Guild Wars 2

Tachenon.5270:

Easily retconned. All it would take is an intrepid band of Stone Summit dwarves who stubbornly refused to undergo the Rite of the Great Dwarf and were either forgotten or stricken from the record due to undwarvenly behavior. Perhaps, after a time, they have come to regret their behavior and have returned from their dark wanderings, hoping to reunite with their lost kin — but alas! Until they make up for whatever undwarvenly thing they did, they are for some reason or other unable to undergo the Rite.

And so they become player characters.

It has been explicitly stated that the Stone Summit disbanded and rejoined Deldrimor shortly after Eye of the North, and that by 50 years after Eye of the North, all dwarves that still lived had undergone the Rite.

They’ve already kittened with GW1 lore making it near pointless to care for pre-EotN lore, I don’t want them to go retconning GW2 lore Willy nilly too.

Especially when A net has on many occasions, before McCoy stated that they would never retcon, just give new truths. Sadly, a certain McCoy and LW writing team broke that promise a dozen times over.

Still, no need to make crimes worse.

If you actually read the article, then it’s painfully obvious what they consider “groundbreaking” is the PC talking during normal gameplay.

They’ve said before, specifically Bobby Stein I believe, during the Living World that due to technical limitations they literally couldn’t give the PC spoken dialogue outside of those face-to-face cinematics, so for them to be able to is groundbreaking – in the context of how they’ve altered the GW2 engine’s coding to allow this.

Groundbreaking in games? No. Groundbreaking in GW? Yes.

Another reason there was no PC voice in the LW was because people hated those face-to-face cinematics (with good reason), and they had to hire 20 voice actor per language rather than one per language – for a free dlc, that would cost them more than its worth.

And the race-specific dialogue is an improvement too, though not really all that groundbreaking.

As far as I know, only dev comments on weapons useable in GW2 would be the FDS. And aside from Akitten o direct lore in the game – just connections by name/appearance to something in GW1.

Though the precursor achievements should be giving some flavor to the precursors and in turn legendaries. Whether or not there is any direct lore is unseen, but seems likely.

As for Entropy specifically, it shares skins with the “Cultist Hammer” from Cliffside Fractal, so they may either be the same, or Entropy be akin to the Fiery Dragon Swords: copies of the original more powerful weapons. I’d bet the latter.

Norn are not Icelanders. They are Norn.

Surnames of Norn that have not earned their own legend yet take the first name of their more legendary parent and add sdottir or sson to the end. When they gain a legend of their own, they take on a surname or title reflecting their greatest legend of their choosing.

This is why Jhavi Jorasdottir is not named after some nobody we have no name for that Jora from Eye of the North slept with.

Braham’s name is correct by Norn standards.

Ice of Dragons.1637:

It is true that in islandic culture one gets his name after the father. The norns however get their name after the parent that made the bigger name for themself. In the time of gw1 a couple of norns could start a relationship when they boath were same skilled hunters. I belived it was changed somewhere during the 250 year gap.

Actually it is still the same. Norn are expected to only marry other Norn with equal legends. However, a norn’s legend may rise greater after marriage, such as was the case for Eir with Bjorne.

Dwarves are gone. Not happening.

Make an asura revenant and always use the Jalis legend. That should keep you happy.

Or maybe the smallest possible human, revenant with Jalis legend.

Donari.5237:

And, not posted in the other thread: What’s the earliest step of PS that is getting reworked, even if only in small ways? I’m fairly far along on most alts but I think I have one or two that still have PS set in LA to get through. I’m fine with waiting to advance them if it gets me a chance to see the scenes in the proper setting.

Well with the return of old Lion’s Arch and Concordia, the minimum earliest would be Setting the Stage, the first level 40 (currently) instance. But going off of what I’ve seen, such is only for the visuals of being in pre-destroyed LA.

There is no earlier story step that takes place with visuals changed during the Living World (either season). The only possibility I can think of is in the human storyline: Triskell Quay. But I don’t think the Tower of Nightmares’ physical appearance has altered that far now that it is destroyed.

Unfortunately, there is no story step at Fort Salma or Viathan Lake, so that is forever destroyed unless Anet decides otherwise.

Taimi only appears superior when it comes to knowledge of the ley lines. Phlunt is said to be unable to reverse engineer her W.R.D. But this is all because she has been studying Scarlet and her works and we haven’t seen her in comparison to other asura who have done the same, such as the asura who wrote that ley line theory we can find in the Durmand Priory library (the small one).

She is said to be smarter than others her age, but just that.

A lot of the unique skinned exotics are old GW1 generic weapons. Honor of Humanity and Firebringer were the Gladius and Fiery Gladius respectively, for example. Deathwish was the GW1 Bone Staff. Etc.

Some are named for GW1 NPCs, directly or indirectly. Adam, for example was a skull that the henchman Eve carried around and talked to (and according to her, talked back – woulda been awesome if they gave that exotic skin combat chatter only the wielded could hear).

But aside from such scenarios, where you can infer from model or name, the only weapon skin that has a defined piece of lore would be the Fiery Dragon Swords. They were crafted by Ascalonians attempting to copy the creation of Magdaer and Sohothin – which the Orrians created – in the end they were only copies by appearance and means of combat.

Unclear but they certainly make it out that the Soundless are most susceptible to Mordremoth. But all sylvari seen corrupted have gone further west than any other Soundless or most sylvari for that matter.

Kysin.6349:

This is the info we have on the Fierce Warband:

The Fierce Warband is a warband of the Blood Legion. Their Legionnaire is Pyre Fierceshot. Unkittenre’s leadership, the Fierce Warband were among the many who were disinterested in the thought of following a religion among the Charr. After the defeat of the Titans by humans, they openly revoked the Shaman caste and their Titan gods marking them as rebels of the High Legions.

Now remember that war bands are together from extremely young.

Even IF your argument was correct (which has been proven not to be). It still shouldn’t be a reason to prevent this as a new addition to a Charr body type.

@Konig: please stop editing your post, just reply.

