Because the one and only thing Glint talked about in GW1 was the Flameseeker Prophecies which is 100% irrelevant to the Elder Dragons.
Of course she had the knowledge. But the reason why she kept it a secret is not at all relevant to this discussion, or is it? I realize you’re trying to tell me that if this could be kept from becoming known, the same could be true for the creation of the Exalted. However, I find the assumption to be quite cheesy considering that Glint appears to have explicitly sent the Forgotten in order to look for volunteers. You don’t do that in secret.
Unless you don’t want your goal to be jeapordized and it becoming known would do just that.
Then again, we don’t know all there is about Tyrian history – even in the past 250 years. So who’s to say this isn’t as widely known as the existence of the Zephyrites before we learned about them? Or Mordremoth.
When you’re sticking to a single location, you’re going to have to create new stuff or it’ll become a stale story. And when you create new stuff, it’ll be filling in gaps the audience previously didn’t know – whether the characters knew or not is entirely up to the writing team; and no, that’s not always bad story writing.
No, I don’t. Perhaps you mistake me for thinking they weren’t servants of Glint, which I don’t. It just annoys me that the Exalted blogpost ties them entirely to Glint and doesn’t mention the gods as their actual masters at all.
Why would the Six Gods be mentioned?
The blog post wasn’t about the Forgotten. It was about the Exalted.
It wasn’t the Six who worked with the Forgotten to build this counter-measure. It was Glint. The Six were already distancing themselves from the world by this point.
I forgot about these groups, admittedly. But that doesn’t change the point that knowledge about the continued existence of the forgotten was pretty much lost to humanity 300 years ago and that collides with the idea of Glint sending the Forgotten on a mission to find human volunteers (except if we continue to assume that she restricted them to a specific splinter group of humans within the Crystal Desert at some point, and as I said, it doesn’t sound like that was the specific idea behind it).
Here’s a question for you:
If the existence of the Forgotten was forgotten completely by humanity in 1028 AE (exactly 300 years prior to HoT), then why does a document written in 1071-1072 AE (before Prophecies’ main story but after the Cataclysm in 1071) mention them?
Keep in mind that our very first knowledge of the Forgotten – as full of holes as it may be even during GW1’s time – was written less than a year before the main game (post-Searing) – and over a year after the tutorial of the main game (pre-Searing).
With that in mind, it’s pretty obvious that the term Forgotten was not about forgetting their existence, but what the race called themselves. Though it’s known that at least Elonians of ~200 years prior to GW1 didn’t know what Forgotten looked like, that doesn’t mean the Elonians didn’t know Forgotten existed or what their culture was.
So to say that their existence was forgotten 300 years prior to GW2 is… false.
Source? Certainly this has been brought up before, but I haven’t read it yet.
Source on which – that the 10,000 date is Priory speculation, or that there’s evidence for the previous dragonrise to be 2,000 BE?
Either way, there’s a lot of sources in both. But the main three for the latter are:
All claims that the previous dragonrise was in 10,000 BE is done by Priory scholars. But we know they’re not always correct. Most likely that was simply a dragonrise.
Also, it would be weird for the jotun to have knowledge of multiple dragonrises – implying surviving more than just the previous, which would place their species at being over 30,000 years old.
The term Forgotten came from the centuries of not-knowing that began in 174 AE when the race left the civilized world.
If the Forgotten left in 174 AE to the crystal desert what are they doing in the maguuma only 50 years before GW1? Even if people hadn’t forgotten them, I’m sure it would have been mentioned if they, or their exalted creations (if you want to argue that they created them in the desert) had marched across ascalon/shiverpeaks/kryta to get to the maguuma.
Don’t take dates thrown by ArenaNet literally when it’s stuff like “300 years ago”. They round, a lot. And when you have a hundreds place, expect that rounding to be off by at most 50 years.
But to answer your question: Nothing says that the Forgotten were kept in the Crystal Desert. They willingly went there, and they could willingly leave.
And honestly, you think the Forgotten can’t swim or build ships? They could easily sail from the Crystal Desert, past Orr, and to the uninhabited Tarnished Coast.
Or, hell, use one of their hundreds teleporters. We know they cover long distances, given that one goes from the Crystal Desert to the Desolation.
Do you honestly believe they must pass through civilized land? Probably not.
And who would bother paying attention when at the time of GW1, Kryta is still under civil war, Ascalon is in a constant war with the charr, asura are still settling in, etc. etc.
But let’s say they did pass through civilized land. Who’s to say that they didn’t get recognized and recorded? After all, it’s not like we know everything that’s recorded in Tyrian history. We never did. We never will until we go through all of Tyrian history in the series – and that’s just unlikely.
