Guild Wars 2

Your main problem is that the Historical Monument of Surmia’s date is not when the Second Guild War ended, but when Surmia was founded, and the monument and city were dedicated to the soldiers who died during the Second Guild War. Meaning that the Second Guild War was over before 1020 AE.

The manual are referring to the Third Guild War, without a doubt. The Factions manual definitely has a typo in it there, because we knew in GW1 by said Historical Monument of Surmia that the second Guild War was over before 1020 AE and that from the History of Tyria in the Prophecies manual that the Guild Wars each lasted for decades (and we knew that the Third Guild War ended in 1070 AE with the events of the Searing, etc.). Furthermore, the History of Tyria also says that the First Guild War began only roughly a century after the Exodus of the Gods – not over a millennia after.

Over the next hundred years, the human kingdoms prospered. Powerful groups grew up within each nation. These were known as guilds. It was these groups, these guilds, that held the real power in Tyria. Though there were kings and organizations that made the laws and regulated the land, it was the guilds that enforced these laws—or didn’t—as they saw fit. As these guilds grew, their influence began to overlap.

As is ever the case with peace, it once again came to an end when the volcano erupted, spitting out the five stones and scattering them across Tyria. The magic they embodied seeped out into the lands around them. Though the Bloodstones, as they are called, have never been reunited, the power that they possess was enough to re-ignite the desire for power in the hearts of men.

The struggle for power commenced, and again war broke out. This time, though, the humans were not united. The guilds of the three most-influential kingdoms on the continent battled each other for supremacy. The kings of Ascalon, Kryta, and Orr were not powerful enough to stop the conflict, for the armies of the guilds were even more powerful than those of their own home nations.

https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/History_of_Tyria

Peace only lasted about a century after the Exodus, so that’s roughly when the First Guild War began – whether formally or informally is the question.

Spoilers: Menzies died a long, long time ago, and Balthazar pretended Menzies was alive to keep an ongoing war – even before GW1. This is why we never saw hide nor hair of Menzies, and why Admiral Saidon the Eternal talks about eternal conflict in the Fissure of Woe, and why he never aided against the war against the Shadow Army. Saidon knew the truth. Why else put an otherwise completely pointless NPC in the Fissure of Woe – we know that even in Prophecies ArenaNet was seeding small one-liners about future intended plots if the first game was a success (from Cantha and Elona to Joko and Turai and more). Menzies was even the only one of the three “prime evils” to be free – why wait so long to assist Abaddon and Dhuum? And why would the Fissure of Woe be in eternal conflict if Menzies can be killed – except he can’t because the conflict is caused by none other than Balthazar against himself.

Further, Balthazar aided Abaddon and Dhuum, unbenownst to the other five gods, because that would incite a divine war in the Mists which is better for him than his false war with himself. He even pushed Abaddon to his fall – and we would have learned this years ago if Evon had won. This is why Evon wanted to show people the truth of Abaddon’s fall – he had suspicions about the god of mass murder enticing divine conflict, but needed proof. He told Rytlock at some point, and Rytlock investigated when he was in the Mists. He found the truth out, pointed it out to the other gods, and bam, fallen Balthazar.

You’re asking ArenaNet to fix what is literally an unsynced randomized situation?

There are three locations in Verdant Brink (not TD as you constantly mention) where the Bloodstone Crazed Wyvern could spawn – four if you count the other side of the cliffs but that’s still affected by the Itzel meta event. And that’s just in that map.

In truth, part of the fault lies on you for farming where a meta event occurs while not paying attention to the progress of the meta event. There’s a canopy area that is easily reachable from the Pale Reaver ruins which is not near any event at all that has plenty of Wyvern Hatchlings (the easiest to kill wyverns) that you could have farmed, as one example.

Without changing the wyvern spawns to something else entirely – either by removing wyverns from the wyvern cliffs or by swapping the bloodstone crazed wyvern for, say, a bloodstone crazed beetle, this potential for overlap is literally impossible to fix due to the randomized nature of the spawning system.

LinseyMurdock.4165:

We have already headed down the road of including them, we aren’t going to stop now.

Yes these are niche items, used for one thing. The reason why I still think they are valid to go into storage, is because they are part of long tail rewards where you might have a stack of them sitting around for a long time before using them. There are a few other things like this that we have chosen to include.

LinseyMurdock.4165:

Things to think about a bit more:
• Miyani Items. A lot of folks have rightly pointed out that all of Miyani’s items should go into storage. I haven’t made a final determination on this yet, but it’s likely that we will cut at least some of these from the list.
-snip-
• Badges of Tribute. We said no to these largely because of how you get them and use them. They are bought from a vendor and can be immediately consumed by crafting low-ish cost items with them. I will check in with the WvW team to see if they disagree with that sentiment.
• Mystic Runestone. If I am going to put in Icy Runestone, I should probably put in this one as well.

I really don’t think you should include all of Miyani’s items. Eldritch Scrolls and especially Bloodstone Shards are so little use and with the sole source being Miyani that the only reason you’d have them cluttering your inventory is if you miscalculated how many you’d need when making multiple exotics/legendaries at once (and how often do you do that?) or because you chose to let it clutter your inventory.

The same, in fact, goes towards the new legendary items that have been getting put into the storage (and “we’ve begun doing such so we’re not going to stop now” is a horribly terrible excuse to keep doing something – if you start doing heroine, are you going to keep doing heroine solely because you started? In the end, it’s harmful and unnecessary). It might be for a long term goal like you said, but you actively chose when to get them. They’re not drops. So the only time they’re cluttering the inventory is when you chose to let them clutter your inventory.

Same also goes for Badges of Tribute and Mystic Runestones.

And regarding Mystic Runestones – unlike Icy Runestones, Mystic Runestones have one purpose: generation 2 legendary weapons. Icy Runestones are used for four ascended backpieces, the Offerings of Koda, a guild upgrade, and a scribing recipe – things in which you may need to or want to save up on. Though truth be told… why did we even need Mystic Runestones? They’re fully identical except easier acquisition due to vendor(s) placement.

LinseyMurdock.4165:

• Marks, Talismans, Seals, Medallions, and Crests. I have almost zero desire to put all 25 into storage, but I will rethink Crests specifically because of their inclusion in Amalgamated Gemstone crafting.

If you’re going to include all gemstones and all doubloons, you might as well include all marks, talismans, seals, etc.

The only difference between the three is that you can only upgrade gemstones. The solution to this is obvious – give marks, talismans, etc. upgrading recipes in jewelery (as, IMO, they should have gotten from the beginning).

He looks like Rytlock. He acts like Rytlock. He talks like Rytlock. He doesn’t have magic matching any god.

