I think Kiel is part of doing it for Magnus but I think the motivations are much more simple than many people think. From the Short Story about Ellen, it suggests that they may be closer than just commander and officer. Magnus may see Ellen in a.. maybe no child role but neice maybe. Putting her name forward may be his way of trying to help her in life. Likewise Ellen may be trying to make Magnus proud.
Id love to find out more about their relationship. We do know that Ellen is an orphan, was saved by Magnus as a child and that they have known each other for a long time.
As for weither Kiel is Magnus’s pocket, I suspect its hard to say at this point. Ellen has a strong sense of conviction. It might be interesting if something causes them to disagree and end up going against each other.
Also if people want to argue that Kiel is a puppet of Magnus, then people should also remember that Evon set up the BLT company working for the Ash Legion. Evon could quite possibly still serve the Ash Legion which would put Lion’s Arch political power in the hands of another national group.
Lion’s Arch needs the growth that Gnashblade can provide; like Yomm before him, Gnashblade holds the right talent to make Lion’s Arch thrive.
The Captain’s Council already has merchants and and money men in its ranks. Evon doesnt really offer it much that it hasnt already got in that department. If anything, Evon could represent the same threat to Lion’s Arch that Yomm was in that his market strength could grow too dominant, allowing him to shoulder out the opposition and set laws to favor a monopoly.
Also Gnashblade is in the pocket of the Ash Legion. Do you really want to give a outside power governmental power in LA and undermine its independance?
Plus Kiel is a woman that will vote on her convictions which could be interesting as it could set her against the other council members at times. Gnashblade is just another business man.
as a serious note, what can we learn from the thaumanova fractal that we cant from just raiding inquest bases? isnt it a failed inquest experiment? where did the talk of “OMG DISTROYERS!11!” come from? its been on a few talk pages already
I believe their were unconfermed reports of Destroyers at the Reactor just before it exploded. Frankly, the thing with the reactor is it wasnt just another research base. It was the heart of Inquest research into the EDs. Knowing what actually trigger that explosion could tell us alot about the actual nature of the EDs and perhaps even their origins!
Clearly we should all vote Kiel. She is an upstanding and loyal Lion’s Archian with strong convictions while Evon is a dirty Ash Legion agent with hidden agendas. Plus Evon probably smells funny and just imagine how much of a mess he would make at the council meetings while he was molting. Cat fur…. everywhere.
I can assure you, Evon keeps himself well-groomed. And I don’t know why you would care what the council smells like. Furthermore, Evon is anything but “just another business man.” He’s the head of the freaking Black Lion Trading Company. If anything, he would know how to run a city — something Kiel seriously lacks. Kiel doesn’t even really want to do this — Magnus does. The Lion Guard are just trying to garner more power over the city.
Lion’s Arch is supposed to be a city of diversity. Are you telling me you’ll vote against Evon just because he’s a charr? Shame on you. >:(
Well, we all know the Black Lion Trading company is a front for a power play by the ash legion into LA’s economy. Same issue applies to Evon having a leadership role. Conflict of Interest. After all I wouldnt vote for someone I knew took orders from the Ministry either. Not good practice for maintaining LA’s independance.
And sure Kiel might not know much about running the city but she is smart, steady and a quick thinker and has a strong moral compass. The council already has many members who know how to run the city.
I hope you guys realize it doesn’t matter who you vote for because Evon’s going to stuff the ballot box.
Ellen’s only chance is to catch him in the act.
Evon is not that kind of Charr.
Well he is Ash Legion…..
I’m sure you’re aware that he succeeded. They succeeded in doing everything. That is, until it was Logan’s turn to play guard. Then he bailed to help a queen who ended up doing most of the work herself. And lets not forget about Riona. She almost killed the chances of Charr and Humans working out a truce. Admit it — Humans can rarely be trusted.
Well it was also the queen that arranged the truce between the two factions and a human who actually recovered the Claw of Khan-Ur.
It does raise the issue of divided loyalties though…. Ellen has lived in LA since she was a child. Evon on the other hand was sent to LA by the Ash Legion to extablish the BLT company… Where does Evon’s loyalty really lie if he has to choose between the Ash Legion or LA? hmm…..
Hehe:P This election stuff is more fun than I thought it would be.
I agree with Konig’s assessment.
However the last book got me thinking…..
Seriously, spoilers if you havent read the book:
What is it with GW2 books and the need to have an asura die heroicly at the end of each of them?
Lion’s Arch needs the growth that Gnashblade can provide; like Yomm before him, Gnashblade holds the right talent to make Lion’s Arch thrive.
The Captain’s Council already has merchants and and money men in its ranks. Evon doesnt really offer it much that it hasnt already got in that department. If anything, Evon could represent the same threat to Lion’s Arch that Yomm was in that his market strength could grow too dominant, allowing him to shoulder out the opposition and set laws to favor a monopoly.
