Guild Wars 2

Dust

Hmm, good point you made. I suppose I won’t accept it because ANet won’t really admit it. Since they specifically said they wanted to stay true to the lore of Guild Wars, it would be nice if they actually came clean and said something like, “yeeaahh…we kinda did our own thing here.” =P

now… backs out of room so the fight can continue…

He’s simply comic relief, just not very good at it.

Dust

I agree with most of what you are saying about the time constraints on race development. Of course they downplayed humans for the sake of the other 4, but that’s not really what I’m arguing. I’m arguing that either do it the right way(aka a believable way that does justice to old and new alike), or don’t do it at all. Look, if the roles were reversed between the Charr and humans I’d be arguing for the Charr with the same enthusiasm. It’s not the race itself that’s important, it’s the context within which they are written.

Furthermore, adding new races to the mix is alright…if you do it right. For instance, using your analogy of WoW’s faction reworking, it was done for a real purpose…pvp balancing. It would have been suicide for the pvp part of the game had they not installed some sort of ratio balancing. In our dilemma, they did it for creativity and market share. Not bad things in and of themselves if done right. But for one it wasn’t needed(GW1 already had good story and a loyal fan base), and two it wasn’t done well(see posts elsewhere in just about every thread in the forums).

Using your Britain example; if someone came along with a new book discounting and downplaying most aspects of Britain’s eventful history, relegating it to something akin of a marginal and lucky nation, you would take issue with that. Even I would and my ancestors are Irish! lol The difference between the game and reality is one can be proved, the other can’t.

All we have to go on for the game is what it tells us about itself at the time it was written. And what it told us, through events, missions, text, and visuals, was not much at all like what GW2 wants us to think it was like.

Meh, wasteland+win > garden+loss in my book. But where in the wide, wide world of sports did I imply that the past wuz where all the glory should stay? I’m not arguing that whatever we do post-Abaddon shouldn’t be as important. There are a billion ways they could have made additional content matter while still continuing a similar story-arc as the original.

As far as your last point, I reeeeally don’t see it. GW2 is a glitzy theme-park MMO of epic scale. There’s a flavor for every fancy and a scratch for every itch. But all of that mass appeal dilutes substance…it’s a wide, yet shallow river. GW1 on the other hand, was less diverse and narrower in genre, but it certainly had more depth and originality to it. The way they delivered it felt a lot more new and refreshing than the circus act we have now.

^

It is new though if you think about it. The Charr revolution against the Flame Legion, Adelbern and the Foefire, the closing of Cantha, Joko’s regime in Elona…they are all part of the same GW2 narrative designed to allow room for the new player races.

If you look at the end of just the first 3 games of GW, Ascalon was hurt but actually won against the Charr, Kryta was free from the Mantle’s slavery, Cantha was open, and Elona was free as well. Pretty much all of known Tyria was still dominated by humans.

I wouldn’t think many here would say the new races shouldn’t be here(although I personally would disagree), it’s the way in which ANet went about it that irks many GW1 vets. It’s almost as if they wanted humans to be looked at in a shameful or pitying way. As if all that stuff we accomplished as players back then was quaint and charming like a kid’s story…but what really matters is what is going on now.

It’s not insulting to me so much as to the creators of the original game. That’s who I feel bad for actually. :/

General Caesar is just too unbelievable as a general. He’d be a lot more fitting as a Priory scholar that advises you.

That and his uppity English accent just makes me want to mulch him up and use him for my tomato plants…

Even comparing it to just Prophecies storyline, Proph still wins hands-down.

drax

Well, I didn’t see it that way I guess. To be short, I liked the mystery. It’s good that there was an aspect of Tyria that we can’t or don’t know about, and I think it worked for GW1. It might have been tropish in the fact that there were mysterious gods at all I suppose…but at least they were written well and not some vague diety in the sky that we don’t ever deal with.