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: Konig Des Todes.2086
It’s worth bearing in mind that the mursaats’ antagonistic role had them doing something bad (human sacrifice) for a good reason (keeping Abbadon sealed behind the Door of Komalie). That no longer applies, as the door got opened anyway, and Abbadon is dead.
So, why did they wipe out an entire race (the Seers) and then flee into the Mists when they had the greatest weapon to use against the Elder Dragons during the previous dragonrise?
Furthermore, they weren’t keeping Abaddon at bay – they were keeping the titans from killing their race. The Flameseeker Prophecies is what they knew about, and all that said was that it would lead to the destruction of the mursaat.
Guys, stop trying to turn the mursaat into good guys. They’re not.
WHY does everyone think they’re Mursaat?
Because they look like mursaat and not Forgotten?
Enchanted aromrs looked like mursaat armor – note the head, fingers, and toes particularly.
Interesting how, in that link above, the Devs said we’d find out about the Mursaat in GW2.
You never know where the story may lead…
What was actually said is that they had plans “in the future” for mursaat.
And then they appeared in War in Kryta.
(edited by Konig Des Todes.2086)
Whole thing is dumb. Golden cities, should have been mursaat.
Either this is some ruse to throw people off, or anet have really just thrown all the old lore out and are just making up nonsense now. If these things were created 300 years ago then why did glint never mention them, why did we never see them in gw1?
1) Mursaat structures weren’t golden, but reddish-purple. As we saw in GW1 itself.
Keep in mind that not everything from the manual made it into the game, as it was written while the game was still in development. It’s easy to pick multiple things from each GW1 manual that doesn’t match what’s said or seen in-game.
2) Why would Glint mention it? They hold no bearing on the Flameseeker Prophecies and the Titans, the one and only thing Glint talked about to us.
Also I’m pretty certain that 250 years ago the forgotten had already been, you know, forgotten by humans, surviving only in the crystal desert. But just 50 years before that they were turning humans into mursaat lookalikes? I mean, it wasn’t even humans who were custodians of glint back then, it was dwarves, so it makes even less sense.
The term Forgotten came from the centuries of not-knowing that began in 174 AE when the race left the civilized world. The term comes from before even Turai Ossa.
This does not mean that the race itself was forgotten. And as shown by Turai, and his statement that two groups of humans ventured into the Crystal Desert after his, humans knew of the Forgotten – even if they’ve Forgotten their name.
And it should be noted that we don’t know who the two groups of humans that attempted Ascension were.
I don’t think it makes much sense at all for anything but Mursaat to be in the Golden City within the Maguuma Jungle.
GW1 lore, (for the devs who seem to have forgotten*) – Mursaat, Golden City, Maguuma Jungle. [end of part 1] [start of part 2] The Forgotten, Crystal Desert, Exalted (enchanted armours).
GW2 lore.. seems to have combined the two. This is why it makes no sense to have.. Mursaat-esque Exalted in a Golden City in the Maguuma Jungle.
The problem with your post is that the only link between mursaat and golden structures is a recounting of a starving, hallucinating person.
Furthermore, it should be noted that NOTHING says that Saul was wandering the Maguuma. The manual and all other recollections literally say “forest”. Not jungle, not Maguuma, not Maguuma Jungle. “Forest”. And there’s a lot of forests surrounding Kryta.
Also, your claim of “mursaat-esque Exalted” is kind of funny given that you say “Exalted (enchanted armors)” when the enchanted armors themselves were looking like mursaat armor. So that similarity actually makes perfect sense.
ANet did not trick you, their plan from the begging, and your vision were simply different…
So I guess their plan includes violating previously established lore.
Nothing about the Exalted actually “violates” previously established lore because nothing of this even touches previously established lore except by the name of Forgotten (which had worldly presence) and Glint (who was not imprisoned in the Crystal Desert and thus could go elsewhere when she pleased).
Just because you wanted them to be mursaat does not mean that them not being mursaat contradicts established lore.
Hell, them being mursaat would have contradicted established lore. Mursaat structures were not gold. Nor were they ever friendly or nice or good guys of any form – the entire race are depicted as powerful and selfish kittens who would gladly sacrifice the rest of the world to save their own behinds – and they have done that already. It would make no sense for the Exalted to be mursaat.
Besides, it was pretty kitten obvious from the end of Season 2 – what with the Forgotten Seal sealing the cave with a golden structure inside it – that the Exalted would be related to the Forgotten.
..does not mean the Mursaat have been forgotten and wont make an appearance.
We’ve been waiting nearly 10 years.