Also Gnashblade is in the pocket of the Ash Legion. Do you really want to give a outside power governmental power in LA and undermine its independance?
Plus Kiel is a woman that will vote on her convictions which could be interesting as it could set her against the other council members at times. Gnashblade is just another business man.
as a serious note, what can we learn from the thaumanova fractal that we cant from just raiding inquest bases? isnt it a failed inquest experiment? where did the talk of “OMG DISTROYERS!11!” come from? its been on a few talk pages already
I believe their were unconfermed reports of Destroyers at the Reactor just before it exploded. Frankly, the thing with the reactor is it wasnt just another research base. It was the heart of Inquest research into the EDs. Knowing what actually trigger that explosion could tell us alot about the actual nature of the EDs and perhaps even their origins!
Clearly we should all vote Kiel. She is an upstanding and loyal Lion’s Archian with strong convictions while Evon is a dirty Ash Legion agent with hidden agendas. Plus Evon probably smells funny and just imagine how much of a mess he would make at the council meetings while he was molting. Cat fur…. everywhere.
Part of this was that they turned away from magic big time after the flame legion went down. Another part I believe came from the Charr discovering abandoned old dwarven storehouses with blackpower. Thats what started off their revolution in tech.
Also to be fair, we didnt actually see much of the Iron Legion in GW1. What we see in GW:EN is Blood Legion (and it sounds like they still specialise in warbeasts including seige devourers) while early Prophecies is mostly Flame Legion. Though they were certainly behind humans at the time, they may have had enough of the basics to take what they recovered from the dwarves and start their own thing.
I agree though its something it would be nice to have alot more information about.
Novels I can understand. The short stories I suspect are a product of the bimonthly Living Story updates. Updating the Living Story so often leaves less time to hire voice actors, and it would probably be a waste of money pay someone to deliver lore through voice when it’s going to be all but forgotten in a month anyway.
So you’d prefer some huge walls of text on npcs instead? No thanks.
No, I’d prefer voiced dialogue.
Firstly, the LS teams have a four month production cycle which is plenty of time to handle VA.
Secondly, the short story is done as an addition by someone who has no role in the programing side of the game. Shes a narative designer.
Thirdly, VA work takes alot more time, resources, work, money and people to produce so naturally they arent going to be able to do as much if they VA everything. Also it adds the issue of telling detail in story without forcing players who arent actually interested to stand around and listen to NPC’s drone on.
People need to be realistic in their expectations. The story points in the short stories will come into the game as the story of the NPCs expand but the reality is that the more VA a peice of ingame lore has, the less detail we will get on the lore.
We really lose nothing ingame from having the short stories. Its not like Angel is leaving stuff out of the game because she is writing the short stories. This is something extra she is doing.
Why can’t the game’s story be told exclusively in-game rather than through website short stories and book store novels?
I don’t read your little short stories, ArenaNet, and there isn’t a chance in the Underworld that I will ever buy one of your novels. There was another very popular game that began selling novels to explain the lore and to reveal key plot lines. I don’t play that game anymore because of those cash-grabbing tactics.
As it stands, I haven’t a clue what is happening in-game, in regards to the plot/story and I blame you, ArenaNet.
There isnt anything in the novels that isnt explained in game sufficantly to explain the events and their impact. This is particularly the case with Destiny’s Edge. Hell, the Scavanger Hunt gives several important points on the story behind Sea of Sorrows.
Novels and short story’s allow a different method of storytelling that wouldn’t be as easily in game. Take Ellen’s new short story. Sure they could tell you in game that she lost her parents at sea as a kid but it wouldnt paint the same picture.
There was an interesting interview with several of the narative design people recently that pretty much said that these stories are ones they intent to tell in game but need to find the right way to. Marjory or Braham arent just going to recount in detail key turning points in their lives without reference and when they have only just met you. Again, they wont be told in the same way and with the ‘at the moment’ detail you can get in the novels or the short stories but the story will probably be told.
The other thing to consider is resource allocation. The writing of a short story takes one person who may have the time spare to write it. The novels are mostly written by novelists. Ree wrote one and Jeff co wrote one but I dont think it came out of their game development job time much. Actually having voiced NPC conversations to transmit the same quantity of story and with the same detail just isn’t pratical.
I would like to see more lore ingame. However what we get from the short stories (so far) and the novels wouldnt have the same ‘emotion’ to it as you get in the written media of a novel/short story. One type of media doesnt exclude the other. It also needs to be skipable for those with no interest.
I would like the idea of collectable knowledge. Having books similar to the ones in ebonhawke which recount events and important details of the world of Tyria would be fantastic.
Rapid temperature change is mainly kitten a body if it keeps happening. I once worked at a grocer and had to get things from the freezer. The freezer was set below 0. Outside, in the middle of summer, it was in the mid 30s degrees celcius.