So he’s probably Rytlock.

Don’t think that because he learned new magic and won’t talk about it that he’s an impostor. Rytlock has been ArenaNet’s tool of “later, cub” since release. Ever tried to ask him about Sohothin? You can as a charr. His response: “Irrelevant.” Ever tried asking him about his time in DE, as a charr? His response: “Irrelevant.” Ever tried asking about his and Rox’s relation? His response: “Irrelevant.”

I don’t get why people like him so much. He’s the most bland character because he’s blocked behind a generic “mysterious everything” without even a minute budge towards learning anything that wasn’t presented in Edge of Destiny. And yes, we know more about Rytlock from a poorly written outsourced novel released before the game than we do from nearly five years of the game.

Unfortunately, ArenaNet is very much into not giving us specific cultural practices unless it serves a story plot purpose. And this ranges from the more curious things – like how
(or if) charr, norn, and asura told time / dates before assimilating to the human-centric Mouvelian calendar, to the more mundane like courtships or religious practices (what we know there is only because “’tis for the plot”).

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

ArenaNet tried the whole “living world” thing to the best of their ability. That was Season 1. People hated it, so they went a different route, but they kept the name. Simple as that.

People didn’t hate it; it wasn’t as simple as that.

Nearly everyone loved the immediacy and everyone loved the sheer amount of updates. Some people hated missing an update and more than a few hated the idea that they (or someone else) might miss an update. People loved new stuff, but some hated missing out on old stuff.

Heck, some people never accept any changes to the game, which is why we have constant calls for a return to the old Lion’s Arch, to bring back dungeons (which never left), and some people insist on a Holy Trinity.

Regardless of our own preferences, ANet had a rough time of it during Season 1. It was difficult to implement, it kept developers working at their peak nearly all the time (which is non-sustainable), and the infrastructure wasn’t really ready to handle it.

And I think everyone can agree that no game can be successful enough to discard content at nearly the same rate that it adds content.

So, no, it’s not a simple story: some loved it, some hated it, some would want to see something like Season 1 again. It was a great idea, a rough implementation, a tough sell for many people, and a lot more work for ANet that what we have now. ANet changed direction because, for less effort, they could keep delivering enough content to keep most of us happy enough most of the time.

You forgot to mention that people hated feeling like they had to rush the content and the achievements because they could disappear in 2 or 4 weeks.

But honestly, when you’re talking about a system that gave fast paced, temporary content, and you say people hate that it was fast paced, and they hate that it was temporary, that’s the same as saying they hated the system.

I’m not saying they hated the content of Season 1 (though there were a handful of complaints – mainly regarding the bugs, which resulted in not enough proper testing), just that folks hated the implementation – the delivery – of it. Which, quite honestly, they did, and you even say so yourself (while saying they didn’t…).

FrizzFreston.5290:

But yeah, you can’t just discard the criticism because my suggestion is bad.

Eh, wasn’t saying to. I’m no fan of the current set up. Was just regurgitating their excus-explanation for how they do things (and then adding technical stuff they didn’t go into) when asked before.

But still their “claim of killing their gods” is not meant to be literal.

Very little, if ever, do you ever hear a charr say “we killed the titans that the Flame Legion worshiped”. They say “with engines of destruction, we have killed our gods.”. This is a metaphor, through and through, because it would still be another 50 years minimum before they had any machine from the charr’s revolution and no amount of propaganda changes that well known fact.

All that’s being said, effectively, is that the charr “killed” their desire, need, and want of religions (or gods).

ArenaNet tried the whole “living world” thing to the best of their ability. That was Season 1. People hated it, so they went a different route, but they kept the name. Simple as that.

Don’t expect a true “living world” from a game ever, in all honesty, especially a MMO. It’s just too much work. From the actual content to ensuring bugs don’t mess everything up.

@FrizzFreston: The problem with trying to do that is that you’re either adding exponentially more work as you set up dialogues to be client based (and character based), so as to avoid spoiling new players, or you spoil new players to content they’ve not come close to.

Their choice was to do neither, so as to avoid spoiling new players and because they do not have the manpower to alter hundreds of thousands of dialogues on a bimonthly basis. And in the end, except for where Current Events come in and alter only part of a map (like Season 1 and some of Season 2 did), they treat each map as being “stuck in time”. So The Grove is set in 1325 AE, while the revelation of sylvari origins is in 1328 AE.

Excluding the obvious like Caudecus was high ranked WM… Post-initial release content related:

• Toxic Alliance were made by Scarlet (for the 2 weeks we didn’t know it was even placed down as bets between “nah, Anet wouldn’t pull the same thing twice like with the Molten Alliance” and “Anet makes Scarlet a one-note song”)
• Exalted were tied to Forgotten (before knowing they were called Exalted; everyone else thought they were mursaat, hah!)
• Caithe wasn’t evil when stealing the egg

But I’ve been wrong a lot too, given there’s been a lot of contradictions going on in the plot since S1.

The idea of “giving all races all racial skills” is rather silly to me. It would mean giving charr, etc. a norn wereform, after all.

Amaimon.7823:

good suggestion, and I can see it work for most cases..
but what about the Norn spirits. You can make golem suits, or maybe elemental bodies.. but.. I can’t think of enough to make it work for all races, maybe sylvari can have plantoid exoskeletons

Norn would definitely be the hardest to fit. My best idea would be to merge the three “Become the <spirit>” skills into one that is determined by your biography option, with the skills being the same across all four forms just the appearance being different. I think that’s the best method, there are alternatives (like making more elites for the other races so every race has 4 transformation elites, or turning some of the norn elites into aura skills like the Grenth human racial skill).

Then add a couple more elites to norn to replace the removed ones (1 pet summon and 1 AoE). Move Battle Roar for charr and Pain Inverter for asura to heal skill, make all heals, utilities, and elites function the same, then boost the skills to be on par to profession skills.

Bonus work would be to add a specialization line that boosts the racial skills, but not sure if such is really needed after the above work.

Alternatively, just give a general boost to racial skills’ numbers so that they’re more viable, don’t worry about them being better options than each other, disable them in PvP, fractals, and raids and be done with it. Those are the only game formats where it would matter to the point of “needing to be x race with y profession to be good”.

videoboy.4162:

The book that takes place right before the game makes it pretty clear she loves him too. I don’t think Anet is retconning that, I just think there’s a reason she’s acting like she doesn’t love him that hasn’t been revealed yet.

Minister Estelle: This hamstrung doormat is your only hope, and I’m about to kill him just to put him out of his lovesick misery!
Minister: Estelle!
Minister Estelle: What? The whole Ministry knew it!

