Guild Wars 2

I didn’t get the slightest necromancer vibe from this thing. I got a “decorative bedside table lamp” vibe, mostly. But as for game relevance, I got a “flaming god of war” vibe. Balthazaar (who is depicted on the weapon itself) is pretty much the opposite of cold calculating lingering death. And that’s kind of the necromancer’s thing.

I get the feeling that a lot more than a “tiny minority” collect cats, but I get what you’re saying. The game kind of needs more situation specific dialogue. It’s a little thing that can make a pretty sizable difference. Like, a few people have mentioned being a human “blessed by balthazaar” (as per character creation) and in the latest story instance they may as well have been a god hating charr for all the difference it made in dialogue or story.

We’re not all the same exact character. We have differences!

You really don’t have to be established as a super devout person to understand the importance of a god appearing in front of you. It’s a big deal for anyone. I’m an atheist, but if say, Zeus, for example, a buff old guy hurling lightning bolts and clearly recognizable from scriptures, appeared in front of me, I wouldn’t just be all “whatever bruh, just another dude to me”.
I think Kas responded normally, regardless of how well Anet represented her spirituality.

The torch is fine. Just needs a little backstory to tie it in with the fall of Balthazaar, maybe.

“Balthazaar stood, his soldiers defeated. The Shadow Army had chased him to the only sanctum he had left. The home of his late grandmother. The Shadow Army advanced against him. Mustering his inner fire, he grabbed the nearest sturdy object. Her decorative coffee table lamp. With a mighty bellow, he shouted “FOR GAM-GAM” and launched his counter attack. Balthazaar may fall, but not without a fight."

I think possibly angering Brahm and taking away any chance of glory from his angsty suicide campaign is the highlight of this chapter. If I ended up wasting his time and making him look stupid to all his norn friends, that’s a win in my book.

Jenna is Lyssa, Anise is Livia, Taimi is the real Lazarus (somehow) and my mini pet is the Deep Sea Dragon in disguise spying on all the things I do.

I get it. The Lazarus/Balthazaar reveal kinda threw a wrench into all logical expectations. Anyone can be anyone. But I think we need to calm down with throwing all the false identities around for a moment. Some people might actually just be who they really are.

So, I see a lot of good points on this story. I’m really kind of on the fence for…pretty much all of it. The only thing I’m going to add is a point about the whole “Why does Balthazaar pretend to be a hated dangerous enemy and not the beloved human God”
To that, I’m going to first point out, that I also think that was absurd. I’m with you guys on that one. There really is no good foreseeable reason. But I have a probably bad reason that maybe someone can expound on, or think on, or whatever.

So, anyways, here it is. Balthazaar COULD have easily popped up in Divinity’s Reach and just said “Humans. Follow me!” He’s their god. Who’d say no? But that courtesy only extends as far as humanity. And not even all of humanity (but more on that in a minute). The Charr would, at best, not join his cause out of contempt for human gods, and at worst, organize legions against him. The Asura and Sylvari wouldn’t really be any different in this scenario, because any of them who had joined “Lazarus” would join just about anyone for the right money.

But back to the human thing, a lot would zealously follow him, sure, but humans have a lot of stuff going on right now. God or not, they can’t just stop defending their borders against centaurs and White Mantle to go follow him on his random errand. And the White Mantle oppose worship of the 6 gods, because they think it’s heresy. So they’re automatically enemies.
Appearing as Lazarus gave him the most options, probably. The White Mantle would immediately fall in line. Easy. The next part of the plan, and this is an important step, was to appear as a Lazarus that suddenly didn’t want the world to burn. Now your options aren’t just WM. It’s WM + anyone who was willing to help a guy that was just REALLY powerful and not an evil world hating maniac.

So basically, Appear as Balthazaar, be limited to available non-White Mantle humans. Maybe some curious Asura and Sylvari.
Appear as reformed Lazarus, get guaranteed WM fanatics and any available person of any race/faction willing to give you a chance. It’s the only reasoning I can come up with, so I’m going to go ahead and put it out there.