The only time it caused me a problem was once when I had to continually bring alot of stock out of the freezer. I went in and out of the freezer many times in an hour and before the end of my shift I felt very sick. However its relatively easy to adapt to the temperature otherwise as long as it isnt too extreme, particularly if you dressed for it.
That was a consideration of mine, as well. It seems to have been established that Evon is still a member in good standing with the Ash Legion (called it!), but this means, well, he is still a member in good standing with the Ash Legion. Putting him on the LA council is effectively giving Malice Swordshadow a vote on the council should she choose to exercise it.
Now, the question is, of course… is this a bad thing? The initial gut reaction may be ‘yes’, but organisations such as Ash, the Order of Whispers, and the Shining Blade are probably already stirring the pot, and what we know of Malice suggests that she’s a charr that understands the realities of the time.
Im kind of maybe there. The other question is how strong are his loyalties to the Ash Legion vs. Lions Arch. As much of what we have seen of him I feel hes still quite hard to read. Ellen you pretty much know what your getting but Evon has alot of unknown.
I wouldnt be suprised if his warband was still around. Evon, if he was smart, would have wanted to come across as multi cultural so taking on a Sylvari with a pile of gold would have been smart, particularly if said sylvari seemed capable. His warband could easily still be operating in the background. From the story he didnt seem to have huge respect for them so I wouldnt be suprised if he didnt have them in leadership roles in the business.
I was more thinking along the lines of a completely seperate group of Asura. The ones in the Woodland Cascades seemed to be connected to Rata Sum.
My thought was more along the lines that if there were several (seven?) Asuran cities when the Destroyers struck and they started at the Central Transfer Chamber then refugees from another one of those cities may have fled upwards somewhere else in the world. As far as Im aware we really dont know where on Tyria these cities were located.
With the Asura network comprimised I could see refugees heading straight to the surface rather than risking traveling round to try and meet up with the other Asura, particularly if they had lost contact and the Destoyers were coming from the gates.
As I said its a long shot but if such a disaster hit a ‘lost’ group of Asura, it could have happened in the last few hundred years and such a group could quite possibly build something similar to Rata Sum considering they had the same technical knowledge and achitecture.
I got the impression that Vael was a free agent who was working at the time for the Ebon Vanguard. The guy was pretty secretive. It wouldnt suprise me if we found no mention of him.
It would be an interesting twist if we found out he was actually a Whispers agent. It would kind of fit the guy though why the Order would have been helping the Ebon Vanguard is anyones guess. We dont even no for sure if they had a presense that far north at the time. Or do we?
Either way, I imagine any reference to him would be subtle. He struck me as the type of guy to cover his tracks.
This is a long shot but a thought occured to me.
Are we entirely sure that the only place that the Asura escaped to the surface at was Magumma? Considering how big their underground empire was could another group of Asura escaped to the surface in a different place in the world and rebuilt there? Of course they could have reconnected with the rest of their race with Asura gate but generally that would require knowing where they were connected to and I get the feeling almost all if not all of the old gates were closed.
Also, an interesting tidbit I found in Rata Sum. If your a Vigil player, a guard in Rata Sum shares with you some details of Rata Sum’s defenses. According to him, there is little in the floating portion of the city. On the ground level however there is stronger defenses because of the threat of Destroyers. Do we know exactly what keeps that city floating? Does it hover itself or is there something on the ground holding it in the air?
It would make sense for the Commodore to become a seperate body. After all, one of the issues raised in SoS against Cobiah once he started running LA was that he never went to sea which made calling him a captain questionable. Not having the Commodore as a captian dodges that issue. I wonder if the Commodore still has a vote.
Well know we know.
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/short-story-evon-gnashblade-disembarks/
The question is what the implications are for Evon’s links to the Ash Legion and if he was forced to choose between loyalty to the Legion or loyalty to Lion’s Arch, which would he pick?
I think for the two candidates this creates two very different directions they could go. Ellen is very principled so could quite easily end up rubbing the other Captians the wrong way with her ideals. She is also probably closer to Magnus than we thought. It might explain much on why he put her forward if she is more than just another good officer.
Evon on the other hand is smart and measured and certianly not a coward. However he potentially has to walk a very tight political path. As a councilor he will have his dealings with the council on one side and the ash legion on the other. What if the two dont see eye to eye? What if his enemies discover his links to the Ash Legion? What exactly is the Ash Legion’s goals in LA to begin with?
I kind of hope that if they are going to start explaining the story of the Great Colapse, Riot Alice at least makes a cameo. She is one of my favorate PS characters, simply because her background makes her behaviour make so much sense.
She comes across as an anarchist and crazy conspericy theorist. Her story instead shows her has a young woman struggling with the lose of her father and not willing to accept that his death was an accident. The best part though is she is smart, and quite possibly right.