Nothing you said there counters what I said and the wiki article doesn’t include everything for example we know that Pyre and his warband revolted in 1074 AE.

I would love to dig into all articles possible but annoyingly my home’s internet is broken and I’m restricted to my phone, which is kitten annoying to look into dozens of articles.

Just know these facts:

• Only monk, elementalists, and ritualists stood upright in GW1. Necromancers and Mesmers were actually hunched over too, but not as much as the rangers and warriors, their hunch is comparable to gw2’s charr standing upright when casting (there is still a hunch).
• The majority of spellcasters, but possibly not all spellcasters, were in the Shaman caste.
• The majority of the Shaman caste, but not all shamans, were of the Flame Legion. There were shamans in Blood, Ash, and Iron Legions too.
• In GW2, Flame Legion shamans stand upright, and at that only those who have undergone the Baelfire ritual (results in burning eyes, hands, feet, and/or gut).
• In GW2, the term “shaman” is only seen, in-game, to refer to Flame Legion spellcasters, but articles such as The Ecology of the Charr (wiki it) state that even modern times there are shamans in the other three legions.
• Charr have a natural arch in their spine. http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Olias#Storyline_quotes

Surbrus.6942:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Take a look at who stands upright.

Shamans.

Not every Charr standing upright is a Shaman. Four of seven Charr in Pyre’s own Warband were upright standing Charr.
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Fierce_Warband

In the cinematic after the defeat of Hirophant Burstsoul, which unless I’m mistaken is the main blow in the revolution against the Shamen, most of the Charr cheering on Pyre’s victory are upright standing Charr.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSzTYe-AOII&feature=player_detailpage#t=1751

Demonstratively from GW1, upright standing Charr are not shamen, even though shamen might stand upright. It’s like squares and rectangles: a square is a rectangle, but a rectangle is not a square.

And @ Kysin: For GW1 charr, I said Shamans, not Flame Legion. There is a difference, though those who do not know their lore often do not realize this difference. And for the record, Kysin, I do know my lore, tyvm.

Shamans existed in more than just the Flame Legion by gw1’s time and is almost comparable to “spellcaster”. If memory serves me right, those of Pyre’s warband that stood upright were of the shaman caste but followed Pyre in betraying the caste upon the titan’s downfall. After the rebellion the shamans became less numerous and dropped Flame Legion teachings, still being in the other legions even in gw2’s time, though the title of shaman is more or less restricted to just Flame Legion due to historical affiliation.

So unless I’m wrong, my arguement remains standing.

TL;DR
Shamans existed in all legions in gw1 though most came from the Flame Legion, but it is Flame Legion teachings that are for the charr’s unnatural upright position. Modern times most if not all shamans are of Flame Legion and only Flame Legion use the unnatural upright posture.

Take a look at who stands upright.

Shamans.

Now look at the gw2 shamans. They’re all Flame Legion spellcasters, and they stand upright.

Per lore, the upright standing of charr is not natural, and a practice of the shaman caste.

It was established in lore that the reason why they are hunched over was due to their bone structure and their center of gravity. Said lore came from the same interview that revealed why charr have four ears, iirc.

Their physical appearance does result in some poor armor, but this is due to the fact that all non-cultural armor is designed for humans and just stretched/shrunk non-proportionally for the other races. If armor is the issue, request for better armor designing for charr.

No one will want to party with sylvari characters then. It creates mechanical separation of players, which a net had repeatedly stated they did not want to do (hence the whole peace treaty between charr and humans).

They haven’t stated why this change happened but it will be fixed in 8+ weeks.

Personal opinion but I disagree on your comments on Tonn’s storyline. It was overly predictable to me, greatly so, and was the first fear storyline I did so I didn’t know what to expect. Tonn’s wife’s reaction felt greatly out of place given her combat medical background and her sudden turn around was too sudden (like Logan’s at the end of Caudecus’ Manor story dungeon).

Prophecies manual, specifically the timeline, places Odran alive 200 years before GW1.

At this point, the Crystal Desert was long a desert. No islands or volcanic activity either. And the Tomb of the Primeval Kings had existed for over 600 years by Odran’s time.

The Valley of Gwaun, whatever it is, did not exist in gw1. We can go there as it is part of Talus Chute’s southwest corner, and that was a cliff full of trolls. It is one of the subliminal design retcons between the games, and there is no lore on this Valley.

I’d like to note that the volcano comparison fails at Tomb of Drascir too, which as I said had a portal by Odran. The Tomb of Drascir was in Ascalon.

The chances of there having been more than two portals by Odran into the Mists in the same continent is unlikely.

There is also no record or indication that Mount Maelstrom was a volcano in gw1 or before. All indication actually states that it is destroyer-made.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

If I remember correctly, he resigned from the post before fighting Zhaitan — so why is he back to fight Mord’ when he’s suppose to be an “Orr expert”?

This what’s happen when you let “Quinctilius Varus” lead your soldiers.

He never resigned nor was there ever any indication of such.

In fact, during the celebration after Zhaitan’s defeat he outright states having to lead the pact through five more “impossible victories” against the Elder Dragons – right after being sorry he couldn’t join the assault on Zhaitan due to being weakened from casting the cleansing ritual (e.g., why he wasn’t in the Arah story instance).

Fade.1743:

IllegalChocolate.6938:

Windsagio.1340:

Why didn’t Laranthir turn? (We know he’s specifically not corrupted), and why don’t the PC Sylvari turn?

It got hit pretty well above though, it’s pretty clearly supposed to read Trahearne unwittingly led the pact fleet into an ambush

Regardless of protection or not, it was stated that sylvari could not be corrupted by elder dragons due to their natural good will and spirit (atleast from an interview a couple years ago). If that of course changes throughout their lifespan then the likely hood of that happening will change. The teachings of the ventari tablet teach just that, good will and spirit.

This begs the question as to whether Malyck will be corrupt despite lack of pale tree influence as everyone knows he had a very noble personality.

That was more of a hypothesis than an absolute. Dragon minions cannot be corrupted by other dragons.

