Guild Wars 2

Saint.5647:

Well, the trolls are corrupted with fungal growths and the bee hives are actually growing inside the trolls’ bodies. If you look closely at them you will see this. It is also confirmed in the wiki.

Gonna use ‘your’ le sigh

1. I wrote that on the wiki. NEVER use the wiki for proof, it is written by players and thus subject to fallacies.
2. I’m aware of the appearance of trolls, and that is why I wrote such on the wiki (and you’d note the wording includes appear thus not definite), though a lot of people thought the Mordrem Wolves were nothing but but a skull with a wolf-shaped plant; it wasn’t until we got a very close up look that we were able to tell the difference (and incidentally, I was the one who first pointed it out to folks…).

Saint.5647:

Interestingly, the wiki says that they’re not wolves but Sylvan Hounds. I didn’t know that to begin with and was just basing my theories on observation.

Point 1 above. Dunno who wrote that, since they’re very clearly wolf corpses. Only Overgrown Wolves might have once been sylvan hounds – as they use Thorn Wolf models which were sylvan hounds turned to the Nightmare. Aaaaand, I’ve edited the Mordrem Wolf article – seems the culprit was Somohexual, who was most likely copy/pasting from other articles and slipped up.

Saint.5647:

Regarding the Teragrifs, I am not entirely sure whether their skin is bark or a chitinous shell. There is an undeniable resemblance between Colocals and Teragrifs. Teragrifs are of course more aggressive in appearance and have horns. If they are corrupted Colocals, that would explain the chitinous features.

The bodies are neither bark nor shell; the skin is more akin to cacti or flower stems rather than bark, and are most certainly not shells or skin. Colocals have skin and fur, no shells. There is a similarity between the two, yes, but I’d argue this similarity is more along the lines of Primordus’ destroyers mimicing living creatures than a case of corrupted colocals. The pincers of the teragrifs, for example, are completely disconnected from the main body. Furthermore, the “fully grown” teragriff seen during E6 had wings unlike colocals.

Colocals have no chitinous features.

Saint.5647:

As fas as the Menders go, I think they are similar to the trolls. Their corruption seems fungal in appearance and their flesh appears to show massive signs of decay. Again, I am unsure of the texture on their arms and legs. They either resemble thick, leathery skin or bark from the corruption.

Their skin matches the teragriffs, actually, and they hold no fungus-like appearance. The size also argues plant-made rather than corrrupted animal, but my question comes in the hands, existence of toenails, and the horns – though the horns do appear bark-like, the hands/feet are still questionable.

Saint.5647:

Still, to me they seem like corrupted Mergoyles/Gargoyles from their stature, animations, and appearance. If you take a close look at the face, you will see the same pointed jawline and chin. It could also easily be a re-used resource though and I don’t recall Mergoyles in the Maguuma Jungle.

There were no mergoyles in the Maguuma; their frame is actually shared with trolls. Mergoyles and gargoyles were also made of stone – at least partially – though such would account for the oddity of the hands and apparent toenails…

Since this topic was revived:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B4BtaBOCMAAaVx3.jpg:large

ARENANET HAS HEARD YOUR PLEA. DINOSAURS COME EPISODE 8.

What Erukk said. That is very clearly a tail to me. The Carapace sets are 100% insect designs, so that is likely meant to be some bug’s tail or stinger.

IIRC, the seraph officer in charge there mentions that it was a recent village taken by the centaurs not too long ago. No differing name given to the village, however.

Forgotten Legend.9281:

~i presume that for many years, the Tamini probably had an uneasy truce with Kryta, or rather weren’t actively at war as a tribe. they were essentially bound to the Overlord’s Greatcamp and Earthwork’s Bluff settlements, or cities if you will.
~the Tamini settlements grew, but due to the lack of major conflict in Kessex Hills, the majority of the Seraph forces were directed to the Harathi conflict north of Beetletun.
~at this time i believe there were also Tamini in southeastern Queensdale as well, probably as refugees hiding in the cliffs, building there strength, and then building up the other nearby camps, such as the Cliffwatch Camp.
~the Tamini were also secretly training Bandits at Kenna’s Bandit POI in Firemane Hills, preparing for their major offensive. during this time they set up a few hidden camps in caves.
~since the majority of the Seraph were fighting the Harathi in northeastern Kryta, the Tamini’s surprise offensive went unchallenged, leading up to the attack on Shaemoor in 1325 AE (starting the human personal story)
~during this surprise offensive in early 1325 AE, i believe one of their first targets was the village at Greyhoof Camp Waypoint.

1. Tamini were nomads to the north of Kryta for the most part prior to their alliance/subjugation by the Modniir. They would not have settlements or cities; Overlord’s Greatcamp and Earthwork’s Buffs are Harathi – the Harathi were in the Maguuma during GW1. These fortresses did not exist in GW1.
2. There were no centaurs living in Kryta proper during GW1 – at all. This is the focus of the Centaur War, as the centaurs were forced out of their original homeland in 300 AE, which sparked the Centaur War. It was in a down portion during GW1, but there were no centaurs in Kryta – be it Kessex Hills or Queensdale. The centaur presence in both places is due to their effective push into Krytan territory from the north. Their path was quite literally coming in from the north via Harathi Hinterlands->Gendarran Fields->Queensdale/Kessex Hills. Their presence in both places is a recent thing.
3. The centaur/bandit alliance is relatively recent thing, and extends to all centaurs not just Tamini.
4. The Tamini are the vanguard of the centaur alliance. They would have no “surprise offensive” as they are the prime offensive. They just had a strong offensive, when backed by Harathi and Modniir.

Actually, teragriffs’ bodies show to be fully planty – if any part of them isn’t planty, it’s just the skull, but the rest is very clearly plant unlike the wolves. Thrashers too. Trolls are questionable – they kind of look like infested trolls, but some may be just flesh-like plant skin; same goes for Menders, though the menders look far more akin to teragriffs in skin (which again, is very much planty). Husks are fully planty, naturally.