Faran got a cameo so fingers crossed Alice might get one too.
The Captain’s Council arent really active pirates anymore. Further if you look at their membership it already includes the owner of the LA Asura gate network and a Financer. Frankly, Evon isnt a pirate either. He’s a merchant.
I have found Ellen Kiel rather plain in the past. One of the things Im liking about the current direction its going is that she is a bit out of her element. She isnt a fool but its definately not her comfort zone and, hell, I like the idea of some honesty in a politican.
Im voting Kiel because while Evon would fit into the role of Counciler easily, I think it would be an interesting and kind okittenward fit for Kiel. I also think that Kiel is likely to ruffle feathers in the captain’s council cause she is very commited to her sense of justice.
The stories are connected. You’ll find out more later this year.
If you string out the plot lines for too long, players will lose interest.
What I’ve gotten from the ‘Living Story’ so far:
Some power hungry Charr teamed up with some underground mole people (seriously? mole people?!?! O.o) in order to wreck Kryta for some reason. A walking Cabbage (Canach- who is ‘Canach’ anyway? And why should I care?) went to some random resort island (seriously?!?! a resort island?!?! what happened to fantasy?) and got some crabs angry for some reason. Pirates showed up and killed someone for some reason. Then some random merchants came on a flying boat and sold us stuff for some reason.
I have no idea what is happening in this game. I could talk for hours about the lore and story of GW1 but this new GW2 ‘story’ is just page 6 tabloid filler.
I honestly don’t see how you are planning to tie the story together in any sort of coherent and meaningful fashion. It’s so utterly fragmented as to be nonexistent.
People who clearly haven’t paid any attention to the story shouldn’t complain about it.
It’s not that I haven’t paid attention to the story. It’s just that the story is not conveyed very well in-game. I don’t go to ANet blogs or 3rd party websites to read up on the Living Story. I don’t buy or read books based on the game. The story…the ENTIRE story should be told exclusively in-game and in a way that is easy for those unfamiliar to GW lore to comprehend.
If you have been pay attention to the game, how did you figure that the Molten Alliance had anything to do with Kryta (which they never even went near), that the Molten Alliance had backers (a power behind the throne) that the Aetherblades were after a council seat and also had backers or any details on the Zephyrites at all?
Everyone of these details were in game and available from marked NPCs (Marked to show they had significant information on the plot) or during story missions. All it required to now these things was to listen to or read some dialog. Its not like it was exactly really well hidden.
Infact Secrets of Southsun was the only release that I felt really did a poor job of conveying the story. The problem it seems with the rest was that people generally didnt look closely enough and so missed plot points. My brother is a perfect example. Hes interested in the story but almost never reads any written dialog.
I think the problem is most people dont pay that much attention. The trick seems to be that Arenanet is going to have to make some plot points far more obvious for those who arent willing to look at the details.
1. The Molten Alliance was formed by the Dredge and Flame Legion being brought together by a third, currently unknown party. They allied because of the potential power that their combined technology offered. Using Azurite, a material they found below ground, they could create mechanical technology powered by Flame Legion magic (Charr tech still uses steam). Both groups end goal was conquest. The third party’s goal is currently unknown.
2. Canach escaped at the end of Lost Shores. I dont think they go into detail. He spends some time getting hunted by the Consortium before turning up on Southsun again.
3. The Aetherblade pirates are a group of pirates that use high tech gear and airships. They are allied and supported by the inquest, who provide the tech they use. Apparently the pirates themselves lack the technical knowledge to mantain their own vessels meaning they are dependent on the Inquest support.
There are hints that the Aetherblades may be a newly formed group to act as proxies for someone else. The head of the Aetherblades that we took down during the Sky Pirate release mentioned a ‘Scarlet’ who would ‘have her head’ for her failure.
4. The Zephyrites appear to decend from Elonian and Canthan origins. They are decendents of a group of people who took over the role of the old dwarven Brotherhood of the Dragon as servants of the Dragon Glint. When Glint died fighting Kralkatorik the Zephyrites recovered her corpse and hid it away.
The Zephyrites themselves use an advanced wind magic called the Aspects that they developed over the last 250 years. This allows them to make their vessel fly and to live high above the clouds so that they can avoid the conflicts of the surface. It also allows them to keep Glint’s secrets safely out of the reach of most people.
On an interesting note, the Aetherblades are probably one of the few groups who have the capacity to potentially attack the Zephyr Sanctum while its in the air.
There are overall plot threads to the living story though many have only been shown in hints. Its quite possible that whoever was behind the Molten Alliance was also behind the Aetherblades. Similarly the Aetherblades seem particularly well equiped to target the Zephyrites who just happen to hold some very valuable cargo up in the sky. There has also been lesser tie ins between the patches as they lead to each other.