The Greyhawk.9107:

Manimarco Devil.1790:

Its entertaining how Konig attempts to rationalize Anet’s hilariously poor writing every lore patch.

We talking about the same Konig here? Cause the rest of us see a guy that’s VERY critical of the writing (as he probably should be). There’s a difference between “rationalizing” and “just trying to understand what the fly kitten is going on in this clusterkitten”.

Yeah, I was actually surprised by Konig’s…acquiescence, I guess? He’s usually the first to point out the absurdity in these things. Even I’m thinking “dude, you’re not wrong, but come on, give them SOMETHING”.

This time he’s one of the only really subdued voices. Not completely without complaints, but generally accepting of this chapter.

“At birth, I was blessed by Balthazaar”. I uh, guess he changed his mind.

I like the story. And the map is pretty! The Fire Islands are greener than they were 250ish years ago. Unfortunately it’s all downhill from there. The map was a pain to navigate and the enemies are spaced out JUST enough to keep me constantly tagged in combat, but not close enough together to deal with them in any timely manner. Because a map shouldn’t just be tedious, it should be painfully slow and tedious. The best kind of tedious!

I mean, overall I liked the new chapter, but I’m not digging the layout of the map.

Anela.3867:

imsoenthused.1634:

phys.7689:

point is different themed areas, different movement means

No, the point is artificially introducing a problem that the game already had a solution to in order to create a niche for the introduction of mounts which will undoubtedly be a massive cash shop success for them, at the cost of permanently losing part of the identity that makes Guild Wars 2 a Guild Wars game. Which they have every right to do, but don’t pretend they couldn’t have done the exact same thing with properly used waypoints and strategically places updrafts and ley lines. The only reason they aren’t is so that they can make mounts a desirable item and sell more gems.

Companies are in the business of making money. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t be in business. I don’t understand why people don’t get that.

We all know businesses exist to make money. It’s common sense. But it’s not as simple as just “Let’s make an item and hope people buy it!”. You also have to consider, especially in this case, “will people get irritated if we make a product they not only don’t want, but seem to be adamantly against”. Put simply, if they add mounts they run the risk of satisfying a few customers and driving away an equal or greater amount of customers. Because it’s not always just a case of “if you don’t want it, just don’t buy it”. You have some people who will just up and leave and no longer support the game.

Now I’m not saying everyone is against mounts, but clearly many are. For various reasons. And it seems like at least enough people are opposed to strongly consider not adding them.

Lazarus is… the screaming corn in Lion’s Arch. We were all wondering why it was there. Now it has relevance.

This should be merged with the ancient mount megathread so you can beat this dead horse with everyone else. Don’t think hiding it under a different title will make mounts any less useless.
We don’t need mounts. I can already outrun a center.

Also, annoying bulky mount clutter.

I agree there. He definitely has potential. He was insignificant in GW1, but that only makes him a blank slate, which is really perfect for story building as a major player now, which he definitely is.

UrMom.4205:

I have heard rumors that a dev has confirmed it will be nerfed on tuesday (heard they were in the chat of a WP stream). They called it an “exploit”. I think they are referring to the heavy bags and not the leather hides. We will see tho.

It’s probably the bag thing, if this is true. None of the centaurs at the base camp drop those leather hides. I periodically join this mob on my reaper and might, if I’m lucky, end up dragging a blood crazed centaur off the hill. And MAYBE it will drop a leather hide. But this particular farm is not the way to go for leather.

Lazarus was nowhere near Shiro or Malyx level enemies. He was a Mursaat. We mowed down Mursaat by the hundreds, and the only thing special about Lazarus was that he just happened to be somewhere else when we and the titans were murdering them. He just happened to use probably common Mursaat trick to keep himself alive in the form of “aspects” after he realized almost all of the other Mursaat weren’t as lucky.