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/A_Meeting_of_Ministers#At_The_Upper_City

PC: How is Captain Thackeray?
Lady-in-Waiting: As strong willed and hardheaded as ever, although he seems to have outgrown his puppy-dog affection for the queen. That look didn’t suit him anyway.
PC: I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.
Lady-in-Waiting: Come now, darling. Everyone knew it. And besides, Logan is so last year. Even the cutest kitten can grow into old tomcats, if you know what I mean.

PC: After the incident with Estelle, I meant to ask you about Logan…
Jennah: Captain Thackeray has provided unwavering, invaluable service to the crown. I expect he will continue to do so, especially given the current situation with Caudecus.
PC: Apologies if I’ve given offense, Your Majesty.
Jennah: That’s not necessary. I hear the whispers, and I see with my own eyes. Logan is…a loyal servant, and a friend. I think he’s coming to terms with that. At last.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Regrouping_with_the_Queen

They made it painfully clear that the “only person” who didn’t realize the queen held no feelings for Logan was Logan. They played the “love is blind” card to its finest tune here, repeatedly. As if they wanted to make sure they drove the point of “Jennah doesn’t love Logan” home as deep as physically possible.

That smells blatant, obvious, and ignorant-of-own-work retcon.

Technically Gaheron’s been attempting rise to godhood for a while. We don’t actually know how long he had that “godform” of his, either. He’s no god, but he’s been pretending to be a god before the personal story as well (you can even find an NPC in the Black Citadel’s Trading Post room calling himself “Godslayer” or something because he aspires to kill Gaheron who calls himself a god).

Linken.6345:

if you dont own episode 1 or 2 you cant unlock it mate.

Seems you only own episode 5 the current released one.

It should also be noted that it’s not needed to complete any of the story besides those two (though it does make various fights, such as against Jade Constructs or Caudecus much, much easier).

Ashantara.8731:

Alga.6498:

So what happens now? Their everlasting love has ended

There never was a romantic love on Jennah’s end. It was unrequited love on Logan’s end, but he’s finally come to his senses.

That’s incorrect – and Episode 4’s show that Jennah never had feelings for Logan is just a blatant retcon. Jennah outright states in chapter 3 of the personal story (the instance you kill Kellach – regardless of which Order you join) that she does indeed love Logan.

Before killing Kellach:

PC: Captain Thackeray is very worried about you, Your Majesty.
Jennah: Logan? He mustn’t worry…please, tell him I’II be fine. If he is distracted, and gets hurt, I don’t know what I would do.
PC: If I may be so bold, ma’am, the two of you seem to care about one another very much.
Jennah: He is like an angel sent from Dwayna to be at my side. If things were different, or if Kryta were at peace. then perhaps…

After killing Kellach:

PC: You know that you could stop him, right? One word from you, and he’d stay.
Jennah: No, Advocate. I have enough servants—I want a partner. Logan must be free to make his own decisions. I made such a mistake once before. I won’t make it again.

That dialogue very clearly shows that Jennah does indeed have feelings for Logan. But the main reason she doesn’t act on those feelings is because 1) she wants an equal not a servant, and Logan places himself as the latter, and 2) because the political turmoil (most likely Caudecus) would use her relationship to Logan against her.

If Anet wants to fix what seems to be a blatant retcon, the next time we’re presented with Jennah it’ll be that she pretended such in order to get Logan to act for himself at long last (she’s been trying to do this since we first meet her in the PS after all, and Caudecus Manor story dungeon has her almost succeeding), and the next time those two reunite it’ll be flirting left and right, since the largest political issue (Caudecus undermining Jennah) is no more.

Did you unlock skills on that character prior to the skill point/hero point change in June 2015? When they made the change, they made it so that you kept all unlocked skills and traits beforehand, but if you didn’t have the hero points you effectively went “negative” while the UI only showed 0. You wouldn’t start gaining new hero points until after completing enough challenges to equal out the cost of the skills and traits already unlocked. If you’re a returning player, this may be your issue.

Alternatively, many hero challenge fights can be repeated, so just because you can re-initiate the challenge doesn’t mean you’ve not done it before.

What if racial skills were the same between races, except for aesthetics? Like the HoM pet skins.

Give every race the same number of racial skills, that do the same thing, but with different names and animations. Thus, for example, the sylvari Summon Sylvan Hound, human Hounds of Balthazar, asuran Summon 7-Series Golem, charr Warband Support, and a new norn racial skill (since they have no elite summon racial skill) all summon an NPC that has the same exact stats and skills, but different names and appearance.

Thus there’d be no balance difference between races and at the same time the skills can be improved to matter/be effective in PvE/WvW.

This weapon is less about killing the Six Gods, but the charr’s antitheism stance. And not that they did kill gods, but that they metaphorically killed their religious side.

Narcemus.1348:

False charr history which states that they killed their own gods when humanity actually did that all.

Not entirely false. Pyre and his warband did kill a few titans themselves between Prophecies and Eye of the North, thus is why they’re imprisoned when we meet them. The “there are no gods” chant was the second start of a revolution by that warband, not the first. Of course, this happened after he personally witnessed some titans killed by “mere humans”.

There’s also the fact that Pyre and his warband aided in killing the “second set of gods” the Flame Legion tried to produce: the destroyers.

And then there’s Gaheron, who proclaimed godhood himself, killed by Rytlock and Logan and five ambiguous-race individuals.

To say the charr killed no false god is, quite simply, false in of itself.

Ookamikun.6472:

Also technically the titans conceptually are no different in a sense that they are “higher beings with power from out of this world”.

Hardly. Titans were demons formed from tormented souls, a ritual overseen by a fallen god’s general. They may be stronger than typical Tyrians and are not of the world (though Gorseval seems to be a “naturally occurring titan” so that part is questionable), they are nothing compared to a true god.

And by “true god” I do no refer solely to the Six Gods, but also other divine beings not yet proven to be false: Koda, Zintl, Amayali, (possibly) Mellaggan, and the Great Dwarf (the original one not the “collective of stone dwarves” – there’s good enough implication that the Great Dwarf talked about in the Tome of Rubicon and dwarven legend was, in fact, a singular being).

This is probably going to end up being the next bandwagon theory that gets proven true despite all reason against such, isn’t it? Let’s hope not. ArenaNet needs to stop incorporating contradictory and nonsensical bandwagon theories in their story and make something up themselves.

Arden.7480:

Is it common among the mesmers that they can use magic to clean memories of the other people?

Yes… and no.

GW1 was practically all about the direct manipulation of individual’s thoughts and perception, rather than the common GW2 mesmer magic which is altering reality (though there was that in GW1, it was much less common).