I think the picture will become more clear in the next couple of months as events move forward.
The only things I can think of are a charr with an oddly drawn jaw or a centuar. Since those guys look to be wearing Lionsguard armor Im expecting the former.
I think a Thaumanova Reactor could be awesome. Anyone here old enough to have played the original Halflife? A kind of creepy nightmarish lab where reality is warping around you could be so awesome. Add some flickering lights and creepy sounds and you could have an awesome horrory style fractal. Particularly if we find out the reactor was purposely blown up by the asura inside to stop something escaping….. something unnatural…
Yeah, Ive got no basis for this but you have to admit it would be awesome.
I dont think we will see any large side effects for a while however Arenanet does have alot of room to make our choice now have dramatic impacts later on.
You see its all about lead in time. For MMOs, most long term content and story tends to be only conceptual. This means that future story content isnt set in stone until it reaches development. Anyone coming up with old paper and pencil Roleplaying campiagns had a similar situation and Arenanet can use this much in the same way.
Simply put allowing players a choice now allows you to build the future story around that decision. They dont need to come up with more than concepts for where the story will go with it. Once they know the decision, they can slot the characters involved into place in their scenario and ask themselves ‘how would this guy act in this situation?’
The trick is to show that the choices of the players lead to these outcomes. If Arenanet can do this it can be quite potent storytelling cause it creates side effects for players choices that have actual impacts and give a sense of responability.
Short answer: Yes, they can have a distinct plot path depending on which we choose because they havent fully fleshed out the plot path yet. Weither they will do this and actually effectively show that is something we still have to see.
I feel I should counter on a point that lore doesn’t have to have originated in GW1 to be ‘real lore’. Yeah the Q&A comes of mainly as an ad (though it does give some small lore clarifications at least for me), but the LS does have solid lore behind it. Just because its not referencing things in the distant history of Tyria doenst mean its not valid lore.
They are working to build new lore, relivant to the current Tyria. The Flame and Frost, the Sky Pirates and the upcoming election are all part of that.
As for the story, part of the issue many people may be having is how much of it they can currently see. If we saw the living world appoach applyed in the context of prophecies then the PS we had at launch may have been the exodus from Ascalon and the LS would have kicked off with us running around helping the White Mantle. In that context you would be having people complaining ‘why are we running around with these boring WM when we should be going back and fighting the charr?!?’.
The story is still playing out. Groundwork needs to be set. They have been doing alot of it. Now it may not play out well in the end but Im inclined to actually see what the story is before I say its boring. Im not saying that it doenst have flaws or issues but I would suggest giving it a chance. You might be suprised in the long run.
As for who I will vote for, probably Kiel because thats what I feel my character would vote for. Someone he knows and somewhat trusts over a stranger. Also I have a feeling that Kiel is more likely to make decisions that I agree with.
I think they could be cool if they were expanded on as some ‘rival’ guild for the Living Story.
The only connection I could imagine would probably be some crazy scenario like the gods coming from the distant past rather than another world (time travel rather than space travel). In that regard, something the gods did back then could have triggered the original rise of the EDs and the EDs could be resulting ‘counters’ to the gods.
That scenario is pretty far fetched and unlikely though. More likely the Gods had nothing to do with the EDs. Certainly they didnt seem to know a heap about them when they first arrived. As I understand it, they didnt even realise they were living on top of a sleeping Zhiatan.
Further, it would be strange that the EDs would start rising so long after the gods had actually left agian. Theres like a thousand year break. In the end most connections that could exist between them dont stand up well under examination.
In the next release, the challange involves us ransaking the treasure of a crashed Aetherblade ship for either Evon or Kiel. So unless the nemesis isnt linked to the Aetherblade Pirates, it strikes me as unlikely for Evon to be the nemesis.
Interestingly though, from what I could see of the ‘lore dialog’ of the event, Evon’s first mate refers to the Aetherblades as her ‘fromer crewmates’. Evon recruiting from the Aetherblades? What that means though for the long story is anyones guess at this point.
I find myself leaning towards favoring the Thaumanova Reactor of the two fractals. As nostalgic and epic as the Fall of Abaddon might be, the idea behind the disaster at the reactor holds the chance for alot of interesting lore.
Also I cant get the idea of some kind of Black Mesa/HalfLife like fractal with you running through the reactor as reality bends and warps around you.
I found this guy a war of endurance. I bluffed when ever I could, tried to save any belches and drinks I could for when he used his skill and took Boast to minimise the damage I took when I was forced to drink.
In the end Id say it was luck that I won and I also cheated ( I used a regen booster from the acheivement chests Ive been getting) so that I had some regen during the match. Still took 45 mins or so for me to beat him.
Char should replace Char for all races to be represented on the console.
It would be funny if the pirate quagan entered the running.
Uh, it was Theo Ashford who died – a human.