Now, of course, he has all that bloodstone juju probably making him much more powerful than previous Mursaat, but overall, he was not a significant character in anything until now. He wasn’t in any of the main campaigns and was only present in a non essential side quest in GW1, EotN.

I’m in the “Lazarus is Lazarus, even if he’s incomplete” camp, but I feel like pointing out that you don’t necessarily need a powerful entity as a suspect for “who can absorb all that bloodstone magic”. The game recently (ish) introduced an item we use to store excess energy so we don’t get sick (Or crazy) from leyline energy.
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Shadowstone

This isn’t really an afk farm as much as a coordinated occupation. If one or two (or even probably 4) engineers just popped up turrets and afk’ed they’d get overrun pretty quickly. It’s not like when a lone necromancer sits by itself and just spawns minions and goes to work/sleep/whatever and auto-loots. These people actually need to pay some attention to what they’re doing.

I mean, there is a point in which the farm gets its momentum and a bunch of people can just wander away from their computer if they choose to, but once the rest of the players get bored and leave, that afk engi isn’t farming anymore. He’s getting trampled to death.

I love the tonic, but my only complaint is that my reaper shouts no longer have audio. I was hoping to hear her squeak “You’re all weaklings!” in tiny tonic voice. You managed to miniaturize the other noises, like cheering and laughing.

I guess tiny maniacal laughter will have to do.

armaduras.8972:

PATHETIC MORTAL! THE VOID BECKONS! Dhuum will return, the human pantheon has fallen. All hail Dhuum, The Voice in the Void! The Mouth at the Edge of Darkness! The Ender of All! Emperor of Oblivion!

I’d be fine with this as long as they bring back the cool ban animations.

Maybe it was a simple solution. Such as, the Door of Komalie was a gate between the Realm of Torment and Tyria. (https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Door_of_Komalie) The Mursaat were powering this gate through sacrifices. Take out the Mursaat, you take out the gate’s power source. Therefore, sending something to destroy the mursaat would be an easy means to weaken the barrier.

These threads are fun because they bring out the absolute worst of both sides. There are some valid points on either side, but it’s drowned out by the people who overreact in the worst way. You’re either a terrible puppy-kicking monster for liking this mini pet, or you’re a sheltered…I don’t know…snowflake or some other stupid buzzword, for not liking it.

It’s ok to not like things. And if you’re passionate about stopping animal abuse, then good. You find your inspiration wherever you can and join a cause in the real world.

And it’s ok to think that a pixel fish is JUST a pixel fish and not feel the weight of every injustice done to animals when you look at it. No one is going to buy this gemstore fish and think “This looks great! I’m going to go leash a fish and walk it around my neighborhood!” Probably. And if they do, they have deep rooted problems that a person on an MMO isn’t going to fix.

The point is, calm down. Everyone.

castlemanic.3198:

Squee.7829:

“Atheism by definition means belief that there is no god. "
Not true. Can be easy to confuse because of specific wording, but the exact definition is:
“Disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.”

Squee.7829:

Well, whatever the specifics of anti-theism are

The irony.

Also

Real world atheists themselves even seem to think that atheism is a strict adherence to the idea that there absolutely is no God and that is it, so it’s easy to get confused. But that’s not actually the case. That’s Anti-theism. Atheism just makes the claim that until proof of God(s) is found, there’s no point in going on pretending one exists.

contradicts

the exact definition is:
“Disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.”

Yeah, I don’t know if it’s irony, but there is definitely some hypocrisy in me dismissing the specifics of anti-theism while nitpicking the whole atheism thing xD

But I dont see how the second part is a contradiction. I’m just saying that people who claim to be atheists tend to actually be anti-theists.

Mortifera.6138:

Squee.7829:

“Atheism by definition means belief that there is no god. "
Not true. Can be easy to confuse because of specific wording, but the exact definition is:
“Disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.”