In an interview a while back this was brought up and asked – don’t recall the exact interview, unfortunately, but the response was effectively that mesmers can influence an individual in such a way but mesmers in general, largely through the Mesmer Collective, keep such spells hush hush in fear of the populace backlashing and mistrusting (rightfully so I’d say) mesmers because they could manipulate memories, personalities, and perceptions of the world on an individual basis.

And as such, only the highest members of the Mesmer Collective – which I’d imagine Anise is, given she is in lore presented as one of the strongest mesmers, is a member of the collective, and is leader of the Shining Blade – has access and knowledge to such spells.

Arden.7480:

Do you have any other cases of such as this kind of magic? Did anyone in history of the whole GW use the spell to change memories and time?

I don’t think Anise influenced time. She distorted space to move Kasmeer and the PC out of the area (something we see to be VERY common place among mesmers now – particularly evident among White Mantle), then altered memories of the past 10 or so minutes in the manner of “forgetting it happened” (which compared to instilling false memories is fairly easy all things considered). No time manipulation there.

But for manipulating people’s minds, in addition to above:

The Charr move through the land with the speed and primal fury of a wildfire. I have begun to realize that simple defenses are not enough to slow this onslaught, so I have devised a new spell. It is actually a relatively simple matter to use the ether to alter the perception of an enemy, especially one so primitive as the Charr. In their minds, they believe themselves fatigued…atrophied, even…thus slowing their relentless assault. I only hope it is enough.

The Charr have come to us. All I can do is try to save my research in the hope that someone can use it to forge a better future for mankind. It was this overwhelming desire to stem the tide that inspired my last spell. I have found a way to use the ether to directly inhibit a foe’s mind. The weave is complex, but when properly crafted the spell slows a foe’s actions. It is as if he is moving through molasses. If only this could slow the wave of inevitability about to wash over us. Perhaps some might escape…

https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Research_Journal

These were spells available to every player in GW1, even secondary mesmers. While the PCs are typically “above and beyond the rest”, this shows that what Anise did is plausible for normal people. Especially if they have time to prepare such, which Anise undoubtably did.

And perhaps key words is in the first quote: it is a “relatively simple” matter to use magic to alter an individual’s perception. Perception of time or memories would be involved in such.

So apparently that spell Anise cast which you are saying is such a major and massive spell is in fact… relatively simple. Of course, over multiple individuals it would undoubtably become more complex, but making someone forget the past 10 or so minutes cannot be insanely more difficult than making someone believe themselves fatigued.

Arden.7480:

EDIT: And this spell was casted by the Illusion of Anise(!!!!!). She has really powerful clones who can cast the insane spells!

Not so sure about that, given the illusion was so poor that it couldn’t even hold conversation.

It might be more that Anise used the illusion as a focal point, preparing the spell beforehand in that illusion so it can be activated at a moment’s notice should it need to be.

In the 2007 PCGamer Guild Wars issue, there was a small overlooked line about the Eye of the North. Apparently at the time in the lore it had the “same style of architecture as Arah”.

Of course that doesn’t seem to hold true anymore given the very circular design of Orrian structure we see in GW2, but it would fit the heavy eagle motif we see in Orrian undead armor. The implication that I got thus being that it was made not by humans but by the Six Gods.

EDIT: Grabbed the magazine since it was reachable. The exact quote being “It is not human, dwarven, or asuran in construction, although it resembles the architecture of Arah and other godly sites.”

Pretty much. The Forgotten – not Exalted – tried to find a way to keep the world safe from the Elder Dragons. Plan A was “make more Bloodstones to house magic” but they couldn’t do this because they didn’t have the “divine resources” which the Seers did.

So the Forgotten went to Glint to come up with Plan B, which eventually became the Exalted and Aurene.

Countess Aire.9410:

Why does every back piece for ascended type becomes a money and time sink?

So… you’re wanting backpieces to be completely free?

Things will always be either a money sink or a time sink. Either time to put into doing content, time to wait, or money to buy things. There’s no alternative other than instantly free things or lots of RNG.

And honestly, who wants a game to just blatantly reward you for doing nothing? Sure, sounds great. But you don’t get any sense of satisfaction out of it. And who wants everything to be RNG? Do you really want the every single ascended gear from achievements or vendors out there to have to RNG drop like generic ascended gear in open world? If so, good luck ever getting ascended gear outside crafting.

The Wayfarer’s Hedge was a great backpiece collection except that we had to do every heart + pay 1,000 unbound magic 16 times for fastest rate. If it was one heart = one runestone then it would have been infinitely better (could finish it in 4 days minimum).

The other backpieces are all fairly reasonably priced and not hard to get. No real sink to them, truth be told, given how easy it is to get unbound magic or the specific map currencies. If anything, they’re too cheap, because they’re so much easier to get than the original ascended backpieces.

Honestly, I wish all of S3 backpieces were akin to the Wayfarer’s Hedge (but fewer daily heart repetition) or even the three order backpieces from HoT. But none of them were all that horrid.

Draconis Mons is fairly easy to navigate. I mean, it is literally a spiral with two platforms.

The PoI being unclear what level they are on is a fundamental issue that is seen throughout the game – and not just on vertical maps. This is something ArenaNet really needs to work on (hero challenges are the same).

Astralporing.1957:

Notice, that Scarlet doesn’t actually say whether she was the one to invent steam creatures, or if she was (or wasn’t) basing the ones she produced on someone else’s work. It’s entirely possible she had a contact with one of the steam portals before and is just trying to copy what she saw.

You apparently missed the point where the “Grand High Sovereign’s creations” do not exist in Tyria, and that Scarlet sent her steam creations to Lornar’s Pass.

In other words, the sole sources of steam creatures are from the Grand High Sovereign in 1325 and Lornar’s Pass, but Scarlet created steam creatures in 1319 AE.

Even the NPCs around Lornar’s Pass are talking about the steam creatures being a recent invasion – a recent invasion in 1325 AE.

In other words, Scarlet had no source to “base the ones she produced on someone else’s work”. There were no steam creatures existing in 1319 AE, at all.

draxynnic.3719:

(Regarding Konig’s point about how recent the invasion was… Scarlet sending them to Lornar’s Pass is the last thing in her diary. So it might well have happened just before the personal story starts.)

I’m not so sure, the town folks act like it’s been a long time since Scarlet had been around – longer than her death for sure. Granted it would be just over two years between the Steam creature invasion and our arrival in Prosperity so maybe.

All the other entries seem to be closer together though, so it’s weird that from halfway to the end is a 4-5 year gap.

Basically what draxynnic said.

The issue with that argument is that Commanders exist on three of those fronts – only really lacking in Draconis Mons. We also see one, curiously, in Timberline though.

So there is already that situation of “that additional authority to derive from Trahearne or one of his commanders” being present in those locations.