You missed Eye of the North and War in Kryta then. And that’s not ArenaNet’s fault.
(edited by Konig Des Todes.2086)
It’ll be acquired via a collection.
What about for light and medium classes? Do they get a fancy new armor set collection? ^.^
Konig I am going to concede on this one, because there is something you personally like about this latest article. Your personal opinion differs from mine, so I am going to leave it that. Instead getting into a war of words. Plus divulging into personal attacks is not entertaining for either of us.
Once more, you’re putting words into my mouth – which, ironically, some would consider a personal attack.
I never said I liked anything about the article, in response to you. To be fair, I don’t really like anything about the article.
But I also don’t dislike anything – other than the unnecessary reveal before release – about it either.
But everything you said has no bearing on the article. You were bringing up unrelated writing, and then claimed I said said unrelated writing was good writing (which, again, I didn’t).
Question: why does this golden city have the White Mantle symbol on its gate in the HoT trailer if it was made by the Forgotten and it’s not related to the Mursaat?
While similar, those aren’t White Mantle symbols.
(edited by Konig Des Todes.2086)
Edge of Destiny had Glint saying 300 years ago for when the Chosen tried to kill her. Presumed at first by folks to be a reference to the bonus mission, though there’s the potential that it was to be a future Beyond arc (Elona’s? Ascalon’s?) since she mention that they learned about her past.
So your opinions about some of the events with the Sylvari have been good quality writing in the game so far? I mean the things that happened with Traherne (especially with Caladbolg in his hands), Scarlet being a cartoon megalomaniac silver tongue technical genius, and the sylvari relations to mordremoth (one of the elder dragons being more power then the 6 “human gods”) is considered excellent writing?
Well, it depends on which “some of the events” you refer to. But do take note that I never said there was good writing – just that none of it was a dues ex machina.
Trahearne was actually good writing. His fall point was in voice acting and lack of exposition (especially for non-sylvari PCs).
Scarlet was nothing but horrid writing, but nothing with her was a dues ex machina. Though the term mary sue is used a lot with her, it’s not an accurate term – villain sue is closer.
The sylvari relation to Mordremoth is bad in that ArenaNet made continuous contradictions between how sylvari function and how dragon minions – including mordrem – function. The relation itself is not bad. The reveal was bad and their attempt to hide it was bad. Whether or not the last critical piece of the “hero comes from the villain” trope is good or bad (that is, the reaction) has yet to be seen.
None of these are dues ex machinas, like you claimed.
You really think Arena Net is going to deliver a ground breaking story that rivals anything they have ever done before?
No.
But I’m willing to be pleasantly surprised.
I’m sorry but you have been the one who have also pointed to many of these flaws before.
I have pointed out flaws, yes. Many times, continuously.
But not those flaws because those flaws you “point out” are non-existent. And you overgeneralized what the flaw was, leaving it to be no better comment than “the story is bad”. Hence my question of “do you even know what you’re talking about?”
Again, I never said it was good writing, I merely said there was no dues ex machina and no mcguffin – in the sense you’re using.
Want a Dues ex Machina in GW2? Heart of Thorn’s Demo Story has it: Rytlock. THAT is a Dues ex Machina through and through. He’s gone, then he’s back and he knows what’s going on. Right.
And that is a quarter of the reason why I pray that story instance will not see any form of existence in the HoT storyline.
Want a McGuffin in GW2? While Glint’s Egg does come pretty close, a better one would be Magdaer. It was used to introduce the plot of the dungeons – the beginning of Destiny’s Edge’s reformation, and why we go out of our main plot’s way to put them together. But… whatever happened to it? It literally disappeared. It was also presented as a plot provider for the Ascalonian ghost situation… and abandoned in favor of a ritual that sends Rytlock into space-I mean the Mists.
(edited by Konig Des Todes.2086)
Colors are always used to represent things throughout civilizations and even in the natural world. It’s especially prevalent in GW themes.
So it would be a better question to ask: Why wouldn’t it be a thing?
What’s so special about the humans that they were the only ones chosen to become Exalted? Glint had an entire order of Dwarves at her disposal that were devoted to her and her ways. Why go so out of your way (by a whole continent) to abduct/manipulate groups of humans to go to Maguuma for your trials, their conversions, and city building?
Weird lore is weird. Let’s hope it makes more sense later on.
Forgotten were followers of the Six Gods in large, while also curators of Glint. Humans were the only other race that were in large also followers of the Six Gods throughout history (though it’s known for naga, dwarves, and centaurs to follow one or more of the Six – Dwayna, Dwayna and Grenth, and Balthazar respectively). So it’s not so weird that humans were chosen. More so when humans weren’t around from the previous dragon rise.