Personally I’d rather save the scientific minutia for real-life. The various Asuran technobabble on ghosts and magic and corruption makes the game sound like a never-ending episode of The Big Bang Theory. Guild Wars is a fantasy genre…with all the divine and demonic elements to boot. By meshing magic and science, they created a no-man’s land genre which doesn’t do either justice. I mean…who needs magic when you have lasers?

Also, I actually thought the fact that Guild Wars not having dragons in the traditional sense(Glint and Kuunavang were both nicely un-cliched) made for excellent originality. That same originality was present in the story and cultures of the first game. Why mess with that?

I still maintain my “retcon” argument, just not in the fine details so much as it is in the big picture. The new ANet writers were very good in how they made sure almost everything fit together legitimately. But they were very poor in their choice of theme, style, and content. That’s why I object so strongly I guess, because they made such an obvious play for mass-appeal at the expense of the old story. Like dragons, magi-tech, steam-punk, vikings, lasers, unicorns, etc, etc, etc.

It’s ridiculously cliche’d to the point of overkill…and I can’t bring myself to take any of it entertaining, much less seriously.

Zaxares.5419:

The trouble is that for human civilisation to be at its prime, it would also have to be at its most stable, most secure, and most prosperous. (And in other words… boring.) Such a glorious time of human civilisation would also have meant there would have been little need for adventurers or heroes. There would be no threat to rise up against, no great enemy to challenge and defeat. It just wouldn’t make for a very exciting game where everybody is a baker, shopkeeper or town guardsman, whose most exciting part of his day is arresting unruly drunks at the tavern.

Well, us roleplayers would probably still find it fun, but I’m sure many other GW2 players didn’t buy the game to play Second Life, Guild Wars-edition.

Well I didn’t mean it that way really, I wouldn’t want an entire game to be like pre-searing Ascalon lol. Conflict and violence tend to bring out the best and worst of us, which is the most enjoyable part of a game to experience really. I didn’t mean to imply “in their prime” meant peace and stability. I think GW1 captures some of this, it’s just short-lived and at the end humanities “golden age” so to speak.

It just seems odd they would introduce us all to this world, and then turn around and produce a sequel with an entirely different cultural theme and style than what we had. The limits of GW1’s antiquated(albeit excellent for its time) game engine is what was holding it back, not the story. The story and writing were some of its best features, why change that?

Hmm, I don’t think the gods had either the will, or the power, to deny it to non-worshippers. I don’t think they really wanted to anyway. Maybe unleashing magic upon Tyria was something they couldn’t reverse, who knows. They weren’t all-powerful gods after all, and they made many mistakes. I mean, restraining magic into the bloodstones would support this, why not just directly cut off creatures from using it?

The gods of Tyria seem to act a lot like Greek gods did. They rebel, they get angry, they make mistakes. They use humans(or whatever race in this case) as tools to accomplish something…why not do it themselves? Do they have relations with Tryian creature, I’m not sure on that one?

There seems to be this assumption that since they are gods, they should have complete control over everything they create or favor. I just don’t think that’s the case with the GW1 Tryian gods. Magic seems to have been the giant “cat is out of the bag” for them, and however powerful they are…they can’t control it completely. The way they act in relation to Tyria and Tryians seems to support this.

Also, I may have missed it, but I don’t remember hearing that the gods created the world while playing GW1. Honest question, were there texts or npc’s around that spoke of it?

Now the obvious retort to that is that fact that the history of Tyria already had the rise and fall of humanity before Prophesies even took place. Which is true.

But… none of us players ever got to experience that. Much like new GW2 players have little to no connection to GW1, none of us GW1 players have any connection of substance to Tryia in its prime. Like Orr, or the Primeval Kings of Elona, or Cantha in the time of Shiro. They are all whispers of a past long gone.

Yet the little time we, as players, are given to participate in that world (from 1070-1079AE) is fleeting.

That story needs a real life of its own, that we can experience, before you draw the curtains on it.

That’s how I see it anyway. :/

Oh it’s perfectly possible, it just requires the right writing.

I have loads of ideas on that but I’d rather not go in-depth with them. But in my imaginary scenario, GW2 is the game where us players really get to see the humans shine. And GW3 is the game where the humans fade, much like the Forgotten, and the Charr replace them as the dominant race.