The existence of such ranks in Timberline Falls, however, makes me think that we’re either seeing typos in Vigil ranks, or standard ranking in the Vigil that’s uncommon. Especially since all Commanders, Captains, and Lieutenants seem to be Vigil with two, Order of Whispers, exceptions.

draxynnic.3719:

being a ghost is a form of existence after death that isn’t life. It’s undeath.

It’s more of being dead than undead. Undeath is a “partial return to life”, or rather giving the dead a semblance of living; excluding game mechanics (whether video game or tabletop), undead are virtually always mobile corpses – being neither dead nor alive. Ghosts are dead, ergo are not undead.

draxynnic.3719:

Mad King Thorn is technically a ghost, albeit a particularly powerful one, and he’s concerned…

That would undoubtably be due to Dhuum’s whole “unjust punishment” side.

A final death can easily be part of such punishments, but there’s plenty of implication that Dhuum did more than simply make souls cease to be.

draxynnic.3719:

His method of gaining power is connected to this – it is death in the underworld that empowers him, which gives him further incentive to just consume souls rather than granting them an afterlife.

Nearby deaths and consuming souls are very different things, however, and not all killed are souls anyways – in fact, the majority of Dhuum’s servants are living demons.

Every Elder Dragon seems to have had a “herald” champion for them – Drakkar for Jormag, Great Destroyer for Primordus. The death of the herald causes the Elder Dragon to sleep 50 more years than otherwise, but it’ll inevitably wake on its own.

Primordus and Kralkatorrik both woke up late, as their awakening overlapped with another’s (within the margin of a decade – or so we’re led to believe for Primordus/DSD); thus, they both had their heralds removed (Great Destroyer was killed, Glint was turned – some dialogue implies it happened after he fell asleep but before the other ED did, while other dialogue implies it happened while he was still awake thus couldn’t be his intended herald; if the latter, she likely killed it).

The DSD, Jormag, Zhaitan, and Mordremoth all woke up “on time” thanks to their heralds (Scarlet being Mordremoth’s last-minute-made herald).

By all indication, the Giganticus Lupicus – a champion from the previous dragonrise (told to us by Anet) – was likely Zhaitan’s herald. It’s rather speculation, but the existence and effect of the Great Destroyer, Drakkar, and Mordremoth as well as the times of awakening indicate that all had a herald, but three were made inoperable (though one, Mordremoth, got a last-minute replacement).

draxynnic.3719:

Hrrrmn. It’s obscure whether the Infinity Ball player character is claiming that he or she invented the steam creatures, or whether his or her ‘creations’ were an improvement on Scarlet’s original design. The stuff in the Living Story seasons seems to indicate that Scarlet invented them rather than reverse-engineering some she picked up from Lornar’s Pass.

Oh, no, it’s pretty clear that the Grand High Sovereign claims creation of the steam creatures.

Mysterious Stranger: Wait until you get to know my creations. In my reality, they conquered Tyria.
Mysterious Stranger: You don’t stand a chance. In your world, this technology hasn’t even been invented yet!

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Split_Second

However…

Dawdler.8521:

We know they existed in Lornars Pass long before Scarlet did anything, that she was interested in the infinity ball and that her inventions was based on salvaged materials.

This is also wrong. It’s also outright stated for Scarlet to have invented them, prior to the above dialogue taking place:

Ceara: My black-market dredge contacts continue to prove useful. For a little gold, they sell me their scrap iron so I can build my steam minotaurs.
Ceara: I’ve landed a lab assistant position with Omadd, an intelligent but overly gentle asura. I should be able to wrap him around my little finger.
Ceara: Today I am sixteen cycles old, and to celebrate, I’ve been testing my first steam portal with steam minotaurs. The last batch actually made it in one piece.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Prosperity%27s_Mystery

(Note for dates: Ceara was born in 1304 – so turning 16 is 1320 AE)

So the steam creatures “don’t exist in 1325 AE” because they were not invented yet, but yet Ceara made them in or before 1320 AE and sent them to Lornar’s Pass (and, apparently, Brisban Wildlands) around 1320 AE.

What’s truly off is that despite the proclamation that Scarlet sent them to Brisban Wildlands, the only ones we see there are from the Infinity Ball or Thaumanova explosion fallout (or malfunctioning asura gates). Further, dialogue in Lornar’s implies that the steam creature invasion is relatively recent, yet the Season 2 dialogue implies they were sent there years ago.

It’s a blatant, poorly researched, retcon that turns the future you into a terrible, horrible liar (as well as any NPC proclaiming the Steam creatures are a recent invasion, which is about all NPCs talking about them).

draxynnic.3719:

LS1 was basically driven by asura and sylvari, noting that LS1 was essentially villain-driven with the ‘good guys’ basically never taking any proactive actions to speak of. So, essentially, it was driven by Scarlet and the Inquest.

You forgot about Levvi driving The Lost Shores, Canach driving Southsun Part 2, and Dessa… There was Ellen Kiel, who was basically the second main figure (just after Scarlet) as while half of the plot dealt with “Scarlet’s actions” the other half dealt with “Kiel’s actions”, but she largely played second fiddle during her arcs (either to Levvi or to Magnus).

Bearhugger.4326:

Well if you recall pre-launch, both the artists and the writers seemed to have A LOT of love for the Sylvari race. There was a lot of blog posts and interviews about the design of the race, a lot more than for any other race.

This was because sylvari were “the new thing”. Players at the time were almost all GW1 vets, or were getting into GW1 in preparation for GW2, so they all had some degree of introduction to the other races.

There were a lot of blog posts about the humans, asura, norn, and charr too, mind you, but most interviews focused on sylvari because they were “the big unknown” to players that could be talked about.

Mind you, this is the very same excuse ArenaNet writers gave us to “quell” complaints about the PS and S1 being so sylvari focused, with promises that they’d go away from sylvari post-S1 (well, didn’t quite work out with HoT, but after HoT that seems to be the case).

So we may not see sylvari play a major role for some time; partially because ArenaNet had “done their focus” (Mordremoth) but also because Anet tends to have kneejerk reactions to issues.

Amaimon.7823:

BrotherBelial.3094:

well the Sylvari story ends with HoT so, we can look forward to other races getting the spot light, as humans did in the current living world story.

there’s still some open hooks;
> New Duchess of the Nightmare
> Malyck
> Unwell (but recovering) Pale Tree
> what happened to the sylvari who fell to mordremoth, are they ghouls now, are they free, are they caught inbetween?
> The Pale Tree is more than a champion of mordremoth, she has more power/ability than she would’ve had if she was just a champion, mainly the dream, which has yet to be explained.