-Sigh-
Nothing ever said dragon minions cannot be corrupted by other dragons. In fact, Subject Alpha and the entire Crucible of Eternity purpose indicates otherwise.

We don’t know why the sylvari are protected, but the indication is that it is a combination of the Dream (unique to the Pale Tree and her sylvari – Malyck has no Dream connection) and willpower. Per this article, proximity to Mordremoth’s corruption strengthens his ability to overcome their corruption.

Furthermore it is implied that without the Dream, sylvari can be corrupted by ANY Elder Dragon.

Underwater content is great for GW2 and should not be abandoned. The aesthetics alone is just superb. Seriously, go underwater and swim in first person with max field of view. Beautiful.

But this said, having little underwater content makes sense when we’re in a dense jungle or an arid wasteland. It’d be awesome to have some underwater caves or the like but like Ascalon, underwater content is bound to be rare by theme alone.

I do think underwater content needs an overhaul (traits, the still up/down focused movement, lack of skill options, etc.) to enjoy it’s maximum potential, but it works as it is all the same.

I hope there is some underwater content, but overall I would expect it to be akin to Ascalon. Some lakes or underwater caves/ruins and nothing more.

Question for Bobby Stein:

There are quite a few story steps that could use improvements due to poor scripting (read: NPC actions in story steps). Some that come to mind are Underground Scholar, The Battle of Claw Island, and The Priory Assailed.

Is there a place where any… shall we say irksome story steps that could use tweaking be reported? Such things wouldn’t really count as “bugs” as far as I know.

For example of what I refer to:

• In Underground Scholar, you zone in to see the dredge already assaulting the Priory structure, however, the objectives and dialogues give off the impression that you missed a part where you are in the structure before the dredge assaulted, and went out to fight them to return to seeing Vyacheslav for only a moment before he retreats.
• During the Battle of Claw Island, there is some dialogue/cinematic/etc. scenes that don’t line up well or show what’s happening (when the first dead ship is sunk, when Commander Talon is killed) and the part where you have to hold off the risen easily comes off as never ending, especially to those who haven’t done it before (I certainly recall feeling like I was fighting for nearly an hour when I first did it).
• For The Priory Assailed, the destruction of the laser had near no reasoning for such happening, and though I think this was fixed the priory NPCs would wipe the floor of risen, removing any sense of urgency, as there would rarely be risen for players to kill (for once, competant allies!).

So yeah, is there a place you’d like non-bug ‘feels weird playing through this’ reports for the PS, since you’re working on them already?

Another question: any update on Season 1 bring made permanent as was promised in the past? Would be nice to have that before HoT…

Danikat.8537:

The first changes are in A Light in the Darkness which is the last instance of Chapter 6. The Greatest Fear storyline comes after that.

Just clarifying, the last step to chapter 6 is, in fact, Retribution. A Light in the Darkness is in the middle if chapter six – the fifth of seven steps.

The rest you got right though.

Slowpokeking.8720:

Can you also revamp the Zhaitan fight? Remove those minions fight and just let us fight Zhaitan.

No thank you on the latter bit for reason I stated in the thread you made in the lore forum.

For others, the minions he refers to are the dragon’s, Mouth, and champions on the ground. He’s wanting a net to remove everything but the worst part of the instance.

You fail to realize that it wouldn’t make Zhaitan any more menacing than he currently is unless you change the Zhaitan encounter itself.

Why fight another Mouth? Because it’s a new Mouth. Because you need to secure that landing space for ground troops (presumably if the rumors I’ve heard that there was a ground battle after the tower intended, the ground troops would come into play here) and destroy the anti-aircraft towers descimating the fleet from a distance. Why fight the Dragon champions? Because the skies are full of them, as they should be. It would be weird as all he’ll if you just fly through a swarm of dragons without combating any. That’s half the issue with the silly “air drop” excuse for the current reworked PS.

These encounters do not hinder the fight with Zhaitan, just like fighting the Armageddon Lords and Prince Rurik didnter hinder the fight with Khulbron during Hell’s Precipice.

Sure, we fought different champions before, but to use that as an excuse is not proper. I mean, why fight the Sovereign Eye of Zhaitan then? We already killed an Eye of Zhaitan before. Why fight Tequatl, we already fought Blightghast. Why fight the Shadow of the Dragon twice/thrice? Just because you fought an enemy type once doesn’t mean you should never encounter that enemy type again – even for bosses. Fighting old bosses is a staple in Capcom games and it works well for them. Something like this works a well here too and like I said, for the dragons it would be weird as he’ll to fly through a swarm of them and not fight any.

The only non-Zhaitan fight that needs to be changed, imho, is the wait between the encounters. It should be a bit more fast paced. And Destiny’s Edge needs to get off their butts and do more once on the airships.

Legendaries are already a dime a dozen. TBH, the precursor is just a frustrating aspect of it, and it is no barrier to those who have money to spend – so it’s only those who are poor irl that suffer from not having precursor crafting.

The new legendaries will be rarer because you can’t just buy them (or the precursor).

Yumiko Ishida.3769:

You can always decide to move all the RPers in NA side to a low pop server that doesn’t ever do well on wvw if you don’t care about wvw at all. I was even considering transfering to one to make a new home for all of us.

Thing is that there are many RPers that enjoy WvW. This is part of why TC is a high WvW server.

But yeah, short of getting the RP community to all up and go, it’s not gonna happen nor is it really necessary with the megaserver. If you want to land in maps with a bunch of roleplayers, join in RP guilds and add a bunch of people from TC (particularly roleplayers) to your friends list.

Slowpokeking.8720:

I mean remove the previous encounters with the Risen mini bosses, Mouth and dragon champions because we already fought them in previous battles.

No thank you.

The Mouth is the best part of Arah story currently (and the fight is MUCH different than the first fight – either one). And the dragon champions are too rarely fought (aside from those three, only Blightghast and Tequatl).

The other champions from before the airship part are meant to serve as introductions to boss mechanics during the explorable mode, and in all honesty aren’t too hard they need nerf/removal. They’re unique enough challenges to remain, IMHO.