I always got the impression that GW1 introduces us all to a wonderful and diverse human Tyria, and GW2 is the closing chapter on them.

They cut out all the good stuff that’s supposed to be the meaty middle of the epic story of human triumph and fall…a story you would feel emotionally connected to.

That’s what’s missing here.

Dust

I used those examples because the thinking that went into them is the same thinking that went into the Charr, and most everything else for that matter. Like I’ve stated before, ANet isn’t expanding on GW1, they are reinventing it.

Take your shell analogy; I would argue they didn’t just fill in the shell, they changed the shell itself first… then filled it. Or in other words, they didn’t expand on the Charr persona…they reinvented it, then expanded on it. That’s a huge difference. And you can apply that line of thought to much of the GW2 world.

Now…why not accept that anyway and move on? Personally, in a way I have. I’ve accepted the Charr, and actually the humans too for that matter, simply as part of a different game with little to no historical antecedents. But bridging the narrative between the two games has proved too large of a chasm to overcome.

At least for me it has. Therefore, when it comes to “story” at least, I can’t accept GW2 as a legitimate heir to GW1. And therefore I call it out on it when I see it.

Does that make more sense? :/

Well…simply show some humility for the foundational lore with which you base your entire game on.

For example, why is Agony a a fractal boss mechanic? Spectral Agony was an attack particular only to the Mursaat in GW1, not some random ability that bosses have. “Spectral” being removed from the name doesn’t take away from the fact that the name and effect were obviously gleaned from the Mursaat ability. ANet didn’t care for the history of it, they apparently just wanted some cool fractal mechanic that also evoked a bit of nostalgia.

Or take the Ascended items at the Laurel Merchant: The Eye of Janthir, the Royal Signet of Doric, Palawa Joko’s Finger Cuff?? Why are these things being sold as trinkets like bling-bling at the local market? Randomly assigning important historical names to merchandise just cheapens the meaning of the name.

It’s like ANet thought GW1 lore would be cool to use as a giant bag-of-fun with which they could pull out any snippet of information and then use it as anecdotal diatribe of a time when everyone was “doing it wrong,” or as a cheap sticker to put on baubles you wear around your neck, or as anything that can’t be taken seriously or truthfully.

They could have easily done it in a way that wasn’t so condescending…

Riot

Oh I don’t think anyone doubts that the GW2 Charr have matured in their civility…at least relative to GW1. It would be pretty hard to make a factionless game with one race still wanting to annihilate everyone lol.

I didn’t hate them back them either, I just think they were intentionally written to be the “big bad guys” of GW1 and that’s what they were. They were really only different from Ogres and Grawl in their numbers and military power, and it wasn’t until EotN that their narrative took a radical shift. At which point certain details of their history were added and changed to make them more both believable and viable as a future playable race.

Zax

Your post is a perfect example of the kind of thing ANet wants to see. A GW1 vet who has reservations at first, but eventually accepts the new narrative with open arms. That’s perfectly fine for your character to do that, and I’m sure ANet loves it. But it’s still important to understand the inherent truths of the game back then. And not gloss-over, downplay, or outright change things for the sake of perpetuating your(ANet’s) own creativity.

It’s disrespectful.

That’s not how it played out it GW1 though drax. It didn’t matter if races were for or against the gods, the 6 bestowed magic to all relatively intelligent beings on Tyria at some point. And then restrained its use with the bloodstones when everyone started abusing it(especially the humans).

I used the adjective “human” gods because that’s how they are portrayed now. They were really Tyrian gods. It didn’t matter if you worshiped them or not, magic was available to everyone. Look, ANet wanted to take the story in a different direction so they tweaked the lore to that end. What’s so hard to believe about that?

First of all, it wasn’t strictly a “human” point of view, it was a Guild Wars point of view. There’s evidence for it all over the place in GW1, not just the manuscripts.