You forgot that we still do not know what the nature of the Dream or Nightmare are (they did not originate from the Pale Tree and both opposed Mordremoth so they didn’t originate from him either; promotions made it out to sound that Mordremoth was “hijacking” the Dream to turn sylvari, not that he made the Dream and was reclaiming it), or what happened to the cave full of seeds.

Ghosts are neither undeath nor resurrection. What I got from all the lore about Dhuum is that he’s a sadistic kitten who punishes those who don’t deserve the punishment they’re given (thus “unjust”), and that’s what the Foefire effectively does.

We also know that Dhuum is very hypocritical when it comes to the things he hates. He’ll use them himself, but not allow others to do so. And he certainly isn’t against using ghosts as minions either.

Aaron Ansari.1604:

These are the ones I mean. Not counting the airship/submarine captains, obviously.

Lieutenant Mayday is not a member of the Pact – only Vigil were involved in Draconis Mons.

Except for Captain Scott and Lieutenant Morrison, those are all Vigil as well. I believe I’ve seen other clearly-not-Pact Vigil with “standard military ranks” elsewhere. So I think this is just a series of typos on ArenaNet’s part, or there are more Vigil ranks than merely Recruit, Crusader, Warmaster, and Tactician (which, truth be told, makes sense – but would also mean we skipped a few ranks when the PC got promoted from Crusader to Warmaster).

Another possibility, given those are all humans sans Mayday and Horvath, that those are ranks from before they joined the Vigil (such as if they were in the Seraph or the Mist Wars).

That feels a bit too recent of an event for Balthazar to have learned so much about the secret ongoings of Tyria (Lazarus’ state of being particularly). Possible, though.

But honestly, I’d think the Foefire is more likely tied to Dhuum. Endless ghostly torment and forced to relive their last day alive over and over for eternity sounds more like unjust god of death than the once-semi-just god of war.

The Pact basically has 3 ranks:

Marshal, Commander, and Liaison.

There are multiple commanders, though there is the “commander above commanders” that is the PC (until Season 3 where the PC steps down at least). All other ranks are the ranks of whatever forces individuals are from when working with the Pact.

The heads of the Orders are not part of the Pact, nor are all Order members part of it either. The liaisons are the highest Order members in the Pact, and work as the official go-between between order leader and the Pact leadership. These being Wynnet, Doern, and Efut.

(Side note: Laranthir is higher ranked than Efut in the Vigil, but doesn’t seem to hold position of being liaison. He is treated as makeshift second-in-command during HoT, though.)

The Pact is akin to a Venn Diagram; the circles would be the orders, the overlaps are the Pact.

I don’t recall any captains or lieutenants in the Pact, except when dealing with Seraph entering in. Most NPCs with non-standard Orders rank are just commander. The only “Captain” in the Pact that isn’t clearly of a non-Order that I can find is Captain Gullivre, so I’d be willing to label him an anomaly.

The Exalted are immune to dragon corruption, do not age, able to go into hibernation for when there’s no need for them to be awake, and are unkillable unless you strike a very specific part of their body (their mask) – they can even be dismembered and still live, unlike weak, aging, bleeding mortal humans.

Tarir was made about 200 years prior to GW2, after the events of GW1, so they wouldn’t have had much time to defend it. But when it comes to defending it, Exalted are far superior than humans.

And we are told that after Aurene is ready, the Exalted are to move to another location, to further a different part of Glint’s Legacy – these are acts (creating Tarir, protecting Aurene, going elsewhere) centuries apart, so would you really trust unknown future generations to the salvation of the world? I wouldn’t.

vove.2768:

Resuming: HPs are really stupid mechanic. There are a lot of stupid mechanics in this game, but HP beats most of them. Please consider making them less of a pain or at least add some rewards for doing them.

Hero points or skill points are a fundamental aspect in any MMO. The only difference between GW2 and other MMOs – other RPGs for that matter – is that getting hero points is not restricted to experience gain.

And this, honestly, is a good thing. You may not have been around for it, but once upon a time leveling experience did give skill points instead of spirit shards (at this point, there were no hero points – hero challenges were called skill challenges and rewarded a skill point alongside leveling up or filling that bar at level 80). This, however, ended up trivializing the concept of skill points because just as people have thousands of spirit shards now, folks had thousands of skill points then. Any new skill would be instantly obtained with minimal effort.

Splitting the two were a way to ensure that it wasn’t a trivial aspect, given how rare new skills are (which is another intended design because as ArenaNet learned in GW1, having a hundred-some skills per profession gets really hard to balance).

As to the champions in Heart of Thorns’ HP, this is intended and, in fact, required because the hero challenges reward 10 points each. Honestly I’m amazed there are any commune challenges there, given how simple they are.

And while you complain, I find it fun. Besides, you do not need all 40 HoT hero challenges to max out your skills – if you get all 214 core hero points, you need only 4 HoT hero challenges (36 hero points), all of which you can get from the non-combat ones. If you’re having so much trouble, which is uncommon, a little WvW and you can buy the HPs for Proofs of Heroics.

They’ve provided all the means for you. If you’re still having issues, then the only solution ultimately is “get good” because, let’s face it, GW2 is not a hard game. It’s not like Dark Souls where you’re expected to die a lot.

Aldath.1275:

Marjory and Kasmeer don’t seem to share a bond beyond the kiss

I have been replaying Season 2, and honestly I felt that the characters were much better written then than in HoT or Season 3, which is weird since everything else in writing has improved since Season 2.

Naturally this includes a bond between Marjory and Kasmeer. Or who remembers that Rox has the superstition of spitting for luck?

It’s almost like Anet’s writers are incapable of focusing on multiple aspects of storytelling at once…

Aldath.1275:

Canach… Why is he even in the group?

Technically, he isn’t. He was assigned by Anise (aka forced into the role) to work with us during HoT and Season 3, and now that he’s no longer bound to service (part of his repentence from his criminal actions in Season 1), he left. He may show up again, out of a sense of camaraderie and strategic alignment.

Aldath.1275:

To be honest they could kill everyone except Taimi and nothing would ever change, as she’s just the Mary Sue that helps us find how to do things while our character becomes less and less important.

They actually managed to subvert the Mary Sue trope with episode 5, with Taimi’s massive blunder.

Which was, surprisingly, well done.

Well deer and other animals are probably more seen as “warbeasts employed by the charr”, like how the charr use devourers and (in GW1) ceratadons, among other creatures.

Yes, the Foefire ghosts see everyone as a charr, even humans – even animals, asura, sylvari, norn, etc. every living being is a charr in their eyes.

LinseyMurdock.4165:

12. Experience data loss, resetting progress back to step 7, thus undoing all the hard parts I just did
13. Experience crushing demoralization and wallow in sadness for days while numerous people try to help recover work. This is why you should never save your docs locally and nowhere else.