Most Mordrem appear to be corrupted plants, rather than corrupted animals. The only one known to be once an animal is the wolf, which is a corpse controlled by a flower Mordrem’s roots.

And even if teragriffs and trolls are corrupted animals: husks and thrashers are not, and we’re harvesting fangs, tendons, bladders, and spleens from them.

I see no “elephant face” on any Carapace armor set. The leggings all look butterfly/moth like. Maybe you’re just mistaking butterfly/moth wing designs for elephant head/ears?

Erukk.1408:

Shadelang.3012:

Yep. Im well aware of where there from. I see no reason for the giant flower like plant to not grow limbs at start ripping peoples heads off though. I mean look at the thrashers.

It’s what we get for making so many Little Shop of Horrors jokes during the first half of the season. We get to fight Audrey II now!

I think this is actually a bit more literal than Erukk’s joke is meant to be.

Mawdrey and Mawdrey II. Mawdrey is a purple-mist glowing Mordrem vine. Mawdrey II is a bloodstone dust consuming venus fly trap.

Vine Crawlers are the ends of those giant vines. They’re giant mouths with purple-mist glowing Mordrem vines.

Mawdrey is the infant form of the giant flower, and Mawdrey II is the cut-off Vine Crawler of Mawdrey.

So we’ll be fighting a grown up Mawdrey, I’m expecting.

The difference is the government.

You say “government is government”. But:

Is the government of the United States the same as the government of North Korea?

Is a monarchy the same as a Krytocracy?

And even amongst the same types of government, is one the same as another? No. It is never “government is government”.

The charr would never allow their trade to be dictated by a human constitutional monarchy that is split between charr-haters and peace-wanters. The asura downright are out to have global economic rule and utilize Lion’s Arch free city focus as part of their scheme (as do the Ash Legion). Changing the government of Lion’s Arch from multi-racial leadership to human-centric semi-racist leadership would affect everything.

And do you really think that Caudecus would allow a city of Kryta to be multiracial? No, he’d use that in his smeer campaigns against Jennah.

Also: “Funny, and they ARE prepared to depend on the goodwill of PIRATES??”

They actually aren’t. Lion’s Arch is a free city, began by pirates, but not solely ruled by them – ruled by naval captains in modern times. The entire establishment of Lion’s Arch depends on trade with the other locals, unlike Kryta, so it’s only obvious that they wouldn’t betray their trade partners (without a foolproof means of escaping blame).

Mental Paradox.3845:

I have to wonder… you spent so much time resisting me, and even continuing to attack after I had stated we’d never agree anyway. I mean, really, why does it mean so so much to you? Why is it so important that LA of all places stays occupied by those pirates? Unity? We have the Pact, now.

I can ask the same to you: Why would it be so important for LA to be back in Kryta’s hands? What good would it do them?

And why do you speak as if you’re a figurehead of Kryta that’s being attacked by the other nations of Tyria. You’re playing the role of a politician through and through now, to disturbing degrees.

Mental Paradox.3845:

Strawman argument.

I suggested using retaking Lion’s Arch TODAY, 1327AE – not back in Edair’s time.

You said:

Also, Edair was a fool. I wouldn’t attack LA from the water – that’s insanity. Naval power is what LA is best at. I’d develop airships like the ones used by the pact and attack them from the sky. Bomb them into the ground, then send in ground forces.

“Edair was a fool” “I wouldn’t attack LA from the water” “I would develop airships”. Intent or not, your word was saying “if I were in Edair’s shoes, I would develop airships and attack from the sky”.

If you’re talking about now, then you wouldn’t need to develop airships – they’re already developed. Unless you developed a new kind, but then they wouldn’t be “like the ones used by the pact”.

Mental Paradox.3845:

Why not? It was that way before pirates seized it. It can be that way again. Lion’s Arch is the largest seaport in Tyria. What choice do they have? Second reason why your opinion is garbage: if what you said was true, trade would not be possible at all. How would trade in the real world work? There doesn’t have to be a centralized trade hub. The real world chooses to trust the host government… because when money is involved, everybody is suddenly such good friends…

And then the claim that Kryta is in bad shape… I’d argue they are in worse shape. The situation may not be ideal but Kryta would still win.

I find your lack of patriotism disturbing. It’s funny how this game seems to bring all the anti-human misantropists out. I think it’s really cute how you guys take this all so seriously and try to gang up on me.

Actually, before the rise of Zhaitan, Lion’s Arch was the human trading hotspot. Asura and norn seldom traded there, even seldom traded at Port Stalwart after LA’s flooding (before reconstruction), and the charr didn’t trade at either unless they were brigands unrelated to the legions – and even then, they were hated at Port Stalwart and killed on sight at Lion’s Arch pre-flooding.

So no, it was not “that way before pirates seized it.”

Also, technically speaking, pirates did not “seize” it any more than a person begins living in an abandoned, run-down house and renovates it.

And what choice do the races have? How about Rata Sum, which has a port, is tied to the most economically spread out race of the five races, and lies past the Ring of Fire Islands thus having the best choice of being able to trade with other races? Or how about pushing to renovate Orr now that Zhaitan’s dead and the peninsula is under Pact control?

And to your last comment about us being “anti-human misanthropists” – not only is such false, but the reason why we “gang up on [you]” is because of comments like this:

Second reason why your opinion is garbage

I find your lack of logic disturbing.

Ardenwolfe.8590:

What part of “We don’t need an expansion to pay the bills,” are you not getting? And it’s not two years. It’s still one. And the statement was made mid-year to boot.

“What if an expansion doesn’t come in 2015.

2013 → 2015

Two years would pass by the time we get an expansion, minimally.