Secondly, GW2 is a different story, with a different agenda, and a different staff than the original. It’s almost on a different world for crying out loud. Having human gods being the creators, and keepers ultimately, of magic just doesn’t jive with a multi-race game where they are all using magic equally. It was a retcon done for mechanical, thematic, and lore purposes to serve the GW2 agenda.

It’s really that simple.

Rafahil.2857:

foofad.5162:

Rafahil.2857:

Wanderer.3248:

Daecollo.9578:

So my thief just downed a ranger.

After almost downing it, the rangers pet interrupts me, then starts chasing me around as I try and kill it. Then downs me with a 6k hit.

Then it proceeds to rez the downed ranger, then they both destroy me.

Fun fun fun!

What kind of thief doesn’t use shadow refuge before stomp?

Edit: and follow up with dance.

Who wastes a utility to just stomp someone?

You’re joking, right? Do you PvP?

I’ll C&D or Black Powder to get the stomp in, but no way will I use shadow refuge to do that. It’s a crutch for subpar players and only really needed when you are being swarmed.

He’s right though. I honestly can’t remember the last time a thief spiked me when not stealthed. It’s got to be weeks ago, and I play like 3 hours of W3 everyday.

Canguro.5768:

you can fully command your pet while downed, attack a specific target, retreat, heal you, F2, swap…

Where is the pet skill bar when downed? I use my mouse to activate my pet skills, my left hand fingers already have enough to do with movement and weapon skills.

I honestly never knew you could command your pet while downed, is this really true?

I actually use two signets, and only 20 points in Marks. Been doing that for like 6 months. Beastmaster sig just isn’t nearly worth what I’d have to give up to use it. But then again, I only like the two signets for their passive effect.

As for warriors…they pretty much own me if they stay in melee range for too long(which is often). So I it’s hard for me to sympathize.

Yeah…I’d add that it doesn’t always change target when releasing the right-click. It’s random as far as when it does or doesn’t. At least that’s been my experience. :/
And autoattack, while fine for PvE I suppose, is not good to use in W3.

I think what upsets peeps the most is both that it seems like such an easy fix, and that ANet doesn’t seem to want to address it. It’s a pretty large thread for a minor problem.

Geo

Two things…

1) pressing AND releasing the right mouse button acquires a target if the cursor is over one, not just pressing only. While this is not a problem for players that continually hold down the right mouse button, the hordes of players that use it on and off for movement are getting screwed by it at every encounter.

2) using a key-bind for “acquire nearest target” is screwed up to. Many, many times I try to use it with my intended target literally right in front or next to me and instead it acquires a target next to it, behind it, or sometimes behind 3-4 other mobs 30 feet away. It’s unreliable at best, completely broken at worst. As such, using the left mouse button for targeting is sometimes a necessity in small fights(zerg warfare it doesn’t matter too much). As such again…the right-click issue comes into play.

^
As would I. I suppose there are some inherent cultural differences that those of us, as westerners, can’t relate to. In the grand scheme of real-world social issues, it’s no secret that “western”(especially American) social ideas have been viewed as overly oppressive, or even morally offensive, in other cultures. Maybe this is part of that unfortunate issue.

Ursan.7846:

Funny story. I was sPvPing yesterday. I was 1v2ing 2 mesmers. They burst me down pretty quickly. One mesmer leaves while the other remains to finish me off.

My dog KD’s him. Then I stop him with 2. Then I swap pet and my 2nd dog KD’s him. And suddenly, he’s down, and I’m 1-ing him to death while my dog revived me.

Ranger downed state is hilarious. I love it so much.

Wait…you can switch pets while downed??

^
hilarious…

Based on Lokheit’s post, it might just be that if Cantha does make an appearance at a later date, it will be a very reworked Cantha. Given NCSoft’s wishes to stay away from Asian themes and keep it “universal” as they put it, it wouldn’t surprise me to see Cantha heavily infused with non-human races. Perhaps the Tengu? I have no idea how they would do that…it seems counter to the current state of Canthan affairs. But who knows. Maybe the theme of a future Canthan expansion will be ridding it of the “evil xenophobic overlords” who are in control. /shrug

As for the Canthan District image, I think the offensiveness was not with the quality of the representation, but rather with the simple fact that it’s inside a “western” city. Subordination of cultures can be a very sensitive issue I guess…

The Eternal Grace.3157:

Jski.6180:

GW1 was not an mmorpg so to compare it to GW2 is a bit wrong.