Oof, had this happen to me once. Luckily it just was a loss of 4 hours of work. But this is why after every work day I save my data to two+ usb drives, my desktop, my laptop, and if it’s small to a floppy drive. I will almost always have at least 3 versions of everything important.

6614116

Bloodstone Shard
Elonian Wine
Brick of Clay
Eldritch Scoll
Mystic Binding Agents
Unid Fossilized Insect
Anthology of Heroes

So for these I don’t think they’re needed. WIth the exception of the Unidentified Fossilized Insect, all of these must be bought, and of those except for the Mystic Binding Agent they must be bought one at a time. Any reason to have more than you need is player error and I don’t think covering that is worth taking up space in the material storage.

This is especially so since these have so niche uses. Of these, I would only include Bottles of Elonian Wine, Anthology of Heroes, and Mystic Binding Agents because those three have enough uses to merit stockpiling them. Maybe Eldritch Scrolls but, honestly, I think most folks can and should just wait before buying one if they need any.

These things, like legendary gifts, feel too niche. Maybe if they got more uses in the future – and I do support using older, underused materials more often to up their value – but as is, no.

I’m not entirely sure the need for the chef or scribing stuff (particularly Scribing Kits, Finishing Kits, and Book Covers for scribing, since those have so few uses) as well, but I don’t use those enough so maybe they are an issue for those who do.

I would consider adding lumber cores and other RNG drop scribing materials like them, too. Don’t bother with the things that can be only obtained through vendors unless they have a wide variety of uses. That’s my opinion.

“Justiciar Caudecus, The Unseen Ones smile upon us. After years of searching, High Inquisitor Xera has found a lead on the refuge of our injured god, Lazarus. It would appear that, after he was betrayed by Justicar Naveed over two centuries ago, Lazarus was forced to re-split himself into aspects to contain the corruption. Once imbued into artifacts, these aspects were scattered across the Maguuma Jungle and sites sacred to our order. And it is now our charge to gather these aspects.”

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Master_of_Puppets

This is the first letter Esthel sent to Caudecus (that we have access to). Xera had to “find a lead” on where Lazarus left the relics. That indicates that the White Mantle had no idea of where the relics were, at least in modern times. It could be that the events of the War in Kryta (or later unknown events) had resulted in the White Mantle losing the knowledge, or that they never knew but Lazarus left hints in hopes they would find out. Either way there doesn’t seem to be a “wait until the time is right” situation.

However, the idea of the White Mantle losing the knowledge becomes unlikely given the second line in that letter:

“It would appear that, after he was betrayed by Justicar Naveed over two centuries ago, Lazarus was forced to re-split himself into aspects to contain the corruption.”

It would appear – meaning that they only just found out. Unless the entire situation of Lazarus’ actions in the Tarnished Coast and after were lost and forgotten, then the White Mantle never knew in the first place.

The third line does support the idea of lost knowledge, since the artifacts were “scattered across the Maguuma Jungle and sites sacred to [the White Mantle]”, but it could be that those who spread the artifacts were constructs or never survived spreading those artifacts so the White Mantle on a whole never got that knowledge.

Okay, if I’m understanding you correctly…

The mursaat did not learn about their extinction while in the Mists, let alone from individuals from the future, nor is there any indication where they hid from the Elder Dragons was a fractal (there are more than just fractals in the Mists after all – including entire worlds). They also had “a plan” to rule other races long before the charr began worshiping titans, and they were no longer in the Mists by the time they would have known (if they even knew) the charr were worshiping titans.

The mursaat learned of their extinction the same way everyone else did: through Glint’s prophecies (dubbed the Flameseeker Prophecies).

There is no “scroll to defeat Balthazar”, let alone one that Menzies had – by any indication we’re given. Presumably you mean the one Braham found (as that is the only relevant magic scroll to the plot atm)? No relation to either Menzies nor Balthazar.

I wasn’t saying they weren’t scattered – the letters to Caudecus make that much pretty clear in that Xera had to go on a long journey to recover them after finding the first.

What I was saying is that because they were scattered, it’s very likely that Lazarus had re-split himself in a rush, thus not preparing White Mantle for reviving him, and therefore explaining why Xera had to go on a long journey to recover all of Lazarus’ parts in the first place as well as why some White Mantle – like Caudecus – did not know about Lazarus’ ability to exist without all aspects.

Amaimon.7823:

However, where do you draw the line between gods and ‘gods’. because the point I was trying to raise is that while there is a pantheon of 6, there are more individuals of questionably equal or within-reach-of-power power that can be considered gods.

I think the very clear line of procession and the related power that must be passed down for one (even a mortal) to become a god that exists within the Six Gods is a clear label of what separates other beings from the Six.

This isn’t to say there cannot be other gods, we have other faiths out there that label other beings as gods after all (Koda, Zintl, Amiyala, and possibly the Great Dwarf and Mellaggan all being candidate “non-Six Gods gods”), but that Menzies and the like are not of the same kind of god as the Six.

Furthermore, nothing ever claims Menzies or Balthazar’s father were gods. Just very powerful beings. And as shown by Abaddon’s death, the gods are more than just “very powerful beings”. Just as the Elder Dragons are more than “just very powerful dragons” because we know they’re tied to The All.

And it should be stressed that being a god does not make one invincible. There’s a very clear difference, even in real world pantheons. You’ll never find a polytheistic faith in which no god can ever be killed – most polytheistic faiths, in fact, are built upon the notion of a more modern and human-loving and human-like group of gods overthrowing less human-like god or group of gods (in many cases, these being related directly to the sky, like Uranus from greek mythology (or Caelus as the Romans called him).

@Vesuivius: There’s no reason to believe the scroll does anything more than produce a very powerful flame to the weapons (one strong enough to crack Jormag’s tooth).

@Arden: The jotun monuments and telescope, like many other things, were brought to Arah by the Six Gods. We’re outright told this in the dungeon. There’s no reason to believe the jotun ever lived outside of the Shiverpeaks given the jotun monuments which have wethered there but are seen nowhere else but where they were “taken to” (Arah).

Furthermore, the vaults that the Forbidden Scrolls were in were made by the Six, containing those very things we investigate in the Arah explorable paths, and this was well after the jotun had fallen from grace and humanity had made Orr its kingdom. There’s no reason to think jotun (whether one or many) traveled to the heart of a highly religious human nation, accessed their forbidden vaults, and left with one of its contents back to the Shiverpeaks.

draxynnic.3719:

Certainly, the Voices appear to be communing with something in the Mists – but questions can be raised as to what. Is it the original Koda, or has something brought Koda down (possibly having his power taken by one of the dragons) and what is left in the Mists is an imposter or a mere remnant of what Koda once was? Is Koda what the kodan claim Koda to be, or is their belief that they are the pinnacle of enlightenment mere hubris, and Koda is merely another face of another being, possibly one we already know such as the spirit of Bear?