I don’t understand why they created the Exalted. What’s wrong with the mursaat, forgotten and seers?
None of those could really play a modern day allied role. The mursaat are villains, through and through, despite people trying to stick up for them; seers are pretty much extinct – the last member we knew of was last seen on an autopsy table overlooked by asura (thank you Zinn…); Forgotten have disappeared for as-of-yet unstated reasons.
Doesn’t Glint already have the Brotherhood of the Dragon and the Zephyrites following her? Why did we need another faction that was created solely to serve her?
Brotherhood of the Dragon were due to turn to stone/die off with the return of the Dragons as prophecized. It wouldn’t be improbable to presume the prophet for that prophecy was in fact Glint.
As for the Zephyrites – they’re the spiritual successors of the Brotherhood of the Dragon, but who’s to say that the Zephyrites weren’t those tested, and those who didn’t succeed became known as the Zephyrites? After all “securing a peaceful future” matches what the Zephyrites are doing for themselves. Living in peace.
It’s constantly portrayed now that the forgotten serve Glint rather than they were allies or liberators of her.
They were always depicted as curators, servants, and guardians of Glint. Rather than master-servant, it comes off to me more as mutual beneficiaries.
Back to the exhalted – why? Why not simply have a handful of forgotten in Maguuma? Or some Brotherhood of the Dwarves that didn’t undergo the ritual?
The Forgotten were established as MIA. The Dwarves all underwent a different ritual – the Rite of the Great Dwarf.
Especially a race that seems to have so much in common with another race of Maguuma – the mursaat.
Fun fact: Nothing actually stated that the mursaat were related to the Maguuma. Saul merely found a city in a forest. That’s the term used to describe the location: “the forest”. And there are many around Kryta.
The exhaulted are only 300 years old – that dates them roughly 50 years older than the events of GW1. Why would Glint use humans? As others pointed out – she was noted as being forgotten to the humans, the dwarves on the other hand were not only familiar with her, but a faction of them served her at the time. Why not forgotten?
Anet loves to round. Remember in Edge of Destiny, Glint said that “300 years ago” the very humans she heralded as heroes against the mursaat came to kill her for finding out her history.
Glint is a cool character but she is becoming a lot like Scarlet – seeping into lore and stories all over the place.
Glint is nothing like Scarlet, because unlike Scarlet, Glint is old, prophetic, and has reason to be doing all that she’s being connected to. She’s also flawed – something Scarlet wasn’t.
It would be more accurate to say Glint is becoming like Abaddon.
Just gonna put this here; It’s from the “tarir city” post in HoT gen forum.
“EdwinLi.1284:
Well i have a hypothesis and this may allow us to figure out what happened to Saul D’Alessio.
Maybe Saul found this city of Tarir and mistakened the Exalted as the Mursaat. He went back to kryta tell the story of the golden city of Tarir and the Exalted. After that returned to the Maguuma and as the lore stated he was unable to find the city again but he did find the Mursaat. However, since both the Exalted had strong magical powers and both can fly Saul may have mistaken the Mursaat to be the Exalted believing the Mursaat were another form of Exalted.
Using Saul’s misunderstanding the Mursaat pretended to be the Exalted. This may also explain why Saul may have been taken away since Saul knows the location of the Exalted which serves Glint and the Mursaat were after all fighting against Glint’s flameseeker prophecies.”Any of you lore masters know of anything that pokes holes in this theory?
Honestly, it’s a pretty sound theory.
Works better than any other theory about Saul and the mursaat, in all honesty.
Lore is here and the Exalted are not mursaat but construct created by the Forgotten to be caretakers of Tyria.
Excuse me but….
CALLED IT.
But originally humans? Come on, that’s rather disappointing.
The best fantasy settings have mystery and the unknown, Arena Net have been connecting everything even if it is not needed. We have humans and Glint yet again, where is the wonder when all the characters are always the same?
It’s very obvious that ArenaNet are tying things into GW1 a lot with Heart of Thorns. And it’s also very obvious why – there were constant complaints about how GW2 doesn’t seem related to GW1 at all.
It was pretty obvious to me that the Exalted were going to be related to the Forgotten – Season 2’s finale made sure of that (the Forgotten seal).
But to say that Guild Wars has no mystery is ridiculous.
If anything, it has too many mysteries, and half of them are mysteries created by pure lack of information being told to players (e.g., mystery for players but not for characters – such as Mordremoth’s name) rather than it being a true mystery in the setting.
Edit: I’m also super annoyed by the fact that the Forgotten are now continuously presented as servants of Glint, where they were primarliy servants of the Six.
Uh… you need to replay Prophecies.