Some people disagree with that…I am one of them. It wasn’t directly an open-world mmorpg, but it was definitely still there. I mean really…mmorpg stands for what? “Massively multiplayer online role-playing game”, correct?

• Massively – There were large number of players who played – check
• Multiplayer – You formed parties and guilds and achieved things with them – check
• Online – check
• Role-playing – Well I was playing a character I created, so – check
• Game – check

If it isn’t an mmorpg, what was it? GW1 is definitely comparable with GW2 in many aspects, especially user interface and such, which is mostly what I was referring to anyway.

I somewhat agree with your post, but GW1 was no MMO. “Massively” is an adverb that describes “Multiplayer” here, they shouldn’t be separated when breaking down the acronym. An MMO is massively-multiplayer which means the multiplayer aspect of the game should be massive. GW1 has a cap of 8 for any out-of-town adventure…hardly massive. It’s a co-op multiplayer dungeon-crawler if you need a better descriptor.

Ahhh crap. Yeah, it was late and i was jumping around a lot. The fantasy trope thing was from a different post. Sorry about that, I’ll edit it out. :/

Hmm, I don’t think the facts of Prophesies lent themselves to anything but having the Charr as being the bad guys. I also don’t think we didn’t know “their side” of the story not because it was hidden from us, but rather there wasn’t any. I think it’s a pretty safe bet to say that the Charr in particular were retconned. Although I will say ANet actually did a decent job of lining up all of their facts and figures and making sure there was very little, if any, that directly countered established lore conventions.

It’s not the factual minutia of lore that I have a problem with, it’s the overall character and style of the game that is an issue. Much like my “educational observation,” you can’t pinpoint it on just facts and figures. It’s a synopsis of facts, observations, judgements, perceptions, and even feelings. Each of those is important in its own right, because they all are used to determine overall quality and enjoyment.

Relying just on facts isn’t enough in my opinion. For example, analyzing a poem on rhyme or meter or technical aspects alone is a bad way to judge poetry. A similar idea works here.

Was GW1 inspiring to me? A little bit, but it was mostly very endearing. Probably because the story was good and a lot of characters/cultures were easy to identify with or at least like. It was good writing.

With GW2, it not only fails to connect with a lot of the spirit of GW1, it’s also just not very likable. I hear that constantly from other players. Sorry if that stings a writer, but I get the feeling they were targeting a young audience anyway. Like I’ve mentioned elsewhere, the Charr are just a very obvious example of this shift, as these forum posts show. The main reason for this, imo, is the dramatic shift in the narrative that occurs in GW2. And the main reason for that shift is the desire for as wide an audience as possible.

It all goes back to the profit margin. I mean, why do you think we might not get Cantha in the future? If NCSoft thinks it has even the slightest chance of upsetting a small demographic of Asian players…they will nix it. Why? Because it’s lost revenue. Someone should have told them a long time ago that trying to satisfy everyone really ends up satisfying no one. WoW was a freak of nature, companies would do well to not try and replicate its success, but rather work on a smaller, yet very loyal, fanbase.

Just like GW1.

Dustfinger.9510:

How do we know it was unsettled? The ecology says the charr were driven back and forced to surrender the lands that would become ascalon. Bu tbefore that it also says they stopped clamoring over the same land and spread throughout the territory.

Eh, it doesn’t specifically state anywhere that it was unsettled. I was making an educated observation. There’s no mention of Charr having settlements there, nor any in-game evidence. It just makes sense that they were nomadic, both because of their culture and the fact they seem to be modeled, at least partially, after Mongols.