Though it’s questionable how strongly it relates, there is the Spirit of Koda in the Edge of the Mists. Which is just a spectral bear, really.

Though the spirit of Bear the norn revere seems to be the bear spirit that first questions Koda and is elevated in the kodan folklore. Or so my interpretation has been.

draxynnic.3719:

One thing to note is that the Forgotten believe that the Seers used divine magic to create the Bloodstones, and furthermore, a form of divine magic that the Forgotten do not have access to. Given that the Forgotten are servants of the Six, and all indications we have are that the Six were not involved in creating the original bloodstone, this could indicate that the Seers had a different source of divine power that the Six did not provide. Finding out what (or who) that source was and gaining the use of that power could make for an interesting storyline.

Clearly the seers sacrificed Koda to create the Bloodstone. :P

(Yes, I kid – if a god was sacrificed, then I’d say the original Great Dwarf, who is hinted to have been his own person in the past, was the sacrifice.)

Cristalyan.5728:

If your hypothesis is true (I mean if the lore writer(s) had this idea in mind when designing the story), that means the Dragons and The six are the same thing for their worlds: A regulating mechanism for the evolution cycle of their respective Universe.

Yes and no.

It does seem to be the direction Anet’s going, thus why there are so many similarities, but among the differences is the term “regulating”. The Six Gods do not seem to be doing any regulating. At least, not anymore.

And this ties into the fact that the Elder Dragons don’t need to regulate magic. Their greedy personas result in the need.

And this ties to your point 2:

Cristalyan.5728:

2. The dragons have no moral impediments when coming to do their job – to regulate the evolution cycle of the world – even if this means to destroy any civilization on Tyria.

The Elder Dragons do not have a “job” per se.

Every Elder Dragon, either directly (Mordremoth, Jormag, and Kralkatorrik), or via their minions and actions have shown to have each very different personalities and, more importantly, goals. Their goal is not “balance magic” or “reset civilizations”. If it were the former, there’d be no need to go all evil and assault civilizations; if it were the latter, there’d be no need to corrupt wildlife left and right (in fact, such would be an impediment to the goal since they’d want primitive and potential evolutionary races to survive).

I made a few posts a while back about these in full in studying these personalities and goals. The TL;DR is:

• Zhaitan’s minions preach about, effectively, an eternal undead kingdom ruled by Zhaitan without loss of loved ones or death.
• Jormag directly shows being after a world where survival of the fittest is rule, even if those fit are his enemies (for the most part, he’ll only corrupt willing converts, though the Sons of Svanir don’t follow this, and he’ll let potential enemies who have “proven themselves” go free).
• Kralkatorrik directly desiring to “have” or “become” all things – he’ll take (read: corrupt) all that he can, and destroy the rest.
• Mordremoth seems to want to replace the world – to become what sustains all life.
• Primordus has shown only one goal: to eradicate all life.
• Sadly, DSD is a mystery.

None of this is about “regulating magic” or “regulating evolution”.

The entire reason why the cycle exists, in the end, is the Elder Dragons’ greed of obtaining more magic. They keep eating magikittenil there is none left, but since they apparently need to eat magic to survive, they go into hibernation and wait for magic to regrow. Many minions speak as if the Elder Dragons are here to stay this time around, not that they’re here and will be gone in a few hundred/thousand years. Ultimately this means that if they can restrain their consumption rates, then they may be capable of remaining awake indefinitely.

And this seems to be what the Six Gods have managed – to find a way to remain awake indefinitely, thus no need of regulation.

Cristalyan.5728:

1. We can fight any of the Six and even we can kill it (It will be replaced by the remaining five) but a war against the God of War can be epic :-)

Not really. Nightfall showed with Abaddon that killing just one god would be potentially (and highly likely) to be highly cataclysmic. This is probably why they didn’t just kill Dhuum and Abaddon when they went evil, but waited for suitable replacements in the form of Grenth and Kormir.

Cristalyan.5728:

3. If no Aurene, can we replace the dead dragons with other entities? The Pale Tree can be a good replacement for Mordy.

We will undoubtably need more than just Aurene. The problem in the end is not the amount of magic, but rather connections to The All. And despite Primordus and Jormag eating the lion’s share of Mordremoth’s and Zhaitan’s magic, those two’s orbs were dormant during Taimi’s simulation with The All, indicating that Primordus, Jormag, and potentially Kralkatorrik and DSD never truly replaced the fallen Elder Dragons.

This may mean that “six” is mandatory for the world to survive long term.

In theory, any dragon minion, dragon, or magic-consuming creature can become a replacement. This means not just Pale Tree, but any sylvari as well, and even Kuunavang, chak or imps. But there is indication through this season that even for sylvari who should be capable of regulating magic that “too much magic” is dangerous for mental (and physical) stability.

If the twisted aspect was hindering him so badly like intended, and he was in immediate pain as well so that’s likely, then he might not have had time or concentration for leaving instructions. It’s also possible he did it without the White Mantle’s knowledge (I cannot imagine they’d not keep the relics in the most high of reverence if they had them at any point in the past).

Kralkatorrik would probably be a safer bet, given that saltspray dragons utilize air and fire magic, and Kralkatorrik/Glint have a lot of relations to sky (specifically wind, lightning, and sun and in Kralk’s case, clouds and storms), second to their relations to crystals.

Unlikely. Why would a scroll that was locked away in the vaults of Orr suddenly be in the northern Shiverpeaks (Bitterfrost Frontier isn’t Far Shiverpeaks, technically, but the northern edge of the Shiverpeaks before the Far Shiverpeaks)?

Besides there’s this NPC who makes mention of a jotun scroll Aesgir had and Braham says that the scroll is “similar to the scroll Aesgir used in his great victory,” which indicates that the scroll is more likely to be of jotun origin, and had been in the Shiverpeaks for the past 200 years. Perhaps it’s been there longer though, since we found it near jotun monuments (they’re right outside the other exit of the cave).

So in addition to the first question of why its sudden change of location, if this scroll was among the “lost scrolls”/“forbidden scrolls” it would imply the one that caused the Cataclysm was of similar origins which would mean the Cataclysm magic was made by jotun – why would they make such magic (perhaps, one can argue, their infighting got that bad).

Then there’s the fact these scrolls were forbidden. Why forbid a scroll which all it does is ignite weapons with fire? That’s not particularly dangerous.