I wasn’t until the events of Prophecies that human civilization ran into them again (not counting Turai Ossa a few centuries before).
I don’t remember this line about human civilization. Do you have a source? Also, you believe Turai Ossa and his followers, but can’t believe that any others might have gone after. None at all?
I believe that Agroman refers to the dialogue of this quest. Though it doesn’t really state what he’s claiming.
And as mara pointed out, there eerily resemble Enchanted Armor.
And people told me they didn’t.
I don’t understand how the Mursaat would just let the Forgotten start to build a city in what is essentially their territory (close to the Maguuma Bloodstone). I mean judging by the fact that the Forgotten worked for Glint, who in turn predicted the fall of the Mursaat, I would say they aren’t exactly on friendly terms. Not even counting the fact that the Mursaat actually went to war with another elder race (the seers) before, so it even has a precedent.
I already felt that the sudden Forgotten and Glint connection in LS2 was a little out of place. They were attached to Elona and the Crystal Desert in GW1, not Maguuma. That was more Mursaat territory. But having an entire forgotten-build city there seems a bit much.
Most likely happened after Prophecies’ events.
Anet likes to round things, so them rounding to “300 years” instead of saying “256 years” is understandable. Not desired, can be confusing to those who don’t remember their love of rounding, but understandable.
Turai Ossa wasn’t even aware of what the Forgotten were when he and his followers stumbled across them.
Keep in mind that two groups of humans attempted to Ascend after Turai and before our PCs in GW1.
And we don’t know who they were.
It’s hinted that they were Ascalonians and the Seekers, but who are the Seekers? We still don’t know.
Edit: The last time that the dragons rose was over 10.000 years ago and deliberately kept a secret. That’s no comparison.
10,000 BE according to the Priory’s best guesses. But evidence actually points to it being circa 2,000 BE.
(edited by Konig Des Todes.2086)
It should have went like this
Elder Dragons last reign (11000 years ago)
While that’s more or less what the Priory claims, evidence points to the last dragon reign being circa 2000 BE rather than 10,000 BE.
It seems that since the Gods came and left, they had no idea that the Dragons even existed. They built the city of Arah on top of Zhaitan because Zhaitan leaked out magic and they thought that place was fit for their city and what not.
While it’s likely the gods didn’t know the exact location of the Elder Dragons, they did know of them. There is also indication that they did not build Arah – or at least, they did not build the beginnings of it – as parts of Arah existed before the Six Gods supposedly came to Tyria (see Altar of Glaust and Arah Forgotten path).
The bloodstones were created to seal most of the magics of the earth due to Tyrians using magic to wage war on each other. Then King Doris begged the gods to take away the magic.
Old GW1 lore that’s been retconned. The original Bloodstone was where the magic that Abaddon unleashed came from, and it was created by the Seers during the previous dragonrise to house all non-corrupted magic to force them to go to sleep early. See Arah Seer path.
Poor story telling, in all honesty.
Drax is correct in every sense – Jaken’s a little off in that we knew what the egg was since Hidden Arcana (before Caithe took the egg), nor is there any indicationg that the egg will help against Mordremoth directly, all indication is for post-killing Mordy – but that’s what we figured out for ourselves, it was never explained via narrative. So really, players who don’t go looking for that side dialogue will be going “we care… why?” which is never good.
I wouldn’t necessarily put “primal” on a level with “less intelligent”. Perhaps “less civilized”, yes, but that isn’t the point.
Berserkers (by which I explicitly only mean the Warrior specialization) for example also rely on primal anger to gain power, but that doesn’t necessarily make them less intelligent than other fighters.
The mind of an Elder Dragon is so large and so heavily focussed on destroying/assimilating/devouring/etc that I can’t really see them wasting any thoughts about the subtleties that concern human beings, which are very much what a mesmer has to deal with in order to manipulate their enemies. I believe with all that missing, it shouldn’t have been such a big deal for Anise and Jennah to merely “touch” the mind of Kralkatorrik, who had just awakened and was pretty much on rampage. Perhaps an Elder Dragon’s mind is even so large that they don’t even notice something as small as a human mind. Manipulating anything within and even staying connected with it after Kralky has noticed what’s going on is a different story.
Primal is not destructive but primitive – or first. Primitive tends to mean less advanced, less intelligent, and less civilized.
As for “not noticing”, you need to read (or re-read) Edge of Destiny. Because Kralkatorrik most definitely noticed Snaff and Jennah/Anise. Jennah/Anise reeled because of Kralkatorrik’s mind. Snaff definitely saw something comprehensible even upon first looking into Kralkatorrik’s mind. And I’ll note that Kralkatorrik definitely noticed Snaff before he began manipulating.