And on the first part: that was then, this is now. Profit sources changes. Their income came from selling new accounts of GW2, and selling gemstore items. How many new players are we actually seeing? How many gemstore purchases are there? Compare said number of the third year of game’s life (which we’re in the middle of, towards the beginning side) to the first year of the game’s life (which the statement was made near the end of).

Of course, THEN an expansion wasn’t needed to pay bills, because the game wasn’t a year old yet, we didn’t have the fiasco of Scarlet Briar yet which dismayed a lot of players, didn’t have the burnout (both for players and developers) of the continuous Living World that ended up setting a precedence of player demands, and we didn’t have the reversion of the Living World to be closer to the Personal Story.

Ardenwolfe.8590:

So, I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt. Let’s say a year and a half. That’s ‘not in the near future’ to you?

Not for a video game. But again, if we get an expansion announcement, that’ll be early 2015. If we get an expansion release, that’ll be mid-2015. Both dates being an “at the earliest” scenario. For a video game that survives, no, that is no longer in the near future.

Ardenwolfe.8590:

Are you not are fully aware most expansions, from the start, take a minimum of two years to storyboard, write, create, and polish? We’re not even talking alpha and beta testing to weed out the kinks.

I don’t think it’s two years, but I only have minimal playtest experience, though most expansions come out within a year and a half of the game’s life. I don’t expect an expansion now or even early 2015. It’s clear that if they began working on an expansion, it’d be after the statement; it would have begun its initial stages of “okay, we’re doing an expansion” in late 2013, if not early 2014.

Ardenwolfe.8590:

Yet, somehow, we’re to believe that on top of all the current Living Story content, seasons, and other promotionals, you want us to believe that somehow ANet has a team dedicated to massing a new expansion.

All secret-like with no announcement or promotion of any kind?

Exactly how many people work at ArenaNet?

And how many are seen working on the Living World and other releases?

Hint: Over 200 people work at ArenaNet. Not that many work on the Living World content.

And they ARE being secret-like. For over a year now, they have said absolutely nothing about Ree Soesbee and Jeff Grubb’s activities at ArenaNet. They are the two biggest figureheads when it comes to story prior to Angel McCoy taking over as she’s one of the two lead writers for the Living World. Where have ArenaNet’s continuity designers gone? Why have they been silent for the better part of a year and a half? Why whenever someone at ArenaNet are asked about them, they clam up and if they say anything at all it is “we can’t say”?

At this point, I’m believing that they either have those two locked up in a dungeon somewhere, or there’s a secret project going on for over a year now.

As a fun fact: they didn’t mention anything about GW2 until after Eye of the North’s release, not until roughly a year after they decided they’d make GW2. And after that initial announcement it was dead silence for over 2 years. So yeah, ArenaNet would go completely silent on a big project. Why do I say this? Because they already have. Twice.

FlamingFoxx.1305:

Mental Paradox.3845:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

Mental Paradox.3845:

LA won that war thanks to the Risen. Zhaitan’s defeated now. Scarlet weakened LA critically. Remember the guard that says they don’t even have enough personell for one shift? How could they possibly resist the entire Krytan army?

Lion’s Arch is also its own independent city-state that has alliances with the other four major races at this point, on top of other groups such as centaurs (that’s more of a peace agreement though) and Zephyrites.

Mental Paradox.3845:

Also, Edair was a fool. I wouldn’t attack LA from the water – that’s insanity. Naval power is what LA is best at. I’d develop airships like the ones used by the pact and attack them from the sky. Bomb them into the ground, then send in ground forces.

You didn’t read the book did you? Edair not only created a naval blockade with a fleet that the Lion’s Arch fleet (what little there was at the time) could not withstand (they only survived thanks to the risen), but also created a land blockade across northern Lion’s Arch, preventing all trade route access. Edair created a 360 blockade around the entire city.

Also, you do not simply develop something unheard of before. You can say “I’d develop airships!” because you know such would work, but can you think of something completely new to yourself in every way and expect it to not only work, but be useful in combat situations?

This said, your posts convince me that you’re a bit of an egomaniac and I am glad you are not a world leader.

Airships already exist. They don’t have to be invented from scratch. In fact, they already contain human technology.)

Airships did not exist at the time that Sea of Sorrows is set…
The Airships were invented by the pact during the timeline of the personal story, which is years after Edair attacked LA… There were no airships. He had ships, that was it.

Thank you for pointing out that glaring paradox in Paradox’s post.

Syzygy makes a decent point for context of the story. Dasenthal makes a good point for reward outweighing cost.

But I just want to make it stated that daily time gating should NEVER, EVER, EVER (plus ultra caps) become a norm for things. And I hope nothing new ever has such a thing again. It is annoying enough with Ascended crafting and Mawdrey II crafting. At least Charged Quartz Crystals have so few uses.

Ardenwolfe.8590:

nGumball.1283:

They never said they won’t do an expansion.

Actually, they have. This statement was somewhat retracted in 2013 by Mike O’Brien. He hinted, in an interview, that expansions were a possibility . . . but not any time in the near future.

“We don’t need an expansion to pay the bills, and we’re not focused on an expansion right now. I won’t try and predict the future, maybe someday we will do one, maybe we won’t. But for now we are focused on the living world. We believe we can update the world and adapt the world in any way we want to through these bi-weekly updates.”

http://www.pcgamesn.com/guildwars/guild-wars-2s-future-we-dont-need-expansion-pay-bills

All signs point to no expansion next year. Sorry. Not happening.

1. He didn’t say no expansion here. Or anywhere. It was only ever stated that they want to see if they can make the Living World replace the concept of expansions. Content-wise, sans the temporary nature of S1, I’d say it’d worked… but promotional-wise, I think the Living World is horrible.
2. “not any time in the near future.” I’m pretty sure 2 years timespan counts as “not in the near future”

Mental Paradox.3845:

LA won that war thanks to the Risen. Zhaitan’s defeated now. Scarlet weakened LA critically. Remember the guard that says they don’t even have enough personell for one shift? How could they possibly resist the entire Krytan army?