The charr that died was merely a representative from the Legions for the ceremony.
And I agree. Suwash for Captain’s Counci!
Confirmed in the live-stream that the Fall of Abaddon refers to the battle against the gods, NOT the GW1 mission.
Well I’ll be kitten ed.
Personality wise, I’m Kiel all the way. But the god kitten ed fall of Abaddon and not death?
kitten YOU ARENANET GIVE US BOTH FRACTALS! DON’T BE LAZY NOW!!!
Your right…. Ebon’s offer is so hard to resist…. I mean thats HUGE. Im not sure how the reactor can really compete lore wise frankly. It does have the advantage that alot of non GW1 players or lore fans would neccesarily be that interested in Abaddon but really…. I fell like I can see Ebon smoothly whispering in my ear… HES MY EVIL DEMON ON MY SHOULDER!!!
From a lore perspective though this election, as you said, has other effects. Personally I have a hard time trying to guess where either getting elected my lead.
On a personal character level though it does create an more predictable direction. Ebon will probably just go back to what he was doing. But what about Kiel? It strikes me as unlikely that she will be able to return to her previous job. She will have a ship and be a captain but she will also be unemployed.
That can hold some serious challanges to a workaholic character. What does she do with herself now? She strikes me as someone who will pick herself up again quickly but it could be interesting to see how she handles such a big change to her life. Currently she, to me, feels the least developed of the characters they have introducted with the LS.
Either way, I havent decided which way Im going to vote yet. I think Ill wait and see where the story goes first.
The WHAT?!?!
Seriously, this seems almost unfair. I mean sure, the reactor might be kind of interesting but compared to the something like the Fall of Abaddon… Its either referencing his war against the other gods in which case it would be amazing new lore or its referancing his defeat by the sunspears which would mean a peak at a GW2 version of Abaddon and a look at a GW2 version of the Realm of Torment!
Poor Kiel. She may have just lost the vote of the bulk of the lore community with this….
This is a curious problem because I never had a problem on it with my personal computer but at the moment Im using an older less powerful computer and Im having this problem alot. Perhaps this problem is related to performance of a machine.
I might try turning my video options right down and see if it makes a difference.
I think your missing some other important elements.
Flame and Frost: Introduced us to two new characters, Braham and Roxx. Also we learned that someone unseen had been behind the Dredge/Flame legion allaince.
Southsun Cove: Introduced Kasmeer and Kiel who would and will play major roles as the story continues.
Dragon Bash: Introduces Marjory, makes us aware of a mysterious character by the name of Mr. E who warns us about trouble at the upcoming Effigy Ceremony. Marjory and Mr. E seem to have links to the Corrupt Ministry plot line that can be picked up later.
Sky Pirates: Introduces the Aetherblades and their alliance with the Inquest. We find that, like the Molten Alliance, the Aetherblades appear to have a backer. This time we get a name ‘Scarlet’. Mai makes it clear to us that the Aetherblades arent done.
BotFW: Introduces the Zephyrites who appear to have an item of great value on their airship. Sets up the election in LA for next release.
I think your right about the Sky Pirates/Zephyrite thing though. Thats my hunch particularly since Kiel is now an airship captian. However I also suspect we will find out that the backers for the Molten Alliance and the Aetherblades will end up being the same people.
If Belcher’s Bluff was lore-wise then Norn characters would have supremacy over all other omnomberry juice drinkers hands down. But then it wouldn’t have been fair for other races.
Actually, Hylek are almost immune to toxins so they would probably be better…
I think it is far to say that after saying that jumping puzzles are optional content, having this release require jumping so much is kind of unfair. I think having JP focused content is alright but only if it allows others who dont like said content to still participate in another way.
In this regard its fair to argue that the Sanctum Sprint, all the Kite hunting acheives (except the one in Beggar’s Burrow that requires no jumping), Best. Dive. Ever. and the Lessons of the sky acheivement are JP required and therefore not really sticking with their early comments on trying to avoid making JPing required.
However Id also argue with the people saying that getting to the sanctum requires going through a JP are going a bit too far. Its three jumps that afterward once you get the WP at the top you never have to do again. Thats hardly a JP. Its a small short obsticle that once crossed allows you to do all the other acheivements except the JP ones without any jumping.
Having the meta require 8 and maybe having another acheivement as a ‘completionist’ achivement for those who what to go further would have been better. The resource node is a tough reward to ignore particularly since it may soon be the only source of Quartz.
I think Marjory will play an important role too but probably more in a support/leadership/guidance role.
This makes me wonder if there could be EDs that arent destructive. If they are just acting according to their nature there is the possibility for Dragons to exist that arent fixated on assimilation or distruction unless the cause of why the EDs do what they do effects all dragons.
We still don’t know how Kuunavang fits into the larger picture.