Edit: The question raised by the idea that mesmers perhaps banned those spells out of fear is – why now, if it was deemed acceptable during GW1?
Times change.
Though, IIRC, all dialogue on mesmerism in GW1 was more about conjuring phantasms and interrupting foes rather than the non-beginner skills we see which were about getting into your opponent’s mind per skill name and action. So even in GW1, the more “direct mind manipulation” tended to not be the commonly taught stuff.
However, something to keep in mind while reading these interviews: there have been later mentions by the GW2 narrative team on the GW2 forums that if any interview ever conflicts with what’s actually presented in game lore-wise, always go with the game’s version.
Also something to keep in mind is that ArenaNet never had to worry about this until Angel McCoy continuously made errors on interviews, and from what was said she’s even the one who caused the year-gap-controversy for when Secondborn were born.
For warriors, shouts are likely just motivational speeches. People don’t really seem to get how much moral can improve situations, or harm it, and people tend to take the mechanics literally.
Rangers is questionable, but most cases seem to be commands to the pet so I would argue the same. Non-magical.
Guardians is most likely magic, given it’s a magical profession.
Reaper and Temptest is definite magic. Most spellcasting is often depicted as saying something – though not necessarily so in GWverse – so it wouldn’t be off.
But none of them are mind control. None of them are even close to such.
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: Konig Des Todes.2086
And no lore about daredevil, tempest, berserker, herald, reaper and chronomancer.
Reaper: Marjory took up her sister’s sword and started training with Rox on how to use it. Then she presumably teaches her abilities to other necromancers.
Herald: As we’ve seen Rytlock is a herald (he channels Glint). We know Rytlock actually met Glint while she was still alive and I think it is likely that he met her again while in the mists.
On top of that, Daredevil seems to come from the bandits/White Mantle based on looks and skills, and chronomancer may be from Kasmeer (she does use Time Warp a lot in the Fort Salma instance).
Thus leaving tempest (Zojja begins shouting at mordrem?) and berserker (Canach gets lit on fire by the mob seen in trailer and he uses that to empower his rage?).
Since Agony Resistance is only useful for one mode of game play. And even then only for the higher difficulties. Why is it an item to modify gear with then?
Gating.
Honestly, that’s all it is. Gating content with a requirement.
Oddly enough, something they outright stated they do not want to do with raids.
Having it character based just makes it a bigger gate.
Why the gear modifying slot? Because that’s all the slot was originally meant for – unlike magic find which took up a stat slot thus making you weaker for the sake of “better loot”.
I didn’t call the mind of an Elder Dragon inferior to that of a human or unintelligent, but more primal and simply different, sentient in a more alien way.
“Primal” implies “less intelligent”, which is not what I would call the Elder Dragons.
But comparing the two makes it kind of clear that there wouldn’t be any sense to assume that mesmers just put aside what they commonly used in GW1, because it would be wasting a massive advantage.
From a design perspective, this was done for the obvious change of style – GW2 is “flashier” than GW1, focused more on seeing the effect of things than reading words and images.
From a lore perspective, this could be explained away as a case of fear of stigmatism happening like with necromancy. It’s not showed well – like a lot of such things in GW2’s lore – but people fear necromancy more than any other profession. Part of it is simply the overlying tone of using corpses (something only sylvari lack), but a good portion is also the heavy overtone of necromantic threats (Zhaitan). Mesmers had apparently cobbled together a group – human only or multiracial is unknown – and they banned the use of this magic for one reason or another, and that reason is most likely fear of being treated the same as necromancers.
Although Scarlet wasn’t exactly the best villain, she definitely put a sense of excitement in the game. Whether it was the Aetherblades, or the Twisted Marionette, Scarlet constantly kept the game interesting. It was so much fun logging on and seeing Scarlet’s new plan and overall insanity.
Sounds more like you enjoyed the constant updates of unrelated plots rather than Scarlet herself to me.
Printing has been spreading for quite a while. The first printing press was charr-made, and the Durmand Priory began using the invention themselves for quite a while too. Humans are known to have converted old wine distilleries into such (similar to our own typography history).
I don’t think we have an exact date for the invention of the printing press in Tyria, just that all the races unified into using New Krytan in 1105 AE with the Durmand Priory’s guidance. But we know that the printing press has existed for several years – if not several decades – by now. Every writing we see, or rather almost all of it, aren’t done by hand but by print.
It doesn’t surprise me that type writers of such an antique design are in use. Though I don’t think such has been seen before.