This topic again. Anet needs to fix that search engine of theirs.

• Zhaitan comes from dwarven legends/Scroll of the Five True God.
• Primordus comes from dwarven legends/Scroll of the Five True God.
• Jormag comes from dwarven legends/Scroll of the Five True God.
• Kralkatorrik comes from Glint/Scroll of the Five True God.
• Mordremoth comes from the Scroll of the Five True Gods.

Presumably, the jotun records also contain the names. Though why the deep sea dragon’s name is continuously missing is curious.

As for minion names:

• Destroyers destroy.
• Risen have risen from the dead.
• Icebrood are a brood made of ice.
• Branded are those branded by Kralkatorrik/the Dragonbrand.
• Mordrem are those that come from Mordremoth (lamest).

The later was were I made a joke once that because the Sclerite weapons look like something that could be the DSD’s corruption that the DSD’s name is Scleritefin just as Mordrem→Mordremoth.

Why we call them Mordrem? Dunno. I guess “sylvari” was too spoiler and “Blighted” (see here ) was too unimaginative?

Each race doesn’t have its own dragon nemesis. Not really. If it was “humans vs Zhaitan” then humans would have had a much bigger role in Orr. They didn’t.

-Who is responsible for Elder Dragons names, Mordremoths in particular?
Given that there’s no reason for dragon minions that never heard the Elder Dragons’ names before corruption (see: Orrian risen) to use names from the gods or ancient races, most likely the dragons themselves.

-What does the term Mordrem stand for besides being a minion of Mordremoth?
Mordrem: Being of Mordremoth. (read: comes from Mordremoth – “we come from the jungle dragon”)

Seems pretty simple the logic behind it. Now, the logic behind not using something else? That’s the question.

- Would you agree that every race has its own Elder Dragon nemesis? (Human vs Zhaitan, Sylvari vs Mordremoth, etc)

Nope. Otherwise humans got the short end of the stick, and sylvari got two dragons. Because Zhaitan was mostly about ze plants! And what wasn’t was about charr and, arguably, asura. Very little norn and human interference (and all norn interference we see resulted in risen norn!).

- If the former is true, will we receive a sixth race consisting of underwater dwellers once we take the fight to Bubbles? (Quaggan for Everyone!)

Largos.

Aaron Ansari.1604:

Or the Court (and wasn’t the name changed to Guards?)

According to Matthew Medina, it wasn’t so much “changed” but a bug that it said Court. There is no Mordrem Court (according to Matthew Medina).

Wrong forum. Ought to be in the Guild Wars 2 forum, as this is about mechanics not lore.

That said: I want to see the fight change, but just removing minions would make it worse. How do I know? They’ve done that already.

I’d also like to note that Shiro summoned Shiro’ken when he banishedp lacers; Abaddon had Torment Claws and Graven Monoliths, and the Great Destroyer summoned many destroyers. I also much preferred Hell’s Precipice (and Gate of Madness and Destruction’s Depths) over those three.

With Arah becoming a personal story step it is now the one and only personal story step that is of a proper length (imo) and is more than a mere 5 minute instance (well, arguably the Battle of Claw Island and Retribution are of good length, though there is a part in the former that’s too long and Blightghast is a bit too simple of a fight).

Zaklex.6308:

Donari.5237:

“Q: What new voice-over is going into the game?
A: We wanted to update some key lines for several characters in the Personal Story, including those of Trahearne, the Pale Tree, Tonn, and Apatia. In some cases, we are merely re-recording the existing lines to get a more appropriate delivery to match context. In other cases, we are rewriting character dialog to better fit a particular scene.”

Please say this includes the lionguard’s shout in the cinematic on Claw Island where we sink a bone ship and she cries out “A small victory, Gods, there are so many of them.” The VA clearly didn’t know the context and “A small victory” comes out triumphantly rather than full of horror. I think that’s the only line in all the PS that grates on me so harshly every time I hear it. It’s delivered with an entirely wrong emphasis for the situation.

Actually the Lion Guards shout is done correctly, it’s this way: we sink the bone ship and she cry’s out: “A small victory”…(all the other ships start to surface and she says, “Gods, there’s so many of them”. “A small victory” is a triumphant yell, if rather insignificant, followed by the horror of “Gods, there’s so many of them”. Exactly as it should be. it’s nuanced but it’s correctly done. Now, all of my characters waiting at Victory or Death will finally be able to complete the PS.

Dunno about you but every time I play through this, “Gods, there’s so many of them” shows up before the additional Bone Ships.

This happens a lot in certain cinematics, where things don’t really seem in order or properly timed. Any dialogue featuring one character cutting another off is often seen as character 1 saying an incomplete sentence, three seconds later character 2 starts their sentence that cuts off character 1.

One of the biggest gripes I have in regards to dialogue and story sequence/scripting is one of the norn chapter 3 story steps: Underground Scholar where the dialogue implies that you were present when the dredge show up, rather than showing up just behind the dredge (dialogue implies a situation of you show up, missing dialogue, dredge show up and you head out and then return to see Vyacheslav run away).

Truth be told, there’s a LOT that needs to be done throughout all of the Personal Story, not just the second half. And if amongst such improvements are means to allow the Personal Story to be repeatable… well… -coughs-

Loboling.5293:

Ok, well I just finished chapter 5 “A helping Hand”; the journal says my next mission is “The Battle for Claw Island”. Hopefully this will change to “Greatest Fear” when the update hits, if not. I’m one sad panda. I won’t start the battle for claw island, but I’m still nervous.

You haven’t reached the Greatest Fear part. You misread Bobby Stein’s listed story step The Battle of Fort Trinity for The Battle of Claw Island.

You have 3 story steps you can do before you hit the first “stop before” point – A Light in the Darkness.