My point was that though explorers may have set out, they had a much smaller chance of coming back than our real world versions. Imagined sea monsters are less likely to eat you than real ones. Theres nothing saying we havent had people try to explore. Just that we havent had anyone successfully come back to tell us much about it.
As for the desperate bit, your ignoring the harm to said races ability to explore. The entire norn and asuran populations were refugees that had already moved. The Asuran arent native to the Maguuma. Infact they had almost never been to the surface before 250 years ago. The norn’s situation was similar. Both groups didnt have the resource bases at the time to look into long distance exploration. They were more focused on re establishing themselves now they had found safer territories. You dont take high risk missions when your looking for safety.
Looking at the other two races which have been around long enough to do that exploration we have the charr and the humans. Prior to the last two hundred years, the charr were bearly better equiped technologically than ogres. The charr have spent alot of time developing to the point that they are one of the most advanced races now but this is only a recent development and much of their efforts have been pored into conflicts. Charr are very territorial. They rarely run away from fights they want to win.
That leaves the humans. The humans have spent 250+ years having disaster after disaster thrown at them. They have seen their nations fall, been under the rule of the Mursaat, fought constant and costly wars on multiple fronts, suffered several major disasters, been left by their gods, been betrayed by one of their gods leading to them having to kill said god and generally get kicked in the gut repeatedly. Humanity is holding on to what it has, as hard as it can at the moment.
Now that doesnt mean there hasnt been explorers. What it does mean is that any explorers that have gone searching the world have either not come back, not let anyone know what they discovered or have had their knowledge lost in the repeated and destructive conflicts and disasters that have haunted the world.
Tyria has it rough. Really rough.
Short answer: Nations havent had the resources to spend on supporting exploration of the world. Those that have managed to head out either havent come back or arent telling anyone about it.
I was discussing this with some friends and we thought out how they could add expansion like content with the LS.
For example, consider Nightfall:
-Living Story starts with reports of unusual magic disturbances. Players investigate. Discover something is messing with fabric of reality.
- Kormir shows up just as Nightmare demons start spawning in LA. Players have a instanced story step or dungeon where they push back the demons and seal the portals. Kormir explains the source of the issue and players saddle up to head to elona.
- New zone is Istan or at least part of it. Players arrive and have a few intanced story steps introducing them to the new hub and several key characters (Koss and co). Players have a chance to explore and learn about the area.
Now as you can see by those steps you could use Living Story releases to roll out pretty much the same story as you would have had from the same expansion. Potentially you could have had LA characters arrive earlier in the story and be involved in the early steps the Elonan characters had in Nightfall.
My point is that there is nothing stopping them from rolling out ‘Expansions’ in chapters. Theres also nothing to say that they cant have different sized releases. They could introduce a new race by simply having a large major release that opened up their starting area, city and introduced the race for the other characters.
One major difference between Jormungandr and an elder dragon is that the elder dragons are real in Tyria. They are also hardly the only large threat. Our early explorers didnt have threats like krait either. Tyria is full of hostile threats that dwarf what early explorers had to deal with in the real world.
The other thing to consider is that all the races we know well have undergone devistating losses over time. The norn lost all their homelands and a large number of people. The Asura literally had their empire completely destroyed. Humanity has had several major nations completely destroyed. Cantha and Elona have not only been cut off but are under the rule of leaders that are quite likely to not be friendly. The Charr were rather primative until the last few hundred years and much of that time has been spent in waring against humans or each other. Much knowledge would have been lost. We dont even know for sure where humanity originated from at this point save it seems to not be native to this planet. Those who do seem to know more (order of whispers) arent sharing their secrets.
We now see the races starting to explore more. For the last 100 years or so no one has been getting past Zhiatan because he literally had fleets rising out of the water to attack and kill anyone who tried to sale past. We know have airships but they are only recently developed and mainly in use by the pact, the occational asura scientist, the inquest/aetherblades and now Ellen Kiel. We also have the Zephyrites.
Now the Zephyrites may know alot more about what is happening elsewhere in the world. They have quite a few members of canthan and elonian decent. However they dont sound like the come down often as they dont seem to like the surface world as much as the skies. Its also likely that they limited how far they wondered until recently to ensure they could aid Glint if ever called upon to since they were devoted to her.
Regardless they dont seem to want to tell us if they know anything. The Zephyrites probably have alot of secrets.
Do we have any evidence that there ever was a “before” Glint was a champion of Kralkatorrik?
One thing i want to put there is we seen Kralkatorrik only corrupts to make followers not create them. Primordis is only dragon that does so i think so far with destroyers. So to that extent it is possible Kralkatorrik corrupted glint into being a fallower but their is no records of pre preelderdragons rising cause glint helped kill them all. Dwarfs and Dragons are know as the oldest race on terria, hard to have race with only 6 members and no reproduction like to put that out there.