As for why there are more keys than 26 is because you have the decibal numeral system (0-9) and punctuation symbols (period, comma, colon, semi-colon, hyphen, exclamation point, question mark, quotation mark, etc.).
Relevant links:
(edited by Konig Des Todes.2086)
Silverwaste rubble collection events have the same issue. Technically, all collection events do.
When you turn in however many are needed, there’s then a timer – 10 seconds if you solo’d, a minute if not. However, if something causes the event to fail (e.g., another event spawning, like in Silverwastes when the forts get under attack), the event fails even if all items are turned in.
It’s nice that the timer is there, but it should be counted as completed once that amount is filled. Timer should be there only to obtain credit at last moment – it shouldn’t prevent people who spent 4 minutes on the event from getting credit just because the game-enforced timer was too slow.
Events should count as completed the moment their objectives are completed, no later. Especially now that they’re giving more rewards than mere gold, exp, and karma.
With all due respect to those who follow the lore and take it seriously, this was the most tedious experience in the game. Couldn’t someone else handle the politics, like Treehearne? I’m just a grunt who kills dragons and other beasties, a blunt instrument if you will.
The irony of this statement is hilarious to me.
Constantly people complain about how Trahearne shouldn’t be Marshal, the PC should…
Yet one of the most boring parts of Season 2 – the attending boring parties and setting up formal meetings – is exactly what the PC would constantly be doing as Pact Marshal.
Given Abaddon, I’d be inclined to argue that “something has accelerated their awakening” in the same manner that something accelerated their slumber (Bloodstone).
TBH, it never made sense for the time since the previous awakening to be in the same line as all prior ones due to those two things. So I’ve always been suspect of Varra Skylark’s claims in Arah.
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: Konig Des Todes.2086
You can see a hologram of her, at least.
But yeah, story wise she has taken command of the Aetherblades and is hiding out in the Edge of the Mists. I recall being told that all three alliance groups Scarlet used (Molten Alliance, Aetherblades, and Toxic Alliance) will have plots in the future. If that’s true, then the group we’re most likely to see in HoT is the Toxic Alliance. Aetherblades and Molten Alliance, if Anet ever gets to them, will be in future content most likely.
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: Konig Des Todes.2086
Legendary weapons are made easier.
They said a full set of legendary armor would take as much effort as a single legendary weapon.
So really? Just as many weapons as you’re not using but can use is all Anet intends for you to carry. And trinkets/aquabreather, perhaps.
On a different note: Zerker may be meta in core content, but that doesn’t mean you have to run it. So whatever build works for you in HoT content will more than likely work for you in core content. Problem solved.
The only need for multiple sets is if you want to be able to fulfill multiple roles on a single character.
(edited by Konig Des Todes.2086)
Still, the human mind can hardly be compared to that of an Elder Dragon. I would argue that reaching into something as large and raw as a dragon’s mind is easier than getting into that of a human, but that it’s much more dangerous for the mesmer and harder to control anything within it due to its vast primal nature.
I wouldn’t compare them either.
But I think a many-thousands-year-old intelligent mind that has read the memories of everything it created (said ‘everything’ rising in the millions) would be superior, not inferior, to the human mind.
Perhaps distribute was the wrong word for it. I always had the impression that the Elder Dragons let, or at least that Zhaitan lets his champions do most of the thinking and commanding for him, while he himself is largely the corruption/desire that fuels the champions.
Letting others command armies is vastly different than not being intelligent.
My point is that I highly doubt they can just take over another guys thoughts and do with them whatever they want, but that they depend a lot on trickery, hexes and illusions to pull the strings. I’m basically saying that mesmers don’t just do hostile takeover, because if they could do that all the time, there wouldn’t be any need to get in a fight. And I figured that in order to intervene as drastically as Anise does in Party Politics, a direct takeover would at least be partially necessary.
I would argue that “a lot of trickery, hexes, and illusions to pull the strings” is a “hostile takeover”.
It’s not on the same level as, say, dragon corruption where the very foundation of free will is overridden, nor is it on the same level as the rewriting the Geth in Mass Effect 2 in which the personality is fully and totally changed while still retaining free will.
But it would still be forms of brainwashing and overall making another belief something that you want them to – which is the very foundation of the Grizwhirl, and the argument of what Anise did during Party Politics, which is nothing more than implanting thoughts, not enforcing change (which seems to now be what you’re talking about).
I find the comparison a bit lacking, because modern tanks are pretty much better at everything when comparing them to WWII ones. A GW2 mesmer has a lot more raw power and a lot more reality altering than a GW1 mesmer, but the latter can interrupt spells in the fraction of a second and put hexes on other people’s minds which I believe would win in a direct fight. But actually, I believe mesmers still use interrupting spells and hexes, they just don’t fit well into GW2’s combat system.