Lion’s Arch is also its own independent city-state that has alliances with the other four major races at this point, on top of other groups such as centaurs (that’s more of a peace agreement though) and Zephyrites.

Mental Paradox.3845:

Also, Edair was a fool. I wouldn’t attack LA from the water – that’s insanity. Naval power is what LA is best at. I’d develop airships like the ones used by the pact and attack them from the sky. Bomb them into the ground, then send in ground forces.

You didn’t read the book did you? Edair not only created a naval blockade with a fleet that the Lion’s Arch fleet (what little there was at the time) could not withstand (they only survived thanks to the risen), but also created a land blockade across northern Lion’s Arch, preventing all trade route access. Edair created a 360 blockade around the entire city.

Also, you do not simply develop something unheard of before. You can say “I’d develop airships!” because you know such would work, but can you think of something completely new to yourself in every way and expect it to not only work, but be useful in combat situations?

This said, your posts convince me that you’re a bit of an egomaniac and I am glad you are not a world leader.

Cooking it burns your hands and destroys kitchen equipment.

They are literally crystals.

I’m fairly sure that injecting/consuming bloodstone dust would be more akin to using meth.

And, uh, let’s not forget the fact that we slowly KILLED a grawl over the course of three days by feeding him bloodstone-based foods and broths.

I’m fairly sure this is all a part of ArenaNet saying “there will be no Ascended chef crafting, at least none that utilizes bloodstone dust, because it is not edible.”

Mental Paradox.3845:

Aaron Ansari.1604:

But the timeframe, though… yeah, I’ve got no excuses there. ArenaNet has always had a bit of a problem with times and distances. That all of this happened in a year is no more hard to believe than that the dwarvern civilization never progressed beyond swords and bows in 10,000 years.

I hate to invoke real life here, but humans in the real world also used spears, bows and arrows for 100,000 years – guns have only been around a few centuries. Aircraft 110 years. Internet, which we take for granted today, was a nerd’s fantasy 20 years ago. Smartphones are also only 5-6 years old. My point is that we’re in a period of exponential progress.

Tyria could work the same way. This war against the dragons may have been the best thing to ever happen to the world – it caused races to unite, and those races to develop more and more advanced tech/magitech in a short time.

While normally I’d agree, there are three issues:

1. The date given for the invention of stone, wood, and steel weaponry is 10,000 BE; the supposed date of the last dragonrise.
2. The world of Tyria, unlike Earth, has magic which alters the source of technological advancement (or logically should).
3. During the time of the said above date given for the invention of stone, wood, and steel weaponry there were at least two – if not four – magically advanced civilizations, namely the mursaat, Seers, and potentially Forgotten and jotun, not including the giganticus lupicus whom, while said to not use weapons of stone, wood, and steel, did have cybernetic augmentations based off of the risen G-Lupe seen in Arah (which is, indeed, a cyborg of some degree).

These three points combined call into question the notion of 10,000 years of lacking technological, magical, or magitechnological advancements.

That’s incorrect, Aaron. They do have internal organs, they just are dramatically different from that of animals. It was clarified by Ree Soesbee that the blog post you linked to was unclear, and meant that they don’t have organs like animals do – they do have a digestive system (it’s even been recently stated that their poop is mulch).

So I’d say that since they have a digestive system, they do fart. Farts form from chemicals being made during digestion.

The Pact didn’t really invent. They innovated.

Rifles, as said, were around for quite some time. We see pistols even in Sea of Sorrows novel – 100 years before the game. Handheld guns were invented first by charr, though became widespread relatively fast, and a lot of groups had cannons well before.

The charr were already working on submarine and helicopter prototypes in the very beginning of the game, but weren’t ready for field use. Humans already had hot air balloons and asura already had blimps amd both had flying magical devices of their own designs – they just weren’t really combat worthy; that’s where the Pact came in.

As for why still use catapults and trebuchets …. well, the turrets appear to be harder to move about, but they do use them further in the field. And they actually very rarely use catapults and trebuchetes. In fact, I can’t think of a single case of either being used – mortars, yes, those are used at all the Silverwastes forts, and burning oil, but not catapults and trebuchet.

TL;DR Most Pact technology stems from the charr, but most of it was charr prototypes – they couldn’t get things to work properly yet. Humans and asura (perhaps norn and sylvari) butting in and giving opinions pushed them along faster.

narwhalsbend.7059:

In real life, technology progresses based on past inventions, but if this is true, how did helicopter technology progress from the current Pact Helicopters to the KT-29 Moahawk that the Ebon Vanguard uses at some point in the future? They are very different.

GW1’s april fool’s jokes are, unlike SAB, not canon lore as far as all indications go.

And even if they were, nothing says that they are of the future we experience, rather than say, a fractal or ‘potential future’ like the infinity ball storyline.

Yeah, it’s easy to get too many.

I kind of wish we could salvage dark matter for ecto or crystalline dust. Heck, even T5 dust will be fine with me. :P Or merching them.

I’m expecting the fixes no latter than next Feature Batch.

Which will be post-Season 2, most likely. So… February/March? :/

Though yes, an update so that we don’t get our expectations up again would be nice.

perilisk.1874:

The corollary is that if you don’t love Guitar Hero, don’t play it. It’s just AP.

Meta achievement reward says otherwise.

That said, 500 notes is not hard. This is my internet connection, during the good times:

http://www.speedtest.net/result/3945990167.png

And I Manage Perfect scores8. Maybe the OP needs to know when to hit the notes. Hint: it’s *after they pass the line. I set my camera to bird’s eye view for bell choir.

If this doesn’t work then listen to the songs and find whichever of the three octaves (upper, middle, lower) that you work best with and memorize when the notes should hit. Use music rather than your sight.

Also make sure you’re hitting the right keys.