BobbyStein.2315:

With this release, we are changing a few things about the final Personal Story step “Victory or Death.” For starters, the instance has been modified to support 1–5 players so you will no longer need a full party to complete it. We have converted the story mode of “The Ruined City of Arah” dungeon to be a Personal Story step, so after this update goes live, you may only play it once as part of your Personal Story. We are also unlocking the explorable mode of this dungeon by default so access will no longer be gated by story mode completion. We are also updating the Ruined City of Arah Dungeon Track to be unlocked by story mode or explorable mode completion. Additionally, the “Master of Arah” achievement is being updated to only require completion of explorable mode paths. Please note that the core gameplay and structure of this story instance has not been changed—the difficulty has been adjusted to allow for solo play and will therefore be more accessible for players.

Hmmm, interesting. Not sure I’d like the non-repeating part of it – I’d rather have all story modes scaled to 1-5 players and be repeatable, TBH. I am certainly disappointed that the core gameplay and structure remains unchanged. Was really hoping for an improved Zhaitan fight.

BobbyStein.2315:

The Personal Story was not designed to be replayable. Attempting to adjust a character’s story progress introduces a wide variety of bugs across various content and game systems. We investigated different solutions for partial and full story resets. In all cases, the changes led to unpredictable results in many different content types, including permanent blocking of story progress.

I wouldn’t mind some changes to the Personal Story if it meant being able to replace. E.g., rather than choosing one or the other story path you instead get them in differing orders (or now a certain order). I would suggest investigating such possibilities as well.

BobbyStein.2315:

While we haven’t set a release date at this time, we can confirm that you will have at least 8 weeks from the time of this posting to complete “The Source of Orr”

Two months? Marmelade.

Donari.5237:

All right, I’m trying to parse out which of my alts I need to advance and which I need to hold still until the revision. Of those not yet done completely with PS, I have these pending steps for my alts:

— Temple of the Forgotten God
— Further into Orr
— A Light in the Darkness
— Marching Orders
— Starving the Beast
— Ossuary of the Unquiet Dead

And one alt who is at level 70 PS but I don’t have noted which step.

Can anyone more savvy than me say which of these I should advance, and to which step, in order to get the most PS steps?

Don’t advance any except maybe the level 70 PS one (if you’re at Forging the Pact, don’t advance, if you are then advance to Temple of the Forgotten God).

Orpheal.8263:

A question that jumps my mind also first:

Has the Zhaitan Battle anyhow been improved within these works?
Can we ever expect to see there improvements in this very underwhelming battle to become a serious epic battle, that will become absolutely memorable???

Bobby Stein stated that there’s no core gameplay or mechanic changes for Arah story mode, so that would mean no changes to the Zhaitan fight. Unfortunately.

Mea.5491:

“Please note that the core gameplay and structure of this story instance has not been changed—the difficulty has been adjusted to allow for solo play and will therefore be more accessible for players.”

^ Does that mean I can solo the dungeon now but I cannot open that first gate alone? Or did they change the gate? (Right now it needs 2 people to step on the plates to open it).

It means they’re changing the gate and the scaling the mob difficulty to be on par to a story instance (which scales up and down based on number of players).

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

Malkavian.4516:

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

Thanks! Good to see Personal Story has been restored

You mean “being restored”

So.. Good to see personal story has being restored? :P

Ok all jokes aside, what is wrong with “has been restored”?

The change hasn’t come yet. That’s why it hasn’t been restored yet, but is being restored (soon™).

ignores the Scarlet abomination discussion

Mickey Frogeater.1470:

The Toxic Alliance would hold the Krait(who are Mordrem) & the Toxic Sylvari(which are just Nightmare Courtiers that use the Green glow instead of the more common orange glow by default) and serve as minions that attack from the waters of the Heart of Maguuma.

While the krait are definitely altered in mind and body we don’t have confirmation they’re Mordrem while the Toxic Courtiers are not. Both easily could be, just as much as neither. Though the ‘both’ is more likely.

Mickey Frogeater.1470:

The Molten Alliance which consist of Flame Legion Charr(with Dredge armor and Fire infusion from drawing on the power of Primordus’s Destroyers) and Destroyer Fire infused Dredge would give Mordremoth Fire magics from Primordus to his control(explaining the fire Mordrem controlling the fire breathing Wyverns in the Heart of Thorns trailor).

Flame Legion fire magic is not confirmed to be powered by Primordus – nor is that of the Molten Alliance (as their fire magic comes from the Flame Legion). Though there are hints here and there, it isn’t proven nor absolute. Fiery mordrem-related plants are nothing new. The Molten Alliance also weren’t altered like the toxic krait were.

Mickey Frogeater.1470:

The Aetherblades would give Mordremoth the means to attack from the Mists.

And why would he care? Jormag is the only Elder Dragon shown to care for the Mists. Aetherblades also have no reason to work for Mordremoth, given that they weren’t altered like the toxic krait were.

Mickey Frogeater.1470:

The Twisted Watchworks could serve as additional aid to Mordremoth’s cause along with the Steam Creatures.

Presuming that he can even control them; the steam creatures are now automatons – e.g., self-controlling – and the twisted watchwork haven’t been seen since Scarlet’s downfall indicating the lack of their continued existence.

Mickey Frogeater.1470:

The Nightmare Court would serve as his main group of tactitions.

Presuming, of course, he can control them.

Mickey Frogeater.1470:

In the end Mordremoth would control Plants(Mordrem), Nightmares(Nightmare Court), Poison(Toxic Alliance), Fire(Molten Alliance), Air(Aetherblades), Steam(Steam Creatures) and Machines(Twisted Watchworks).

Nightmare Court, despite their name, is unrelated to actual nightmares of either the dream variety or the demonic variety.

Mordremoth already has control over toxins, as we can see in the Silverwastes via Vine Crawlers. And if the Toxic Alliance are already influenced by Mordrem, then he gains little but the krait’s magical knowledge.

And the steam creatures are only steam-powered. They don’t control steam in the least. It’d be like saying you have control over charcoal just because you run a furnace.

Don’t forget the scriptures of Balthazar from GW1:

For weeks did the battle rage on, and those who had taken up the mantle of war grew weary and their courage began to falter.