At any rate, you’re very right about one thing Dustfinger: barring some unlikely rewrite, the new lore will eventually come to be considered as the legitimate truth. And the old GW1 point of view will be forgotten. That’s just how this stuff works. It’s too bad really, it had a lot of potential. It’s interesting to see how this all plays out in the forums though, I wonder if ANet staff ever take any of it to heart.

I wouldn’t say it was on par at all.

The humans took unsettled land away from an area the Charr considered within their realm, and not only occupied it, but made it their home. And once they established a kingdom inside the Charr southern realm, they never sought to eradicate the Charr.

In contrast, the Charr not only decided every Ascalonian should die because of it, but every human on the continent should die too. How is that on par?

The U.S. and England decided a long time ago that their economic and political interests were more or less the same…so they dropped the old grudge. But there are plenty of real-life examples to the contrary. Ireland/England, Israel/Palestine, and India/Pakistan to name a few off the top of my head.

I’ve just given up at this point and resigned myself to a more spastic playstyle in W3 where I randomly attack anything within range like a crazy man.

It’s actually not a bad way to fight…if you don’t mind chaos.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Obsidian.1328:

I’m pretty sure they knew this stuff was going to be in this game before they wrote out the story for it.

I’m not so sure, speaking from the experience of a tabletop GM who had a persistent game world I used for several years and several gaming groups which sometimes had the same people around who wanted to know what their old characters had been doing. You figure out pretty quickly that if the two games are far apart enough spatially or temporally then you don’t have to worry about that kind of continuity as close as if you were starting up in the backyard of where your last group had been playing around.

It gets worse if, as in the case of GW1 and GW2 . . . two games are connected lore-wise and one hasn’t quite . . . kinda, sorta maybe finished . . .

Oh I understand that. I just think it’s fairly obvious that they wanted to make it a long time between games from the beginning. I mean, think of all that long time-frame would allow them to do, both creatively and mechanically: the addition of new, novel, and “cool”(for lack of a better word) design mechanics like rifles/airships/etc., deep development of the player races that had either a very different portrayal in the past(Charr) or were non-existant(Asura, Norn, Sylvari), the introduction of new, universal antagonists(dragons), a lot of geographic design freedom while still keeping bits and pieces of the old world in tact for nostalgia, etc.

Just paging through the old concept design clips, you can easily tell the direction they wanted to go with GW2 in terms of style and atmosphere. I really don’t think it’s unreasonable to think the long interval was anything but planned from the start.

Please call it “Ranger.”

I know they are similar in many ways, it just irks me somehow.

Yeah…they sure did evolve. Darwin would have thought he died and gone to heaven.

Odd, though, that humans have managed to actually de-volve at the same time, as nothing filled the vacuum of their gods’ departure.

They were account-wide until NCSoft got involved right before opening day. It made a lot angry back then, but has since gone by the wayside mostly.

draxynnic.3719:

The dwarves had bombs and explosives built into ballista bolts. The siege turtles may have been about as common as WW1 tanks, but they showed that the technology existed. There’s those mortars defending Dzagonur Bastion, although to be fair it’s questionable whether they’re more magic than technology, but the magic may simply have been in the mounting. And that’s without considering EOTN, since that’s explicitly setup for GW2.

The gunpowder genie was already out of the bottle. They could have maintained medieval fantasy stasis if they’d really wanted to, sure, but that would be about as believable as medieval stasis ever is when explosive powder has already entered the scene – which is to say, not very.

Well…they could have maintained that stasis easy had they not decided to pick up the GW story 250 years down the road. In real life, it took decades and decades of research/trial-&-error between the introduction of the rudimentary cannon to something “rifle-esque” that could be used by a lone infantryman. But, of course, that fits in with their time-frame just fine.

All I was really saying was that the decision to have 250 years between GW1 & 2 had a lot more to do with what kind of game they wanted to produce(multiple player races and guns for weapons) than it did with any anchor in established lore. I mean, it’s hard to believe the writers had this all worked out before hand, then came to the designers and said, “Ok…we’re going to need animations and coding for pistols, rifles, mortars, cannons, tanks…aww heck, just throw in helicopters too.” I’m pretty sure they knew this stuff was going to be in this game before they wrote out the story for it.