Aaron Ansari.1604:

Horses are up in the air.

Thinking about this again, I’d have to argue that there’s no way they’re up in the air.

The argument of horses being “extinct in the known world” falls short because of when Seraph compare the centaurs to three different kinds of horse breeds. The very fact that an average Seraph not only mentions different kinds of horse breeds but also expects the other party to know indicates that there’s common knowledge – to some degree – of horse breeds. Meaning that it’d be at least possible for the average joe to differentiate between different horse breeds; which in turn means that the average joe would have had enough interaction and/or teaching and/or viewing of different horse breeds. This is unlikely to ever occur if horses were long extinct.

Except, Big Tower, you miss this line from Ogden:

Ogden Stonehealer: “The brotherhood believed that she would one day become an Elder Dragon. She was old and wise, well on her way.”

This referring to Glint, who was a dragon champion. So apparently, it is at least believed that champions can become an Elder Dragon, given time and magical consumption free of an Elder Dragon.

Y’know, I probably would buy that kind of merchandise.

Shame the mold broke.

Palador.2170:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Jan Living World

I take it this means “The Living World for January”?

What happens if that release bugs out and crashes? Does he come by your desk and smash your present? Take it away from you until the problems are hot fixed?

January 2014, when The Origins of Madness, which featured the triple headed ancient great jungle wurm (mouthful eh?) being released into the world of Tyria.

Edit: Wait, if the mold broke after three heads were cast… does that mean each head were colored a different color?

To match each of the three heads?

That would be double awesome.

I’d keep fan-made symbols separate, personally.

I was intending to try to get in contact with Matthew Medina. Maybe he can send us the remaining, and maybe if we find all the New Krytan words in Orr we can fan-translate and send them for the art team to subtly change. Ahhhh, here’s wishful thinking.

Randulf.7614:

They stated a few weeks back there will be some changes reverted back in the mission sequence, but that it was a time consuming job and there was no time frame for completion

Technically all they said is that they are working on fixing the issue. They never said the word “revert” in any variation, synonym, or synonym’s variation.

The ornament thing is a collection achievement. Within the Basic Collections tab, rather than the Wintersday tab.

You just need to unlock it before Wintersday ends, by all appearances.

Which is weird.

Shiren.9532:

PeterFries.1057:

By all means, continue to direct your writing criticisms at me. It may not seem like it at times to you (bearing in mind that we’re working ahead), but are we doing our best to make course-corrections to address your concerns.

I wanted to bring this up for a while but I found out after the relevant thread got replaced by a new release.

At the end of The Dragon’s Reach part 2 the plot of Canache spying on the Pact for Anise was revealed. At the time I was concerned that, as a Pact Commander – or just a charr with more loyalty to Trahearne than Anise, I was going to be written as hearing that conversation and just ignore Canache’s presence within the Pact later on without mentioning he’s a spy.

After his next appearance (during the mission with Caithe) the player has some… aggressive dialogue I and many other players were annoyed with. I personally read the dialogue to be critical of Canache’s past (the events on Southsun) and unforgiving of him or unwilling to see his value in a more important fight (against Mordremoth).

In a Points of Interest episode you discussed this and said that the player’s dialogue was meant to reflect the Pact Commander’s attitude towards Canach, not only because he was our adversary on Southun, but because we know his “hidden”(?) motive to spy on an organisation we are loyal to.

As a player who a) wanted to see our PCs stay loyal to the Pact and not ignore Canach’s mission, and b) didn’t like the voice given to my PC when talking to Canach, I personally don’t feel like the intention came across well in-game. I wish my PC had specifically addressed him being sent to spy as opposed to talking to him all high and mighty. I didn’t feel like the dialogue represented my issues with knowing him to spy on the Pact but rather it came across as a moral judgement of his past behaviours.

First off, I don’t watch PoI so I missed this.

Second off, the intention fell even more off when in E7, we’re still mean to Canach, but close by saying “oh, and say high to Anise for me” (regardless of race – seems weird for a charr). That came off to me as “my PC is a jerk to Canach and doesn’t care that Anise is spying, in fact, my PC likes Anise so he’ll just use this sylvari as a messenger to say high to my human bff”

Just don’t see any mistrust over Canach basically having “Hi, I’m Spy” hanging over his head, it all feels directed toward Canach’s past… And my PC being a relentless kitten wipe.

Herbal remedies not only predate germ theory, but worked and are still used today, even being the basis for some simpler medicines.

Also, just not having a germ theory doesn’t mean they’ll be completely unsanitary. The acts of hygiene well preceded the prevalence of the germ theory in the mid 1500s, going back to the Roman and Greek civilizations if not earlier. There would also be more concepts of surgery than just amputation except for hack doctors (no pun intended), and bloody equipment rusts, they’d clean it off, as well as their own hands. I’m fairly sure the concept of boiling water to make it taste better precedes the germ theory too.

Basically the germ theory did not create all these acts of hygiene, but rather explained why these long-existing acts of hygiene actually work. They were done because they knew “hey, we can get sick if we don’t” but they didn’t know why they’d get sick.

A few things of note, Serophous:

Serophous.9085:

Lets go back to ls1 when we first meet brahm. Rytlock doesn’t believe what he says, and is “too busy”. Looking back, this could suggest he was researching a way to get rid of the ghosts already.

He was too busy due to the huge influx of sudden refugees brought by the Molten Alliance attacks. The entire leadership at the Black Citadel was – hence Rox’s first instance with the meeting of tribunes and Imperator Smodur.

Serophous.9085:

The one pic we see him with fiery eyes. Could he be possessed? Unsure. He could also, once again, going through some ritual or spell to protect himself. We don’t know what books he was looking in to when figuring out the ghosts.

This was just concept art for the ritual, presumably. The concept art, while used as a loading screen, did not make it in-game visually. And it doesn’t seem to have held any significance thus far. I would take its canonocity with a small grain of salt.