Then did Balthazar, god of war and fire, appear to the soldiers, carrying with him a grand sword that did glow with such brilliance it blinded any who looked upon it. When he spoke, His voice was like thunder, and it shook the ground with force.

Then saith He, “Lift up thy weapons. For you are my soldiers, and must you be steadfast, strong, and brave of heart. They who neither hesitate nor stumble shall be rewarded. Then shall you have glory. Then shall your deeds be remembered for eternity.”

And then did release from His sword a hundred thousand flames, which encircled the soldiers. For this was the fire of courage, and forthwith did they follow the god into battle without fear or hesitation. Thence was the enemy struck down.

pdavis.8031:

All the information we have on the gods is from random NPCs and scrolls. Thats pretty much how in-game lore works. If the NPCs in-game are saying, you find some books/scrolls in-game saying in, than you can pretty much rest assured that what they are saying is accurate.

That’s the case for just about every other MMO out there, but not so for Guild Wars. If it is said, then it is second-hand information – the person can be lying or simply not knowing the truth themselves.

However, there are nearly a dozen references to Balthazar being the god of war and fire. But like the other gods, the element seems to be a secondary thing – like all other titles (for Balthazar, this includes things from courage and honor to mass murder depending on perspective).

Thruln the Lost is intended to be an in-your-face example of how NPCs can be wrong. He is contradicted by dozens of other statements, including jotun ghosts, leading the things not contradicted to be called into question. In reality, this is true for anything we do not witness ourselves. This is a tool that Anet uses to retcon-without-retconning. Something that has been done a lot to religiously-historic lore presented in GW1.

Mickey Frogeater.1470:

Dwayna’s snowmen soldiers might explain Grenth’s ties to Ice when Dhuum did not have such ties due to the fact that she was Grenth’s mother.

Dhuum is Shadow and Death(like Zhaitan) while Grenth is Ice and Death.

Dhuum is never tied to anything but death, actually.

Dwayna has ties to Snowmen, yes, but this tie is not out of what the snowmen are made out of (snow and ice) but instead how they’re made: through joy in a time of bleak weariness (winter).

Though it is uncommon, Grenth is also tied to darkness and destruction. All gods have a multitude of facades and connections, not just the two. Dhuum is the only one whom we’ve seen with just the one – but this is more likely due to a lack of knowledge than anything else, as even Abaddon we have seen a multitude of facets (secrets, wisdom, water, the abysmal depths, etc. etc.).

Random race day. All PCs and NPCs of the player races are randomly generated into equivalents of any of the five race, changed on spawn/map load.

Caen.1827:

I just hope basic quality control/project implementation collapses like this are the exception, rather than the norm.

Personal opinion, but it’s the norm in regards to the September 9th update that caused this problem, and the Living World – the former because it was just a disaster update for ~80% of the stuff IMHO where I don’t know what Anet was thinking, the latter because the Living World has bee pure experimentation for them, which results in some things being great, and a lot being not so great. Sadly, I feel that it is the storytelling that gets the short end of the stick.

We know outright we will have 63 new achievements for the original precursors. And that’s ignoring the new precursors and new legendaries.

There’s achievements tied to the story in both LW and Personal Story, so it only makes sense such in HoT gets achievements.

There’s achievements for nearly every jumping puzzle and mini-dungeons, and I’m pretty sure jumping puzzles have already been confirmed for HoT, so achievements for them will make sense.

As far as we have seen, maybe.

People can come back from the dead, but no one has done so while in the Mists, and all but one success and two attempts required one’s original body. That one success exclusion would be Shiro Tagachi (the two failures would be Mad King Thorn and Gaheron Baelfire), but such was not in the Mists though there is no reason why what Shiro did could not also be done in the Mists. But normal resurrection hasn’t worked since around gw1’s time for reasons unknown.

LadyRhonwyn.2501:

I finished my PS last weekend, just to see how it worked out withe the new order. And to be honest, I preferred the new order… The only thing that bothered me was some lines of various NPC’s that should be changed as they refer to elements that still need to be done. But with the new order, you try to cleanse Orr first and then start the journey to clean up the rest (aka Zhaitan).

But, I would have liked it better if you killed Zhaitan first, and then ckeanse Orr by giving it that life injection. The cutscene of that story part is just awesome, but a bit wasted in its current position in the story order…

So you preferred being airdropped across Orr – across dragon filled skies instead of being able to go to the location on foot. Because it makes more sense to have dragon filled skies be the main course for how you get places.

You prefer being able to go through a risen stronghold via airdrop to an underground cave system, just to later – if you chose the Durmand Priory’s plan – destroy that risen stronghold which was giving the Pact a tough time in the entire area, which includes blocking off the passages beyond the fort (note, the fort in question is the Temple of Melandru).

You prefer trying to remove corruption long before everything that could prevent the removal of corruption is dead; the reason why removing the land’s corruption was last before Zhaitan was because Zhaitan could re-corrupt it, but it was done before Zhaitan because it also weakened him significantly (something a lot of people miss – even before the reordering – was that killing the Mouth, crippling the incoming of corpses/creation of risen, taking the temples, and cleansing the land is what allowed us to even stand a chance against Zhaitan; people also missed that these were all things that Zhaitan could repair given time, as we see him with a new Mouth of Zhaitan in the Arah story dungeon – a stronger one, at that).

TBH, if you paid attention across all the fine points, the current story order makes zero sense, even if the dialogue and the Source of Orr’s NPCs got tweaked. They’re small issues, sure, but when you have a dozen small issues… it becomes a big issue.

So I’m going to respectfully disagree that the new order works besides dialogue.

People tend to forget that the charr were NOT the original settlers of Ascalon.

It’s a little obscure piece of lore, but charr conquered Ascalon twice. Once before humanity arrived, and once after. The original inhabitants of Ascalon is implied to have been the dwarves – and the grawl.

Relevant links:

• Lore on Kathandrax Steelsoul, a dwarf who fought back the charr in what’s now called the Blood Legion Homelands, he was buried where he died in an elaborate catacombs.
• There’s a line here indicating the charr’s general direction of invasion that ended with Ascalon: north, west, then south. It’s the second paragraph.
• Source that the charr enslaved the grawl when they conquered Ascalon the first time.