It’s not a belief in no god(s). It is a complete lack of belief entirely. Meaning their views are based solely on evidence and not faith. It seems like a small nitpick in wording, but the actual difference is huge.
Understanding this, you can easily say that the Asura are atheists. They acknowledge the human gods and make absolutely no claims that they do not exist, but only acknowledge them as powerful beings based on the fact that there is evidence for them. Not because of some ancient traditions or scriptures CLAIMING they exist with no concrete evidence to back it up, but because they find actual evidence.

Real world atheists themselves even seem to think that atheism is a strict adherence to the idea that there absolutely is no God and that is it, so it’s easy to get confused. But that’s not actually the case. That’s Anti-theism. Atheism just makes the claim that until proof of God(s) is found, there’s no point in going on pretending one exists.

Anti-theism is the belief that there shouldn’t be a god, that it is great He does not exist.

Well, whatever the specifics of anti-theism are, it’s probably not too popular in Tyria. The human gods in Tyria made themselves very well known until very recently in Tyrian history. Whether you see them as gods or not is irrelevant, but every race seems to have documented evidence of them existing. (I.E every race knows that Balthazaar opened a portal to the mists in LA after Zhaitan flooded the original one)
If I recall correctly, the Sylvari didn’t start waking up until a good bit after any of the gods revealed themselves, so they might be the most skeptical.

Your definition of anti-theism might make the Charr candidates since they seem to have a bit of a grudge against (at least human) gods. But they do think the gods exist. They just don’t like them.

“Atheism by definition means belief that there is no god. "
Not true. Can be easy to confuse because of specific wording, but the exact definition is:
“Disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.”

It’s not a belief in no god(s). It is a complete lack of belief entirely. Meaning their views are based solely on evidence and not faith. It seems like a small nitpick in wording, but the actual difference is huge.
Understanding this, you can easily say that the Asura are atheists. They acknowledge the human gods and make absolutely no claims that they do not exist, but only acknowledge them as powerful beings based on the fact that there is evidence for them. Not because of some ancient traditions or scriptures CLAIMING they exist with no concrete evidence to back it up, but because they find actual evidence.

Real world atheists themselves even seem to think that atheism is a strict adherence to the idea that there absolutely is no God and that is it, so it’s easy to get confused. But that’s not actually the case. That’s Anti-theism. Atheism just makes the claim that until proof of God(s) is found, there’s no point in going on pretending one exists.

Yeah, they leave a lot of loose ends and junk. It’d be nice if they did actually give some lore insight as to why spec classes exist all of a sudden.

I think you’re just assuming that because Rytlock was the first revenant all specs have to be established by an NPC before we can do it. I don’t think that was ever implied to be the case anywhere in the game.

I noticed a globe in Lake Doric at the Lakeview Villa PoI that had a pretty big portion of the map on it. It extended out to the ocean west of the Maguuma (which I don’t recall ever seeing before. All the maps I’ve seen cut off just west of Dragon’s Stand) and goes just south of Istan. It probably won’t be significant, but I thought it was neat. Are there any larger maps in depicted in GW2 to look at?
I’m particularly interested in the fact that the weird southward jutting peninsula seems more solid than in GW1 and the Elon river is an actual river and not just a series of large puddles until it gets to Vabbi.

Horses were alive and chilling in some plains in one of the books. This was long after the sinking of Orr and around the time just before the events of GW2. They were described as normal horses but not much thought was given to them before the story moved on. That’s pretty much the overall treatment of horses in all of GW. They exist, but no one really cares or bothers to use one.
It can probably be treated with the same kind of logic as using the bathroom or eating. Everyone does it, but there’s almost never a reason to show someone doing it in a movie or video game.

Just a flesh wound.3589:

Well, ooohhkaaay already. Lol. That’s very strange.

I’m calling it. Zombies. Zombies coming out of the ground to swarm the countryside.

It has been my experience that plants kill zombies. That corn may be our last line of defense. Assuming the tall walnuts get overrun.