Vayne.8563:

Meret.5943:

Vayne.8563:

Casuals found it hard

They did? May I ask how you know?

Okay, let me qualify that. Some casuals found it hard. I know because I’ve met and talked to them over the years. There’s one guy in my guild right now who couldn’t figure out Guild Wars 1 at all. He couldn’t. He’s played lots of other games, but Guild Wars 1 was just too complicated. Too different from other games. It’s not the first time I’ve heard the complaint.

In some ways, Factions was worse than Prophecies in this way, because you could level to 20 in a day. They threw skills at you so fast you didn’t have time to adjust. Prophecies was a much slower game, during which you got skills much slower. But over all, the complexity of the skills, which people keep touting, were too complex for some people.

And these aren’t necessarily unintelligent people. They were people who were overwhelmed by the game’s complexity.

Hell one of the guys in my guild didn’t even know there missions because he didn’t notice the enter mission button the party panel in Prophecies. He spent the entire time doing side quests and wondering why there was no story.

LOL. I had a similar fate on my first toon. I was new to the game and didn’t know anyone really. But I started noticing that everytime I bought a skill, the price would go up some: 200g, 400g, 700g… I told myself that if it got to 1 plat I would restart the entire game and be very selective on which skills I bought. Since they obviously kept increasing exponentially. lol

Wish someone had told me it capped at 1 plat before I started over. :P

Lol, like the giant turtles with a cannon strapped to their backs? Those were few and far between and unwieldy to say the least. Hardly common. No class could use explosives really, they were environmental novelties at most. Now you see stuff like that more often than Koss dying.

But, you just validated my point kinda. They wanted to expand on explosive/projectile devices, so what’s the obvious first step?:

“How do we do that?”
“Hrmm, let’s make this next game be waaaay in the future.”
“How far?”
“Idk, 250 years sounds good.”
“Sweet!”

It’s not rocket science.

Umm…why is everyone trying to come up with a plausible explanation for this? The decision to put rifles/guns/bombs in the game was made waaaay before the lore was written to support it, not the other way around.

I mean, it’s not like the combat designers were handed the finished story of GW2 Tyria and said, “Ok…let’s come up with some legit animations for firearms!” They knew gunpowder-related weapons were going to be in the game almost since its conception. Seems to me that by denying this concept to certain classes, ANet has created a Living Anachronism for lack of a better phrase. It’s their own fault really.

Lydell.8713:

Obsidian.1328:

This may sound crass, but can Cuddlestrike simply post the score update and not use it as an excuse for an Asuran runway expo? It reminds me of Toddlers and Tiara’s and it’s starting to make me sick.

I never post much in the forums at all, but I had to stop and post here. The hell are you talking about? Cuddlestrike’s score updates are the best thing ever. Better than a lame cropped screenshot just showing the scoreboard.

Subjective…but no, they aren’t.

Cutekhaos.5489:

Obsidian.1328:

This may sound crass, but can Cuddlestrike simply post the score update and not use it as an excuse for an Asuran runway expo? It reminds me of Toddlers and Tiara’s and it’s starting to make me sick.

I.) Yes it sounds crass and creepy.
2.) Knowing what Toddlers and Tiara’s is also creepy and crass.
3.) No one said you had to look at each picture don’t pretend like you didn’t.

Finally leave Cuddlestrike alone you “big” bully.

If it makes a difference, I googled “child beauty pageants” because I didn’t remember the name of any of those shows I saw commercials for while watching something else. Toddlers and Tiaras just sounded apt for my comment.

I just hope my search history on my work comp is never checked…

Is it me or has anyone else noticed that the landscapes are spatially smaller in GW2? Visiting the Pockmark Flats area nowadays I was struck by just how small an area it was. In GW1 it seemed almost 3 times bigger. /shrug

Oh, and to the JQ havoc squad that flipped our north camp in SoR BL 5 minutes before maintenance last night…we managed to flip it back 2 seconds before log-out! Kudo’s for tryin though.