It wasn’t part of the twitter teasers either.

Serophous.9085:

Next we see him with a blindfold on, and wearing a different armor. There is also the quote “my journey has just begun”. In other words, after the initial trial, he has yet to prove himself. So he was given another quest.

I think this isn’t “proving himself” so much as his return to Tyria.

Serophous.9085:

Again, he dove into the mists, went through some trial, and was given a new mission. So, who are “they”? Well, my first thought are the ghosts, that since mord was able to attack scarlet through omads machine (and maybe the machine actually sent her to the mists, and not the eternal alchemy). That and with the gods gone, there really isn’t anyone guarding or stopping intrusions. This part I want to believe, but I don’t know enough about the dragons (technically no one does) to know if they possess this kind of power.

Mordremoth is more about Mind, not spirits or the Mists. That’d be Jormag, if any Elder Dragon, who is the only dragon to have known influence on the Mists (though Zhaitan supposedly did draw at least one spirit from Grenth’s domain).

And why would ghosts become gw1-scarab-like plants?

Serophous.9085:

The second theory is rytlock was sent out of the mists some how, and went to the second pale tree (discovered that there may be a second one by doing the sylvari story line). This one probably wasn’t able to defend against the dragons attacks, and once the tree fell, her children were corrupted and twisted.

Possible. I’ve heard thoughts that Rytlock ended up coming out of the Mists at the old Temple of Balthazar that was in the Falls.

Serophous.9085:

I believe (just a belief) that the person who gave glints egg to the master WAS the pale tree with the plans told to him what to do when mord awakens. It would explain why mord wants the egg so badly.

The voice of the being that gave the Master the egg was a deep, masculine voice.

Doesn’t fit the Pale Tree at all.

Serophous.9085:

Note though, the sword isn’t by his side still.

Actually, you can just barely see it, but it does seem to be on him in the final picture (“Be ready for anything”) we’ve gotten. On his left side, you can see the hilt. It clips with his armor though, and as such is mostly beneath the armor’s flaps.

Serophous.9085:

The final pic Shows an up close pic, and we fully see the new armor along with “be ready for anything”. In theory, rytlock probably reported back to whoever sent him out, and they are ready to move.

I think they’re quoting Rytlock’s lines from E8, personally. The first images for the No Point of Return teasers we’ve been getting were quoting E3 and E4 stuff, and the latter ones that point to what we’ve seen, such as the Master of Peace’s “I have something I can no longer protect” is again, quoting the NPC’s words in Season 2.

So I think that these will be phrases we’ll be hearing personally when we see Rytlock again (presumably E8).

I get sick and when I’m nearly better and ready to work on this (about), you go and have it done.

GG

Now get a translation grid on the wiki. :P

And explain the code.

I’m highly curious.

PeterFries.1057:

Sorry. It’s being looked into right now, but I’m not a part of that process and there really isn’t anything to talk about yet.

I think folks just want an inside look on the current stance, not what’s being looked into. Though knowing it’s “being looked into” is nice.

Makes me wonder how high on the list that means it is, though.

PeterFries.1057:

Oh, one more thing: sorry for threadjacking this discussion so badly :/

Shhhhhhh, the mods will come and close it if you mention threadjacking!

BuddhaKeks.4857:

Show Spoiler

hide spoiler

Please don’t tell my french ex-girlfriend I said that, she punched me for lesser things x_x

I lul’d.

Titus.4285:

What if the Tengu built the wall to defend Baede’s Kryta, not to defend their own (we haven’t seen any walls on the other side, have we?). E.g. like part of a trade agreement for the land they’re now in posession of. Of course, that purpose may have changed by now though.

Novel maps show that the Dominion of Winds wall is all encircling.

Mental Paradox.3845:

I expected this kind of response.

It’s pretty clear to me. You have no backbone.
Don’t do it because whatever’s in there has value – do it out of principle.
Humanity has already surrendered WAY too much. Ascalon to the Charr, LA to pirate scum and a traitor, and now this vast piece of land by the Tengu.

Enough is enough.

You call it backbone.

I call it stupidity.

Leave yourself a buffer for when kitten hits the fan. Always. Don’t weaken yourself before the stronger enemy by fighting a weaker enemy. If you read Sea of Sorrows, Prince Edair attempted to do exactly what you suggested but with Lion’s Arch, and what happened? Oh yes, his entire fleet got wiped out by the Risen.

Lion’s Arch didn’t have that big kitten wall the tengu had either.

King Baede was the smart one by letting Lion’s Arch go, letting them take the brunt of all the attacks. But at the same time he infiltrated their leadership twice. He was a manipulative kitten who saw the benefit in letting go of a little land to keep an enemy off his people’s backs.

What’s more important? A city, or your nation’s citizens’ lives? An island no one cared for, or your nation’s citizens’ lives?

I disagree with that statement, Aaron. ArenaNet has stated in the past that they cannot – thus do not attempt – to render all life in Tyria. With the scaling, that would make the world full of things. This includes most wildlife, and as such there’d be wildlife we do not see in explorable Tyria.

This may very well include horses.

The fact of the matter is that we just don’t know if horses exist in Kryta, Ascalon, etc. And if they do, what kinds of breeds. We just know that multiple breeds of horses are known to humans in the general sense (there’s a Seraph soldier who compares the three centaur tribes to draft horses and other kinds of horses which indicates not just separate breeds of horses, but domestication of horses in the past if not also present).

I don’t recall a gate dumping asura outside Thaumanova without a receiving gate… The only asura gate related stuff near Thaumanova I recall was the gates leading to and fro the Inner Inquest Complex – there’s two gates there. All other teleportation is a result of the chaos magic explosion.

As to two gates attuning – this is only for modern gates, and the gate Logan, Rytlock, and Caithe stumbled upon seemed to be from the previous generation (which had one set destination and could supposedly only need one side activated to work – hence the need to destroy the gates in EotN, both times).