So, looking at the old GW1 Kryta map, it looks like what is now Lake Doric occupies a space that was previously called watchtower coast. (https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Watchtower_Coast)
I’m guessing those ruined stone structures under the water in LD are what’s left of the watchtowers that we never actually get to see in the first game.
What are the chances of us actually figuring out what those were supposed to be watching out for? I’m not really holding my breath for answers, but I am glad they were at least included (assuming they are in fact the towers).

Totally understandable. It gets pretty annoying trying to figure out what people are talking about when they say “Tyria”. Especially in GW1 related stuff because Tyria could reference literally anywhere.

The pact sealing the bloodstones affected EVERYTHING. Not just humans. It sealed magic the world over. He was not chosen because he had sovereignty over humans. He was chosen most likely because it was him that demanded the gods’ attention.
Him being the ruler of several nations and the fact that he was sacrificed probably had little to do with each other.

It has been 2 days and the Quaggans don’t suspect there is a spy among them

My easiest explorations by far are done by my perma-stealthed scrapper. For general solo I prefer my necromancer for its user friendly style and durability.

I think when you have such a disliked character thrown into an undeniably important role, there really is no good way to get rid of it. We could have given him some grand send-off befitting the commander of the greatest force for good in Tyria, but too many players would just be too indifferent to the man himself. Like being forced to attend the funeral of a person you didn’t care for. You’re just stuck there thinking “whatever, the guy was kind of a jerk anyway”. (Not that Trehearne was a jerk or anything).
So your other option is to let him fade into obscurity and leave people wondering “well what about his accomplishments? Sure, he was boring and annoying, but shouldn’t we honor his actions”? not realising that any kind of funeral would be overshadowed by your lack of caring for the individual.
Either way, people wouldn’t be happy with how it was handled.

This whole thread is amazing

You need to use a character that has done the latest living world stuff, apparently.

Vacheron.9870:

First, use all your berries for unbound magic, then follow the next steps:

Step 1: Open Black Lion Chests, get Frozen Exotic Weapon Fragments
Step 2: Buy Cold Forge Exotic Weapon crates with unbound magic
Step 3: ???
Step 4: Profit

I’m not sure how an endless stream of Clarion Iron Mace of Superior Disappointment would net any profit.

You want to not get offended? Go play another game >:o

Sorry. I don’t mean that. There are no online games that don’t have the occasional rude dismissive people. But that doesn’t make it any less pleasant when you meet them. On the other hand, sometimes it’s not just a bitter way to shut down a conversation. Sometimes it’s a legitimate suggestion. Sometimes people suggest rather radical changes that just don’t fit anywhere in GW2.
I recall recently someone suggesting some pretty intense P2W systems reminiscent of the thousands of Korean MMO’s that are out there. For people like that, it might be more helpful for him/her to just go to another game that more suits their preferred play style.

I feel like the “Make [random thing] great again” would be a much more popular meme if it didn’t make so many people sad.

That being said, I think most people are just happy enough the last balance didn’t completely annihilate the class and are fine to just let the necro hide in mediocrity.
Better not draw attention to it and risk having it “buffed” into something useless.

Plot twist, The dragons are a team of doctors and wardens.
Sylvari are decorative plants given life by our imaginations, Asura are patients from the children’s ward, Charr are service animals and Norn are just…tall patients I guess.

I think it was hinted (but somewhat vaguely) in Edge of Destiny that the heroes from GW1 might have died coming back to do the bonus mission for The Dragon’s Lair. Before Glint got killed, she spoke to Destiny’s Edge about heroes who came back to kill her and failed.
Some might argue that it could have been some other group of adventurers, but others would probably argue that Glint isn’t likely to entertain guests all that often, given how hard it is to find her lair.

Then again, it was probably Anet’s intention to leave that part of history blank so you could make your own story for your own character. For all anyone is concerned, you could have just taken a 250+ year nap.