Just something id like to put out there although no evidence.
For Kralkatorrik, that somewhat depends on what the Shatterer is. Constructed/grown from crystal or some dragon he found to corrupt?
Seriously, this feels somewhat off topic. To start with Im guessing we are using a rather generalised definition of ‘evil’ making phylosophical discussions rather difficult.
To avoid the drawn out complexities of arguing ‘Whats the definition of Evil’ lets make the question simple by say ‘To our characters, who have limited awareness of the nature of Azeroth, are the EDs evil’. Now from that we can ask ‘What are the EDs and why are they consuming all magic?’.
It could be very possible that their existance is to balance out some other distructive force we are unaware of because of their existance. Perhaps if they dont consume magic, the magical energies in the world build up to dangerous levels.
Since we know so little its hard to say if there actions are ‘evil’ for the fate of the world. We can say their actions are ‘evil’ to our characters. However, weither the EDs are ‘evil’ themselves really depends on their state of mind. Rarely to people consider themselves ‘evil’ for steping on an ant, pulling up a weed or clearing out mould but to the EDs that could be effectively what we are. Perhaps to them we are ‘evil’. After all ‘evil’ depends on perspective.
It’s really, really hard for me to like Braham more than Eir. I would hope he’s not a replacement.
I dont think he or any of the other characters are. Currently I dont think DE are being used much in the LS cause Arenanet is trying to avoid conflicting timelines for players still playing through the PS. I suspect eventually they are going to have to change that, particularly if we do go after another dragon, or the PS will start causing issues with what the LS can do story wise.
The Priory were in the area looking for Dwarven artifacts. If memory serves though, that was a Order of Whispers camp. It was quite mysterious. I certainly havent figured out what was happening their though I do remember the Dynamic event.
Do we have any evidence that there ever was a “before” Glint was a champion of Kralkatorrik?
It’s heavily suggested in the wording.
From Arah Forgotten path:
“Warden Illyra: Yes. Yes! Look at these runes. The Forgotten were able to remove Kralkatorrik’s control over Glint.
Warden Illyra: Glint remained in crystalline form, but she regained her free will and identity.”
To regain something you have to have had it in the first place so that would suggest she was corrupted rather than created by Kralk. The fact that she “remained” in crystalline form also suggests that she had a previous form before Kralk corrupted her.
The Zephyrites also refer to Glint as being older than the Gods (although not sure how much I believe them)
Thats kind of a long shot. You could easily be reading more into what they say than they are actually saying. Certianly, Glint’s pre champion status doesn’t seem to be well known knowledge if it was true and the way your taking their words would suggest that they think it is.
As for Glint being older than the Gods, all that requires is for Glint to have been around during the last Cycle. The previous ED cycle predates the gods by a good 8000 years doesnt it? That would mean Glint was at least 10000 years old. At the very least we can safely say she was older than Grenth.
Its base seemed to be the cities foundations which were pretty solid stone and metal. Im judging this by the structure of the Undercity area. Kaineng had some pretty massive sewers and canals down low.
I thought Gaust was her name when she was a champion of Kralkatorrik. Where do we learn that Kralkatorrik corrupted her and that changed her name? I thought the Arah path only showed us how she was cleansed of her corruption.
I doubt a tidal wave from Orr would have damaged Kaineng too much. It may have flooded the lower parts of the city. Frankly that could be interesting cause those deeper places could easily have monsters and sea beasties move in with all the humans washed out.
It is possible that if Kaineng City has had its population drop that much of the original city could be in ruins however, abandoned to fall apart.
Natural Phenomena aren’t neccesarily good things. On our own world, natural phenomena has lead to some of the worse mass extintion events we know of.
The EDs are driven by hunger. We, and probably every civilisation they have consumed, has just been either food or in their way. I dont think evil is the right term. They are however potentially our doom and so that makes them enemies no matter what they are.
One curious question that Ive seen a few times pop up in game is what caused the EDs to come about in the first place? I think until we find out that we cant be 100% sure as to the true nature of the EDs.
I wondered out to Cragstead today while chasing acheivements to visit Braham. He had a new (voiced) dialog with Ottilia.
Poor guy got dumped for a merchant. Wasnt let down very nicely either. Ottilia isnt a nice person:P
Its nice to see they are doing small things with these side characters as the releases progress even if it is only a little bit of dialog. My guess is they recorded the stuff back a few months ago and are releasing each bit as the new releases come out to continue their little side stories.
Actually, if you head out to Braham and Roxx’s instances you’ll find that their story is progressing in small ways. Roxx is training Frostbite and running Errands for Rytlock while Braham…. lets just say poor Braham isnt have much luck with love (Ottilia isnt very nice!).
Most of the characters we have met so far have only had introductions. They have been set up so they can play larger roles in the LS as it progresses.