PeterFries.1057:

There currently isn’t UI implemented in the game to display something like a lore book. We have some places that we can display longer text strings, like those summaries in our recently-added Story Journal UI, but conversational text strings have to be kept within a certain length to account for things like German localization.

There’s not a lot that’s “simple” to implement in a game as complicated as an MMO like ours, unfortunately.

Lore books are something we’d like to see happen, but I can’t promise they are on the way soon or anything.

I am now picturing one of those odd superlong German words taking up the entire conversation box….

I can totally see that happening if you aren’t careful.

I’m a bit curious though: what was wrong with the original beta creature codex books’ system? They played a full-screen cinematic with cycling paragraphs of text (usually 3 from those we saw). They aren’t what people usually attribute to in-game readable books, being text-based repeating cinematics, but still I’m curious as to what was “wrong” with those creature codices.

What is it that prevents a different kind of conversational pop up box from, well, popping up? You can have interaction result in a large number of things, as well as item uses. So it’s rather curious.

We know there are still horses in modern times. From Edge of Destiny page 97:

Visions. Beautiful visions…a grassy plain where wild horses ran…a deep lagoon encircled by leaning palsm….a great glacier with snowcapped peaks in blue… a sere desert where crystalline statues stood…

These being some depictions where the malfunctioning asura gate flashed to. Now, we know that – prior to experimental teleportation in 1325 AE – asura gates can only lead to another asura gate. So all of these locations had to be where the asura had been.

And come to think of it, I wonder why we never tried deciphering all those locations. Noticing it, those “crystalline statues” intrigue me now…

PeterFries.1057:

Iason Evan.3806:

It just needs to be tighter during the meat of the rising action and tension and body of the story for it to work as a complete thing.

Got it. Tighter meat.

Hah. Sadly, it seems like Elysian’s suggestion is the only serious one when you’ve written it like that. :P

Paradox.1380:

Peter has made this thread… incredibly entertaining to read. Also Mmm Bloodstone Waffles. Gah that joke is the best i laughed so hard when my friend linked me the recipe for that.

Recipe? I feel I’m missing something here.

wwwes.1398:

Maybe I’ve just binge-watched Buffy on Netflix too much lately, but they do a really good job at the “big bad” long term stories, and it always involves exposition that comes from library and throwing around ideas in a big group after the action ends.

You say that like it’s a bad thing to watch a lot of Buffy (and Angel).

And yeah, those shows do have interesting long-term villains/rivals.

Oi, oi…

I wonder how many times “are there any horses in Tyria” will be asked in a new thread. Anet, please fix your search engine…

Short answer: yes, there are horses.

Long answer: Read this, the most recent thread

Horses don’t seem to be the primary mount, however. Only humans have ever been known to ride them – in Orr and Cantha, particularly – though this doesn’t say much. Dolyaks are common mounts in concept art and by the stone summit dwarves in GW1 (as were snow beasts, which aren’t seen in GW2 sadly), and I’d imagine that oxen, marmox (marmoxen?), and possibly even mosshearts (for sylvari) to be mounts – basically, any beast of burden caravan animal seen in GW2 may be potentially used as mounts.

As for medicines, there’s no explicit mention of the level of quality for medicines, but I’d imagine Renaissance era kinds of things. With magical healing, there doesn’t seem to be a huge rush to figure out proper “mundane” (or alchemical) medications. Elixers brewed from various herbs that sooth particular ailments and the like.

Healing magic is more or less a catch all as I understand it. There was an interview stating that typically biological understanding is not necessary for healing magic (though the existence of Menders in sylvari society proves that this does not go past the animal/plant barrier), but I presume that the level of magical healing used differs from society to society – asura likely use it the most, then sylvari, human, and norn, then charr the least (of the main races, this is).

I doubt Tyrians would know or care about glucose levels. Especially given that’s overall not a very major thing despite the product labeling claims (which are more or less the product of a very, very, very noisy singular individual over a matter that very few people actually need to watch for).

I don’t see why tengu=Primordus. They’re hardly underground related. They just have a presumably minor destroyer problem.

Oenanthe.6549:

I am no computer dev, and I guess it might be too hard to do, but I would love to see some gradual improvement, a bridge mended here, rubble cleared away there, that type of thing to make it look as if the workers were actually achieving something.

I doubt it would be too hard. Program wise, they do this already with things like the giant vines in Silverwastes. They just need to code a specific model from switching from version A to version B (much like destructible objects, though in this case in reverse) with an animation to fit that (probably the typical swirling animation that goes with most rebuilding event animations).

The hardest work, I imagine, for such would be to create all the visuals for all those stages of development and structures.

Gulesave.5073:

For those who haven’t been paying close attention: the reconstruction has indeed been progressing, albeit slowly. Every time I run a character around the city, I notice something that wasn’t there a month or two ago.

It’s hard to notice unless you run around and look, and it would be a great help if there was a little more focus on cutting down the rubble and patching holes.

You sure? I’ve been pretty observant – or so I like to think – but have only noticed changes occur during the Festival of the Four Winds update. After that, I haven’t seen any change.

If there have been changes, they need to be more obvious then.

I’m glad to see some merriment (albeit brought about by sad times) on this forum. We need more of it, to show the better side of the gw community – the community I learned to love and enjoy back in GW1 days. I tend to feel like it’s lessened since those days, but posts like this… reminds me that it isn’t, at least as much as I tend to think.

I hope things work out for the best for you, Sylv.

Aaron Ansari.1604:

perilisk.1874:

Konig Des Todes.2086:

What I don’t expect:

• The Pact getting their butts handed to them, at least in a permanently damaging way.

The Pact getting their butts handed to them would make uniting the traditional forces of the five races to fight Mordremoth, a thread that began this season with the meeting at the Pale Tree, even more imperative.