We got a status update on the Pale Tree during living world season 3 chapter “Out of the Shadows”. It’s not much, but it was said she was getting better, but still injured from the attack two years ago-ish (according to the in game timeline). So she probably won’t die. And she probably isn’t in a coma anymore. Just not ready to entertain guests I guess.

BuddhaKeks.4857:

“Comprehensive Study of Jotun Language” = 4 paragraphs. Checks out. Sorry that is no dig at you, more at the small amount of material we have to work with. :P

Anyway, as you said yourself the Jotun were astronomers. Maybe they also observed the celestials, that we know from Cantha. One of them was a rooster, which could explain the chicken head. Just a wild guess though.

This seems pretty plausible. I was looking around at other Jotun ruins (Leaning Grade PoI in Dredgehaunt Cliffs) and found another set of carved rocks. One rock had a more complete depiction of the same stuff I posted earlier, but another rock had a circle with a snake in it. (Top right circle in attached picture). There are pictures in all of the circles, I think, but they’re really hard to see.
Snakes are part of the celestial thing too.

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

Crinn.7864:

Gerrand.3085:

solely crown based dictatorship,

Monarchies are not a dictatorship. They may seem similar at the surface but they are hugely different. Monarchies tend to be built around codes of tradition and royal responsibility, while dictatorships are just absolute power unrestrained by traditions or responsibilities. That difference is also why some real world monarchies have lasted for centuries while dictatorships rarely last longer than a generation.

Also the quaggans are changing fast because they are under threat. Humans do the same, but in the current gw2 timeline there is no immediate species-level threat to humans outside of the Elder Dragons, and none of the Elder dragons operate in Kryta.

Um, a monarchy is, by definition, a dictatorship:
Dictatorship:
" a country, government, or the form of government in which absolute power is exercised by a dictator."

Monarchy:
“a state or nation in which the supreme power is actually or nominally lodged in a monarch.”

In the UK (as well as other nations), the monarch is only nominally in charge; the laws are made by the popularly-elected government (if by “popularly-elected” we include the House of Lords). In a traditional monarchy, the monarch holds absolute power.

You might be thinking of a benevolent monarchy, in which the monarch chooses to act in the interests of the people. However, even then, they can change their mind at any time or relinquish the throne (due to death or personal choice) to someone who is not benevolent. Either way, it’s a dictatorship.

How are those the same thing? It’s easy to see where they CAN be the same thing, but it clearly states in the definition you provided that a monarchy can exist if only NOMINAL power is given to the monarch. A dictatorship, by the definition provided requires ABSOLUTE power.
So, you have a monarch, if it has absolute power, then you’re right. It’s a monarchy AND a dictatorship. If you have a monarch that has decision making power but does not have absolute control (i.e. requires support from a counsel) it is not a dictatorship any more than the United States is a dictatorship. And as much as people like to say mean things about the US. and its president (current elect or otherwise) he is not a dictator. It is absolutely impossible for him to be one given his lack of power and reliance on bodies like Congress.

And to clarify, the Queen of Kryta does require a consenting counsel. So, she’s not a dictator. If the entire counsel disagrees with her legislation, it probably won’t pass no matter how much she complains about it.

“… and without sacrificing abilities needed to DPS – unacceptable.”

This is exactly what balance is. It’s the most vital part of literally every MMO ever. You can max your damage, or you can increase your utilities, or you can be durable, or you can break things down with damage over time (i.e. conditions). To be good at one thing requires you to sacrifice another thing. A lack of variability was what caused the Berserker meta to strangle the gameplay for the first 2 years of GW2 before they finally made other builds actually useful.

ChanxThexMan.1078:

I’m not sure if someone already asked this, but have you tried teleporting to friend? Didn’t want to read forty miles of text, so give it a go.

It does work. My friend teleported to me with one.

I also like how the Kodan armor repair NPC’s tell you “Good as new! Unless you start up bear-wrangling, this should last you a while.”
I’m all “Is that a subtle challenge, bear-man?”