CuddleStrike.8215:

Obsidian.1328:

This may sound crass, but can Cuddlestrike simply post the score update and not use it as an excuse for an Asuran runway expo? It reminds me of Toddlers and Tiara’s and it’s starting to make me sick.

Sorry if it annoys you, however, my friends want to see my pics sometimes too.

shrugs

Each to their own. However, the score is always nearby. Sorry if it irritates you in such a manner.

Farewell

Lol, well I wasn’t being personal. The level of “cutesiness” in this game is getting out of hand though. :P

I guess I just wish I’d known I was buying a kids game before purchase. Never seen a company produce a sequel to a game that targeted a younger demographic than the first I suppose. Someone has to say it.

And I’ll wear my grinch hat proudly!

This may sound crass, but can Cuddlestrike simply post the score update and not use it as an excuse for an Asuran runway expo? It reminds me of Toddlers and Tiara’s and it’s starting to make me sick.

roadkill.3749:

Chokolata.1870:

How i understand this game is that it works on build counters . I fully agree that the thief is OP because it has huge burst potential , and can choose fights and has many escape mechanisms , even solid sustain .

However, shouldn’t the apothecary beastmaster build hard counter thiefs ? I mean , you would have 3000 armor , heavy protection procs , lots of evades and healing .

I run something similar and so far I have never lost a 1vs1 fight vs a thief. Not saying I’m owning them. I have to use every trick I have. And it’s hard because pets are bugged, I have to wait for them to get out of stealth and use F1 (for the pet), dodge and 1 (for me) while the thief only has to use 1. But it’s doable. After all that’s why we play rangers. Because we like the challenge. And that’s why they play thieves.. because they suck.

Speak for yourself lol. I rolled ranger because I fell in love with the class in GW1. I didn’t even get into W3 until I cleared every PvE map and geared myself out in exotics. I’m just too cranky now to start over.

No thanks…the amount of graphical pyrotechnics in this game is already overboard.

I read somewhere it was because when they conducted some kind of poll to an Asian audience, the general feedback was “they didn’t like the fact that there would be an Asian-themed district inside of a ‘western’ city.” Like it was implying the Asian culture was subordinate to the western one…or something. Nationalism can be problematic I guess…

^

Well ya, that’s why I said directly or indirectly, it never states in what manner the gods helped the humans establish Ascalon.

As for the Wall, I just clicked on the link in the GW1 wiki timeline for “Great Northern Wall is erected.” Which is where it goes into more detail. It’s wiki though, so it can be edited just the same. /shrug

Zaxares.5419:

Obsidian.1328:

And where does it say the last Khan-Ur was assassinated by a human? Or that the last Khan-Ur was a shaman for that matter?

It was never stated that the last Khan-Ur was a shaman, so you’re right there. It was also never explicitly stated that the Khan-Ur was assassinated by humans, but it just seems VERY convenient that the Khan-Ur would die “mysteriously” (actual words from the Movement of the World article) when he was gearing up the Charr legions for a mass invasion to kick the humans out of Ascalon back when they first arrived.

That threw the four Legions into vicious infighting, and the humans used that time to build the Great Wall of Ascalon. If the Khan-Ur had managed to attack before the humans had time to construct it, they would probably have all been swept back into the Shiverpeaks/Kryta.

So yeah, no proof, but it just seems awfully convenient timing.

Ehh…I never got the impression that a human assassinated the Khan Ur, mostly because at the time they supposedly had the gods, directly or indirectly it never really says, helping them establish Ascalon. Why would the Charr present any threat to them with the gods at their back? If anything I got the impression it was just another power-hungry Charr wanting the throne for himself, but that is just my opinion.

Also, there is an 800 year difference between the human arrival in Ascalon and the building of the Northern Wall. The Wall wasn’t even started until 898AE, very soon after the Charr were said to start worshiping the Titans(870AE). It was in response to this new Charr activity that led to its construction, not the chaos following the death of the Khan-Ur.