The point was more that the common mesmer of GW1 and the common mesmer of GW2 utilize different skills.
Again, the grizwhirl is an uncomfortably indirect example.
It made people see illusions.
Esprits d’Orr : Are the illusions created by mesmers visible to anybody or only to the caster and the spell target ?
Angel McCoy : This depends. Casting an illusion that can only be seen by one person is an extremely advanced skill as it requires getting directly into an individual’s mind. Only the most skilled of mesmers can do this, and mesmers don’t talk about this ability. If people were to find out that mesmers could do this, it would prejudice people against mesmers and damage the trust and love mesmers work so hard to inspire in others.
No documentation of this ability exists outside the Mesmer community because the targets of this kind of spell don’t realize they’ve been duped. No one else can corroborate their experience either, so…it’s often explained away as battle fatigue. Even within the mesmer community, knowledge of this kind of spell is “need to know” only, which means only the most elder and experienced are initiated into the circle.
What the question is asking about? That is exactly what the Grizwhirl does. And Angel says that yes, it exists.
Though Angel apparently forgot that every mesmer did this in GW1. Which isn’t surprising given how many other times she messed up in lore interviews, which resulted in her and Bobby Stein saying that they’re “secondary lore” (I’m serious, until Angel, no interview ever contradicted in-game lore – certainly not on enough continuous occasions to require devs saying that lore is no longer canon).
I didn’t say that the dragons aren’t sentient at all, but that they aren’t sentient in the way humans are.
Sentience is sentience regardless of race or species.
They have a much more primal consciousness, I’d argue. I’d even say that is also the case with Mordremoth, in a way, eventhough he appears to do more precise thinking by himself instead of distrbuting it among his champions, being the dragon of mind.
So does Kralkatorrik and by any indication, the other Elder Dragons.
Dragon champions are independent in their personality and actions, by in large. There is no indication that Elder Dragons “distribute” their mind or thinking amongst their champions.
I disagree concerning Macha. Perhaps it already took her proper training to implant communication? Later in the book, it is implied that the Krytan navy uses mesmers to communicate across ships in just the same way as Macha does, only over a greater distance. Prince Edair surrounded himself with an elite force, so I believe it is fair to assume that telepathic communication isn’t a basic spell.
Complexity or basicness is irrelevant. If it can be done, it can be done. We know Anise is one of the two most prominent mesmers in Tyria – Jennah being the other. Few – if any – exceed their abilities. If it can be done, they’d be able to do it no doubt.
But as I said, I don’t want to deny a Mesmer can brainwash people.
Isn’t that what you very much said before, however? That mesmers do not mess with people’s minds. This was why you think Anise didn’t do such – because, to quote, “It’s never really stated that mesmers can get directly into people’s head.”
Since just about every GW1 mesmer did that, I’m doubtful that its impossible, nor do I believe that it’s challenging.
Elsewise, I couldn’t think of any reason why Tyria wouldn’t be completely controlled by mesmers. :P
Because it’s too much work, requires too much coordination, and requires being taught in techniques which aren’t commonplace in the modern era (think like comparing a tank operator of WWII’s era to a modern tank operator – their skill sets will be rather different, don’t you think?).
But let’s presume that a mesmer can mind control 5 other people. That means there’d have to be 1 mesmer for every 5 non-mesmers. If some aren’t controlled, then they’ll likely notice – over time – that mesmers are mind controlling others. And if that happens, revolt happens. Prejudice against mesmers that aren’t mind controlling, mass mayhem, genocide – or professioncide rather – occurs.
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: Konig Des Todes.2086
First off, I don’t think you were actually in the wyvern’s fire. A bunch of Rangers are using the new fire wyvern pet, especially at that fight, so you were probably standing in friendly fire.
How do I know this? Because unless you’re getting a ton of focused healing being spammed on you, you will still drop in about 8 seconds or less of standing in that fire as a Reaper. And that’s assuming you had full life force and health.
You can melee the wyvern as a Reaper with ease, yes, but only from the sides or back.
I was definitely taking damage, and on a character with ~30k health and ~25k death shroud. Was definitely longer than 8 seconds.
I’m not entirely sure I buy that. I played the reaper too (played four different ones, Reaper being one of). Did you stand in the fire next to the wyverrn and melee him the entire time?
I wasn’t in the fire the entire time, no, but when he was down I was melee’ing him (first fight I had, second fight I alternated between ranged and melee for a different experience). But when I was in the fire, by the time I only lost half of my death shroud everyone left and right of me would be downed/defeated (which I took as a queue to strafe around the wyvern).
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