Having conquered a land once, enslaving the local primitive people there, and being pushed back does not justify nearly destroying the ecosystem in order to take it back from another set of invaders (the ones who pushed them back).

There’s obviously the assaults on Kryta and Orr – the intent to cause a Searing in Orr even – and the enslavement. But the OP’s argument of “it was their land first” doesn’t even fly even ignoring everything else.

Charr are hardly “the good guys” – which is why I like playing them, because they’re not good per se, but they’re not evil either. If using the old D&D alignment, most of the race would probably fall under true neutral. But Anet has troubles with storytelling, especially in GW2, in regards of depicting good and evil forces as anything but the extreme of those concepts (that would still make the game rated T at least).

Bunnikk.2146:

BobbyStein.2315:

Bunnikk.2146:

Thank you, Anet. I will happily spread the word to everyone I know that the story will be playable again.

I just want to be clear that we haven’t announced a release date for the Personal Story Restoration content yet. We’re posting information on Tuesday.

Thanks for the clarification; I got too excited. I will hold off and continue to wait as patiently as possible.

You can still let folks know that a fix is coming but without an ETA still, and that there’s information on said fix coming on Tuesday.

She resumes after you leave the jail, actually. Before you encounter the first cat golem.

Knighthonor.4061:

If that’s compared to dry top, doesn’t that mean the zone is pretty small? And didn’t they say the expansion only has 3 zones?

Three layers (“biomes”) to a zone.

So if the bird’s eye view of the map is the size of Dry Top, that should mean – hopefully, that it is three times the size of Dry Top (more or less).

The biomes are most likely comparable to The Grove, Rata Sum or The Silverwastes (with it’s jumping puzzle). The Silverwastes was even stated to be a test for the new maps, alongside Dry Top. So the three layers won’t cover the entire zone, more than likely, but a good portion of it. So I guess most likely each zone will be 2-2.5 times the size of its bird’s eye view.

A note on WoodenPotatoes’ videos: He loves to state theory and speculation as if it were fact, and misses some painfully obvious details quite a lot. He also has a tendency to use others’ theories thus leaving people watching his videos to think the credit is his alone. So while a decent introduction, he’s far from credible.

And it is stated that the Arcane Eye has quite a few secret facilities spread in remote areas, to stay form prying eyes. There’s another one in Gendarran Fields, part of the asura PS that choose Vigil.

The Stone Summit were exiled to the Far Shiverpeaks after their loss in the war in 1072 – largely caused by the players killing Dagnar and then destroying the Iron Forgeman. So the Stone Summit’s presence in the Far Shiverpeaks wasn’t even 6 years old – and Kilroy (amongst other Deldrimor dwarves) only went north to hassle the Stone Summit individuals (I believe those related to the Sepulcher of Dragrimmar was amongst them). Jalis’s camp was only established because Olaf sent him a message, though Olad stated that he knew Jalis personally so there had to have been contact between Jalis and norn before, whether this was up north or down south is anyone’s guess however. Nothing says the ruins are of dwarven make, though we see similar pillars in Sorrow’s Furnace which is likely where such a connection is made (however, said ruins are seen across the depths and Sorrow’s Furnace is as much an excavation of ancient ruins as it is a dwarven underground fortress).

Well, Kralkatorrik bleeds and has flesh. We know this from GW1 and Edge of Destiny anti-respectively. Primordus in GW1 – particularly the Ogden’s Benediction cinematic – seems like he’s flesh too. Jormag’s tooth look like bone.

So I’d say that the Elder Dragons are physical living beings at this point, made of flesh and blood.

Well I never said confirmed. I said heavily implied. Which, in my opinion, it is.

Andred.1087:

hrasna.3017:

I’d like to hear the return of the GW1 themes!

I have the entire GW1 soundtrack, and it’s just so memorable

-Chris

Doubt that will ever happen. Surely the agreement that ANet had with the original composers over the GW1 music does not include using it in GW2, and securing such an arrangement would entail quite a bit of legal work, I would imagine.

They already use some tracks in GW1. For example, the GW1 halloween music is heard in some of the haunted areas of Ascalon.

It’d probably be easier to make your own compilation of GW1 and GW2 music though and place it into the music folder.

Treks are actually very useful for a small guild as they don’t require many people and are easy to do. They don’t need to be part of your weekly guild missions, obviously, since they don’t reward individual rewards – including commendations – but if you’re a small guild then they’re useful for building influence, which will let you get to other guild missions (such as rush) and higher tiers easier.

Shame that they don’t use a certain fractal instability as inspiration for how most champions respond to crowd control skills.

Unique world bosses having things like defiant or the break bar works fine. They’re world bosses, after all. But the standard champion should simply have resistance – not immunity – to CC, IMHO.

I leave that up to your interpretation. I bolded the main line in my opinion.

@Witcher: Ascalonian ruins actually only exist in Ascalon and the Mists – which could very easily be replicating Ascalonian ruins. I cannot think of a single place in Tyria that is outside Ascalon with those sets of ruins. The only possibility I can think of would be Fort Koga.

As for what’s happening there? Best guess I would say is that Dhuum is trying to ascend into godhood. Yup, Archdiviner = Dhuum and colossus = Dhuum’s predecessor. That’s my theory. Why? Well, the Archdiviner is downright necromantic – wells, minions, etc. If necromancers had hammers and were OP, the archdiviner is how I’d picture them. The archdiviner also has the same base setup in clothing as Dhuum (hood, skulls on weapons, using minions). And for why I think the colossus is a god? Aside from Prometheus – a story of gods and gods’ predecessors – being the inspiration for the fractal, it’s the shine to the body. Gods are stated to be glowing and bright to look at, and while not blinding the colossus is curiously shiny. What’s most curious to me, however, is that when you kill the Archdiviner, he sinks into the ground with nature’s growth surrounding him (Healing Springs animation) while he’s grasping at his throat as if he is in immense pain – as if his actions there kitten ed him to the vengeance of another being… namely, I would say, Melandru. A goddess who pushed for peace would certainly want to punish a man who’s acted in violence and torture of others with a weapon that would punish others but not himself if used (another thing similar to Dhuum – Dhuum laid out rules that others cannot do, but broke the rules himself by all appearances). Another similarity is that deaths charged the hammer – and deaths in the Underworld made Dhuum more powerful. And while never said to have had a predecessor, Dhuum is curiously absent from the list of gods who traveled to Tyria. Grenth may be called the first Tyria-born god, but I wonder if that’s true or just forgotten… And even then, maybe this is so early that it was still the generation of humans that came into Tyria.