It would also give the PC (Pact Commander, convenient acronym) something to do in a future season in terms of building them back up. Trahearne could give us a little cube to help things along.

But it would also feel like retreading old ground, even worse than episodes 3 and 4 did- and I remember those taking quite a bit of criticism in that regard. Increased national support is good and all, but at this point they either have to be complete imbeciles to ignore what threatens them, or so far out of the line of fire that they have no motivation to help us no matter how many one-sentence arguments we throw at them.

There’s two big issues I see with the whole “Pact getting their buts kicked”

Firstly, we already have the nations’ supports. They all have their own issues, so they can’t give much. What they can give, they’ve sent. The Pact’s defeat now is the same as Tyria’s defeat. Because if the nations give any more, then they’re defenseless to the Nightmare Court, the bandits and centaurs, the Sons of Svanir, the Flame Legion, ghosts, branded, renegades, and separatists (I’m actually rather amazed that the charr are giving all they are given Iron Legion’s hold-ups – but then again, there’s two other legions beyond what controls Ascalon).

Secondly, as Aaron said, having to rebuild the Pact would just be the same old same old. We did this in the Personal Story, and we did this in Episodes 3 and 4. I’d rather have new concepts tossed in. Expanding the Pact is no doubt inevitable, however, as with each battle there will be losses needed to be recovered. But rather than rebuilding with pre-existing forces, such would be better off with new forces, new nations, and delving deep into those groups’ lore. We had a go with the minor races in this to a small degree in the PS, but what of other races? What of kodan and tengu and largos and so forth?

I don’t think I ever put words into your mouth. I actually requested words from your mouth. Those words being your support for your argument.

You presented your theory, but no support for said theory.

I never said you were trolling, but now with those two attachments, I do think you are trolling.

My desires:

• New zone; double or triple the number of story steps
• Explanation of and obtaining the egg, and the ‘golden location’
• World Boss with the mordrem plant
• A giant catastrophe at the very end that leads into an expansion that focuses on fighting Mordremoth.
• Rytlock’s return.
• New confrontation with Shadow of the Dragon at golden location.

My expectations:

• Cliffhanger
• Little progress
• Still no egg
• Still no explanation
• aka E6 and E7 repeated

I’m keeping my expectations low so that I can be pleasantly disproven.

What I don’t expect:

• The Pact getting their butts handed to them, at least in a permanently damaging way.

ElysianEternity.6215:

The biggest highlight beside Glint’s lair was the Library in EP5. Now I’ve read that Leah isn’t so fond of lore-dump expositions and I agree that it’s not the best way to go about lore in general.

I think Leah was referring more to things like A Study in Scarlet where the entire purpose was to dump lore exposition, rather than Hidden Arcana, which had optional lore in the background. Prosperity’s Mystery was the former as well, though much better disguised.

One is forced on the player.
The other is optional.

@Mental: Whoever said that the tengu forced it? Maybe they paid Kryta for the land, or made some other kind of agreement.

At the time they established the Dominion of Winds proper, Lion’s Arch was a fledgling state and Kryta had bigger concerns (establishing DR, the establishment of LA, re-establishing farmlands due to the floods, etc.). With their apparently recent expansion into what was western D’Alessio Seaboard, they could easily have made agreements with either Kryta or LA.

At the time of the Dominion’s establishment, Jennah didn’t even exist. The one in charge was King Baede, who allowed the establishment of Lion’s Arch as a separate nation due to the Dead Ship incursion – basically, he allowed someone else to take the brunt of the damage and responsibility of keeping Elder Dragon hordes at bay. The tengu could have been allowed for the same reason.

Your comparison to the US is poor at best. Kryta had just taken major damage and still had many enemies. The two groups they let grow put a force between Kryta and Kryta’s newest (and potentially greatest) enemy: Zhaitan.

So that’d be like say, someone nuked the five most populated cities of the US + the White House, though the president and congress survived, and someone took Alaska after it had been abandoned for decades (but hospitable); the nukes came from Russia. The people who took Alaska are not only now in between the recovering US and the attackers, but enemies of the attackers as well.

Would you really put in forces to retake Alaska, or would you let Alaska take any brunt of Russia’s attack?

And your comment of “their own home” is false. All that remained on Sanctum Cay even by GW1’s time was an abandoned monastery. It was a deserted island.

PeterFries.1057:

BuddhaKeks.4857:

Well if his last name is any indication he is probably a frisian and in Germany they are known to be exceptionally cunning… uhm no wait they are known for something “different”

:(

JayMack.8295:

Aww, I want a post it note on your desk with my name on it…

Bwuahahaha. Keep thus up and your desk will be covered in post-it notes for naming players. :P
Btw, where’s mine?

Uhm…. The PC should start nicknaming all of the biconics. Rox is Eyes, Marjory is Spooks, Kasmeer is Doll, Taimi is Short Stuff, Braham is Wolfie, and Canach is ’Stache (for his cool ’vari mustache).

Nothing says those journals came from an extraordinary individual.

And you STILL have zero evidence backing your claim.

Arcana is a trait for elementalist… but what is arcana? The short answer? We don’t know. It’s just a term for a fifth trait of elementalists that deals with magic that can effect all four attunements. A pre-attunement magic is the best description we can apply to it.

But nothing even hints at the notion that arcana = ether. Nothing at all.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Astralporing.1957:

BlueBoy.1236:

Ascended and legendaries are luxury items.

BiS is not a luxury.

Please point to the content that you can’t complete in exotics… if there is some content that is physically impossible to complete in full exotic gear then ascended is no longer a luxury but is required. Otherwise it is a luxury item.

High level fractals?

Warbands are of a single legion.

But warband members can switch legions to join a new warband – albeit very rarely (every time in the PS, it’s Rytlock’s doing, sometimes via calling in a favor, after you impressed him with helping take down Barradin). If they do this, however, they are no longer a member of the previous legion. They are of the warband’s legion now.