I’m probably a bit incoherent but that’s my theory, more or less, on Cliffside.

I don’t really have anything for Uncategorized or Swamp. Underground (aka dredge) I think is far too ambiguous to tell, and at that I can’t see it being of great importance; best we can figure is that it is post-GW1.

@Buddhakeks: When asked what the fractal was about and that people have noted things both Ascalonian and Elonian in style (imo, the fauna looks very much like Istan, as do the villager clothing and the presence of krait wouldn’t be found in Ascalon) and the devs response was basically that the fractals can sometimes mix times and places so Aquatic Ruins “could be” Ascalonian and Elonian – they didn’t really confirm it is a mix of those two, but they said it’s possible.

@Pixelpumpkin: Well….

Volcanic Fractal appears to be depicting the results of Primordus corrupting living and basically pulling a Jormag (intentinoally or not). First off, the Imbued Shaman holds a Destroyer Bow, which itself is a pretty decent hint; the Vampire Bats are oddly fiery as well, and there’s the “infused” stones that are on fire – infused with what? As a recent bonus: the model for the infused stones has been reused for the Heart of the Destroyer object at Mount Maelstrom for Mawdrey creation. And then finally there’s the final boss arena, being very similar to the arena of fighting the Great Destroyer – the boss causes lava to rise in what was cooled rock. But what convinces me that the fractal is basically showing a “what if” scenario of Primordus corrupting living beings was that in an interview Jeff, Ree, and Scott were asked if Volcanic Fractal related to Primordus, and while they dodged that question they talked about Primordus corrupting living beings, confirming such is possible and describing the process. Said process is that of encasing the being in stone and liquifying the body over time – “similar to icebrood”. Those who do the fractal frequently enough will know that the shaman encases himself in a bubble of stone before jumping into the pit of lava.

I believe that Snowblind Fractal takes place sometime between 1165 and 1169 AE. Reason why I think this is threefold: 1) The only icebrood we see are icebrood wolves, and we see some land corruption; but there isn’t a single icebrood norn, and the blizzard uses ice elementals rather than icebrood elementals. 2) When Jormag awoke, he caused a 4-year long blizzard before heading south; he awoke near the northern shores (far enough to seek out and capsize and divide the kodan sanctuaries but close enough to have caused an inland sea), so his influence during this blizzard would likely be minimal. 3) The boss’s name: Lornarr Dragon_seeker_. He’s seeking Jormag, thus Jormag hadn’t been found yet, but they know that Jormag’s a dragon so it likely rose. Thus, the norn had felt his influence, but not his personal wrath. So during the four year blizzard is most likely when the fractal happens.

Cliffside Fractal is a big speculation mode piece, as the only real hint we have is “it’s of humanity’s earliest times”. I would place it’s location around Sunrise Crest’s dual continent – the reason being is twofold: 1) While humanity was brought to the world at Arah by Dwayna, they had to return to the continent several centuries later via boat, so they were taken elsewhere; the question becomes where is that elsewhere? 2) We know that elsewhere wasn’t Cantha, as humanity also arrived, seemingly by boat, on Cantha from somewhere else. Going off of the map in the Durmand Priory, there are trade routes marked – one trade route goes from the Battle Isles to Sunrise Crest. I suspect Sunrise Crest is where humanity’s “first Tyrian civilization” lies. And thus, the location of the Fractal. There’s also a lot of obvious Canthan nods there – the rune on the seals, the apparent assassins and ritualists which are the novices and chanters respectively, and the spectral minions of the archdiviner. But while very Canthan… they also lack that Canthan feel to me. So I think this is proto-Canthan, which is known to be very Canthan as well – via Chong one of the oldest humans.

Louveepine.7630:

I always thought that the Asuras have xenophobic tendencies when it comes to share their knowledge.

Less xenophobic and more paranoid. Asura don’t like sharing their discoveries in general, including to other asura – and this was more so before they were forced to the surface (which resulted in a LOT of lost knowledge, which in turn was the original motivation for the creation of the Inquest). Nowadays, anything learned, discovered, or made before graduating from a college is considered the college’s property (and thus Rata Sum’s property and the Arcane Council’s property), similar to what we saw between Taimi and Phlunt (what’s uncommon is taking credit for it, which Phlunt also tried but other people are too smart to know he didn’t make it – according to Zojja and per her he can’t even reverse engineer the device). So all designs, experiments, discoveries etc. from before college graduation since Rata Sum is stored in the Rata Sum archives (which is part of the second chapter for the asura personal story).

But as Aaron said, Scarlet was the first and only stated case of a non-asura studying at a college – let alone three – and was a major source of the disdain some players have towards her (that, and her other lore breaking actions like uniting an enslaving xenophobic race/group with a anti-slavery race/group – twice – via bullying and ‘silver-tongued trickery’ of “well the other group already agreed to it!”).

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

I don’t think Scarlet, who we all know is a mary sue, is a good example. I mean she succesfully managed to become an expert in every field in just a few years. Yeah right..

It would be like someone in our society studying at 10 universities at once and majoring in all the courses they have to offer in just a few years. Unless you’re an android or god that isn’t happening.

Thankfully a later retcon came about to “clarify” that she only took crash courses at each university. Which would hardly make someone an expert – she was just “knowledgeable enough” (which apparently is very knowledgeable even if you take out the ‘expert’ part – which is still very mary sue-y).